Hung Parliament - My Arse

The combination of wanting the Tories to remain in power - goodness knows why - and the waning ability to interrogate sources, meaning Government lines to take get recycled as if they were fact, has caused our free and fearless press to move effortlessly from one unconvincing dead cat to another, but convince no-one with brain plugged in and a hole in their arse.

Last week, we were treated to the farcical claim that London Mayor Sadiq Khan could be beaten by the Tories’ latest challenger Susan Hall. The batshit Ms Hall, who had taken a favourable stance on Combover Crybaby Donald Trump, and indeed on the memory of John Enoch Powell, was never going to get within striking range of Khan, who won by more than 11%.

Where the claim originated cannot be told with complete certainty, but it is most likely that the idea of a race too close to call was to distract Tories from inconvenient ideas like changing leader yet again. That means someone not unadjacent to Rishi Sunak pitched the dead cat as a means of giving him another couple of days free of speculation and other turbulence.

That the right-leaning press, and to her shame Laura Kuenssberg of the BBC, ended up looking mightily foolish for being taken in by this drivel, should have caused them to stop and think when the next amateurishly concocted Look Over There was, with the certainty of night following day, waved before the assembled hacks and pundits. But that is to reckon without the desperation.

Here we encounter not just the desperate wanting for the Tories to be doing better - as if - but also the hollowing out of journalistic resources over the years. Investigative journalism is mostly out of the question; shovelling it on is the name of the game. Even the Mail titles, best resourced of all, only do the investigative stuff when it wants to dig up dirt on its current targets.

And so it came to pass yesterday that the Murdoch Times slung the next in what is going to be a long and tedious procession of dead cats on the table. “UK heading for a hung Parliament, says Sunak … PM warns Starmer would be ‘propped up’ in No10”. Ah, the old “frighten voters shitless with the spectre of the SNP” ploy. This is, to no surprise, total tosh.

But do go on. “Sunak seized on a projection by the elections expert Michael Thrasher that suggested if Thursday’s results were replicated in a General Election, Labour would fall short of enough seats to win power”. Two things here. One, it will not be a local election that bins the Tories. And Two, one result from Thursday suggests that the Hung Parliament claim is still tosh.

But for the increasingly desperate and downmarket Telegraph, this is a credible line to take. Hence today’s paper telling readers “Sunak: Election race is closer than polls show” (you don’t capitalise after a colon, Tel people. That howler wouldn’t have happened if you hadn’t binned all those subs).

But enough. The one result that shows this dead cat is another dud is the by-election in Blackpool South. Labour did not only win the seat from the Tories, they achieved a swing of over 26%. This is not just up there with the kinds of swings achieved by Labour in the run-up to the 1997 General Election, but beyond them. And we know what happened to the Tories in 1997.

Another recent by-election that shows the Hung Parliament dead cat to be a phoney is that in Mid Bedfordshire, where (yes, it’s her again) Nadine Dorries scored a majority of over 24,500 in 2019, only for it to be overturned by Labour. This was a solidly safe Tory seat. It had returned a Tory MP since Alan Lennox-Boyd took it from the old Liberal Party in 1931.

The whole idea of trying to extrapolate from local election results to predict a General Election outcome is what Sir Humphrey would have called “brave”. It might also be termed “unwise”. Add to that the potential for tactical voting against the Tories from an electorate that knows it’s been screwed, and you get results like Tiverton and Honiton, where the Lib Dems achieved a swing of almost 30% to take the seat. The Tories are facing wipeout.

And that will happen no matter how many dead cats are deployed. That is all.

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Tory Losses - Media In Denial

They lost 472 council seats. All bar one of the elected Mayoral elections were lost: despite the presence of an independent candidate in the West Midlands, who took votes from Labour, the Tories still lost the Mayoral poll, and in London, Sadiq Khan recorded his largest winning margin in the teeth of a hostile right-wing press. There was also a Parliamentary by-election loss.

Even with the host of negatives facing Labour - hostility among Muslim voters to the party leadership’s stance on Gaza, Keir Starmer’s flip-flopping in the face of press hostility, the welter of bad faith knocking copy aimed at deputy leader Angela Rayner, and fiddling of electoral system in a vain attempt to hobble Khan - the Tories were trounced across the country.

In London, a last-minute attempt to sow doubt among the public, claiming that polls were tighter than predicted, and some even claiming that Tory Susan Hall might even win, was exposed as a sham. The worse news is that a supposedly senior BBC figure - Laura Kuenssberg no less - had joined in this momentary voyage down the rabbit hole. That was bang out of order.

The offending entry on Twitter, X, or whatever Muskrat’s calling it this week, is still there: “What's going on in the London Mayoral race? No votes have been counted yet, so hold on to your hats.. but it is clear tonight that the race is much much closer than some polls had suggested”. No votes have been counted, but “it is clear … that the race is much much closer”.

That’s what you get by promoting someone who appears to prioritise getting sources to actual analysis, to filter out the wacko crap. Ms Kuenssberg continues to, as Peter Oborne put it, “just shovel it on”. But there will be no carpeting from Robbie Gibb, oh no. That’s just a bit more “both-sidesing”.

Also not getting carpeted is political editor of the Murdoch Sun on Sunday, Kate Ferguson, putting out prejudicial crap like “Sadiq Khan has had a strong showing in the postal votes in London....sources say”, having claimed “Sounds like Tory Susan Hall is ahead in the voting in Camden / Barnet patch” when counting had not started, and the priceless “Senior Tory sources saying it’s looking good for Andy Street in West Mids”. Street lost.

Over at Gammon Broadcasting™ News (“Bacon’s News Channel”), an idiot called Ben Leo mused “Is today when Sadiq Khan is finally toppled in London? Are the whispers, the rumours, the sources correct that the Labour man has been run to the wire by Susan Hall? Is this the day England reclaims its capital city from Net Zero chief zealot mayor Khan? Let’s see”. Let’s not.

There was much talking up of Reform UK, who scored, er, two council seats. As opposed to the Greens, who gained 73 seats to leave then with a mere 179. Or the Lib Dems, whose gains totalled 105 seats, to give a total of 520 councillors, more than the Tories - for the first time since 1996. And we know what happened at the General Election after that.

Still the media is obsessing about the Tories, and looking even further right to speculate whether con-man and congenital liar Nigel “Thirsty” Farage will return to become Reform UK Oberscheissenführer. The BBC is once again not covering itself with glory, as Ms Kuenssberg persisted in asking Labour’s Pat McFadden about the party’s problem with the Muslim vote.

While she allowed the appallingly wacko Suella Braverman to smear Labour as “hard-left maniacs” who would “open our borders” and “indoctrinate our institutions and schools with PC madness”. Meanwhile, losing West Midlands Mayoral candidate Andy Street has reminded anyone listening that the way for the Tories to win is from the centre ground (now occupied by Labour).

