Beginning to think I should use a stop watch to time how long it takes Mel Stride to mention his only solution to anything posed to him by an interviewer (being to cut welfare benefits - never with any details of which ones and by how much).

Post a character that starts with the letter K (First or Last) K

Been repotting some potted acers. Using ericaceous compost, of course, which comes in pink bags from garden centre near me. If you are a 70s child, like me, you’ll know what my earworm is right now.

So at what point does a regime that believes in striking first, bombing a country back to the Stone Ages and not worrying about war crimes resort to nuclear weapons?

Not seen this before, but present SCOTUS seems to like citing very early E&W authority to justify bollocks, with precedent we’ve all moved on from in E&W. Is there a legal equivalent term for the Chortlemuffin effect?

I often wonder how the American voters could have been so stupid as to vote for Trump, given the predictable outcome. But then I remember the horror of turning on the radio at 6am on 24 June 2016 and hearing the referendum result, and realise that we are no different in the UK.

Badenoch has a touching faith in PM powers. Couple of weeks ago, it was to increase number of Type 45 destroyers. This week it is to create operational North Sea gas drilling wells in North Sea. Starmer can be criticised for many things, but being unable to time travel is not one of them. #PMQs

Amazed how little I’ve heard about this in UK, whereas lots of discussion amongst my colleagues (I cover MEA). I have found a number of ME public authorities’ website are effectively off air.

Commando comics’ simplified history of WW1 and WW2 stated that Yanks always turned up very late to any “scrap,” once all the heavy fighting had been done by brave Tommies, and would then claimed all the credit. So 1970s schoolboys would claim UK hesitating to join USA Iran adventure is payback.

Getting strong déjà vu: you can argue the rights or wrongs of use of US bases in UK indefinitely. It doesn’t change anything. Been going on since at least 1986: hansard.parliament.uk/commons/1986...

Did Rubio really hold a presser outside the Steam Pipe Trunk Distribution Venue?

Wonder how many Commonwealth MPs there are, who Farage will certainly go after under his disenfranchisement plans?

David Frost John Cleese Ronnie Barker Ronnie Corbett

Whilst this may be an appropriate response for an AG of the current USA administration, I don’t recommend it for any LiP (or counsel!) appearing before an overworked judge in a court in E&W.

Thatcher very pro single market, but regretted QMV expansion in SEA to bring it about. It is possible to be a non-EU member of single market. Starmer?

On order. It’s by A Sharpe, so how could I not? So Anna is not @barristersecret.bsky.social , or a massive bluff?

What I have not heard from any cabinet member is the obvious reflection that the interest in Burnham would be zero if the party believed there was a vision within government with a plan to execute it. Who knows, maybe there is one, just not communicated to us plebs on the ground?

Just heard some prof of American politics on BBC Radio 6 claim disclosure delays in Epstein files justified as complicated, given volume of documents. Dear BBC 6, next time speak to any experienced litigator?

Test cricket tests your technique, temperament, patience, character ....it is the the "real" test. (Many variations of this on the internet.) So test cricket between Australia and England, with the longest test history, even more so. Sadly, England’s current team collectively seem to lack all 4?

If Freemasons v Met Police judicial review ever happens, how will we know if any judge hearing the case should be recusing himself?

Have you got 5 minutes? (When in private practice: do you do pro bono?)

TWIMC: whilst I trained in a City law firm, and later became a partner in one, I denounce any suggestion that I am a “London Lawyer.” You may call me a lefty lawyer or a human rights lawyer as much as you like. I do not recognise these to be defamatory labels.

Not sure what the context is of this post. But personally, I’ll be singing Messiah today (7pm Boxgrove Prior, with Shopwhyke Singers). There is a chorus…

Who’d choose to be an England cricket fan? You have to be born to it.

Still can’t get over that one signatory to Budapest Memorandum seems willing to accept invasion of Ukraine by another signatory, despite further joint declaration made by them in 2009, and expects Ukraine to cede further territory, shrink its armed forces and accept security assurances from them.

