Perhaps it beats them, for no description of war or occupation could give readers a sense of history, culture and language being so smoothly and so speciously emptied of meaning.

ECONOMIST: Exiles from history

When Mr Blair announced last week the first phase of a withdrawal of the army from Basra, Sir Menzies was able to claim, somewhat speciously, that even the government now accepted his argument that there was nothing left for British troops usefully to do in Iraq.

ECONOMIST: Bagehot