Properly funding the court system would clear the backlog even more quickly. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

The immigration doom loop in full swing. Chasing the xenophobes is a doomed strategy both economically *and* politically. (1/3) archive.ph/pyVLg

The "reach out to Reform" argument within Labour has two axioms: clamp down hard on immigration and get everything working again. The former prevents the latter.

x1,000,000

Only steering towards the iceberg can save the Titanic

Total and utter and unmitigated bollocks. Luke and his destructively factional, entirely deluded mates are steering Labour to electoral wipe out and the country towards the catastrophe of nationalist right-wing government. This is exactly like Brexit: a car crash happening in slow motion.

It really says a lot that peaceful protest in public spaces can get you arrested in the UK but the Twitter situation is viewed as completely okay. Americans take a very absolutist view of free speech which comes with real trade-offs. But this state of affairs completely inverts them! Deranged stuff.

Twitter is owned by a fascist, Facebook and the Washington Post have gone MAGA, and now CBS News is about to be turned into far-right state TV. Here’s why America has a liberal media bias problem.

I like how basically every poll, even on the most trivial of issues like 'who was the baddie in 90s CGI adventure ReBoot' is a repudiation of Labour's strategy of trying to win over Reform voters.

“There's a global solar energy revolution happening led by China and it should have been one of the biggest stories of 2025 While the US is committing to a suicide pact with fossil fuels, the rest of the world is leapfrogging into cheap nearly limitless energy” @esqueer.net bsky.app/profile/gwag...

Trump is trying to force US oil companies to rebuild Venezuelan oil fields that are too expensive to invest in at current crude prices while a full blown energy revolution is happening with cheap solar and electrification growing exponentially. This is a dying empire shit.

Very strange how France are able to respond, but No 10 is still collecting facts and has no response.

The US attack on Venezuela is an illegal act of aggression against a sovereign country (with lots of oil). Venezuela has become a more deeply repressive dictatorship & urgently needs democratic solution but this is unjustified & unjustifiable. Look forward to seeing swift UK Government condemnation.

Marco Rubio is reportedly saying Maduro will stand trial in US courts. Which means it’s now the US administration’s position that US courts can hold foreign presidents, but not the US president, accountable for crimes.

Trump isn’t predictable or consistent, but this particular action *would* be consistent with the emergence of a G2+1 order where Washington and Beijing, with Moscow as a junior partner, give each other free rein in their purported spheres of influence.

The core of the issue I take with the Ovenden piece, is that this is a particularly acute problem when the government doesn’t have a clear sense of what it wants, the clear trade-offs that it is willing to accept as a result. Which stakeholders are you willing to piss off for extended periods.

100% seriously, European leaders and Commission officials should plan on the basis that the US might do this to them too, about Greenland, about tech regulation, about “Christian values”, about “free speech”, whatever.

*cough*

A gangster state at home, a rogue state abroad: and entirely because Congress and the Supreme Court have abdicated their proper constitutional roles.

"The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.” In that ancient history ‘the strong’ (Athens) overreached & were defeated. This time? Also, wouldn’t like to be a European leader, figuring out what to say & do about this. (We will have to accelerate defence and tech sovereignty.)

Discworld QOTD, from Guards! Guards!

More often than not the struggling North/dominant South paradigm shaping media depictions of UK politics creates a misleadingly simplistic narrative that ignores the ideological diversity and areas of bourgeois prosperity in the North and pockets of economic collapse in the South.

This is a great PHOTO ESSAY on “solar hockey stick of hope”, and countries breaking free of oil and gas dependence. IF your country's media isn't telling you about the renewables global boom, then consider why.... www.science.org/content/arti... bsky.app/profile/scie...

Add George Orwell, Peter Townsend and Joe Strummer

We have so much good evidence for cash transfers but so many just refuse to accept that those in poverty can make good decisions.

Worked example of the crippling effects or Treasury brain here

Wilhoit's Law: “Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.” en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_W...

"Farage and Badenoch are free to offer up an explanation as to why Connolly should be able to incite violence without consequence, while el-Fattah should face extrajudicial punishment for it. Until they do so, there is an all too obvious one: they are openly pandering to racists."

I've been doing this as a comedy bit for years, but I do believe it; before I die, I will see the establishment of a Royal Commission on Britain's failure to attract sufficient immigration, and many of today's broadsheet ethnonationalists will be on it

I am trying, really trying, not to get angry but it is genuinely unbelievable how much of our current woes you can put down to "the Conservative party thinks only in a 2 day media cycle and acts accordingly." A party gleefully smashing up the hotel room then asking whose room it is.

Our best, and v plausible, hope is in they purity test each other to the point the outgroup is so large that they can't win any elections.

Nothing could better sum up where we are as a culture

Not quite the original definition of ‘disaster capitalism’, but still…

Honestly also the brass neck of this paper, which cheered this asymmetric trade deal at the time and advocated that Liz Truss, the Cabinet minister who signed it should become *prime minister*.

The ‘central paradox’ in this quote becomes less mysterious when you remember only 1/5 electorate voted for Starmer in the GE

This is one of the most beautiful things I have witnessed, the craft here is impeccable.

Coppola’s description of a film director as the “the ringmaster of a circus inventing itself” applies to many other fields, especially around catalysing political change and transformation for better futures. Quoted in @lrb.co.uk review of Walter Munch memoire. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

Discworld QOTD, from Hogfather

OH, THERE HAS TO BE SOMETHING IN THE STOCKING THAT MAKES A NOISE, said Death. OTHERWISE, WHAT IS 4:30 A.M. FOR? - Terry Pratchett, Hogfather good night and good luck to every other parent with small children out there

it's crazy that 500 years ago, you would see the ruler of your country maybe once in your life and hear whispers that they're the Sun God, but now with social media, you get to see on a daily basis that they're the most unhinged, idiotic, and unhappy person you know

Just when I thought I couldn't admire the man more... 🎯 🎯 🎯 💯 💯 💯 👍 👍 👍

I couldn't find the quote on a quick browse of Goodreads (I don't have my copy with me), but I did find this, which I think sums up what is so repellent and arid about Blue Labour and this government's view on class and aspiration more broadly.

Not least because it seemed to spell more of the same on austerity/tough choices, rather than 'Change' people voted Labour for. Question is whether u-turns and change of emphasis in 2025 budget can turn people's impressions around.

Think it's fair to say the economic decisions and narrative of Lab's first year - Winter Fuel - Rose Garden Speech - NICs - Farmers IHT - Approach to disability benefits - Not enough help on cost of living Did more than anything else to cause Labour's crash in popularity

But a cat sometimes has to point this out to him. Merry Christmas to all.

Agree with all of this, other than "the right will go 'pro-natalist" - I think what will happen is that much of the right will shift from 'blaming our ills on immigration' to 'blaming our ills on ethnic diversity', which is already happening to an extent.

I’m reminded of watching two old ladies ask a teenage goth for directions and she politely told them and when she was out of earshot one lady said “You know where you are with a goth”

another example of AI as tracer dye, exposing an already existing problem (and, of course, significantly worsening it)

This Yglesias piece in the NYT is horrifically bad. Almost every "fact" it cites is provably false. At best it is cocktail party banter from a pundit who knows nothing of energy. At worst, it was cut/paste from oil industry talking points. So, a rebuttal: www.nytimes.com/2025/12/18/o...

Noam Chomsky has spent about 60 years telling us that billionaires control the world through corporate propaganda.