In case it wasn’t clear. bsky.app/profile/snel...

The point is that the new NSS tells us nothing that wasn’t obvious in February. The only thing that has happened in the interim is that the US has showcased its essential weakness.

Manic week - apologies for multiple posts, but its all in plain sight now The Double Headed Eagle - Russia and America and Authoritarian Big tech The EU is the enemy of both pdjukes.substack.com/p/the-double...

Zia Yusuf - the unelected multimillionaire policy chief of Reform - makes his fourth Question Time appearance tonight. The party has five MPs

People sharing on social media made the petition impossible to ignore. Through shares and reposts, the call for an inquiry into Russian influence became a national demand. @eastangliabylines.co.uk

Just imagine having to find this every month. #FightForYourNHS

Farage favours private healthcare over the NHS. For those complaining about the NHS - be careful what you wish for.

As an ex-accountant I understand the logic behind the EV pay-per-mile scheme. Revenue from fuel duty will go down, so we need to replace it. This is why accountants make good servants but bad masters.

The Commons isn’t usually the place for sharp comedy, but today’s Budget delivered a moment that made even the frontbench blink. Let’s just say Russia came up… and Farage was the punchline. 🔥

The BBC’s own “impartiality briefing” for freelancers included not doing anything to annoy the DM. So - not impartial! Also not great for freedom of speech.

When the racist comedian Bernard Manning fell out of fashion in more tolerant times and stopped appearing on TV he defended his long history of appalling offensive "jokes" as nothing more than "banter"and insisted that he "had a go at everyone". This is the Bernard Manning defence.

Rachel Reeves says there’s a “hole” in the public finances. A new decade-long Brexit study explains it: a 6–8% hit to GDP – that's £180bn-£240bn a year – means less tax, less investment and less money for everything else. Brexit made Britain poorer. Much poorer. @eastangliabylines.co.uk

Devastating article from @eastangliabylines.co.uk Leaving Europe was, and remains, a very bad idea. Let's hope the UK is returning to rationality. @pecksniffsdiary.bsky.social @peterthurlow.bsky.social @annadamski.bsky.social eastangliabylines.co.uk/news/brexit/...

Whatever your convictions, if your first goal is to be informed instead of confirmed, you need to consult several news sources. These are today's UK front pages. Same story, different importance, different angles - to the point where the findings are actually distorted. #GoodMorning, everyone

I don’t want McSweeney sacked because of this briefing ‘war’. I want him sacked because he’s steered Labour down such an awful, xenophobic path and paved the way for Farage in number 10.

This speech never gets old.

The Trump regime is now telling states to unsend SNAP benefits. They want to do everything they can to make life harder for people. It’s said often, but always worth repeating: the cruelty is the point.

"It is estimated that more than 400 women and girls were abused and exploited within Mohamed Al Fayed’s Harrods enterprise. I am one of them." This is a survivor's account of the structural failure of British justice when confronted with money and power. A must read ⤵️

* Mamdani wins by daring to be radical – a lesson for Labour’s timid souls * Reform ditches more policies leaving racism still standing * LibDems are beating Reform in number of by-election gains * And Pecksniff’s Diary toasts 200 editions – gin optional, gossip essential Read the latest column ⤵️

Imagine how the cognitive dissonance is going to 🤯 the tiny minds of the “Londonistan is a dangerous hellscape” brigade. 😆 Well done London! 👏

Gutted to see what we’re missing out on.

Apparently all those Restore Trust supporters who paid for a membership last year to try to take over the NT didn’t renew this year. Numbers well down. Well done to all who voted to keep them out. 👏

Updating my LEGO White House

Via Press Gazette: "The Daily Star’s livestream of the Liz Truss lettuce has been acquired by the British Film Institute’s National Archive for a collection of significant pieces of online video. The BFI’s curator said it was “a seminal moment in British political history”"

"The algorithmic cesspit known as X...quietly moved on and chose to ignore the whole situation...because their specific authoritarianism runs exclusively on fumes of rage, and joy and organisation is kryptonite to them." Yes! 🙌 Well worth a read ⤵️

A remarkably powerful and highly entertaining rant‼️ And to steal a phrase from @bearlypolitics.co.uk... The exasperation you'll sense comes from just how obvious so much of this is, and how determined our political system seems to completely ignore it. Please read and experience the exasperation!

