I expect to see a lot more tangible signs of "de-risking" vis-a-vis the United States in 2026.

London Underground

Hope looks different to everyone 🌱 From the people I meet to the changes happening across our city, there’s plenty to feel hopeful about.

Thierry Breton blacklisté aux Etats-Unis : pour le sénateur Claude Malhuret, «il faut arrêter d’être à plat ventre devant Trump»

Les sanctions américaines contre @ThierryBreton et 4 autres Européens ont choqué sur le vieux continent, confronté à un Trump hostile. Un divorce douloureux auquel l’Europe n’est pas préparée. Ma chronique Géopolitique bilan 2025 dans le 7/9 @franceinter www.radiofrance.fr/franceinter/...

The Starmer government has decided the national interest is to appease Trump. But other Labour politicians will surely conclude their path to reelection lies in the opposite direction bsky.app/profile/dral...

Hoffentlich p.dw.com/p/55vkv

we ask the question: why are Labour MPs and ministers still using X when its owner has vowed to destroy them? www.ft.com/content/5b0e...

As long as people vote on national tickets, ignoring local council performance…

Since Bernard Shaw, good Fabians have had to accept the limits of localism. Social policy is inherently centralist - for the sake of (the attempt to secure more) equality open.substack.com/pub/cradle2g...

Opinion: Has public debt in the developed world become unmanageable? Recent debt numbers starkly underline how far we have moved beyond the ancient public finance paradigm whereby debt was racked up in wars and paid down in peacetime ft.trib.al/CCWRAox

With all the moral force your victory on a 7% turnout gives you.

After spending all of last week in Berlin, I wish I was feeling more upbeat about what EU leaders achieved and the outlook for 2026. But I think the messy deal was not a good enough outcome from the EU at a moment when it was essential to demonstrate unity & geopol strength ENDS

New Swingometer post! I review the preditions I made last Christmas about politics in 2025 and try and draw some lessons from my various blunders and missteps: swingometer.substack.com/p/my-2025-pr...

Marie Perrin, 28 ans, a résolu un casse-tête vieux de plusieurs siècles : séparer efficacement les terres rares pour recycler ces métaux précieux présents dans nos objets du quotidien. ➡️ https://l.lepoint.fr/UN4

Localisai in action? www.localgov.co.uk/Council-work...

Not the right question below: rather, can Britain afford to resist Trump/Vance, risking the ci-devant security environment of Europe

Faiblesse/zwakheid

Amazing complacency, so typical of liberal American responses to Trump open.substack.com/pub/michaelm...

Excellent news: from January 2027, British students will once again be able to take part in the EU’s Erasmus student exchange programme. This is something I have long campaigned for and is a huge win for London and our young people.

Seems mandatory for journos these days to say you ‘sat down with’ the person you interviewed. Woodward & Bernstein’s best work was standing in underground car parks.

Pylons (climate goals) 'overly ambitious' www.localgov.co.uk/Value-of-new...

Once upon a time this was called comprehensive area assessment www.themj.co.uk/framed?actId...

"The money's not here. Your money's on Joe's blockchain, right next to yours. And on the Kennedy blockchain, and Mrs Macklin's blockchain, and a hundred others"

How liberal democracy amused itself to death, chapter 67572.

I think we can add this to the growing list of exhibits evidencing "Twitter is damaging our political culture". Only a Twitter-brained BBC producer would even use the phrase "cultural erasure" let alone think it is a meaningful or credible 'threat'.

La menace russe www.liberation.fr/politique/me...

Anti-racism norms matter. Really shouldn’t be too much to ask of a Labour government that they shun those giving platform to overt racism of a kind that has been unacceptable in the political mainstream of this country for generations.

…and, next May, will get weaker when voters select councillors by party label not town/county hall performance @anthonypainter.bsky.social

Au musée d’Orsay, Bridget Riley «point de départ» d’une pointilleuse

What will replace the element of local democracy in the English NHS? www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Localism, always incoherent as a doctrine, gets even muddier with policing @colintalbot.bsky.social

With PCCs abolished, who polices the police? 10th December 2025 By: Colin Talbot consoc.org.uk/the-abolitio...

What is Labour’s game on service accountability? @colintalbot.bsky.social looks at the obscure fate of elected police commissioners. I ask about NHS trusts www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

In certain circles at least Noam Chomsky is one of the most overrated people on earth

"Look, I knew about him fanboying for Pol Pot, Saddam, Putin and Milosevic. But it was only when I saw this picture that I realised he was a wrong 'un."

Great criticism, but where’s the author’s own prescription for intellectual renewal? The limits of journalism…

I can’t help thinking that when, in future, people ask what UK political leaders said as it became undeniable that US saw European liberal democracy as its no1 strategic foe, Starmer and others will regret that the answer is “not much, shuffled awkwardly, looked at their feet”.

Real “you had one job” stuff from TfL at Finsbury Park here.

«Une menace d’interférence dans la vie politique de l’Europe» : l’UE dénonce la nouvelle stratégie de sécurité américaine

"This has nothing to do with the inconsistencies that have characterised Trump's behaviour on other occasions, but is part of a carefully crafted strategy to reconfigure the world order." Summary of European reaction to Trump's fashy interference. ~AA www.eurotopics.net/en/349639/ne...

RocknRoll Politics is live - and streaming live-at the main concert hall at King Place tomorrow night.. last show of the year… time to make sense it all. www.kingsplace.co.uk/whats-on/wor...

Quite sweet really that so many in the US still believe they have a supreme court rather than a third legislative chamber of 9 members appointed for life with power to change the law unilaterally for whatever reason they fancy. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/06/o...

Elon Musk is a global enemy to democracy.

Good. Now leave that platform.

I think it’s super-great that GBNews is able to use its broadcast licence to give credibility and legitimacy to its overtly racist and would-probably-lead-to-the-loss-of-its-broadcast-licence-if-it-broadcast-them-on-the-main-channel YouTube videos.

I wonder if it's time to retire the role of "political editor" altogether Return most of the coverage to the Economics Editor, the Health Editor, the Home Affairs team & so on. Leave the "who-said-what-to-whom" & "what-does-it-mean-for-the-polls" to others. The BBC doesn't need to foreground this.

🇬🇧 Keir Starmer et sa ministre des Finances ont rassuré leur propre camp et grappillé quelques mois de répit en présentant mercredi 26 novembre un budget marqué à gauche, après un virage à droite contesté qui a fait fuir une partie de son électorat. Lire ⤵️

It also risks the health of the Tooth Fairy, may provoke the Loch Ness Monster to violence, is an affront to our elven allies in Lothlórien, threatens a critical unicorn habitat and could undo the many benefits of Brexit.

I'll never tire of reposting this headline