Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 1h

A ban on borrowing to fund government expenditure surely means huge cuts to all public services on a scale never seen before. The NHS could not survive this. Neither could the Triple Lock.

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Tom Freeman @tomfreeman.bsky.social · 1h

The role of ideas in this movement isn't as tools for understanding the world or devising ways to change it; the ideas are just mood music, vibes to make you feel edgy/radical/smart. In the phrase "intellectual energy" here, 99% of the importance comes from the "energy". www.ft.com/content/61d4...

"In the panic about young people flirting with fascism, this difference is important. Because one of the main reasons the young are drifting not just to the right, but to the radical or even far right, is its intellectual energy — a fresh fizz of ideas about the ways in which we organise society. That appeals to young people looking for something to get excited about, and something that feels like a departure from — a rebellion against — what their stodgy liberal parents believe.
And while there are plenty of prominent theorists on the right offering radical ideas — Yarvin himself argues that democracy should be replaced with monarchy — there is a distinct deficit of such thinkers, or even of new ideas, on the left. The young men who might once have been excited about Noam Chomsky’s arguments about the media manufacturing consent are now immersing themselves in the pseudonymous rightwing writer Bronze Age Pervert’s Nietzschean critiques of modernity, and his enthusiasm for pre-civilisational masculinity."

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Farrukh @implausibleblog.bsky.social · 1h

Pope Leo says that American bishops need to be more vocal and support migrant communities from being abducted by ICE in US cities

"Important that we as church give a message of hope in the midst of these horrible struggles, what's going on in some cities in the US"

"The church cannot be silent"

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 2h

The far-right doesn't always have to win. Chega had a less than stellar set of results in yesterday's local elections in Portugal. It failed to win in just about all its targets.

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Caroline de Gruyter @carolinedegruyter.bsky.social · 17h

Such a classic.
Center-right parties that start aping far-right parties harm or even demolish themselves in the process (LR, the Tories, the VVD, etc etc)

Garvan Walshe @garvanwalshe.org · 18h

Years of aggressive polarising rhetoric seem to be hurting the PP and rewarding vox.

This is usually what happens. Feijoó would do better to return to his earlier concilating persona

Europe Elects @europeelects.bsky.social · 18h

Spain, GESOP poll:

PP-EPP: 29% (-2)
PSOE-S&D: 28% (+1)
VOX-PfE: 18% (+2)
Sumar-LEFT|G/EFA: 8%
Podemos-LEFT: 4%
ERC-G/EFA: 2%
SALF-ECR|NI: 2%
Junts-NI: 1%

+/- vs. 10-12 June 2025

Fieldwork: 03-09 October 2025
Sample size: 1,000

➤ europeelects.eu/spain

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 13h

The knowledge and nuance in Luke Kelly’s voice are deeply beautiful. He makes On Raglan Road a four minute, two hour film. That is genius.

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 14h

The Junts deal was the killer. The one time he’s really messed up, IMO.

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 15h

Water management here is non-existent. So much is wasted. So little is stored. We are incredibly vulnerable. It's a huge worry - or would be if we were not so ridiculously complacent.

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 15h

Another Spanish poll showing PSOE getting within touching distance of PP. However, the far-right Vox is looking ever-stronger. Worrying.

EM-electomania.es @electomania.es · 1d

#España 🇪🇸 - encuesta GESOP (12 oct): subidón de Vox 🥦, el PSOE 🌹 a 1p del PP 💧

💧 PP: 29% (117-121)
🌹 PSOE: 27,8% (112-117)
🥦 Vox: 18,4% (68-72)
🌷 Sumar: 8% (14-16)
🪻 Podemos: 3,7% (3-4)
🍋 ERC: 2% (8-10)
🍇 Junts: 1% (4-5)

🎯 PollCheck: 5,5

👇
electomania.es/encuesta-ges...

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Hyperlexic @hyperlexic.bsky.social · 16h

They’re deliberately trying to figure out how to give Trump wins without setting precedents that future Democrats can use.

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 17h

Amy Coney Barrett defends heavy use of the shadow docket: "If we wrote a long opinion, it might give the impression that we have finally resolved the issue, and in none of these cases have we finally resolved the issue."

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David Beech @davidbeech.bsky.social · 15h

Your average voter thinks most MPs are lining their own pockets - better line of attack on money is how he earns it. Going over to the US and slagging off his country for cold hard cash for a start.

