Dissent Spring 1996 Colin Powell's decision not to run for the Republican nomination both surprised and disappointed me. It also prompted a search for a satisfactory explanation. I began with the...

Why did the big mammals suddenly die out in America? Was it climate change or slaughter by native Americans? An event of more than 11,000 years ago is refracted through the lens of modern politics

Jeremy Clarke goes on holiday to New Zealand where he watches soaps and dices with death

Young Scotland applauds the crude, aggressive scenes of "Trainspotting." Respectable, middle-aged Scotland is at ease with anti-English xenophobia. Kenneth Roy wonders what has happened to the rough...

The raucous Europhobic Tory press and their pitch to mould the new conservatism

Dear Polly, It feels most odd to be writing this letter to you across what appears to be a chasm of thinking that divides us. Odd because although we are both working mothers and for years were...

Brussels diary

The defining moment of Boris Yeltsin's career was his humiliation by Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987. In pursuit of revenge, Yeltsin broke up the Soviet Union. But he has remained a loner, unwilling to...

I used not to care for football. About the game, I had no feelings; it was the fans I disliked. I objected to them in general-loutish yobbos with their football scarves and cans of Special Brew; I...

The bombing of Lebanon is new proof of Israel's disregard for Arab life, says Palestinian peace negotiator Ahmad Khalidi. But peace is still necessary