Late night crew, one for you!

In which I pick a fight with Liam Byrne for some reason:

Hope everyone is ready for the day two story when Farage or some other notable Reform figure inevitably doesn’t completely disown Trump’s autism comments and instead implies an openness to asking questions about the drug.

Early feedback on my book is extremely positive! & thanks again to @iandunt.bsky.social for the endorsement. It’s a graphic memoir about my experiences of breast cancer treatment age 37 (don’t worry, it’s uplifting) 2 days until publication. You can pre-order it here. linktr.ee/ThisMightSur...

NEW: Has Liam Byrne had his Weetabix? takes.jamesomalley.co.uk/p/has-liam-b...

Seems a bit odd to run this study on whether ChatGPT can accurately summarise scientific papers by: a) Not actually specifying which models were used b) Almost certainly using non-reasoning models that are wildly out of date now www.science.org/content/blog...

Why "rent-seeking" and corporate greed aren't always to blame:

If this doesn't get as many reposts as my angry polemic against the racists last week I am going to be furious.

NEW: Has Liam Byrne had his Weetabix? takes.jamesomalley.co.uk/p/has-liam-b...

Really hope that as Starmer enters the room, Big Jet yells "Here he comes! It's a big one, all the way from London! Bit of a wobble, phwoah, balls of steel on the pilot there, and textbook landing in the chair!"

Starmer on BIG JET TV (463k YouTube subscribers). Is the government… learning to do comms?! youtu.be/3HHYzVyNhtM?...

He’s going to tell the racists to fuck off, as per my suggestion (well, maybe). takes.jamesomalley.co.uk/p/this-is-en...

This week’s pod is a good one!

1/ Very interesting seeing support for Ed Davey’s (accurate) criticism given the prior discourse on Bluesky recently arguing that Reform should be opposed purely morally versus in terms of whether their policies “work”.

Evening crew! A pod for you!

It's funny how Heathrow's third runway is treated as this massively important big deal, generating endless noise on its impact/cost etc, dominating Parliament and discourse. Yet Gatwick getting a second runway approved is a one-day, second-or-third-in-the-running-order story.

Afternoon crew! This week's pod is a good one!

This is why I'm (slightly) more sympathetic to the government's unpleasant immigration schtick. Though I wish they would be more humane and stick it more loudly to the racists (and think it would be politically rewarding to do so), I think the underlying strategy is a pretty accurate analysis.

My comments @britishfuture.bsky.social on proposals to revoke settlement and abolish indefinite leave to remain from Nigel Farage's Reform Party this morning www.britishfuture.org/reform-attac...

It would be good if the only political pushback against Nigel Farage's plans to mass deport hundreds of thousands of our neighbours, friends, family and colleagues didn't just come from a handful of backbench MPs and one regional mayor

Honestly @mjrobbins.com's story about Bristol this week is absolutely mental and is a perfect case study in how Britain can't seem to do... anything.

Some fun lunchtime listening!

New episode of THE ABUNDANCE AGENDA podcast! ☢️ Why the US-UK nuclear agreement is a big deal! 🚤 How one barge disrupted a major Bristol redevelopment for EIGHTEEN YEARS ⚡️ And we speak to the company building a nuclear reactor to power the London Gateway port! www.abundancepod.com/p/britain-go...

Reform are now coming after people with permanent residency. It'll be citizens next. No one is safe from authoritarian governments.

I think reactions to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict might be the starkest divide yet between Twitter/Bluesky timelines.

Amazingly there’s an actual answer to my question!

Reclaiming the Union Jack from white nationalists, reclaiming the colour orange from Trump...

I wonder why the LibDems pivoted from yellow (or “gold” as they called it) to orange?

👍👍👍

This is interesting! Though I think it highlights something that is annoyingly elided by the digital ID debate: The Blair proposals back in day were like 100x more Orwellian! They wanted everyone's DNA stored in the identity database! www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Notable that Australia and Canada recognised Palestine at the same time as the UK. A correct observation that we actually have very little influence over what happens in the Middle East, and that despite the endless noise, our actions only really matter when coordinated with our allies.

It's bizarre that the question is being asked - the stunts are clearly wildly effective at driving attention! (Plus we still haven't seen the stunts reach their finale, with Ed Davey jumping out of a balloon on the edge of space.)

James flags up Lizzi Collinge MP (Morecambe and Lunesdale) sharing a video of her Westminster Hall speech in early September on what the Battle of Britain meant @lizzicollinge.bsky.social takes.jamesomalley.co.uk/p/this-is-en...

'We shouldn’t let the anti-racism norms crumble. Keir Starmer – and the rest of civil society – should loudly reinforce the norm, and send a signal that racism is still unacceptable – and deeply unpatriotic.' takes.jamesomalley.co.uk/p/this-is-en...

This by @jamesomalley.co.uk is good.

"Today, in 2025, the norm has broken down. Too many thugs and racists feel as though they have been granted permission to behave terribly" - James O'Malley's blog

This is good but he should say it in front of a TV camera! takes.jamesomalley.co.uk/p/this-is-en...

Lib Dem Tim Farron MP tells party conference Reform UK "spent a lot of their time [at conference] giving a platform to people who think that the Covid vaccines gave the royal family cancer, to self confessed convicted racists, and worst of all, Lembit Opik"

This is a funny post but you could make the same 'critique' of computers. We can think - but having computers store our thoughts and ideas is quite useful too!

Picked up my partner from a train station first thing this morning. About 7:45am. It was virtually deserted, save for a member of staff on the gateline. As she went through the barriers, a guy wriggled through with her as the gates swung open. Completely shamelessly.

I think what makes the Your Party fiasco both tragic and funny is that ultimately, they're fighting over who will win 5% of the vote at the next election and help Nigel Farage take power.

One sad thing about the Corbyn/Sultana feud is that once upon a time this would’ve resulted in a furious pamphlet war and the launch of about five newspapers and journals. Now all that bitterness is being channeled into bourgeois institutions like the ICO and the libel courts…

It sure is weird how our critical infrastructure, particularly Heathrow it seems, keeps getting hit by problems like this! I don't want to Russia to judgement but if only there were some explanation for this!

You gotta fight, for your right, to Your Party.

You gotta fight, for your right, to Your Party.

Andrew WK never had these problems.

Remember the story of Galley Hill, the road the collapsed that nobody can fix? The good news is that there's some movement a fix. The bad news is that movement is Natural England doing (of course) a bat survey. takes.jamesomalley.co.uk/p/the-landsl...

I did not have Geowizard turning out to be a Reform supporter on my bingo card for today!

Good piece by @jamesomalley.co.uk on how "the anti-racism norms that have become deeply embedded in British society over the last generation or so are unravelling at alarming speed." open.substack.com/pub/jamesoma...

I did not have Geowizard turning out to be a Reform supporter on my bingo card for today!