Yesterday, we asked whether the launch of Nick Clegg's new policy document, 'Make it Happen', would get good coverage ('Can Clegg make it happen in the papers?'.)

There is certainly a raft of coverage and comment across the papers - and the vast majority of it is favourable:

The FT, Independent, Telegraph and Guardian, have coverage in the news sections. Interestingly, its The Daily Mail that gives most coverage to the detail of the measures ('Lib Dems vow to slash taxes for poorer people by cutting billions in Whitehall waste').  The sketchwriters also give the launch a fair amount of attention.  Both Simon Hoggart in The Guardian and Ann Treneman in The Times obsess amusingly about the dishwasher that tried its best to derail the launch.

Firstly, two tories give opposing views.  Michael Brown in The Independent thinks that the bold move is actually chasing votes in marginal Lib Dem/Tory constituencies and is likely to be seen as such ('Lib Dems can try and turn themselves into Tories, but I fear they'll still be squeezed out') Whereas Iain Dale in The Telegraph is far more effusive - suggesting that the policy agenda will give a brave Clegg an advantage over a timid Cameron ('What a shame the only tax cutter is Lib Dems leader Nick Clegg')

The Times leader gives consideration to who will benefit from the proposals.  It welcome the move but says that the positive message of cuts for lower income people will be overwhelmed by worries of tax rises for the better off ('Liberal Freedom'). 

Many pieces raise doubts as to whether the Lib Dem grass roots will support the measures.  However, on The Guardian Blog Helene Mulholland shows that the messages from the grassroots so far have also been overwhelmingly positive. ('Cutting taxes, can Clegg make it happen?')

Finally, Alf Young's piece in The Herald might be a pointer to the way things will play out in the papers over the next few months.  The column isn't about the Lib Dem per se - it concentrates on the tax battles between Brown and Cameron ('Mr Brown tries not to blink in the tax spotlight').  A similar piece written at the beginning of the week wouldn't have mentioned the third party at all. But by having a distinctive position the Lib Dems muscle into an issue where they were previously ignored. Commentators will find it much harder to ignore Clegg's line in similar articles in the future. If that is the case, Nick Clegg has not only got good coverage today - but is better placed to receive it in the weeks and months ahead.

Three separate items of interest today.

Firstly, David Aaronovitch cuts through the knives debate to reminds us how little we know about the statistics. (We are all stabbing blindly at knife crime)

Secondly, anyone who has read CentreForum's work on population (see 'From boom to bust? fertility, aging and demographic change' or 'Does Britain need a population policy') will enjoy Dominic Lawson's piece in The Independent today - 'The hypocrisy of the population zealots'.  Lawson's stimulus is a report from the Optimum Population Trust, a group that says the Government should set targets to reduce UK population to less than half of today.   of procreation and the work it is based on:

[The author] argues: "If the intrinsic value of procreating is the self-fulfilment of the procreator ... then we can presume this experiential value, this fulfilment, is achieved after the first birth – and merely replicated thereafter." I suppose the same argument could be used at the other end of the process. Wife to husband, after consummation of marriage: "That's the last time we're doing that." Husband: "Why?" Wife: "This experiential value, this fulfilment, has now been achieved. To do it again would be mere replication."

Finally, regular readers who follow the ups and downs of the commentariat will find Gideon Rachman's piece in today's FT a stimulating read.  His main argument, that American journalists treat their role more seriously than the UK, is summed up in the title to the piece 'American journalism, still a model'.

He concludes with an interesting observation about the UK opinion writers:

British journalists are often curiously unwilling to acknowledge their power. A recent Reuters Institute report on the “Power of the Commentariat” is in no doubt that opinion writers shape politics. But the authors, John Lloyd of this newspaper and Julia Hobsbawm, note that: “No commentator to whom we spoke said s/he was powerful. It doesn’t figure on the permissible responses of British commentators.”

Despite the growth of the blogosphere, and the decline of newspaper sales, one only has to look at recent Guardian debates about Gordon Brown's premiership to understand that commentators are still exerting a powerful influence on the political world.