God almighty. The saintly patience shown by @georgemonbiot.bsky.social as he fields inane question after inane quest from Tim Stanley on The Moral Maze… Well done, George.
If you’d be my bodyguard, I can be your long-lost pal.
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God almighty. The saintly patience shown by @georgemonbiot.bsky.social as he fields inane question after inane quest from Tim Stanley on The Moral Maze… Well done, George.
At first I thought to myself “but Chris doesn’t write the headlines - maybe he says more in the article”. But no, literally NOTHING in several hundred words of what’s essentially a giddy puff piece.
Say what you like about ChatGPT but this quick experiment in getting it to create a cartoon, something that took two quick prompts, is lacking only in the rubbish dialogue I gave it, something that was really just placeholder text for the test.
My highlight from an anonymous Reform Conference Diary entry, which a source provided @mrhenrymorris.substack.com, who’s kindly published it. What a day they had yesterday!
Yeah, that sounds more human somehow. I think it’s that the word ‘assistant’ has been co-opted by tech bros in recent years and has become associated in my mind with AI assistants.
The king thinks you’re a proper dickhead, Andrea.
2/2 But… optical assistant? What sort of job title is that? It sounds like something computer-generated rather than of 3D flesh. If she WAS computer-generated, I’m impressed and terrified by this technology in equal measure.
1/2 Had my first eye test in 20-odd years the other day, confirming what I’d long suspected: I need reading glasses.😞 A few days later, I find myself at SpecSavers embarking on a world that’s entirely new and somewhat confusing. The optical assistant I spoke to was SO helpful and patient, though.
Labour need to utterly condemn this in the strongest possible terms. Any equivocation or caveats whatsoever will be contemptible.
“I’m watching you, human.”
Lee Anderson, Andrea Jenkyns, Nadine Dorries… a bolder Tory strategist would capitalise on the departure of these assorted arseholes as an advert for the party, but of course the strategists they’ve got, which seem to be cut from the same shit-stained cloth as Labour’s, will advise them to compete.
This message to my mum - I always call on Saturdays to do the FT magazine quiz with her over the phone - prompted a two-screen reply about the complications she and my dad are having today. I’ve inherited this long-winded trait, and this exposure really hammers home how others must perceive me. 😳
3/3 Fat chance. This is doubling down on a political strategy that isn’t working, and is bad policy (and rhetoric) too. Just do a good job of governing and achieve more good things, things people will judge you on. Once again I’m having to share this: bsky.app/profile/alis...
2/3 Honestly, if Starmer recognises that things aren’t working - at least in the public’s mind - and he probably does, does he really think a harder line on immigration is the way to go? Or does he think Mahmoud will be SO good that he’ll win over the sort of journos and voters obsessed with this?
1/3 I’ve got to be honest when I say I don’t know much about Shabana Mahmoud, who’s replaced Yvette Cooper as Home Secretary, but Chris Mason has described her in a report on #r4today as “to the right of the party” and appointed for the firm line she’ll take on boats. Well, isn’t that just great?
I’ll say this for Limahl’s Never Ending Story: if you’re going to have a 36-hour earworm with no end in sight, this song has the best title in the business.
Also, how the hell do Robinson and Curtice think voters know what Farage stands for if not through media exposure? Most of them haven’t met the man. And who exactly gives him this exposure? Does he have his own newspapers, TV channels and radio stations? No. No, he does not.
It’s also not just media coverage of Farage himself or even his wretched party; it’s the constant focus on his talking points. Starmer shares some of the blame, of course. But Robinson’s brazen pooh-poohing of the listeners’ letters he referred to when asking the question (at about 7.30) stank.
“It’s not just the media coverage”, says John Curtice on #r4today to a question from Nick Robinson that dripped with scorn; it’s that, unlike Keir Starmer, people think they know what Nigel Farage stands for. Yes, that’s true. But no one thinks it’s ‘just’ and, Nick, why ask a psephologist this?
I'm not.
3/3 Why must we either fly these flags in wildly inappropriate places or disavow them? Can’t we just say “yes, there are times and places for them”? Wouldn’t that be healthy? - Big international sporting events? Check! - Culturally significant landmarks? Sure! - Mini-roundabouts? No, fuck off.
2/3 Beyond this, though, it occurred to me about halfway through my ride in this morning that I hadn’t seen any flags despite the number of roundabouts I’d ridden over and tower blocks I’d passed. Which is - or should be - normal. Why can’t sanity be restored elsewhere? Why is it all or nothing?
