OMG. The Guardian have confused Kenneth Clark, presenter of the 1969 series 'Civilisation' with Tory ex-MP & former Chancellor Kenneth Clarke in their review of the new BBC series 'Civilisations:Rise & Fall'

Toby Young, self-appointed king of free speech, is speaking in Hungary tomorrow about UK “censorship”. He’ll be addressing a group funded by Viktor Orbán’s autocratic regime, which has seized control of the country’s media, judiciary, and routinely harasses its critics

Total insanity. Deeply illiberal and authoritarian. Snatching people who look different off the street on the off chance they might be illegal. Does Philips realise that this is the language of tyranny?

Man Who Thought Fleetwood Mac’s ‘The Chain’ Was Over In For Thrill Of His Fucking Life https://theonion.com/man-who-thought-fleetwood-macs-the-chain-was-over-in-for-thrill-of-his-fucking-life/

She’ll be asking universities next…

really a sign of how fragmented and basically lost the admin has become in the last six weeks or so. Imagine having secretary focus on this dress up for your 90 minute flight thing.

We are not yet a year into Trump’s second term and already DOGE has been mothballed, MTG has bailed from Congress, the administration tried and failed to present a Russian plan to end the war, and the ‘Secretary of War’ is trying to court-martial a US Senator. Time for a reminder of this I think…

News coverage of DOGE’s creation earlier this year was practically wall-to-wall — for weeks. “$2 trillion in savings, $5000 dividend checks, an entirely new model of government.” And now that it’s gone, it’s like eh. @techcrunch.com techcrunch.com/2025/11/24/d...

PUNCHBOWL: “.. GOP members messaged us over the weekend saying that they, too, are considering retiring in the middle of the term. Here’s one particularly exercised senior House Republican: @punchbowlnews.bsky.social

This is an official statement from Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, who is the top civilian at the Pentagon, and thus the link in the chain of command between the President and the SOUTHCOM commander, and thus the key civilian who would be giving orders in what may soon be a war with Venezuela.

NEW! How should Labour respond to the two key issues to voters of the economy and immigration and what are the electoral stakes this week of the budget? Read on for our answer... @nprcoxford.bsky.social @jrf-uk.bsky.social

So many symbols of Europe (collectively, including the UK) putting defensive politics ahead of responding to the modern world. Which is more than anything else the reason for widespread disillusion and sluggish growth.

Now that’s writing… from @nesrinemalik.bsky.social’s excoriating piece on Mahmood.

As I said at the time this was the landmine in the immigration white paper. It will cost unis much more than they're getting from inflationary rises in domestic fees.

Pretty predictable that the generation of Centrist politicians that underestimated Farage's populist gut appeal from the Right will also underestimate Polanski's populist gut appeal from the Left

I think this sums up Blue Labour to a tee: someone experiences, or shares a human tragedy, and you feel sad for them, but equally it doesn’t give them license to tear up 600 years of information about what drives prosperity and replace it with saying the word “relational” a lot.

Lots of things to dislike about Lord Glasman. A small one of them is repeating private conversations to the press.

There are some truly unhinged bits in the piece about Glasman, as to be expected when dealing with Glasman, but seriously what the actual? That's...one hell of a conflation of terminology.

I would be very intrigued to know about the location of some of the more George Crossy accounts on X while we are at it.

I only just saw this thanks to @ed3d.net and I don’t have time to do a full fisking before my daughter’s bedtime but a few hundred words in and it’s utter nonsense. substack.com/inbox/post/1...

"My NHS colleagues & I weren’t willing to let the bodies pile high in their thousands. Boris no longer mentions them at all." My piece on the responses to the UK Covid-UK Inquiry report that try to airbrush the dead away. Sincere thanks, @theobserveruk.bsky.social. observer.co.uk/news/nationa...

Oh… another sacrifice to the insatiable Blue Labour beast

This is pretty striking and makes me wonder exactly what Labour have been up to in making policy seemingly in response to / fear of the former rather than the middle group.