Our free and fearless press, and too many in the broadcast media, are yet to understand one very straightforward fact: the wider electorate is not listening to them. They’re sick of being told how wonderful everything is, how the Tories’ cunning plan is working, and how all will be well as soon as a few of those horrible brown people are dispatched to Rwanda.

What was it that LBJ said “seems hot to you, but it never does to anyone else”? That was Pissing Down Your Leg. Hello media people.

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Laurence Fox - A Complete Shit

Was he, one wondered, just an amiable eccentric who wasn’t really a racist bigot, but merely misunderstood? Former minor thesp, didn’t-even-get-started musician, multiple failed litigant - as in loser of lawsuits - and appallingly bad at politics politician Laurence Fox has now provided the answer in no style at all. There is nothing amiable or merely eccentric about him.

Dear Larry. Dear Dear Larry. Dear hopefully nicked Larry

The Great Man got himself into an argument with broadcaster Narinder Kaur. Sadly for Dear Dear Larry, he couldn’t just leave it at the stage of agreeing to disagree, and posted an explicit upskirt photo of her on Twitter, X, or whatever Muskrat’s calling it this week. He shouldn’t have posted it, and the platform should have taken it down sharpish. Neither event happened.

Which means that both Fox and Twitter could be in serious trouble: as Ms Kaur has now told, “Police are involved now”. Posting material like that is potentially illegal, and potentially punishable by a custodial sentence. Fox’s recent conduct makes him eminently well-qualified for being banged up for a few weeks down The Scrubs. Even the right-wing press is unimpressed.

So it was that the Mail told readers “Broadcaster Narinder Kaur has thanked people for their support amid the ongoing police probe into Laurence Fox over an 'upskirt photo' he shared of her online … Former actor Laurence Fox posted the explicit image of Ms Kaur on X, formerly Twitter, without her consent on Wednesday evening amid a spat about their political views”.

What say the Rozzers? “A spokesperson for the Met Police told MailOnline: 'We have been made aware of a post on social media regarding an up-skirting offence and we are currently investigating the circumstances.’” Also, “There was outrage after Mr Fox posted the photo, which was taken and shared online without the consent of Good Morning Britain contributor Ms Kaur, to X. He has since deleted the post”. Mighty courageous of him.

And the potential offence? “The Voyeurism (Offences) Act 2019 applies to anyone operating equipment or records an image under another person's clothing without reasonable belief of their consent, to view their genitals or buttocks. It is a criminal offence where the purpose is to obtain sexual gratification or to cause humiliation, distress or alarm. The maximum sentence if found guilty is two years in prison”. And there is more.

His next hotel stay?

“'Revenge porn', the sharing private, sexual photos or videos of another person without their consent with the purpose of causing embarrassment or distress, is a sexual offence under the Criminal Justice and Courts Act 2015”.

Larry having to sign the Sex Offenders Register? So did those possibilities make him stop and think? Sadly, neither event occurred. Instead, Dear Dear Larry has since issued a rambling non-apologia. He’s honestly very very sorry. But he isn’t actually sorry at all. Because he’s a total shit.

Here’s his schtick. “I would like to apologise to [Narinder Kaur]. Although it’s not my fault she forgot to wear any pants with a load of paps about, I shouldn’t have sunk to her level. She doesn’t deserve mockery for being a nice woman seeking fame. And she is just that. A nice woman. Seeking fame … She gets away with it because she is a woman and she is brown. Those are the woke rules; that if you are brown or a woman, you can do no wrong”.

How very North Minehead By-Election of him: “I am not a racialist but, and this is a big but …”. On he rambled. “Her motivation seems to me to always try to say anything which will get her some attention and approval. As you may have noticed, I’m not here to seek approval or to make friends. I’m here to expose the terrible ideas and virulent hypocrisy which are wrecking the social fabric”. Disagreement is now “wrecking the social fabric”.

But enough already. At the very minimum, Fox should be given a Police Caution for what he’s done, and thereby become the owner of a criminal record. Or maybe a couple of months’ porridge. Especially as he’s signed off with the creepy suggestion that he and Ms Kaur meet for a coffee.

The time of Laurence Fox was for a time, but not for all time. Just rejoice at that news.

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Hainault Stabbings - Enter The Ghouls

At around 0700 hours today, a car was apparently driven into a house in the Thurlow Gardens area of Hainault, in north-east London. Soon after this, a number of people were stabbed by a man brandishing what looked like a Samurai sword. One of those stabbed, a 13-year-old boy, has since sadly died. The Police attended, Tasered the suspect, and detained him.

Greg Hands - cheap opportunist ...

They accomplished that, it seems, in just over 20 minutes of being called to the scene. This swiftness of response has not been enough to deter the ghoulish convocation of political opportunists and other bad faith actors, who have seen “stabbing” and “London” together, seen that there is a Mayoral election on Thursday, and put the boot into Labour incumbent Sadiq Khan.

So who would like to set the ball rolling? Greg Hands would. His majority in safe Chelsea and Fulham was just over 8,000 in 2017, and the way the Tories are going, or not going, he could lose the seat come the long-awaited General Election. “What has our great capital city come to when a 13 year old boy is killed in a sword attack?” he blustered, to universal condemnation.

... Richard Tice - more of the same ...

The sub-text of the Hands attack is that Khan Done It. Except there is some plausible deniability there, which there wasn’t from Richard Tice (he’s not very nice), who at present leads Reform UK. “Appalling news about the killing of a 13 year old boy in Hainault today as well as multiple others seriously injured incl brave police officers. Our thoughts & prayers with all those affected”.

He should have stopped there. But he didn’t. “Our thanks go to those who bravely went to the attacker, to protect others. This collapse of law & order must stop. Enough is enough. [Sadiq Khan] has failed Londoners. Last week he laughed when warned of machete crisis. Now a child is dead”.

... Master Cole, setting the bar lower ...

Maybe he should have listened to someone called Isabel Oakeshott, who, the last time I looked, was Tice’s partner: “I want to know ALL about the person who murdered a 13 year old boy with a Samurai sword today. Public deserve to know who he is; where he's come from (UK born and raised or otherwise) and how he came to carry out this heinous act”. Good. But yer feller doesn’t.

Someone else sensing an opportunity, and looking as if he’s still Tory Bear at heart, was the odious flannelled fool Master Harry Cole, still continuing his pretence of being a real journalist by succeeding the non-bullying Tom Newton Dunn as political editor of the Murdoch Sun. “Sadiq Khan confronted over people ‘running around with machetes’ on the streets of London earlier this week: ‘I think the Tory candidate should stop watching The Wire.’”

