From the alternative culture of direct action with its own hard-hitting broad sheets and bulletins – Squall, Corporate Watch, Schnooze – through to new thinking amongst public sector activists disappointed by the Government, to innovative politics north of the Border and across the Channel, these will be sources of an independent political vigour.The problems faced by would-be candidates for the space left by the New Statesman, are mainly economic: concerning retail distribution and the difficulty of funding. But there’s still an uneasy defensiveness towards anything outspokenly on the left. It seems like a hangover from the collapse of Communism and the electoral debacles of Labour. It’s as if everything to the left of Peter Mandelson has been blamed for Stalinism and Labour’s past divisions; as if the new or libertarian left had never been and the SDP and Labour right were blameless for the party’s electoral defeats.The impact of radical journalism on the left has depended on the strength and legitimacy of left politics in Westminster. The last flourish of left journalism was in the early Eighties, when Labour’s innovative new left had a national platform at London’s County Hall, when the alternative economic strategy and a radical democratic agenda for party and state were still a focus of lively debate.

An apparent connection with power provided an aphrodisiac for left journalism, lots of it: New Socialist gained a circulation of over 10,000; a radical New Statesman thrived; Marxism Today relaunched; Richard Gott’s Agenda page in The Guardian was indispensable reading.But we’d go out of business if we depended on the return of a new Labour left to give radical journalism its political buzz. Help! Have the boundaries of political debate really become so closed in that the theme tune of that tawdry politician Harold Wilson is today’s ode to political achievement?

Politicians are almost bound to succumb to the balance of economic and political forces. The job of a socialist journal is to challenge those narrowing pressures.
Since I edit an upstart journal of the left, the monthly Red Pepper, you might expect me to claim that we can step into the breach. Certainly, we learnt from the New Statesman in its iconoclastic days. My own memories of being an occasional nervous contributor when the regulars were Christopher Hitchens, James Fenton, Paul Foot and Anna Coote, influence my editorial efforts. We too engage in mainstream political debate rather than snipe from a sideline – that, at least, is our intention.But we cannot on our own challenge Murdoch’s force-fed culture, with its abilities to breed cynicism and powerlessness.Every day and every week, informed dissent gains sustenance from Channel 4 News, from columnists such as Polly Toynbee in The Independent, Francis Wheen, Paul Foot (again) and Decca Aitkenhead in The Guardian, Nick Cohen and much else in Will Hutton’s Observer and Neal Ascherson in the Independent on Sunday.

The car is strong and I am confident for the rest of the season.”I had a bad start because of wheel spin and coming from behind is difficult because you have to be aggressive without making mistakes It was a big relief when I heard about Michael. Jarno Trulli’s engine failure after a stirring final drive for Prost- Mugen-Honda pushed Schumacher one place up the order and his very presence appeared to intimidate Rubens Barrichello into throwing his Stewart off the road and now he was seventh.On the penultimate lap he brushed aside Damon Hill’s Arrows-Yamaha and was through the red mist into the sixth place that earned him a potentially crucial point. For the visitors, Tiger Woods is a dubious favourite on his Ryder Cup debut, and the experience of Fred Couples is preferred at 11-1 (Hills).TO WIN THE RYDER CUP: 1-2 United States (Coral), 2-1 Europe (widely available), 10-1 tie (Ladbrokes).TOP EUROPEAN POINTS SCORER: 4-1 Montgomerie (H), 6-1 Faldo (C), 6-1 Langer (C,H,L), 9-1 Olazabal (C,L), 10-1 Westwood (C), 11-1 Parnevik (H), 12- 1 Woosnam (L), Clarke (H,L), 14-1 Rocca (C,H), 16-1 Johansson (H), 20- 1 Bjorn (C,H,L), 33-1 Garrido (H,L).TOP US POINTS SCORER: 100-30 Woods (C,H), 13-2 Lehman (H), 7-1 Mickelson (C), 8-1 Leonard (L), Love (H), 10-1 O’Meara (C,L), 11-1 Couples (H), 14-1 Furyk (C), 20-1 Hoch (L), Faxon (H,L), 25-1 Maggert (L), Janzen (L).C -Coral, H -Wm Hill, L -Ladbrokes. True, the Europeans’ preparation has not been ideal, and the Cup holders’ cannot match the depth of experience in their opponents’ side. Instead of loading all of his debts into a small subsidiary and letting it go bankrupt as many businessmen would have done Heseltine struggled to pay off all his debts knowing he needed a squeaky-clean past if he was going to have a political future.What Town and Topic did expose was Michael Heseltine’s fantastic ability to spot good people. Keighley 8

Huddersfield 18
Huddersfield finally made their extra ability and experience tell at Cougar Park, but only after battling their way through a fierce Division Premiership semi-final.They won through despite being outplayed for the first 40 minutes by a Keighley side that no longer has many of its better know players, but still shows all its old spirit.Huddersfield played into their hands during the first half. We have all grown up together, met our partners and wives together, and have started families together.