Mixed marks on Brown report card

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An old-fashioned school-masterly air descends over the papers as they weigh up the Prime Ministerial new boy.

"Fine words," comments the Daily Telegraph as it assesses Gordon Brown's first major foreign policy speech. But it wonders how he will enact them.

The Sun says he is right to threaten to "hammer" Iran if it fails to rule out a nuclear weapons programme.

The Independent, however, feels that it had been left "none the wiser", with "more questions unanswered than resolved."

"Worthy goals," says The Guardian - but the paper thinks that he will need a lot of diplomacy to achieve them.

Bottle merchant?

Buying alcohol at any time of the day or night could soon be a thing of the past - if the Daily Mirror is correct.

Under the headline, "War on Booze," the paper says Prime Minister Gordon Brown is planning to prevent shops selling drink in the evening after 2300.

The Daily Telegraph says a report on the effects of 24-hour licensing will go to the Home Office in the New Year.

But as anecdotal evidence, the Daily Mail offers a street in Oxford which has been nicknamed "Vomit Alley".

Home truths

The Mail claims credit for exposing what it sees as further evidence of Home Office blundering.

Pointing to leaked memos, it says that the Home Secretary was told of problems at the agency that licenses security guards, and kept quiet.

The paper declares that "she had no excuse at all for her silence".

And the Daily Express is annoyed that senior staff in the same department shared Â£2m in bonuses - despite being declared "not fit for purpose".

Stormin' Norman

The writer Norman Mailer may be dead, but tributes are still being paid to what Andrew O'Hagan in the Daily Telegraph calls his "honesty and energy."

A friend of Mailer's, O'Hagan recalls how well he had performed at his last appearance on a public platform.

When told: "You did it again," Mailer replied: "We're always doing it. We must remain fools at all cost."

A Financial Times cartoon shows angels on a cloud - one battered and bleeding, saying: "I just met Norman Mailer."