Many prefer to pull out their own teeth - poll

Liberal Democrats would rather pull out their own teeth than have Sir Menzies Campbell lead the party into the next election, a poll has revealed.

Martin Amis: the Horrorism of dentistry

The novelist Martin Amis has coined a new term for the dread and fear of the dentist's dark workings: Horrorism. In a moving, and sometimes unsettling essay, published in this week's Observer, he describes the pain and terror of his own experiences in the dentist's chair. "Of course there is a terror of going to the dentist, just as there is anxiety and then terror when you hear the first howl of the wolves in the Siberian wastes. The "horror" is reserved for when the wolves are upon you, the death-drill of the dentist, the squirt of blood, and the pat-pat-pat of fang-shrapnel. It is always horrible." Martin Amis' teeth are 12 years old.

Gordon Brown in U-turn on own Teeth

Gordon Brown is reported to be considering drastic measures to counter the apparent popularity of David Cameron, who in a recent Guardian/ICM poll leads Brown by 13 points when voters were asked who they would vote for in a general election. Brown is said by friends to have decided to replace all his teeth with wind turbines in an audacious bid to outflank Cameron on green issues. "Let's be honest, Gordon's smile is a bit off-putting at the best of times," said a source close to the Brown camp. "This way, when he smiles, he'll be powering a Scottish crofting village, or a council estate in Croydon. What can that turbine on Cameron's roof do? Whisk a zabaglione?"

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Lunatic elected President of Turkmenistan

A handsomely coiffured lunatic was sworn in as president of Turkmenistan yesterday after winning 89% of last Sunday's popular vote. The new president, Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, used to be the personal dentist of the previous dictator, Saparmurat Niyazov, who died last December. Mr Niyazov, who styled himself Turkmenbashi, or Father of the Turkmen, had previously been considered the most deranged and authoritarian national leader on the planet, known for renaming the month of January after himself and April after his mother, closing all hospitals outside the capital and banning gold teeth and lip-synching.

Reaction to the new president was mixed in the main square in Ashgabat, the country's capital. "I worship the new president as a god!" said one old man who declined to give his name. "We could all just die of happiness, and probably will!" said another.

A common concern was expressed by a passing taxi driver: "We are a dirt poor predominantly Muslim socialist dictatorship with the world's fifth largest reserves of natural gas. How long can it be before Chavez, Ahmedinejad and that London mayor come sniffing around?"

"And don't get me started on Bush," he added.