Patrick Treacy

Reader. Waterford, Arsenal Munster Ireland fan. dad of 2

[Glenn Tunes @glenn_tunes]

I STILL FEEL THAT SINCE PRESIDENT OBAMA HAD TO RELEASE HIS BIRTH CERTIFICATE TO PROVE HE WAS AMERICAN..TRUMP SHOULD BE FORCED TO RELEASE THE EPSTEIN FILES TO PROVE HE'S NOT A PEDOPHILE 🤷🤔
AM I WRONG 🤔

[Nick Reeves #RejoinEU #NAFO #FBPE @nickreeves9876]

Farage squirms as Rep. Jamie Raskin obliterates the "Putin-loving, free speech imposter, Trump sycophant".

Please share as widely as possible. The news media have a convenient habit of forgetting about Farage's service to Russia.

[GET A GRIP @docrussjackson]

🚨 Muslims Taking Over the UK?

An important message from Shah Lalon Amin, group director of award-winning Delhi 6 street food group, who in 2023 won the Curry King title at the inaugural Nation's Curry Awards.

“I never thought I’d have to write this. But I keep seeing people say Muslims are trying to take over the UK, bring in Sharia law, or push the country toward civil war. And I know some of that fear feels real. So I’m speaking plainly, not to argue, not to attack, just to bring this back to reality.

This is not a Muslim-majority country. It is a parliamentary democracy and a country with Christian heritage. Laws are made by elected representatives. Muslims make up around 6–7% of the population in a country of roughly 70 million people. There is no legal, political, or demographic pathway for replacing British law with any religious law. That isn’t secretly unfolding. It isn’t slowly building. It isn’t a hidden long-term plan.

The average Muslim in Britain does not spend their time plotting political change. There are no secret strategy meetings. No takeover conversations. No coordinated agenda. And no, we don’t have some secret WhatsApp group discussing who’s arriving by boat next week. The only WhatsApp groups we have are about exam results, family gossip, and who’s bringing dessert for Ramadan.

When Muslims get together, the conversations are painfully ordinary. Football results. Who’s top of the league. Ronaldo vs Messi debates. The cost of living. Mortgage rates. Trump being unpredictable. Children’s school reports. Business worries. Holiday plans. During Ramadan, it’s fasting and food. That’s the reality. That’s because we are British, our daily lives look very similar to the average person in this country.

What people call “Sharia courts” in the UK are religious councils that mostly deal with marriage and divorce paperwork or mediation. They cannot override British courts. They cannot enforce criminal punishments. They cannot replace Parliament. If anything conflicts with UK law, UK law wins every single time. It’s no different in principle from Jewish Beth Din courts that handle religious matters within British law. Religious arbitration exists under the legal system. It does not replace it.

Yes, many asylum arrivals are young men. Dangerous journeys are often made by the strongest family member first so they can seek safety and claim asylum and if approved, reunite with their families legally. This pattern has been seen throughout migration history.

Wanting secure borders is reasonable. Wanting efficient processing is reasonable. Criminal behaviour should be punished. But that’s immigration policy, not proof of a coordinated religious invasion.

Sometimes I hear people say, “We want our country back,” or “We just want to protect our country.” I understand that feeling. Wanting safety, stability, and a sense of identity isn’t wrong. But Britain hasn’t been taken. It hasn’t been stolen. It’s still here. Its laws, institutions, culture, and democracy are intact. Protecting a country doesn’t mean hating your neighbours, it means upholding fairness, rule of law, and shared values.

There is no secret Muslim lobby running Westminster. British Muslims are not politically unified, do not vote as one bloc, and do not answer to a central authority. Most British Muslims are doing what everyone else is doing: working, paying taxes, raising children, worrying about bills, hoping their kids succeed, wanting safe streets and a stable country. We don’t want to change Britain into something else. We are part of Britain.

You can want law and order. You can want borders controlled. You can want your country protected. That’s fair.

But if anti-Muslim panic exists on your screen and nowhere in your real life, that’s not society—that’s an algorithm selling you fear.” 🇬🇧

[Reginald D Hunter @reginalddhunter]

#pledgewithreg
https://t.co/jEoM9wUrcq

[Bill Badbody @Bill_Badbody]

News in pictures

[Led By Donkeys @ByDonkeys]

This is who @ElonMusk really is. Don’t buy a Tesla.

Location: Tesla European HQ, Amsterdam.

