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Joan Smith: A woman to make enlightened voters shudder

Sat, 06 Sep 2008 23:00:01 GMT

In the heady atmosphere of last week's Republican convention – electrified by Sarah Palin's barnstorming speech as the vice-presidential candidate – a curious fact seems to have been overlooked. On paper, the new darling of Christian conservatives ticks all the right boxes as only a media-taunting, oil-drilling, gun-toting, abortion-hating, creationist mother of five could. Equally at home posing for photographs with her children and dead animals, she sends out an irresistible mating call to evangelical voters who suspect that John McCain is secretly too secular for their taste.

Joan Smith: Russian barbarism must be tackled head on

Sat, 30 Aug 2008 23:00:01 GMT

On Saturday 7 October 2006, the Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya was just about to publish a report on torture and murder in the breakaway republic of Chechnya.

Joan Smith: This is how Labour can get itself re-elected

Sat, 16 Aug 2008 23:00:01 GMT

The last thing Labour needs in this inclement political summer is a by-election. Even worse, the sad death from cancer last week of the Labour MP John MacDougall means a contest in Scotland, offering voters another opportunity to demonstrate their disenchantment in Gordon Brown's backyard. If Labour loses Glenrothes, where Mr MacDougall's 10,664 majority looks extremely vulnerable, the Prime Minister may soon find himself the last Labour MP in Fife, a former party stronghold that has shifted its allegiances decisively since 2005.

Joan Smith: The Chinese heroes Brown and Jowell will not meet

Sat, 09 Aug 2008 23:00:01 GMT

The opening of the Beijing Olympic Games two days ago couldn't have gone better: around 80 world leaders turned up, meekly sitting through a sanitised version of 5,000 years of Chinese history, despite the regime's failure to improve its atrocious human rights record. It hadn't been asked to do much in the first place, but the country's authoritarian leaders correctly calculated that they could get away with murder (literally) in a world mesmerised by China's emergence as a major economic power.

Joan Smith: Everyone, it seems, has a theory about Madeleine

Thu, 07 Aug 2008 23:00:01 GMT

Fifteen months after the disappearance of Madeleine McCann from her parents' holiday apartment in Portugal, the mystery of her whereabouts is as compelling as ever. At least two new theories have emerged this week, one involving a paedophile ring in Belgium and the other a possible sighting in Amsterdam.

Joan Smith: We all need time off. Only the reasons differ

Sat, 19 Jul 2008 23:00:01 GMT

There are many reasons why someone might need or want time off work. On Thursday, a legal secretary won a landmark legal ruling after arguing that she was forced out of her job because she asked for flexible working hours to look after her disabled son. Judges at the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg agreed unanimously that Sharon Coleman has the right to claim "discrimination by association" in a British court, which will now rule on the facts of her application. The decision establishes that Europe's ban on employment discrimination protects not onlydisabled people but those who care for them.

Joan Smith: Domestic violence is a crime society ignores

Thu, 17 Jul 2008 23:00:01 GMT

The figures are horrifying: almost 60 murders so far this year, and on average a victim calls the police every single minute. Families are devastated, children orphaned, and the damage continues into the next generation; it's an epidemic of crime, in the jargon of the day, but you'll rarely read about it or see the victims' photographs.

Joan Smith: Russia shows contempt for human rights

Sat, 12 Jul 2008 23:00:01 GMT

I'm never sure what people mean when they accuse someone of being a spy – whether they're talking about 007-style hidden cameras or the mixture of observation and gossip which makes up the bulk of intelligence reports.

Joan Smith: Macho politicians are turning back the clock

Thu, 10 Jul 2008 23:00:01 GMT

I've heard many things about Gordon Brown but no one's ever suggested that he beats his wife or tortures spaniels. Heathcliff, to whom the Prime Minister has allowed himself to be compared, does both these things in Wuthering Heights, a novel so savage that one contemporary reviewer suggested it was the product of a dyspeptic digestive system.

