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Leon told us AI is coming for our jobs, and now the Telegraph has launched its AI travel adviser:-
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travel-expert/

Ask not for whom the bell tolls...

I won’t talk about the tech - I believe I’m still not allowed - but I will talk about the economic implications

The NYT has a piercing essay on the crash in tech/coding/computer science jobs for graduates. You can guess why. The industry is burning on the ground floor, the fire will spread to the rest of the building

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/10/technology/coding-ai-jobs-students.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

The great jobs shakedown is beginning

The more interesting thing to watch over the next couple of years will be what - if any - new jobs are created and/or in what areas there will be increased job demand.

I fear there won’t be half - a quarter - as many created as will be destroyed. Coz of my amateur scribblings in this arena I’ve gained a couple of friends and online acquaintances who are very well informed hereto. Let’s just say one of them works in N1C

And I have heard and seen scary things

I say this with no pleasure at all. Quite the opposite. I have two daughters age 19. What will they do?!?

“Hi Grok, can you write me 800 words on the future job opportunities of junior employees in a new age of technology and AI ubiquity, following the Spectator magazine’s style guide”.

As for today’s teenagers, either trade school or something that relies on human-to-human contact. That or a PhD in machine learning.

He’s a good essay on what the next few years might look like. https://x.com/gregisenberg/status/1956703650744578091

It's a good essay for the gullible. Generative AI will have important impacts, but most of that is fantasy.

Surely something must be in motion as half of Europes leaders aren’t going to go all the way to the US for nothing.

What's in motion is this. Trumpism thinks that the western alliance should be a European thing, not a USA + Europe + Canada thing. The USA sphere of influence is wanted elsewhere.

Trumpism also thinks that Russia's sphere of influence should include part of eastern Europe, boundaries in the long run to be decided by Russia and Europe, not USA.

Western Europe wants the alliance to be the whole of NATO, including of course the USA. The USA can abandon Europe whenever it likes but is not yet ready to make it undeniably obvious that it has switched sides. The frog boils more slowly than that.

Western Europe is wondering how to get ready for that day. And is currently temporising.

So where do you think he thinks the USA should be directing its economic and military might?

The first into his pockets.
The second, against his domestic opponents.

There must come a point (surely) when the US media stops reporting the batshit insane things DementiaDon says, and starts reporting the consequences.

Inflation is rising. Tariffs are hurting US consumers. Armed vigilanties are detaining citizens in the street. Putin is dictating foreign policy.

It might be the media that does for The Donald but I suspect he will go the same way as Boris, whose colleagues eventually tired of being sent out to lie for him, only to discover later on that the official story had changed anyway.

Different power dynamics.

Boris's ministers knew that they had a mandate and position independent of Big Dog. Their career prospects were enhanced by dumping their leader.

Donald's ministers are probably out when the Orange One goes. Probably sooner than that, if they are too disloyal too early.

Afternoon all

It seems the group of leftie trots who call themselves the horse racing industry has now turned on the Government:

https://www.racingpost.com/news/britain/british-racing-to-stage-one-day-strike-on-september-10-in-protest-at-tax-plans-aUEGP3k057u5/

Let's be clear - there's a lot of politics at work in this but the underlying issue is the fear of what will happen of the tax on betting (Betting Duty) is harmonised with the tax on games of chance (Remote Gaming Duty). The former is 15% which comes out of bookies profits (to which as you know I am a regular and valued contributor) and the latter is 21% which comes out of the numbskulls who play the FOBTs in betting shops, mini casinos and the like and includes betting on "virtual" racing at Paddy Park, Comeondowns and all the other ludicrous names for imaginary courses.

The claim is the industry will "lose" £66 million if the taxes are harmonised and the bookies have to pay more to HMRC. This will ripple back through racing in terms of sponsorship and other areas. At the same time, there's a fear bookies will be less "generous" with their odds forcing serious punters to the black market.

Needless to say, this won't bother the likes of Coolmore and Godolphin but will likely impact the smaller players (doesn't it always?). The race courses will probably hike their prieces to make up the shortfall and then whinge when they can't get anyone through the gates.

With foal numbers in decline, the attraction of six race cards with four or five runners in each race isn't obvious from a punting perspective but if you've got £60,000 down the back of the sofa to back the SNP, good luck to you.

@SkyNews

BREAKING: France's president Emmanuel Macron and Finnish president Alexander Stubb are the latest European leaders to say they will attend Zelenskyy and Trump's meeting

Is that a good thing? Is this a Z/T meeting or a meeting at which Z/T are among the participants?

Nobody, including and perhaps least of all, the attendees has any fucking clue. It's make-it-up-as-go-along school of statecraft.

It's probably a combination of FOMO from the European leaders, nobody wants to be the first lift sanctions on Russia but also they definitely don't want to be the last, and DJT enjoying summoning them across the Atlantic so he can be rude/incomprehensible to them.

I think they should all send body doubles.

But really shit ones, like the rubbish waxworks of famous people in those Madame Tussaud’s rip-offs.

Maybe they could send Mark Kermode for Keir Starmer.

That's quite a good one. Definitely close enough to fool Trump, I think.

They could send David Lammy in place of Keir and it would fool Trump.

They could send a fucking scatter cushion instead of David Lammy, to anywhere on earth, and no one would notice the intellectual difference

David Lammy, the Harvard-educated lawyer who got Britain a better trade deal?

No, David Lammy who thinks Henry VII came AFTER Henry VIII

That would be the Cambridge-educated David Lammy. It's easy to get them confused.