[RedSparrows]

Someone quipped 'the plane fell out the window'.

I laughed. It's so grim.

[MisterMuncher]

I had started listening to the "Sad Oligarch" podcast last week (great material if you can work your way past the presentation, which is, charitably, dreadful) which is a breakdown of the many sudden, unexpected, loosely explained deaths of the Russian elites since 2022. That manner of joke has surprisingly wide currency within Russia, in a kind of laughter in the dark way. It's nearly considered a sign of personal ascension to brood about how you're reaching the status of getting a window of your own.

The abiding impression is of a body politic so enamoured of the national mythos of stoicism that they're almost welcoming of this level of bullshit, as it proves something about them as manly men surviving despite it all. A country that made itself into Fight Club, content to brutalise themselves because anything else would be "soft"

[satnav]

Watching a few news programmes today I get the impression that most news readers are relieved that the will no longer have to grapple with trying to pronounce 'Prigozhin'.

[Watchman]

Or maybe, coming to a street near you, a “novichok neighbour”

[Bones McCoy]

To recycle the old Polish joke.

The Russian news agency is describing the event as a tragic accident.

We see no accident, and no tragedy.

[Bones McCoy]

And contemporary Ukrainian.

Man who demanded extra missiles receives first delivery.

[Bones McCoy]

And contemporary Ukrainian.

Man who demanded extra missiles receives first delivery.

And also

Special landing operation fails.

[MisterMuncher]

Deplanestration

[Andy McDandy]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... em-ukraine

Marina Hyde on Elon Musk's latest wheeze: meddling in the war.

Please let’s put much, much more of our future security in the hands of people who treat war and the fallout from an unsolicited invasion like a broadband contract.

When he does finally make it there in his big space rocket, will even Mars be far enough for Elon Musk to fuck off to?

Phoney Stark .... the edgelord magnate (and edgelord magnet)

Ultimately, it remains one of the more pathetic tragedies of our age that Musk is seen as a superhero analogue – but perhaps also an inevitable one, given that superheroes connote institutional failure. After all, if society and its institutions were working as they should be, we wouldn’t need them. This is certainly the mood that Musk likes to play into, forever fanning the sense that the world and its problems are too hard to manage for everyone from ordinary people to police chiefs to politicians and supranational bodies.

[Youngian]

Important physical and psychological advance for Ukraine. Analysts point to a lot of resources for Ukraine to hold the bridgehead and a lot of diversion of Russian forces to remove them.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's chief of staff Andriy Yermak has said that Ukrainian forces have gained a foothold on the left (eastern) bank of the Dnipro river.
Russia has admitted that some Ukrainian forces have set up positions in a village but claims they will soon be wiped out.
If the area is held it would mean a significant advance for Ukraine. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-67424672.amp

[Tubby Isaacs]

Where's Mr Right Side of History?

[kreuzberger]

Ukraine and Moldova being welcomed to the top table today, along with Georgia on the bench for the time being.

The mainland looks more beautiful by the day, despite that cunt Orbán.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/ ... st-updates

[Youngian]

A fine morning has taken a nose dive into despair, time to take some meds.

The US is reportedly planning to move nuclear warheads to the UK in response to the growing threat from Russia.

Senior figures on both sides of the Atlantic have called for preparations to be ramped up in case of a potential war between NATO forces and Russia.

To reinforce the alliance, the Telegraph reports Pentagon documents reveal the nuclear weapons will be stationed at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk.

They are said to be three times the strength of the Hiroshima bomb. https://news.sky.com/story/us-plan-for- ... k-13057390

[Abernathy]

Another headache for Prime Minister Starmer. Quite honestly, I'm beginning to admire Keir more than ever simply for being ready to take on what looks increasingly like a near impossible job.

[Bones McCoy]

Another headache for Prime Minister Starmer. Quite honestly, I'm beginning to admire Keir more than ever simply for being ready to take on what looks increasingly like a near impossible job.

I hope the massive laundry list facing him won't result in a one and out term of office.

[Oboogie]

Another headache for Prime Minister Starmer. Quite honestly, I'm beginning to admire Keir more than ever simply for being ready to take on what looks increasingly like a near impossible job.

I hope the massive laundry list facing him won't result in a one and out term of office.

Starmer's 'To Do List' is already intimidating and getting longer by the day.
Plus he's going to inherit the worst economy for 70 years.

Inevitably, by the end of his first term he'll be standing for re-election with a significant number of tasks still undone and a lot of very disappointed voters. How much this matters, depends on which tasks and how many voters are disillusioned, will he be able to maintain sufficient goodwill for a second term to finish the job?
Maybe.
Much depends on what happens to the Tories in the wake of their defeat, hopefully they'll render themselves unelectable for at least three terms but we can't count on that.

[Abernathy]

Yes. On top of all the other stuff he will have to deal with as PM, there’s always the not insignificant little matter of ensuring that Labour gets elected for a second term. I think it’s very much a background consideration, but needs to be given serious thought from day one, and will obviously take on ever greater importance as we approach the end of the first term.

I’d like to think that Labour will govern so well, and make real progress, in that first term, especially by comparison with what has gone before, that re-election might be almost a given. Particularly if the Tories have headed off down a mad bastard right wing, Braverman or Badenoch led rabbit hole.

[Watchman]

If he makes it clear exactly what the Party has inherited, and what the priorities are. Grown up talk, no bullshit

[Malcolm Armsteen]

When Franklin Roosevelt became president he found that things were worse than expected.
One of his ploys was to explain this in adult-level detail in a series of radio broadcasts he styled 'fireside chats with the American people'. Taking them into his confidence and sharing his plans and the thinking behind them.

We are going to need a new deal - a doctor's mandate as Roosevelt put it.
Relief of the symptoms, recovery through planned and coherent action, reform to make sure it doesn't happen again.

[Andy McDandy]

That's what we need, but I'm afraid we've been conditioned into demanding we're not treated like idiots, while demonstrating incredible idiocy.