Joan Smith: There's nothing poetic about Amy's self-destruction

Wed, 25 Jun 2008 23:00:01 GMT

When I last talked to the Palestinian critic Edward Said, not long before his death, he was working on a book about late style. Nearing the end of his own career, he was interested in the flowering of creativity experienced by some of the world's greatest writers and composers as they reach old age. Experience and maturity provide new sources of inspiration, a possibility overlooked in a culture seduced by the Romantic notion of "live fast and die young", which currently seems to have the singer Amy Winehouse in its grip.

Joan Smith: To clear your name, it helps to speak up

Sat, 21 Jun 2008 23:00:01 GMT

When the England rugby team faced the All Blacks in Christchurch yesterday, it was not an ordinary sporting occasion. Members of the team had just heard that they would be allowed to return to the UK despite an allegation that a teenager was raped at their hotel after last weekend's international in Auckland.

Joan Smith: Rage is the product of a coarser age

Sat, 14 Jun 2008 23:00:01 GMT

There are some crimes so abhorrent that they make us wonder what kind of society we're living in. One of these bouts of soul-searching was prompted last week when a man died after a violent altercation in a Sainsbury's supermarket in south London; a man and a woman have since been charged with the murder of Kevin Tripp, a 57-year-old engineer from Colliers Wood.

Joan Smith: There is only one route out of poverty

Wed, 11 Jun 2008 23:00:01 GMT

It's always gratifying when the Tories show their true colours. Yesterday, as new figures demonstrated the widening gap between rich and poor, the Conservatives denounced a deal giving modest rights to 1.3 million of the most vulnerable workers in Britain. "Business will be dismayed that when they most need a Government on their side, they have a Government getting on their backs," thundered the Tory employment spokesman Jonathan Djanogly, son of a wealthy industrialist.

Joan Smith: Vicious criticism of Hillary could deter future candidates

Sat, 07 Jun 2008 23:00:01 GMT

She has had to endure months of sniping, mostly in the form of spiteful personal remarks. They said she was too old, not up to it, and some of the attacks were so vicious that they made her cry. In the end, though, Carrie Bradshaw triumphed over Indiana Jones, with the movie version of Sex and the City taking an impressive £2.1m in British cinemas on its first day.

Joan Smith: So how many more women must die?

Wed, 04 Jun 2008 23:00:01 GMT

Once again the police are on the rack, bombarded with questions about the murder of a teenager who allegedly lived in fear of a stalker. This time the victim is a schoolgirl, Arsema Dawit, who was stabbed on Monday in the lift of the block of flats near Waterloo, south London, where she lived with her mother. The 15-year-old, whose family is from Eritrea, is the newest name on a roll call of young women whose friends and relatives believe they were tragically let down by the authorities.

Joan Smith: Sharon's lipstick diplomacy suits the Dalai Lama

Sat, 31 May 2008 23:00:01 GMT

Was it bad karma? Or possibly, feng shui? I must say I hadn't considered either as the cause of the earthquake that devastated China nearly three weeks ago. I was thinking more along the lines of tectonic plates and sudden releases of energy. So I am grateful to Sharon Stone for alerting me to the possibility of a supernatural explanation. Ms Stone thinks all those tons of rubble could have been caused by China's treatment of her "good friend" the Dalai Lama.

Joan Smith: John Prescott is the Princess Di of politics

Tue, 27 May 2008 23:00:01 GMT

The biographical details are eerily familiar: the childhood blighted by an acrimonious divorce, the failure to thrive at school, the crippling shyness made worse by press intrusion, even the bulimia. After almost a month of excruciatingly embarrassing revelations, I'm afraid there can no longer be any doubt. John Prescott is the Princess Diana of British politics.

Joan Smith: 'Cars' is a four-letter word...

