BritBlog Roundup #5

Yes, here’s the 5th weekly BritBlog Roundup. Anything from a citizen or resident of the four nations on these Isles is eligible, you can send in something of your own or something you have spotted elsewhere, just so long as it’s good. You’re too late for this week (obviously) but for next week send your nominations to britblog AT gmail DOT com by noon GMT Sunday. Any subject, any viewpoint and certainly don’t feel that any political or other ideas have to agree with mine. This is an attempt to showcase what is going on in British and Irish blogging, not an exercise in supporting my prejudices.

Having said that, of course the first piece this week is Francis supporting my insistent and repetetive statement that PG Wodehouse was not a novelist or dramatist but a documentarian. The Telegraph obituary page is where I get my proof too.

Mr and Mrs McMuffin need your help to find a home for a deserving puddy tat. Download the .pdf poster.

Chicken Yoghurt points to The Pseudo Magazine’s take on Intelligent Design. An elegant destruction of a New York Times piece on the subject, perhaps a little polite to my taste. [Bile, venom, that’s what people want in a Fisking!]

Chickyog himself makes a very good and very short point about The Dear Leader.

Simon Holledge hasn’t quite grasped the rules yet (we’re trying to find particular posts, not particular blogs) but his nomination of And All That Malarkey looks very good. Intelligent web design...that’d be a novelty, eh?

The New Economist is fascinating on one of those basic building blocks of how to rid the world of poverty. Democracy a help or a hindrance?

An absolute must read sent in by Martin Davies, something where it is the site as a whole that works, not just one post. I’d try to explain it but Martin does it better than I could:

My friend and esteemed British Blogger JahJahDub has decided to write a poem about every premiership manager. This is particularly brilliant as he knows little about football and less about poetry. The results are brilliant.

Norm of that Blog is also in poetic mood, a Wilfred Owen parody in the style of Pinter to celebrate the latter getting the prize named after the former (or should that be the other way round, a Pinter parody in the style of Owen? not a great literateur, me.)

A very fine demolition of Tim Garton Ash’s latest piece on Europe at The Future is a Foreign Country. Very fine indeed. (Apologies for including something that does conform to my political prejudices. Ed.)

Victoria wants us to look at Post Hipnotico, which while being written from Mexico, in Spanish, is actually being done by a Brit, and Expat Yank, who appears to live just round the corner from my sister in Dorset. I think you could say that he hasn’t quite absorbed the nuanced and European view of the Iraq War yet.

Jarndyce sends in his own posting on the meaning and origin of Sforza Italia (as I use it, my Italian being Naples accented), and I have no doubt he’s right in detail, just think it coincidence.

James Hamilton (and this was one of my picks of the week as well)  sends us to read the interview with Hernando de Soto at Stephen Pollard’s place. Sterling advice there for the Make Poverty History crowd.

Mark Holland, this blogs’s guide to the cycling scene, nominates grayblog. (BTW, if Mark says it’s good, then it is good, no further comment needed.)

Anoneumouse points to a little piece of numerical sleuthing at England Expects. Just how much has the EU Constitution cost so far?

Liberal England is unhappy with Charles Clarke (is there anyone happy with him other than Charles Clarke?)

Nick Barlow is offering advice to the Catholic Church. Very good advice too.

The Obscurer shows a very interesting little piece of economic thought at The Filter, Football and Porn.

Clive Davis has uncovered a gem in Broom of Anger. A scream of rage and anger from West Belfast.

Bunny is funny about British restaurants. As one who worked for years in them, rather have to hang my head in shame at the truth of it.

The Busman is a scream, I’d pay for the video camera to be there when Twenty Major takes a ride home from the pub. (Note, many Irish blogs have a more liberal attitude to profanity than the average maiden aunt.Ed)

Twenty Major provides us with the great cross-St Georges Channel sport on March 18th each year, as Irishmen everywhere compare hangovers. An attempt at upstaging the host is made, quite successfully, by Ciaran in the comments section.

Natalie Solent, Squander Two and JohnB of Shot by Both Sides (remember to read the comments section) continue to chew over that Lancet report on civilian deaths in Iraq. Interesting but not a debate I want to re-enter, not remembering the bollix I made of it last time (short story... read report, get enraged, write article, get published, piece goes to number 1 on google news and then have to admit that what I’d written was actually rubbish. Embarrasing really.)

Chris Lightfoot is his usual lucid self on the subject of the Prevention of Terrorism Act.

If you’re not reading the Copper’s Blog then you should be. I reckon he’ll be the next blogger to be offered a book deal.

And that’s it for this week, BritBlog Roundup #5. To send an entry in for next week, email to britblog AT gmail DOT com. Toodle Pip!

Welcome Instapundit readers (thanks Glenn) and yes, you too can contribute to next week’s roundup. Whatever you think is good from an English, Irish, Scottish or Welsh blog (written by anyone who is either or both from those nations or lives in them, so expats of both kinds count) is eligible.

Earlier Roundups are here, here, here and here. Enjoy!