1/3 Look closely and you’ll see two flags flying from the top of Tower Bridge, near where I am now, having cycled into central London for the first time in a few weeks. The one on the left is a Union Jack. On the right it’s a St George’s Cross. And I like them. They’re inclusive and appropriate.
Of course, it might just be that he gets off on being seen to be relevant, and journalists are all too willing to help him by reporting on and talking to him regardless of whether they share his tragically small-minded views.
But this isn't to say that we don't broadly have one or that, where it's lacking, his policies will improve things.
Yep. I suspect he sort of casually believes it in a "yeah, there's probably some truth in what I'm saying but it's not why I went into politics" kind of way. I must stress, of course, that *I* think there's very little truth in it, other than saying a shared cultural identity is generally good.
2/2 What would each of those mean for keeping Reform out of power? Personally, I’d say B) would be best, as he’s so intolerably unlikeable but also desperate for the limelight, so this might damage Reform. A bit. But the collateral damage to the debate! Then again, that applies to all scenarios.
1/2 What’s little Bobby Jenrick’s plan? If we rule out that he just really, really believes the poisonous shit he’s spilling out and simply must evangelise, that leaves, in descending likelihood: A) A bid for the Tory leadership B) A defection to Reform C) Creation of a new party that he’d lead
True.
Thanks. (And it probably *was* slightly snobbish, but I didn't really mean anything by it. It was just a way of identifying Rajan who, as I say, I quite like.)
Yeah, I wasn't really asking you as a lawyer, more as a political commentator. I don't have a clear answer myself. I just think that we have to be clear on the nature of the advice we ask. Obviously we need to comply with the law. But some (possibly all) politicians might be expected to do more.
My rule of thumb is to assume anyone who implies a stranger is a massive snobbish cunt for a lighthearted reply on social media* is a massive cunt, snobbish or otherwise. *Which, if they'd read further replies to, they'd see is from someone who goes on to praise the person deploying glottal stops.
God! The whistler seeks me out.
1) "Please advise me on minimising my tax according to the letter of the law." 2) "Please advise me on how to pay amounts of tax according to the spirit of the law (and not contravening its letter)." 3) "Please advise me on how to pay my tax legally and in the spirit of my party's tax position."
I told myself I wouldn't get into this (see below) but, as a general point, it feels like while this is a sensible suggestion, it needs clarification. Which of the options in my follow-up post would be a fair instruction to an advisor from an MP? Would their party matter? bsky.app/profile/alis...
That's the one but a) I'm joking, of course, and b) I actually quite like him despite his over-exposure, to be fair.
Ha. Can you imagine the Telegraph headlines if they *hadn't* adopted that strategy?
Ha! I love children's birthday parties, as long as I'm not hosting them. When they get to a certain age, you can drop them off and get a bit of free babysitting; if they're too young to be left, at least you can share the burden with other parents and sneakily eat their party food scraps...
I quite liked Rylan despite myself until a few days ago when it felt somehow like the instincts I was overriding had been right all along. It was almost comforting.
I am. Although to be fair to him, I actually quite like Amol Rajan, so I'm really just jumping on the bandwagon of whoever spotted that he gets loads of BBC gigs and must have a good agent.
Yes, I totally agree on your first point. See below. I agree on your second too. It's weird, isn't it? At least when you have a government you didn't vote for you can tut about their shit governing in a way that doesn't make you feel complicit. bsky.app/profile/alis...
I hear from a BBC insider that the short list includes Amol Rajan, that young guy with the glottal stops from the Today programme and the bloke who replaced Paxman on University Challenge.
Exactly.
Doesn't sound great... but, tbqhwy, I've stopped caring.
He planned to finish his original soundbite with 'tweeting' until he realised what that would mean for how he started it. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...
(Maybe she is behind the scenes. Who knows? And, truly, God help us if no one is. But unless I have evidence, she's on her own.)
Maybe. Maybe not. As I say, I'm too exhausted to even investigate, and feel no loyalty in helping out a comrade, because at the moment, she doesn't feel much like one when she doesn't speak out against Cooper and Starmer. I mean, obviously she can't. She's in the government. But still.
I defended Angela Rayner last year. Now, I can't be bothered to look into what she's been accused of or seek out ways of defending her if there are any. She and her front-bench colleagues have done very little recently to defend the values of basic compassion and common decency that I hold dear.
