Daniel Katz

But they might vote for the Greens? Seriously, they should know that when Farage leads the polls NONE of the old certainties hold. Anything can happen.

I don't think so. He's well known as Mandelson's protege, and Mandelson is now thought to have given away state secrets. The association is too strong. Anyone known to be close to Mandelson is now finished.

I'm surprised no one is saying ANYTHING about Streeting. Isn't it likely this ends his hopes too? PM Mahmood (not a prospect I in any way relish) has never seemed more likely. On the other hand, if this had happened 2 weeks earlier they would've had to let Burnham run, and then...

It would mean taking them on. It's time to take them on. (I fully understand the obstacles you point out).

The obvious solution is to legally limit the number of properties any individual or company can own with the purpose of renting.

I just hope the meeting wasn’t a short session.

I assume Morgan McSweeney made the decision, and since McSweeney wants Streeting anyway, it's all to the good that it makes Starmer look weak.

But this might ensure that the challenger can only be Streeting, whom the puppet-masters would rather have anyway. What's strange (but no longer surprising) is that Starmer himself is too stupid to see this.

It's such a stupid idea that foreign students can get the "same" education without actually living in a foreign country, without engaging with the people and culture of that country. It's such a stupid idea that Universities UK warmly welcomes it, the greeting it offers to what is most stupid

Over here at Bloomsbury Studies in Critical Poetics we would be interested in seeing something on Loy. www.bloomsbury.com/uk/series/bl...

With Thompson you tend to need a very subtle filmic equivalent of the first-person narrator, which turns out to be harder than it looks.

Your description also holds good for the ludicrously named "Office for Students," which "regulates" higher education, and should be done away with.

Why is it seen as a good thing for applications for asylum to be "down"? It's only a good thing if it means there are fewer people in the world who need asylum. If that's not true, then it's a good thing when applications go up. We should be giving shelter to more people.

This just takes us to YOUR uni log-in, old chum! Please post journal name.

I of course agree but in reality the rest of the RG is probably avidly eyeing it to see what it's possible to get away with.

That's the playbook.

Good thing the Govt did all it could to prevent this by launching a massive campaign of free vaccinations in the autumn...oh, wait a minute....https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/dec/11/nhs-bracing-for-worst-ever-winter-crisis-in-next-fortnight-amid-rising-flu-cases

Starmer and hardline governments risk creating ‘hierarchy of people’ by constraining human rights Human rights official says politicians are playing into the hands of the populist right as they seek to tackle migration

I'm so impressed by Starmer's work here. In fact, I think Fifa should give him a peace prize. www.theguardian.com/law/2025/dec...

Exactly. Irrational non-problems are not amenable to "rational solutions."

Post-16 plan ‘not recipe for Russell Group domination’ – Vallance Science minister dismisses as ‘bizarre’ fears that government push for ‘teaching-only’ specialists will further concentrate research activity in small number of institutions

Wow, a massive disaster that will lead to large-scale redundancies, closures of universities, degraded working conditions for young academics, and free cash for the private sector. If you're in the union, vote to strike! www.timeshighereducation.com/news/post-16...

Fifty higher education providers at risk of exiting market in England, MPs told Regulator says 24 are at more immediate risk and may have to stop degree courses within next 12 months

VCs won't protect their institutions or students, so we have to. UCU members, vote to strike! Use your power before the uni managers use you up and throw you away. www.theguardian.com/education/20...

Ask Avanti!😆

When I was finishing my PhD in 1993, my advisors told me the job market "had never been so bad."And there's hardly ever been a time in the 32 years since when that statement was not correct.

Vote Green, vote Green!

Labour are so bad. So, so bad!

Yes, everyone already knows Starmer is done and going on as if this might last until 2029 clearly feels like an empty charade to everyone--the media, the MPs, the cabinet....maybe even to Starmer himself.

I don't the think the so-called populist left blames ills on shadowy others, they blame it on capitalism, and their intellectuals have extremely complex, frequently differing analyses about how to remedy things. It's simply ignorant to refuse to accept that.

It is often used dishonestly--deployed as part of the "there is no alternative" arsenal. And, as in the piece that prompted this, it almost always implies that people who question conventional wisdom and entrenched power do so because they are uneducated or stupid. That's false.

Populism is a dishonest, useless term. Its purpose is to assert that all opposition to established power is essentially identical and interchangeable. This is simply not true. Farage and Polanski are not the same thing, and losing faith in the Tory-Labour establishment is a sign of intelligence.

My immigrant paternal grandfather, Ben Katz, also served in the US army in WW1. Just a few years after arriving in New York from Lithuania.