Tomsk79

Amid the impressive and heart-warming displays of solidarity, there has sadly also been a lot of rubbish written about Charlie Hebdo and its cartoons on the English-speaking web over the past week (I've seen the beautiful term 'anglosplaining' used for this phenomenon). Rather than add to the pile, here are some links to pieces doing the rounds that I've found genuinely informative. Two of them are by actual French people. On the French satirical tradition: http://artgoldhammer.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/tragedy-at-charlie-hebdo.html On where power really lies: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jan/08/charlie-hebdo-martin-rowson On American know-nothingery: http://67-tardis-street.tumblr.com/post/107589955860/dear-us-followers On not taking satirical cartoons at face value: http://www.quora.com/What-was-the-context-of-Charlie-Hebdos-cartoon-depicting-Boko-Haram-sex-slaves-as-welfare-queens On targetting racism in France: http://www.dailykos.co

In response to Gordon Brown's proposals for "home rule" for Scotland in the event of a No vote, there have been many murmurings about what is to be done about England and the West Lothian Question . In line with the current government fashion, the most popular change suggested is to resurrect regional devolution, only this time to city regions in the form of combined authorities . Although giving more powers to cities would be welcome, it is not clear what this has to do with the matter at hand, namely who gets to write legislation for England. More importantly right now, it is a gross insult to Scotland to assert that English regions are constitutionally equivalent to the whole of their country. If the union is to mean anything, it should mean equal treatment for the constituent countries, and the only logical conclusion is an English parliament. As I've argued before , if such a parliament was designed correctly it would have the added benefit of reducing the

At one point during the seemingly endless interrupting competition between Alistair Darling and Alex Salmond I took a look at what I had written previously on the subject of Scottish independence. What I recalled as fairly recent posts turned out to be two and a half years old. I can only imagine how interminable the independence debate has been for the poor residents of Scotland. Nevertheless I was surprised how relevant the point about currency options for the discarded "devo max" option remains today. In essence, what the SNP are trying to propose as independence is devo max: they want to keep the Pound, the Queen, the BBC, and other trappings of the UK while having maximum powers in every other respect. If anything the idea of a Poundzone is even more stupid for an independent Scottish state, as it would require a political union of a kind which negates its own independence. Salmond must know this and therefore I suspect he would want negotiations for such a union

(Yes, that's my real signature ) Nick Clegg and the Lib Dems ran an admirable European election campaign. It is clear what they stood for in leaflets and in broadcasts: "the party of in", in their well-honed words. Clegg was even prepared to take Farage and UKIP on directly in two TV debates. For people who believe, the disaster of the Euro project notwithstanding, that the EU is a good idea, here was a party prepared to make that case bravely and forcefully. Labour, by contrast, had nothing to say on Europe. Literally nothing: their election leaflets were concerned only with domestic issues, and they bizarrely chose not to attack UKIP at all, despite the open goal that their "Thatcher on steroids" worldview presents, not least in areas in the North where they are now challenging Labour's traditional strongholds. I admire Ed Miliband in many ways, but it's hard to argue that their campaign this time round was anything other than dismal. And y

Consider two married couples. In the first partner A goes out to work while B stays at home, with gross earnings of: A: 40,000 B: 0 In the second both partners go out to work, earning: C: 20,000 D: 20,000 Currently the first couple is taxed significantly more than the second couple because personal allowances are not transferable. Much as I hate to agree with David Cameron, it's hard to see how this is fair, particularly if the state is in the business of subsidising C+D's childcare costs. Cameron has however sold his quite reasonable baby step towards transferability in a bizarre way: by saying it is recognising marriage in general. It is certainly not doing that, as anyone living like C+D will not benefit financially at all from the change. What it does do is offer people the choice to arrange their lives either way without being penalised by the tax system. That feels like a win for equality to me. If Cameron wants to wrap it in right-wing bluster, so be it. In