Just watched Antony Loewentein’s “Not In My Name” on Al Jazeera. It is worth watching.

There is something so magical about the moon, luminous like a pearl, peeking through darkest of green trees in an inky blue sky. When I was a little girl, my art teacher told me to look carefully and see if I could find the image of a mother and child etched on its surface. Even now, I still see it.

Spot on 😆👇

I don’t get the British political psyche. Why is it angrier at people trying, however imperfectly, to govern and not for their own benefit than at those who treated the whole thing as a game, mocked everything they touched, and gave us Brexit?

Blair weighing in on Labour’s future is about as welcome as a bag of peanuts at an allergy clinic and just as toxic. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Some Wednesday morning humour from Russia. For talks with Europe, Putin would like some one who has “not said all sorts of nasty things” about him and suggested Gerhard Schröder..🤣🤣 giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/... EU mulls Angela Merkel or Mario Draghi as possible Vladimir Putin whisperer

Isn’t the last point essentially what Starmer is doing with his EU reset? Incremental trust-building, leaving the destination open.

Big promises made during leadership bids routinely shrink on contact with reality. A disappointment already and he hasn’t even won Makerfield yet. apple.news/AskpjTN66RIu...

Shouldn’t Burnham and those pushing him to challenge a sitting PM have thought about Reform before destabilising their own government? Hard to claim moral high ground on democracy high when one is manufacturing a by-election for personal ambition. /1

Instead of looking at what policies are making them unpopular with voters after the locals, Labour attacked the democratically elected sitting PM. And that is what disgusts me the most. Voters told them something. And they chose to ignore it.

There is quiet dignity and integrity about a man who wakes up every morning and goes about doing his job, fully aware that his own party is preparing to stab him in the back. Incidentally, Boris Johnson didn’t attend a single COBRA meeting during the pandemic. And he partied while people died alone.

What if Burnham doesn’t win the Makerfield by-election?

Forced myself to go to the gym despite feeling out of sorts, and am so glad I did. This lovely family cheered me up immensely.

All I can think of is, how can the EU take us seriously with this level of government drama? How can the markets? How can anyone? It is starting to feel like a badly made sequel to the end of Boris Johnson’s premiership but messier, and with no clearer ending.

This Labour infighting has a strong whiff of Liz and the lettuce tussle.

Now, if I were into conspiracies, I would say this all looks rather convenient.. Josh Simons, the Labour MP resigning and conveniently clearing a path for Andy Burnham to return to Parliament was previously a director of Labour Together, the think tank whose leading architect was Morgan McSweeney.

Streeting’s resignation letter would sting if it came from someone with credibility, conviction, or even a trace of charisma.

WHEN WILL THE MEDIA COVER THESE STORIES? www.ft.com

Note to Wes Streeting - you don't launch a coup by firing a water pistol into the prevailing wind.

Xi Jinping has laid on a lavish state banquet of exquisite Huaiyang cuisine for Trump. Delicate broths, braised crab roe, refined knife-work, centuries of culinary tradition… And somewhere in Beijing the most powerful man on earth is quietly wishing it was a Big Mac with a side of fries.🤣

This is well worth reading. 👇

If Reform did this in government I would laugh. But Labour airing their dirty laundry naked is just embarrassing. The last vestiges of a serious party destroyed not by Starmer, not by poor local results, but by his band of headless plucked chickens clucking faux moral outrage.

This is the right moment for Starmer to introduce PR. Strategically it neutralises his internal critics. Transformatively it will be one of the most radical democratic reforms in the country’s history. And it is the one move that will fundamentally weaken Farage’s position.

A party this self-obsessed, this contemptuous of the people it was elected to serve, deserves the electorate defeat heading its way. Whoever leads it.

Even though I didn’t vote for him, I am glad Starmer is PM, given all the options present. The behaviour of Labour MPs & ministers against him is utterly distasteful. No self reflection, no plan and no respect for democracy. I wouldn’t trust any of them to look after my dog, let alone lead a nation.

