It’s not entirely obvious this indicates the unstoppable march of populism…why does the UK’s current political trajectory (v likely center left win) seem so different to much of the rest of Europe. Here’s a theory…

https://twitter.com/samfr/status/1747923991744979007

Populism is currently driven by reaction against incumbent political parties, driven by principally economic factors.

I see that Brexit failing is topical again. As others have pointed out, this is not complicated (v expensive and divisive project by v unpopular government with v little tangible benefit). If it was HS2 it would already have been canceled. The fundamental conditions are in place fir its substantial change or reversal (polling, demographic change, poor economic performance) but nothing will change until there’s decisive political support. Of which there is conspicuously none at present.

I am imploring someone to dig into the debt interest number. It is obviously very important but is I think being a little misunderstood. For example, not much of the actual ‘cash’ cost increase will be attributable to debt raised during Covid.

https://twitter.com/resfoundation/status/1728791720819896784

Why? Because most of the Covid debt was raised when rates were very low. And because the proportion of inflation linked debt is relatively low (say 10ish%) and because annual interest cost includes the non-cash (today) item of the additional redemption cost of the linkers.

A combination of Brexit, widely considered to have failed, Johnson et al conduct issues, the disastrous Truss episode and now Sunak’s failure to get a grip, put the Conservatives in very dangerous territory.

https://twitter.com/samfr/status/1679026607254536192

And rightly so. And curious to see them shamble onwards from day to miserable day without any apparent clue.

1. Is Rishi Sunak’s reputation for competence still merited (if it ever was)? 2. I have previously considered competence to be his core strength (most certainly on a relative basis) but I think I may have overestimated him.

1. I wanted to share some Brexit thoughts. 

It is important to acknowledge‘this’ Brexit (other forms were available) BOTH succeeded (it happened) and (so far) has failed. 2. There is no better evidence for ‘this’ Brexit’s failure than the polling which shows a divided country largely united in thinking that it has not gone well and that the UK should have a closer relationship with the EU.

Ah German ambassador responds to Lammy (LBC) Tonally v positive but carefully returns to the 4 freedoms.

The more I think about this, the stranger the message gets…the message seems to be that SM / CU etc are out of the question NOT because of Brexit itself (which seemed to me to be the previous Labour position) but because…

https://twitter.com/andrewsparrow/status/1671198291382480897

…of the ‘acrimony’ Brexit has caused with the EU / European states which is all the fault of the Cons. That may or may not be correct but surely the implication is that if the ‘acrimony’ was no longer there then Labour might have a different view…

Been learnt an old Greek saying (goes back to Homer apparently):

‘In the beach restaurant do not order the whole fish without first asking the price.’ This is proper new elite stuff

Wasn’t going to watch the HoC debate because I thought it would make me too cross.

I was not wrong. (I really don’t want this to be about politics)

1. On failure and why not accepting and understanding failure is the reason the Conservatives will lose the next election. 2. Failure is an entirely normal, even healthy part of life but much less discussed than success.

How often do we hear people extolling their failure, the reasons for it, and what they will do differently?

For the DR sympathetic takes it’s extremely unfortunate that he actually erm resigned due to a commitment he had previously made to resign if any of the complaints were upheld. We can safely say it was an act of great misjudgment to have staked one’s career on the basis of one’s own view of numerous complaints.

The beliefs that civil servants are somehow exceptional in their work place sensitivity (and therefore can’t be effectively managed) and / or have ideological agendas to block government initiatives (both unevidenced) are great examples of motivated reasoning. Alternative and plausible explanations include: CS are representative of generally held views re modern workplace behavior…

Possible that Trolley’s report simply ‘establishes the facts’ and does not pronounce as to whether the ‘facts’ constitute bullying - see ToR below. assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/upl… If that’s the case, then Sunak (perhaps with advice from ethics advisor) would need to decide if the ‘facts’ amount to bullying.

1. It’s not entirely obvious the new style Twitter Blue paid subscription is going to be a success. Numbers so far are small and revenues nowhere close to making up for the loss of advertising. 2. The so far almost entirely unfulfilled promise to remove legacy blue ticks is also pretty good evidence twitter blue is not working - imv the platform can’t afford to derate so many of its content providers.

I have laboured long and hard, using deep analysis of the past and the future, to come up with this definitive historico-literary-predictive take on British politics…

🥁 🥁 🥁 Nigel Lawson (RIP) was responsible for Tony Blair was responsible for Nigel Farage was responsible for Brexit was responsible for Boris Johnson was responsible for Keir Starmer was responsible for PR was responsible for the UK rejoigning the EU.

And this is also why it’s very shortsighted to dismiss current Brexit polling (if you build it they will (someday) come etc etc).

https://twitter.com/benwansell/status/1642876698080288769

If Dover / Eurostar end up being completely borked then events will not transpire to the liking of Brexit supporters.

SURPRISE!

thetimes.co.uk/article/30d025… If it was me, I would simply not make claims / leak stories to newspapers that have virtually no chance of actually happening.

Guys, not for the first time I wonder why I am not running the country. This is a profound mystery to me because I am reliably informed I have all the Robyn credentials. And yet. Nor do do I appear to have ‘immense cultural influence’. I don’t want to show off but if anyone around here is a member of the metropolitan liberal elite…well…it’s me…but for some mysterious reason I’m not exercising ultimate power over you all.

It’s just not fair.

Algorithmic boosting based on payment rather than content is a very, very bad idea.

In effect, you add to existing corporate advertising (which no one likes but tolerates) a whole new form of personal paid for advertising (w/ no quality vetting). And what do people do if they find in their TL tweets they don’t like from people they don’t follow?

They block / mute and / or switch to the Following TL.

In effect, this would seem to allow for free verified status for the Top 10,000 (and also for their designated affiliates (ie divisions and employees).

Imagine a big news organization…this suggests they can also get all their designated journalists etc verified…

https://twitter.com/variety/status/1641803295894241280

…All of a sudden you go from a very small number of verified accounts to *a lot* - this is presumably the point…but of course it entrenches a rather specific big business type hierarchy at the expense of individual content providers…