Now for my first revisit. The last time I read The Daily Telegraph, I disliked their very strong conservative slant, but enjoyed having and aggressive but not especially talented opponent to tear some holes in. Today, I hope to repeat my previous experience.
The main front page headline for today is "One in six patients ‘wrongly diagnosed on NHS’", which seems relatively uncontroversial since the story states the figure is "up to 15 per cent" and is actually based on a study from the American Journal of Medicine which expects to see a figure of around 15% from all developed nations. Other front page headlines are "Lib Dems call for end to Afghan war" (self-explanatory really), "Obama sidesteps Brown at G20" (Obama and Brown to have face-to-face talks during G20 summit), and "Bullied girl’s saviour is sacked" (lunch lady tells parents about bullying, is sacked for breaching 'pupil confidentiality', seems a bit harsh seeing as how the parents were fine with it).
Inside we see that a poll by ICM for The Guardian has the Conservatives 17 points ahead of Labour (really, 17 points and the Mirror is talking about a hung parliament?) and a story about a music teacher who had a lesbian affair with a 15 year-old pupil, where it seems the judge was reluctant to prosecute, saying the teacher was "not, in any sense, a sexual predator". The question of where the age of consent should lie is a debate I think that will rage on and on, though I personally would not be opposed to lowering it.
Further inside we hit upon our first really contentious subject: Assisted suicide. This one is over a court ruling, expected tomorrow, clarifying that relatives of those who kill themselves will not face prosecution as long as they do not "encourage" them and help only those with a "clear and settled intention to die", which seems quite reasonable to me. Christian groups do not see it that way though, are accusing the judge of being biased, want to take the case to the new Supreme Court, and are even threatening to take the case to the European Court of Human Rights. Again with my personal opinion, this looks like a desperate rear-guard offensive to me, that has little chance of success. In fact, given the fact that opinion polls consistently show 80% support for allowing assisted suicide to be performed in Britain, I'm amazed these groups haven't been completely defeated already.
The opinion pages are where the meat is though, starting with the amazing revelation that the Lib Dems don't know what they're doing and won't win the election. With the rest, I'm amazed to agree in some areas. There's criticism over the vacuous remarks from Alesha Dixon on Strictly Come Dancing (celebrity stories are one thing, biting op-eds about celebrity stories are something else) and commentary about the Copenhagen summit on climate change without a single remark about climate change being a load of disproved rubbish or cap and trade being an intergovernmental conspiracy. Are we finally past all that?
Most interesting is a commentary from Mary Ridell about how Brown stands the best chance of winning re-election. For the most part, I agree with Mary here. Boldness is the key, scrapping ID cards and the replacement for Trident would certainly help get me on board, electoral reform would probably pass if given a strong enough push from Labour and the Lib Dems, and - speaking of the Lib Dems - it may be time for a new Lib-Lab pact. It also seems we agree that David Cameron currently risks sleep-walking to victory over a weakened oppostion, and may end up leading a weak government with no mandate and no direction (though unlike the Telegraph's writer, this is currently my hoped-for scenario, I also think Cameron himself would not make a good Prime Minister and would probably be his own downfall). Agreement on all this probably means the facts of the matter are beyond dispute, so the way forward now seems clear for Brown, but will he be paying attention?
The actual format of the paper seems slightly different to when I last looked, but is probably just day-to-day variation. The paper itself is 32 broadsheet pages (down eight from last time) + another 10 broadsheet pages for the 'Business' section (two more than last time) + 20 tabloid-sized pages for the 'Sport' section (a colossal thirty-two less than last time). The price is still 90p.
So, less of a fight than last time, but more enlightening. Has the Torygraph gone all soft and liberal or did I just catch them on a bad day this time around? Well if I want inoffensive news I could just go for The Times, it's the same price and easier to manage thanks to the tabloid form factor. But still, now I'm confused. I may have to re-revisit the Torygraph, just to be sure...
Previous: Phase 2/Day 1 (Daily Mirror)Next: Phase 2/Day 3 (Leek Post & Times vs. Your Leek Paper)