Ferguson hails 'boy wonder' Anderson

Best in the world is going a bit far, though if you read it , he never actually says that. Still when do football journalists actually write what is actually said.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.jhtml?xml=/sport/2007/12/06/sfnman106.xml
he has undoubtedly been the biggest plus of the season so far, if we had lost Scholes and Carrick last season our title ambitions would have been sunk below the water mark, but Anderson has come in and took his chance magnificently. Meaning when Scholes is fit, he has some big decisions to make in the second half of the season as to who gets left out of central midfield most often. Obviously that means Scholes plus 1 other, and maybe in the European games Scholes plus 2 others as Scholes is still the daddy. At the moment it is not looking too good for Carrick or the forgotten man of central midfield Fletcher. I would not be surprised to see one of those two move on next summer, it's a bit early to say that, but i am absolutely certain it will happen.

Drogba out for months?
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/premier_league/chelsea/article3007126.ece

And the invincibles mark 2 look like a team with a soft centre to them still, after seeing the last two games. They don't like it up em you know.

England beaten by Sri Lanka
http://sport.independent.co.uk/cricket/article3226338.ece
A game where England really missed Flintoff i thought. Probably more for his bowling than his batting, you can usually rely on him to discomfort opposition batsmen. I don't think Sri Lanka would have got such a big score in the second innings if England had got a fit Freddie in the side. It could have then been an even more exiting last day. Bell and Prior did superbly, but you always suspected once Murali got one he might be able to wrap it up.


New findings may be due to a defector
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,2221994,00.html
There seems to be a lot of internal Washington politics attached to this new Iranian intelligence finding and perhaps the settling of some old scores. Hopefully they will achieve their aim of stopping the hawks from launching any more mad cap escapades.

Simon Jenkins has the right approach to Iran. Although the country has it's fair share of theocratic nutters to use a Craig Murray phrase, it also has some of the more progressive democratic elements in the middle eastern region. You couldn't call them liberal according to our values, but of that region, they certainly couldn't be called conservative. As for the population, they would seem to be a hell of a lot more sympathetic to western ideas than their Saudi counterparts. That is not exactly going to be the case if they are attacked is it.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/story/0,,2222113,00.html

The price of policing the world ?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,2221994,00.html
If as he says the yanks are struggling to update some of their aircraft due to cost, then we really should be scaling back some of our grandiose visions of our place in the world.

I am generally in favour of Turkey being admitted to the EU,
http://books.guardian.co.uk/news/articles/0,,2222069,00.html
but if authors keep getting taken to court for writing what they believe to be true, then they will have to wait.

Information chief calls for ID review
http://www.guardian.co.uk/idcards/story/0,,2222071,00.html
better still bin this illiberal idea

I thought the love in between the neocons and the torygraph would have finished when Conrad Black had to sell, but it still seems to be true love
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml;jsessionid=SUEWBLYPSBDS1QFIQMFSFFOAVCBQ0IV0?xml=/opinion/2007/12/06/dl0602.xml
How many aspects of American electioneering, that the Telegraph admires are just so so wrong. First Romney has spent hugely to try and win the Iowa caucuses, how is it vaguely democratic to win any election by spending more money than your opponent. Second the spacing out of the states caucuses makes certain states more important than others and thirdly does anybody here really want elections spreading out over virtually two years, as the presidential nominations and then presidential elections have become. I think four weeks is probably more than enough for most people in this country. As to the the argument that this is where the candidates are tested, politicians are tested in the house of commons and in the art of governance if they are in power, as Gordon Brown and George Bush are finding out. Of course this all sounds jolly good to the Telegraph because the American system means that the wealthy are rarely hurt by senate, congress or presidential elections, a thought, surely close to every telegraph readers heart.

There have been a number of commentators getting more nervous by the day about the parlous state of the the economy, Anatole Kaletsky joins them,
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/anatole_kaletsky/article3006819.ece
With the record of the bank of England before it was nationalised by Attlee' s government i think we should be worried. If laissez-faire economics are dead, we need politicians and maybe even new parties who will think out of the box as Keynes and Lloyd George did in this country and Roosevelt and his new deal adherents did in the states. Maybe when economies stabilise, the taxation of share transaction will find favour and all sorts of progressive ideas like a land tax given a fresh once over. The one thing for sure is New Labour is not going to be the party of new ideas, I can't see the Tories being it either, although to be fair there is a bit of the chameleon to their history, if an idea comes along that they can use to ensure their survival as a serious political power, they may well grab it, although they will obviously limit the radical aspects of any new direction. The liberals or even the greens if they were serious would seem to be best placed of the established parties.

Your wish is the banks command, as interest rates are cut
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2007/dec/06/interestrates.bankofenglandgovernor2
Larry Elliot comments
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/larry_elliott/2007/12/when_it_comes_to_the_crunch.html

American sub prime losses could soar according to the times
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/markets/united_states/article3007121.ece

I wonder how much shit the Glazers are going to be in?