As long as it's not Keir Starmer

Nigel Farage says Tony Blair 'not my choice' to help govern Gaza but understands Donald Trump's logic

Donald Trump has said former Labour prime minister Sir Tony Blair would head up a "Board of Peace" in Gaza.

Nigel Farage has said Sir Tony Blair would not be his choice to lead an interim government in Gaza, but understands Donald Trump's logic in choosing the former Labour prime minister.

The Reform leader said "as long as it's not Keir Starmer" heading up a transitional Gaza authority, he is happy.

"As long as it's not Keir Starmer" could could become a popular phrase suitable for numerous situations where competence and integrity are usually required.  

I need someone to clean the car - as long as it's not Keir Starmer.

I need someone to walk the dog - as long as it's not Keir Starmer.

Fishy

Barrister Steven Barrett on the China spy case - he sees it as a resignation issue, as bad or worse than the Profumo affair. Unfortunately Starmer sees resignation as a job for minions.

You can just ignore journalists

Ben Sixsmith has a useful Critic piece on the loosening of the narrative grip exerted by mainstream media. Worth reading. 


You can just ignore journalists

The fact that something is being treated as controversial does not actually make it controversial

In 2019, the New Statesman published an interview with the late conservative philosopher Roger Scruton. Scruton was reported to have made “a series of outrageous remarks” — about a “Soros empire”, for example, and about Chinese people being “robots”.

Scruton was a titan of British conservatism. Conservative MPs hurried to prove themselves — by throwing him under the bus. “Antisemitism sits alongside racism, anti-Islam, homophobia, and sexism as a cretinous and divisive belief that has no place in our public life,” yelped Tom Tugendhat MP, “And particularly not in government.” “No brainer,” snorted Johnny Mercer MP, “Let’s not take our time on this. @TomTugendhat absolutely right.” Scruton was promptly fired, and the New Statesman’s George Eaton posted a photo of himself drinking champagne.

Eaton, it turned out, had done a poor journalistic job. When Scruton had talked about Chinese people being “robots”, a transcript revealed, he was referring to government conditioning and not to their essential nature. Other “outrageous remarks” simply were not outrageous. If we can refer to a “Murdoch empire”, or a “Koch empire”, why can we not refer to a “Soros empire”? Scruton was reinstated amid awkward apologies.

The lesson for British right-wingers should have been clear. When a journalist says “jump”, you don’t have to ask “how high?”

As usual

One idle afternoon this week, I finished the Kindle book I was reading so as usual I logged onto the Amazon website, selected another and downloaded it. Something Mrs H and I do all the time, along with a vast number of other Kindle readers.

My phone was on the table by my chair, so it gave the ping sound as an Amazon confirmatory email arrived. As usual. 

For some reason it suddenly struck me how remarkable the technology has become.

Finish a book –
select another from the vast online repository –
buy it –
ping goes the email app –
start reading the new book.


Next time I probably won’t notice how remarkable the technology is.

As usual.

Wild Haggis Documentary

 

Opportunity of a lifetime

'Opportunity of a lifetime' to live and work on remote UK island with no electricity, shops or cars

An 'opportunity of a lifetime' has come up for a family or couple to live and work on a remote island off the coast of Britain.

The island's officials are looking for people to join the small community on Bardsey Island (Ynys Enlli) and live virtually off-grid.

Situated off the Llŷn Peninsula in North Wales, the island has no electricity, shops, schools or cars.

A political opportunity of a lifetime too. Invaluable work experience for Ed Miliband and all members of the Climate Change Committee.

Their reports would be interesting.

Political Paranoia

An interesting aspect of North Korea is extreme political paranoia directed at its own citizens. Even here in the UK, this kind of paranoia does highlight a disturbing characteristic of the Starmer government. 

As we know, there has been an unmistakeable rise of paranoid political interference in what UK citizens say and even think. As we also know, it is one of the defining characteristics of a totalitarian political outlook.

 
N. Korean authorities jail private tutors as crackdown intensifies

Several Chongjin residents in their 30s and 40s have been caught working as private tutors

North Korean authorities have recently been tightening restrictions on private tutoring. Anyone caught being paid for private lessons reportedly faces legal sanctions, with no exceptions being granted.

“Here in Chongjin, there have been several recent cases of individuals being sent to labor camps for giving children private lessons at their homes,” a source in North Hamgyong province told Daily NK recently.

Macrohard and Grokipedia

Is Elon Musk really building ‘Macrohard’ to troll?

Insisting that the Macrohard project is really his latest undertaking, he said: ‘It’s a tongue-in-cheek name, but the project is very real!

‘In principle, given that software companies like Microsoft do not themselves manufacture any physical hardware, it should be possible to simulate them entirely with AI.’


This one sounds interesting too - 

A beta version of ‘Grokipedia’ will be published in two weeks, he claimed on his platform X, built with the help of his artificial intelligence Grok.

Perhaps we can await Grokstagram, Grokbook and GrokTok in the coming months too?

Shrink Bloat

First-year doctors threaten to strike because they can’t get enough work

First-year doctors have voted in favour of strikes in a fresh blow to Wes Streeting, the Health Secretary...

The latest ballot saw 97 per cent of first-year resident doctors vote in favour of strikes, equating to 3,950 people in total. The turnout was 65 per cent.

97 percent? Isn't that the same percentage of climate scientists convinced we are all doomed by climate change and it's your fault? 

Coincidence of course, nothing to do with a tendency of professional people to gather together in large flocks for protection against anything with sharp teeth.

Reading on -


Dr Jack Fletcher, the chair of the BMA’s resident doctors committee, said the doctors in question “won’t accept that they face a career of insecurity at a time when the demand for doctors is huge”.

He said: “The numbers are absurd: more than 10,000 doctors applied this year to become psychiatrists with less than 500 able to get a place, yet patients are still experiencing significant waits at a detriment to their health.


By gum, so this year 10,000 doctors applied to become psychiatrists but only 500 managed to get a place. That's shrink bloat. 

Decades ago my cousin went in for psychiatry after qualifying as a doctor. At the time he said it was the quickest way to become a consultant, which he duly demonstrated.

A swathe of bold policies

Take that, Nigel! Kemi Badenoch has just proved why Reform don't stand a chance

Kemi Badenoch and her Conservative colleagues have announced a swathe of bold policies that might at last start to win over wavering voters. Over the past year, Kemi's critics have complained that she's been too slow to set out big ideas - and let Nigel Farage make all the running. But she's making up for it, at the Tory party conference in Manchester.

We've seen pledges to take the UK out of the European Convention on Human Rights, stop the welfare bill rising even further and cut household energy bills, giving some much-needed relief to people still struggling with the cost of living. And the conference has barely begun. In the days to come, we can expect big announcements on cutting crime, making sure our courts really do punish criminals and more.

A plug for the Tories of course. Any ambitious political leader may announce a swathe of new policies, just as anyone may play language games.  

