Another evening ends with the theme tune of Hill Street Blues. youtu.be/swLQxNvsa9M?... Be careful out there, and remember the illiberals will not always win.
Gardens, genealogy, theatre, musically eclectic. Politically Left of Centre. Londoner. Formerly East of Southall, now East of Oxford; I've never lived more than 10 minutes from the A40.
658 followers 1,319 following 2,013 posts
view profile on Bluesky
Another evening ends with the theme tune of Hill Street Blues. youtu.be/swLQxNvsa9M?... Be careful out there, and remember the illiberals will not always win.
I know, I know, but: The president of the US saying, literally, "we're going in" in reference to sending the military to an American city for no reason beyond terrorizing the local population should be the most immediately impeachable shit imaginable
Yes my offsprings' friends have mostly had their children in their mid-to-late 30s even in their forties and have often stopped at one. I can only think of one who has more than 2 and she did start younger than the others. A lot have not started families at all yet (aged 38-45) and are not likely to
"For the government it’s quite mad to keep using X. It’s active participation in its own destruction and against its own interests. I cannot fathom the logic of doing it. It would be like a Reform government communicating entirely through the Guardian comments section."
My new project ‘Modern Medievals - Art Bridging Centuries’ and these images illustrate the fifty - yes 50 - individual A5 pictures that form the main elements of the project. I have a vision for an illustrated artbook and framed work! Any help gratefully received! www.kickstarter.com/projects/mod...
Which I'm sure is the aim of these constant confected 'controversies'.
1/5 Meet Peter Thiel — one of the most powerful and dangerous people in the world, yet too few people know about him. He’s not just a billionaire. He’s a political engineer, a surveillance capitalist, and a man quietly shaping America’s future — and not for the better
I think we taste things differently.
Have I gone mad or did Today just do an entire interview with the Conservative energy spokesperson, on the Conservatives' plan to max out North Sea oil, without a single question about the environment? (There was a question on crowding out investment for alternative energy, but I think that was it)
They aren't even nice things. They are shitty, tacky things.
Putin's top propagandist and a former economics professor at the University of Alabama, Vladimir Solovyov, threatened that Russia would “march on Paris” after France’s President Macron called Putin "a predator and an ogre at our doorstep".
I lay this entirely at the feet of marketing, not science.
Sky News is now in direct competition with GBNews.
They can worship how they like, what people object to is hypocrisy.
Why are the tabloids so enraged about every aspect of Angela Rayner’s life? | Zoe Williams
Not just that, he's lying about an entire country and appears to be trying to whip up some sort of civil war. And yet people here, including the government, keep on using his trashy fascist social media site.
It is insane to me that the richest man in the world is using his global megaphone to call for millions of British people to be rounded up and deported (including my family) and somehow this isn’t even news.
Thank you. I took it last Thursday afternoon, so don't think I should still be feeling sick today. Also really strong food aversion to almost everything. I think I need a break for a while.
I'm sure that's right. To be honest it was mostly horticultural curiosity 🤣
Unlike pre-Brexit polling, there's really no sense in which there is a public appetite for leaving the ECHR.
Did you get over it? I've been on 5mg for 6 weeks and I'm still sick for several days and can't eat for 3 days. I'm going to have to go back to 2.5mg. I was losing weight well on 2.5mg and felt great. Now I just feel ill. Maybe I need to do a couple more months at 2.5 and then try again.
The Torygraph is effectively the Daily Heil for people who prefer their prejudices couched in words of more than 2 syllables. Jeremy Hunt ‘forgot’ about those 7 flats he bought =crickets. A strong, working class woman does well in life = the financial scrutiny equivalent of the Spanish Inquisition!
She should've bought seven at one time like a certain Mr Hunt. If she'd been right-wing cries of the politics of envy would be sounding now in her defence. Know your place, Angela, nice things are not for the working class.
If Angela Rayner lived in a cardboard box, the Telegraph would claim she nicked it.
UPDATE: Judge blocks mass transfer of estimated 600 immigrant children from US to Guatemala amid dispute over whether parents have sought their return. DOJ lawyer calls suit 'outrageous' interference, but judge suggests holiday timing of flights is suspicious www.politico.com/news/2025/08...
Archbishop of York criticises Farage over UK asylum plans - www.reuters.com/world/uk/arc...
Well said
You don’t see this👇🏼news pushed by the BBC on its main news page like they “report” when Farage opens his mouth or a migrant lands etc.. #RightWingScum put a Union Jack on a Mosque to intimidate them.. So its leaders put it in a window saying 'This is our flag... we are proud British Muslims”👏🏼👏🏼👌🏼
👏👏👏👏 These are the people I want to share my country with - not right wing goons.
Britain has been multicultural for the last 2000 years. That's why we have the Roman alphabet, a Middle East religion, Arabic numerals, a Syrian patron saint, an aristocracy with French ancestry and a German royal family.
What a total and utter cnut.
