Michael Portillo thinks that China’s economic sway is such that it has undermined US foreign policy with impunity... Andrew Sullivan argues that to tie Obama to racial separatists is unfair... Minette Marrin says that if people in late middle age choose to take risks with their health for fun we should admire them... and Martin Ivens says that Brown’s reconciliation with Livingstone brings to mind the Low cartoon of Hitler’s pact with Stalin