Alasdair
@ralasdair.bsky.social
Left politics, football (Spurs, Union Berlin, Scotland), rugby (Scotland), cycling, history, occasional rant.
📍Berlin
📍Berlin
Website manager at the OBR having the worst day of their career. Poor sod.
November 26, 2025 at 12:02 PM
Website manager at the OBR having the worst day of their career. Poor sod.
Absolutely mad take complaining about how news coverage works from *checks notes* the Editor of ITV News?!?
It’s a sign of how insane the news cycle is these days that this historic failure of government policy got just one day of news coverage this week.
Not saying that’s right or wrong, but it’s astonishing how quickly the agenda moves on these days.
Not saying that’s right or wrong, but it’s astonishing how quickly the agenda moves on these days.
BREAKING: UK’s response to Covid was “too little too late”. Acting faster could have saved 23,000 lives in England according to the public inquiry.
Boris Johnson presided over a “toxic, sexist, chaotic culture” in No10, where rule-breaking seriously undermined public confidence.
Boris Johnson presided over a “toxic, sexist, chaotic culture” in No10, where rule-breaking seriously undermined public confidence.
November 23, 2025 at 7:53 PM
Absolutely mad take complaining about how news coverage works from *checks notes* the Editor of ITV News?!?
50 years since Franco died. And now Spain is a thriving democracy and everything he and his fascists would have hated. That always brings a smile to my face.
November 20, 2025 at 8:11 PM
50 years since Franco died. And now Spain is a thriving democracy and everything he and his fascists would have hated. That always brings a smile to my face.
Just noticed that was Kieran Tierney's first ever competitive goal for Scotland in nearly ten years of being in the squad.
And what a belter.
And what a belter.
November 19, 2025 at 12:54 PM
Just noticed that was Kieran Tierney's first ever competitive goal for Scotland in nearly ten years of being in the squad.
And what a belter.
And what a belter.
I still have the Scotland flag I hung at my window as a 13-year-old in Germany when we were in the ‘98 World Cup. I’m now 40 and my daughter will be six months old when we next kick off a World Cup match. #SCOvDEN
November 18, 2025 at 10:37 PM
I still have the Scotland flag I hung at my window as a 13-year-old in Germany when we were in the ‘98 World Cup. I’m now 40 and my daughter will be six months old when we next kick off a World Cup match. #SCOvDEN
Absolute madness. 🏴
November 18, 2025 at 10:25 PM
Absolute madness. 🏴
Just queued for an hour in the FIFA ticketing queue to discover that the only tickets to any of the Mexico City games they were willing to sell me were Wheelchair Companion ones. I don't know anyone in a wheelchair...
November 17, 2025 at 6:53 PM
Just queued for an hour in the FIFA ticketing queue to discover that the only tickets to any of the Mexico City games they were willing to sell me were Wheelchair Companion ones. I don't know anyone in a wheelchair...
The Labour Right are ideological hardliners who care more about "purity" (and thumping the left) than winning elections.
November 17, 2025 at 11:34 AM
The Labour Right are ideological hardliners who care more about "purity" (and thumping the left) than winning elections.
It's going to be fascinating to see how the Labour right try to avoid the inevitable backlash in the 2029 leadership election. The gerrymandering and rigging is going to be a sight to behold...
November 17, 2025 at 9:58 AM
It's going to be fascinating to see how the Labour right try to avoid the inevitable backlash in the 2029 leadership election. The gerrymandering and rigging is going to be a sight to behold...
Labour's fundamental problem on immigration is that they're trying to compete with people "offering" mass deportations and concentration camps. There is nothing they can do that will "outflank" that. But they keep trying...
November 17, 2025 at 9:54 AM
Labour's fundamental problem on immigration is that they're trying to compete with people "offering" mass deportations and concentration camps. There is nothing they can do that will "outflank" that. But they keep trying...
At Union Berlin, there is a last vestige of DDR football culture still alive. There’s a certain bridge on the way out of the stadium. Under this bridge, it’s tradition to sing “Ooooh, Scheissss Dynamo!”
October 29, 2025 at 10:32 PM
At Union Berlin, there is a last vestige of DDR football culture still alive. There’s a certain bridge on the way out of the stadium. Under this bridge, it’s tradition to sing “Ooooh, Scheissss Dynamo!”
I was in London today. Saw three sumos in deep discussion with the ladies in the Liberty Haberdashery section about fabrics, and it made my day.
October 20, 2025 at 9:50 PM
I was in London today. Saw three sumos in deep discussion with the ladies in the Liberty Haberdashery section about fabrics, and it made my day.
ACAB. Especially Berlin cops, for whom any form of left-wing protest has become an opportunity to act out their violent authoritarian fantasies.
Stell dir vor, du setzt in Gegenwart eines Kindes völlig unverhältnismäßige Gewalt gegen dessen Vater ein – und wenn sich Menschen darüber empören, erklärst du, das Problem sei nicht die Gewalt, sondern die Empörung. Klingt totalitär? Kein Wunder.
October 13, 2025 at 7:14 PM
ACAB. Especially Berlin cops, for whom any form of left-wing protest has become an opportunity to act out their violent authoritarian fantasies.