I’m not a politician, of course, and am sure I thought it would be in the UK’s interests ultimately.
Pretty grim and despicable stuff if true. That said and in the spirit of complete candour, I can’t, with my hand on my heart, claim that, in the period 2016 to 2020, I didn’t hope the EU and some of its member states would do things to force our government’s hands. I might even have called for it.
Yes to point one. You’re probable right on point two. Fwiw, I love Scotland, lived there very happily (as an Englishman) for four years, and at the height of Brexit madness (something that we’re not really out of) came close to supporting an independent Scotland for its sake.
‘Supposed’ was my attempt at neither endorsing nor denying the idea that nationalism in Scotland is civic. It’s a debate I wanted to avoid. I proved nothing. You, however, have demonstrated your prickliness.
If the Mail has decided that, regardless of what it does, this government is leftwing, maybe, you know, it has nothing to lose - and plenty to gain - in being leftwing? (Yes, childcare and yudder yudder. But that’s not what you’re spending 99% of your time talking about or what disgusts your base.)
Funnily enough, because of my crisp-heavy regime, this is how I describe my abdomen.
Joke's on you, Guardian. Our kitchen is too small for a dishwasher.
This is worrying but, Guardian subs, why would you illustrate a story about physics with some kids who are clearly in a biology lesson? www.theguardian.com/education/20...
Yeah, that’s a fair point, and I’m underplaying the phenomena you describe. I guess nationality is objective but that doesn’t stop racists saying it shouldn’t apply to certain people. It’s a mixed blessing, Britishness being more universal and less ethnicity-based. But I think my first point stands.
... sub-identities within the UK and the idea that, unlike Scotishness (and its supposed civic nationalism), Englishness - a slippery term - is associated by some people (wrongly, depending on the contexts, but I'm talking MOST contexts) with ethnicity, unlike the objective nature of nationalities.
Great piece. And yes, it's annoying that those nationalities get a free pass. My tuppence-worth: the proximity of Ireland vs the distance of places these other countries colonised, coupled with the British presence in Northern Ireland, make the Union Jack a flash point. Problems are worsened by...
Is this the right forum to point out that, as well as being Canadian (and Irish), Carney has British citizenship, so Mark Carney himself is in fact also the British Mark Carney?
Hooray! I'm up to 500 followers! Oh, it's a cleavage.
Oh, it's awful elsewhere, for sure. I won't defend them on this. I just wondered whether Twitter might be worse in terms of any of: - Wording and content - Frequency and volume of these awful messages - Dominance at the expense of other messages Maybe not. For the reasons you say, I left Twitter!
2/2 However - and this certainly wouldn't excuse it - is it possible we can conclude that they've cynically calculated that, Twitter being what it is today, those messages are appropriate there but not so much elsewhere? (It still won't win people over and it's wrong, I want to stress.)
1/2 I'm no fan of Labour immigration strategy. First and foremost, it's appallingly cruel, wrong and counterproductive, so it's bad policy. It's also bad politics. And they must know the strategy isn't working. Just look at my output on here. I've been scathing in recent months.
'Fear' because the treatment might work? (This is from a piece in the Financial Express yesterday, which is a citation in an actual Wikipedia article dedicated to Trump's health: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_and...)
#EmilyThornberryWasRight
Kemi Badenoch and her pledge to reverse Labour’s ban on new fossil fuel operators in the North Sea doing a great job there in reminding me that, while Labour has been disgraceful in many areas, not least immigration, her lot are far worse. Thanks, Kemi, and #r4today headlines!
Learning a new word once every 365 days should certainly be within my grasp.
Fuck it. This is a sign to stop playing Wordle, I think. Was hoping to get to a 365-day streak but if I had, would it really have improved my life?
They really should have used protection while flag-shagging.
Ha! What have you started, Chris?
One of many tedious immigration-related headlines from the Daily Express online. If, on a day as dark and shameful as today, a paper whose readership Labour’s policies are designed to appeal to can spin this into a story about migrants having more rights, isn’t it time to reconsider their strategy?
Imagine representing Scottish Labour today. Just imagine!
As I say, I'm not going to defend the party today...
... principle of a zero-tolerance approach. And clearly it's right to be against corruption. But... yes, there's a germ of truth in what you say as applied to the party that won last year in my opinion, but it's only become fully apparent - at least to my innocent eyes - in the past few months.
