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Mark Steel

President Barack Obama

The US Army's bad apples

The case of the soldier who went berserk in Afghanistan and killed 16 people must be utterly baffling to psychiatrists.

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Inside Mark Steel

Mark Steel: St Paul's protestors: what would Jesus do

Wednesday, 29 February 2012

At last, the police have become efficient. They may have stumbled slightly with their investigation of News International, but they haven't made the same mistake with the people sitting around by St Paul's.
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Mark Steel: Iraq was such a laugh, let's do it to Iran

Friday, 24 February 2012

Governments and commentators keen on promoting a war against Iran should be stridently opposed, not so much because of the threat to world peace, but because their reasons display a shocking lack of imagination.
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Mark Steel: If religion has been marginalised, then I'm the Pope

Wednesday, 15 February 2012

If you're going to complain that religion is becoming "marginal", as Baroness Warsi did yesterday, it's genius to do it when you're a member of the Cabinet on a visit to the Pope. Maybe Warsi said to him, "For example, your Holiness, look how these days you're tucked away in a backstreet in Rome which hardly even shows up on the A to Z."
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Mark Steel: Being a Crystal Palace fan is all about losing on penalties

Thursday, 26 January 2012

I've read a bit about the Cuban missile crisis, when for a few days the world wobbled on the edge of nuclear war. But I bet it was a doddle compared to the nerves of being a Crystal Palace fan in the days before Tuesday's second leg of the Carling Cup semi-final against Cardiff City.
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Mark Steel: Greed from landlords, not claimants

Wednesday, 25 January 2012

We've come to that point in the lifetime of every Tory government when we're invited to scream about people on benefits. Some people enjoy this activity all the time, but at the moment it's like New Year's Eve for drinking, a time when if you're not doing it to excess, you get sneered at for not taking part in the fun.
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A new yacht is the least the Queen deserves

Wednesday, 18 January 2012

One of the talents of the Conservative Party since the days of Margaret Thatcher has been to explain economics as if the country is a household, so everyone can understand ideas such as the need to cut spending when you're in debt.
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Mark Steel: We should hand out Olympic medals to big business

Wednesday, 11 January 2012

I love the Olympics. During the Games in Beijing, I watched for nine hours without a break until the commentator said, "And you have to say, that's a CRITICAL moment in the history of Algerian judo."
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Mark Steel: Do the elderly need a �14m bonus as well as pudding?

Wednesday, 4 January 2012

Almost everyone connected to the elderly or care homes has insisted the Government addresses the issue of the lack of care homes.
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Mark Steel: Just because you're an atheist doesn't make you rational

Wednesday, 28 December 2011

Having followed the latest debate about religion, I'd say the conclusion is obvious that the only thing as disturbing as the religious is the modern atheist.
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Mark Steel: I wish I could be taken for lunch by the taxman

Wednesday, 21 December 2011

This country must be about to become dazzlingly liberal. Because it's been revealed that the Inland Revenue "negotiated" with big business about their tax bills, often over lunch, and then let them off £25bn.
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Mark Steel: Don't let's forget the rich are different

Wednesday, 23 November 2011

The High Pay Commission has just published a report about the trend in salaries paid to the highest 0.1 per cent of earners, and it seems that someone must have made a terrible mistake.
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Irony really is dead when this hawk is a peace envoy

Saturday, 8 October 2011

Tony Blair keeps popping back to annoy us, doesn't he? Every few months, just as you think he's slid into history, he emerges getting paid a million pounds for something, like brokering an arms deal with Josef Fritzl and you realise we'll never be rid of him.
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How car insurance ordeal drove me to near despair

Saturday, 24 September 2011

To sense the irrational, terrifying chaos that drives the modern economy you should get someone to drive into your parked car in the middle of the night.
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Bankers: eight billion years in jail should do it

Wednesday, 14 September 2011

Instead of this pointless Vickers Report about how to sort out the banks, the investigation should have been carried out by Supernanny. She'd have sorted it.
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Mark Steel: Flogging is too good for rioters

Wednesday, 17 August 2011

People who love to scream about stern discipline and National Service are having a fantastic time in post-riot Britain.
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Of course alcohol can be a problem, but so can doctors

Saturday, 13 August 2011

Britain is getting drunker than ever, apparently, with a Government 'consultation' expected to reveal the shocking statistic that, compared with 20 years ago, there are 80% more documentaries or news items showing a clip of a girl in a short skirt being sick on a bench while a lad with no shirt makes a noise like a werewolf as he's thrown into a police van.
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Mark Steel: My guess is the cleaners are to blame

Wednesday, 20 July 2011

This year's television drama awards must surely go to the news, whose current scriptwriters are outstanding. Next week Newsnight will end with James Murdoch being told his real dad isn't Rupert, it's Fidel Castro. Then the credits will roll and we'll all be desperate to see the next episode.

It's like being endorsed by Gary Glitter

Wednesday, 8 June 2011

The International Monetary Fund say the Government's strategy for sorting us out is going to work. Every time they've been asked to comment on a country's economy they've insisted it must cut wages, restrict the unions, and privatise everything, so the Government must have been really nervous as to whether they'd approve of the strategy of cutting wages, restricting unions and privatising everything. It must have felt like waiting for your A-level results.
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