Richard D North welcomes you to his new blog. (It links to my old site, now archived.) I am a right-winger, in love with the free market and arguing against the soft-left, liberal, green, PC consensus. Oh, and I'm a conflicted softie. A bit hippy and arty round the edges too. More »

Latest posts

RDN on Guardian’s Comment Is Free (Cif)

Posted by RDN under Economic crisis / Mr C's Makeover Politics / Rightist manifestos on 9 March 2010. No comments.

I was bucked to have a piece run on the Guardian’s Comment Is Free (Cif). I was bemoaning Mr Cameron’s Makeover Politics. Here are a few reflections on the comments it received.  More »

The Hurt Locker: Gritty, sure. But realistic?

Posted by RDN under At the movies / Military Covenant on 8 March 2010. One comment.

The courage of EOD – bomb disposal – staff is well worth celebrating and Kathryn Bigelow’s The Hurt Locker does it brilliantly. Still, this is perhaps not all that accurate an account of the trade. More »

A Single Man: Surprisingly simpatico

Posted by RDN under At the movies on 7 March 2010. No comments.

Everything about the buzz surrounding Tom Ford’s film led one to expect the worst. To overstate the case, one expected a sort of style fascism. More »

The British and Ronald Searle

Posted by RDN under Mind and body / TV and Radio on 2 March 2010. No comments.

Searle is 90 tomorrow and Channel 4 News ran a tribute interview. Typically, the commentary had to have a little attitudinising. More »

A New Military Covenant: The 21st century warrior?

Posted by RDN under Military Covenant / Politics and campaigns on 2 March 2010. No comments.

The British military tradition is real, but it is up for grabs. Here is my account of a British military which becomes large, clever,  multi-purpose, and is deployed worldwide. Along the way, it becomes more commercial, more part-time and more argumentative. More »

Which party wants a modern state?

Posted by RDN under Mr C's Makeover Politics / Politics and campaigns on 2 March 2010. No comments.

I want to scrap the BBC, expand the military, phase out the NHS and the rest of the Welfare State, empower Whitehall. What is this unholy muddle? And how does affect politics? Do the Tories get it?  More »

The Tories lack “bottom”

Posted by RDN under Mr C's Makeover Politics / Politics and campaigns on 27 February 2010. No comments.

The Tory leadership under David Cameron clearly lack something. Their followers don’t know what the party’s for. The Cameroons are a bit controlling. Blairite, then. But there’s something more… More »

Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll: 6 out of 10

Posted by RDN under At the movies on 24 February 2010. No comments.

S & D & R & R has a lot going for it, but it’s a little lame in some departments. More »

Revolutionary Row: Gorgeous but thin

Posted by RDN under At the movies on 21 February 2010. No comments.

Sam Mendes is a very good director but he has a track record of disliking capitalism and isn’t a lot better about human relations. Revolutionary Road makes these points almost as well as American Beauty did.  More »

Stewart Brand’s Whole Earth Discipline

Posted by RDN under Climate change on 12 February 2010. No comments.

Drawing on one aspect of Stewart Brand’s new Whole Earth Discipline, this is a rather dense (mercifully short) note about the weakness of most discussion about the merits of action on climate change. More »

a Meticulous design