Tuesday's comment from the papers in...

Today in Times Comment

• David Aaronovitch: How to be a mad dictator
• Libby Purves: Stand up for Nicky-No-Names. Our children are being exploited by advertisers.
• Nick Donovan: Forget trying to talk to Khartoum
• Chris Ayres: When IVF turns into an IQ test
• Mick Hume: Ah, a nice bit of brutality
• Bronwen Maddox: Africa must drop the guilt card to strengthen its hand
• Michael Gove: Choosing curtains is enough to drive me off the rails
• Ann Treneman: Tessa shows off her lung capacity in relay section
• Peter Riddell: Fed up with this lot, but alternative is little better
• Gerard Baker: Fed set to choose its weapon at dawn

And from the rest of the papers…

• Rachel Sylvester: (The Telegraph) - Has Ed Balls got what it takes to keep No 10?
• Alan Cochrane: (The Telegraph) – David Cameron fires up Union in the bitter cold
• Richard Siklos: (The Telegraph) - Conrad Black was author of his own demise
• Polly Toynbee: (The Guardian) - Balls's bold plan to end child poverty could revive Labour
• Max Hastings: (The Guardian) - Both Tehran and Washington must swallow the rhetoric and seek a deal
• Michele Hanson: (The Guardian) - If you want a telegram from the Queen on your 100th birthday, be prepared for a frightful slog
• Steve Richards: (The Independent) - They may be leaders in waiting, but neither Balls nor Miliband is ready for the top job
• Mary Dejevsky: (The Independent) - Competition among carers won't help your granny
• John Walsh: (The Independent) - Tales of the City
• Melanie Phillips: (The Daily Mail) - Standards in our schools rising? No, it's all Balls!

And from around the world…

• David Brooks: (The New York Times) - The 2008 presidential election has fundamentally shifted, but it hasn’t been because of events in Iowa and New Hampshire. It’s because of events everywhere else.
• Eugene Robinson: (Washington Post) - With Oprah in Obama's corner, the prospect of America electing a black president no longer seems impossible.
• Anne Applebaum: (Washington Post) - If for nothing else, we should be grateful to John and Anne Darwin for bringing the excellent word 'pseudocide' back into wider public use
• Sally Bedell Smith: (The Wall Street Journal) - Two Presidents in the White House?
• Frank Rich: (International Herald Tribune) - The Republicans find their Obama
• Andrio Adiwibowo: (The Jakarta Post) - Jakarta and its mangroves