... to which Christian Calgie responds "hold my beer"

No tragedy left unexploited by the Murdoch mafiosi. And who was that Cole credited? Christian Calgie. Who he? Former apprentice sandwich monitor to the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines at the Guido Fawkes blog. Cole was, of course, Staines’ tame gofer. And what has Calgie had to say?

“A week ago the Tory candidate for London mayor raised the machete crisis in London. Sadiq khan’s response? ‘I think the Tory candidate should stop watching The Wire.’ He doesn’t care. He thinks it’s a big joke. These words are utterly hollow”. Mayor Khan tried and sent down in one. But Calgie, like Master Cole, is not a disinterested bystander in this case.

During his tenure chez Fawkes, Calgie slyly edited one of his posts to remove what looked like an actionable smear of former ANC MP Andrew Feinstein. He also penned an item claiming that the BBC was a Quango, which it is not. But he is desperate to bash Sadiq Khan. Another sad Tory supporter.

All the time, what these less than august beings don’t report in their respective papers (Calgie must have drawn the short straw - a berth at the Daily Brexit, still called the Express), but the Observer does, is “Tory staff running network of anti-Ulez Facebook groups riddled with racism and abuse … Investigation finds groups hosting Islamophobic attacks on London mayor Sadiq Khan, white supremacist slogans and antisemitic conspiracy theories”.

Compared to which, the attack by Hands and his cheerleaders is positively mild stuff. Tories yah-boo well, but 14 years of failure tell their own story.

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Mail, Anti-Semitism, And Hypocrisy

Opportunist to the last, the Mail titles have maximised the claims of Gideon Falter, head man at the so-called Campaign Against Anti-Semitism, that when marches in solidarity with the Palestinian people took place in central London, this made the area unsafe for Jews. This opportunism has required some highly creative writing, plus the old standby of talking well, but lying badly.

Falter had gone after the Metropolitan Police, demanding the resignation of Commissioner Mark Rowley, but after the full video of the CAA man’s encounter was revealed, Rowley not only stayed in place, but gave his backing to the cops featured in the incident, and told Mr F he wasn’t going to give him an interview. Which is more or less telling Falter to fuck off.

But those who might have thought that was that reckoned without the creativity, and indeed rank hypocrisy, that come easily to the inmates of the Northcliffe House bunker. So it was that today’s Mail on Sunday brought us a package of righteousness, cop-bashing, and flat-out lying.

“After officer warns campaigner for being ‘Openly Jewish’ … POLICE ARE SO COWED BY THE ANTI-SEMITIC MOB, THEY EVEN COVER UP THE HOLOCAUST … Shameful insult to the Six Million” thunders the headline, the photo helpfully captioned “NO RESPECT: An etched boulder [you don’t capitalise after a colon, Mail mutts] at Hyde Park’s Holocaust Memorial Garden was hidden by a blue tarpaulin yesterday, to protect it from pro-Palestine protesters”. Sadly, the cops had nothing to do with that.

As the Met’s feed on Twitter, X, or whatever Muskrat’s calling it this week told, “This is an inaccurate headline that will only fuel community concerns. The decision to cover the memorial was taken by park authorities, not the police. As the paper’s own article makes clear, it is a precaution Royal Parks have taken for a number of different events”. Police in no cover up shock horror.

Meanwhile, some Mail watchers may be wondering what a paper that has dabbled so extensively in anti-Semitism, and not just in the years leading up to the outbreak of war in 1939, is doing playing the other side of the field. But then, that’s all part of the opportunism and hypocrisy. It was the Mail, after all, that launched an anti-Semitic attack on the memory of Ralph Miliband.

Which f***er's calling me out for anti-Semitism, c***?!?!?

The father of David and Ed was called “The Man Who Hated Britain”, thus recycling one of the oldest anti-Semitic tropes, that of the “Disloyal Jew”. To head off the inevitable criticism, the name on the by-line was that of Geoffrey Levy - “it can’t be anti-Semitic, a Jewish journalist wrote it, see?”

Miliband Père is dismissed as a mere “Jewish immigrant”. At the Jewish Chronicle, Martin Bright mused “I have always been wary of calling this dark undercurrent ‘antisemitism’, but the Daily Mail’s leader about the Milibands and Marxism (headline: ‘An evil legacy and why we won’t apologise’) dripped with the nastiest kind of prejudice”. So blatant, even John Mann noticed.

Could it get more blatant? Don’t ask. The Mail, this time wanting to kick anyone not invested with the idea of the UK leaving the EU, told its readers “Angry scenes as police separate Leave and Remain protesters at anti-Brexit rallies across Britain (and Eddie Izzard has his pink beret knocked off) … Typically British scenes included gentleman in tweed waving a Union Flag”.

Except anyone reading the article today won’t see the “gentleman in tweed”. The photos have been removed. But Zelo Street screen grabbed them. They featured one Jeremy Bedford-Turner. He is a rabid anti-Semite. So rabid, in fact, that the Guardian later told “A far-right army veteran has been found guilty of stirring up racial hatred after the Crown Prosecution Service was pressured to reconsider its decision to not bring charges against him”. Go on.

“Jeremy Bedford-Turner, 48, called for his ‘soldiers’ to liberate England from ‘Jewish control’ in an address outside Downing Street and blamed Jews for issues ranging from both world wars to Jack the Ripper … Under cross-examination, he admitted that he wanted all Jews to leave the UK”.

The Mail. Hot on anti-Semitism. Except when it doesn’t want to be.

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St George And The Gammon

And so it came to pass that many out there on the right told anyone not yet asleep that they were no longer allowed to celebrate St George’s Day. There were claims of “two-tier policing”, and blame was ascribed to anyone that could be labelled WOKE, and of course all those Scary Muslims™. Then, those same people, er, celebrated St George’s Day anyway.

However, and here we encounter a significantly sized however, it would not be enough just to celebrate, which had not been banned. There had to be an exhibition of the Gammonati getting aled up and kicking off. This they did, in no style at all, in central London, in contravention of a series of laws, and the agreement made in order to allow them to march.

The Metropolitan Police warned beforehand “Later today, an event to mark St George’s Day is expected to take place on Richmond Terrace, off Whitehall. We believe those planning to attend include far right groups and groups linked to football clubs travelling from elsewhere in the UK”. So it proved.

Next came “The event is not due to start for an hour and regrettably officers are already dealing with disorder.There is an area allocated for this event in Richmond Terrace. This group went past it and continued up Whitehall. When officers formed a cordon and asked the group to turn round, they reacted by violently forcing their way through. Mounted officers intervened with horses to restore the cordon”. The ale was already talking. Again.

Addressing the gathering later was Stephen Yaxley Lennon, who styles himself Tommy Robinson, wearing a loud suit in a built-up area, and telling anyone who would listen that he is going to sue the Met. Like he sued Cambridgeshire Police, perhaps? He lost that one. But being of less than perfect courage, Lennon did not hang around and made a swift exit.

