In the department of You Can't Make This Up: surely, in a few years, we'll discover British Labour leader Ed Miliband has cunningly bribed the Daily Mail to attack his departed father (fought against Hitler, refuge) for "hating Britain" (translation: being a Socialist) and to gate crash his uncle's funeral? They couldn't be naturally this dumb, surely, not even the Daily Fail? Anyway, you have to love the Guardian's summary: Previously known to many voters only as the man who knifed his brother, Ed Miliband has the Daily Mail to thank for his transformation into the man who loved his dad.

Meanwhile, of course, the US conservatives also do their level best to come across as caricatures without the brains of a five years old, but that's not new. It would be a tad easier to sympathize with the Democrats in government on more than the healthcare subject, though, if they didn't give the continuing impression of having adopted Richard Nixon as a role model. I don't suppose it got anywhere mentioned across the Atlantic, but this seek one of our writers, Ilja Trojanov, who was en route to a literature conference in Colorado, was denied entry to the US at the airport. (More about this in English here.) Considering he was among the most prominent public protesters against the NSA spying, the conclusion he drew, that this was a punishment by the land of the free for having voiced an opinion, does strike one as likely. Next week, the Frankfurt Book Fair starts; I wouldn't be surprised of the matter gets mentioned in at least one of the opening speeches.