Phil Hewitt 🕯

Grumpy old man. These are my personal opinions and don’t represent the views of my employer. Retweets not an endorsement. Likes maybe a placeholder.

[Phil Hewitt 🕯 @mrphewitt]

Brexit liars in 2016 - Britain can stand alone and thrive.
Brexit liars in 2019 - Luxembourg is bullying us

[Joshua Reed Eakle 🗽 @JoshEakle]

So it begins.

MAGA is about to find out how tariffs actually work first hand.

[Massive Attack @MassiveAttackUK]

Really smashed the elite there guys.

[Robert Peston @Peston]

Trump’s re-election is a global earthquake, and some of the strongest shocks will be felt in the UK and Europe.

These are the three big reasons

1.The UK and Europe are too dependent on the US military and its defence industry at a time when Putin’s land grab in Ukraine threatens our security directly and the Middle East tumult risks dangerous escalation - and when Trump talks of securing a fast peace with Putin on terms that could be presented as a victory by the Russian dictator.

2.The UK and European economies are growing too sluggishly to adequately deliver the living standards and public services demanded by citizens - and Trump’s threat of swingeing tariffs and a new age of protectionism could turn low growth into perma frost.

3.The cohesion of all our societies are being shaken by a social and digital media that daily challenges truth and fact, and which promotes hysteria, grievance and resentment. Trump’s pact with Musk means there is no chance that the digital misinformation beast will be tamed. The populist far right will be emboldened everywhere.

There is now a massive geopolitical choice for Starmer. Does he djtch his cautious incrementalist approach to restoring economic, trade and diplomatic relations with the EU in favour of something that looks more like a big bang? He’ll be under enormous pressure from his supporters, the LibDems and Greens to go much faster than he instinctively wishes to restore trade integration with the EU and build a new security integration.

Apart from anything else, the UK will now be under intense pressure to increase defence spending. Quite how that will be affordable is unclear absent a growth boost from securing seamless access once more to the EU’s single market.

Or does Starmer stick with relatively timid incrementalism in changes to the EU relationship, and make a brave bet that he can work constructively with an emboldened Trump - who (I am told) admires what he sees as Starmer’s untrammelled control of parliament while nursing a grievance at what looked to Trump like a coordinated Labour plan to help Kamala Harris.

Trump has historically been contemptuous of the EU. He would not be impressed by any perception that Starmer and the UK would choose friendship and loyalty to Brussels, Paris and Berlin over Washington.

But Starmer will have to choose.

[Machine Pun Kelly 🇺🇦 @KellyScaletta]

He was the worst President in history. And when he got voted out, he tried to stage a coup. Then he stole national secrets and sold the ones he didn't store in the bathroom.

He was convicted of fraud, found liable of sexual assault and convicted of 34 felonies. He is half a billion dollars in debt, owned by God only knows who, and the biggest national security risk the nation has ever had.

But at least he's not a Black woman.

[Femi @Femi_sorry]

Kemi Badenoch admits they promised a Brexit they knew they couldn't deliver.

[RockGod @TheHoustonWade]

Trump: "we always have huge crowds and never any empty seats."

Cameraman: *pans camera*

[Licypriya Kangujam @LicypriyaK]

Blame Climate Activists for blocking the road.

@ExtinctionR
@ClimateDefiance
@JustStop_Oil
@XRLondon
@XR_NYC
@XRebellionUK

[NewsThump @newsthump]

How it started How it's going

[Paul Schleifer @PaulSchleifer]

The SpaceX booster capture thing is all very impressive, but have we all forgotten that Thunderbird 1 was doing this and so much more back in 1965?

FAB

[Phil Hewitt 🕯 @mrphewitt]

This is rocket science in action

[SpaceX @SpaceX]

Mechazilla has caught the Super Heavy booster!

[BBC Newsnight @BBCNewsnight]

"Between 5 and 20 years from now there’s a probability of about a half that we'll have to confront the problem of [AI] trying to take over"

Regarded by many as the "godfather" of AI, Professor Geoffrey Hinton tells #Newsnight the technology presents an existential threat to humanity.

[Phil Hewitt 🕯 @mrphewitt]

Nigel Farage lied

[Haggis_UK 🇬🇧 🇪🇺 @Haggis_UK]

PA: You said the Speakers Office & the Parliamentary Security team gave you advice not to hold in-person constituency surgeries... the SO says this didn't happen & PS can find no record of such advice being given.. who's lying?

Nigel Farage: "The speakers office is always right"

[alan rusbridger @arusbridger]

Gavin Collins was an off-duty police officer enjoying a night out in central London when he was attacked by a pair of thugs. They repeatedly punched and kicked him, even after he’d been floored. Gavin needed titanium plates in his cheek and one eye socket following the unprovoked attack.

One of the attackers had three previous convictions for similar offences of common assault in the previous three years. As it happened the thugs were brothers, and the sons of one of Britain’s richest property tycoons.

But they were in luck. When they eventually appeared before Recorder Christopher Hehir in Southwark Crown Court, the judge was in a forgiving mood. The thugs were given suspended sentences—one of 15 months and one of six months.

Fast forward to last week when the same judge had to consider a different kind of case involving two young women who did not attack anyone, but did throw a can of soup at a painting by Vincent Van Gogh.

No one needed surgery. The picture frame was moderately affected because—fun fact—tomato soup is apparently “slightly acidic”. But His Honour Christopher Hehir reacted very differently, jailing one young woman for more than two years and the other for 20 months.

[Phil Hewitt 🕯 @mrphewitt]

She really should cut to the chase and join Reform

[Times Radio @TimesRadio]

“There was a time when there wasn't any maternity pay and people were having more babies.”

@KemiBadenoch suggests statutory maternity pay is "excessive".

@KateEMcCann | @AdamBoultonTABB

[PoliticsJOE @PoliticsJOE_UK]

"I stand here also as a black man... whose ancestors rose up and fought in a great rebellion of the enslaved. Imperialism. I know it when I see it."

@DavidLammy accuses Russia of being a mafia state in unbelievable speech at the UN.

[Brexit Bin 🇪🇺🇬🇧🇩🇪🕊🇺🇦 #BrexitHasFailed @BrexitBin]

Please listen! 🔊
As Mark Carney explains, Brexit was the first salvo in a wider, coordinated attack upon Western democracy. Its aim is to undermine our system by convincing enough people that "fascism is okay". That's why the message of "our nation is broken" is always the same.

[Bryan’s Gunn @bryansgunn]

Strong outfit

[Tim Bale @ProfTimBale]

It's not all relative, obviously, but....

[Fake History Hunter @fakehistoryhunt]

'Romani ite domum' on a reconstruction of a Roman settlement in Britain, in the Hull and East Riding Museum 😆

[Francis Keogh @HonestFrank]

Sven-Goran Eriksson’s last public message