Yet there is an obvious wider problem with political promises which aren't worth anything, the voting field becomes significantly skewed by too many useful idiots. We saw that when Jeremy Corbyn became Labour leader, but it is far from being a modern problem.

For example, it could be said with some justification that the current Labour government was put there by useful idiots. In which case, anyone paying attention must have at least some doubts about the value of elections and the point of voting.

Does voting for the least damaging option work? It is not obvious that it does, all established political parties chase the useful idiot vote with worthless slogans, clichés and promises. If it continues to work as it has in the past, what else are they going to do?

What is missing is that subtle recognition of a leader who intends to deliver, knows how to do it and is backed by enough supporters to make it work. If this isn't there, then the voting booth can't deliver it.

They can have ours

France loses yet another prime minister as Sebastien Lecornu sensationally quits plunging country into deeper crisis

France's new Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu resigned on Monday barely 14 hours after appointing his new cabinet - plunging the country into a fresh political crisis.

His shock resignation led to demands from the far-right National Rally for President Emmanuel Macron to call a snap parliamentary election.


I'm sure monsieur Starmer would soon learn to lie in French. He'd enjoy it and what a relief it would be for him to be back in the EU.

Two choices

Two choices in one blog post today -

A link to piece on Starmer's difficulties with the China spy case 

or -

A time-lapse video of a slug eating spaghetti. 

I opted for the video.

The audacity to begin

Suppose we take Sir Keir Starmer as an example of someone who utters abominable nonsense as Charles Dickens’ oily character Mr Chadband does in Bleak House.

So, Mr. Chadband—of whom the persecutors say that it is no wonder he should go on for any length of time uttering such abominable nonsense, but that the wonder rather is that he should ever leave off, having once the audacity to begin—retires into private life until he invests a little capital of supper in the oil-trade.

Charles Dickens - Bleak House (1852-53)


There is a useful question here. It’s not only Starmer’s abominable nonsense we wonder at, nor that he carries on with it, but how did he ever have the audacity to begin?

The point to be made is that millions of us don’t have that level of audacity or anything like it. We can’t begin to spout the abominable nonsense Starmer spouts. Where did the required audacity come from and when?

Story Time

Badenoch: Tories will deport 150,000 migrants a year

Kemi Badenoch has pledged to deport 150,000 illegal migrants a year with new Trump-style immigration squads.

The Conservative Party leader will use this year’s conference in Manchester to announce how she would reform Britain’s migration system after leaving the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).

There is one thing the major political parties have taught us over recent decades - believe nothing they say. None of their claims, promises, manifestos or numbers.

The word 'pledge' is particularly unreliable.

Sean Plunket Reads 'Mum's Busy Work' By Jacinda Ardern

 

Drink, lunacy and practical joking are barred as explanations

Green Party membership overtakes Liberal Democrats under new leader

Rachel Millward, the party's deputy leader, announced the achievement to members on the second day of the party's annual conference in Bournemouth this morning.

It's believed to be only the second time this has happened, with the last time being more than a decade ago - in January 2015.

The Greens have revealed they now have more than 83,500 members, to the Lib Dems 83,174.


I don’t like games that make me feel a congenital idiot. But there was one that rather amused me. You invented a preposterous situation and the point was to explain naturally how it came about. Drink, lunacy and practical joking were barred as explanations.

John Buchan - The Runagates Club (1928)

Because it cannot lie

"If one destroyed in museums and libraries, if one hurled down on the flagstones before the churches all the works and all the monuments of art that religions have inspired, what would remain of the great dreams of humanity? To give to men that portion of hope and illusion without which they cannot live, such is the reason for the existence of gods, heroes, and poets. During fifty years science appeared to undertake this task. But science has been compromised in hearts hungering after the ideal, because it does not dare to be lavish enough of promises, because it cannot lie."

Gustave Le Bon quoting Daniel Lesueur (Jeanne Lapauze) in -

The Crowd; study of the popular mind (1895)


In which case, science must be made to lie in the interests of ruling elites. Ruling elites have no use for science as a secure knowledge culture which cannot lie, especially as the cold blue light of reason could be turned on their lies. 

Science wasn’t lavish enough of promises and has become less lavish in recent decades, but its great fault is the same as it was in Le Bon's day - as a knowledge culture it cannot lie. The favoured approach to fixing this fault has long been familiar to us.

Scientist says

Scientist says ancient human civilizations lived on the moon... and the proof will be televised soon

A scientist has claimed that astronauts may soon uncover the remains of a long-lost human civilization that once lived on the Moon 50,000 years ago.

Author and geologist Gregg Braden told podcast host Joe Rogan that evidence of this ancient city was kept from the public by the US and Russia during the Cold War.

However, during the interview on Wednesday, Braden noted that emerging superpowers China and India plan to televise their findings once upcoming expeditions reach the lunar surface.

 

Bookshops v Libraries

When I worked in a second-hand bookshop — so easily pictured, if you don’t work in one, as a kind of paradise where charming old gentlemen browse eternally among calf-bound folios — the thing that chiefly struck me was the rarity of really bookish people.

George Orwell - Bookshop Memories (1936)


For myself, public libraries possess a special horror, as of lonely wastes and dragon-haunted fens. The stillness and the heavy air, the feeling of restriction and surveillance, the mute presence of these other readers, “all silent and all damned,” combine to set up a nervous irritation fatal to quiet study.

Kenneth Grahame – Pagan Papers (1894)

William the Bold

Prince William: I’m not afraid of changing the monarchy

The Prince of Wales has said he is not afraid to question tradition to make sure the monarchy remains “fit for purpose”.

The Prince said it was “safe to say that change is on my agenda” when he became King, as he wanted to “impact people’s lives for the better”.

“The bit that excites me is the idea of being able to bring some change,” he said, warning that it was important not to get “too attached” to history and tradition.


Not an enviable position for him and there is no chance he'll manage to initiate positive change, whatever that might be. If the monarchy changes at all during his stint on the throne, it will almost certainly be changed for him, not by him.

As for wanting to “impact people’s lives for the better” he could begin by admitting that his main problem will be preventing his government from making things worse. From what we see now, this isn't going to happen.

Canada High

 

Clues

Oh well, Keir Starmer is at least an unmissable clue. Maybe.

It is absurd to imagine that a mendacious political leader such as “Sir” Keir Starmer with his cardboard “knighthood” represents a political party which is not as mendacious as he is. Absurd to believe Labour claims to represent “the people”. It ain’t so.

Senior members of the Labour Cabinet have no moral compass and no interest in voters other than people to be manipulated by rhetoric. If absurd rhetoric works, then absurd rhetoric is what we get. It is foolish to expect otherwise.

Senior Cabinet members seem to be incapable of doing anything unselfish and that’s another clue. There are many. Always have been, it’s just that clues are thicker on the ground these days. Footprints and greasy fingerprints everywhere, that kind of thing.

Clues everywhere, but going back to senior Cabinet members, they are entirely satisfied with their own sense of purpose and whatever mendacity and evasion serves their ambitions and the needs of the moment. 