Sat, 24 May 2008 23:00:01 GMT

Almost 20 years ago, when a group of professional women defied Saudi law and drove through the streets of Riyadh, the word "driver" started being used as an insult in that part of the world. I have some sympathy with those women, but I think it's time we started using the word with a curl of the lip in this country. British drivers - not all of them, but the ones who think it's their inalienable right to use their cars as much as they like - are among the most antisocial people on earth. Worse, they have political clout: last week, in the middle of a major oil crisis, they demanded that the Government do something about it and Gordon Brown felt he had to comply. He duly rounded on the Opec oil cartel, but that won't stop calls for him to cancel rises in fuel duty scheduled for autumn. After Crewe, Labour MPs are so terrified of losing their seats that they may well persuade him to do it.

Joan Smith: A portly nation is no laughing matter

Sat, 17 May 2008 23:00:01 GMT

A couple of weeks ago, on a station platform in the north of England, I counted at least four morbidly obese adults. One of them was a mother with a toddler, who was already showing the same tendency. So I wasn't surprised to discover last week that British children are near the top of a new table showing the extent of childhood obesity in 27 European countries. Scottish boys and girls are at number two, with a third weighing more than they should, while their English counterparts are not far behind; almost 30 per cent of English girls are overweight, putting them at number four in the table, while English boys are in sixth place.

Joan Smith: Success is no antidote to addiction

Sat, 10 May 2008 23:00:01 GMT

When the police shot and killed a man in London on Tuesday evening, the news was greeted with disbelief. First, the siege happened in Chelsea, an affluent area of London. Second, the dead man was white and a barrister. Third - which got into headlines - he was an Oxford graduate. We have become used to hearing of black kids being shot in Kilburn or Brixton, but it just doesn't happen to people like Mark Saunders. Prosperous lawyers aren't supposed to become distraught and open fire across one of London's desirable squares; they're supposed to belong to the right clubs, make money and become QCs.

Joan Smith: Medusa, bitch, witch, mad cow, DemocRAT... Why does America hate Hillary Clinton so much?

Sat, 26 Apr 2008 23:00:01 GMT

Hillary Clinton is a witch who eats babies. She is a modern-day Medusa who turns men to stone. She is a DemocRAT, with a rodent's body and long tail. She is a mad cow, spreading disease across the country. Hey guys, life's a bitch, so why vote for one? No, I haven't taken leave of my senses: I am simply repeating some of the most vitriolic attacks on a woman who has dared to run for the White House, prompting an outpouring of misogyny on a scale that brings to mind medieval witch-hunts. The amazing thing is not that Clinton is trailing Barack Obama, but the fact that she's doing so well.

Joan Smith: J K Rowling and the quest for fair pay

Sat, 19 Apr 2008 23:00:01 GMT

When J K Rowling appeared in a district court in New York last week, something strange happened. In normal circumstances, Rowling is regarded as a thoroughly decent woman whose novels have provided pleasure to millions and who has, moreover, given a great deal of her wealth to good causes.

Joan Smith: Give thanks and praise for John McCain

Tue, 15 Apr 2008 23:00:01 GMT

The man at the bar looked familiar, even before he started telling anyone who would listen how George W Bush had spent millions of dollars to prevent him becoming President of the US. It was more interesting than going to a lecture on the mating habits of Galapagos fauna, which was the only other entertainment available on a cruise ship in the Pacific Ocean, and it didn't take long to work out that our disgruntled fellow-passenger was the Arizona senator, John McCain.

Joan Smith: There are lies, damned lies and diary clashes

Sat, 12 Apr 2008 23:00:01 GMT

The UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-Moon, has a diary clash. The French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, hasn't decided what he's doing that day. The Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, never intended to be there anyway. With the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics less than four months away, 8 August 2008 is causing as much disarray among world leaders as the unwelcome discovery that a meteorite is hurtling towards us. How are they to react to this totally unexpected event, which has caused protests and threatens to call into question their commitment to human rights? Turn up and look shifty, following revelations that China has broken promises to improve its atrocious human rights record? Announce a boycott and risk the wrath of athletes and (in Brown's case) retaliatory action at the 2012 London games?

Joan Smith: What about those without any children?

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 23:00:01 GMT

If there is one piece of New Labour rhetoric which comes close to making me howl with rage, it is the phrase "hard-working families". Who are these people that Gordon Brown loves so much, parading them in his speeches at every opportunity?