Best Of

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Okay something is seriously kicking off in Iran. But it’s good that a comedian has some of the best takes on the situation.

https://x.com/omid9/status/2017631358030381188

Absolutely nothing confirmed and currently zero on the mainstream TV channels. But news of multiple bombings targeting IRGC strongholds is flooding in on the Telegram channels. At the risk of sounding like Gillette soccer Saturday, these are the cities:

Bandar Abbas
Ahvaz
Khorramshahr
Abadan
Qasr-e Shirin
Parand
Qeshm
Dezful
Reports of explosions in places like Qeshm and at the Qom Governor's Office building.

Just to cover my tracks currently waiting for Chris Kamara to verify.

So what sparked the recent unrest in Iran? Could it have been foreign interference? My Dad has these books in his office room I read when I was small, where, before Sov Bloc attacked Mega City One, they sowed chaos and lawlessness in Mega City One, to soften it up and it take its eye off what they were up to.

Well, the regime is only in place because (a) they don't allow opponents to stand in elections, and (b) they have a highly efficient security service that tortures and kills opponents. (Come to mention it, that sounds a bit like Russia too.)

Add to which, over the past 20 years, Iranians have gotten poorer and even less free.

The proximate cause of unrest is the fact that oil prices have come down, the regime was weakened by US strikes, and sanctions are biting. There have also been a lot of protests in recent years -such as the one over the killing of the girl by the religious police- so the anger (particularly in urban Iran) is palpable.

And at some point resisting the regime becomes less painful than sticking with it.

Pollution gets everywhere.

I just remember Alec Guinness saying that word so reluctantly in Star Wars whenever I hear it...

As a fine Shakespearean, you'd think he'd have been gotten accustomed to it.

Fixed.

Okay, here goes:

#competition @Benpointer

1. Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? 0
2. Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? 0
3. Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 44
4. Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 22
5. UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). Reform, 14%
6. Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 16%
7. Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 12
8. The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Sir Keir Starmer
9. Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? No
10. UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £165bn
11. UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.3%
12. Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. Spain.

You think the midterms are off?

I think the House could be a handful of seats either way, more likely to the Dems but everyone’s saying that already.

Unlikely that much changes in the Senate, plus or minus one.

Really? "A handful of [House] seats either way"? Excuse if I book mark that one.

You certainly can.

Most people have gone for 3-20 seats, so I said 0 to be on the edge. I suspect it’s about 5 seats’ swing.

The reality is that the gerrymandering of the US House is now so bad, that there’s very few marginal seats any more.

Andrew Neil BA argument update.

Delta flies direct from Nice to New York, and have sold him a first class return for €3k, which seems awfully cheap!

https://x.com/afneil/status/2017660593935728764

But Delta fist class isn’t Emirates first class, let alone BA first class.

He isn't wrong on BA though. I had the misfortune flying with them once last year, never again. Victor Meldrew attitude from staff, appalling food, no proper internet, and planes that appear like they haven't been upgraded for 20 years.

Then you fly Qater or Emirates or Singapore...and you are like never ever ever again on BA. The low cost Chinese carrier I flew on internally in China were better than bloody BA.

The comment from a friend who works as BA cabin crew is that they are trying to run a high end airline with Ryan air style pay and conditions but without the shiny new planes.

If you’re BA cabin crew, you have no idea what Ryanair cabin crew Ts&Cs actually look like.

Experienced BA CC make £60k+, Ryanair CC make minimum wage.

During COVID, BA tried firing cabin staff to re-hire on minimum wage + 50p

Strangely, the staff were not impressed.

...

Andrew Neil BA argument update.

Delta flies direct from Nice to New York, and have sold him a first class return for €3k, which seems awfully cheap!

https://x.com/afneil/status/2017660593935728764

But Delta fist class isn’t Emirates first class, let alone BA first class.

He isn't wrong on BA though. I had the misfortune flying with them once last year, never again. Victor Meldrew attitude from staff, appalling food, no proper internet, and planes that appear like they haven't been upgraded for 20 years.

Then you fly Qater or Emirates or Singapore...and you are like never ever ever again on BA. The low cost Chinese carrier I flew on internally in China were better than bloody BA.

The comment from a friend who works as BA cabin crew is that they are trying to run a high end airline with Ryan air style pay and conditions but without the shiny new planes.

If you’re BA cabin crew, you have no idea what Ryanair cabin crew Ts&Cs actually look like.

Experienced BA CC make £60k+, Ryanair CC make minimum wage.

During COVID, BA tried firing cabin staff to re-hire on minimum wage + 50p

Strangely, the staff were not impressed.

First BA had a King, then a Marshal(l) before winding up with a Willie.

*Not my gag I am afraid.

Okay, here goes:

#competition @Benpointer

1. Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? 0
2. Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? 0
3. Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 44
4. Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 22
5. UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). Reform, 14%
6. Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 16%
7. Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 12
8. The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Sir Keir Starmer
9. Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? No
10. UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £165bn
11. UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.3%
12. Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. Spain.