If working people do not have the sense to see political parties for what they are, then ambitious politicians do not see it as their responsibility to enlighten them. They aren’t going to tell it as it is – why would they?

If working people do not have the sense to see the personal ambition revealed by the habitual evasions and mendacity of their elected representatives then hardly anyone in Parliament is likely to enlighten them.

Ministers like it this way

Callum McGoldrick has a useful CAPX reminder that the Quangocracy is here to stay. Well worth reading because there is no evidence that any government has ever intended to tackle the problem, in spite of rhetoric claiming otherwise. 

Political oversight of government by elected political parties has gone.


Quangos are out of control – and ministers like it that way

• Prime Ministers have been piling up new quangos for 70 years: Tony Blair created 92
• Britain’s quangos have a total expenditure greater than the GDP of Norway
• Keir Starmer’s Government created 27 quangos in its first eight months

Calls for a ‘bonfire of the quangos’ have been made since David Cameron’s time as Leader of the Opposition all the way through to Keir Starmer’s premiership. Yet for all the rhetoric, the quangocracy has grown bigger, better staffed and more powerful, as is detailed in the TaxPayers’ Alliance’s new quango database.

With over 500,000 staff and a total expenditure greater than the GDP of Norway, the reliance on these ‘arm’s-length bodies’ by ministers, and therefore the impact on our lives, has never been greater. Since Anthony Eden took office 70 years ago, every Prime Minister who has stayed in office for a full year has created a quango. Tony Blair created 92, the most of any Prime Minister. Even David Cameron, the man who first promised the great bonfire, created 54.

Disposable income

Some interesting disposable income stats from Daniel Dunford of Sky.

Finances feeling tight? New figures on disposable income help explain why

By the end of the last Conservative government, people had less disposable income each month than they did at the start. This had never previously happened over the course of a parliament.


Three paragraphs I found interesting -


In the first six months of Labour's tenure, disposable income rose by £55, a larger increase than under any other government in the same period. In part, this was down to the pay rises for public sector workers that had been agreed under the previous Conservative administration...

Jeremy Hunt, Conservative chancellor from October 2022 until the July 2024 election defeat, told Sky News: "The big picture is that it was the pandemic rather than actions of a government that caused it [the fall in disposable income]...

Analysis by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, which also takes into account housing costs, says that disposable income is projected to be £45 a month lower by September 2029 than it was when Labour took office.

Pointless People

An entertaining piece by Martyn Brown of the Daily Express, worth reading, spoilers included in extracts below though.

I was at Labour conference and scored Starmer, Reeves and Lammy speeches - one gets 0/10

1. Keir Starmer

Let's begin with the biggy. In terms of length at least.

The Prime Minister's warbling monologue came in at just under an hour and was packed with, well, very little policy.

Rating: 3 out of 10.


2. Rachel Reeves

It would be fair to say the robotic Chancellor is no great orator.

But she spoiled what was one of her warmest outings in front of an autocue by pretty much admitting that she's going to hike taxes at the Budget in eight weeks time.

Rating: 1 out of 10



3. David Lammy

In a flurry of arm-waving and gestures he accused the Reform UK leader of "poundshop patriotism" and branded the party's plans to deport immigrants as "racist".

Worse was to come for Lammy when he accused Farage of flirting with the Hitler Youth - later issuing a grovelling backtrack - during a toe curling TV interview.

Rating: 0 out of 10.

Michael Laws On Jacinda Ardern

 

As you were

GP practices across England now have to offer online booking

Every GP practice in England will now have to offer online appointment bookings, in a bid to reduce the so-called “8am scramble” every morning.

From 1 October, practices will be required to keep their online consultation tool open for the duration of their working hours for non-urgent appointment requests, medication queries and admin requests.


Mrs H just tried it.

No appointments available.

As you were.

Woven City

Toyota has just opened a mini city in Japan where employees will move into smart homes, use electric cars...

Car manufacturer Toyota has built a mini city in Japan where thousands of employees will be moved in to test a raft of future technology, including e-mobility vehicles.

The world's most prolific car seller this week unveiled its 'Woven City' - the first purpose-built high-tech village that will become an experimental test bed for autonomous driving, robotics and smart home features.

A cluster of hydrogen-powered homes, which has been built on the grounds of Toyota's disused factory at the base of Mount Fuji, has already welcomed its first members of staff and their families, which will be made up of inventors and 'weavers' - the term used for those living in the properties.

Bosses at the car giant have touted the village as a real-life setting in which to trial myriad inventions, from flying taxis to robot pets and drones that escort you home at night.

 

It's easy to understand what this is about from a Toyota research and development standpoint, but there is a heavily idealised social aspect to it too. What lies beyond the 'Woven City'?

Factories, farms, mines and waste disposal for example, they seem to lie well beyond Woven City.

Essential

Millions of households skip 'essential' bills - while higher earners miss more credit card payments

Millions of households are failing to make essential payments for housing and bills, with higher earners increasingly missing loan and credit repayments.

Data from the consumer website Which? reveals the proportion of missed housing, bill, loan and credit card payments increased to 7.7 per cent in the month to 12 September, the highest level this year.

It means that an estimated 2.2 million households are struggling to meet the cost of these outgoings.


It's a small point, but words such as 'essential' and 'struggling' aren't in the data. We have the data and the trends and are capable of applying the social interpretation ourselves - or not. 

Yet no media outfit seems able to resist a few hints about what that social interpretation should be, even if it's only a word or two slipped in here and there. 

Yes, a small point, but it goes on and on and on.

Time to chuck out the lawyers

Well worth reading - a Critic piece on the disastrous UK immigration system and the role of activist lawyers in breaking it.

Time to chuck out the lawyers

The immigration system is broken beyond repair, thanks to activist barristers and a hopeless Home Office

There can be few people in Britain who think that our system of immigration and asylum law achieves what they would like it to. Readers of the Daily Telegraph will be familiar with its regular churn of stories with eye-catching headlines about the perverse results of appeals in the tribunal system against Home Office decisions — for example, “Asylum seekers allowed to stay in UK despite lying in claims” or “Asylum seeker sold drugs days after deportation was cancelled” or “Migrant spared deportation because he has tattoos”, ad infinitum and ad nauseam...

Part of the problem is that the size and complexity of immigration and asylum law defies comprehension. If you ask Google’s AI how many UK immigration statutes there are, its response is: “It is impossible to state a definitive number of UK immigration acts because new legislation is continually enacted and previous acts are often amended, rather than replaced entirely.”

The answer is not less than 13, starting with the Immigration Act 1971. The Supreme Court said in a 2013 judgment: “The Immigration Act 1971 is now more than 40 years old and it has not aged well. It is widely acknowledged to be ill-adapted to the mounting scale and complexity of the problems associated with immigration control.”

And the solution?


