Tim Bale

And so the zombie policy re-emerges for yet another sequel…

Alt headline: Secondary Moderns set to return if Farage elected

New grammar schools set to return if Farage becomes PM The creation of new selective schools was outlawed by New Labour in 1998

Crushingly predictable. Utterly unjustified by decades of research. A shibboleth in place of a policy.

No matter the issue, Trump has lost support since he took over.

Trump's (dis)approval ratings - prior to Iran (c/o @economist.com: www.economist.com/interactive/...)

What I will never understand is....Twitter was *never* a good gauge of public opinion! I genuinely cannot understand the people who have clearly been using it as a measure of something other than 'internal leadership contests' (where it was genuinely useful' or 'ways to discover cool links'.

We paid an ex-Tory MP to lobby for our fake Chinese firm - and authorities did nothing Investigation finds no rules were broken. It just goes to show how few rules there are.

Last week, UK lobbying regulator closed investigation into ex Tory MP Ben Howlett

We offered Howlett money to work for a fake Chinese investor. He introduced us to a dozen Labour MPs

Regulator didn't even speak to us. Our system is broken

New, by me: democracyforsale.substack.com/p/we-paid-an...

Front page of Telegraph with a story on Cabinet ministers stopping Starmer following Trump.

Hate to break it to the Telegraph and its readers but (for the moment anyway) the UK is not a presidential but a parliamentary democracy in which a Prime Minister tends to need the support and consent of 'big beasts' in the Cabinet before acting. If they don't like it, then maybe move to DC?

"would otherwise receive immediate access to welfare and social housing" is BS.

Correct: "after 5 years working in a care home, would be eligible to apply for welfare and social housing on the same basis as the rest of us."

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Deliberately misleading/disingenous.

We are launching another online Spring Seminar Series, starting two weeks from today.

www.psa.ac.uk/specialist_g...

We have a great programme of four fascinating talks from political psychologists, happening fortnightly on Thursdays at 12:00.

The line-up...

Store aisle shelves stuffed on one side with inflatable ducks faces the other, stuffed with inflatable flamingos.

some shit is about to go down

See for example this in the conclusion (which I assume you haven't reached let - afraid it is a long book!!)

Deluded. Labour lost about ten points during the course of the 2024 campaign. A strategic triumph it was not.

Wealthy Dubai residents race back to UAE to avoid tax bills Some risk spending too few days in the emirate and too many in the UK

Tax exiles stuck in London desperately trying to get *back* to Dubai to avoid becoming tax resident in the UK? Just great stuff. giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

Fascinating (in an ‘insight into Telegraph-mind’ way) that the Energy Secretary’s opposition gets the splash headline, while the Chancellor and Foreign Secretary’s opposition gets relegated to ‘also starring’ status.

Front page of Telegraph with a story on Cabinet ministers stopping Starmer following Trump.

Hate to break it to the Telegraph and its readers but (for the moment anyway) the UK is not a presidential but a parliamentary democracy in which a Prime Minister tends to need the support and consent of 'big beasts' in the Cabinet before acting. If they don't like it, then maybe move to DC?

That cosy candle? It’s also polluting the air you’re breathing What you don’t see when you burn a candle.

For your next pub quiz: "Denmark is often said to be the country with the highest per-capita candle consumption in Europe. Danes burn around 5.8kg of candle wax per person per year – the equivalent of about six bags of sugar." But more seriously...

How to understand the post-Gorton and Denton national poll that puts the Greens ahead of Labour It’s not the byelection win that matters but the scale of the swing to Zack Polanski’s party.

My thoughts on the poll showing the Greens have overtaken Labour following the Gorton and Denton by-election, whether this could be a "bandwagon effect", and what that means, for The Conversation: theconversation.com/how-to-under...

Matthew Jeffery: Margaret Thatcher would never have joined Reform UK | Conservative Home Thatcherism was never the politics of protest. It was the politics of government, grounded in ideas strong enough not only to win power, but to sustain it once won.

So what does your Ouija board say?

Well, you'd hope....

What would Winston Churchill make of war with Iran? Donald Trump has said Keir Starmer is ‘no Churchill’, but his dismissal is based on a simplified version of history.

"Churchill once observed that war, once unleashed, rarely follows the tidy paths imagined by those who start it. That warning may be as relevant as any of his more famous phrases." @richardtoye.bsky.social

Most Reform members believe non-white UK citizens born abroad should be forced or encouraged to leave, poll finds Nigel Farage’s recent efforts to woo centre-ground voters may cause tension in party’s right flank, says Hope Not Hate

Personally, I'd have gone with the fact that "one in five (22%) also supported it for non-white citizens whose parents were born in the UK" for the headline. 😱

Telegraph front page: 'Starmer is no Churchill'

But Trump's no FDR.

JOB

Assistant Professor of Political Theory
University of Cambridge
@thecambridgeschool.bsky.social

www.cam.ac.uk/jobs/univers...

Ach, sorry to hear about 1). Suspect 2) has something to do with the insurance forms we all have to fill out when doing an overseas trip!

It makes it a total nightmare if a speaker wants a fee rather than just expenses, so we feel your pain at the same time as praying the person we've invited doesn't want one, lest we and they are plunged into the bureaucratic abyss.

join the club

[We see a close up of a young white male, tanned, white teeth, coiffed hair clearly an influencer on social media. It is an image such as you see when social media posts are shown on the news. In the corner of the screen is named a location: DUBAI. He is staring slightly off-camera for several silent panels of the comic strip. His eyes move slightly. He is having a thought.] From off-screen a newsreader’s commentary comes: NEWSREADER: Extraordinary images here of an expat in Dubai [The influencer’s eybrows raise slightly] …Having their first ever geopolitical thought. [CUT TO a BBC news scene. The BBC newsreader CLIVE MYRIE is talking to an interviewee next to the screen showing the social media influencer’s face. The interviewee’s name is David Jones]. CLIVE MYRIE: To explain the significance of this moment we’re joined by David Jones, our Expat Thoughts correspondent DAVID JONES: Clive, this is momentous It was caught on film at the end of an Instagram post titled: ‘Dubai Is Brilliant’. [Pointing at the screen, the influencer’s expression still the same] You can clearly see in the eyebrows here, the dawning realisation that there *might* be something in the world beyond his dickhead self. It marks a *huge* departure from all the Dubai Expat’s previous thoughts. CLIVE MYRIE: Which are…? DAVID JONES: You've Got To Get Yourself Out Here Mate, Everything Is So Clean, I Don't Have To Pay Taxes, I Am Incurious As To Why I Do Not Have To Pay Taxes, and Spa. CLIVE MYRIE: And might we see an expansion of these new Thoughts in coming days? DAVID JONES: I think we can expect to see: “I Deserve To Be Airlifted By A Country I Pay No Tax To” CLIVE MYRIE: Mmm. [Ends]

Tell us about it! I'm guessing you don't at least have to prove your right to work in the UK, which is the case if you're employed at a UK university but do any external examining for another university. And hopefully they don't demand that they 'onboard' you into their own HR and payroll systems.

What if AI just makes us work harder? [FREE TO READ] Employees have reported increased momentum, but also a feeling of having more to do

What if AI just makes us work harder?
as.ft.com/r/8481a3a6-8...

Late deciders, higher turnout: what the Gorton and Denton byelection taught us about voters High numbers of undecideds may partially explain the late swing to the Greens.

via @hannahbunting.bsky.social @lottehargrave.bsky.social and @jess-smith.bsky.social