John Rogers wanders the City of London's passages and alleywaysI sometimes wonder if one of the reasons the "London isn't safe" propaganda has gained such a hold is that the city has changed so much in recent decades. I hardly recognise the skyline from the days when I worked there in the 1980s. But maybe London has always been like that. Go back another 40 years from when I knew it well and you would find a very different cityscape of bombsites and ruins. Still, a lot of "the old London" remains. In fact, I was surprised how much of it John Rogers found on this walk. Here's his ... (more) |
The fault, dear Mandy, is not in your stars, but in yourselfEmbed from Getty ImagesSomeone once asked Max Clifford: "Max, if you're so brilliant at public relations, why does everyone think you're a cunt?" Similarly, I would like to ask Peter Mandelson why, if he's such a master of the dark arts, he's always being found out. Perhaps the answer is to be found in this character sketch by John Crace: Betrayal is Mandelson's lifeblood. It's there in his treatment of Wes Streeting. Poor trusting Wes. A man more used to stabbing others in the back. Wes looked up to Mandy. Treated him as a mentor. How did Peter repay him? ... (more) |
People who never use AI are very bad at spotting AI-generated textAI use is seeping out of business and science writing and into the world of literature. And that, says Malin Hay in a post on the London Review of Books blog, is a problem, because literary editors may be the worst equipped to spot text generated by it: Experimenters in the US last year showed nine subjects a series of articles, half written by humans and half generated by ChatGPT, Claude and other large language models. Asked to guess which of the texts were human, the four subjects who rarely or never used ChatGPT in their daily lives scored "at ... (more) |
Will Labour close the 'Trump loophole' in its political reform plans?The latest edition of my email newsletter about work in Parliament, A Lord's Eye View, is out and you can also read it in full below. But if you'd like to get future editions emailed direct to you as soon as they are published, sign up now: The government is right to want to protect our democracy from being flooded by dodgy foreign money. But as I've highlighted before, their plans leave far too many loopholes. So I took the chance today to raise this topic again, this time using Donald Trump as an example. Did someone share this with ... (more) |
Mathew on Monday: Pluralism Means More Than a SloganOn Saturday I travelled down to London to attend the Compass and Progressive Economy Forum's Change: NOW! Conference, which brought together around 700 people from across the progressive spectrum for what felt like a serious and timely conversation about the future of politics in Britain. In an age of deep political fragmentation, rising populism and the growing threat posed by Nigel Farage and Reform UK there was something very refreshing about spending a day at an event where people were prepared to engage with those beyond their own political tribe. Speakers included Caroline Lucas, Vince Cable, Zack Polanski, Clive Lewis ... (more) |
How much must we pay for the fantasies of Mayor Rotheram?Another week another undeliverable scheme comes from Mayor Rotherham and the Merseyside Combined Authority. This time it was a reaffirmation of the Central Station plan which had been announced at the start of the year. And this is not the only Mayoral fantasy. The other is the Mersey Barrage which has been discussed ever since I first became a councillor 51 years ago (I had 8 years off for good behaviour, so I have only completed 43 years so far!) And how could I forget the third 'back of a fag packet' offering from Mr Mayor which is making the ... (more) |
Are deepfakes a threat to democracy?The Independent reports on warnings by a leading think tank that the UK is facing a "democratic emergency", after new polling revealed around 16.5 million UK adults saw political deepfakes in the month before the local elections. The paper says the poll found that almost one in three (30 per cent) voters said they had seen a deepfake or AI-generated video, audio clip or image about an election candidate or politician online in the lead-up to this month's elections: The polling of 2,005 adults was conducted by Opinium for the cross-party think tank Demos between 30 April and 6 May ... (more) |
The Joy of Six 1526Daniel Katz report that the Makerfield by-election has become a poisoned chalice for Reform UK because of its choice of candidate. "Over the past couple of decades, many progressives have found themselves in an awkward and novel position. As defenders of existing political institutions, as defenders of norms of civility and moderation, as technocratic policymakers shifting policies at the margin in response to past evidence."Ben Ansell argues that the left has ceded political radicalism to the right. Lorna Finlayson defends universities as a 'space for exceptions': "The perception is that students and academics do nothing all day but doss around ... (more) |
Nicola Sturgeon - we can have sympathy for her as a deceived wife, but there are serious questions to answer about governance of the SNPWe need to separate two things in the Peter Murrell case. As a wife, I accept in good faith Ms Sturgeon's statement that she was deceived and lied to and knew nothing about the use of SNP money by her husband to buy many things. But the role of a wife is very different from the role of leading the party in power in Scotland. There are things like audits, presentation of accounts at AGMs, certification of accounts, sign offs, invoice verification, purchase orders etc. The whole governance structure. The whole compliance edifice in the SNP has failed dramatically – ... (more) |
Jill Sobule: I Kissed A GirlWhen Jill Sobule died last year, GLAAD reported: Sobule's manager, John Porter, said in a statement to media: "Jill Sobule was a force of nature and human rights advocate whose music is woven into our culture. I was having so much fun working with her. I lost a client and a friend today. I hope her music, memory, & legacy continue to live on and inspire others." Long before Katy Perry's version, in 1995, Sobule released a song titled "I Kissed a Girl" and it hit the mainstream making history by becoming the first song with blatantly queer themes to ... (more) |