What is to be done? It is beyond the scope of this article to produce a detailed answer, but here’s a modest proposal. Everyone criticises the current system for its complexity and legalism. A reformer could do worse than chuck out the lawyers and judges and simplify the law. Rather than having to navigate the archipelago of courts and discretionary decision-making, a better system would see immigration control subject to oversight from Parliament, not the courts and activist lawyers. Ultimately who is here should be a political choice, not a legal right.

Farage 'greatest threat' to livelihoods says greater threat to livelihoods

Nigel Farage is 'greatest threat' to livelihoods, says Chancellor - as protester interrupts her Labour conference speech

The Chancellor has branded Nigel Farage’s agenda the "single greatest threat" to British people’s livelihoods as her Labour conference speech was interrupted by a pro-Palestine protester.

Rachel Reeves accused the Reform UK leader of pushing “falsehoods” and “easy answers”.

It comes as polls show Mr Farage is on course to be Prime Minister, with his party overtaking Labour with voters.

"The single greatest threat to our way of life and to the living standards of working people is the agenda of Nigel Farage and the Reform party,” Ms Reeves told the annual political conference in Liverpool on Monday.


Rachel from Accounts would do better by trying a spot of honesty about the political difficulties she faces. Easy to say of course, but not so easy for any member of her absurdly dishonest government.

Yet Reeves could do better and admit the difficulty her party has with spending and the resistance to cutting back even on waste, because everyone knows there are vast swathes of waste to be scythed from government spending.

 
Politically though the Chancellor can't admit the monumental scale of it. Until her party grasps this problem, the political mire is where they'll stay. Everyone knows it too, apart from Starmer as far as we can tell.

Unfortunately for Reeves there is no point to being Chancellor of the Exchequer in this government. There is nothing to achieve, the political restraints are far too strong. Not that her failure isn't deserved, as far as we can tell it is fully deserved, but there is a certain mild poignancy to it.

Page Six

Labour left red-faced as beaming Angela Rayner appears in party's conference brochure

Labour's official conference guide features a beaming Angela Rayner urging party members to have a 'brilliant' time in Liverpool... despite her having quit weeks ago.

In an awkward gaffe, Ms Rayner's resignation from Government appears to have come too late for a reprint of the glossy 255-page brochure.

On page six of the guide, which lists every conference event, Ms Rayner is referred to as both 'Deputy Prime Minister' and 'Deputy Leader of the Labour Party'.

This is despite her no longer holding either role following her resignation over a tax row earlier this month.


The most astounding aspect isn't the bungling, it's the size of that glossy 255-page brochure. Is anyone likely to read it? 

Lots of people will probably read as far as page six of course, but the entertainment is likely to begin and end there.

As a precaution before posting this, I checked if the donkey chap is still with us - he seems to be for now. 

Sooner or later

Sooner or later the population of England will turn Communist, and then it will take over. Some form of Communism is the only effective religion for the working class; its coming is therefore is inevitable as was that of Christianity. The liberal Die-hard then comes to occupy historically the same position as the ‘good Pagan’: he is doomed to extinction.

Palinurus (Cyril Connolly) – The Unquiet Grave (1944)


As we know, when Connolly wrote this, communist USSR was deemed to be more successful than it subsequently turned out to be. Yet the political classes have known for a long time that policies are more easily sold to citizens via collectivist framing. The totalitarian creed behind it stays out of the frame.

A very familiar and durable example is climate change policy framing which from outside feels like a totalitarian political creed because it is. It’s an aspect of the religion Connolly foresaw but more middle class than he anticipated.

The BBC, NHS, state education and many other encroaching aspects of UK life continue to survive because too many people do not demand power over their own lives. They fail to see the framing and do not resist each encroachment as the creed tightens its grip.

A useful perspective on underlying political creeds is to abandon a Left- Right spectrum which in any event obscures trends. With Left- Right framing the words don’t change as trends encroach. A useful substitute is a political-pragmatic framing, or we might express it as political and apolitical.

Political-pragmatic framing highlights a political divide which is very one-sided in terms of power, as the immense reach of government becomes permanently skewed towards political ends. As we know - we’ve seen it. Too often, pragmatism does not suit democratic governments.

Within political-pragmatic framing, political language is clearly easier to formulate than pragmatic language. Political language has far fewer restrictions on meaning and facts do not have to be relevant or even genuine.

To take it further, political language does not have to mean anything at all if it triggers useful sentiment and offers a sense of belonging. However loose political language may be, belonging and not belonging are clear enough even to those who are not true believers.

Conversely, anyone may adopt pragmatic, apolitical outlook, but can’t belong to it in the same way that political believers belong to political power.

Big Trees

Amazon rainforest trees are getting bigger due to climate crisis, study finds

The research, published in the Nature Plants journal, found that the average size of trees in the Amazon has increased by 3.2 per cent every decade for at least the past 30 years.

Dr Adriane Esquivel-Muelbert, from the University of Cambridge and joint lead author of the paper, said the results highlight the vital role of rainforests in tackling climate change.

She said: “Ahead of COP30 in Brazil later this year, these results underscore just how important tropical rainforests are in our ongoing efforts to mitigate against man-made climate change.

Presumably, one of the aims of Net Zero is to reduce the size of Amazon rainforest trees. Or bigger trees are good because...

But let us wait to see what Ed Miliband says, he's the expert.

Beggars

Labour ministers beg Reeves to unleash public spending

Rachel Reeves is facing a revolt from ministers who are demanding she tear up her fiscal rules to allow more public spending.

Ministers are “begging” the Chancellor for additional funding to fulfil manifesto commitments in their departments, warning “austerity-lite” politics will drive voters into the arms of Nigel Farage, The Telegraph understands.

Ms Reeves needs to fill a £30bn black hole in the public finances at her Budget in November, when she is expected to announce tax rises and spending cuts to satisfy Britain’s creditors.

This doesn't help. The blockheads have made so much of black holes that even a few Labour voters must finally realise there is a limit to spending other people's money. 

Rats in a sack is the image which comes to mind. Not without its entertainment value - send in a Jack Russell.

Starmer Says The ID Card Database Will Be Rugged and Secure

 

Dull stuff from Sir Keir

Starmer brands Reform UK an ‘enemy’ of Britain ahead of Labour conference

Sir Keir Starmer has vowed to take the fight to Reform UK, who he described as an “enemy” of the country, ahead of the Labour Party conference this weekend.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves has, meanwhile, said she wants to sign an “ambitious” new youth migration scheme with the EU, which she claimed would reduce the need for tax rises in the forthcoming budget.

Speaking ahead of the Labour conference in Liverpool, Sir Keir told the Guardian newspaper that the gathering was a “real opportunity for us to make our argument about patriotic national renewal, to own patriotism, to define it for what it is”.

Dull stuff from Sir Keir. 

A chap is bound to wonder if this is to be the conference where Labour folk openly admit that Keir Starmer is a political nuisance, too boring to carry on. 

