04 August 2008
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From the Editor…
Welcome to the New Statesman website. Whether you are a new reader or an existing one - online or via the magazine - I hope you'll enjoy the great writing, fresh ideas and provocative debate that make the New Statesman Britain's award-winning current affairs weekly
Cover story
The patriot games
Neighbourhoods have been razed, protesters silenced and human rights activists jailed. China will allow nothing to get in the way of the success of the Beijing Olympics
Features
Tactical Briefing
From: The Unit To: GB Subject: The others
China's secret grief
Mourning the victims of the May earthquake has reminded a nation of the deaths it is forbidden to recall - the students of Tiananmen and the tens of millions who lost their lives under Mao
Spitting image
As the Games approach, the state is trying to wipe out habits visitors may find offensive
Party lines
The Chinese Writers' Association employs 5,196 of the country's most popular and influential authors. In return, it expects them to produce poems, novels - and state propaganda
A hundred million blogs
China and the world wide web
Regulars
New Statesman Leader
Leadership is only a part of Labour's current problems
A contrived autumn relaunch with new faces and catchphrases will not fool voters into believing it is a different party
The Politics Column
Labour's last Scottish leader?
Anger aimed at the Prime Minister has an added dimension explained by English unease at a Scot ruling over them
What not to wear No 4038
"It was simply a case of there being something of a lack of understanding of what formal daywear actually means in this day and age, leading to some outfits not quite complying," said Ascot's chief executive on the sensitive topic of the new wording of the rules "to protect the integrity of the Royal Enclosure". Observers have claimed that the dress-code rule changes for the enclosure are simply meant to keep chavs out. So how do you spot a chav? You were asked for your suggestions
Culture
Changing man
Nine years after founding the boundary-breaking West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, Daniel Barenboim tells Rachel Aspden that the solution to the Israeli-Palestinian problem must be cultural, not political
Secret history
Vienna's flak towers have long been abandoned - they are too painful a reminder of the city's Nazi past. Now a group of students is campaigning to get them reopened, writes Robin Stummer
A history of violence
Elite Squad, the latest film about Rio’s favelas, fails to raise the real issues around police brutality
Performance
The thrill of the chase
Rachmaninov is safe in the hands of this Russian soloist, bar the nervous start Prom 10: BBC Philharmonic Royal Albert Hall, London SW7
Film
The joke is on us
Provocative social commentary is the order of the day with this US comedian Sarah Silverman: Jesus is Magic (15) dir: Liam Lynch
Television
Outrageous fortune
Inspired drama gives a Shakespearean dimension to a tale of Iraq's first family House of Saddam BBC2
Radio
Not so fantastic plastic
Emily Maitlis tackles a burning question of our age: why is Barbie a minger?
Books
Reasons to be fearful
The spectre of atomic weapons has been replaced in the popular imagination by that of climate change - yet two defence analysts convincingly argue that another nuclear catastrophe is as likely as ever
Totalitarian recall
Iron Fists: Branding the 20th-Century Totalitarian State Steven Heller Phaidon, 240pp, £45
Among the angry
I Wouldn't Start From Here Andrew Mueller Portobello Books, 480pp, £8.99
2 txt or not 2 txt, tht is th ?
txtng: the gr8 db8 David Crystal, with cartoons by Ed McLachlan Oxford University Press, 256pp, £9.99
Observations
Island of dark secrets
Child abuse used to be a taboo subject, of course, but that does not explain why Britain abandoned the girls of Pitcairn to their fate
Disney under fire
Battle lines have been drawn after a Disney employee was sacked for bringing a .45-calibre pistol to work
