Aisling M

Next time I get a cold, I'm going to betray it by having a Lemsip and some ibuprofen.

"Why do you 𝘰𝘯𝘭𝘺 talk about Pakistani grooming gangs? There are 𝙩𝙚𝙣 times as many white grooming gang suspects?"

@maitlis.bsky.social asks ex-Reform MP @rupertlowe.bsky.social why he won't denounce all perpetrators of grooming gangs equally.

Louise Haigh condemns ‘misogynistic’ and ‘sexist’ briefings against female ministers - Politics.co.uk Louise Haigh, the former transport secretary, said she was “really fed up” of reading negative stories about her colleagues.

🚨 NEW: Louise Haigh condemns ‘misogynistic’ and ‘sexist’ briefings against female ministers

Speaking to BBC Newsnight, the former transport secretary also said it is “unlikely” she will vote for the government's welfare cuts

Full story 👇
www.politics.co.uk/news/2025/05...

“A family earning £100k a year will now find themselves on minimum wage after taking part in just two drug binges a week.”

Evidence also suggests Labour could lose far more seats at next election from disillusioned leftwing voters defecting, than from its 2024 voters switching to Reform.

And just one in seven Reform inclined Labour voters agree with ripping up net zero agenda.

There's a line connecting Hunt's NI cuts and the electoral system for mayoral races and the BBC management and the EHRC. The Starmer/McSweeney theory of politics just isn't interested in naming, let alone undoing, Tory institutional capture

It is this, not arguing, but also this Labour party has been strikingly reluctant to occupy the commanding heights of the discourse. The last government made a bunch of attempts to embed right wing bias in institutions and processes; this government is content to leave them all in place.

Ify, Katie, and Brennan holding hands in shared trauma solidarity. Their arms connect to form a triangle between them, and the Virtuous Economic Cycle is superimposed atop it.

always remember

If you know, you know

Even the officials who originally worked on the EA (who weren't asked their views by the Court) have been expressing their surprise, because they assumed their intent was clear from the legislation (and, indeed, it really was until now):

Spare a thought today, too, for lesbian women, overwhelmingly trans inclusive, but who the Supreme Court has presented as exactly the opposite. Sorry but the heterosexual judges on the Supreme Court know better than you what you really think.

I remember having my mind blown as a (dim) 16 year old when my history teacher really drilled into our heads that laws are just what enough of a powerful interest group decides is right, that the law isn't infallible, and that it can be moral to oppose certain laws

Having excluded all trans people from proceedings before it, the Supreme Court decides in favour of For Some Women Scotland.

wait i'm sorry i scrolled by this headline and thought it was in the USA but then I saw it again and... what the fuck, britain??? what are we doing here??

some more congestion pricing Ws:

Broadway attendance: up 21%
Restaurant reservations: up 7%
Pedestrian traffic: up 4%
Retail sales: up $900M
Commercial leasing: up 61%
Subway crime: down 37%
Car crashes: down 50%
Honking complaints: down 69%

Rachel Reeves confirms 15% cut to Civil Service running costs Savings will be from back office and administrative roles rather than front-line services, chancellor tells the BBC.

Reeves also implicitly confirming that external consultancy spend will increase by about the ‘saved’ amount.

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

I see Andrew Neil has decided - probably from his seven bedroom villa in the south of France - that only 1.2 million people being immiserated is nowhere near enough.

An entirely reasonable sentence that once more is completely incompatible with slashing PIP.

In the past two weeks, my TikTok algorithm is really pushing me with ‘SkinnyTok’ content. All saying that it’s not that bad to be pushing being skinny, that 16 hour fasts are cleansing, that ‘it’s not heroin chic’, that Snag tights advertising of women size 20+ is ugly etc.

This is the bad times.

This.

Those with power do not want others to have human rights - the rights you have because you are human.

That is why they sneer at human rights, use the media and propaganda to deride those rights, and cut off legal aid so the rights cannot be asserted.

And some unwise people clap and cheer.

I cannot describe how much this will benefit Russian oligarchs who will be able to hide illicit funds behind US corporate structures. This is beyond shameful and a disgrace.

Winston Churchill at the White House wearing a one-piece garment known as a siren suit.

Zelenskyy's character can be judge more directly by how he treats others and whether you think he's protected his country. From what I've seen, he has treated Americans with respect. His attire is to remind people he's at war, not unlike Churchill wearing a siren suit to the White House in 1942.

Two photos: One shows Zelenskyy in a black quarter zip at the White House meeting, the other shows Elon Musk in a black graphic t-shirt, black topcoat, and black ball cap, also meeting with the Trump cabinet.

One reason why I think respectability is stupid is because it's often used as a mask. Such judgements are rarely about the clothes themselves, but more often about the bodies beneath them. To wit, no one raised an issue when Elon wore a graphic t-shirt and ball cap to meet the Trump cabinet.

NEW: Just 6% of Gen Z say they actually want a dictator – not over half, as has been recently claimed.

Our study finds only a very small minority of 13-27-yr-olds really feel this way, when their views and interpretations are tested with different questioning approaches 🧵⬇️

Can we also keep in mind that while Zelenskyy like Churchill 1940-45 postponed elections, Trump in peacetime tried to overturn by violence an election he lost - and has since pardoned all the co-conspirators in his attempted coup?

The equivalent would have been Roosevelt calling Churchill a dictator when the Luftwaffe were bombing London. It's beyond belief, really.

Trump is losing his rag because Zelensky isn't backing down. He needs Zelensky to back down. So support Zelensky.