They may also ask themselves if he'll take Labour to a point where the whole party becomes a relic of the past, a bit of useless wreckage best ignored by the modern world.

Cling on Sir Keir, cling on.

Sign of the times

Text from our son this morning, created with AI.

Whatsit makes a speech about something

Starmer: We face battle against Reform for Britain’s soul

Sir Keir Starmer has said Labour faces a battle against Reform UK for the soul of Britain.

The Prime Minister said “the battle of our times is between patriotic national renewal” by his Government and the “toxic divide” offered by Nigel Farage.

Voters at the next election will not be faced with “the traditional Labour versus Conservative” choice because the Tory party is “dead”, he added.


His talents lay so thoroughly in the direction of being uninteresting, that even as an eye-witness of the massacre of St. Bartholomew he would probably have infused a flavour of boredom into his descriptions of the event.

Saki – The Unbearable Bassington (1912)

Trump’s Europe mauling

Richard North has a TCW reminder of the lessons Europe needs to learn from Trump's UN speech and the generally inadequate media response to those lessons..


Trump’s ‘gloves-off Europe mauling’ was a fraternal correction

IT IS difficult not to celebrate Donald Trump’s address to the United Nations General Assembly, so strident and damning that most of the ‘progressives’ seem to have been caught out and have yet to marshal their full-strength vitriol.

There is a sense that the US president, in raising so many subjects simultaneously – exploiting to the full a target-rich environment – has achieved defence saturation. The attacks are so widespread that his numerous critics aren’t quite sure which one to shoot down first.

The whole piece is well worth reading as an angle on the security risk of not taking Trump's criticisms seriously.

The London Times, though, is somewhat more level. It has its Washington editor, Katy Balls, describing the speech as a ‘gloves-off Europe mauling’.

The reason the speech can’t be dismissed as just another Trump diatribe, Balls writes, is that it speaks to a wider concern within the administration. While the President has said he won’t lecture Middle East countries on how to live, members of his cabinet see what’s happening in the UK and Europe on migration and energy as a genuine security risk.

She quotes one Republican as saying: ‘We need our allies to be strong and share our values. If our allies change for good, that is a huge problem for the West’.

Keir's Kreepy Kards

Keir Starmer says new compulsory digital ID cards will be 'enormous opportunity' for Britain

Labour's new much-criticised compulsory digital ID cards will be an 'enormous opportunity' for Britiain despite a growing civil rights backlash.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer yesterday announced the ID would become mandatory for right to work checks by the end of this Parliament in a bid to curb illegal immigration.

Sir Keir said: 'I know working people are worried about the level of illegal migration into this country. A secure border and controlled migration are reasonable demands, and this government is listening and delivering.

An obvious danger here is slogan fatigue, Starmer being such a tin-eared dullard heading a Cabinet of tin-eared dullards. Merely to prop up a few worthless political careers, this totalitarian stunt may be forced through against somewhat jaded opposition.

Unfortunately Starmer is also reassuring - reassuringly useless. 

In which case ID opposition may be more muted than it should be. Muted because of a background feeling that the ID scheme won't work anyway because nothing does work with Starmer's government and the whole thing will be such a mess that he will be gone before it is fixed.

As an aside, a driving licence is usually accepted as ID. It seems quite possible that this digital ID measure is being introduced because of an official expectation that driving licences will, over time, become less widespread among the general population. 

Skiving again

 Automatic post. 

Another morning hospital visit today so not much blogging activity until later.

Too Modest

Keir Starmer loses another trusted lieutenant as comms chief Steph Driver quits No10

Keir Starmer's director of communications Steph Driver has become the latest senior aide to quit No10.

Ms Driver, who worked for Sir Keir for five years in opposition before joining him in Downing Street, confirmed today that she was leaving, amid a shake up of the PM's team.

In comments reported by the Guardian Sir Keir praised her for her 'leading role in transforming the Labour party and delivering our historic general election win'.


Keir Starmer is being far too modest here, he has done more to transform the Labour party than anyone else...

So far.

 

Co-op plods on

Co-operative reveals £80m earnings hit from ‘malicious’ cyber attack

The Co-operative Group has revealed it slumped to a half-year loss after taking an earnings hit of around £80 million from a “malicious” cyber attack in April.

The retailer said it tumbled to a £75 million underlying pre-tax loss for the six months to July 5, down from profits of £3 million a year ago as the hack took its toll.


We popped into our local Co-op a few days ago and as usual only one checkout was open but we didn't have to wait long as nobody in front of us was buying much. 

We don't know how it keeps going - never busy, never any problem with crowded aisles, isn't cheap and sells very little that isn't available in any of the major supermarkets.

Our Co-op is handy, plonked as it is in the centre of town, so maybe that's what keeps it going, but the customers do look old.

We haven’t covered ourselves in glory

Jeremy Corbyn admits ‘we haven’t covered ourselves in glory’ after Your Party infighting chaos

Jeremy Corbyn has admitted “we haven’t covered ourselves in glory” after a string of embarrassing setbacks and weeks of bitter infighting at the top of Your Party.

Relaunching its paid-up membership service, the former Labour leader apologised for “the confusion in getting to this point” as he urged backers of the new left-wing outfit to “move on” and sign up as founding members ahead of its first conference in November.

It comes after Mr Corbyn last week said he was seeking legal advice after his party's co-leader, Zarah Sultana, sent an “unauthorised email” from Your Party’s account, inviting its supporters to become paid members, apparently without his backing.


There isn't much left to say about Jeremy Corbyn. Maybe his name should be Ed Corbyn as Ed seems to be a popular name for political clowns, but unfortunately it isn't. 

Corbyn doesn't seem to be the major political threat Labour has to face from the loony left though, Ed Starmer has that job well in hand.

Or maybe Ed Burnham will achieve his ambition, oust Starmer and become be the chap Corbyn has to battle with. 

So little to play for.

Cheesy Ed

'Get the bungee harness ready': Lib Dem leader Davey vows to keep doing cheesy stunts

Ed Davey vowed to keep carrying out cheesy stunts to get attention today, despite signs that voters are tiring of his antics.

He quoted Frank Sinatra today as he vowed to lead the Liberal Democrats 'my way'.

It came in his keynote speech closing a party conference that has seen him march at the head of a brass band, play cricket on Bournemouth beach and conduct a BBC interview while on a zip wire.

Apart from the stunts as a measure of his shallowness, Cheesy Ed is a curiously uninteresting politician. He seems to have no aptitude for being taken seriously on anything, as if the stunts are all he has. Even his rhetoric comes over as a series of rhetorical stunts designed to attract attention rather than serious consideration.

It may even be that Cheesy Ed doing it 'my way' isn't what Lib Dems want from their leader. His position isn't likely to be as precarious as Starmer's, but even Lib Dems could wake up one day.

Rash Tax

Reeves urged to reverse ‘rash’ tax commitments and reform system by think tank

Rachel Reeves should “reject the path of least resistance” and consider rowing back on her “rash” tax commitments at the Budget, a leading think tank has said.