We also have Trachycarpus fortuneii (I have one in my garden in Oxford) and Phoenix Canariensis (Canary Island Date Palm) Obviously they are all pretty hardy and grow best in sheltered or southern coastal areas where the temperature isn't too cold in the winter.
Yet his face isnt.🤣
They might have. There are palm trees of some types in the south of England.
It's in a race to the bottom with GB'News'
Turned on the telly. Said to my beautiful wife “Sky will be having another “refugees are going to kill us all” racist hate fest. Flicked over to Sky News, and Ta-Daa!!!!! they’re chuntering away about refugees, again. Turned it straight off again. @skynewsrss.bsky.social is pure racist shit.
A months-long investigation estimates that the profits from the Trump family’s ventures in private clubs, hotels, golf courses, crypto currencies, NFTs, and other businesses has raised President Trump’s net worth by billions of dollars.
As JD Vance attacks Zohran Mamdani for not being grateful enough... How grateful is JD to the United States? How does he show it? Or is the obligation to show gratitude only applicable to non-whites? JD Vance is a racist white supremacist. www.independent.co.uk/news/world/a...
This is what communities are about. It isn't knuckle dragging morons disrespecting the flag to spread hate, it is people like Crystal Clean Windows. We saw it after the riots last year. The far right are not representative of local communities. H/t to @ottoenglish.bsky.social for the original post.
Just spent a week in Paris. The most enjoyable big city experience I've EVER had. Cars are given as little room as possible. Parks EVERYWHERE and bikes are treated as equal users of the road. Never felt threatened by a car ONCE. The tree canopy is so impressive. I was blown away in every way.
This #SocialistSunday remember how amazing you are and know that there is hope when we all find one another ☮️🇵🇸❤️
What a traitorous piece of shit Farage is… (Sunday Times)
I never give the fact that my husband is half Chinese a second, or even first, thought. But this could happen to him, my brother in law or our neices or daughter. I never thought I'd have to be afraid for them in the UK.
It's not those things which have 'sparked' it. It's the constant stream of online lies, propaganda and disinformation people are absorbing from social media and the right wing press. Voter discontent has been manufactured by those who want to destabilise Europe - they succeeded with the US.
They don't care they just don't want to see them or know that 'we' are paying for them. They would honestly rather they died.
If only.
Ominous sign from the White House.
I remember my (adult) kids telling me that mice had been spotted when one of our favourite restaurants was closed through the window. It never stopped them going there. (It was very good).
Or high viz yellow
The menu sounds so good. I want to go but Brighton is a long way from Oxford for dinner 😭
The council should paint the roundabouts another colour, not give the idiots and nice new white canvas every night. If it's visibility that's the problem paint a white circle round the outside and the middle a different colour.
"There have been a lot of opinion pieces about why Bluesky is not useful because the people there tend to be relatively left-leaning," Shiffman told Ars. "I haven't seen any of those same people say that Twitter is bad because it's relatively right-leaning." Incredibly good article right here:
Mine used to say 'School-ish' in reply to that question, which tells you even less than 'Fine'.
Considering people seeking asylum living in hotels get less than a tenner per week, and those in other accommodation get less than 50 quid, this really is performative nonsense from the Home Office. People aren't buying fur coats and snowmobiles FFS. 1/ www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...
MAGA has made a political philosophy out of being an idiot.
RFK Jr, "We need to stop trusting the experts, right.. Trusting the experts is not a feature of science or democracy" Good luck America 🤷♂️
The devastating flu epidemic of 1918 was particularly dangerous for young adults, for people in their prime, who died by the millions. But RFK Jr. is too stupid to know that. Link below.
A rare good news story in our age of doomscrolling. NO2 pollution charts for PARIS (from AirParif.fr. republished by WashPo for our US chums). A huge improvement in air quality over the last 17 years, thanks in part to the green policies of Ann Hidalgo, mayor since 2016. Cities CAN be nice places!
So patriotic! Somehow there is nothing remotely surprising about this story.
Amazing story: one of the organisers of the group putting Union Flags up around Manchester previously did time for being part of a people smuggling gang. manchestermill.co.uk/manchester-f...
OF COURSE it’s the rich CEO of a company stealing from the kid because every story these days ends that way www.themirror.com/sport/tennis...
Teeth. It's the teeth.
I have. I think you haven't. I suspect you have never been at all.
??? We walked everywhere in Paris, apart from using the Metro a couple of times. I don't understand what you're getting at.
Anhelina, her mother Nadia, and 23 other people — rest in peace, innocent souls.
BREAKING: Social Security Administration chief data officer and whistle-blower Charles Borges has resigned after bombshell report that SSA put highly-sensitive data at risk. He sent out an email to colleagues moments ago. Here is the text of his email shared with me:
Can we just clarify that they are NOT given phones by the government/ tax payer. They are provided by charities at no cost to the general public.
Outlets reporting Farage’s comments on the case ought to give similar prominence to the Court of Appeal *explicitly stating* that it did not consider the relative human rights of asylum seekers vs citizens in its decision. He’s just being an opportunistic liar here.