This Labour drama is boring me now. A bunch of hungry toddlers throwing a tantrum and their toys out of the pram. With no one to pick them up.

Fahnbulleh’s resignation letter is notable not for its content but its construction- surgical, coordinated and designed for maximum damage. There is no alternative vision. This is destabilisation dressed as principle. /1

I just dont understand why. Still way ahead in councils. Big Parliament majority. They could swat the RW media, donors, foreign media ownership.

Cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face isn’t uniquely British. Italy with Berlusconi, America did it with Trump.… But Britain has turned it into an art form. Brexit. And now this. /1

Across the Channel, the French are never happy without protesting. But they riot because they believe it matters. The British pile-on isn’t protest, it is contempt. The satisfaction of takedown by people who have stopped believing anything matters. Which is exactly the soil Farage thrives in.

Brexit was a vote of grievance & unicorns. Starmer’s downfall is a similar kind of grievance & unicorns. The purity the left demands, the perfect leader, unsullied by reality is its own magical thinking. What it will bring us is something far worse. And Farage won’t be as easy to get rid of.

My council results, no Reform candidate elected despite all the flag shagging and having an Asian candidate. 🤣🤣 Labour lost one, Tories gained 3 councillors and Greens gained one, Lib Dems lost two. (Traditionally Lib Dem and Tories area)

Your voice soothes. Your stories make me believe in a better world. What you show us is so forgotten, so magical, so real, and so so important. Words fall short but not my admiration and respect. Happy 100th birthday, Sir David Attenborough!

Every political party has to sell a story. Reform sells grievance and nationalism, Conservatives sell nostalgia, Greens sell hope. All hard to disprove and easy to believe. The Lib Dems are selling a temperament, decency, moderation, a better way of doing politics…

Oh, is it now? www.reuters.com/world/middle...

Ten years on, the choice in UK local elections is between the Brexit swindler, the Brexit enabler, the Brexit follower, the Brexit denier and the Brexit ignorer…and yet every decision they will make, from economy to security to politics, is singed by Brexit.

The IRGC may have just overplayed their hand, and it is doubtful Tehran can rein them in. That leaves Trump with one move… and it isn’t diplomacy.

The day US cannot deliver on its promises… apple.news/AOGLo-DufSLi...

Was the reliability ever quite as stable as it is often assumed to have been? Trump is clearly making things worse but he may also be exposing longer-standing asymmetries in the transatlantic relationship that were easier to overlook in periods of relative stability. 👇 my thread below

Am I the only one who sees no difference in his before and after pic? For just under $5000, looks like Trump’s attempt to reduce the value of dollar has worked. apple.news/APX3zTzo3QYy...

Rather rich coming from Starmer considering his own “island of strangers” hate speech.

I don’t agree with Zack Polanski on everything, but he apologised for the post. Starmer’s “intervention”, and saying he isn’t fit to lead any party, especially given his own silence on Farage’s immigration rhetoric & Reform’s crypto funding says more about Starmer than it does about Polanski.

Stunning.

Aww bless, it still hasn’t occurred to Trump that this was never a requirement for any previous president, let alone three times over.

It looks like King Charles’ trip paid for itself and then some. Boosted Scotland–Kentucky whiskey diplomacy and managed to school Congress and Trump on their home turf. Priceless.

Geopolitics has officially reached kindergarten level. Congratulations to all parties in the war/operation, you are all winners. Now please collect your participation trophies and exit the Strait of Hormuz. 2000+ ships and the entire global market would like to get back to work. Playtime is over.

Impressive and absurd in equal measure. The head of a constitutional monarchy championing democracy to an elected legislature, on the anniversary of America’s independence from that very monarchy, evoking the Magna Carta, past presidents, his late mother, and glorious partnership like no other./1

UAE just announced it is leaving OPEC effective May 1st. Why. My initial thoughts…

Hegseth probably thought water would turn to wine and five loaves of bread and two fish would feed 5000…