Not making a swift exit was already has-been political campaigner and former not very good actor Laurence Fox. Dear dear Larry, wearing the Nike trainers he would see banned (why? Who knows. And, indeed, who cares?), churned out false equivalence after false equivalence about other protests.

“Oh, look, the two tiered [Metropolitan Police] have suddenly decided to get their elbows out after months of genocidal chants on Londons streets. All because they hate our country and they hate our [flag] … So it’s important to understand the nuance in the meaning of those who call for the death of Jews week after week, but anyone with a St. George’s flag is definitely far right?” With the odd pack if lies thrown in. And then came another bad faith actor.

To no surprise at all, that actor was Turning Point UK, demonstrating their sense of victimhood by whining “So the Met Police once again provoked peaceful protestors by unreasonably kettling them. They then charged them with police horses and are now crying victim? Shame. They would never do this with a pro-Palestine protest. Two-tiered thugs”. Followed by ignorance.

“Yesterday despite persecution from Khan's thugs in the Metropolitan Police, patriots from across the country united to celebrate St George's Day”. The Mayor of London does not have operational control of the Met - that power is held by the Home Secretary. But that office is held by a Tory, and so TPUK are not going to direct their ire at him. Or come clean with their followers.

The Met gave us the real story: “Four arrests have been made outside a pub in Whitehall. One on suspicion of assault and three on suspicion of assaulting an emergency worker. Officers were quickly on [the] scene and order has been restored. The southbound carriageway was briefly blocked but has now been reopened”. The real double standards were then exposed.

Louise Raw, who you can tell as she’s a doctor, mused “IMAGINE IF THIS WAS A PRO PALESTINE RALLY! Imagine the political OUTRAGE. Rachel Riley and co COMBUSTING. [Suella Braverman] doing her nut. Demands to ban future rallies from the people concerned. Yet ‘for some reason’, it’s not happening”. A few thugs kicked off and the cops kept order.

What you will not find on Palestinian solidarity marches. That is all.

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Gideon Falter Claims UNRAVEL

Even before the more complete footage emerged, showing the encounter between Gideon Falter, head man of the so-called Campaign Against Anti-Semitism, and senior officers of the Metropolitan Police, during the passage of a Palestinian solidarity march in the vicinity of the Aldwych on Saturday 13th April, doubts had been cast on the narrative offered to the media.

Falter claimed that he was merely going for a walk in central London. He was not, unless one counts being backed up by several others and a film crew as merely going for a walk. He claimed that he was just crossing the road, but he was not: the only conclusion that can be reached from viewing the footage is that he was trying to walk head-on at the march, provoking a confrontation.

He and his colleagues were guided back onto the pavement and told they could cross the road at a crossing point. The cops would have had good grounds for arresting Falter for assaulting a Police officer, and a breach of the peace. But the right-leaning part of our free and fearless press had already decided on its narrative, confirming its status as more bad faith actors.

Also confirmed as a bad faith actor was (thankfully) former Home Secretary Suella Braverman, who has effectively admitted that she wants Mark Rowley sacked because he will not stop the Palestine solidarity marches, which she smears as “hate marches”, despite their passing off overwhelmingly peacefully, and including in their number thirteen Jewish organisations.

What the press, and Ms Braverman, cannot or will not take on board is that the longer footage shows Falter apparently looking to provoke. The cops were taking action to stop that happening. And it was not the first time Falter had pulled this one, except this time he and his pals were on foot, and they had previously hired a van to, presumably, drive against the march.

So there arrived this morning the inevitably tedious headlines. From the Telegraph, caught doing an Anti-Semitism on its front page with its attack on George Soros, we get “PM refuses to back under-fire Met chief - Sir Mark Rowley faces questions over force’s ‘appalling’ treatment of Jewish man”.

The Daily Brexit, still called the Express, a routine source of bigotry, told “No 10 fails to back Police chief over protest row”, while the Murdoch Times, whose owner memorably complained about the “Jewish owned press” on an open Twitter feed, had “PM appalled by Jewish man’s ordeal”, and the Mail, source of a viciously anti-Semitic attack on the memory of the late Ralph Miliband, had “JEWISH LEADERS CALL ON MET CHIEF TO QUIT”.

Sadly, the cavalry has arrived too late to save Gideon Falter. He was told that “At every single march there are thousands of Jewish people marching”. He said there were not, but the evidence is overwhelming. Rivkah Brown concluded “As suspected, this incident was a setup. Gideon Falter wasn't just passing through: he'd organised a stunt to rile protesters, and the police attempted to prevent the altercation he was clearly gunning for”.

Former Met CS Dal Babu added “I have watched the thirteen minute clip that’s on [Sky News] & it’s a totally different encounter to the one Gideon Falter … has reported …The narrative that’s been pushed is not accurate”. He also concluded that an arrest for breach of the peace would be justified.

As did former chief prosecutor Nazir Afzal: “Having now seen the longer video of the police interaction with Gideon Falter, I see that we have been misled. The officer may have been more careful with his words, but Mr Falter was provocative to the point that an arrest for breach of the peace might have been justified”. Even the BBC was standing firm.

On the Radio 4 Today Programme, presenter Mishal Husain asked Suella Braverman if she’d seen the whole footage. Ms Braverman said she’d seen enough. Ms Husain told her “I suggest you watch the whole video ... as you're basing what you're saying on incomplete information”.

Gideon Falter is, meanwhile, threatening defamation proceedings. For being found out, perhaps? This wagon has now lost its wheels. End of story.

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Campaign Against Anti-Semitism - Questions

Once again, an intervention by the so-called Campaign Against Anti-Semitism has generated the expected feedback from the usual sources, while an increasing number of observers are expressing reservations about what has been presented to media and politicians. This time, it is the regular marches in solidarity with the Palestinian people that are being targeted.

What has been claimed can be put directly: CAA head man Gideon Falter was out walking in central London on the Saturday before last, and in the vicinity of the Aldwych came across a Palestinian solidarity march. This happened by coincidence, you understand. Also purely coincidental was the presence of someone to video Falter’s encounter with the Police.

He was then given a platform by the Murdoch Sunday Times to claim “I was treated like a criminal for being Jewish. The Met chief must go”. Do go on. “Being Jewish in pubic feels like a brave act. Last weekend I went to Synagogue, as I do most Saturdays. After the service I went for a walk, as I do most Saturdays. It was early afternoon … and I was with five others”.

And? “At Aldwych, we came across the pro-Palestinian protest and we started to cross the road as the front of the march got to us. Suddenly I felt hands on me. I looked around to see a Police officer, who was shoving me on to the pavement. He said: ‘You are quite openly Jewish, this is a pro-Palestinian march. I’m not accusing you of anything but I’m worried about the reaction to your presence’”. Some seriously clumsy language from the Met’s finest.

