Of the many reasons to read Marginal Revolution, one of the foremost is the 7th "rule for life" of Tyler Cowen, one of its co-authors: "learn how to learn from those who offend you". The pile-on aimed at the Truss-Kwarteng Budget has been so uniform that it is almost offensive to read those wondering whatContinue reading "So, why aren't we panicking about France?"
It's been stymied by Covid and even the death of a queen, but Arts Fresco - Market Harborough's street theatre festival - was finally back today. Perhaps it wasn't as big as in the past, or as it would have been if it could have been held last month, but the organisers did wonderfully well to rearrange things at such short notice and were rewarded with a golden autumn day. Apologies for the date stamp on some of the photos.
One thing that we have all learned in recent years is to be wary of saying that the Conservatives have jumped the shark because they will likely do something even worse the next day. However today's Sun report, that an actual current Cabinet Minister has suggested that women be given tax cuts to persuade them to have more children in order to "wean the country off its addiction to immigration" is a definite contender for the shark jumping accolade. This is an idea that comes from Orban's Hungary, where women with more than four children don't have to pay any ...
The latest edition of my weekly political polling round-up, The Week in Polls, is now out. As it says: Eight different pollsters have had polls out with fieldwork conducted at least in part in the last week. The Conservative vote share ranges from 20-26% in them. Find out more by reading The Week in Polls in full here, and you can sign up below to receive future editions direct to your email inbox:
In the Shropshire Star Ian Nellings, cabinet member for waste management, saidd: "I do want to make clear that we have no current plans to charge for garden waste collections." The phrase "no current plans" has been well rehearsed by politicians through the ages and does not mean no future plans, or that plans are not being developed. And the possibility of changing for garden waste is mentioned a number of times in a paper to a recent meeting of the Place Overview Committee. The paper did not ask the committee to back charges but after an intervention by Green ...
Christine Jardine, the Lib Dem spokesperson has written to the Cabinet Secretary to ask for an enquiry into whether the champagne bash Kwasi Kwarteng attended on the night of his budgetary earthquake breached the Ministerial Code: From The Observer: "The image of the chancellor quaffing champagne with bankers just hours after announcing his tax cuts for the very wealthiest in society is bad enough," she said. "But it would be unforgivable if it turns out Kwasi Kwarteng discussed his plans with hedge fund managers who have since been profiting from the fall in the pound. "The cabinet secretary must immediately ...
The Observer reports: The head of the civil service is facing calls to order an investigation into whether Kwasi Kwarteng breached the ministerial code when he attended a champagne reception with hedge fund managers after his mini-budget... He is being asked to clarify whether he adhered to the ministerial code at the Conservative party gathering. The code states that ministers who discuss official business at a "social occasion" while not in the presence of civil servants must report the content of discussions to their department as soon as possible... Christine Jardine, the Liberal Democrat cabinet office spokesperson, has written to ...
Welcome to my summary of the latest national voting intention poll from each pollster currently operating in Britain. Below the table, you'll find the option to sign up to email updates about new polls and also a set of answers to frequently asked questions about political polling. Or, if you'd like to find out more about how polls work, how reliable they are and how to make sense of them: Check out my book, Polling UnPacked: the History, Uses and Abuses of Political Opinion Polls, andSign up for my weekly analysis of the latest political polling: The Week in Polls. ...
Sun 9th
14:30
Tom Arms' World Review: Russian setbacks, Ukraine, North Korea, Saudi, Trussonomics, Hurricanes
Setbacks for Russia The Chinese, according to senior diplomatic sources, have told Vladimir Putin that they will not support his use of nuclear weapons. This is unsurprising given that Beijing used a recent UN meeting to reaffirm its long-standing policy of "assured retaliation" which basically means no first use and no support for first use of nuclear weapon by other countries. The Chinese position is one of a series of mounting Russian diplomatic setbacks that are running alongside a series of battlefield defeats. On Friday there was a Cold War echo when the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded jointly to ...
Yesterday I joined a queue of about thirty people at the Princes Park Medical Centre to have my fourth Covid jab. There was a cross section of people there from around South Liverpool although someone aged forty would have been ... Continue reading →
Sat, 12:52: At the Porta Nigra. https://t.co/wWFJ33m0Mt Sat, 12:56: An easy mistake to make. https://t.co/PufTqCwGsi Sat, 14:48: Good lengthy analysis, worth your time. https://t.co/Zgo0vrRZm0 Sat, 15:43: Six months today since the funniest ever corporate passive aggressive customer response. https://t.co/600T1YVWAo Sat, 16:05: RT @AndrewPRLevi: Michael Gove in the FT claiming he asks himself all the time whether tying our arms & legs together with Gorilla Tape, af... Sat, 17:52: Beasts of the Southern Wild, and Juicy and�Delicious https://t.co/TaUSLc47to Sat, 17:56: RT @_gmh_: @nwbrux I do like the signs in the gate pointing out that Augusta Treverorum was much bigger than Colonia. ...
An article in yesterday's Guardian highlighting the environmental cost of holding this year's soccer world cup in Qatar has reminded me of the many other reasons why this particular venue is unsuitable for such a high-profile tournament. The paper reports that Qatar is going to need at least 10,000 litres of water every day for each of its stadium pitches. They say that based in a region with virtually no access to fresh water, it is going to rely on desalination - the practice of debrining saltwater so it is drinkable. As the paper says, this seems like an elegant ...
Over on the UCOVI blog is a fascinating pair of posts giving an insider perspective on the many problems that the Conservative Party encountered with its MERLIN and then Votesource databases for recording information about voters. Some of the problems were public at the time, but these two pieces add lots of eye-catching details, such as: The use of data in political campaigning is often far too cackhanded to be as sinister as Cambridge Analytica and Brexit/Trump. I consider my short stint on the IT helpdesk at Tory HQ as the foundation year of my data career. It was here ...
Crystalline is a song from Björk's eighth album, Biophilia, and was released as a single in June 2011. Two remixes of tracks from the album by the Syrian musician Omar Souleyman. The Guardian profiled him in 2015: Omar Souleyman was a prolific wedding singer with more than 500 live albums to his name before civil war broke out in Syria in 2011. As his country became increasingly unstable, Souleyman fled to Turkey, where performing for couples tying the knot was no longer an option. Yet he continued to write songs of love and positivity as a welcome distraction from the ...
Festival of the Future is the University of Dundee's flagship festival programme that celebrates and enhances collaboration between science, arts, and culture. The festival this year is all about sharing experiences, connecting with nature, health, and wellbeing, and celebrating and protecting our spaces and places. During the festival, you will be able to experience the sensations of forest bathing, design and build your own mini garden, top up your happiness supplies and explore the tranquil and natural spaces that we have right here on our very own doorstep. There's lots of great events next week and more details are available ...