🚨🚨Excellent news: After three years of reasoning, pleading and conceding, the EU has had enough. On Monday, the EU's MS are expected to back a new bill that will permanently cut #Russian gas supplies to #Hungary and #Slovakia — whether they like it or not. 🧵 www.politico.eu/article/eu-c...

🇺🇸 Scum has arrived on Butterfly …Not just the White House but other Depts too. Not enough to lie on X and Lies Social but now to spread their lies here I’ll block if I see them. Screenshot don’t repost or quote post their actual posts. Starve them of engagement. www.9news.com.au/world/white-...

Trump validating the need for these protests in a perfect own goal.

Last night I watched 'Good Night, And Good Luck' - a film I'd particularly recommend my American followers (re)watch. While it's about a media attack on McCarthyism, it's wildly relevant to today's political climate.

Charles Rennie Mackintosh's reputation in his lifetime, and to the present day, was based not just upon his work as an architect, but also as a designer and painter. In 1923, with his wife Margaret, he settled in Port Vendres in the Mediterranean. 'The Little Bay,' is from 1927.

What he not saying is that his friends and cronies invested a fortune in Argentina since their guy Milei won, they stand to lose a big chunk of those fortunes the way things are going, and Argentina’s elections are in two weeks and we are tampering in them to bail Milei out.

Javier Milei had to beg a bail-out and already needs another. Argentina's economy is in a tailspin. Gov't bonds and peso in freefall. People starving, throwing rocks at him. Farage last year: "He's amazing. It's Thatcherism on steroids. Cutting and slashing expenditure. That's leadership." SHARE!

It's that (tiresome) time of year again the National Trust comes under attack, as voting gets underway for the 2025 AGM. If you're a NT member, have you voted yet? Here's the link ⤵️ www.nationaltrust.org.uk/who-we-are/a...

The River Cam should flow with pure chalk spring water. Instead, it runs on sewage outflows laced with phosphorus, and it's killing life in the river. Read the full story for this week's #BigRiverWatch ⤵️ @eastangliabylines.co.uk

wrote about this last year and sure I wasn't in any way the only one but imo people voting for populist politics in the 21st century *is* a sign that they do just have too much faith in institutions, as opposed to not enough - they want to have their little tantrum but assume things will just hold

They have to be dragged, kicking and screaming, into doing the right thing.

Latest: Grok to be trained in alternative facts.

on.ft.com/46eXCO6 Crossings of small boats to UK in August fall to lowest since 2019. Poor Nigel.

At least one citizen journalist reported accurately on the Appeal Court Epping ruling on Friday as part of a piece on the attitudes of Epping residents to the protests, @paulbernal.bsky.social This is why people should follow @eastangliabylines.co.uk

100% Our 10 publications at @bylinesnetwork.co.uk now get many more engagements (and click-through) from Bluesky than it ever did on Twitter/X. Here’s our graph of traffic from X vs Bluesky over the last 12 months.

Can you imagine what the Founders would make of this? The vapidity and the cowardice? The naked emperor and his snivelling band of invertebrates.

A new verb just entered the lexicon. *To Witkoff* - to obsequiously flatter someone in such an overtly embarrassing manner that onlookers squirm with 2nd hand embarrassment. Example: Did you see that Witkoff guy witkoff the President?

Did you know that we have a national poetry competition? The first winners will be announced on Wednesday 27 August at 6pm. Read Jimmy Andrex's preview. yorkshirebylines.co.uk/news/bylines...

If he's proposing we begin negotiating peace with Russia once Ukrainian troops have seized Moscow and Putin has shot himself in a bunker, I guess I'd be ok with that. Feels a bit extreme though.

Britain isn’t being “overrun” by migration — it’s being sustained by it. The Bear argues politicians on all sides owe voters honesty about this simple fact.

European leaders dropping everything, last minute, to rally behind Zelensky in Washington is one of the Continent’s finest political moments this century.

How can the government promote & welcome this type of arrangement, for all its benefits, without seeing the single market, the customs union or even the EU in the same light? inews.co.uk/news/politic...