However, and here we encounter a significantly-sized however, the BBC’s account, while it stresses “Mr Falter … says he was not there to counter-protest”, also notes that the cops told him “You will be escorted out of this area so you can go about your business, go where you want freely, or if you choose to remain here because you are causing a breach of peace with all these other people, you will be arrested”. “With all these other people”.

Falter has, meanwhile, sounded off at length about his experience, and “said Sir Mark [Rowley, Met Commissioner] should resign or be sacked and he claimed ‘racists, extremists and terrorist-sympathisers’ had been ‘emboldened’ by the Met's ‘failure to curtail the marches’”. So who backs him?

Suella Braverman. R-i-i-i-ght. That’s the same Suella Braverman who, in a routine act of provocation, smeared peaceful protests as “hate marches”. Moreover, if this is to be investigated properly, the authorities need to see the uncut footage from the CAA, plus any other footage and photos. Why so?

It should be remembered that the CAA has significant previous form, from its list of Honorary Patrons including at least six individuals who have either exhibited racist behaviour, used racism for their own ends, or been singularly unwise in their choice of language in areas concerning race, through one of those Patrons hosting a hate preacher at the Commons, to appearing as if it wanted to professionally ruin one of its targets. Enough wasn’t enough.

But recently, Falter and the CAA overreached themselves, putting the boot into Labour leader Keir Starmer when the latter visited the Holocaust Memorial during a visit to Berlin. “It is a matter of decency and long-established convention in Germany that you never stoop to using the Berlin Holocaust Memorial as some kind of a prop” told the CAA. There was more.

“But to incorporate the Memorial as the backdrop for a political clip that does not even mention the Holocaust is an insult”. The blowback came from … Margaret Hodge, Ruth Smeeth, and Lee Harpin. Ms Hodge told “I’m fed up of CAA using antisemitism as a front to attack Labour. Time to call them out for what and who they really are. More concerned with undermining Labour than rooting out antisemitism”. OH WHAT A GIVEAWAY.

So the CAA was out of favour, and out of time, when its head man just happened to be in the same place as a march in solidarity with the Palestinians. Now, a moment of verbal idiocy from the Met has given his organisation a new credibility which it may not totally deserve.

Let’s see all the footage, from the CAA and elsewhere. No pressure, now.

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Rayner And Cops - Who Wrote The Letter?

For people merely reporting the news, the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines and his rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog seem very familiar with the claims now being investigated by Greater Manchester Police regarding what Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner may or may not have done wrong. More familiar, it seems, than the Tory MP who made the complaint.

If James Daly didn't write his own letter ...

One has to wade through an awful lot of creepy and obsessive bad faith knocking copy - the thought enters that, had the target been Fawkes fave (yes, it’s her again) Nadine Dorries, she would have already have called her detractors for alleged stalking - to find that the Tory MP concerned was James Daly, who sits for Bury North (until the election, after which he won’t).

The Great Guido, in a superb example of geographical ignorance, describes him as a “local” MP, despite Bury North not only not bordering Ashton-Under-Lyne, Ms Rayner’s constituency, but also being some distance from it. But the Fawkes massive knows rather more about the complaint being made to the unfortunate cops about what Ms Rayner did or did not do.

So much, in fact, that the Fawkes blog dedicated a long-ish and tedious post to the matter last week, telling those not yet asleep that “Most commentators are focusing on the electoral roll aspect”, but “with a 12-month limit for proceedings to commence after the crime was committed - this means that the police probably won’t recommend … that Rayner be prosecuted”.

Shouldn’t that be “allegedly” committed? But do go on. “A perjury charge would also be disproportionate in isolation”. Would it now? Have Staines and his pals been taking legal advice? Carry on. “What then was her motive for pretending publicly on the electoral roll that she lived at her old house? It was almost certainly to avail [sic] of the substantial council house discount”.

Was it now? “By misrepresenting where she was living she could, prima facie, have obtained a financial benefit of £16,975”. They have been taking legal advice, haven’t they? And the conclusion from all of the above?

... then who done it?

“The substantive issue for the police is nothing to do with capital gains tax, or taxes on rental income or any other of the myriad of potential HMRC related issues. This is about gaining a pecuniary advantage by misrepresenting her living arrangements. This is a more serious issue than making false declarations under PPERA, the police will in all likelihood be more interested in following the money”. Well, that’s that, then. Or rather, not when James Daly presented himself for a little light media grilling the other day.

With a little prompting from Labour’s Chris Bryant, Daly duly blustered “The matter is with Greater Manchester Police”. Bryant wasn’t having that. “What do you think she’s done wrong?” Come on James! “I’ve just answered that question”. Oh no he hadn’t. What were the concerns that he’d put to the Police? “The information that [GMP] released to the Times, and I think that those are the broad framing of the matters that they are considering”.

He still wouldn’t, or couldn’t, say what she’s supposed to have done wrong. Beth Rigby intervened. “You wrote to the Police. Did you not put concerns or allegations? Didn’t you write to them about it? Am I misunderstanding … what did you ask them? Why won’t you say?” But he still wouldn’t answer.

“I asked the Police to investigate certain matters that were in the public domain … regarding certain things”. Ms Rigby tried again. “Did you ask them to investigate tax matters … electoral roll issues?”. Then we came close to an admission: “I think there are a number of matters, and I think some of the issues that you’ve raised, are included within that”. He THINKS so.

But he doesn’t want to discuss the matter because there’s a Police investigation. Why? Is anything here sub judice? Maybe he should ask the Fawkes rabble to get him up to speed, as they seem to know more than he does. Meanwhile, another Tory MP - Mark Menzies - is generating headlines for yet more alleged misbehaviour. Not that The Great Guido is telling you.

Did Daly write his own letter? And if he didn’t, who did? I doubt that the Fawkes massive done it. But they may know who did. No pressure, now.

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Liz Truss - Chicken In A Basket

And so it came to pass that, rather than accepting that she has not been the most successful or popular of politicians, Mary Elizabeth Truss, aided and abetted by our free and fearless press, mounted a comeback. This has been so successful that the best her team could do was to secure an appearance on Sun TV, which means the audience would be very small indeed.

Except, of course, for Ms Truss’ fellow right-leaning politicians, and all those hacks and pundits who would watch the broadcast, then tell anyone not yet asleep how wonderful it was. Sending down the softball “questions” and not subjecting Ms Truss to any discernible reality check was the odious flannelled fool Master Harry Cole, still pretending to be a real journalist.

So what is the Truss tonic that would improve the lot of average hard-working taxpayers? Don’t ask. “I think we need to leave the ECHR”. Make the trip to the supermarket a bit cheaper, would it? Put food on the table? Make transport costs more affordable? Over to Master Cole. “With or without a referendum? No more referendums?” None you might lose, he means.

