David Gooda
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davidgooda.bsky.social
David Gooda
@davidgooda.bsky.social
North west. Irish diaspora. Housing, reading, running, cooking. Grown-up children are no less time-consuming.
Reposted by David Gooda
Ultimately the minimum wage is a brilliant tool, but it can’t compensate for “we haven’t built any housing”, “we have cut cash transfers to the bone” and “all the third spaces have been cut to pay for social care”.
The minimum wage is not a cure all — we’re asking too much of business
Politicians spend too much time uttering cheap rhetoric about cheap labour
www.ft.com
November 25, 2025 at 12:46 PM
Happy St Katherine's Day to all scholars, librarians, and Katherines. May you win an argument against an annoying man today, in the true spirit of Katherine herself.
November 25, 2025 at 11:09 AM
Reposted by David Gooda
"Europe’s problem is not that it lacks options. It is that it refuses to use them". Jade McGlynn skewers both the Dmitriev/Witkoff plan for Ukraine's destruction, & Europe's refusal to act decisively enough to prevent disaster. open.substack.com/pub/smalldee...
Circus
Amidst the absolute chaos of a Witkoff-stamped Russian psyop-as-peace plan, discussion is filled with anger at Washington and at Moscow.
open.substack.com
November 25, 2025 at 9:43 AM
Reposted by David Gooda
I suspect the Government will come to regret not taking the opportunity to free itself from a manifesto that basically leaves it administering the post-Brexit economy and state.

It's a lot to ask of industrial policy and a bit of deregulation to structurally shift things.

Hope I'm wrong.
November 25, 2025 at 8:03 AM
Reposted by David Gooda
Glasman: 'We will keep fighting the 1955 general election until you give us the RIGHT answer!'
The newspaper of British Conservativism: 'What a necessary voice!'
November 24, 2025 at 11:56 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
Still no better heuristic for revealing a politician or public figure's deep unseriousness than checking whether or not they are a climate sceptic.
The so-called “Global Warming Policy Foundation”, generally recognised as a #ClimateDenial lobby group, has Lord #Glasman giving its annual lecture…..
November 24, 2025 at 6:50 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
Given the PM loves a flag-waving presser about something patriotic, i don't get why govt is not now in full 'launch an inquiry on foreign interference in UK politics' given this week we've had Nathan Gill jailed over Russian bribes, Chinese spies again, & this www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article...
MAGA X accounts exposed as being run from far-flung foreign countrie
The rollout has hit the MAGA movement particularly hard, with high-profile accounts which often post about election results and Trump's anti-immigration agenda linked to far-flung foreign nations.
www.dailymail.co.uk
November 24, 2025 at 3:40 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
Still reeling from the Stanford report on Brexit. Reduced GDP by up to 8% and investment by as much as 18%. The UK Treasury would have £40 billion more each year if Britain had remained in the EU. Devastating self-immolation.
The Economic Impact of Brexit
Other
siepr.stanford.edu
November 24, 2025 at 11:02 AM
Reposted by David Gooda
See also councils as utilities/ land developers with a sideline in public services.
Essentially the best way to run a railway is for it to be owned by a development corporation, and then frankly whether that corporation is state owned or privately owned is sort of a much of a muchness:
The missing piece in Labour’s rail renationalisation scheme
Whether trains are public or private is not the deal-breaker for a well-functioning service — it is about a better delivery model
www.ft.com
November 24, 2025 at 11:13 AM
This is such a significant decision. Where is the coverage?
November 23, 2025 at 11:34 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
The difficult truth is that there is a clear national security element to social media information flows. It can't all be viewed through the single lens of free speech. Disinformation sabotage is a hostile act intended to destablise our societies. Our societies need appropriate protection.
November 23, 2025 at 7:08 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
If I’m understanding this correctly, X is owned by a white nationalist who pays poor people of color in developing countries to pretend to be working class white Americans to scare other white Americans into being afraid poor people of color from developing countries are going to ruin America?
November 23, 2025 at 7:30 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
Although the scale of this is still to be assessed, this is the inevitable outcome of the monetization of the algorithm. Rage-bait becomes a personal revenue model. Nothing about this should be a surprise.
NEWS: I spent the past 24 hours going through major MAGA accounts on Twitter, and a bombshell development has become clear: most of the right-wing ecosphere is being fed propaganda from foreign actors.

This impacts elections. This impacts discourse. This is major. Subscribe to support my work:
NEWS: Major MAGA Accounts on Twitter Exposed as Foreign Actors
A stunning development over the past 24 hours.
open.substack.com
November 23, 2025 at 8:02 PM
Amazing. Lionel Nimrod People Are My People.

