Say what you want about the ever-more-floundering Gordon Brown - i.e. that he's a liability to his party and should step down immediately before further damage is caused, something like that - chances are you wouldn't go as far as to speculate that he'd be beaten in an election… read more…

Robert Mugabe - never the most progressive of public figures - has labelled an American diplomat a 'prostitute' and insisted that any foreign interference in next month's run-off 'election' would not be welcomed with open arms. Not only that - he's apparently prepared to throw U.S Ambassador to Zimbabwe… read more…

Why, you poor misguided fool. There you were, thinking that Tony Blair's existence consisted entirely of smiling eerily, replacing genuine political debate with Clifford-esque marketeer rhetoric, and latching onto insanely flawed arguments for invading certain portions of the Middle East. Apparently there was much more to it than that.… read more…

Quick note to any lefties out there who are a little dismayed with Boris Johnson's poll lead: imagine how your Italian counterparts must feel. Not only did the nation decide to re-elect notorious right-winger Silvio Berlusconi this month - a move which provoked much international forehead-slapping - but now… read more…

Obesity is a major problem in the modern developed world. Right this second, countless millions of people are busy claiming that their overweight status is down to a faulty thyroid gland or their naturally 'big-boned' structure, rather than the fact that they spend all day shovelling family-size bars of… read more…

So Silvio Berlusconi has swept to power in Italy once again, a decision which - thanks to his pro-US stance and general conservatism - has polarised both national and world opinion. Apart from, y'know, the vast majority of people who are more interested in watching Britains Got Talent than… read more…

Recent international relations with China have been somewhat fractured to say the least. Not only have the anti-Olympic protests gathered a worldwide strangehold - from activists scaling the Golden Gate Bridge to grown men wrestling with Blue Peter presenters over a fiery torch - but now there seems to… read more…

Belgium is remarkably tolerant of lots of cultural oddities - they're responsible for Tintin and The Smurfs, after all. Yet while they're evidently big fans of bequiffed reporters and undersea blue people, they're not too keen on British exports. Namely ex-PM Tony Blair. Blair has been hustling for the… read more…

See that headline? Savour reading it as much as Westmonster savoured writing it, won't you? It's not every day you get to type out such a wonderful, tell-all bastion of simplicity. Ilkka Kanerva is the foreign minister for Finland ... or rather he was until Tuesday, when the Conservative… read more…

Political conflict is usually quite a subdued affair in Britain. Sure, you'll occasionally catch a glimpse of John Prescott on a bitchslapping rampage, but apart from that we're simply a more restrained bunch. Nothing like Argentine First Lady Cristina Fernandez, then, who has found herself in hot water following… read more…