To be fair to the judges at Nuremberg, they didn't buy the line that the Nazis were really trying to defend the West against the Bolshevik untermenschen.
David Timoney
@fromarsetoelbow.bsky.social
Autonomous vehicle. Self-assembly required. May contain traces of critical theory. Retweets not necessarily a WTF Blog: fromarsetoelbow.blogspot.co.uk
I think the best way to read this obvious propaganda is as a determination by the party right (through its Guardian-friendly mouthpiece, Labour Together) to keep the membership small and reliably anti-left. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...
Labour members ‘have tougher view on welfare than you might think’, poll suggests
Survey finds party members see health, the economy, cost of living and climate crisis among biggest challenges
theguardian.com
There's obviously a bit more to this than the Guardian's story suggests, not least Labour's antipathy to Tower Hamlets and its anxiety over the City's decline (the customers for that data centre), but it doesn't suggest a radical approach to housing. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...
Approval of east London datacentre labelled ‘slap in the face’ for local democracy
Campaigners decry Angela Rayner’s backing for Brick Lane project that has only 11 affordable homes
theguardian.com
The Guardian's pre-obit of Rod Liddle carries the amusing suggestion of a contradiction: "Liddle worked as a speechwriter for the Labour party in the 1980s, but his later writing often critiqued and criticised the left." www.theguardian.com/media/2026/a...
Sunday Times and Sun columnist Rod Liddle dies aged 66
Tributes paid across industry to provocative journalist who died after short illness
theguardian.com
If the result in 2024 tells us anything, it is that Clacton's voters disagree. Also, you can't accuse Farage of not being serious. He is a grifter, not a gadfly.
The death of Rod Liddle marks the end of an era. Unfortunately, that era is merely Rod Liddle, rather than the era of contemptuous, anti-intellectual bigotry that characterises the British press. They're queuing up to replace him already.
It strikes me as increasingly likely that the Burnham era will be judged above all on housing and homelessness. The latter is tractable, but only sustainable through council housebuilding. Labour's record in Manchester is not that impressive. www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2026/au...
Harry Stopes | Manchesterisms
Bev Craig, leader of Manchester City Council before she was comfortably elected last week to replace Andy Burnham as...
lrb.co.uk
Attlee would have disagreed. But what did he know?
We've had a number of "stifling and absolutist periods" in our national discourse over the last 40 years and I can confidently say that the pandemic wouldn't even make the top 10.
Lewis Goodall@lewisgoodall.com · 4d agoNo need for anyone to agree with me - but some of the responses to this on here reminds me just how stifling and absolutist a period in our national discourse Covid was.
I was wondering how long it would take for someone to come up with a "Burnham can be explained by Catholicism" take. I'm only surprised it wasn't Paul Mason. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
Like Burnham, I was an altar boy. His Catholic upbringing is shaping the way he governs |Julian Coman
With a prime minister raised in a tradition that emphasises our mutual dependency, we may finally have a leader who can address the anomie gripping our country, says Guardian associate editor Julian…
theguardian.com
This is an example of the learned helplessness of British politics and commentary. Freedland's provocative idea is that the UK's foreign policy should centre less on the whims of the US and more on the EU now that the latter has embraced militarisation. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
Will Trump be Burnham’s undoing, or the making of him? The answer lies in Europe | Jonathan Freedland
In an increasingly dangerous world, Europe is finding safety in numbers – but Britain is on the outside. The new PM’s task is to change that, says Guardian columnist Jonathan Freedland
theguardian.com
"If the state doesn’t exist to pool risks, what is its function?" Chris Dillow on the crisis in social care and the macroeconomic consequences of addressing it. chrisdillow.substack.com/p/social-car...
Social care: the fight for economic thinking
Reforming social care isn't a left vs right issue: it's about economics vs prejudice.
chrisdillow.substack.com
According to George Monbiot, "Starmer was a weak man, without a clear vision of his own, who was rolled by any powerful state or corporate lobby. He was no match for a well-funded and highly effective international campaign." This is misleading. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
Think our basic rights are safe? In the age of oligarchs and corporate lobbying, think again | George Monbiot
The global assault on our freedoms is coming ever closer to home. Just look at the sinister prosecution of UK lawyer Rajiv Menon, says Guardian columnist George Monbiot
theguardian.com
Bizarre headline. We all know why, and if you want to know the likelihood of a substantive "review", I'd point you to Burnham's coincidental commitment to trident renewal. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...
UK government reviews why police ceding criminal cases to US military
Exclusive: ministers and police chiefs examining how cases involving US military personnel on UK soil are handled after Guardian revelations
theguardian.com
Genuinely gob-smacking in its shamelessness that after the farce of Starmer John Crace should be lauding Burnham as a "grownup". www.theguardian.com/politics/202...
Andy Burnham wants to fix social care. It’s personal for him and for a lot of us too
Finally a grownup is in charge who speaks to voters as fellow adults. If he fixes this, he’ll achieve more than most other PMs
theguardian.com
Rafael Behr, not unreasonably, accuses Badenoch of "affirming her faith in Our Lady Margaret Thatcher" but then proceeds to "fondle the beads on the Tory rosary" in claiming that Trump is the antithesis of Thatcher in policy. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
Suddenly the British right feels a political chill. It’s getting cold in Andy Burnham’s shadow | Rafael Behr
The Tories and Reform had it easy when Keir Starmer was self-destructing – but a new PM with ideas exposes how vacant the opposition has become, says Guardian columnist Rafael Behr
theguardian.com
The point about "Liquidate the kulaks", which this obviously (yeah, hilariously) nods to, is that it was a policy with a clear goal (however misguided). But what would be the objective in getting rid of sociology? Why not ignore it rather than actively terminate it?
