alinag

Re: Jenrick's "tinderbox" analogy, this was Quintin Hogg's 1968 response to Powell: "If one is going to say… that this Bill… is like lighting a match to the gunpowder, it might be thought a little careless to go about with a lighted cigarette in one's mouth, flicking the ash all over the place."

No - which is why FDR wanted a rules-based system to internationalize the New Deal, and what we got instead was Reagan’s plan to internationalize Milton Friedman’s political economy. Why didn’t we get the FDR version?

A map of English local authorities showing which of them would stand to gain or lose more MPs with the introduction of votes at 16 and automatic voter registration, compared with a boundary review under the current rules.

Thinking about the parts of the country which may be impacted by the introduction of automatic voter registration, compared with the current electoral rules remaining the same.

Blue are LAs which would be entitled to more MPs using 16+ and AVR, red those who would lose.

Fully agree that the EU needs to use the time it gained for more substantial reforms. But I am personally not a fan of the 'humiliation' discourse as a driver for reform, as a kind of 'hating on yourself' pychological motiviation.

Doesn’t this strengthen the commission’s hand in upcoming negotiations with member states & other power centres re new MFF and generally?
Obvs, MFF just one piece of achieving these goals but seems to be going in this direction, no?

read the whole thread

Don’t know why they call them dumb. This js hilarious

Croíthe Radacacha | Player | Irish Television Channel, Súil Eile A documentary about 'the love that dares not speak its name' - found at the very heart of the Irish Revolution. The hidden stories of eight female couples who were central in the fight that freed Irel...

I never knew about this

www.tg4.ie/en/player/ca...

Microsoft relied on China-based engineers to maintain SharePoint "OnPrem", which was recently exploited by Chinese hackers to breach US government systems (Renee Dudley/ProPublica)

Main Link | Techmeme Permalink

Thank you.

I'm always in remedial class when it comes to PA election stuff!

There's a county called Schuylkill?? The Navy should defo name a ship after that.

Yes Philly is double Allegheny.

As an aside, curious if SOS will put Musk's party voter registration under 'Other Parties' and hurt his ego and put it in a separate category. I know, it's early day but since Libertarians got their own column

Increase in registered Independents (or 'Other parties') numbers 2020 vs 2024 in descending order (and with Libertarians included under Ind for 2024)

Well Allegheny has the most votes usually but depressingly it had less turnout in 2024 vs 2020 so since it's still number one in this list....something to do with mail-in ballots?

If it's not a GOP voter reg thingy then is it something to do with % turnout at 2024 election.
I'm going down the list of depressing things about PA elections 😫

Only WWII reduced the influence of those people (so long after Prohibition abolished).
Still think 2033 interesting, for a variety of reasons either gonna happen then or not happen at all

That's why it should always be same number of days (as nights) + 2 or 3 off. First day is sleeping, second day is sleeping some more and thinking of doing things and maybe third day actually doing things.

To be honest, I want all rota to be like this. I'd do 14-16h shifts and then days off

Brexit's 21st Amendment Can the Rejoin campaign learn anything from the End of Prohibition?

@benansell.bsky.social

I take less reassurance from rejoin polling than you but where are you on the politics (the players) of the 2033 prediction given we have Starmer (neither dry nor wet) but we also have Farage leading the polls

benansell.substack.com/p/brexits-21...

Also, during a gold rush, sell shovels

European integration didn’t evolve into a political project having started as an economic one. It was a political project from the start.

I don't think Brits are that different to the bond market or the market in general when it comes to gloominess about UK prospects or even world in general.

What reason had Americans to think up until very recently that the good times are ending so they shouldn't spend?

There's plenty of non-arable sunny land for both vines and solar panels.

Vines look great for the tourist but you have to have the workforce and it has to make economic sense. And these are two different business cases.

IOW if there's not more vines it's nothing to do with solar panels.

There is no problem in the current NHS that was not made much worse by Jeremy Hunt.

It’s been obvious for some time that Musk’s platform is deliberately & dangerously hideous. There is nothing to stop politicians, up to & including the government, removing themselves from it entirely. Their every utterance would still be reported, regardless of how it entered the public space.

Cover of Republic: Britain’s Revolutionary Decade, 1649 - 1660 by Alice Hunt

I finished reading Republic by Alice Hunt last night, and found it so interesting.

Partly how it’s written - it has a chapter for every year (1649 to 1660) of the commonwealth, and tells the story via diaries from a whole range of people.
But partly because it was just such a mad period.

Quoting myself (insufferable) because I am increasingly sure my thesis — that we never hear about a female loneliness epidemic because the only women I know who regularly describe themselves as lonely are in bad heterosexual relationships — is actually true.

Three million on NHS England waiting lists have had no care since GP referral Exclusive: Data reveals ‘invisible crisis’ with millions yet to have first specialist appointment or diagnostic test

in addition to not getting the specialist care, complications from the original problem that led to the referral will lend these people in Emergency Departments where the care for the problem is not adequate and also adds to the ED burden

www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

You're not wrong with the picture. Things in Romania during Ceausescu were vastly different and much worse than in similarly Communist neighbouring Yugoslavia under Tito because of all sorts of things relating to Ceausescu himself.

Trump reminds me a lot of that.

Somehow when it comes to something like this all the vaunted prowess of AI our saviour amounts to nothing.

It was down to good old fashioned journalism to find this out and report it to Google and then they nixed it (until the next one, of course).

This is a great policy brief.

Short enough (about 10 pages) to actually read whole, clear enough to understand even for people not steeped in EU budget details but also deftly mixing numbers and ideas.

Russia, Ukraine, and the Global Order with Fiona Hill Podcast-Folge · Brussels Sprouts · 01.08.2025 · 1 Std.

Fiona Hill injects a healthy dose of realism into the European wishful thinkers’ minds.

@nicolange.bsky.social
@constelz.bsky.social
@joerglau.bsky.social
@carlomasala1.bsky.social