Ian Taylor

Husband, father, SF fan, Guardian & Listener crossword fan, retired IT professional, Newcastle United fan & Lancashire cricket supporter.

[Parody Nigel Farage @Parody_PM]

https://t.co/a6RA9P6hwD

[Uilliam @liamodaily]

@Adam_Pearson Made my election contribution ! vote Binface 2026 !

[Ian Taylor @Dev_IanT]

@marc_taylor @RuthFox01 not to mention the entire country in that it will cost us £250k.

[Sam @SamCKx]

The answer is this:

I sincerely believe Nigel Farage is the most corrupt politician in the history of British politics by an order of magnitute. He has personally enriched himself to the tune of at least £7 million in the last 24 months, whilst working families still suffer the disasterous consequences of Brexit.

Reform, and everything it stands for, poses an existential threat to the British way of life, to civil liberties and the very fabric of Britain. Reform is a wolf in sheep's clothing; it could not be further from representing the best interests of ordinary working families. Farage proves that every single day.

I hope that answers your question?

[Ian Taylor @Dev_IanT]

@StevePaul63 @David__Osland and who do you think funded Johnson's flights of fancy?

[Gianl1974 @Gianl1974]

*BRITISH WRITER PENS THE BEST DESCRIPTION OF TRUMP*
Someone asked "Why do some British people not like Donald Trump?" Nate White, an articulate and witty writer from England wrote the following response:

A few things spring to mind. Trump lacks certain qualities which the British traditionally esteem. For instance, he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities, funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed.
So for us, the stark contrast does rather throw Trump's limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief.
Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever.
I don't say that rhetorically, I mean it quite literally: not once, not ever. And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humour is almost inhuman.
But with Trump, it's a fact. He doesn't even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty. Trump is a troll. And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers.
And scarily, he doesn't just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness. There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It's all surface.
Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront. Well, we don't. We see it as having no inner world, no soul. And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist. Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that. He's not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat. He's more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege.
And worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully. That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a snivelling sidekick instead.
There are unspoken rules to this stuff – the Queensberry rules of basic decency – and he breaks them all. He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless or female – and he kicks them when they are down. So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think 'Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy' is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that:
• Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and most are.
• You don't need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man.
This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss.
After all, it's impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form; he is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit. His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum. God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid. He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart. In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump.

[Ian Taylor @Dev_IanT]

@jivinmalc @rj_abel @mssassysally if you hold Ed responsible for that to that degree, then the entire Tory government during Covid would be on trial for mass murder.

[Ian Taylor @Dev_IanT]

@PollingReportUK @reformparty_uk -Please stop pretending that this is a serious poll. This is biased fantasy. Fortunately.

[Ian Taylor @Dev_IanT]

@Ww3truthsayer @JohnCleese he's been given £5m by a benefactor, which he claims is not political. That's enough. Trump is a danger to the entire world and is doing his best to get rid of democracy in the US. How anyone can say he's doing a good job is quite terrifying.

[Ian Taylor @Dev_IanT]

@Ww3truthsayer @JohnCleese even Johnson at his worst was nothing compared to Trump, nor to Farage.

[Ian Taylor @Dev_IanT]

@DJW1991 @tnewtondunn I disagree. 'Posh' Lib Dem strongholds like Sutton could most definitely vote for Green, especially if it was an STV system rather than pure PR.

[Ian Taylor @Dev_IanT]

@FiraxisGames Civilization 2, many years ago. I still miss the Throne room.

[Ian Taylor @Dev_IanT]

@spursey10157435 @clairebubblepop They don't commit crime? You mean they don't personally commit violent crime. They could be responsible for all sorts of crimes such as fraud.

Also they do not spend anything like the same percentage of their income as a poorer person does.

[Ian Taylor @Dev_IanT]

@MarkVipond @afneil I don't think any Tory supporter can take the high ground on matters of resignation.

[Ian Taylor @Dev_IanT]

@MarkVipond @afneil This is nowhere near as bad as Boris and I bet you weren't shouting for his resignation.

[James Tate @JamesTate121]

Too on point not to share, “Aussie reply to Trump rant about NATO not being there for us.

Mate. You run a country with 600,000 homeless people sleeping on the street tonight. A country where 40% of adults can't cover a $400 emergency without borrowing money. A country where insulin costs more than a car payment and people are rationing it to survive. A country where medical debt is the number 1 cause of bankruptcy. A country where women are dying in hospital car parks because doctors are too scared of abortion laws to treat a miscarriage.
You lock up more of your own citizens than any nation on earth. More than China. More than Russia. More than North Korea. The land of the free has 2 million people in cages, and a quarter of them haven't even been convicted of anything. They're just too poor to make bail.
Your life expectancy is going backwards. You're the only developed nation where that's happening. Your infant mortality rate is worse than Cuba's. Your kids do active shooter drills between maths and English while you sell the gunmaker's stock to your mates.
Your minimum wage hasn't moved in 15 years. You've got teachers working 2 jobs and veterans sleeping under bridges and you just spent a trillion dollars flattening a country that didn't attack you.
And you’ve got a convicted felon, adjudicating raping, paedophile protecting, porn star shagging insurrectionist running the biggest dumpster fire war campaign since the Taliban thanked you very much for losing again.
And you're calling Greenland poorly run?
Greenland has universal healthcare. Free education. One of the lowest incarceration rates in the world. Nobody goes bankrupt there because they got sick. Nobody dies in a waiting room because their insurance said no.
"NATO wasn't there when we needed them." When exactly was that, champ? September 11? Because NATO invoked Article 5 for the first and only time in history FOR YOU. Soldiers from dozens of countries deployed, fought, bled, and died in Afghanistan FOR YOU. Australia wasn't even in NATO and we still showed up. For 20 years.
And you pulled out at 2am without telling anyone and left them to deal with the mess.
So maybe before you start calling other countries poorly run, have a look at your own backyard, you spray-tanned aluminium siding salesman. The only thing poorly run in this picture is your fucking mouth. Credit (borrowed from) Jim Scroggins - original author 📷 unknown”

[Ian Taylor @Dev_IanT]

@PollingReportUK @FindoutnowUK Absolute fantasy. Who the hell are you asking?

[NASA @NASA]

Make new friends, but keep the old.

A new photo captures the Moon's near side on the right (the side we see from Earth, identifiable by its dark splotches) and its far side on the left. The Artemis II crew are the first to see the far side with human eyes.

[Ian Taylor @Dev_IanT]

@DanielGoldersUK @OlIyCFC @reformparty_uk Most of those are the fault of the Tory government and the censorship stuff affects everyone. If you think anything will get better under Reform you are seriously deluded.