The Institute for Government (IfG) said Labour’s “unrealistic” approach to tax has left the Chancellor reaching for “piecemeal changes”.

The Government has repeatedly said it will not increase the rates of VAT, income tax or national insurance at the Budget in November.

A report by the think tank calls on Ms Reeves to undertake serious tax reform, instead of reaching for an “eclectic grab bag of tax raisers”, which could further complicate the system.

Eclectic grab bag? That's not very nice when mixed in with references to the Chancellor and we know nothing about a rash. Of course this is not a tax to help fund the NHS by taxing folk with a rash. With any other government it would not be necessary to clear up this point, but we are where we are as the dismal saying goes.

How about the exhortation to reject the path of least resistance? 

Blimey - Rachel is a politician, not a very good one, but they build their careers on a steely determination to find, own and skip merrily along the path of least resistance until another, easier path beckons.

One point below ‘acceptable’

Legacy tech: HMRC rates its technical health at 3 out of 5 – one point below ‘acceptable’

Chief executive reveals that the tax department begins a major £1.6bn programme of upgrade work from a position that is less than acceptable and well below what is considered ‘ideal’

“‘Technical health’ is defined as the strength of HMRC’s ongoing relationship with its technology estate,” he wrote. “Poor technical health increases the risk of service failure, security breaches, and operational inefficiencies.”

Sorry Chancellor, we can't do sums of that type at the moment.

Lib Dems and the Wrong Cronies

Ban ministers from foreign lobbying to ‘Trump-proof’ politics, Lib Dems say

Ministers should be barred from lobbying on behalf of foreign leaders in order to “Trump-proof” British politics, the Liberal Democrats have argued.

Calum Miller, the party’s foreign affairs spokesperson, warned of a “creep of cronyism” into UK and global politics in his speech at the Lib Dem conference.

He called for ministers to change the law, banning Government figures from lobbying on behalf of foreign leaders...

He added: “We must protect our politics from the insidious creep of cronyism.

The underlying problem here is that the Lib Dems feel left out, they aren't involved in cronyism because they don't appear to have any cronies at all - not one worthwhile crony. Almost as if nobody really likes Lib Dems. I'm sure that's not so, but collectively there is something a little off about them.

It's not that they don't want cronies, but unfortunately there is a playground aspect to their politics - the Lib Dems don't have any cronies so they don't think anyone else should have them either.

Apart from power cronies of course - 

Davey refuses to rule out deal with Starmer to stop Reform winning power

Hands up anyone who wasn't reminded of HS2

 

Gosh - even Lib Dem MPs have noticed

Davey refuses to rule out deal with Starmer to stop Reform winning power

Speaking to Sky News' political editor Beth Rigby, the Liberal Democrat leader said he would "wait to see the result of the next election" before deciding on any agreement with Labour...

Asked whether he felt he had a "moral responsibility" to keep Reform out of power by forming an alliance with other progressive parties, Sir Ed suggested it was not necessary because "we can stop Reform by ourselves"...

Beth Rigby highlighted reports showing that his own MPs had expressed a desire for their leader to "drop bullshit stunts and raise your game".

Presumably a desire for "Sir" Ed to drop the stunts is a reference to his predilection for playing the fool and failing to carry it off with any semblance of political dignity. Not that there is much of that about - political dignity. 

Blimey, if Lib Dem MPs have noticed, maybe Lib Dem voters will notice too - eventually. 

The British Penny Farthing Championships

 

Taskforce

Starmer considers scrapping visa fees to steal talent from Trump’s America

Sir Keir Starmer is exploring plans to eliminate visa fees for leading scientists, software developers and academics in a bid to capitalise on Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown in the US.

The Prime Minister’s global talent taskforce is said to be examining the move as a potential economy-boosting measure ahead of November’s Budget...

The taskforce looking at the proposal is led by Varun Chandra, Sir Keir’s business adviser, and Lord Vallance, the science minister and former chief scientific adviser to the Government.

Gosh, a taskforce. Starmer is reminding us of Trump's recent visit of course, trying to keep the aura of power glowing for a little longer, even though it has already disappeared across the Atlantic. 

Political talent is what we need, a talented Chancellor for example, but Starmer won't have considered that.

Flight of slogans spotted over Gatwick

Reeves: Gatwick second runway shows Government ‘backing builders, not blockers’

Gatwick Airport’s £2.2 billion second runway plan could create thousands of jobs and help “kickstart the economy”, Chancellor Rachel Reeves said.

Ms Reeves said: “This Government promised to kickstart the economy – and we are.

UK taxes to rise steadily to combat mounting public spending pressures – KPMG

“While the economy showed resilience at the start of the year, the second half looks more uncertain,” Yael Selfin, KPMG UK’s chief economist, said.

“Elevated tax burdens, weaker global trade and cautious consumers are likely to keep growth subdued into 2026.”

The Chancellor is facing a “tough balancing act” with “mounting pressures on health and defence spending, combined with weaker growth”, she said.

Oh dear, Rachel from Accounts is still being trundled out to say things nobody believes or listens to. Sometimes she wears a hard hat to pose with people who actually do things she probably doesn't understand. A better understanding of publicity might help with that.

The world is changing, becoming more informed. Political folk need to wake up, take a look at themselves and listen to the slogans they are required to repeat. As do voters unfortunately.

 

Plant

As we know, at the moment there is a good deal of media chatter about possible replacements for Sir Keir Starmer as UK Prime Minister. A number of people have been suggested, such as Angela Rayner and Andy Burnham, but it is worth considering other possibilities.

For example, suppose Keir Starmer were to be replaced as UK Prime Minister by a geranium. A nice healthy geranium in a pot made by a British craft potter would have a number of advantages.

No more wooden lies.
No more wooden evasions.
No more wooden rhetoric.

The point to be made is that a geranium is the ‘do nothing’ option we should consider before embarking on any project and politically a geranium Prime Minister would deliver just that. Imagine a geranium presiding over a Cabinet meeting. The geranium –

Pays no attention to Ed Miliband’s next loony scheme.
Pays no attention to Rachel from Accounts scrabbling after taxes.
Pays no attention to any moans, madness and wrangling at all.

A win!

Happiness is...

Sir Ed Davey brands Elon Musk a criminal and calls for his arrest for 'allowing online harm to children'

Sir Ed, speaking from the Lib Dem conference in Bournemouth, said Mr Musk could be prosecuted under the Online Safety Act, under which social media companies have a legal duty to protect children from harmful content and their directors are liable for criminal prosecution for breaching it.

 

Had I followed my pleasure and chosen what I plainly have a decided talent for: police spy, I should have been much happier than I afterwards became.

Søren Kierkegaard - Journals (1843)

It's not serious politics

Nigel Farage not a patriot, Ed Davey says as Lib Dem conference begins

The Liberal Democrat leader launched the broadside against the head of Reform UK as he opened the first day of his party’s conference by setting out his own stall on migration and “British values”...