“No more referendums. I agree with you”. How Murdoch collegiate of her. Back came Cole. “But you’d need a massive mandate from the people to do that”. Which more or less kills her ambition stone dead. Who’s going to vote for the Tories if it means her? There was a flicker of realisation before she continued “You would. But it’s not enough just to leave the ECHR”.

Uh-oh. So what else is on her wrecking ball target list? “What else do we need to leave?” asked Cole. Leave? Nah, Liz is talking abolition. “We’ve got to abolish the Supreme Court”. Yeah, rule of law? Phooey! Master Cole cued her up for the follow-up: “Bring it back into the Lords?” She liked that idea. “Yes, bring it back into the Lords”. So abolition is no abolition.

And then came the Oh What A Giveaway moment from Master Cole. “I presume the OBR’s pretty high on your hit list as well”. Not much of an interrogation, is it? Go on Liz! “That’s definitely, although … what the OBR do with their modelling is they actually encourage Governments to have higher immigration”. EH? How the merry fuck do they manage that?

“Because they essentially try and force Governments to trade off tax cuts for immigration rises”. The OBR doesn’t even “try” to force any outcome on Governments. Anyhoo, carry on. “But the other thing, we’ve got to leave the ECHR, abolish the Supreme Court, abolish the Human Rights Act”. Master Cole? “And what, a British bill of rights? The Tories tried to do that”.

It was a simple question, a tap-in from six inches, an open goal. Not for Ms Truss. “I prefer the traditional Bill of Rights”. Which is, or was, what, exactly? “I mean, Britons have been free for many, many years”. Starting to sound like her lobby group handlers didn’t program the Trussbot all that well.

“The idea that Human Rights were only invented in 1997 is a Blair fiction”. It would be a more credible assertion if anyone were making that claim. Then she went totally wacko. “All that he’s invented is rights for people that shouldn’t be in our country”. Liz Truss, folks, who doesn’t understand that Human Rights apply to all humans, the clue being in the name.

Her fortunately brief tenure as Prime Minister was marked by frightening economic ineptitude - cheered on by the right-leaning press - which was heralded as going for growth when all it would have done would have been to line the pockets of the already well-off. She needs to learn the basics of Propensity to Spend versus Propensity to Save, and stop allowing the Tufton Street mafia to fill her empty head with outmoded economic drivel.

She also needs to accept the reality - that her time has been and is not coming back. Politically and economically, she is a walking basket case. Blaming migration for failure, and wanting to abolish all those institutions that done her wrong (allegedly) will solve nothing, will help the country not at all. Liz Truss needs to embrace the real world, not chicken out of it.

I give you Mary Elizabeth Truss - the epitome of Chicken In A Basket.

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Rachel Riley In A Spot Of Bother

The shocking scene of a lone male armed with a long blade, selecting a variety of female victims, at the Bondi Junction Westfield centre was bad enough, but worse was to come as a variety of agenda-driven pundits piled on, blaming the carnage on terrorism, which of course had to mean Scary Muslims™. After the pundits came others with their own agendas.

So after Desperate Dan Wootton and flap-mouthed bigot Julia Hartley Dooda came a singularly ill-advised intervention from Countdown numbers person Rachel Riley, who has now deleted the offending Tweet, X, or whatever Muskrat wants us to call it this week, but the Internet never forgets, and so her words can be retrieved for all to see. This, then, is her first take.

“For 6 months now, people have been out on our streets proudly calling for ‘Intifada Revolution’. If you want to know what ‘Globalise the Intifada’ looks like, see the Sydney Mall … 5 victims stabbed to death and 8 transferred to hospital, including a baby, due to one man and a knife … In the second intifada over 1,000 Israelis were murdered in restaurants, on buses and in the streets by suicide bombings, stabbings, stoning, lynching, shooting, rockets. The youngest victim was just 9 hours old … Sydney mall, multiple times over is what they’ve been proudly calling for”. This generated adverse comment.

Not least because the Bondi Junction attacker was not part of any organised campaign; he was a lone agent with a history of mental health episodes and, it appears, a problem with women. Also, Ms Riley appears to depend on her definition of the term “Intifada” being the only one, which it may not be.

In any case, she seems to have stopped and thought, or perhaps someone caused her to stop and think, with the upshot being that deletion, itself coming hard on the heels of an explanation. That brings to mind the cynical but true observation of Ronald Reagan that if you’re explaining, you’re losing.

Anyhoo, cue Ms Riley’s Take Two: “Just to clarify, my intention with this tweet was not to say this attack was caused by any ideation or to link it to Islamic extremism. At the time we did not know who the attacker was, and as such I made no reference”. Ri-i-i-ight. And there is more. Rather a lot more.

“My aim was to highlight the weekly calls for ‘intifada’ being tolerated in London and around the world, which in actuality means violence on our streets. For 6 months now, I have avoided taking the tube, or going with my kids to anywhere near the marches each Saturday, and each week we see the extremist chants on proud display with little outcry”. Do go on.

“Sadly, the type of attack seen in Sydney yesterday is exactly the kind of violence the previous intifada involved and I hope to avoid in future, but in my opinion ignoring the problem won’t make it go away. Attacks on Jews have recently become repackaged as ‘resistance’ in some circles, and we should in one voice condemn all acts of violence, whoever the perpetrators and whoever the victims”. The Bondi Junction attack misinterpreted - again.

And then came the final coda. “I am sorry if this message was misunderstood, that was not my intention”. Is she sorry if the message was not misunderstood? How about just saying sorry, full stop, no get-out clause, no conditional statement? How about stopping and thinking first, not later?

It’s not the most open of debates when Twitter/X/Whatever tells us “Accounts [Rachel Riley] follows or mentioned can reply”. Not just anyone, then. Meanwhile, “For 6 months now, I have avoided taking the tube, or going with my kids to anywhere near the marches each Saturday” means she depends on sources like Harry’s Place, rather than actually being there.

Being there, as in the thousands who make up the Jewish Bloc. On every one of those marches. The marches which result in very few arrests. Instead, she linked, deliberately or otherwise, “Intifada” to a lone man with serious issues rampaging through a shopping mall. Followed by an explanation. Followed by calls for Channel 4 to end her tenure on Countdown.

Stopping and thinking beforehand. It’s always the best way to do things.

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Bondi Junction - Dooda Lies Again

Not just at Shepherd’s Bush: Westfield centres appear all over the place, with one located in the eastern Sydney suburb of Bondi Junction, a place named not for a rail station - though there is one there now - but for a Tramway junction which was part of the Australian city’s extensive network that was finally abandoned in 1962. Now that centre is notorious for something else.

