love* in the time of plague (and by love* i mean brexit* and other dreary matters of uk politics)

Tories basically doing another version of the same thing. I suppose there are enough people paying little enough attention for these messages to cut through but it only takes one of these to go viral and you've clowned yourself.

You clown yourself on Twitter, but I don't think the public ever notices that. The Tories have proved multiply how effective droning repetition of the same message (even beyond the point of ludicrousness) can be

Sturridge has gone to Chelsea.

Also that Sun front page. If this is a grand Murdoch plan to get Boris replaced by Gove then it's a deep deep chess game.

when I post "fuck off starmer you cunt" every day it is actually a very serious experiment in message discipline.

Another delightful divergence between the two Suns #TomorrowsPapersToday pic.twitter.com/CuQXTZnzh9

— Mia de Graaf (@miadegraaf) May 25, 2020

I thought the choice of "svengali" by the Sun was interesting, separates Dom from Johnson, I'd say maybe that's overthinking it but thinking at all about it is over by definition

Weirder and weirder...@jwiechers put blog through Internet archive machine and reference to coronavirus, quote on coronavirus was not in the version of blog saved on Way Back MAchine on Apr 9 2020 ... but is there this month...https://t.co/Bwmwgm2jFg

— Faisal Islam (@faisalislam) May 25, 2020

He’s basically our Jacob Wohl, and our politics is at his mercy

Could you be any more predictable?

― Is Lou Reed a Good Singer? (Tom D.), Monday, 25 May 2020 21:52 (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

You are well aware that he can and he will.

― Andrew Farrell, Monday, 25 May 2020 22:07 (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

Anvil working on overdrive to argue with absolutely anybody tonight is it.

― xyzzzz__, Monday, 25 May 2020 22:22 (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

Looks like I've misjudged the mood of the nation here. Perhaps I have misunderstood what Peston's purpose is

Really good one tweet summary:

i mean, we're examining the inconsistencies in *this*, laughing at the absurdity of *that* and he's just walking away with a vicious little smirk on his face.

Honestly, fuck that and fuck him>

— jamie k (@jkbloodtreasure) May 25, 2020

Looks like I've misjudged the mood of the nation here. Perhaps I have misunderstood what Peston's purpose is

― anvil, Tuesday, 26 May 2020 bookmarkflaglink

Fixed it for you.

If I was a Tory govt doing a points matrix of Pathetic arse licking client journalists Pesto would score pretty low for his inability to ask a simple and direct question when that is all that is required. He's a fucking mess!

Gove, Hancock and Johnson all knew Cummings went to Durham - it should be obvious to anyone listening to their responses. Fraser Nelson and Andrew Neil surely knew their ailing colleague Mary Wakefield was not in London. She even retweeted government ‘stay home’ advice on her birthday - while on her way to a nice day out? Broadcasters, journalists and opposition parties need to pivot to ‘you all knew - and when did you know?’

They are all complicit in this and it’s time to prove it beyond reasonable doubt.

Justin Webb is currently tone-policing a Bishop on #r4today, demanding he explain why he called Dominic Cummings "Cummings" in a tweet, not "Mr Cummings"

— Karl H (@red____dawn) May 26, 2020

Thy king Dom Cum

Some junior minister no one's ever heard of just resigned.

all credit to Dougson Mc Bobbnotty

a man most famous for being someplace else (running the line at a champo league match) when he should have been in his rightful place (westminster)

The number of deaths involving Covid-19 in the UK has topped 47,000, according to the latest available data.

The total includes new figures published on Tuesday by the Office for National Statistics which show that 42,173 deaths involving coronavirus occurred in England and Wales up to May 15 (and had been registered up to May 23).

let's get this country back out there and mingling, we can break six figures by the end of august if we all work together

New in the @SavantaGroup / @SavantaComRes #covid19 daily tracker:

- Boris Johnson’s approval rating is now at -1%. It was at +19% four days ago.
- Overall government approval is now at -2%, dropping 16 points in a day.

More: https://t.co/5AzgxudsUl

— Chris Hopkins (@ChrisHopkins92) May 26, 2020

This is just so insulting to the public’s intelligence. pic.twitter.com/WVH3YmVqRj

— Ash Sarkar (@AyoCaesar) May 26, 2020

They are all complicit in this and it’s time to prove it beyond reasonable doubt.

― santa clause four (suzy), Tuesday, 26 May 2020 bookmarkflaglink

This is proved about 10 times a day every day on a number of issues. Yet to see any consequences.

This is humiliating.