Best for Britain @bestforbritain.org · 15h

And yet he claims to understand the struggles of working people...

https://leftfootforward.org/2025/10/nigel-farage-now-earns-over-1-million-from-12-second-jobs/

Nigel Farage now earns over £1 million from his 12 ‘second jobs’

The Reform leader has raked in a further £189,000 from side jobs since May this year

leftfootforward.org

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Daniel @deargodwhatnow.bsky.social · 15h

It's legitimately been 20 years of libleft people calling Farage rich and posh and it's never ever worked. Nobody thinks he's an ex miner! People know who he is!

Best for Britain @bestforbritain.org · 15h

And yet he claims to understand the struggles of working people...

https://leftfootforward.org/2025/10/nigel-farage-now-earns-over-1-million-from-12-second-jobs/

Nigel Farage now earns over £1 million from his 12 ‘second jobs’

The Reform leader has raked in a further £189,000 from side jobs since May this year

leftfootforward.org

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Alastair Meeks @alastairmeeks.bsky.social · 15h

Last night I heard of another friend of a friend who has been lost to a rabbit hole of online propaganda. We need to start treating this as a serious public health concern.

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Lewis Baston @lewisbaston.bsky.social · 21h

It’s infuriating that so mediocre and crude a power as Russia is running rings round European democracies and that they have so many willing collaborators.

Sam Freedman @samfr.bsky.social · 1d

New post just out:

The relationship between Russia and the European radical right goes well beyond Reform's Nathan Gill being bribed.

In this post I trace the history back to the 1990s and look at the threat it poses now.

(£/free trial)

open.substack.com/pub/samf/p/r...

Russia and the rise of the radical right

Marine Le Pen meets with Putin before the 2017 French Presidential election (Photo credit Mikhail Klimentyev/AFP via Getty Images)

open.substack.com

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Prof. Stefan Rahmstorf @rahmstorf.bsky.social · 21h

High resolution images from satellite and from eddy-resolving ocean circulation models point to an ongoing decline of the Atlantic overturning circulation, a key ocean current for our climate. Read more about it in my new blog article. 🌊
www.realclimate.org/index.php/ar...

RealClimate: High-resolution ‘fingerprint’ images reveal a weakening Atlantic Ocean circulation (AMOC)

The #AMOC is the reason for Europe’s mild climate. Evidence that it is slowing has been piling up over the years – it now is likely at its weakest in at least a millennium, and it may even be approach...

www.realclimate.org

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 21h

With water supply, as with so much else, we are deeply, ruinously complacent in the UK. We just assume we will have enough. In the South West we had two years of well above average rainfall. It's taken just a few dry months to put us where we are now.

JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 22h

Reservoirs are now fuller in Spain than they are in South West England. And South West England is probably in a better position that much of the rest of the country. Across England, there is no meaningful rainfall in sight.

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ScandinoIR @scandinoir.bsky.social · 22h

...but the worrying fact is that no left-of-centre party seems to have figured out a strategy to win elections in the current environment. Being open to immigration or caving in to the racists seem to have relatively similar electoral results.

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 21h

Yep, we are terrible at water management in the UK. We just assume there will always be enough of it. As with so much else, the British are self-destructively complacent.

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 22h

Reservoirs are now fuller in Spain than they are in South West England. And South West England is probably in a better position that much of the rest of the country. Across England, there is no meaningful rainfall in sight.

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 22h

None on the horizon, sadly. If it's a dry winter next year will be absolutely brutal.

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 22h

I think Sánchez doomed himself with the Junts deal. But I really hope I'm wrong!

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 22h

The far-right has power in Italy and the Netherlands. It is on course to get it in France, Spain and the UK. We really aren't exceptional - except, perhaps, in the far-right being slightly more popular here than elsewhere because our voting system does not allow for a separate centre-right party.

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 23h

In political and social terms, the UK is a bog standard Western European country. What actually makes us different is our electoral system. But the collapse of the centre-right across much of the continent (including the UK) will mean even that becomes less of a differentiator in the future.

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David Henig @davidheniguk.bsky.social · 23h

Funny how I only ever hear stories about the EU entry scheme, not the UK equivalent...

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 23h

All true - but only fair to say that based on the polls, Spain is on course to elect an anti-immigrant (except from Latin America), very right wing government which will have actual fascists holding important ministerial posts.

Farrukh @implausibleblog.bsky.social · 1d

In the UK we have Keir -island of strangers- Starmer, whose government is driving right wing anti immigrant and asylum seeker policies

In Spain, Pedro Sánchez is not only celebrating diversity, they're embracing and speaking positively about immigrants

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