I don't see myself as a centrist but, Labour circa 2023/24 was just about close enough to the left for me to be happy to campaign for it. I'm also not commenting here on whether Corbyn was guilty of antisemitism, deliberate or otherwise, as the argument has been done to death, but I support the...
That's one way of looking at it, a very cynical one. I don't feel like defending the party today for obvious reasons. But it *looked* like it was simply becoming more centrist compared to Corbyn, as well as being seen to take a zero-tolerance approach to antisemitism and corruption.
My hope now is that, in the same way that no one predicted a Labour victory in 2024 in the aftermath of the 2019 election, given everything they needed to do to turn things around, the party will ditch at least one of McSweeney and Starmer with enough time on the clock to turn things around again.
Yeah. In a lot of ways you've been proved right. I still don't see what alternative there was to getting the Tories out. But, on this issue at least, Labour is in many ways worse or differently bad.
It would have surprised me had someone seen into the future last June and told me he'd be like this in power. It no longer surprises me. I've come to expect it. I'm this close to abandoning the party but am clinging on in the hope of McSweeney being dumped.
Seriously, we need a march. Is anyone organising one?
Labour apologists*: ask yourself what your reaction to these various developments would have been were a Tory government behind them. *I'm still a party member. For now. But I won't defend them on this nonsense.
Sorry, but wtaf? This does absolutely nothing but ensure that even more people, including children, have to use irregular crossings, and blocks people who even this government have recognised are refugees from being with their families. This is utterly sickening from Labour. 1/
Yet again, I find myself having to wheel this out. My hope for the party I campaigned so vigorously for in June last year has a hit a new low, and I see no signs that it won't continue its descent towards the Earth's core. Cc @yvettecooper-mp.bsky.social
You can’t out-fash the fash. Stop trying. It makes us hate you, and the fash will never love you.
How's Labour getting on with all those "tough choices"? It seems to me it would be a tougher choice to show an ounce of compassion towards asylum seekers in this climate of frothing hatred towards them, but maybe I'm being too literal and haven't engaged a brain as big as Morgan McSweeney's.
Starmer's weird endorsement of the George cross, rather than a more normal "why do you ask? There's a place for flags, I suppose, but I'm not very interested in them", is appropriate: it's both a red flag, as in a warning of his susceptibility to nonsense, and a white flag, as in surrendering to it.
I think something vaguely logarithmic goes on in our minds, doesn't it? Year 13 gets locked in as a Really Big Number, and so anything above about 20 seems absurdly large. Hope term gets off to a good start!
Ha! As an aside, 'Fritzl' *does* sound like a challenger brand social media app, doesn't it? The type the alt-right might favour, in fact. Not that I'm saying that sort of keyboard-warrior gobshite is more aligned with Josef Fritzl's worldview than those further left. I definitely wouldn't say that.
Also, don't people like Musk see themselves as the true upholders of Western values, values they think refugees don't hold? Free rides that a Labour government supposedly offers refugees aside, I thought his argument was that their views DON'T align with Labour's, so how are votes being bought?
1st September today, huh? Take your age at your next birthday (or your age now if it's your birthday today), subtract five, and that's the academic year you'd be starting today if you'd never left school. Horrific, isn't it? (I don't know why I'm doing this to myself and you.)
'If' doing a hell of a lot of heavy [etc]
Thought you might. Just checking!
Cc @zoejardiniere.bsky.social, @mikegalsworthy.bsky.social, @georgemonbiot.bsky.social
I've Googled this and searched on here to no avail... Are there any pro-refugee marches going on in London in the near future? As you can imagine, Google's results are clogged up with news of wankers shouting outside hotels.
Yes, absolutely - although my comment was in response to Peter saying he suspects he's not alone in thinking Zoe is doing a brilliant job.
You're not alone.
Ah, I can help you, Henry. What happened is that Yvette's campaigning in September 2015 famously had such great effect on Theresa May's government and those that followed that the Tories skewed things so far in favour of refugees that we now need to reset the balance in favour of hardworking brits.
Yvette, I'm confused.
Tightening rules on bringing asylum seekers’ family members to the UK is great politics if you ignore the fact that many natural Labour voters will hate it and Reform voters think that asylum seekers already here shouldn’t be allowed to stay. But that aside, it’s brilliant. Well done, Yvette Cooper!