Iain MacGilleBhràith

The Green victory in Denton is the result which will have the biggest effect on Labour, far more so than a Reform win.

The blithe assumption progressives have nowhere else to go has been proved catastrophically wrong.

Can’t help thinking of this quote from a Labour minister, a year ago…

As the analysis starts of the Gorton and Denton result, I wanted to flag some aspects that my experience yesterday suggests are being over or under-played

(Caveats - I went to Longsight, Gorton and Denton town centres and spoke to as many people as I could, but it was mostly during the working day)

And in return that’s a really good analogy 👌

Hammering/ed them…

Little-known Rule 34 sub-sub-clause: I wrote a novel titled Rule 34 (and triggered a violent wikipedia edit war because they'd previously had a rule saying "no wikipedia articles titled Rule 34" and my book was notable enough to make the cut …)

At 9:18, 3rd period of the Finland-Switzerland women's ice hockey QF game, the ice crew came to clean the ice during a pause

What follows is the funniest use of the slo-mo alternate angle tech I've seen them use during these Olympics of one of the crew members falling

Respectively:

Has it?
Noting also I carefully said both “*tends to*” and that it is an unstable equilibrium 😊

And the fact that PR may allow(?) 2 party systems does not alter the point…? 🤷‍♂️

Absolutely: I did think about using that instead…!! 👍😂

Thx for pushing this.

(A minor quibble on the article:

“[FPTP] is regarded as best suited to a system dominated by two… parties”

I’d argue that is cart before horse: FPTP tends to *cause* 2 party systems (altho unstable equilibrium and - your point - particularly bad until equilibrium reached!))

Over 50 Academics Warn That Voting System Is Not Fit For Multi-Party Politics Dozens of academics have written to the government to warn that the current voting system risks producing distorted results on an 'unprecedented' s...

I never really sign stuff. But this was different. It's not about trying to facilitate or block a particular party's route to power. It's about an electoral system that's unsuited to the political realities we face today and risks giving us government after government with no convincing mandate.

'Labour politicians urgently need to adopt the Conservative/Reform view of public opinion—that it’s movable, and it’s their job to move it.'

Discuss.

Forget Jim Ratcliffe’s half-apology: to speak of immigrants ‘colonising’ Britain is wrong and sinister | Sunder Katwala He fused an echo of Enoch Powell with the spirit of the far right’s great replacement theory. This is no way to progress a humane migration debate, says Sunder Katwala, director of British Future

I wrote for the Guardian about why Jim Ratcliffe's talk of Britain being "colonised" by immigrants crosses the line between legitimate debate and inflammatory rhetoric. It fuses echoes of Powellism with great replacement conspiracies of "civilisational erasure"
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

I genuinely once referred to it as Loch Windermere… I was simultaneously so proud and disgusted. 😏

Bless her, she’s such a stupid nasty MAGAbot: I understand what impeachment mean and I’m a in-this-context nobody in the UK…

It’s not easy being PM in challenging geopolitical times, under 24 hr watch. But, that’s why mere tinkering, piecemeal reforms, or catchy slogan initiatives aren’t the answer. We need more profound, HONEST, review of our constitutional setup, national security posture, international relations. 🧵

If you are using the phrase "full speed ahead to uber-woke, net-zeroist, rejoinerism", especially if you are of the left, a loved one should take your phone off you and send you to Baden-Baden or somewhere for a month.

Morgan McSweeney does have some fans in the Parliamentary Labour Party, of course. One MP says they are "devastated" he has left. Another warns it represents "full speed ahead to uber-woke, net-zeroist, rejoinerism". An MP who has been through several general elections when the tide was against Labour says of colleagues: "Good luck to all these careerists when they face an election without someone like Morgan at the helm. "Some of us are old enough to remember the Corbyn era with no one in charge and the party floundering."

Yes, god help we risk a floundering government that feels like no one is in charge.

Three posts on phones and social media.

1. Instead of being 'pro' or 'anti', we should think of phones like cars - useful, but dangerous - and social media like alcohol - fun, but addictive.

They have their place, but need age limits and precautions.

www.edrith.co.uk/p/phones-are...

A purple t-shirt featuring a retro-style graphic of three joyful frogs dancing under a rainbow. The design includes mushrooms, butterflies, and stars with the whimsical, stylized text "Gay The Pray Away."

In honor of the recently held National Prayer Breakfast, tonight's Low Quality Ad is for this Gay the Pray Away shirt. Anyone who has actually read the Bible would know it explicitly states the key to getting into heaven is to be as gay as humanly possible.
collabs.shop/d8avwb

McKinsey probably earned a fortune in fees advising them😏

The blunt truth is that if Karen Pierce had been a man, then she would still be US ambassador now and Keir Starmer's government would not be on the brink of death.

But maybe that’s why we went wrong? That was the start of the slippery slope to fucking about…?! 😂

Yes all this fucking about with classic foods for novelty value can fuck right off 👍

"In retrospect Prime Minister, was his nickname of The Prince of Darkness not a tiny bit of a red flag?"

Nowhere near as serious in the UK, but it is really interesting to see exactly the same dynamics in the UK anti-fascist movement.

Deliberate attempts to narrow its support base as far as possible and to drive away normal people.

Entirely counterproductive to their stated goal - and revealing.

You could make the same argument for Labour in the UK. Too much electoral strategy, not enough political vision and leadership.

Ella Marriott, Commander of the Metropolitan police said: "Following the further release of millions of court documents in relation to Jeffrey Epstein by the United States Department of Justice, the Met received a number of reports into alleged misconduct in public office, including a referral from the UK Government. "I can confirm that the Metropolitan Police has launched an investigation into a 72-year-old-man, a former Government minister, for misconduct in public office offences. "The Met will continue to assess all relevant information brought to our attention as part of this investigation and won't be commenting any further at this time."

it’s good night from me

Gordon Brown played a blinder during the financial crisis. Little wonder he's pissed off at the conduct of Mandelson at the time.
Brown will be history's most unappreciated PM. He was, and is, terrific IMHO.

Door is open to customs union talks with UK, EU Commissioner says Valdis Dombrovskis says the EU is willing to engage with Britain amid mounting global uncertainty.

Well will you look at that 😁 "Door is open to customs union talks with UK, EU says"

"he also said Britain and the EU could remove "most" food checks between the UK and the bloc"

And we know it really happened! "Speaking after high-level talks with ministers"

www.bbc.com/news/article...