The Ryder Cup golf between the USA and Europe started in New York on Friday. Predictably Trump turned up to be met with cheers from the largely MAGA crowd (one of the few places Trump doesnt get booed). USA Keegan Bradley reportedly did a ‘Trump dance’
Trump himself of course was pictured with leading LIV golfer and power driver Bryson De Chambeau who is a known Trump fan.
This is a ‘which side are you on?’ sporting occasion, the answer in this case being Europe with several of Ireland and England’s most hirsute golfers in the team
In the unlikely event that you check the Daily Express, Telegraph, GBNews etc not only are Reform going to win the next Election it will take place soon and Farage will be PM. How he will manage that along with his PFLs never seems to be asked,
A new YouGov poll which looks at current sentiment across every English, Scottish and Welsh Constituency suggests that Reform could be the largest party in 2029. Its a long time off of course.
YouGov are a major commercial polling organisation and they are not these days in the business of what E P Thompson labelled as far back as 1959 as Ephology. That is polls which seek not to report opinion but shape it.
Hence their current poll in fact looks at a range of possible 2029 outcomes (graphic above) and notes that in 86 seats the projected Reform lead is so small that a poll victory is far from sure (Labour successfully worked on small margins in 2024 but are now paying the price)
The latest MRP Election Poll should be read in conjunction with Hobsbawm’s Labour in the Great Cities
The latest MRP Constituency poll which looks at voting intention if an Election was held now can be found here. Its easier to read than previous versions but no more definitive
I’ll comment further on what it *may* show but a quick look at the results suggests that reading it in conjunction with Eric Hobsbawm’s Labour In The Great City has some point
The first Wetherspoons opened in Colney Hatch Lane, Muswell Hill, N10 in early 1979. It was originally owned and run by Andrew Marler but before long local man (at the time) Tim Martin appeared and took it over. Wetherspoons was launched. The pub was sold in the 1980s and the Wetherspoons in Muswell Hill, the Mossy Well, is now in the centre of the location at the top of Muswell Hill itself.
The pub has since been extended and gone through various name changes. Its currently trading as Furlongs and from the 12th October will have a new Sunday roast menu, something Wetherspoons no longer does. The prices are however a little higher than Spoons
I drank in the original Marlers/Martins/Spoons in 1979 and a brief memoir is below
Reform’s Banks says Liz Truss ‘would not be allowed to join Reform’
Aaron Banks who financed Brexit and Farage and stood as Reform candidate for West of England Mayor in 2024 (he came second, much apparently to his relief) has been speaking to the Financial Times
It was the usual outlandish mixture of purging civil servants (though Banks, showing his liberal side, would stop short of shooting them) and abolishing the infrastructure of the capitalist State. Reform commented that Banks was not speaking officially.
As Tory Conference looms and Liz Truss has publicly stated the Stephen Yaxley Lennon has been hard done by, Banks revealed that he had recently had dinner with her. She would not be allowed to join Reform because she is ‘tarnished’ in the public’s mind for crashing the economy. Banks was equivocal about whether this was correct or not but underlined that it was not going to change in term of her reputation.
Many comment that Liz Truss appears unwell and really needs help but politically on that basis she could be in line for the next US President if she can somehow manage to prove she was born in America (as Boris Johnson was)
As for a ban on Truss joining Reform due to image issues given the number of cranks, weirdoes, racists, fascists and conspiracy theorists it has in membership, some at least elected ‘politicians’ it must be wondered if the ban will last
The below is extracted from a series of articles that Engels wrote for the Labour Standard in 1881. Some will be familiar with them. Indeed they have in the past been available as a cheap printed pamphlet. Now they are free on-line at the Marxist Internet Archive.
Engels was writing at a time of change in party politics, with the formation of the Marxist Social Democratic Federation in the early 1880s (Engels was not enthusiastic seeing it as dogmatic and not particularly Marxist) and in 1893 the Independent Labour Party (Engels was more enthusiastic)
Below he writes of the importance of forming a working class party and what it might achieve with reference to the Chartists. Engels died in 1895 so we can’t know what he would have made of the Labour Representation Committee (1900) the Labour Party in its current form (1918) or the Communist Party (1920) but his points remain of political interest.
He refers of course to working men. Women did not fully get the vote until 1928
And yet there never was a more widespread feeling in England than now, that the old parties are doomed, that the old shibboleths have become meaningless, that the old watchwords are exploded, that the old panaceas will not act any longer….
… Of Radical shams there has been unfortunately enough since the break-up of the first working men’s party which the world ever produced — the Chartist party. Yes, but the Chartists were broken up and attained nothing. Did they, indeed? Of the six points of the People’s Charter, [6] two, vote by ballot and no property qualification, are now the law of the land. A third, universal suffrage, is at least approximately carried in the shape of household suffrage; a fourth, equal electoral districts, is distinctly in sight, a promised reform of the present Government. So that the break-down of the Chartist movement has resulted in the realisation of fully one-half of the Chartist programme. And if the mere recollection of a past political organisation of the working class could effect these political reforms, and a series of social reforms besides, what will the actual presence of a working men’s political party do, backed by forty or fifty representatives in Parliament? We live in a world where everybody is bound to take care of himself. Yet the English working class allows the landlord, capitalist, and retail trading classes, with their tail of lawyers, newspaper writers, etc., to take care of its interests. No wonder reforms in the interest of the workman come so slow and in such miserable dribbles. The workpeople of England have but to will, and they are the masters to carry every reform, social and political, which their situation requires. Then why not make that effort?
Monday 6th October 5.30pm Geoff Brown, a People’s History of the Anti-Nazi League
A People’s History of the Anti Nazi League
Written as a total history, from below and from above, using interviews, archives and private collections, the book covers the prehistory of the ANL, its formation as a united front, the ANL’s relationship to its sister organisation, Rock against Racism, the origins and impact of the April 1978 Carnival against the Nazis, turning the ANL into a mass organisation with a presence in schools, colleges, workplaces, unions, challenging every manifestation of a fascist presence. This included the campaign to reduce the fascist profile in the media, ‘the Battle of Brick Lane’, the struggle to win significant Jewish support, the general election of 1979, concluding with the Leeds Carnival against Racism and the anti police riots of July 1981.
Contact BLF Organiser Keith Flett @keithbeard.bsky.social
Andy Burnham’s eyebrows could be key factor in potential Labour leadership bid
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that Andy Burnham’s gravitas adding eyebrows could be a key factor in a possible bid for the Labour leadership bid
Burnham is clean shaven but is far from un-hirsute. In particular his eyebrows are a significant presence, considerably more impactful than the perpetually clean shaven Keir Starmer.
BLF organiser Keith Flett said, Andy Burnham must seek Denis Healey eyebrow impact and gravitas in any Labour leadership bid. He will need to promote further eyebrow growth and we suggest daily marination in imperial stout could be the way to a Labour leadership winning vote