[Bill Madden @maddenifico]

This gentleman is spot-fucking-on about Elon Musk. 🎯🎯🎯👇

[Prof. Steve Keen @ProfSteveKeen]

"Elon Musk is Wrong Again" Top Economist Warns the US

[LBC @LBC]

'You're the one complaining about it...how much do they get?'

'Just so you don't think I'm some mad racist, my granddad is an immigrant from India.'

@Matthew_Wright challenges caller Daniel who feels the UK offers 'so much' to migrants, but doesn't know how much money they get.

[☀️👀 @zei_squirrel]

this is the depraved tactic always deployed to destroy workers' solidarity: Try to pit us against one another. Divide and conquer. Eddie Dempsey brilliantly destroys this propaganda by repeatedly emphasizing that the union workers on strike have the same interests as all workers:

[Protect Kamala Harris ✊ @DisavowTrump20]

This is Eva Marie Kogel, the opinion editor for the German newspaper Welt. She has resigned in protest after Welt published an op-ed from Elon Musk supporting the AfD, a far-right political party with ties to Neo-Nazis.

RETWEET to thank @EMKogel for standing up for democracy!

[John Crotty @itsjohncrotty]

An extraordinary week for Ireland has seen its history revised & diminished by a U.S Senator & British commentators

They repeat 80 year old anti-Irish slurs & 20th century thinking

The subject is Irish neutrality in WW2

What is the truth? (1)

[Protect Kamala Harris ✊ @DisavowTrump20]

RETWEET to wish our Vice President and Second Gentleman a happy holidays! 🎄

[The Blindboy Podcast @bbboatclub]

Can’t remember her name. I do know she founded the Force Research unit in 1982, which oversaw illegal arms smuggling from South Africa to the North of Ireland, these weapons were used to deliberately target civilians as an act of tax funded British state terrorism

[Liam Nissan™ @theliamnissan]

Quick, everybody post Elon memes while he's still sleeping off last night's ketamine binge

[Кобзар 🇨🇦🇺🇦☦️ @CanadianKobzar]

The First Lady Elonia is fat, can’t jump, has hair plugs and has had jawline gender affirming surgery. Your move fat boy.

[Led By Donkeys @ByDonkeys]

How Musk broke Twitter and helped elect Trump
(Location: Tesla European HQ, Amsterdam)

[Brian Allen @allenanalysis]

BREAKING: https://t.co/JQWy2gTfhs just dropped a new track titled "Yes She Can"—and yes, “She” is Kamala Harris.

This is the anthem America needs to hear right now.

[Martin Lewis @MartinSLewis]

IMPORTANT PLS SHARE. It's rumoured the English £9,250 tuition fee cap may be raised this pm for the 1st time in 8yrs, as University's finances are strained. As student finance misunderstandings abound, I've bashed out a few notes to help...

1. Higher tuition fees WON'T change what most pay each year. For most, they're paid for you by the student loans company and you repay afterwards only if you earn over the threshold. The amount you repay each year (9% over the threshold) solely depends on what you earn not on what you borrow.

2. Increasing tuition fees will only see those who clear the loan in full over the 40yrs pay more. That is generally mid-high to higher earning university leavers only, so the cost of increasing them will generally be born by the more affluent. Most lower and middle earning university leavers will simply pay 9% extra tax above the threshold for 40yrs (and higher tuition fees won't change that)

3. The rise is tuition fees is likely to be trivial compared to the changes the last govt made for 2023 starters. 2023 starters had their repayment thresholds dropped to £25,000 (from £27,295/yr) and had the time they had to keep repaying for (unless cleared) extended to 40years from 30years.

So these higher annual repayments for longer, increased by over 50% the amount many graduates will eventually have to pay back for going to university. Yet they were almost stealth changes because people can't intuitively feel the seismic impact.

Changing tuition fees is a more obvious rise, but in reality has far less of an impact on the amount most will repay (though combined with the 2023 changes it does certainly up the cost).

4. The biggest practical problem for students isnt tution fees (even if raised) its the fact maintenace loans aren't big enough. English maintenance loans have not kept pace with inflation. I'd urge the govt to couple the tuition fee loans with bigger living loans - if not it is a real risk to social mobility, with those from the poorest backgrounds likely to be worse affected.

I could write more, but will stop here, hopefully this gives an idea the issues are less straightforward than many feel.