No massively keen on this glam rock pink backdrop for Starmer's press conference.
Isn't the point to present an alternative prime minister image?Not sure it accomplishes that.
Oh wow. Starmer calls for a 2-3 week circuit breaker.
Starmer is now in line with the official scientific advice. The government is not. He is in a better place.
Starmer to Johnson: "You know the scientific evidence backs this approach. You know a circuit break is needed now. You can't keep delaying this. Act now. Break the cycle."
Good politics, smart strategy. In line with public opinion. Starmer saw the opening and he took it. But it is also the right policy.
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Everyone's emotionally in a very similar place aren't they. This kind of simmering anxiety, basically just awaiting a lockdown of some sort or another, bracing for the longest, harshest winter.
It's like we're learning as a species how to go into hibernation.
To me, this period feels less scary than spring, but somehow more depressing. I guess because of the cold & dark. The shock and this-is-just-like-28-days-later chat of March has turned into sullen predictability.
It didn't have to be this way, even with the Leave vote. They could have pursued a compromise position which respected the views of Scotland and NI. They did not.
Instead, only the most extreme and aggressive version of Brexit was tolerated and anyone who disagreed was branded an enemy of the people. So this is where we are.
And before anyone starts with the 'isn't it ironic that you want to silence people as a liberal' horseshit: They murder those who disagree with them. They encourage violence against minorities.
Freedom demands that they be stopped. Only the most infantile, skin-deep understanding of liberty would allow them to continue.
Johnson speech just kicked off. I'm already struggling.
He started with the island-story-battle-of-the-blitz stuff within the first minute.
It's an after-dinner speech, as usual - his primary register. The kind of thing the crowd in the hall would have absolutely lapped up. But in this case delivered to silence.
So it took about five days to record the audio book, which I spent with this awesome engineer called Alex. He was extremely patient with me getting shit wrong, then launching into a stream of angry swear words, which he duly erased.
While we were doing it, he was hard at work recording his first album, where he was doing literally everything: the writing, the lyrics, the singing, all the instruments. That guy was dedicated to that shit. He was all in.
And now he just sent me the first single from the album - Modern Times. And the thing is... it's fucking brilliant. Even the missus, who usually despises what she calls my "whiny white boy music", says it is - quote - "not shit".
Watched Rise of the Planet of the Apes again last night and this is as good a chance as any to remind you that it is really quite marvellously fucking brilliant.
The scene where Caeser says 'no' is an actual classic. Seen it many times before, but still made me jump up and shout: 'fucking yes mate'.
That whole trilogy is flawless. A perfect set of films, from start to finish. Intelligent, tragic, engrossing: great for spectacle but still hugely intelligent.