Make that man PM

ppl are like "careful what you wish for, we might have a Gove govt" and my stance is well, we'll have a terrible fucking tory govt no matter what, at least a Gove one would provide more genuine lols

(open to being schooled on what Gove would be more damaging on than Boris/Cummings are tho)

He proposed that central govt 1) expropriate all state schools and the land they are built from the local councils who run them and 2) hand them to the private academy sector for free

is the thing I keep remembering about his ambitions as education secretary. I mean, at least the Russian govt got nominal market rates from its cronies in the form of bribes when it sold off USSR assets. The man's a craven idiot

"prof"

We're at quite a pivot point/historic hinge here. If nothing happens and we all move on, then political accountability in this country - at least between, if not actually at, elections - is essentially over. Anybody in a position of power will be able to do pretty much anything.

— Tim Bale (@ProfTimBale) May 26, 2020

Johnson is terrible news but fundamentally lazy and wants to be loved, which are two massive opportunities for an opposition. Gove is neither, and he's damagingly stupid in that Thatcherite way. Coupled with Cummings he managed to wreak some enormous damage at Education: the curriculum is still suffering as a result.

But he'd be yet another unelected PM, presumably without Cummings at first, and with Brexit waiting to murder him, so I think we'd be OK for a spell.

Gove is more dangerous than Johnson ideologically. Johnson more dangerous on a practical level.

anvil became the story, very unprofessional

Never, ever expect heroics from backbench Tory MPs but they can generally be relied upon to do what it takes to save their own skins. There are a lot of them on thin majorities with absolutely livid constituents right now. "No one will give a shit by the next election" depends heavily on whether you're sitting on a majority of 80 seats or 200 votes. So the number of Tory MPs who pipe up now matters.

It's very evident by now that the PM has decided that Cummings is still more of an asset than a liability to the government but it would be a gigantic mistake for anyone to rely on the unwavering loyalty of Boris Johnson so everything depends on where that line is. I think it's quite likely that Cummings will just be able to ride this out - assuming there are no more revelations, and he has made too many enemies within the civil service, the British establishment and the wider country to prevent anything else coming to light.

He was shockingly unlucky to have been spotted and recognised by random members of the public if they were his only two trips out of the house.

The fun will really start if proof comes to light, as is suspected, that half the cabinet were all at it too.

I would prefer Gove as PM, because it would represent failure and humiliation for scumbag BJ. And because I would be slightly more confident about Labour beating Gove.

I mean, the head on him. Even if you didn’t know who he was, you’d remember seeing him. He’s a gift to investigators, between his head and the way he dresses.

that head on him in full

https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fi.pinimg.com%2Foriginals%2Fa2%2Fa7%2Fbe%2Fa2a7be3d6405c7deea282b1ca0440b6b.jpg&f=1&nofb=1

I heard Sarah Vine once describing him as an alpha-male and suddenly i felt like Cary Grant

sniper's dream amirite

If I was a Tory govt doing a points matrix of Pathetic arse licking client journalists Pesto would score pretty low for his inability to ask a simple and direct question when that is all that is required. He's a fucking mess!

Precisely but let's not let that get in the way of allowing anvil perform his customary "You might think that but..." routine.

This fiasco just mirrors the pandemic response as a whole - if you fuck it up at the beginning, any further attempt at justification just digs a deeper and deeper hole. All they can do now is front it out, which they may well manage to do. Still, a thinker like Cummings only comes along once in a generation, so why sacrifice the opportunity of bathing in his superior intellect for the sake of a few junior minister resignations?

sarah vine providing vital outreach to incels by showing that no matter how much of a disgusting mutant you are, no matter how vile your views, someone out there will find you hot

That cuts both ways there tbh.

I still think it was more of an achievement for Gove to find someone who agreed to have sex with him tbh.

i'm still o_O at the way he kept talking about the inaccurate reports in the press where the problem seemed to be that he hadn't made an unnecessary 5 hour trip in his car after being exposed to coronovirus at work to visit his parents as reported, he'd actually made an unnecessary 5 hour trip in his car after being exposed to coronovirus at work to visit his *niece*.

that gove interview.

lol owned

My mum: “Are you going to be doing more stuff defending Cummings”. Me: “Yes”. My mum: “Then you’re an idiot”. So that’s going well then...

— (((Dan Hodges))) (@DPJHodges) May 26, 2020

get Dan Hodges's mum on Twitter

OK I hadn't realised he was Glenda's boy, must be a tense lockdown

Glenda Jackson OTM. She must have spent the past decade silently dying of embarrassment.

Glenda iirc was very in line with Corbyn in many of her views? But yeah, the double Oscar winner and her large adult (still living at home) idiot son is a lockdown I’d pay to watch.

"Why is Dan in a newsagents buying Lynx" you wonder. Therein lies a tale. My mum: "When you're out, get me some cigarettes". Me: "I'm your only child. If I make an extra trip I may catch the virus". Mum: "With the sacrifices I've made you don't want to go there". I buy the fags.

— (((Dan Hodges))) (@DPJHodges) April 24, 2020

Got to get around to watching 'Women in Love' one of these days..