Six of the Best 302

"The Alliance Party says enough is enough. Over a violent 48 hours it has seen one of its representatives forced from her house, others attacked in their home, the shutters brought-down at a string of its offices, and a party advice centre gutted by arsonists. On the face of it, the rampage is linked to loyalist anger over restrictions placed on flying the Union flag from Belfast City Hall. But Alliance now says this crisis follows ten years of intense unionist political campaigning aimed at stifling the liberal party’s growing appeal – as well as loyalist paramilitary intimidation that Alliance has previously played down." The Detail on worrying developments in Northern Ireland.

Thinking Liberal suggests a way for the Liberal Democrats to avoid wipeout at the next European elections.

Jennie Rigg has been reading the first edition of Ad Lib, the new magazine from the Liberal Democrats.

How are the Republicans getting on after their defeat in the recent US Presidential elections? Not very well, reports The New Republic.

"I guess the favourite Western for most movie buffs (of a mature age) came from this period with many selecting Sergio Leone’s 1966 film, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. While this is a great must see classic movie, for me his 1968 release of Once Upon a Time in the West is the best Western ever." So says Movies My Dad Likes.

The lead-mining country of the North Pennines was an early inspiration for the poet W.H. Auden. Robert Forsythe discusses how he may first have come the village of Rookhope there.