Friday, April 16, 2010

A week is indeed a long time in politics....

By any stretch of the imagination, the past seven days has been an extraordinary week for international and domestic politics.

I wonder if Iceland's volcanic ash plume would have so effectively grounded North Western Europe had the pilot of Poland's ill-fated presidential plane followed Russian air traffic advice and diverted from Smolensk to Minsk last weekend ?

Meanwhile financier and philanthropist George Soros has warned of the possible break-up of the European Union if Germany and other countries fail to support the financial rescue of Greece and similar failing economies more wholeheartedly.

Sounding a positive note, the Washington summit on nuclear arms control earlier this week has been widely hailed as a success.

On the domestic front, I listened to yesterday's first live broadcast "debate" between the leaders of Britain's three main political parties on the radio, which conveys a rather different impression to television.

I have to say that there was something about the format of this event which wasn't entirely satisfactory, although I agree with the general view that Liberal Democrat Leader Nick Clegg emerged as the "winner".

As I missed the end of the broadcast, I'm not sure whether environmental issues were discussed. However, I have to say that the silent skies outside more than made up for this !

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