Oh dear (English teacher understatement). Possibly the best England bowling attack in years, so batsmen waft bats outside off stump all innings. Getting well hacked off with this routine of waking up at 6ish to hear of batting collapse in Australia, and another bowling miracle required.

Still bitterly ironic that the “Take Back Control” wankers did nothing in February 2020, like shut the borders, quarantine and contain.

Alex Norris is 10+ yrs younger than me. So he maybe doesn’t have the strong childhood memory I have of watching Papillon. It made a big impression on Tarantino, too (he’s written about it), hence the watch scene in Pulp Fiction. So how is his new jewellery/valuable policy going to work out?

Disturbingly high correlation between promoters of Brexit and supporters of scrapping licence fee, or BBC entirely. Also same degree of mendacity. If successful, I am sure they’ll create same cultural wasteland as Brexit’s economic one. Cory’s enshittification of British TV and radio on steroids.

The worst thing about this BBC “crisis”? Gives opening for Charles Moore interviews.

A movie you've seen more than 7 times with a gif

National Cat Day on Wednesday. Halloween today. You just can’t contain your excitement, can you?

I haven’t done the research, but I cannot see how making someone’s indefinite status and rights, err… definite and conditional, will not end up with a whole load of legal challenges under the Human Rights Act.

Unsolicited prick/Jenrick pic.

(To background music of The Guns of Brixton): promising to set up a law enforcement agency modelled on an agency that appears to be unaccountable and is possibly a white supremacist organisation is quite a call.

Apparently some Reform supporters are upset about criticism of Farage and being labelled racist. Lads, lads, lads (is it mostly lads?), can’t you take a bit of free (lawful) speech and “banter”?

I know it’s a stretch, but imagine there was a foreign power antithetical to USA keen on testing response of US military to some ambiguous manoeuvres. What day would you choose to start?

Why anyone would want to take scientific health advice from a smoker is beyond me.

Scrapping IDL? No doubt Reform will propose cancelling British passports of dual citizens (why does Home Office require you to submit second passports on renewal?!) and the UK-Ireland CTA (as they are toxic to any freedom of movement). What a bunch of wankers.

So all of you (particularly SUCA members) who used to engage regularly with the Socialist Worker seller outside of the Student Union in Southampton in late 1970s and 1980s, you’ll have to put yourselves down as associating with SWP. Associated with the radical left, were you?!

"As part of a well regulated militia"

Given the history of RW press going after prominent LW politicians, it is a surprise to me that the Labour Party does not have a support team of professional advisers with a role to vet/advise etc. Or in other words, what is the Whips Office doing?

On what basis do I know what a conveyancing firm thinks was the scope of its instruction from its client? www.sra.org.uk/solicitors/g...

If Lloyds are only just beginning to manage workforce performance, doesn’t this imply that at some senior level, managers haven’t been managing. Start with them? www.theguardian.com/business/202...

Free speech; isn’t that Article 10 of the ECHR as stated in Human rights Act 1998. Both of which Farage et al want to get rid of?

Farage: “I think it’s legitimate to say that if people feel they have lost control completely … and if people feel that voting doesn’t change anything, then violence is the next step,” RW think tank office vandalised. RW commentator outraged. <sigh>

Anyone been to a live performance? I imagine an audience shuffling around, coughing etc, then stillness when performance starts, with immediate resumption at the end of I and II, applause at end of III. Tantalisingly different quality of silence between end of performance and start of applause?

Trump Cabinet Meetings’ self congratulatory laughing and sycophancy always reminds me of The Untouchables. Like to guess that this is the first dinner after the Home Run dinner.

I’m sure I am not alone in being busy with Google/Wikipedia during and after #KingAndConqueror. Sort of history we rushed through in about Yr 3 or 4, so needed to look it all up as TV timeline seemed (and is) way off.