If we Liberal Democrats accept this referendum as part of a new coalition pact, we will bring ruination on ourselves.
He should have been franker in condemning Robert Mugabe for his ruination of Zimbabwe.But such shortcomings and South Africa's failings since his retirement from active politics pale into insignificance when set against the magnitude of his overall achievement.
But the economy's ruination brought the possibility of political rebirth.
As a milestone on Afghanistan's post-conflict journey, this should be celebrated, but cautiously for the promised recovery lies further ahead than ruination lies behind.To the long list of Afghanistan's dysfunctional institutions may soon be added its parliament.
Most are smallholders, who fall easily into debt, and a dry summer can mean ruination.
Conservatives have worried that same-sex marriage would somehow entail the ruination of the family as the foundation of society, but we have seen only the flowering of family values among same-sex households, the domestication of the gays.
Yet by fighting on, the two sides risk bringing ruination to their country.
After centuries of domination by either the Lithuanians, Poles or Russians, ruination during the second world war and decimation by Stalin, the nail Belarus has been sitting on since 1994 is Alexander Lukashenka.Mr Lukashenka's rigged referendum on October 17th gave him the right to change his country's constitution and stand for a third presidential term in 2006.
There are plans to build five-star hotels, golf courses and yacht clubs.In 2010 the opening of a 4km bridge from the Chinese mainland to the island brought its picturesque villages within easier reach of the usual ruination by land-hungry developers.
Mr Brown the flop, and Mr Brown the saviour of the universe, Bagehot submits, are more similar than they may at first appear.In his response to the crisis, Mr Brown has demonstrated many of the traits that contributed to his ruination before.
And the uncertainty is spiking the efforts of Tendai Biti, the MDC man who is the unity government's finance minister, to secure the foreign cash the country sorely needs to recover from Mr Mugabe's ruination of the economy.Some say this is part of Zanu-PF's plan to fight the next election, perhaps as early as next year, on its usual populist platform, blaming the West for all Zimbabwe's ills.