Gordon Brown and it’s not even close…
On the centenary of her birth, Margaret Thatcher is Britons' top choice for best PM of the last 50 years
Margaret Thatcher: 29%
Tony Blair: 12%
Harold Wilson: 6%
Boris Johnson: 4%
Gordon Brown: 3%
David Cameron: 3%
John Major: 2%
yougov.co.uk/topics/polit...
Margaret Thatcher: 29%
Tony Blair: 12%
Harold Wilson: 6%
Boris Johnson: 4%
Gordon Brown: 3%
David Cameron: 3%
John Major: 2%
yougov.co.uk/topics/polit...
October 13, 2025 at 6:24 PM
Gordon Brown and it’s not even close…
I don’t mind Steve Clarke using Dykes as an impact sub, but I’m not sure waiting til the match has less than ten minutes to run to bring him on is the way to do it. #Scotland
October 12, 2025 at 5:54 PM
I don’t mind Steve Clarke using Dykes as an impact sub, but I’m not sure waiting til the match has less than ten minutes to run to bring him on is the way to do it. #Scotland
Worth remembering Macron refused to appoint a moderate left candidate and instead did a dirty deal with fascists to appoint Barnier last year.
Macron reappoints Sébastien Lecornu as French prime minister
Macron reappoints Sébastien Lecornu as French prime minister
Lecornu, who resigned as PM on Monday, is tasked with urgently delivering a budget to parliament
The French president, Emmanuel Macron, has named Sébastien Lecornu as prime minister, reappointing him after he quit the job earlier this week.
Lecornu’s immediate task will be to deliver a budget to parliament by the end of Monday. Continue reading...
www.theguardian.com
October 10, 2025 at 10:20 PM
Worth remembering Macron refused to appoint a moderate left candidate and instead did a dirty deal with fascists to appoint Barnier last year.
Possibly the most Scotland way to win 3-1. We were rubbish, extremely stressful finish and Lyndon Dykes doing something mad at the end.
October 9, 2025 at 8:53 PM
Possibly the most Scotland way to win 3-1. We were rubbish, extremely stressful finish and Lyndon Dykes doing something mad at the end.
Ernst Thälmann’s wife is going to have a thing or two to say about this.
The...founder of antifa's...girlfriend?
LOL
These people are so fucking stupid.
LOL
These people are so fucking stupid.
lest anyone think the girlfriend line was a hilarious joke I concocted...
October 9, 2025 at 5:57 PM
Ernst Thälmann’s wife is going to have a thing or two to say about this.
Yet again I am pointing out, you don’t “fight Reform’s rhetoric with everything we have” by…agreeing with them.
Keir Starmer has announced an end to "golden tickets" to setting in the UK with a string of measures stripping back the rights of asylum seekers.
Keir Starmer to strip back asylum rights with new measures - 'no golden tickets'
www.mirror.co.uk
October 1, 2025 at 9:48 PM
Yet again I am pointing out, you don’t “fight Reform’s rhetoric with everything we have” by…agreeing with them.
Nonsense. What hurts Labour is saying Reform are racist while agreeing with Reform’s points and aping their policies.
Crying racism only hurts Labour
Activists like it, but the median voter will feel attacked.
📊 @bwalker.uk
Activists like it, but the median voter will feel attacked.
📊 @bwalker.uk
Crying racism only hurts Labour
Activists like it, but the median voter will feel attacked.
www.newstatesman.com
October 1, 2025 at 9:01 PM
Nonsense. What hurts Labour is saying Reform are racist while agreeing with Reform’s points and aping their policies.
Starmer making a shouty speech about Reform being racist is all well and good, but then why is his government enacting Reform-like policies? The clearly haven’t realised that the more they agree with Reform, the more salient they make Reform’s agenda and the worse it gets for them.
Mahmood says she will introduce new conditions for indefinite leave to remain:
Lived here 10 years not 5
Being in work
Not taking a penny in benefits
No criminal record
Giving back to community eg volunteering
Lived here 10 years not 5
Being in work
Not taking a penny in benefits
No criminal record
Giving back to community eg volunteering
September 30, 2025 at 4:29 PM
Starmer making a shouty speech about Reform being racist is all well and good, but then why is his government enacting Reform-like policies? The clearly haven’t realised that the more they agree with Reform, the more salient they make Reform’s agenda and the worse it gets for them.
Amazing how little talk of a leadership challenge there is within Labour, given Starmer is the least popular PM in half a century.
Prior to these results, Major and Sunak shared the spot for the worst with a rating of -59.
Click here for the full findings: www.ipsos.com/en-uk/reform...
Click here for the full findings: www.ipsos.com/en-uk/reform...
September 28, 2025 at 1:12 PM
Amazing how little talk of a leadership challenge there is within Labour, given Starmer is the least popular PM in half a century.
The whole Your Party thing reminds me again that the world might be very different if it had been John McDonnell’s “turn” to be the left’s candidate for Labour leader in 2015.
September 20, 2025 at 9:02 AM
The whole Your Party thing reminds me again that the world might be very different if it had been John McDonnell’s “turn” to be the left’s candidate for Labour leader in 2015.