Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

18.02.11: Steve Bell on continuing unrest in the Middle East

Don't miss ...

'I couldn't give a baby the life I wanted to': Commenter bookfay's frank and honest account of the aftermath of her abortion

Highlighting local council workers' pay is a smokescreen: Even if you sacked all our top managers you'd make hardly any saving, says Lambeth councillor Sarflondon

'Her attackers felt entitled to humiliate and violate another human being': Survivor of sexual assault Speaksense44 speaks their mind on the case of Lara Logan

Editors' picks

Public hostility to politics will deliver a yes to AV

Martin Kettle: The mood is for change: people hate the system and believe in fairness. The May vote will have lasting consequences for British politics

Opinion directs the boot of truth at the crotch of power. Long may it sting

Simon Jenkins: After Baltimore's raucous HL Mencken died, some felt the age of the column was over. Yet today news is the endangered species

A welfare bill for people with straightforward lives

Julia Unwin: Simplify the welfare support system by all means – but don't forget that the lives of real people are complex

Kayte Lawton: Most overpayment is not caused by fraud

Bahrain crackdown will make citizens more determined

Abdulnabi Alekry: The strategy was to demonstrate peacefully, but attacking Bahraini activists has ruined hopes of a brokered deal

Muhammad min Libya: Regime must now fear its people

The new elitism of internships

Ross Perlin: Internships are the face of privilege, restricting opportunities to those who can work for little or nothing – or even pay for it

Adding insult to Lara Logan's injury

Amanda Marcotte: Some blame the CBS reporter for her assault; others condemn Egypt as a society of sexual violence. Neither is the real problem

Latest posts

5hr 19min ago
We don't need to de-industrialise to meet our emissions targets

Response: Investing in a low-carbon economy will create growth and keep Europe competitive, says Carlo Jaeger
10hr 52min ago
Hopes and fears: an Algiers diary

Karima Bennoune: After last Saturday's protest, the desire for reform and freedom is stirring in Algeria – despite the shadow of past civil war
15hr 38min ago
Belgium's 250 days without a national government

Laurens de Vos: The south and north are struggling to find common ground – can the Flemish wish for a confederation find Walloon support?
16hr 36min ago
For David Cameron's forests U-turn, timing may be all

Jonathan Freedland: Government blunders that come early in a term are often forgiven, but how did the sell-off policy ever come into being?
17hr 35min ago
Suicide threats don't help disability debate

Sharon Brennan: Turning the cuts battle into a life-or-death matter detracts from the message of the everyday harm DLA changes will have
19hr 24min ago
In death, as in life, David Kato has the power to help gay Ugandan people

Prossy Kakooza: The murder of the gay rights activist may at least save BN, a lesbian asylum seeker like me, from deportation
19hr 38min ago
Abortion is quietly shoved off the agenda again

Zoe Williams: A practical way to protect women in need of an early termination has been quashed in the high court. Ideology has trumped clinical need
19hr 54min ago
Only pressure from below can bring Egypt democracy

Seumas Milne: The decapitation of the regime was just the start. The revolution will have to go further if it's going to deliver what people want
20hr 24min ago
It is vital these difficult cases are heard in public

Deborah Orr: Should a young woman be sterilised? Should a sex ban be imposed on a man in his 40s? Hearings involving vulnerable people need close monitoring
20hr 54min ago
A rotten sort of recovery

John Harris: The coalition's 'flexible' economic model relies on cripplingly low pay and rising job insecurity
21hr 25min ago
Ebooks and their ilk are no replacement for libraries

Response: These community spaces provide so much more than just free access to books, says Catherine McNally
21hr 54min ago
Listen to this message of hope from Europe's Arabs – and the warning

Timothy Garton Ash: Spain is closer to the Arab world than any other European country, but it has no better response than the rest of the EU
1 day ago
In praise of … Castle Drogo

Editorial: In the care of the National Trust today, £11m must now be raised to safeguard the structure of this compelling folly
1 day ago
Steve Bell on David Cameron's forestry U-turn – cartoon

The government is abandoning plans to change the ownership of 258,000 hectares of state-owned woodland
1 day ago
Referendum law: Of pipers and tunes

Editorial: There is one point on which campaigners agree: the law that will govern the referendum is inadequate