Well let's see how this strategy of telling "white liberals" to "fuck right off" works out in the local elections

Thing is, Home Secretary, if you tell people like me to fuck right off, who supported the Labour Party precisely because it has historically been an anti-racist party (amongst other principles you have also jettisoned), we might just do that. And I don't think Labour can afford to lose our votes.

15-Minute Cities – How Urban Design Entered the Culture War | Origin Story YouTube video by Origin Story

This is so good, we wish WE had made it! The history & lunacy of the disinformation campaign around 15-Minute Cities, by 2 “non experts” @iandunt.bsky.social & @dorianlynskey.bsky.social who show how experts SHOULD be communicating. Thanks to the @originstorypodcast.bsky.social podcast. #UrbanTruth

Keir Starmer knew who Peter Mandelson was when he appointed him.

The idea vetting was somehow important or even relevant is a joke: it was just a convenient excuse for Number 10 to use, so it could blame Mandelson for "lying" to pass it. Now he didn't pass it we're at a new level of silliness.

When Angela Rayner underpaid £40,000 in stamp duty, Richard Tice said it was "morally completely indefensible” and she should resign if she had “any moral decency”.

Now we learn he set up four shell companies that let him avoid paying £100,000 he owed in tax and to then transfer the cash to Reform

Pope Leo XIV @Pontifex X.com #ArtificialIntelligence systems increasingly shape and permeate our mentality and social environments. Like every great historical transformation, this too calls not only for technical competence, but also for a humanistic formation capable of making visible the logic behind economics, embedded biases and forms of power that shape our perception of reality. 1:31 PM • 4/17/26 • 91K Views

Pope Leo XIV @Pontifex X.com Within digital environments — structured to persuade — interaction is optimized to the point of rendering a real encounter superfluous; the otherness of persons in the flesh is neutralized, and relationships are reduced to functional responses. Dear friends, you, however, are real persons! Creation itself has a body, a breath, a life to be listened to and safeguarded. 1:31 PM • 4/17/26 • 209K Views

Pope Leo XIV @Pontifex X.com When simulation becomes the norm, it weakens the human capacity for discernment. As a result, our social bonds close in upon themselves, forming self-referential circuits that no longer expose us to reality. We thus come to live within bubbles, impermeable to one another. Feeling threatened by anyone who is different, we grow unaccustomed to encounter and dialogue. In this way, polarization, conflict, fear and violence spread. What is at stake is not merely the risk of error, but a transformation in our very relationship with truth. 1:31 PM • 4/17/26 • 696K Views

Pope Leo on AI:

“Within digital environments — structured to persuade — interaction is optimized to the point of rendering a real encounter superfluous; the otherness of persons in the flesh is neutralized, and relationships are reduced to functional responses.”

This short thread is worth reading:

The BBC undercover investigation into false immigration claims is deeply irresponsible journalism. It does not highlight that exploitation by unregulated advisors occurs because legal aid was cut and the system is insane to navigate.

Did the BBC assume that asylum applications, unlike every other facet of human society, were completely free of fraud? Seems like a complete loss of perspective over their investigation, which is now into its second day of dominating its headlines

Legal advisers help migrants pose as gay to get asylum, undercover BBC investigation finds The BBC exposes a shadow industry charging migrants thousands of pounds to help them cheat the asylum system.

Disgusting reporting by BBC using a tiny number of cases to suggest widespread abuse of a system which routinely denies LGBTQIA+ individuals asylum and forces them back into environments of persecution. This article massively distorts the reality of the situation. 1/
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

BBC News leading all its bulletins on demands by former Government advisor Lord Robertson for more defence spending, without at any point mentioning his current paid senior role for US defence lobbyists

Mahmood’s migration changes will deliver fraction of claimed savings, data suggests Exclusive: Analysis of government figures indicates public finances will gain £600m not £10bn if migrants’ access to benefits is reduced

The human arguments against Mahmood's earned settlement model are obvious. It will make families' lives far worse & hinder their ability to reach their potential in the UK.
But now the economic arguments are falling apart too.
The govt must scrap these plans now.
www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...

