12 unrelated links

1. Here is the Jewish Chronicle, advising all non-Jews not to vote Labour because Jeremy Corbyn is anti-semitic. You have probably tired, as I have, of people saying "I know everything is extraordinary nowadays but this is REALLY extraordinary". So what do I say? This is now normal, I suppose. As you were - how many days are there left to save the NHS?

2. This link I am giving you for two reasons. First, as part of my ongoing project of giving you access to Zadie Smith's writings. Second, because it is well worth a read anyway. It's about an artist called Celia Paul, who seems to be, at the risk of sounding utterly bourgeois, really quite odd. Or, to put it differently, it's about one of Lucien Freud's muses and lovers. If you've ever wondered why on earth all those women put up with Freud then read this - and continue to wonder.

3. Do you remember all the fuss about atheism a few years back? And do you wonder what happened to it? New Atheism, social justice and hamartiology answers your questions in great style. (In genuinely unconnected news, it will not have passed you by that Kanye West has released an album called Jesus is King and that Kim Kardashian and her children got baptised in Armenia.)

4. The European Convention on Human Rights (which is the basis of the Human Rights Act in the UK) makes it illegal to abolish private schools. But of course it does! When, in 1950, the drafters of the ECHR surveyed the ruins of Europe, reviewed the atrocities of WWII and vowed "Never again!", they clearly had in mind the fundamental threat to human dignity - none greater! - that might result from forcing nice children to associate with the sorts of children who go to state schools. Indeed, if only Herr Hitler had been to the right kind of school, who knows what unpleasantness could have been avoided ... Seriously, whether you are on the left or the right, you should remember that human rights law is a well-intentioned but doddering and ridiculous force for wishy-washy conservatism - a kind of spectral Dominic Grieve. There are many worse things out there, but it is not an infallible source of wisdom.

5. Someone you might want to follow: Wolfgang Munchau and Eurointelligence. Interesting accounts of what is really going on in Europe. Not just Brexit, of course. How about this, for example: "If you read the German business press, you get an immediate sense of the country's dependence on CO2-emitting technologies. Three of the top stories in FAZ this morning were the final go-ahead for the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, a new coal-fired power station going online, and a rise in SUV sales at Volkswagen. We sometimes feel as if entering a parallel universe time warp when reading German newspapers. The country is not even pretending to try and reach the Paris climate targets." If that makes you think that the British press does not really tell you much about Europe and you want to know more then Eurointelligence is worth a look.

6. Someone else you might want to follow: Niall Gooch. Likes murder mysteries, Ravilious, trains. Not a fan of Dr Beeching. Wrote this: "Have you ever actually seen an old maid hiking to Holy Communion through the mists of the autumn morning? I have." Also on Twitter, rightly admiring Uxbridge's Civic Centre, for example. Here's what he wrote about Brexit (he voted Remain ... and yet ...).

7. You know Conway's Game of Life? No? You should. This is a bit fiddly but otherwise fun for all the family.

8. You know that the European Court of Justice has held that individuals have the right to request that search engines remove certain web pages from their search results. Google de-lists a lot of BBC web pages as a result. This is the BBC's reaction: "As a contribution to public policy and debate, the BBC has decided to make clear to licence fee payers which pages have been impacted by publishing this list of links." Intrigued? See some here. Not an example of the Streisand effect. Or at least not yet.

9. Private firefighters in California.

10. The signature film of every major city. Well, a lot of US cities and some others.

11. Switzerland.

12. This is pretty cool.