I think I've gone beyond just doubting, Kier...

Is this because investors see us as politically and economically isolated and increasingly unstable? www.ft.com/content/e709...

If you were thinking, "well, Keir Starmer is alright, but I wish he were less likeable, more compromised and had a more oddly shaped head" then boy are you in for a treat.

Wes Streeting would be for Labour what Liz Truss and Kemi Badenoch have been for the Tories. He's only a good choice for leader if you want to kill the party. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

The two pictures are 11 years apart. On 10 May 1933, the Nazi Party staged an ideological spectacle of the burning of 'un-German’ books. 2nd image: Auschwitz II-Birkenau, burning pits outside gas chamber and crematorium V, 1944. #Auschwitz warns us of where ideologies of hatred can lead people.

Meanwhile, I'm still reeling from the fact that Richard Tice can't find it in him to condemn someone for saying that Nigerians should be melted down to fill potholes.

I have little evidence to support this as the UK media hasn't done much digging - but I strongly suspect that the very mildest investigation into Reform's elected representatives will unveil antisemitism worse than anything ever uncovered (or imagined) in any other mainstream UK political party.

I spent way too long this weekend correlating 81 census variables with local election results, so you don't have to. Enjoy! datawrapper.dwcdn.net/QQQ3D/7/

One of the oddest things about Starmer’s notion of “secure borders” is it doesn’t extend to defending our democracy from foreign oligarchs (and yes the crypto guy is also a mini-oligarch).

I'm curious how far up the Reform Party hierarchy we have to look before we stop seeing marks and start seeing grifters?

Blue Labour will say “better to turn Camden into a marginal in order to win Barnsley” and then get absolutely destroyed in Barnsley.

My ward's results are in - we've gone from two Labour councillors to one Labour, one Tory. It could have been worse. Reform in third place - which is kinda surprising given the constituency had a maniac Brexit Tory for an MP until the last election.

I believe we term this artwork "where the 2024 Labour vote is now".

The idea that Reform, run by public schoolboys from the south of England who want to cut taxes for the rich, have anything to offer people in Hull or Barnsley is just so mad I don't know what to do with it

Every three minutes on Bluesky today: oh that's a delightful name for a town! Dudly-on-Friendton. I see they have voted for the Murdering Orphans party.

The chef's kiss on this is that Hampstead was won by...you guessed it, the Tories!

I need the worst analysis you have.

Gah - Labour may be a bit shit, but they're still better than the goddamn Tories.

Hilarious - but will they learn anything from this other than "let's be even more like Reform"? Will they bollocks.

I for one have literally never seen the supposed appeal of Burnham. He's always struck me as a slightly soggy Tony Blair. (I never got the appeal of Blair either.)

Labour and the Tories both spent most of the last two decades trying to be a more competent version of the Lib Dems, and failed. They're now both trying to be a more competent version of Reform, and are still failing. Neither has been much of a representation of their roots since the early 90s.

It's almost as if people who are left leaning vote for left wing parties, and people who are right leaning vote for right wing parties - but it's pretty rare for people to switch from left to right, or vice versa. Astonishing finding. Someone should tell the Labour party.

I've never been much of a one for party politics - but it is genuinely astonishing that Labour has spent most of the last 30 years attacking people to its left while trying (and repeatedly failing) to appeal to people to its right.

The main parties don't care about us, it's time for a change - let's vote for the party (that's actually a company) based around a single dodgy grifter who hates being questioned (plus a tax exile), even though no one involved with it has ever had a positive impact on literally anything.

Civic duty combined with a morning run, so feeling extra virtuous.

One of my local Labour councillors just rang the bell - core message: "we are not the national party" Starmer really has fucked an insanely strong position, eh?

*catches up on the latest UK political news* Has Starmer finally totally fucking lost it? Reform are advertising plans for concentration camps and Starmer's attacking the (checks notes) *Arts Council* for unspecified, possibly imagined misallocation of its meagre funding?

In just over a month, the duration of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine will match that of the entire World War I. And the entire might of Russia and its totalitarian allies, as well as of the Kremlin's corrupt useful morons in the West, still can't defeat Ukraine.

The same people who'll be arguing against paying £1bn a year for better EU market access (reducing costs for businesses and consumers) will claim that £500m for this performative inhumanity - and the hundreds of millions more their concentration camps will cost - is all money well spent.

What's fascinating is we have seen this story play out on the other side of the Atlantic. You could not need any more demonstration of what will happen. Yet our entire society, led by the politicians and media just pretend there is no knowing. 1/2

"The most ruthlessly efficient manner possible" - yes, that sounds *much* better than Reform's concentration camps in Green constituencies. Nothing even more alarming there.

Hey I heard the EU are trying to ban everyone from getting a tattoo saying I AM A HUGE MORON on their forehead, pass it on to the Tumble Dryer Second Amendment guys

Considered opinion: Zack Polanski has expressed some dubious views and remains a little naive in some of his public statements. Meanwhile, Nigel Farage holds multiple dubious views, hides payments from dubious sources, associates with dubious people, and gets angry or runs away whenever challenged.

This is the "the EU is trying to destroy us with energy saving lightbulbs" uproar all over again. It's also the straight bananas one. They only have the one tactic - and it keeps on working.

Google News is now pushing fucking Reform party Twitter posts on me - less than a week before an election.

It's a total mystery why the Tory party is dead and almost buried.

'The Conservative leader said on Saturday that she did not sign off on the use of a clip from the massacre, in which British soldiers opened fire on unarmed civil rights demonstrators in Derry, and that it was distributed by “very young people”.' Is that an apology? 1/2

Richard Dawkins right now

If your response to someone saying "antisemitism is bad" is to respond with "this one specific incident of an attack on Jewish people outside a Synagogue may not have been antisemitic because..." then a) leave me out of it, and b) you are part of the problem

Now being reminded why I gave up on Twitter.

For the record - and unsurprisingly, given a) I live in the borough in which these attacks have been happening, and b) I'm not a monster: Antisemitism, anti-Jewish sentiment, and anti-Jewish violence is unacceptable - just as all forms of prejudice against races and faiths is unacceptable.

In totally unsurprising news, Richard Dawkins is developing AI psychosis. Paywall bypass: archive.is/6RdK9

Tory door knocker just told to go the same place as the Reform one from last week. Still no sign of the Greens, lib Dems, or - most surprisingly, Labour. It's almost like they *want* to lose the local council.

FFS, I *really* don't want Farage as PM. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

The EU has always had its problems, but every now and then it reminds me why I like it: Brussels pushes remote working to ease energy crisis - www.ft.com/content/bbc9...

When I suggested to someone in early 2016 that the hardest Brexit could include withdrawing from Erasmus they told me I was mad...

So here is the video of the question I asked Goodwin, and his response The key question - how much he will lose financially if MCC is wound up - is not answered www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7OP...

To be fair to Reform, they're the first party to actually ring the doorbell rather than just shove a leaflet through the door. They're also the first party to be told precisely where to go.

People will be closely studying how Hungary's opposition pulled off their win in such a pro-incumbent system. Important to note that the theme was corruption. Democrats need to get much better at calling out Trump's corruption.