❗The biggest neo-nazi music festival in over a decade is coming to Great Yarmouth and we need your help to stop it. hopenothate.org.uk/2025/08/28/g...
If Nigel Farage is in tune with “the British people”, how come an overwhelming majority of the British people don’t want him to become Prime Minister?
Why would it be? The news headlines are constantly immigration, and so out of proportion to reality everything else looks like trouble at a local garden fete. Politicians should be loudly pushing back at this. But they don’t. Either through opportunism or cowardice. Either way, they are failing.
This should be headline news - the implications are horrifying …
Who on earth are the 22% of weirdos who don't want publicly owned schools?
Polling from @Moreincommon_ on Lucy Connolly More than half think her sentence was too lenient or about right. Only a third that it was too harsh. Only 18% think politicians should associate themselves her, while 51% think they should actively distance themselves from her.
Seems the BBC significantly exaggerated the Home Office case here, both in their wording on Twitter and on the broadcast itself. Home Office lawyers did *not* say this, which would be politically toxic, and play right into the hands of you know who. >
🤣
Reform are closing adult education centres in Derbyshire and plan to sell off the buildings. The decision was made behind closed doors with no public allowed in the meeting and without a public consultation. Some of the centres have as much as 60% of students from the most deprived demographics.
We are going to experience the collapse of the U.S. dollar, aren't we? These motherfuckers want to tank the dollar so they can be crypto feudal lords. Americans should be CRAZY alarmed about this.
Day 240 of #365DaysOfSmiles This is Bryson and he's never gonna automatically say "I can't"
Listening to a podcast where a well known tech world wannabe fascist calls journalism "nonconsensual invasion of privacy for profit" and thinks that's clever and my goodness does that reveal a lot of how completely brain wormed a bunch of these guys are once they faced a tiny bit of criticism.
The far right is screwing up the best dogwhistle it’s managed in years. Putting up flags on lamp posts and daring mainstream politicians to object was clever. It’s escalating to graffiti – which the public hates – and overt political messaging, which isn’t deniable. And on other people’s property.
Farage owns four homes: Family home (£1M, retained after his divorce) Two beachside homes in Kent (via his comp. Thorn In The Side Ltd) One investment property in Surrey (rented out) Radio silence from media about this but uproar about Angela Rayner’s two homes & ministerial home #NigelFarage
GRAND JURY NULLIFICATION! Prosecutors Fail to Secure Indictment Against Man Who Threw Sandwich at Federal Agent www.nytimes.com/2025/08/27/u...
"Boycotting the state banquet … is the only way I can send a message to both Trump and Starmer that they cannot close their eyes and wish this away. "Donald Trump must act now to end the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza and get the hostages released." www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
We had a horrific emergency involving our kids today and right now I'm just sitting at my computer in a daze and in shock. Thankfully they are okay but others are less fortunate.
Is the BBC Reform UK's mouthpiece? Yup. "Researchers at Cardiff University have produced a detailed analysis of every episode of the BBC’s flagship Question Time programme broadcast between September 2014 and July 2023 to see if the broadcaster was balancing political viewpoints."
RULE ABOUT AMERICAN FLAGS: If you burn the fabric part, you're looking at jail. But it you use the pole part to assault a police officer, you get a presidential pardon, praise, and some cash.
The numbers on this are staggering: if we decided to meet the whole world’s power requirements with solar PV, we’d get payback in around six years - and then free energy for everyone… billmckibben.substack.com/p/a-modest-p...
👉 THIS👈 👇 WHEN FASCISM COMES TO AMERICA IT WON'T BE WEARING JACKBOOTS. IT WILL BE WRAPPED IN STARS & STRIPES AND CARRYING A BIBLE! - GEORGE CARLIN
"At Cable Street, it was lots of people from different backgrounds banding together, and they drove the fascists out because they they came out together." @hardeepmatharu.bsky.social @bylinetimes.bsky.social on resisting social division @goldbergradio.bsky.social podfollow.com/byline-podca...
Quick question, is it bad when the dictator gets to decide who is a Jew? I’m not familiar with history, how does that usually work out for us?
FFS Shropshire Star
The President of the United States sat in the Oval Office and said "a lot of people are saying maybe we'd like a dictator" and that is not even a top story.
A group of people (including my husband) are trying to get the Wheatley Morris going again.
I’m a British white woman. My family heritage can be traced back centuries. Farage will never speak for me, in fact no racist or fascist ever will. My country falls apart without immigration & it loses its soul when we mistreat those in need. Farage can go to hell, he doesn’t get to destroy the UK.
(I feel like one of those 'angry people in local papers'.) What on earth are people who hear that going to think about our village? The reality couldn't be further from the impression given of us by Radio Oxford.
@bbcoxford.bsky.social Sophie Law has just said that 'colours have been raised' in our village, along with others, and inviting comments. I've just driven round and found 6 flags on one street only, in a village of several thousand people. Obnoxious though they are is that really newsworthy?
Reform's plan - take up to £2 billion from taxpayers, and give it to the Taliban so they can kill and torture more people.
timj64.bsky.social 