"I'm not bitter", says bitter Tom Baldwin. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
Burnham is master of his message for now. But he should know this: media foes will offer no respite | Tom Baldwin
While the new PM’s slick social media operation can help him bypass the hostile press that devoured Starmer, he will still need friends in the fourth estate, says former Labour party adviser Tom…
theguardian.com
"The result of that was the decision to import a leader from outside Westminster: first the unknown Starmer conning the membership; and then a recycled Burnham avoiding the need for an election through PLP discipline." The party is dying before our eyes. fromarsetoelbow.blogspot.com/2026/07/of-f...
Of Fictions and Factions
From arse to elbow. A blog about politics, economics, football, films, music and various other stuff that catches my fancy. Dave Timoney.
fromarsetoelbow.blogspot.com
And lo, they did fashion the soft left once more from the dust of history.
This is oddly circumspect in its reference to "trans issues". Who exactly are journos fearful of? www.theguardian.com/media/2026/j...
UK journalists ‘self-censoring stories about Trump and the right over safety fears’
Government-backed investigation finds risks are normalised amid ‘a narrowing of the public conversation’
theguardian.com
New blogpost: Of Fictions and Factions - The media's response to Andy Burnham's first week as PM has been a strange mixture of patronisation and resentment. They are getting their bearings, and central to that process is the invention of a new faction. fromarsetoelbow.blogspot.com/2026/07/of-f...
Of Fictions and Factions
From arse to elbow. A blog about politics, economics, football, films, music and various other stuff that catches my fancy. Dave Timoney.
fromarsetoelbow.blogspot.com
The idea that we should be worried about AI slop misrepresenting history is akin to worrying in the 1930s that Sellars & Yeatman's 1066 and All That might not have been a useful school primer. observer.co.uk/news/columni...
AI slop is warping our view of history – our schools need...
With historically inaccurate content swamping our feeds, it is vital that we identify and assess the sources of the narratives we are absorbing
observer.co.uk
Aren't British aristos lovably eccentric? Fun fact: Amanda Feilding was the mum of Rock Feilding-Mellen, property developer and deputy leader of Kensington & Chelsea council who resigned following the Grenfell Tower disaster. Andrew O'Hagan sympathised. observer.co.uk/news/nationa...
My hallucinogenic encounter with the skull-drilling Count...
Amanda Feilding’s passion for microdosing with psychedelics led last week to a £2bn drugs firm takeover – via desert toads, Donald Trump and trepanning
observer.co.uk
There were no massive, substantive changes under Blair. We know this because most of what he did change was reversed or made irrelevant within a few years of the coalition govt.
Glen O'Hara@gsoh31.bsky.social · 2w agoWhat can Burnham learn from Blair? My view: *Believe things! *You have to have a strategy *It has to be consistent and long-lasting *Strategy must fit with tactics and comms *Your people are important *Be optimistic, speak optimistically *You can make massive changes renewal.org.uk/blog/on-its-...
You don't often see the sausage-making process made so public but here we have the Guardian literally calling for the invention of a new Labour Party faction, despite the "cause" being nothing more than petulance and a sense of entitlement. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...
Was Keir Starmer’s leaving party the boozy birth of a new Labour force?
A £10,000 bar tab was drunk, there was a ‘lot of anger’, and now ex-ministers are thinking how to cooperate in future
theguardian.com
For the last 2 years you'd struggle to find anyone who would willingly accept the label "Starmerite", but now they're a "powerful phalanx", apparently. The political press have a long tradition of inventing Labour factions, notably the ever-useful "soft left", but they've excelled themselves here.
PoliticsHome@politicshome.bsky.social · 2w agoLabour MPs unhappy with the treatment of Starmer loyalists have warned they could make life hard for Burnham at the Budget “Andy’s Starmerite purge has created an incredibly powerful phalanx of skilled political operators who intimately know the government’s fiscal position" Harriet Symonds writes
The tone is remarkably reminiscent of Walter Layron, the Economist's editor during the 1930s. He was sceptical of Rooseveldt's New Deal, complimentary to Mussolini and muted criticism in the paper of the Nazis to maintain UK-German trade relations. (See Alexander Zevin's Liberalism at Large.)
Musa Okwonga@okwonga.bsky.social · 2w agoThe editor in chief of The Economist referring here to the AfD’s leader as a “perfectly thoughtful person“ instead of what she truly is - a driver and enabler of German fascism - is a huge part of the problem.
"Now, I might be mistaken here. It could be that ministers in the Starmer government weren’t really interested in accurately gauging public opinion or (often a different thing!) the public interest. Maybe all they wanted was to defeat the left and get well-paid jobs after politics."
Chris Dillow@chrisdillow.bsky.social · 2w agoNew substack: how politicians are misled by sampling bias chrisdillow.substack.com/p/on-samplin...