Stop. The. Clock.

Cas Mudde spells out what has become largely the consensus among researchers: moving right on immigration will not weaken the far right nor strengthen social democracy. If your reaction is "but in Denmark" please at least familiarize yourself with Danish politics www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Teenager prosecuted over £1.67 in unpaid tax on a car. A criminal conviction for an offence that happened before she knew she even owned a car. Infuriating that this kind of thing is still happening Labour has failed to fix the #SingleJusticeProcedure www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/t...

The Home Secretary explaining that the rise in racist violence is, actually, the natural response to higher levels of immigration is a state of affairs that can't exist without the government having largely decided that racist violence is, if not legitimate, at least understandable.

Home Sec Shabana Mahmood continues this troubling point Governments should seek broad public confidence on immigration - but can only do so within the 97% who accept this Home Sec is British No immigration policy can ever appease < 200k people (0.25%) who perpetrate hate crime using racist slurs

Oh my god

once again joining the many people who have observed how much of a world-historical problem it is that Trump is so fucking funny

It's Friday afternoon, so who wouldn't want to enter the weekend with one more round of my patented bubble plots of British politics? In this final (one hopes) of my mini-series I look at who the 'odd ones out' of British politics are. Who is 'out of touch' with the rest of the public. Let's see 1/n

To win power Reform will have to spend the next three years justifying extreme policies and remarks and preventing Kent County Council from collapse. No wonder Farage wants an early election, writes @benansell.bsky.social.

Most Macclesfield outcome ever

Good news for Adam I guess

I asked grok who was the better role model for humanity, Jesus Christ or Elon Musk. GUESS WHAT.

Labour is in deep trouble. But three years out from the next election, it could yet be the tortoise to Reform's hare, argues @benansell.bsky.social.

A better option for Labour's liberals, in my view, would be to return to the spirit of the 1995 Clause IV, and confidently assert an agenda of free trade and equality – in opposition to the insurgent global radical right, and as an alternative to Starmer's conservative, inegalitarian statism.

Oh no. An amazing bassist, style icon and a genuinely lovely guy who was happy to hang out with random students in Manchester. RIP 👑 www.theguardian.com/music/2025/n...

Manufacturing consent

A new postdoc position is now available at the Center for European Studies at Harvard for 2026 2027, The Guido Goldman postdoctoral fellowship, named after our center's founder A great opportunity to work at Harvard for the year. Here is more information: ces.fas.harvard.edu/opportunitie...

I know it is much more entertaining - I'm guilty too - to follow the briefing and counter-briefing from No 10 but this is actually news you can use to understand what's going on with govt.

Gov just published a new list cabinet committees. In short, looks like (1) big vote of confidence in Darren Jones from the PM, (2) existing missions + immigration are top of the government's agenda, (3) PM wants things to happen faster, and (4) Rayner's priorities perhaps no longer front of mind?🧵

Wrote about Man Panic: The panic over a male crisis in Britain is overblown economist.com/britain/2025... from The Economist

The Eric Schickler essay in Larry Bartel's symposium on "What Trump Has Taught Us About Political Science" is one of the most insightful pieces I've read in 2025. US institutions turned out to be weak, and we have to rethink conventional wisdom. open access: academic.oup.com/psq/advance-...

Very disappointing to see so many missteps at my institution.

The Democratic Party faces big challenges and has lots of work to do to win voters' confidence, but the generic House trial heats from two national voter polls today put that in perspective. Marquette (certain to vote): Democrats 53%, Republicans 44% NPR/PBS/Marist: Democrats 55%, Republicans 41%

Why should people who “look like” the home secretary be on the hook for immigration policy? This is great by @stephenkb.bsky.social:

That American politics went off the rails after Barack Obama and British ethnonationalism has reared its head after Rishi Sunak is the real tell about how committed some people are to integration and post racial politics.