Best Of

What an awful brother the King is.

King Charles considers removing Prince Andrew’s Duke of York title

Relations between the brothers are said to be at tipping point after scandals involving Jeffrey Epstein and alleged spying by China

https://www.thetimes.com/uk/royal-family/article/king-charles-prince-andrew-duke-york-title-news-hlcgmjlwb

The response of the King seems quite mild, given the fact that Andrew has clearly misled the court as well as the media concerning his relationship with the Epstein circle. If I were the King I would be incandescent that his brother has clearly lied to his face. More to the point, there is the open question of what else Andrew has been doing that is, shall we say, unlikely to be popular in the country at large.

If, as I think we may suspect, it includes highly problematic financial arrangements, I think that Andrew will be exiled to the outer darkness for the rest of his life. Certainly the Prince of Wales seems to be of this opinion. This is notwithstanding the attempts of Beatrice and Eugenie to stay in good standing with the court, which I think are completely doomed.

Ironically it is not the size of the Royal family that is the problem- the Duke of Kent and the Gloucesters have been doing sterling work, as have the Edinburghs and the Princess Royal and Sir Tim... even Zara and Mike. The Yorks on the other hand...

It’s rare for someone not to possess a single redeeming feature, but I think Andrew achieves that distinction.

A friend of mine wrote a wonderful adult Harry Potter fanfic, where even Bellatrix is horrified by what she sees inside Andrew’s mind. She hands him over to Fenrir Greyback, to punish as he sees fit.

“Like you, Fenrir’s an animal, but even so, he has some standards, and he thinks you’ve fallen short of them.”

The curious thing is that the late Queen seemed very fond of Andrew. Perhaps it was as simple as being a person that only a mother could love.

In his 20s Andrew was actually quite good looking and dashing and after having flown helicopters in the Falklands War relatively popular as a war hero.

His older brother though was seen as rather stuffy, old fashioned, with overly large ears and strange interests such as talking to trees and soon overshadowed by his much more glamorous and charismatic and warm wife Princess Diana

You know, flying helicopters is actually quite hard. Flying them on and off ships is even harder. What a shame he couldn't stick with the whole piloting thing.

He just would have ended up flying Epstein one day and it would all go the same way.

Exclusive: Bridget Phillipson Says Electing Lucy Powell Deputy Labour Leader Will Cost Party Next Election

https://x.com/HuffPostUKPol/status/1979216057869971739

I mean we know Lucy Powell is quite shit, but not sure that is Labour's core issue.

I doubt the average voter has even heard of Lucy Powell, let alone will decide their vote on whether she is Labour Deputy Leader or not

We’ve had a lot of newsworthy Lucys recently. Bloodthirsty baby killer / innocent victim of miscarriage of justice Lucy Letby, bloodthirsty inciter of racist Arson / blessed martyr of the woke mafia Lucy Connolly, and now [Burnham stan account / saviour of Labour?] Lucy Powell.

Whither the next Lucy?

Lucy Beaumont
Lucy Fallon
Lucy Bronze

Excellent and really important work by @AyoubKhanMP . Maccabi Tel Aviv fans behaviour has been shocking and the fact they remain in European competition is a stain on the sport we all love

https://x.com/themuslimvoteuk/status/1978955958815437063?s=46&t=CW4pL-mMpTqsJXCdjW0Z6Q

When I have time I look forward to reading all his comments demanding that fans from teams who have violent racist ultras are also banned, some of the Italian and Central European teams are terrible for this.

The solution while requiring considerable policing, ought to be quite simple.

Hold the match at a neutral venue, limiting the numbers so that opposing fans can be well segregated, and ban for life anyone initiating violence.

Sectarianism cannot be allowed to prevail.

The wailing on behalf of the Maccabi fans on here is bizarre. Invert it and imagine a bunch of ultras from an Islamic country marauding around Jewish parts of London and threatening to kill them.

I think in both scenarios you can make a case against collective punishment, and for asking the police to follow an intelligence-led approach.

That's generally been quite successful with football-related violence, so you'd expect that liaising with the Israeli police would be useful.

And then a few arrests of people who are calling for violence against the visiting football fans, and I think you could go a long way towards heading off any trouble.

The most important point seems to be that the police haven't banned visiting fans on the basis of the violence they might be guilty of perpetrating, but due to the risk of other people perpetrating violence against them. I've come across this attitude from the police before, of asking victims to modify their behaviour rather than confronting criminals. It's the wrong approach.