So much of my adolescent thought was influenced by late 80’s/early 90’s R4 comedy. Surely there’s an authoritative account out there somewhere?
The story of early Lee And Herring vehicle Lionel Nimrod's Inexplicable World - one of the best radio comedy series of all time, and the fact that it isn't better remembered and more celebrated is a mystery worthy of investigation by Lionel Nimrod himself

timworthington.org/2019/04/25/c...
Come With Me Now, Into The Swirling Mists Of Human Inadequacy…
The just about explicable story of Stewart Lee and Richard Herring’s first ever comedy show – Lionel Nimrod’s Inexplicable World.
timworthington.org
November 23, 2025 at 7:01 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
Here’s this week’s column, in which I beg the chancellor to go big this week - on both headroom and narrative - so that by next year, if she’s still here to deliver it, the budget will be boring, because we all know the plan 🙏🏻
www.theguardian.com/business/202...
Rachel Reeves, please, let’s make budgets boring again | Heather Stewart
Budgets need to be reassuringly dull with no repeat of this year’s long, drawn-out and chaotic buildup
www.theguardian.com
November 23, 2025 at 3:49 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
Those who are pursuing increasingly racialised politics lecture the rest of us about how we are out of touch.

All the time, it is they who have fundamentally misread the public.

Yes, people want managed migration. No, they do not want the country torn apart by aggressive nationalism.
Why do people think England flags have been raised on lampposts?

White adults
National pride: 26%
Anti-migrant/minority sentiment: 49%
Both: 19%

Ethnic minority adults
National pride: 15%
Anti-migrant/minority sentiment: 55%
Both: 20%

yougov.co.uk/society/arti...
November 23, 2025 at 7:56 AM
Reposted by David Gooda
Big organizations are buying it because they think they have to, as there is a decent chunk of money that’s made just swindling execs. But that isn’t even really working! Everybody is doing cargo cult shit. Tech companies only know how to spend money and send 3000 Patagonia apes into your inbox.
November 22, 2025 at 11:37 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
This isn’t institutional capture. It’s a parallel epistemic system built outside medicine, using influencer dynamics, curated anecdotes, and spiritualised autonomy to replace verification, deliberation, and accountability.
November 22, 2025 at 11:54 AM
Reposted by David Gooda
Loads of shabby crap badly-used late Victorian 2 storey blocks on almost every thoroughfare outside Central London, pull them all down and build 5 storey mixed residential above commercial ground floor. I've been saying it for a decade.
November 22, 2025 at 3:53 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
Quite difficult to be a good citizen, and do all the things a good citizen is supposed to stay on top of, if the civic institutions are falling apart.

But just you watch: if I paint anti-pee paint on a TFL station without permission I bet the justice system will spring into action!!
November 22, 2025 at 2:24 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
Newmarket MP Matt Hancock gave a £37bn Covid testing contract to Jockey Club director Dido Harding, who subcontracted it to Grand National sponsor Randox, employer of Tory MP Owen Paterson, whose late wife chaired Aintree racecourse. That's how the Tories handled the pandemic.
November 22, 2025 at 12:42 PM
Not only stupid: also lazy.
No shock here: The Guardian notes several phrases in the U.S. peace proposal to Ukraine appear to be directly translated from Russian.

One standout is the line “It is expected that Russia will not invade neighboring countries,” a clunky English phrasing mirroring the Russian “ожидается.”
November 21, 2025 at 6:51 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
As the Budget looms, Labour is ignoring the most obvious cause of Britain's economic woes: Brexit. Latest column www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
Rachel Reeves is studiously ignoring the cause of Britain’s woes: the Brexit-shaped hole in its roof | Jonathan Freedland
The autumn budget will mop up some damage, but the true source of the economic crisis is clear. The government should now fix it – tragically, it won’t, says Guardian columnist Jonathan Freedland
www.theguardian.com
November 21, 2025 at 6:33 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
Ukraine is on the brink of an historic betrayal by Trump to Putin.

Keir Starmer must bring our European allies together to back Zelensky, starting by seizing frozen Russian assets to support Ukraine.
November 21, 2025 at 5:16 PM
Reposted by David Gooda
Increasingly think private equity has been curse for the UK. Asset stripping the high street - and all encouraged by the government through favourable tax treatment.
The Curse of Private Equity

Asda to raise £568m in sale and leaseback of stores.

Company loaded with debt, cut staffing, wages.

Already sold most of its warehouses and 25 supermarkets in sale and leaseback deals. Asset stripping continues.

Company losing market share.

What next?
Asda to raise £568m in store sell-off as sales continue to fall
Supermarket still losing market share despite effort under Allan Leighton to win over customers with price cuts
www.theguardian.com
November 21, 2025 at 9:09 AM