This is the ultimate test for a constitutional order.

Either constitutional mechanisms are used to check and balance this, and remove him from office, or they are not.

For there can be no greater test for any constitution.

This is a real post (link below for proof) by the President of the world's most powerful country. This isn't funny, or cool, or "talking like normal people". This is an unhinged lunatic that no sane person could want to interact with. No coming back from this.
truthsocial.com/@realDonaldT...

Probably was a bad idea to elect both the dumbest and most emotionally fragile president in American history.

It is frankly disgraceful this ridiculous situation is allowed to lumber on.

Their interest rate on this death spiral finance is up to 8.25%.

A third of each bill is to cover interest!

You have housing that can't be completed because Thames hasn't built sufficient water infrastructure!

Grenfell was a sign of how the state stripped back building safety regulations, took powers away from local authorities (who then had lacked the power & ability to regulate building safety) and ignored warnings from a Coroner after a deadly fire in 2009.

Nine photos showing the progression of the Grenfell Tower fire on 14 June 2017.

"Everyone dies in the end. It’s just how you go, right? You can’t stop tragic things from happening. Fires do happen."
Reform's Housing spokesperson Simon Dudley on the Grenfell Tower fire, which killed 72 people and left 70+ injured.
www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/reform...

Please read this, understand what the govt is doing & take action. Labour's immigration proposals swap integration for segregation, introduce a Dubai-style Kafala system of coercive employer control & drive low-income families into poverty. They're an abomination.

open.substack.com/pub/wewanted...

Of course no one from *checks notes* Sudan or Afghanistan could be in genuine danger.

Trans people are so often excluded from decisions made about them. I am concerned the puberty blockers trial has been paused not for clinical reasons, nor because govt listened to trans people's constructive concerns about how it will be run, but as a political decision...

This is superb. Denyer addresses almost every conspiratorial canard used by transphobes to scaremonger and dispatches them with aplomb.

Any genuine LGBT+ mp or ally would do well to take their cue from this speech. Anything less is a failure, ethically and politically.

Like an AI bot, Trump will come up with a form of words to meet a given situation.

These words will not correspond to reality, but they will be words that have worked before.

Here his personal language model selects “in negotiations” as something to say to get of this situation, and so he says it.

Oh good. I hope they ALL look like 3D-printed office storage units.

Once again a heartfelt thanks to David "cut the Green crap" Cameron and Nick "What's the point in a nuclear power plant that isn't ready until the 2020s" Clegg for their visionary political choices, whose consequences we get to enjoy today.

Paris said au revoir to cars. Air pollution maps reveal a dramatic change. Air pollution fell substantially as the city restricted car traffic and made way for parks and bike lanes.

“Air pollution fell substantially as Paris restricted car traffic and made way for parks, people-streets and bike-lanes.”

Better for the climate, better for health, better for livability and quality of life.

Common sense.

Such a no-brainer, it’s remarkable that more cities HAVEN’T done the same.

"Over the last few years, American tech oligarchs have become the greatest argument against their own existence.
The sheer scale of their erratic behavior and political interference proves that extreme wealth concentration is a structural threat to society."
-Joni Askola

…immigration and relations with the EU. Both of which have the added benefit of being positive fiscally.

If you’ve decided (sensibly) that the Reform oriented strategy has not worked, then this is a *no brainer*.

As ever the opposite is the case. What they're all arguing for here is dominance over Muslims. Dominance over a religious minority's right to worship, to freely assemble, to be visible, and to exist as equal members of British society.

The complete opposite of what Britain fought for in World War 2

One other thing re Rayner and ILR. Look at the clarity of language in her speech and compare it Paul Ovenden’s execrable waffle supporting Mahmood’s policy the other day.

Orwell was right, obfuscatory and flowery political language disguises poor political thinking.

Hereditary peers to be removed from Lords as bill passes The bill abolishes the 92 seats reserved for peers who inherit their titles through their families.

The move to remove hereditary peers is welcome. The next logical step should be to remove the Lords Spiritual.

There should be no reserved seats in Parliament for any one religion. It’s time to remove bishops from the House of Lords.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...