Asked by the PA news agency what he considered to be British values, the Lib Dem chief described “the vast majority of people who’ve got decent values, respect for the rule of law, tolerance, who love our country like the Liberal Democrats do”.

“They want to see a party that is true to British values but will change our country,” Sir Ed said.

Presumably, assuming it means anything at all, this claim means that British values will be changed by Ed Davey and the Lib Dems. 

In his way, "Sir" Ed Davey is even weirder than "Sir" Keir Starmer, being at least as inclined to direct his message at simpletons. Lib Dems can't think of themselves as simpletons and most probably aren't apart from the Lib Dem problem they have, so why does Ed favour simpleton rhetoric?   

“They want to see a party that is true to British values but will change our country,” Sir Ed says. Surely a substantial number of Lib Dems find this kind of guff embarrassing, so why does he do it? It's not serious politics and neither is this.

 

 

Surely not constipation though

Cyril Connolly on things which stimulate or calm the mind, rev up the 'Flight of Ideas' or rev it down to a kind of calm tick-over.

Thought can be made to take certain liberties by artificial stimulation of the brain. The cortex is a machine for thinking. It can be revved up, slowed down, choked, fed various types of fuel according to the thought it is required to produce. When the mixture is too rich, as in the small hours, the engine pinks, whence ‘Flight of Ideas’.

Thus tea, coffee, alcohol stimulate.

So do heights, wet days, south-west gales, hotel bedrooms in Paris and windows looking over harbours. Also snow, frost, electric bells outside cinemas at night, sex-life and fever.

Cigars, tisanes, long draughts of water or fruit-juice have a clearing, calming effect. They rev down the motor and overcome stoppages. So also do sitting still, relaxing climates, luxury, constipation, music, sun-bathing, hang-overs, listening to fountains, waves and waterfalls.

Palinurus (Cyril Connolly) – The Unquiet Grave (1944)

 

Lots of possibilities crowd my mind. Misty autumn mornings, coffee shops, hospitals, silent streets, stars on a clear night, fog, wet days, parquet floors, old films, old photographs, old wood, quiet valleys, the sea, deserted beaches, the call of a curlew, the Roman road between Newhaven and Buxton and many more. 

To dwell on the possibilities, even that is stimulating.

No - not frenzied

Andy Burnham fuels Keir Starmer challenge rumours as poll shows Labour support at lowest EVER

The latest sign of manoeuvres against Sir Keir came as a poll put Labour on its lowest ever support of just 16 per cent. The Find Out Now research found Reform was way ahead on 34 per cent backing - although the firm has consistently detected bigger advantages for Nigel Farage's party than other pollsters.

Mr Burnham has been the subject of frenzied interest amid the extraordinary meltdown at the heart of Downing Street.

Not so much 'frenzied' as a kind of dull resignation that someone has to replace Starmer but he or she isn't likely to be anyone significantly more capable because Labour doesn't have anyone significantly more capable but does have quite a few who could be significantly worse, implausible as that seems now.

No - not frenzied.

Short break

This is an automatic post because I'll be off early today for a minor outpatient op. Not much blogging going on till later. 

A born amateur

Corbyn accused of running ‘sexist boys’ club’ by co-leader of new left-wing party

Jeremy Corbyn is seeking legal advice after Zarah Sultana sent an “unauthorised email” from Your Party’s account inviting its supporters to become paid members.

As the left-wing MP accused Your Party of being run as a “sexist boys’ club”, Mr Corbyn called on his backers to ignore Ms Sultana’s email.

In a statement signed off by the party’s five male MPs, ignoring Ms Sultana, he said anyone who signed up should immediately cancel direct debits and that “legal advice is being taken”.


He of course was an amateur — a born amateur. He worked so hard, and did so little, and nothing he ever did would hold together for long.

D.H. Lawrence - England, My England (1922)

Death by quango

William Yarwood has a familiar but very interesting Critic piece about the severe nature of the UK quango problem.


Death by quango

If Keir Starmer wants change, he should deconstruct the quango state

Phase two of Keir Starmer’s government and his so-called “Plan for Change” is now in full swing after his first big cabinet reshuffle last week. But let’s be honest, in the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t really matter.

Now I’m not being glib for the sake of it, and I could make the case that it doesn’t matter because of the mediocrity of the ministers shuffled around, but the truth runs a lot deeper than that. It doesn’t matter who Starmer places in which position because the politicians themselves aren’t really in charge...

Unlike how the public imagines the machinery of government to work, the real power is not in Downing Street or Whitehall, but in the vast quango state that has grown unchecked for decades. A shadow state which politicians of all parties have either consciously or unconsciously created and allowed to fester.


We know we have a severe UK quango problem, but the whole piece is well worth reading as a reminder of how severe it is. If we can't even bring an absurd policy such as Net Zero into national debates then we aren't likely to achieve anything else worthwhile. That we can't isn't solely down to Ed Miliband. 

Until that reform is undertaken, it doesn’t matter who Starmer or indeed any future prime minister puts in his or her cabinet. The real government of Britain is elsewhere, buried deep in a sprawling, bloated and unaccountable quango state. And until that shadow government is confronted head on by our politicians no reshuffle, no manifesto pledge and no grand plan for change will matter.

What a charming picture

Burnham allies talk up Rayner return

  

Allies of Andy Burnham believe Angela Rayner could make a political comeback if he replaces Sir Keir Starmer as Labour leader.

MPs think that the former deputy prime minister could provide the Mayor of Manchester with support from inside the Parliamentary Labour Party ahead of his comeback to the Commons.


Don’t we make our world? Isn’t that our blessed, our betrayed responsibility?

Walter de la Mare - The Riddle and Other Stories (1923)

Charles Dickens Sandwich

Uninteresting 1B 2025

Scientists identify a mystery color in one of Jackson Pollock's paintings

Scientists have identified the origins of the blue color in one of Jackson Pollock’s paintings with a little help from chemistry

 

“Number 1A, 1948,” showcases Pollock's classic style: paint has been dripped and splattered across the canvas, creating a vivid, multicolored work. Pollock even gave the piece a personal touch, adding his handprints near the top

The Rules of Planet Starmer

It may be worth summarising, as far as possible, the rules-based system of planet Starmer. 

To begin with we have –

Rulers
Rules
The Ruled

There are of course many gradations of rules plus rules about the application of rules, institutions competent to rule on rule application together with rules about who applies which rules and rules about the ruling circumstances of rule application within the overarching rules of rule application. Rules ruling the hierarchy of rules begin with international rules and the rules ruling the application of these rules when the national rules of rule conflict resolution have to be applied according to local application rules and rules about the appropriate application of such rules, rule resolution rules and rule appeal rules. Rules concerning the application of rules to rules concerning the application of other rules must of course take note of the rules whereby the rules of applicability rule particular circumstances and if those circumstances arose via appropriate rules.

And deny everything anyway.

