A hero is forced to resign
The resignation of Ray Lewis as the Mayor of London's crime adviser is quite simply a tragedy, with profound implications far beyond the insular world of the capital's party politics, says Melanie Phillips. Here is a man who has literally saved lives. Among the boys whose behaviour he has transformed through his Eastside Young Leaders' Academy in East London are those who, without any doubt, would otherwise have gone on to kill or be killed. He took black boys from shattered family backgrounds who were on the way to criminal careers and turned them into high-achieving model citizens. He was simply the father figure they so desperately needed but who was missing from their own fractured families. He was a tough, stern, authoritative, totally uncompromising black man - all factors crucial to gaining their respect. Melanie Phillips Daily Mail
People: Ray Lewis accused of sexual misconduct 
Who's left to defend free trade?
It is frightening how quickly support for open economies can evaporate in tough times, even in the comparatively cushioned West - and even when, it should be noted, very few industrialised countries, and not one emerging economy, are actually in or close to recession, writes Rosemary Righter. The enemies of globalisation are regrouping, and no one expects the G8 summit opening today in Japan's northern island of Hokkaido to mount a convincing counter-attack. Too many of the assembled politicians look past their sell-by date, for a start. Of the G8's three most stalwart champions of free trade, George Bush and Gordon Brown have the support of no more than a quarter of their fellow countrymen, while Angela Merkel's governing coalition is ripping itself to shreds.
Rosemary Righter The Times
With Brown in Japan, ministers jostle for an autumn leadership race
The world fractures into indecision
The American guru Richard Haass wrote recently in Foreign Affairs journal that rather than a multi-polar world, we are moving into a non-polar one, writes Max Hastings. It is becoming progressively difficult to mobilise an international quorum in support of any objective, however worthy and important. This reflects not only the US's loss of moral authority, but also a dilution of power in consequence of globalism, which makes it ever harder for any nation to forge a consensus in support of decisive action. This works to the advantage of tyrants and mischief-makers. The UN security council shows itself increasingly weak and more anachronistic. Nato is atrophying. The IMF and World Bank face growing sceptical scrutiny.
Max Hastings The Guardian
BNP rises, New Labour falls
Just as there is more to racism in Britain than the BNP, the BNP's rise tells us more about Britain than just racism, says Gary Younge. It is a canary in the mine - an early warning system signalling the complacency of our political culture in which our political class has been complicit. Trapped in a hopeless spiral of negativity, people will vote against anything - immigration, the Tories, Ken Livingstone, Boris Johnson, Scottish nationalism, Gordon Brown or Europe, to name a few. But it seems a long time since large numbers of people voted for anything. So the fact that the BNP has performed best in Labour strongholds should come as no surprise. Its rise and New Labour's demise are linked.
Gary Younge The Guardian
The anti-royalists are gone
The late MP for West Fife, Willie Hamilton, proposed in one Commons debate that the government nationalise Prince Charles's paymasters, writes Catherine Bennett. Hamilton said it was 'indefensible' that a miner could work for a lifetime without earning 'as much as we pay that young twerp in a year'. It made no difference to Mr Hamilton, or to the 100 or so MPs who voted with him, that Prince Charles had recently engaged in exactly the sort of work experience which is now supplying the producers of William and Harry with such matchless propaganda. Nowadays, our twerps are hymned by a grateful Des Browne. In 1972 Mr Hamilton said: "He's been in the air force, he's been in the navy. He ought to spend the next three months in the coal mines." Catherine Bennett The Observer
People: Wills could go head to head with 'Iron Mike' in Turks and Caicos
Schools, NHS - everyone's problem
In the midst of this downturn, people's disposable income will be dropping, so those who once relied on being able to buy their way out of poor state provision, by paying school fees or using private healthcare, will find that they are no longer able to do so, says Janet Daley. So the quality and accessibility of NHS treatment and state education will become a matter of lively importance to almost everyone in the country, thereby achieving just the sort of equality of public concern that advocates of state monopoly services have always claimed would transform them. So let's see how well that works; just wait until all those parents and patients, unaccustomed to the high-handedness of government officialdom, discover how little power they have when they are plunged into the anonymous hurly-burly of the public sector.
Janet Daley Daily Telegraph
