Ian

#BBCProms2026 #BBCProms Every year for a while now I've added the BBC Proms Concerts to a public Calendar so it can be viewed alongside other diary items folks have. Its there again for the 2026 concerts - see it in your cal via this link: calendar.google.com/calendar/ica...

80% of the money taken by Reform in last 2 years is from foreign based donors. If they are so patriotic, why don’t they insist on British residents not just people who are British In Name Only, carrying the passport but don’t live here or pay taxes. www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/poli...

The Williamson tunnels under Liverpool are just crazy. Amazing. Lovely piece here with video. www.cnn.com/travel/willi...

Average Trump scandal: many people dead after uncontroversial government program illegally cut by doge for nonexistent savings Average mamdani scandal: he’s playing BASKETBALL with his FRIENDS

Lunchtime mooch in Blackheath (getting around at mo). Haven’t been here for a few years. Blackheath has an unusual concentration of wine bars, off licences, and kitchen/interior design offices. Spot the theme here . Hic 😏. Also, not everything is pre war.

Farage tying himself in angry knots here ... as he refuses to answer the basic question: Is it racist to call Kemi Badenoch a "Nigerian scammer"?

At least 18 early voting centers in rural Alaska have not opened as of Friday, state Sen. Bill Wielechowski says. The commonality? All the affected areas have at least a 60% Alaska Native population — with nearly a dozen having Alaska Native populations upwards of 90%: https://demdock.com/4yTW5Ze

Workers party and ‘man of the people’ blames staff for a poorly attended speech he gives with Jenrick. Empty seats. Striking he says ‘people will have driven up here costing them a great deal of money’ as if folk normally drive into central London: clue, they don’t. www.mirror.co.uk/news/politic...

“On Mondays, people who run businesses tend to be rather busy” How would he know?

What’s that you say? Liz has a new book out which even the Telegraph is saying is even more unhinged than the last one? Wonderful, I’ll post this then.

Not to open oneself up to accusations of being right-wing, but a minimum wage of nearly £30,000 a year and a higher rate tax bracket of £50,000 does look a little off

“If the person is a U.S. citizen or otherwise lawfully in the United States, that individual will be free to go after the brief encounter.” Justice Brett Kavanaugh www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/24p...

We've done this in a smaller scale at @winchester.gov.uk. Much of our recent council housing is S106 obligations, but some is so-called "additionality" where we buy new market housing for council use.

I wonder if there's a case for government acting as buyer of last resort, promising to absorb any new homes the market can't to create stability of demand?

Due to the affordability crisis, this year Thanksgiving Dinner will all be in chip form. What better way to spend Black Friday than on the terlet.

Metaphor alert:

When you fill up your tanks with diesel, 🇺🇸, just think of it in terms of gallons of Ukrainian blood. Because that’s where 🇺🇸 💵 will go. Into Putin’s war machine, his “human safari” as 🇷🇺 military bloggers are calling the hunting down of Ukrainian citizens. Babies. A gift to Russian propaganda too

This is a brilliant article from @militarnyi.com on learning the right lessons from Ukraine’s experience.

Anaziny gentle Farage interview #bbcr4today. Was there even one interruption ? His settled status Universal Credit comment was outrageous: he knows that people need to have earned the right to that by being here working etc. he’s fine with his donors living abroad and effectively being Thai etc tho

Amazingly one sided piece #bbcr4today on Burnham and Brexit. So much negativity. No mention however of the problems he would have from pro EU folk (MPs and others) if he doesn’t move towards EU to undo the deep economic damage Brexit is doing

Today is Ukraine's Day of Writing and Language, and Russia is still restricting it. On 15 December 2025, it dropped Ukrainian from the school programs it imposes on occupied territories. Our updated timeline: euromaidanpress.com/2026/10/26/a...

For the fabulously wealthy, paying taxes is pretty much optional. They can borrow against their vast wealth, which is mostly an untaxed capital gain, without paying taxes. When they die, the capital gain goes to zero. And loopholes exist to bypass the estate tax too.

"moral void' is perhaps the most charitable you could be. Given his narcissistic, misogynist, rapey, arrogance, you could reasonably just call him evil. Thats not a lack of morals he's got, he's actively against normal tenets of society of any faith not just christian bsky.app/profile/robe...

American people bad at Democracy. How can they elect confident morons like this regime? bsky.app/profile/pbum...

Obviously this is racist and gross, but it's also shockingly historically illiterate? No one who has taken a single high school world history course would deny that Arab culture has produced incredible science and literature. This is why we need basic humanities education.

I’m surprised Ukraine doesn’t do more propaganda leaflets over Russian cities. Pictures of attrocities. Pictures of the awful kit Russian soldiers have etc. bsky.app/profile/insi...

Politico wrote up Zohran playing basketball with the uncovering-a-big-scandal tone the same day the NYTimes wrote up "credible allegation that The President of the United States raped a woman" as a political strategy story. Broken media in a nutshell

Who do I give to to get this in front of as many Michigan voters as possible?

More to come on this, but those Labour MPs opposing talking about freedom of movement need to be aware that they are also condemning UK manufacturing to more barriers and probably further decline. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Most talk of constituencies being 'pro-Brexit' or 'Brexit-supporting' is incredibly lazy for basic reasons that large parts of Westminster just don't seem to be able to fathom.

He is so close to getting it

Metaphor anyone? The old transatlantic liner SS United States will be sunk deliberately off Florida around the 2nd week of November. www.independent.co.uk/news/world/a...

Focus on what’s first : election day. Don’t celebrate in advance. Voters notice chicken counting and might stay home thinking their vote isn’t needed bsky.app/profile/mary...