You think the midterms are off?

I think the House could be a handful of seats either way, more likely to the Dems but everyone’s saying that already.

Unlikely that much changes in the Senate, plus or minus one.

Really? "A handful of [House] seats either way"? Excuse if I book mark that one.

Interesting article in The Hill explaining why a 2018 blue wave is now almost impossible given the level of gerrymandering: https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/5670071-blue-wave-slimmed-2026/

Put simply, there are far, far fewer competitive districts than there used to be. And, following the redistricting in California this applies both ways. There is so much wrong with what the Americans still insist is a democracy but if they wanted a place to start redistricting would surely be it.

One Harris error I haven't seen mentioned: The Democratic Party did not provide for voters to have a say in her choice, through primaries and caucuses.

It was her turn. She was entitled. They needed to shut up and suck it up.

Actually, I don't think most of the Senior Dems really wanted Harris; I think they just knew that trying to do a Primary in just three weeks was going to be next to impossible. (Remember, they couldn't even do the Iowa caucuses right in 2020.)

Yes the problems started when they insisted that Biden was running again, well beyond the point where it was clear he was too old.

Then the debate happened, when the President was barely coherent, and they were stuck between a rock and a hard place.

The blame lies with those around Biden who quite liked having the power to themselves, with an old man as the figurehead not challenging them at all.

Basically, no one wanted to be the person that stuck the knife in, and so they decided that the easiest way to get rid of Biden was for him to make a fool of himself on national TV.

Which is a pretty stupid strategy, when you think of it.

If one of them had some courage earler -particularly Harris- then there would have a competitive primary, and who knows what would have happened then.

And that's not a problem unique to the Dems.

Nobody with actual current power in the Republican party wanted to be the one to stick the knife into him either. Except that Trump is impossible to embarass, so the "embarass him on national TV" strategy wasn't an option either.

Sometimes the relevant aphorism isn't that the early bird catches the worm, but that the second mouse gets the cheese.

That's a fair point.

Being generous, Trump is cleraely less switched on in early 2026 than he was in early 2024, and in turn was less switched on then than he was in 2016.

The 2028 edition is going to be a sight to behold then.

Okay something is seriously kicking off in Iran. But it’s good that a comedian has some of the best takes on the situation.

https://x.com/omid9/status/2017631358030381188

Absolutely nothing confirmed and currently zero on the mainstream TV channels. But news of multiple bombings targeting IRGC strongholds is flooding in on the Telegram channels. At the risk of sounding like Gillette soccer Saturday, these are the cities:

Bandar Abbas
Ahvaz
Khorramshahr
Abadan
Qasr-e Shirin
Parand
Qeshm
Dezful
Reports of explosions in places like Qeshm and at the Qom Governor's Office building.

Just to cover my tracks currently waiting for Chris Kamara to verify.

So what sparked the recent unrest in Iran? Could it have been foreign interference? My Dad has these books in his office room I read when I was small, where, before Sov Bloc attacked Mega City One, they sowed chaos and lawlessness in Mega City One, to soften it up and it take its eye off what they were up to.

Well, the regime is only in place because (a) they don't allow opponents to stand in elections, and (b) they have a highly efficient security service that tortures and kills opponents. (Come to mention it, that sounds a bit like Russia too.)

Add to which, over the past 20 years, Iranians have gotten poorer and even less free.

The proximate cause of unrest is the fact that oil prices have come down, the regime was weakened by US strikes, and sanctions are biting. There have also been a lot of protests in recent years -such as the one over the killing of the girl by the religious police- so the anger (particularly in urban Iran) is palpable.

And at some point resisting the regime becomes less painful than sticking with it.

Pollution gets everywhere.

I just remember Alec Guinness saying that word so reluctantly in Star Wars whenever I hear it...

Ok...

#competition @Benpointer

1. Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? 19
2. Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? 2
3. Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 46
4. Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 22
5. UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). Reform, 17%
6. Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17%
7. Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 12
8. The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Emmanuel Macron
9. Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? No
10. UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £165bn
11. UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 1.7%
12. Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. England!

I'd love to see your workings for Q8!

My entry which I will post on Monday has the PM as Mark Carney.

Basically my working is Trump continues to be a dickhead and the Anglo-Canadian Union is formed, Robert might be using the same logic and we have the Anglo-French Union.

By the year end ?

It's an interesting question. I recognise there's a very large component of normalcy bias in my (and most other) guesses, and I'm troubled by the.

OTOH, while I confidently expect to be WAY out on some predictions, it's far harder to say which way, by the year end.

Yes, my view was Trump in a fit of pique ends up not supporting Ukraine/backing Russia (I mean how could we tell?) and before we know the Russia bear expands its tentacles much further across Europe, and Trump buggering NATO, we might end up like the Franco-British Union Churchill proposed in 1940.

Bears have tentacles?

Following the success of the brilliant Sharktopus…