apart from the antiwar bit I don't have a problem with the policies he's espousing. If he has been captured by Libertarians then thats excellent news and may help him get elected PM. The problem is that he is sufficiently flexible that I'm not sure I can trust him to stay comitted.

Somewhere in Yes Minister, Sir Humphrey talks about the need for a minister to have his trousers nailed to the mast - as that way he can't climb down. It would be worthwhile nailing Michael Howards trousers to the mast...

I'm sorry you'll have to provide some sort of evidence about this jibe that Howard is jumping on the 'anti-war bandwagon'. Perhaps a quote from a leading Conservative saying how they feel duped and have decided that the Lib Dems were right all along? I can provide plenty saying the opposite.

The COnservatives do not oppose the war - they support it and were and are far more united on the issue than even the Government Ministers.

What they question is the Government's competence both in preparing properly for the war (through wishful thinking and their ultimately misguided 'UN policy' they delayed both the deployment and equipment of troops) and in bothering to ascertaine the threat that our troops were likely to face when they got there.

The issue of battlefield vs strategic weapons was of no particular significance to the justification of the war in anyone's mind (with the acception of Robin Cook, who was the only person (pro or anti war) to make an issue of it).

However, it is of huge significance that a Prime Minister who sent troops into battle either didn't understand or didn't care that there was a difference.
Frank Johnson's column in the Telegraph made the point best:

"Mrs Beckett's theory [about "insignificant detail"] raised an interesting historical might-have-been. The then equivalent of John Scarlett, Mr Blair's head of Joint Intelligence, tells Churchill in, say, 1943: "Prime minister, the Germans are developing a rocket called the V1."

Churchill: "I am obliged. Pray let me assure, I shall not ask whether they are capable of hitting London. That would not be a significant detail."

Whether you ultimately side with the PM or not, nobody can doubt that it is the job of the Opposition to probe and ask such questions.

You really don't like him, do you?

Absolutely right, Melanie. Who can I vote for now if I want to register my objection to the gradual dissolution of one of the corner-stones of any civilised society, the institution of marriage? I'm no extremist, so which mainstream party represents my views on this, or on so many other things? Answer: not one of them anymore, least of all Michael Howard's moribund Tory party.

How unfortunate too (if predictable), to see the Telegraph fawning over Mr Howard's speech like an devoted spaniel: "one of the most sincere and well thought out speeches by any politician for some time". Pathetic.

Apparently the Tories think their political fortunes are to be made by banging the lower-taxes drum. Granted taxes are "too high" for what we get in return, but if that's the most insightful thing they can offer after surveying the problems facing Britain today, it's very sad. The Tories are quite possibly finished as a conservative political movement; if so I only hope they don't hang about garrisoning even the centre-right of the electoral spectrum for post-sixties social liberalism. That would only bear out about the wisest thing "Red" Ken Livingstone ever said: "If voting changed anything, they'd abolish it!".

"apart from the antiwar bit I don't have a problem with the policies he's espousing. If he has been captured by Libertarians then thats excellent news and may help him get elected PM"

The problem with the Portillista wing of the Party is that it is not really libertarian. They'll endorse gay marriage and liberalising the drugs laws, yet they'll endorse ever more intrusive equality laws, "positive" discrimination, controls on free speech, registers of freemasons in public life etc.

Effectively, their attitude to social issues is that the soft left set the agenda, and Conservatives just have to follow it.

I don't support gay marriage, but don't really regard it as a huge issue. My concern is whether this is a sign that Michael Howard has just accepted the Portillista agenda wholesale. Let's hope not.

"Despite his platitudes about marriage, he has now consigned it to the bin as far as the Tories are concerned. He is backing a proposal whose purpose is to destroy normative values of behaviour..."

Surely the desire among some gay couples for legal and social recognition is, in fact, an endorsement of stability and "normative values of behaviour"? Doesn't their desire for recognition reinforce the notion of marriage as a desireable thing?

Or does sharing the benefits of being a socially-recognised couple somehow diminish or invalidate those benefits? And if so, how?

