Sam Freedman

For an American First isolationist he sure is invade-y.

The problem with diagnosing "the electorate have unreasonable expectations around tax and spend" is that those expectations did not develop in a vacuum. They are the product of decades of politicians and the media telling them they can have x services with y tax levels, or not contradicting it.

"The worst social policy ever" We have a couple of bonus guest posts over the next week.

I wrote a guest post for @samfr.bsky.social setting out what Labour must do if it is to publish a child poverty strategy worthy of its name. Every day between now & the budget I’m gonna add a reason why the 2CL should go to this thread samf.substack.com/p/the-worst-...

A good example of what I was talking about in last week's post about the right and the fading memory of WW2.

samf.substack.com/p/never-agai...

Trump and the Test Ban A nuclear test in the Nevada desert, 1955.

In which I explain how Trump’s announcement on nuclear testing was based on a misunderstanding of what Russia is up to, and why the US would be unable to start testing immediately even if it made any sense to do so. (£/free trial), open.substack.com/pub/samf/p/t...?

We've got a double header on Comment is Freed this weekend. My post coming tomorrow.

Sign up to get that in your inbox tomorrow.

Trump and the Test Ban A nuclear test in the Nevada desert, 1955.

New post from @ldfreedman.bsky.social

"Trump and the Test Ban"

This week Trump said he was going to restart nuclear weapons tests. Did he mean it? And what would the consequences be if he did?

(£/free trial)

samf.substack.com/p/trump-and-...

On the left, the refurbished Lincoln bathroom. On the right, picture I took in Saddam Hussein's palace in Basra in 2005.

Really interesting analysis - you don't have to be big to make money on Substack, which unlike so many other platforms is not winner-takes-all components.news/the-desire-d...

Still waiting for a few co-religionists here to figure out that people like Douglas Murray are in fact not on their side just because they're willing to defend Israel blowing up Gaza.

Another nice example of centre and left votes lining up behind the best candidate to beat Reform.

Going to a Halloween party tomorrow for the first time in years and have no costume. If I take a prescription and some half finished medical notes could I go as an NHS discharge process?

This was very cathartic to write, and I'm grateful to @samfr.bsky.social for giving me the space to try and set out just why the two-child limit must go, and go in its entirety

[mini 🧵]

Ah my rap name.

I think what throws people is a lot of the story lines are basically stuff that happened under Clinton because his people were the advisers on the show. But Sorkin's sentiment is very different from Clinton's.

The entire story of the GFC is people working in markets doing the exact opposite because all the incentives pointed in that direction. No one is rewarded for correctly seeing a risk unless they get their timing exactly right. And they'll get a lot of abuse for trying.

Wait, I thought we could save all the money we needed by cutting diversity hires and reducing unspecified "waste"?

Hard to see why Lam painted herself into a corner on the detail when her comms were being done by this guy

What marks out the two-child limit and its sister policy, the benefit cap, is the way both serve to decisively break the link between need and entitlement, woven into the design of our post-war welfare state.

When you sever this link: poverty and unmet need rise.

(awful, essential details in this)

But it's always been a bit higher. Probably because of catholicism!

Yes I know and yet the change in rates is almost identical.

That's always been true though - so can't account for the change.

OK but that's got nothing to do with incentives given the US don't provide any. I can't see any correlation there. France and the UK are similar and one provides incentives while the other doesn't.

Given the similarity in falls it could only be a marginal effect.

Though their fertility rate is falling at the same rate as ours.

Well no one has actually done that right? My point is that the smaller incentives some countries have offered haven't worked.

So far there's no much evidence that financial incentives work but tbf that is larger than they tend to be.

Incredibly important read in the build up to the budget!

If there is no fish available just make it with potatoes. If no potatoes are available imagine there is fish and potatoes.

If you look at in blocs rather than parties the shift is from left to centre rather than right to centre. Wilders lost seats because his vote split across three radical right parties.