As the BBC has told, “A knife-wielding man who killed six people in a Sydney shopping centre before being shot dead has been identified by Australian police. Joel Cauchi, 40, sent the crowded Westfield Bondi Junction complex into panic on Saturday when he began stabbing people with a long blade. Five women and a man died. Several others, including a baby, were injured”.

Worse, the baby’s mother was one of those killed. But none of this was allowed to distract from the obligatory rush to conclude that the attack had something to do with a group that The Usual Suspects out there on the right love to hate. Someone knifing people? It had to be what Dubya Bush liked to call TRRR. So the person wielding the knife had to be a TRRRST.

Who, then, among the pantheon of bad faith media “personalities” would like to lead off? Enter stage right, or perhaps that should be stage far right, the deeply unpleasant Dan Wootton to whine “If terror can come to Bondi, Australia - with a small baby among those attacked by this savage - then nowhere in the west is safe. Change is needed. When will we wake up?”

But even Desperate Dan stopped short of Going There, of using the M-Word, as in Scary Muslims™. No such compunction for TalkTV’s flap-mouthed bigot Julia Hartley Brewer. “Another day. Another terror attack by another Islamist terrorist. Six dead, others seriously injured, including a baby”.

And, sadly, there was more. “Today, it’s Australia’s turn, the other day it was France’s. It’ll be our turn again next. How long do our Governments think we’re going to put up with this?” However, the New South Wales Police Commissioner told that “she would not describe the stabbings as an ‘act of terror’, reiterating that police believed there was ‘no ideological motivation’”.

So Ms Hartley Dooda had not only come out with another all too predictable slice of flat-out bigotry, she had lied, while accusing politicians, interest groups, and anyone else of whom she wishes to make an example of, yes, you got it, lying. Worse, she left her outburst live throughout yesterday and, apparently, overnight. Worse still, she initially doubled down on her claim, in a Tweet, X, or whatever Muskrat is calling it this week, that is still live.

Off she trilled: “I couldn't care less what colour skin someone has. I DO care about what is inside people's heads. Islamist ideology is the problem, not Muslim people. But you knew that already, didn't you? Keep your head in the sand, I'm sure that will work out well for you”. But Islam, or Islamism, or Islamists, or anything to do with ideology, had nothing to do with it.

And so it came to pass that eventually Ms Hartley Dooda relented. “My tweet below was incorrect. The attack in Sydney was not an Islamist terror attack, it was carried out by a man the police have since named as Joel Cauchi who they say had mental health problems not an ideological motive. I doubt that will be much consolation to the families of his victims”. Meaning what?

Meaning she was right really. Plus it doesn’t explain leaving the claim live for so long. Ah, but she had that covered. “Oh, and the reason I didn't retract sooner was simply because I was out and busy all day yesterday enjoying the sunshine with my lovely family and didn't look at Twitter or the news again until this morning. You guys should try that sometime”.

And to that I call bullshit. She was on Twitter, and Tweeting, at 1115 hours. Maybe the being “out and busy all day” didn’t happen until later in the day. Maybe she didn’t see all the news from the Australian authorities stressing that it wasn’t terrorism. Maybe she takes so little interest in actual facts that there is no point taking any notice of her incessant whining.

She’s not objected to the ratio, though. I’ll just leave that one there.

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GB News - Cuts Incoming

For some reason, the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines and his rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog, usually so keen to report anything and everything happening at Gammon Broadcasting™ News (“Bacon’s News Channel”), have come over all silent on the subject. Their last post mentioning GB News was on the 26th of last month. Cat got your tongue, O Great Guido?

Or maybe not

What the Fawkes folks know all too well, but the rest of us are just beginning to notice, is that GB News is in deep financial trouble - that is, it will be as soon as one or more of its backers ceases to be prepared to see their money sprayed up the wall. Losses in the year to 2023 had grown from 2022’s £30.7 million to a whopping £42.4 million. This year is unlikely to be any better.

On top of that, Paul Marshall, one of those looking on as his money is sprayed up the wall, has apparently decided to join the bidding war for the bundle containing the increasingly desperate and downmarket Telegraph and the increasingly alt-right Spectator magazine. As a result, he is, it seems, about to quit the board of the company that owns the broadcaster.

This from Sky News: “Sir Paul Marshall, the hedge fund tycoon, is preparing to step down from the board of GB News' parent company as he eyes a renewed bid to acquire The Daily Telegraph. Sky News has learned that Sir Paul, the co-founder of Marshall Wace and largest shareholder in the television news channel, is expected to hand over his board seat at All Perspectives to Lord Agnew, chair of the UnHerd Ventures vehicle”.

Do go on. “The potential board changes at All Perspectives come as GB News prepares to make an unspecified number of job cuts as part of a corporate reorganisation. Employees were informed about a round of prospective redundancies at a meeting on Tuesday, according to insiders”.

There was more. “GB News remains heavily loss-making, although it has been gaining momentum with its audience figures in recent months, boosted in particular by the former UKIP leader Nigel Farage's role as a presenter on the channel”. The Mr Thirsty effect. But there was a downside.

“[GB News] has been at loggerheads for months with Ofcom, the media regulator, over its use of prominent politicians as presenters … Ofcom concluded last month that GB News had breached impartiality rules, but that it would not impose sanctions”. Also, “In 2022 … Discovery sold its 25% stake for £8m … implying a 60% reduction in the company's value at the time … Spokespeople for GB News and Sir Paul declined to comment on Thursday”.

So who might be for the chop? Hmmm, that’s an interesting one. Farage they need for brand recognition, as well as his ability to talk well, but lie badly. After economics editor Liam Halligan left, other specialist pundits may follow - those like the low moaning sound of “royal” specialist Angela Levin, and former replacement teaboy to the Great Guido, Tom Harwood.

Maybe some of those Tory MPs, whose presence suggests there is a more serious connection between The Blue Team and GB News, could be for the chop. Or former Tory MPs, like 30p Lee Anderson. After it was revealed by Byline Times - small wonder the likes of The Great Guido hate them - that the Government is spraying taxpayers’ money up the wall on GB News advertising, there may have to be even more cuts if that tap is turned off.

How much taxpayer money? “Despite GB News often platforming racists and conspiracy theorists, and facing record numbers of Ofcom investigations, more than £1 million of UK taxpayer money has been spent on almost 10,500 ads since the channel launched in summer 2021”. That much.

So far, the official stance is to talk up the broadcaster’s prospects. Last December, “Angelos Frangopoulos, GB News' chief executive, said: ‘GB News is in an accelerated growth phase, beating targets across its platforms. We are always evaluating strategic and investment opportunities.’” Very brave words, Minister. Brave but utterly futile. GB News is bust.

They thought they’d won the war when the Murdochs pulled the plug on TalkTV. The reality was that they were next. Just rejoice at that news.

