27 October 2008
Become a subscriber and save £££
Subscribe to the New Statesman for just £82 and receive a free copy of Roy Hattersley’s In Search of England(Hardcover)
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
Features
As the champagne corks pop . . .
Yachtgate leaves voters with the uncomfortable feeling that the super-rich own our politicians.
Exercise your rights
Politicians on both sides of the Atlantic have been "maintaining the fiction" for decades on all aspects of foreign policy. It's time we demanded the truth
The Fund is back in town
The tough remedies of the IMF won it few friends and, in recent years, countries have found more obliging lenders. But now "the bank of last resort" is back - with its austerity packages.
The death of Gucci capitalism
"The public recognises it has the moral right and authority to condemn the ideology that resulted in this. It is a fundamental change."
And still the Chancellor borrows
We are happy to believe in markets in the good times. When times are bad, we run to the state, says Kwasi Kwarteng
The president, his church and the crocodiles
Côte d'Ivoire's Félix Houphouët-Boigny ruled for 33 years, dying with a dream to turn his home village into a grandiose new capital. A dream unfulfilled until now...
No new New Deal
If Barack Obama wins the presidency, comparisons will be made with FDR, another charismatic Democrat to take office during an economic crisis. The fear is that the true parallel may be with Jimmy Carter
The credit crunch bites
A sharp downturn is reported in the sums paid out by the Tooth Fairy, and current economic conditions must even raise doubts as to the future viability of the operation. Brown, Blair, Cameron and other political figures have young children. We wanted to know how they would explain this cutback
Culture
Bye-bye to bling for billionaires
Art sales have been inflated by super-rich collectors who didn't know what to do with their money. Rare works may still command high prices, but the era of mass production by celebrity artists is over.
Enfants in terrible times
This year's Frieze Art Fair featured heaps of recycled ideas. And with budgets squeezed, decadence seemed suddenly so last month
Credit crunchable
With his customary impeccable timing, Charles Saatchi launched his new gallery with a Chinese show about shrinking western power just as markets collapsed
The second coming
Inspired by Johnny Cash with his ring of fire, a slew of ageing crooners are pursuing their desires and reinventing themselves as serious musicians.
Performance
Queen of outrage
America's favourite taboo-breaker is sharper on gender than she is on race Sarah Silverman Hammersmith Apollo, London W6
Film
Stepford school friends
Disney's cheerful cash cow is honest in ways grittier youth films can't match High School Musical 3: Senior Year (U) dir: Kenny Ortega
Television
An old-fashioned misery memoir
A study of Victoria's melancholy youth puts clever women on our screens again Timewatch: Young Victoria BBC2
Radio
Tim Westwood: He's got the ill communication
Nobody - rapper or otherwise - has patter like Radio 1's hip-hop silverback
Books
Virginia Woolf would never win the Booker
Lily-livered publishers have become obsessed with an endless round of prize ceremonies.
The killing fields
What are we doing in Afghanistan? A superb new history shows how successive invaders have tried, and failed, to bring order to the country through force
A talent to amuse
Cartoons and Coronets: the Genius of Osbert Lancaster James Knox Francis Lincoln, 224pp, £25
Creator and critic
Thorold Dickinson: a World of Film Edited by Philip Horne and Peter Swaab Manchester University Press, 316pp, £55
He’s created a monster
The Casebook of Victor Frankenstein Peter Ackroyd Chatto & Windus, 304pp, £16.99
