Dropping aid into Burma
Any dropping of aid from planes without permission would clearly violate Burmese airspace, says a Times leader. Planes risk being shot at; there is no guarantee that survivors, rather than black marketeers or troops, would be able to reach the aid. The political fallout could be as daunting. It may so feed the junta's suspicion of the outside world that it would send in the army to expel the Red Cross and other aid agencies. The West would then argue that the junta was effectively committing atrocities against its own people. If, as is likely, China vetoed any UN action opposed by Burma, the West might be tempted to bypass the UN. But any use of troops or ships - if they were available - could be met by force from Burma's 400,000-strong army, turning the devastated delta into a battleground. Leader The Times
Aid breakthrough – but has it come too late? 
Human Fertilisation and Embryology
The idea of hybrid embryos – even though they are intended to be destroyed at 14 days – revolts people because by obliterating the difference between animals and humans it destroys the concept of human uniqueness, writes Melanie Phillips. The Government is going to such lengths in the belief that anything is justified if it might relieve suffering. But one of the cardinal principles of a civilised society is that the ends must not justify the means. That's why another provision of this Bill, to allow the creation of 'saviour siblings', is also unacceptable. Creating a child not for its own sake but solely as a tissue source to try to cure a disease suffered by another person destroys the principle that a human life should never be used as a tool for the benefit of others. Melanie Phillips Daily Mail
The Mole: Labour Catholics can vote with their conscience today - but not forever
If the reactionary arguments are successful, throwing out vital medical advances and criminalising frightened, often young, women, then it will mark a real turning point, says Jackie Ashley. Whatever you think of the New Labour years, it has been a decade of social liberalism, when racism, homophobia and anti-science voodoo became steadily less respectable. Perhaps we have come to take that shift, that advance, for granted. If Cameron and his party return to rule the country, it is about more than the revival of Old Etonian noblesse oblige. They are Conservatives because they are conservative. There is nothing terribly complicated or surprising about this. Whether it is the increasingly finger-wagging attitude to family structures, or the readiness to take lectures from the churches, the Tories would certainly try to turn back the progressive currents of the Blair-Brown years. Jackie Ashley The Guardian
For many women, abortion is no big deal
For a libertarian it is depressing to see how little part is played by freedom in this debate, says Simon Jenkins. Few MPs have stopped to question whether the state should interfere either with parents or with science in these matters. In Britain statism is taken as axiomatic. Over embryology the most ferocious interventionists, such as Ann Widdecombe and Iain Duncan Smith, are on the right. The debate is bedevilled by regular outbreaks of mad Fleet Street disease. This is based on exploiting the so-called yuk factor, a sense that "something is going on out there that we do not like and therefore must stop". If most people knew what happened in slaughter houses they would never eat meat. For some reason, assisting pregnancy brings out deep and dark emotions, despite its purpose in bringing joy and freedom from disease to mankind.
Simon Jenkins Sunday Times
Why Brown is fighting to survive
The effect of a politician's character - and its chemistry in relating to the electorate - is often quite complex, writes Janet Daley. Mrs Thatcher was hated by large swathes of the population but respected even by those who loathed her. John Major was never really hated - even at the end, he was generally described as "a decent man" - but he was despised for his weakness. Tony Blair was almost impossible to dislike in personal terms, even when you violently disagreed with his actions. We are furious with the Prime Minister not because he is ruining the nation but because he is so annoying; his proclivity for being annoying seems almost perverse. Mr Brown's almost defiant refusal to be engaging or disarmingly frank may well be a deliberate repudiation of his predecessor's style but it's going to cost him his political life. Janet Daley Daily Telegraph
Battle for resources
Their new-found taste for meat, motors and minerals is just the start of a scramble for environmental resources that may even finally drag Africa into the world economy, says Dan Roberts. So why will the "Anxious Teenies" prove to be a return to normality? For much of human history, the battle for natural resources has shaped politics and society, whether over good hunting grounds or hydrocarbon deposits. It was only in the supposedly "weightless" economy of the late Nineties and early Noughties that we ever pretended otherwise, after oil touched $25 a barrel. The politics of energy are still not much discussed in polite circles, but make no mistake: when Vladimir Putin stages military parades in Red Square it is your central heating bill paying for it.
Dan Roberts Sunday Telegraph
Nuclear disaster
In the US, bombs with the force of 60 Hiroshimas were simply lost by the military, writes Johann Hari. On 29 August, a group of US airmen accidentally attached six nuclear warheads to their plane, mistaking them for unarmed cruise missiles intended for a weapons graveyard. They were then flown across the continental United States and left, unwatched by anyone, on an airstrip in Louisiana. Nobody even noticed they were gone for more than a day. This is what we know is happening in relatively orderly and open societies. There have almost certainly been incidents in China and North Korea and Pakistan that we will never hear about – until the worst happens. The dangers of any individual nuclear accident are, of course, very small – but small risks of massive death, accumulating over the 60 years of the nuclear age, suddenly don't look so negligible any more.
Johann Hari The Independent
