Not to be a grouch because it’s stunning outside but I could have done without a record breaking heatwave in the week I took off to finish writing the book 🔥😓

"On the present trajectory, Iran will emerge from the conflict many times stronger and more influential than it was before the war. It will exercise leverage with dozens of the richest nations in the world." Sounds like Robert Kagan was right www.theatlantic.com/internationa...

See yimbypod @jamesomalley.co.uk @mjrobbins.com for on the disaster that bbc local reporting has become

If you want to see the start of @jamesomalley.co.uk ‘s acting career I highly recommend watching this with some popcorn this evening

Smartly done, witty & forensic takedown by @helenlewis.bsky.social for @theatlantic.com www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...

This leadership drama is the junk food of news - tons of salty flavour but a load of empty calories 🤷‍♂️

Come for the mad collapsed road, stay for @jamesomalley.co.uk 's acting debut. A star is born.

Come for the mad collapsed road, stay for @jamesomalley.co.uk 's acting debut. A star is born.

My latest: This road fell down a cliff 3 years ago, and there's still not agreement on why it happened or how to fix it. Featuring a cameo appearance by an increasingly reluctant @jamesomalley.co.uk www.youtube.com/watch?v=AY7i...

Another fantastic short film from @mjrobbins.com about Galley Hill Road, another unfixable Road, this time in Kent. Featuring a fun cameo from @jamesomalley.co.uk and a surprising amount of icing. youtu.be/AY7i61e19A0?...

My latest: This road fell down a cliff 3 years ago, and there's still not agreement on why it happened or how to fix it. Featuring a cameo appearance by an increasingly reluctant @jamesomalley.co.uk www.youtube.com/watch?v=AY7i...

Here's one for the connoisseurs: an entire page on Johan Hari's website dedicated to mistakes he made in his book Magic Pill; the book his publishers Bloomsbury insisted had been thoroughly fact checked when he libelled me. They are not trival mistakes. magicpillbook.com/corrections/

Big news from Westminster - at last we’re going to have a Single Patient Record. Why it’s a good thing and why the government must act to ensure our health data is in safe hands open.substack.com/pub/rorycell...

Being incredibly excited by arctic roll

The real takeaway from this is just what a disaster statutory obligations are for democracy. An attempt to hide where the costs go that has screwed over all the most visible bits of government and has empowered popularism by forcing councils to make choices no one in their right mind would vote for.

It’s this across the board - flytipping is the other big example. Trash mountains with known links to drugs, money laundering, guns and other industrial-scale organised crime and police policy is ‘it’s the Environment Agency’s problem’.

Yeah, one of the best bits of training during my AI degree was a lecture where we watched videos of ‘smart’ robots from Honda etc and deconstructed how they were staged. Profoundly useful.

Probably the best debate I've heard about AI. Refreshingly clear and reasonable pca.st/episode/9ff8...

It really is only a matter of time before Polanski advocates the reopening of the mines to create well paid jobs and ensure cheaper, home-produced energy.

Natural England says £700m protecting fish at Hinkley isn’t enough, and want more before it can switch on. This is process over outcomes: big delays, higher bills and, crucially, terrible for tackling climate change. This is not a serious way to deliver clean infrastructure.

This is honestly the most coldly furious letter I think I've ever seen from a police chief to a politician. By quite some margin.

The football is great and all but this is the big match of the night

Pertinent to the anti-solar campaigns we talked about on the pod this week, where you have Shire Tories ranting against capitalism allied with pro-nuclear greens. I don’t think it’s even meaningful to talk about the ‘centre’, it’s more about modernity vs ‘going back’ in some form.

Abolish the BBC Local Democracy Reporting Service.

Unlocked a new circle of driving hell attempting to get across Bristol city centre during rush hour 😵‍💫

Also the thing about all this process discourse is that in a healthy culture run by a competent leader none of it would have mattered anyway because the idea would never have survived first contact with the light. Like Starmer’s charge against my namesake is he failed to stop his own bad decision.

Why did I check the quote tweets on this? I knew they were going to depress me, just wall to wall people who are going to be poorer than they should be in old age who think that “invest more in stocks and shares ISAs” is some kind of spiv’s charter and not, you know, important advice.

I see the Greens are opposing (checks notes) solar power now.

Ugh - the Royal Marsden helped to save my wife’s life, and they’re trying to do so for many, many more people. And NIMBYs are trying to stop it because the lifesaving building is taller than they’d like?? Give me strength. (Via Looking For Growth)

Relates to a thing I remember seeing a few years ago that basically gerrymandering is often self-defeating because you create a very fragile edifice that can swiftly flip against you if the tide changes

I think this is right and I also just think 'UK-wide MRPs three years before an election' are just an unalloyed bad. They preoccupy MPs and they provide an entirely false level of precision.

fascinated by the weirdly many people going full DIDN'T HAPPEN at this, surely any Londoner who takes the tube regularly has noticed that there are quite a lot more people jumping the barriers these days, and that they're never stopped by staff? you can choose not to care but it obviously is A Thing

If you like infrastructure and bureaucracy with a dash of British humour and some woodworking, you’ll enjoy Martin’s latest video.

Oh this is very good, give it a watch.

Another banger from Martin

Good evening! Check out this month’s film featuring actual woodwork, stunt driving, human clones, batman, mild gore and a possible vampire.

ICYMI...

I don't think anything can prepare you for the scale of the bat tunnel. Like a structure off the cover of an issue of Weird Fantasy.

My friend @mjrobbins.com is becoming an annoyingly brilliant & creative YouTuber. His latest short film covers the gamut inc. bats, infrastructure, woodwork, forest-based body horror etc. Many jokes, including one so subtle and so brilliant that a friend had to point it out to me (a compliment).

unusually high joke density for a video about infrastructure and bureaucracy

Baroque Tom Scott is fast becoming my favourite YouTuber.

Good morning! Behold my latest adventure in film!

You may have heard of the multimillion pound HS2 bat tunnel, but you probably have no idea how insane it actually is. An incredible short film from @mjrobbins.com youtu.be/CUetUfeEZZY?...

Or instead of spending £26k on a bulky electric SUV you could get a compact petrol-engined 2023 Fiesta for £10k and bank sixteen grand to spend on as much fuel/coke/holidays as you want. Which is what a lot of consumers will sensibly conclude faced with astronomical prices for new cars.

People going ‘who does this’ and I regret to inform you that apparently the government surveyed this and bsky.app/profile/iron...

This is such incredible abject nonsense. If the straight stays closed ordinary people will have to use less oil and gas. Price is the fairest rationing mechanism that incentivises people who can to switch and to reduce consumption.

Pulled the trigger on the solly-P today folks, and feeling pretty happy about it given everything.

Remember to be wary, as today is the only day of the year that incorrect or misleading information is posted on the internet.

A lot of people are going to be shocked when they get their next phone and see what’s happened to flash storage prices in the last 2-3 months

Thought I'd give this a go in good faith, but it wants to give the AI permissions to delete everything on my account? No thanks. Not touching this until there is a better permissions model