The image above was posted in the large few days of 2024. It shows one of the less visited locations in the Bonkersverse: The Jack Straw Memorial Reform School, Dungeness. Think of it as Les Quatre Cent Coups with added shingle. But let's see what Rutland's most popular fictional peer has been up to this year. February Shocked by the number of Tory placement at the top of the BBC, Lord Bonkers called for a traditional arse-booting at Broadcasting House: The Chief Commissionaire, traditionally a former RSM from one of the Guards regiments, boots the miscreant the length of the ...
The Cascades were a clean-cut American vocal group who had an international hit in 1962 with Rhythm of the Rain and were later influenced by the Beach Boys. I Bet You Won't Stay is a Ray Davies song that, as far as I can tell, The Kinks never recorded. It turned up on the B-side of an unsuccessful Cascades single in 1965. It's easy to imagine Davies singing this himself. The poster on Bluesky who alerted me to the song described it as a "fantastic link between See My Friends and Tired of Waiting". It's the best Kinks single that ...
Andrew George MP frames his recent article on Lib Dem Voice ("Israel/Palestine: Complicity") around laudable principles—respect for law, opposition to hatred, and concern for civilian life. However, those principles are undermined when language departs from legal definitions, evidence is selectively presented, and allegations of the gravest crimes in international law are asserted as settled fact when they are not. This matters not only for accuracy, but because such rhetoric risks feeding narratives that blur into antisemitism under the guise of moral critique. The most serious flaw in the article is the repeated assertion that Israel is committing "genocide." Genocide is ...
A Conservative leaflet from the 1951 general election, housed at the People's History Museum in Manchester: [IMG: 1951 general election Conservative leaflet looking like the football pools] Information about the leaflet from the museum (see number 5 in the list): [IMG: 1951 general election Conservative leaflet looking like the football pools - museum explanation] Football-themed leaflets were quite the thing in 1951 and you can watch a short video about that election here. For more gems from past election leaflets, see my collection How leaflets used to look.
The £9 million donation that Reform received from a Thailand-based cryptocurrency investor and aviation entrepreneur is continuing to make waves with nineteen civil organisations calling on ministers to legislate to cap political donations in an effort to "rebuild voter confidence" in democracy. The Guardian reports that these organisations have urged the government to show more ambition as it prepares to publish legislation early next year that will extend the franchise to 16- and 17-year-olds: In a letter sent this week to Steve Reed, the communities secretary, and Samantha Dixon, the democracy minister, 19 civil organisations said "a donations cap is ...
