The technology of carbon capture and storage can potentially reduce carbon emissions by 90 per cent, writes Michael McCarthy. Good judges, including some of the most senior figures in Gordon Brown's Cabinet, see it as the only hope for the future of the world (this is not an exaggeration). Yet the urgency with which the idea should be prosecuted is missing, and this is nowhere more evident than in the Government's efforts. It wasn't like this with the Manhattan Project, which built The Bomb. Urgency was its defining characteristic. Whatever you think about nuclear weapons, that was a response to an immense challenge which was swiftly brought to completion. Carbon capture and storage is now the only realistic response to climate change in the future we are about to live through, yet there is more urgency about developing new computer games. Michael McCarthy The Independent
Full article: A simple plan to save the world

Barack Obama and the Clintons utterly loathe each other, writes Tim Hames. She (and her husband) continue to believe that she would have been the stronger contender against John McCain (probably true), that she was denied the prize because they were out-hustled in organisational terms, not real votes cast (valid), and that the Illinois Senator is little more than a charming schmoozer (a plausible assertion, although how ex-President Clinton can offer it with apparent outrage is surreal). The Clinton-Obama display of unity at the Democratic convention will make the Nazi-Soviet Pact look like an event rooted in profound principle. She is aching for him to lose so that she can inherit the earth at the second time of asking come 2012. Never mind Mr McCain, she would prefer that Monica Lewinsky rather than Mr Obama was elected to the Oval Office this November. Tim Hames The Independent
Full article: Don't believe a word you hear in Denver next week
Obama loses momentum during awful August

Jacqui Smith might, for instance, care to balance her populist pronouncements about Gary Glitter being "despicable", which some of our dimmer compatriots will no doubt interpret as a licence, with a stern warning about the consequences of playing vigilante, says Matthew Norman. Irrevocably established as one of the age's leading grotesques, his life has been as destroyed as any could be short of death. One appreciates what a boon his release is for newspapers and phone-ins denied their sovereign right to torment Jade Goody by the diagnosis of cervical cancer, but even a New Labour home secretary should have the capacity to understand that released convicts retain the human rights to privacy – sex offenders register notwithstanding – and security. Matthew Norman The Independent
Full article: His life is destroyed. So why hound Gary Glitter?

The resignation of President Musharraf is not only a sign of politicians implementing a core demand of their constituents but also a remarkable departure from the past, writes Mohsin Hamid. Consider how the country's first three dictators left power: Ayub Khan passed the baton to his successor as army chief; Yahya Khan departed after a catastrophic military defeat; Zia-ul-Haq died in a suspicious air crash. The volatility of Pakistan's history makes me cautious of claiming that something fundamental has changed, but I suspect it may have. Last year, images of Pakistani lawyers in suits clashing with staff-wielding police officers made the newspapers for good reason. It is significant that in a country where those in power (soldiers, tribal chiefs, bureaucrats, landlords, the wealthy) have traditionally mistreated the weak with impunity, the demand for the rule of law has gained mass support. Mohsin Hamid The Guardian
Full article: Pakistan is at last finding its voice. The US would be wise not to gag it
Jason Burke: Musharraf's going leaves West a bleak option

In response to 19th-century industrialisation the British aristocracy rediscovered medieval chivalry, writes Paul Collier. The romantic fashion was in part comic: jousts, castles and armour. But it had darker consequences; the privileging of honour over intelligence, which became the bedrock vision of the English gentleman, had its apotheosis in the heroic stupidities of the First World War. Now, in response to modern agriculture, the aristocracy, with Prince Charles in the vanguard, has rediscovered organic peasant farming. Again it has its comic side: organic peasant produce is a luxury - you will find Duchy Originals, the prince's crested brand, in the better supermarkets; and the lifestyle is for sale in his attractive model village of Poundbury. But my concern is its darker consequences. Organic peasant agriculture is a solution for the angst of affluence, but not hunger. Its apotheosis is the ban on GM crops. Paul Collier The Guardian
Full article: Charles's fantasy farming won't feed Africa's poor