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Finn Conway @finnconway.bsky.social · 3d

Today in absurd Oxfordshire planning disputes

"Plans for a new artistic bench that have been two years in the making have caused outrage among a community."

Reposted by Finn Conway

Stephen Bush @stephenkb.bsky.social · 19d

Maybe - just a crazy idea, but bear with me for a moment! - the reason why the Lib Dems should not “get serious“ is that the UK’s most important media organisation covers politics in babytalk so much of the time?

A paragraph that patronisingly describes what a party conference is.

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Reposted by Finn Conway

Stephen Bush @stephenkb.bsky.social · 19d

(I think a lot of the BBC’s written output can likely be explained by them interpreting “need to write for a reading age of seven” as ”need to write for a moron with an adult reading age”.)

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ʟɪɴᴇs @lines.snail.skin · 21d

That is the point of a university you fucker.

Marc Morris @marcmorris.bsky.social · 21d

Oh no not research and knowledge.

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Finn Conway @finnconway.bsky.social · 22d

Genuinely, how do I get the job as "guy who makes miniature displays for museums", because I think it would be great

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Sam Freedman @samfr.bsky.social · 22d

All political tribes can be hypocritical but the right's current level of hypocrisy on free speech is deliberate. It's an assertion of power not a blindspot.

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Marie Le Conte @youngvulgarian.marieleconte.com · 22d

think if you're broadly a centrist and were suuuuuper concerned about attacks on free speech from the left and so you decided to give the right a hearing then you need to realise you were taken for QUITE the ride (and don't really have anyone to blame but yourself)

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Finn Conway @finnconway.bsky.social · 23d

Anyway, mission accomplished: I found the stone I was looking for at Priene and we finally have some decent photos of it to accompany the bad squeeze from the 1990s

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Finn Conway @finnconway.bsky.social · 23d

I have to wonder what the hardware store owner thought of me this morning when I, very obviously an English tourist in a resort town, arrived in his shop to buy a tape measure at 8:30 — can't happen very often, but we do need adequate tools for epigraphy

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Julianna 💎 @batariangal.bsky.social · 24d

If I had a penny for every time a British politician had a 4-letter first name that begins with “Ke”, led one of the two largest parties in parliament, and was utterly unsuited to a moment of rising fascism, I’d have two pennies. Which isn’t much, but that I got them at the same time is distressing

Zoë Grünewald @zoegrunewald.bsky.social · 24d

Kemi Badenoch refusing to acknowledge that Tommy Robinson is "far-right", now on LBC, and refusing to condemn Elon Musk's words. In fact she says what Musk said *isn't* incitement. So what would be incitement then? How violent would his words have to be before he was deemed a threat to this country?

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David Klemperer @dmk1793.bsky.social · 25d

This is a step in the right direction, but it isn't enough.

The issue here isn't an isolated statement, but that Musk is waging a concerted campaign (in part through exploiting his control of X) to foment ethnic and political violence in the UK in the apparent hope of overthrowing the government.

Robert Saunders @robertsaunders.bsky.social · 25d

Amol Rajan: Do you condemn Musk's words on Saturday?

Jacqui Smith: "Absolutely I do. Those words were wrong & they were dangerous… For Elon Musk to talk about violence in our political system… is wholly unacceptable."

Good to hear a minister speak out at last. This should have happened much sooner

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Finn Conway @finnconway.bsky.social · 25d

The causeway is very popular with beach-goers, no doubt all enthused by the new Airai inscription in ZPE

Finn Conway @finnconway.bsky.social · 25d

Paid an impromptu visit to Airai yesterday to get the lay of the land and see if we couldn't find anything

As it happens, we couldn't find anything, but interesting to see traces of old structures on the peninsula nonetheless

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Stephen Bush @stephenkb.bsky.social · 27d

When Ted Heath sacked Enoch Powell he was acting in the face of a majority in favour. Harold Wilson backed him up and called the speech “evil”. Long past time for Keir and Kemi to do the same.

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Jonn Elledge @jonnelledge.bsky.social · 27d

Keep thinking of arguments for why it would be completely insane to dump a prime minister with a huge majority just 14 months in, and also about how if he's not going to say a single word in opposition to the kind of shit we saw today then I no longer feel convinced by any of those arguments.

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Alexander Clarkson @aphclarkson.bsky.social · 27d

As a colleague mentioned yesterday, Gamergate is one of the five most significant developments in US politics since the Cold War

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Finn Conway @finnconway.bsky.social · 27d

Anyway, a fantastic time was had a Erythrai (Ildır) today, including a look around the ongoing excavations, courtesy of the team

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Finn Conway @finnconway.bsky.social · 27d

These little guys really are incredibly convenient for idiot tourists like myself who have still not learned to drive

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Finn Conway @finnconway.bsky.social · 27d

[guy who's just successfully caught a dolmuş voice] You could say I'm actually pretty much a Çeşme local now, yeah

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Robert Saunders @robertsaunders.bsky.social · Sep 5

Laurie Magnus: Rayner acted "in good faith", had "the intention to pay all appropriate taxes", "was twice informed in writing" that the lower rate was due, "sought quickly to correct the mistake", "acted with integrity", but didn't seek expert advice.

That was a mistake. But I find this much worse⬇️

Naomi Smith @pimlicat.bsky.social · Sep 5

Farage uses tax avoidance vehicles meaning he paid only 25% corporation tax on profits, instead of 40% income tax, but his supporters see this as a virtue and of course there's a very legal difference between this kind of avoidance and evasion www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Nigel Farage uses private company to pay less tax on GB News earnings

Exclusive: Reform leader’s use of personal services firm is a practice criticised across the political spectrum

www.theguardian.com

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Reposted by Finn Conway

Marie Le Conte @youngvulgarian.marieleconte.com · Sep 5

get why she had to go but irksome she lost her job to something quite complex and, let's be honest, reasonably minor in the grand scheme of things, when shadow cabinet members get to merrily hang out with Eddie Swastika without any repercussions

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Stephen Bush @stephenkb.bsky.social · Sep 5

Indeed. Sorry, the core people behind the last year are not liberals! They use the word as a pejorative! Need to accept that if you want social liberalism you are in the business of building coalitions with actual liberals, not wishcasting!

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Reposted by Finn Conway

Julianna 💎 @batariangal.bsky.social · Sep 5

I think she probably did have to go, but I’m still gonna be fucking bitter about the right-wing press scoring a win

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Stephen Bush @stephenkb.bsky.social · Aug 31

Cringed so hard while reading this terrific @jessicaelgot.bsky.social story I think I ruptured something. Who at GMG do I need to sue?

Doubts cast on Kemi Badenoch’s claim of US medical school offer

Stanford University staff and academic experts raise questions over Tory leader’s claim of place and partial scholarship offered at 16

www.theguardian.com

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Reposted by Finn Conway

Jonn Elledge @jonnelledge.bsky.social · Aug 27

"Future historians will surely debate at great length whether it was economics or media culture or simple incompetence that led the Starmer government’s moral compass to break. But they surely won’t debate who, out of the Taliban or the people who fled from their regime, were actually the baddies."

It’s Just Wrong, and They Should Say So

This week: if you think handing asylum seekers to the Taliban is good politics, you’re a bad person. Also: on the non-existence of purple; and a map of the mid-Tudor world.

jonn.substack.com

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