Here we go again - gay partnerships will destroy 'normative' values - it's simply not true, nor is that the intention behind the proposals - melanie is blind to the facts and peddling the same stereotypes about gay lifestyles over and over. Lesbians and gay men pay tax, national insurance, and council tax like everyone else - play the lottery like everyone else - make full contributions to society like everyone else - don't want to destroy marriage - why should we? As we've said before, ad infinitum, we aren't beamed down to soho from another planet - we all came from heterosexual family units, we have brothers and sisters who - gulp -get married and have kids - we even buy them wedding presents, celebrate their marriages, babysit for the kids - (whom we are secretly indoctrinating with our anti-family agenda, erm, not) Recognition of our partnerships is going to happen, so get used to it. And come back ten years later when we can discuss whether marriage has been destroyed because of it. It's poverty and social inequality which is doing that job. Grow up Melanie, and stop getting your ideas about who we are from the Daily Mail and rubbishy television drama. Hi Frank, Hi Reuben, Hi Frisbee, Hi Chuck.

Do like Tony, say whatever it takes to get elected; then, do whatever it is that takes your fancy !

The suckers will vote for you anyway, they are deceivers too.

Dear Ms Phillips, I find it hard to understand the continued frustration you feel at the threat that gay relationships bring to civilised humanity. Your articles consistently refer to this issue in an a disproportionate and sadly hysterical manner. Gay partnerships will not stop the earth from turning on its axis or make the stars fall from the sky. They will however bring a measure of integrity, self-respect and relief to many men and women who happen to have a gay sexual orientation in the same way that some people have red hair. Have you ever stood back and considered whether 2 people in a same-sex relationship can love each other with the same commitment and purity that you and your husband share? I don't presume for your values to be any less than mine, so please don't continue to question mine.

Only last week Michael Ancram, Howard's deputy, reaffirmed his total, slavering support for the war against Iraq. But that's not good enough for Mel: only a loyalty oath to Ariel Sharon signed in Howard's own blood will do.

Estimated time before she describes Howard as a self-hating Jew: 20 days.

Phillips has attacked Howard.

Howard is a Jew.

Ergo - using her past logic - Phillips is an anti-Semite.

She ought to be locked up.

I don't think any of this matters too much to the great British Public.

Homosexualists aren't going to get married anyway. And there are far fewer of them than most perople suppose.

So long as they keep out of the way and don't proselitise or flaunt themselves, let's leave their private arrangements to them. If they want some legal basis for making their Wills etc, so what?

None of this need be a threat to anyone else. Don't let it be a basis for attacking Michael Howard who is the only hope this country has for halting the progress to an Orwellian nanny state.

Clive

Dear Mr Clive Elliot,

People in the 19th century might have used the word 'homosexualist' but it's a pretty odd and quaintly old-fashioned term to use now.

I find your comment extremely patronising. Gay men and women have just as much right to flaunt and proselytise their sexuality as heterosexual men and women do (or not as the case may be). Nor should they keep out of the way and hide behind locked doors. Incidentally there are more gay men and women in the world than you may suppose - but this is neither here nor there. If there was just one they would still deserve to be treated with the same respect that you would expect for yourself.

"Homosexualists" are propagandists for the Uranian Way. They peddle misinformation such as the "one-in-ten" bogus stat which one still sees occasionally (correct figure: one or two in a hundred). They are a vociferous minority of a minority, who embarrass their more discreet co-votaries. They have held back the cause of tolerance the way violent suffragettes impeded the granting of the franchise to women.

"Gay" is an even sillier term: indeed a self-insulting one, since it was traditionally a slang adjective for prostitutes of both sexes. Most dykes are anything but gay, with a colossal rate of clinical depression and domestic violence. "Queer" is the best and most honest label. There is no such thing as a homosexual person, BTW-- only homosexual acts. The greatest living literary queer, Gore Vidal, has repeatedly pointed this out as well as demonstrating it in his own conduct. Few men and hardly any women are exclusively "homosexual".

If you people go on using foolish epithets I shall come for you, and your little dawg too!

"Incidentally there are more gay men and women in the world than you may suppose "

The true number is only bounded by the confines of our imagination !