Britain in Trump’s World

Paying the costs of war

Keir Starmer’s defence spending increase is a very expensive lesson in failing to plan ahead.

Letter of the week: United nations

Write to [email protected] to have your thoughts voiced in the New Statesman magazine.

Even 1980s game shows prove too cutting-edge for baffled peers

Your weekly dose of gossip from around Westminster.

Xi and Putin vie to exploit the second Trump age

By voting for Russia and against Ukraine at the UN, the US president has shown which side of the…

Despite three years of war, Ukrainians do not despair

Also this week: Pills in Poland and a new way of measuring political absurdity.

Ash Sarkar: “I wasn’t smart enough to listen when I was younger”

The journalist and figurehead of the young Corbynite left on progressive politics in retreat and what the right got…

The AfD’s rise is the centre left’s final warning

The surging far-right is a symptom of a world slipping out of progressive control – and comprehension.

The BBC’s fumble leaves the stories of Gaza’s children untold

Also this week: Britain united over copyright law, and Trump’s war on the US press rages on.

Eric Adams’ corruption is emblematic of American politics today

The New York mayor’s behaviour shows how questions of right and wrong have devolved into whatever people can get…

The “success story” of Tory education reform is a mirage

False claims about academies’ performance are obscuring the ambition of Labour’s Schools Bill.

Maternity leave isn’t “leave” – it’s hard work

Just as women need to be told about the realities of pregnancy, we should be honest about the next…

Where to find meaning

As Christianity in Britain declines, two new books ask: what should we believe in now?

Art and the ruins of the left

Can painting alter the course of our politics?

Why we’re stuck in ancient Rome

The enduring resonance of the Roman empire is often remarked upon – but rarely understood.

Curtis Sittenfeld’s ordinary lives

The stories in her zeitgeisty collection Show Don’t Tell are dated by their cultural references, but their astute observations…

From Gabriel Weston to Richard Overy: new books reviewed in short

Also featuring I Don’t Like Your Tie by Marc Moss-Jones and Kevin Core and The Naked Eye by Yoko…

The Last Showgirl is beautiful, tasteful – and tedious

Gia Coppola’s film, about an out-of-work Las Vegas dancer played by Pamela Anderson, looks gorgeous but is let down…

The half-hearted return of Bergerac

This reboot of the classic detective series has lost all its drollness and sense of fun. C’est dommage!

London’s season of sexed-up Shakespeare

New productions of Richard II and Much Ado About Nothing both burnish their texts with hot celebrity appeal –…

Sam Fender’s politicised rock

The North Shields artist’s third album, People Watching, shows the musician continues to find inspiration in his troubled roots.

The changing face of Lent

It has suited our capitalist, secular economy to relinquish the fasting but keep the feasting.

Britain’s embattled markets are an investment opportunity

The thing about business is that one person’s capsized sausage lorry is another person’s impromptu roadside barbecue.

I am haunted by a new, very specific fear

Beware the Waitrose car park.

I’ve nothing against boomers

It’s decades of policies prioritising wealth protection that are the source of resentment.

I attempt peak football-viewing: two live games at once

There were competing sets of replays and live-action excitements. My head swivelled so much I got dizzy.

This England: Things took a wrong turn

This column – which, though named after a line in Shakespeare’s “Richard II”, refers to the whole of Britain…

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Eimear McBride Q&A: “I have a face only Lyubov Popova could love”

The novelist on American cinema and the dream of being an antiquarian bookseller.