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Guido Fawked - Investigation Hypocrisy

Nothing has put the rank hypocrisy of the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines and his rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog in sharper focus than their sick and obsessive pursuit of Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner. Today has brought an excellent example of this, as one of their favourites has been caught peddling misinformation bordering on malicious dishonesty.

Behold the judge of standards in public life

Susan Hall, the increasingly desperate Tory candidate for the London Mayoral election next month, has been gratuitously slagging off her Labour opponent, incumbent Sadiq Khan, claiming that Khan is about to implement policies that he is not. The pièce de résistance in Ms Hall’s pantheon of misinformation is the totally false claim that Khan will hit motorists with a pay per mile scheme.

This from the Standard: “In recent days Ms Hall has repeatedly attacked Labour’s Mr Khan for ‘planning a new pay-per-mile tax’, which she calls ‘his Ulez 2.0’ … The mayor has admitted asking TfL to explore the concept, but has promised it will not be pursued, saying: ‘As long as I am mayor, we’re not going to have pay-per-mile’”. Then it got worse.

“Fact-checking campaigners have criticised Conservative mayoral candidate Susan Hall’s campaign as ‘deceptive' for a leaflet saying Sadiq Khan will bring in a pay-per-mile system for drivers … Images of the leaflet, which claims the mayor wants to bring in ‘another tax on drivers’, were published online by Full Fact”. Then it got worse still.

As Adam Bienkov at Byline Times has told, “The Conservative Party has been accused of running a campaign against Sadiq Khan which is based on a ‘barefaced lie’ which will ‘panic’ Londoners into handing over their personal data … Hall’s campaign have sent out leaflets to Londoners which are designed to look exactly like driving penalty notices”. There was more.

Susan Hall - may be celebrating prematurely

The leaflets have a QR code. “Anyone scanning the code will be taken to a website requesting they fill out a ‘petition’ against the new ‘tax’, which then collects their data”. Also, “The Conservative Party is not mentioned at all aside from a small print reference to ‘CCHQ’”. It’s Zac Goldsmith 2.0.

And has sparked an investigation by the ICO: “The Information Commissioner's Office say they are now considering complaints about the Conservative party's Sadiq Khan leaflets”. So, O Great Guido, given the headline “Police Reconsidering Rayner Case After Criticism”, and knowing the legendary Fawkes appetite for consistency and even-handedness, where is the equivalent headline for Ms Hall, following her misleading leaflets?

But you know the answer: of Ms Hall’s deliberate attempt to smear her way to the Mayoralty, there is nothing. Nil. Nix. Nada. Zip. Zilch. Zero. Not a sausage. Bugger all. But there is a crude attempt to smear SNP leader Humza Yousuf using the old Guilt By Association ploy, or to be more specific, the old Guilt By Claiming He Is His Brother In Law’s Keeper ploy.

And there are two more instalments this morning of Staines’ continuing sad obsession with Ms Rayner, bringing back memories of the right-wing media pile-on against Keir Starmer over what was called Beer And Currygate in a failed attempt to make it sound like a story. And when Starmer was cleared of any wrongdoing, The Usual Suspects inferred He Done It Anyway.

So it will be the same for Ms Rayner. So will the Fawkes hypocrisy.

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The Right’s Sick Rayner Obsession

One senses immediately whether a politician is genuine, unselfish, enthusiastic, an asset to their party, someone who can persuade others to stand in their corner, who empathises readily not only with voters, but their whole family group. Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner is one such. It is why she is now the target of some seriously obsessive behaviour.

Evening all

Ms Rayner is the one who must step in if Keir Starmer were to become indisposed. Unlike her party leader, who all too often looks a little stiff, too upright, visibly ill at ease with some lines of questioning, she is a natural. The thought has no doubt entered with the right that Labour’s poll numbers would improve under her leadership, if such a thing were possible.

Right now, the Tories are looking at a General Election thrashing; if Ms Rayner were in charge, they would be looking at a Canada-style wipeout. Hence the attempts to pull her down a peg or two, many of which have come from the inmates of the Northcliffe House bunker, where the disciples of the legendarily foul mouthed Paul Dacre have leapt from gutter to sewer.

First came the claim that Ms Rayner was wont to do a Basic Instinct-style flashing of now disgraced former alleged Prime Minister Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson. The Mail has suggested she owned up to having done this. But this was a vicious and malicious pack of lies; she had done no such thing. Even the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines and his rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog showed this wasn’t possible. But now The Great Guido is also smearing.

Maybe someone has goaded Staines, telling him the hard truth that he is not as influential as he thinks he is, that he is no longer strong, if he ever was in the first place. Maybe the Fawkes massive wants to show that they still have what it takes to bring someone down. But here a credibility problem enters.

As Tory MP Michael “Wiggy” Fabricant told last Thursday, “On the 13th March 2024, I posted on X a comment on a Guido article which claimed that Dale Vince, a Labour Party donor, is a supporter of Hamas, a proscribed terrorist organisation. This post referenced an article published by the website GuidoFawkes which included an edited clip of an interview with Dale Vince that had been taken out of context”. Ah, Fawkes and context. Do go on.

“The full clip of the interview makes it very clear that Dale does not support Hamas or its actions on October 7th last year. I am very pleased to hear this. Accordingly, I have now deleted that tweet, apologise[d] to Dale, and hope this now sets the record very clear”. Folks might not believe Staines.

But the Mail titles are still smearing, hence today’s Mail on Sunday thundering “MoS unearths photos taken by Labour’s deputy [leader] that expose truth about house row … IN HER OWN TWEETS … THE PROOF RAYNER HAS BEEN LYING”. Mail titles using words like “truth” and “proof”, then calling “liar” on someone else? Another credibility problem. But not for one Mail hack.

The MoS’ not even slightly celebrated blues artiste Whinging Dan Hodges was more than prepared to bat for his supper. “We now know Angela Rayner lied [no independent citation]. So what happened to Keir Starmer's fine words about honesty and integrity” he told, once more missing the question mark.

Dan Neidle told Desperate Dan “Your statement here is not correct. Married couples have one main residence for CGT purposes. Whether *she* lived in Vicarage Road during the marriage isn’t terribly relevant to the tax”. What say Hodges? “She says the second property was her ‘home’”. Neidle was unmoved. “Doesn’t change the tax”. Another observer was also unmoved.

“A photo on Facebook hardly proves that one way or the other”. Which is the MoS’ clincher. And another onlooker mused “Question Dan Hodges needs to answer is why he started another thread on this after being told by Dan Neidle that he was wrong on the law”. Hodges had sniffed “Question Angela Rayner needs to answer is if she does have advice saying everything was in the rules, why did she continue to lie about where she was actually living”.

The Mail on Sunday is not the law. Nor is The Great Guido. And maybe they should sort out their sick obsession. We see you, Tory errand boys.

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