Kmflett's Blog

Beard Liberation Front

2nd July

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has announced an upgraded inquiry into Morgan McSweeney’s beard and its influence on Government policy after the debacle of the Welfare Bill in the Commons on 1st July

During National Beard Week at the end of June Labour leader Keir Starmer was named beard hater-pogonophobe- of the year. His clean shaven revisionism appears to be in line with that of his mentor Tony Blair who pioneered clean shaven revisionist politics as part of the New Labour brand.

The campaigners say that while McSweeney has not always worn a beard he appears to have done so during the Starmer era. The issue is not what McSweeney is trying to hide in or behind his beard- an age old pogonophobic prejudice- but what political purpose his beard serves as Keir Starmer’s right hand man given that the leader himself is a notorious clean shaven revisionist

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, beards in New Labour 25 years and more ago were controversial and this remains the case with the 2025 version of clean shaven revisionist politics. We are determine to get to the root of what McSweeney’s beard is all about

Bognor in 1857

A survey has found Bognor Regis to be at the bottom of seaside resorts, which seems a little harsh.

Marx and Engels preferred Margate and Ramsgate but Engels made visits to a range of seaside resorts including Southport in the North and Bridlington and Great Yarmouth on the East Coast.

In Engels ranking of seaside resorts Bognor was in the ‘not bad’ category.

In September 1857 he was in Ryde Isle of Wight recuperating from an illness on 17th September 1857 he wrote to Marx (in London)

I’ve been to see Pieper at Bognor; quite a nice little place, but not a patch on Ryde

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/jun/27/bognor-regis-back-at-bottom-of-uk-seaside-rankings-which?CMP=share_btn_url

Beard Liberation Front

27th June

Contact BLF Organiser Keith Flett @keithbeard.bsky.social

Beard of Summer 2025: Michael Rosen faces Zohran Mamdani

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that as part of National Beard Week, the Beard Off Final vote is now open for the Beard of Summer 2025

There have been two Close Shave Rounds of voting for the coveted seasonal accolade with a final Beard Off

Michael Rosen and Rishabh Pant won the first Close Shave Round and went to the Beard Off Final. Zohran Mamdani and Alexei Sayle won the second Close Shave Round.

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, clean shaven revisionism may be in fashion politically but we are looking for the most impactful beard of summer 2025

Beard of Summer 2025 Final List

Michael Rosen, Arsenal fan and trade unionist

Zohran Mamdani, US Democratic politician

Alexei Sayle, Tik Tok star & activist

Rishabh Pant, Indian cricketer

Vote pinned @kmflett X or hit reply on BlueSky

Beard Liberation Front

26^th June

BLF Organiser Keith Flett @keithbeard.bsky.social

National Beard Week. Beard Friendly Employer Award withheld due to a retreat from DEI in some workplaces

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that the Award for Beard Friendly Employer of the Year 2026 has been withheld

The Beard Friendly Employer Award is focused on an employer that promotes a diverse workforce and decent working conditions rather than  specifically on beards as such.

Unfortunately due to the influence of the far right Trump regime in the US and the Faragists in the UK many companies are retreating from existing Diversity, Equality and Inclusion policies. However it is far from clear what the real scale of the retreat is and therefore the implications for actual workplace practice

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, a beard friendly employer is one that welcomes all, including those with beards, has good working conditions and is solidly rooted in the communities it serves. We hope to be able to present the Award again in 2027 and in the meantime will be stepping up campaigning to make sure DEI continues to protect a hirsute presence in workplaces

An extra dimension has been revealed to Zohran Mamdani’s victory in the New York Democrat Primary election.

He is a socialist, a beard wearer and an Arsenal fan. In this he mirrors a well known UK politician..

Mamdani has explained his Arsenal support

I came up as a fan in the early 2000s, and it was my uncle who introduced me to the team. I was born in Kampala, Uganda, in East Africa, and my dad’s family is from East Africa, and Arsenal was one of the first teams to have a number of African players: Lauren, Kolo Toure, Nwankwo Kanu, Emmanuel Eboue, Alex Song. Over the years, [then-manager] Arsene Wenger really transformed what English soccer looked like. As a Ugandan kid looking at this team, I was just so proud. I really got in during the good years — the “Invincible” years, the years of success. Then I grew up in the years after that, which were years of infinite hope and very few results, and now we’re in a place where we’re actually competing.