White coat clickbait

At least 1,147 died from climate-driven heat in UK this summer, scientists find

The UK saw its hottest summer on record this year, with experts saying extreme heat incidents were made more likely and intense by human-induced global warming.

A study led by researchers at Imperial College London, released on Wednesday, used modelling, historical mortality records and peer-reviewed methods to provide early estimates of fatalities this summer.

The team found climate change, caused primarily by the burning of fossil fuels and deforestation, increased temperatures by an average of 2.2C, but by as much as 3.6C between June and August.

As one of the comments points out, this brand of 'science' has degenerated into clickbait. 

We could ask what was on the 1,147 death certificates but we won't, white coat clickbait isn't worth it.

I feel that the process was gone through

Trump to go easy on embattled Starmer during state visit

Speaking on Monday, Sir Keir said that he felt “angry” and “let down” by Lord Mandelson, insisting he would not have made the appointment had he known what he knows now.

He said: “I am angry. I don’t particularly think anger helps here, but I feel let down. I feel that the process was gone through and now information has come to light, which, had I known it at the time, I wouldn’t have appointed him.

We can't call it revealing because we already know, but when Starmer says I feel that the process was gone through, it suggests yet again that this is all that matters to him, all he can see. He's process-driven.

In which case, we may as well assume that Mandelson's record of two resignations for politically problematic behaviour wasn't part of the process - so on planet Starmer it didn't happen.

It's quite difficult to understand the man without an underlying assumption that there is something weird about planet Starmer. Apart from Sir Keir Starmer, it seems to be uninhabited.

But we knew that.

The digital language police

Rhys Laverty has an entertaining Critic piece on how WhatsApp changed the word “turkey” to “Türkiye” when he meant the bird and not the country. 


Resist the language police!

Why are my words being censored by WhatsApp?

Given my severe phobia of birds, and farm birds in particular, I am the last person who should be writing about turkeys. But hey ho, cometh the hour and all that.

This week, whilst typing on WhatsApp Web on my laptop, rattling off what I though was a mildly amusing joke about Jamie Oliver’s war on turkey twizzlers some years ago, I found myself censored — yes, dear reader, censored I tell you. Before my very eyes, the word “turkey” was rendered “Türkiye”. I hadn’t even written it with a capital letter; I was mid-sentence. Cue some furious backspacing and de-umlautification.

A familiar trend but the piece is well worth reading as a reminder of what is a political and social trend, not merely a static feature of digital 'assistance'.

If you notice any of this, if you mispronounce a name, or if you fail to observe the quietly revised spelling of anointed words, even in the sanctum sanctorum of your own mind, you are exposed to both the world and yourself as Entirely The Wrong Sort. You are not Respectable. You have missed the latest episode of The News Agents. Gary Lineker is very disappointed in you. The interference of WhatsApp is particularly egregious because it intrudes upon my private communications. It is a Foucaldian policing of private desire, a life submitted to the progressive digital panopticon. It is multiculturalism working as intended.

The Piper at the Gates of Dawn Goes Missing

Chapter 7 was often missing from later editions of Kenneth Grahame's children's book - The Wind in the Willows. Too strange perhaps - unlike the idea of a toad driving motor cars. As for the idea of a mendacious and unreliable toad becoming Prime Minister - preposterous.

It is a strange chapter though, mystical and somewhat pagan, placed there in the middle of the book and not at all essential to the story.

 

Wi-Fi and a 'serious moment of peril'

I set up a new Wi-Fi router this morning. Even for an hour or so while the Wi-Fi was down, it became noticeable how much we use it and how many gadgets we have connected. Ten gadgets in total, not counting granddaughter's phone which has to be connected next time she comes.

A new Wi-Fi router hasn't made the news any more encouraging though - I spotted that almost immediately after logging onto the interweb. 

For example, the media still waffle on as if Keir Starmer merely has to pull his socks up to turn things around. As if another eight months of his mendacious bungling could be some kind of learning curve for Starmer and the horribly useless Cabinet blockers he picks with such unerring accuracy.

Keir Starmer issued 8-month warning as PM faces 'serious moment of peril'

The Prime Minister has been given an eight-month warning to turn the government around or else Labour could face a "serious moment of peril". The stark time limit has been issued by a number of Labour MPs and trade union leaders following the departure of two senior party figures. Sir Keir Starmer's 'phase two' of government kicked off with a major reshuffle following the sudden resignation of Angela Rayner, and then Lord Peter Mandelson.

But ask the person in the water first

‘Man overboard’ is offensive term, says Royal Yachting Association

The phrase “man overboard” is an offensive term that should be avoided, the Royal Yachting Association (RYA) has said.

The national governing body for sailing, which was founded in 1875, has suggested that it should instead be replaced with “person in water” in an inclusive language guide.

It is one of a number of recommendations issued by the RYA to use language that “honours and values” women and non-binary people within the sport and recreational activity.

It could be more appropriate to ask "what are your pronouns?" before risking a more proactive attempt to describe the situation to others.

The village idiot walks in Leicester Square

I've never been a fan of cities, they just keep growing as if nobody knows how big is too big, as if the growth that becomes a city isn't entirely human but impersonal, indifferent. There is something odd, artificial and not entirely sane about them.  

Happiness lies in the fulfilment of the spirit through the body. Thus humanity has already evolved from an animal life to one more civilised. There can be no complete return to nature, to nudism, desert-islandry: city life is the subtlest ingredient in the human climate. But we have gone wrong over the size of our cities and over the kind of life we lead in them; in the past the clods were the peasants, now the brute mass of ignorance is urban. The village idiot walks in Leicester Square. 

To live according to nature we should pass a considerable time in cities, for they are the glory of human nature, but they should never contain more than two hundred thousand inhabitants; It is our artificial enslavement to the large city, too sprawling to leave, too enormous for human dignity, which is responsible for half our sickness and misery. Slums may well be breeding-grounds of crime, but middle-class suburbs are incubators of apathy and delirium. No city should be too large for a man to walk out of in a morning.

Palinurus (Cyril Connolly) – The Unquiet Grave (1944)

Dodge

Carl Deconinck has an entertaining Brussels Signal piece on an emissions tax dodge by the Dutch government. 

Apparently the dodge is designed to offset inevitable financial damage done by EU obligations to cut emissions by 55 per cent by 2030, not because the obligations are deranged.


Netherlands to end ‘perverse’ carbon emission tax

The Dutch caretaker government is preparing to dismantle its controversial carbon emissions tax on major industrial companies, using a legal workaround to avoid a European fine.

According to the newspaper De Telegraaf today, the 2026 budget documents include €650 million in subsidies to fully offset the tax’s financial impact, leaving it in place on paper but stripping it of any real effect...

According to De Telegraaf’s sources, Brussels rules prevent the government from abolishing the levy altogether, a step that could trigger a €1.2 billion fine. Instead, the carbon charge will remain in theory, but with the rate lowered to such an extent — combined with the €650 million in subsidies — that it will no longer bite in practice.