The Week's News

Despite (or perhaps because) my head's either in a book or tramping around somewhere in the vastness that is history, it's good to keep up to date with what's happening in the news. To do this I read 'The Week' a weekly digest of British and International news. It's not all serious though, there's a fair few amusing articles too.

The main stories this week are the elections in Zimbabwe and the mess that is the new terminal 5 at Heathrow. Firstly Zimbabwe. Robert Mugabe, a rather nasty piece of work, is facing stiff competition this week as he tries to cling on to power. He's been President since 1981 and is now 84 years old. It's supposedly a democracy, but the elections are always rigged, tribal leaders are bribed to deliver loads of votes, there's intimidation, fraud, gerrymandering etc. This time though, it seems the vote against him has been so overwhelming that even his impressive election rigging skills might not be enough. The opposition party has seemingly won the parlimentary election (though possibly not yet the senate?) and is claiming victory in the Presidential election, though this is being disputed. One party needs at least 50% of the vote to avoid a 'run off' which seems to be a sort of re-match. The opposition claim they have 50.3%, others say 49% etc. I hope they sort it out and can boot Mugabe out of power, as the country has been in serious decline for the last 10 years - mostly due to him and his attempts to keep and extend his power.

The other major story is Heathrow terminal 5. I've never been to Heathrow, and fortunately when I go on holiday to America at the end of the month I'm flying from Manchester, however it sounds a 'real shambles' as Alan Sugar might say (if you've seen The Apprentice at least a couple of times, you'll know what I'm talking about). I read about this a while ago and it's really hi-tech and sophisticated, but the lack of organisation, management structures and training are being blamed for the hundreds of cancelled flights and the thousands of people still trying to locate their baggage. It will probably be great in a year or two, but for now I'd stay away.

Other stories:

• The bigger a moose's antlers, the better the sex they have.
• Hillary Clinton refuses to give up in the election primary race in the US. Big surprise!
• Lidl are mean. In Germany they have been using hidden cameras to spy on employees, including in the toilets, and in some stores they don't let female employees use the toilet unless they are on their period (when they have to wear headbands to identify themselves). Can this be real?
• John McCain (republican candidate), doesn't seem to be quite the foreign policy expert he portrays himself as, and if the democrats weren't bickering so much people might notice more (particularly silly gaffe this week about Iran, Al-Qaedi etc I wouldn't have known either but then I'm not running for President!)