The main thing on the menu at this week’s NATO meeting in the Hague was obviously arms spending. However the evening before NATO leaders met for dinner at the Palace of Willem-Alexander & Maxima

Trump was seated by far right Italian leader Meloni. The banquet menu was rather at odds with Trump’s favourite meal of incinerated steak.

Starter

Mousse of Amsterdam pickles, marinated vegetables, chive cream & crispy onion

Main course

veal fillet, chanterelle mushroom sauce, asparagus, legumes & pommes Paolo

Dessert

chocolate tart with Tonka beans, soft caramel & vanilla source

(Times 26th June)

One wonders if Trump ate any of that and particularly the vegetables and pickles..

Ex-Living Marxism & Boris Johnson’s policy chief Munira Mirza heads new ‘Fix It’ think tank

Munira Mirza worked for Boris Johnson since his days as London Mayor in 2008. In 2010 her salary as arts advisor to Johnson was £127,874 (Sonia Purnell Just Boris). At No.10 she was paid £145,000 a year. Her main role seems to have been to promote Culture Wars, something the current Tory leader is also keen on. She resigned from No.10 in 2022.

Ms Mirza, wrote for Living Marxism in the 1990s and was associated with the small Revolutionary Communist Party (not to be confused with the then CPGB or the CPB now)

She is now heading up a new think tank ‘Fix It’ and can be found promoting it in the Times (26^th June). She claims Fix It is ‘non party’ and is recruiting ‘successful people from outside Government’

The aims of ‘Fix It’ amount mostly to right-wing waffle aside from one of Ms Mirza’s favourite subjects, sacking ‘poor performers’ in Whitehall more quickly. She also thinks that prisons and housing should be built more quickly, although doesn’t say how.

There is an Advisory Board and while Mirza mentions no names Steerpike in the Spectator has provided a few. They include:

Lord Glasman of Blue Labour

Douglas Murray, the UK’s leading Islamophobe

Liam Halligan, former Business Editor of GB News

James Benjamin, a pollster who has worked a lot with the Tories

Jon Benjamin most recently UK Ambassador to Mexico who departed (FT) after an incident with a gun.

What could possibly go wrong..

The Government doesn’t book the acts: Michael Eavis defends Glastonbury politics

Given what is happening in the world opining on who should or should not appear at Glastonbury seems a little beside the point. However that is exactly what Keir Starmer and Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy have done in recent days. Both have complained about the fact that Irish rap band Kneecap are on the bill. Kneecap are of course pro-Palestinian. However it is Emily Eavis not Starmer or Nandy who gets to book the acts, at least while Britain remains a democracy.

Michael Eavis has rightly spoken out and underlined that not only is Glastonbury political, and always has been, but its on the left side of politics.

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2025/jun/26/michael-eavis-people-disagree-glastonbury-politics-go-elsewhere?CMP=share_btn_url

Indeed Glastonbury has a long tradition of supporting radical politics

The late historian and peace campaigner E P Thompson spoke at Glastonbury on several occasions in the 1980s (I think).

The official 50^th anniversary published in 2020 book records him as speaking in 1984 the day after the Smiths played. Personally invited by Michael Eavis he made his alternative nation speech from the Pyramid stage

Likening the crowd to a medieval army “with its tents, all over the fields” he argued “this has not only been a nation of money-makers and imperialists, it has been a nation of inventors, of writers of activists, artists,theatres and musicians. Looking directly at the assembled crowds he told them “it is this alternative nation which I can see in front of me now.”

Beard Liberation Front

Media release 26th June

contact BLF Organiser Keith Flett @keithbeard.bsky.social

National Beard Week 2025. Keir Starmer named Beard Hater of the Year

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has named Labour leader Keir Starmer as Beard Hater, or to use the Greek term Pogonophobe, of the Year as part of National Beard Week.

The campaigners say that while, like his mentor Tony Blair, Keir Starmer, has hirsute Cabinet members and Morgan McSweeney, he is also, just as Blair was, very clearly a clean shaven revisionist. He has never been known to wear a beard even when a student radical

Previous recipients of the perhaps unwanted accolade include Boris Johnson, Nigel Farage and Donald Trump

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, beard wearers are proud to be Woke and perpetually clean shaven Keir Starmer clearly has a very different perspective just like Tony Blair before him

Engels had cat, as did Lenin (who also had a dog) and Rosa Luxemburg