I hear the approaching thunder that, one day, will destroy us too. I feel the suffering of millions. And yet, when I look up at the sky, I somehow feel that everything will change for the better, that this cruelty too shall end, that peace and tranquillity will return once more.
(Anne Frank)
© Robert Fripp, 1974
It's no doomy thing, For the new world to flourish the old has to die. But the depression era of the 30s will look like a Sunday outing compared to this apocalypse. I shall be blowing a bugle loudly from the sidelines.
(Robert Fripp, Rolling Stone, 19 December 1974)
Fifty-two years ago this week, King Crimson released Red, the last studio album of the band's first epoch and the Fripp-Wetton-Bruford core line-up. It is widely considered one of the best and most influential albums of British progressive rock of the 1970s, being mentioned as an influence by Kurt Cobain, Tool, Phish, Umphrey's McGee and pretty much all bands of the progressive metal genre. Robert Fripp loves that album so much that he had it released seven times. The original recording of 1974, that was transposed untouched to CD in 1986, 1989 and 1999. A remastered version in 2013 as part of the 24-CD/DVD box set The Road To Red, which includes complete recordings of 16 concerts King Crimson played in the USA between April and July 1974. The remastered version was also released as as standalone Expanded Edition CD with three live bonus tracks. The concert played in Providence, Rhode Island, on 30 June 1974, from which the tracks "Providence" and "A Voyage To The Centre Of The Cosmos" were taken, had already been released as part of the 4-CD box set The Great Deceiver in 1992. Finally, a 50th Anniversary Edition in 2024, including new "elemental mixes" of the four original studio tracks and a different cover photo. So here we go, with the 2013 remasters, then the full Providence concert, live versions from the 2010s, when the final incarnation of the band revived Red in concert, and finally the Elemental Mix of "Starless". Sit back and enjoy.
Left to right: John Wetton, Bill Bruford, Robert Fripp
On the 20th of September, there was a general election in Russia, which was the perfect model our democracies should emulate. No country on Earth has ever seen more fairness and transparency than Russia under the enlightened leadership of Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, the greatest... Ok, Ok, stop it... just fucking kidding, mates. Truth is that was the most grotesque travesty of an election Russia has ever seen, and they have seen a fucking lot under Nosferatu. In some constituencies, the FSB stuffed the ballot boxes so boldly that they got 100% turnout, and independent sources estimate that United Russia's national vote share was 35%, not the official 57%. Which doesn't matter anyway as nobody can stand for election there if they are not duly rubber-stamped by the FSB and authorised by Nosferatu, so all "opposition" parties are just the Kremlin's sock muppets since Yabloko, the only ones opposing the war in Ukraine, were shut down. And Nosferatu got what he wanted, headlines of a massive landslide all over his Reich. Donald Trump must be jealous, as this was pretty much his wet dream of an election.
Based on previous election results, Yabloko were very unlikely to clear the 5% threshold for representation in the State Duma, but it didn't matter. They had to be hounded down and silenced anyway because dissenting voices have no place in Nosferatu's Russia, just as they didn't have one in the Soviet Union. It's like the United States' Deep South during the Jim Craw era, or elections in East Germany, where the ruling Communist Party allowed select friendly parties to sit in Parliament, and decided in advance how many seats they would get and who their MPs would be. There is nothing new here, as the last chaotically free election in Russia was held in 1999, the last before Vladimir Putin became President. At the next election in 2003, United Russia emerged out of the blue, fully armed like Athena out of Zeus' forehead, and won half the seats in the Duma on their first try. This was the staring point of Nosferatu's Reign of Terror, built on corruption, intimidation and, when necessary, assassination. Now Nosferatu's fate might well look like history repeating itself. But will it be a Nicholas II exit, when military defeat against Germany triggered the October Revolution? Or a Khrushchev exit, when losing face in the Cuban Missile Crisis set in motion a slow-brewing palace coup? Either is fine by me, and this is why we must never relent in our support to Ukraine, to ensure an unquestionable defeat for the Russian Reich.
Putin’s control of the media is becoming more and more comprehensive. What is left over, that ownership does not ensure, self-censorship increasingly neuters. The Gleichschaltung of parliament and political parties is, if anything, even more impressive.
(Perry Anderson, Russia's Managed Democracy, 25 January 2007)
© Robert Fripp, John Wetton, Richard Palmer-James, 1974
We know that Germany bears a special responsibility due to its history. We will always uphold our political order and our firm anchoring in Europe.
(Friedrich Merz, 7 September 2026)
Did you know that, in East Germany under the Soviet occupation, a political party existed whose core purpose was to represent the interests of former Nazis and servicemen of the Wehrmacht? It was not just tolerated, but plainly promoted, by the Communist regime, and granted seats in the Volkskammer, the Parliament of East Germany, as part of the Communist-led Nationale Front der DDR. The Communist regime never undertook the same kind of denazification as in the West, it just switched the former Nazis' loyalties from one all-powerful state bureaucracy to another. From the Gestapo to the Stasi. The label on the tin may have changed, but the tasks and the goals did not, and everybody lived happily ever after. After the reunification in 1990, the so-called "Ostalgie" became a common feeling in the eastern Länder, nostalgia for the Communist past. For many, nostalgia went further back to darker times, those of the almighty Third Reich. So nobody should have been surprised when State Parliament elections, coincidentally held on the same day as the Russian farce, delivered upsettingly good results for the neo-Nazi Alternative für Deutschland. Shocked, surely, but not surprised.
There have been five elections for Landtage, the State Parliaments, in Germany this year. Baden-Württemberg and Rheinland-Pfalz in March. Sachsen-Anhalt. Berlin and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern in September. But public attention and sensationalist headlines focused on just one, Sachsen-Anhalt. Talk about losing sight of the forest for the tree. The reality of these elections is that the AfD may have doubled their vote share from the previous elections in 2021, but they bagged fewer votes than current Bundestag voting intentions polls predict. While the CDU, SPD and Greens all got more than in generic polls. The overall turnout was 11.6 million from five very diverse Länder, compared to 49.5 million at the last general election, so the results are reasonably representative. I certainly do not want to downplay the very threat embodied by the AfD, but Germany's strictly proportional electoral law means that even their unprecedented 44% in Sachsen-Anhalt are not enough to deliver a majority of seats in the Landtag, and they are still far below that at federal level.
Even in Sachsen-Anhalt, the AfD is very unlikely to form a government. They are tied in seats with a potential Firewall Coalition of the CDU, the SPD, the Greens and Die Linke. Their only hope was to strike a deal with the radical left BSW, on the sole basis that both are supporters of Putin, Europhobes and Ukrophobes. This would have been the mirror image of the situation in Greece after their general election of 2015, when the radical left Syriza formed a government coalition with the far-right ANEL, because both were Europhobes. But this perfect demonstration of the horseshoe theory is not to be, as the negotiations fell apart. Now the Sachsen-Anhalt Landtag is stuck in a stalemate that can only be resolved by a snap election, or CDU Abgeordneten voting for an AfD Ministerpräsident against the explicit orders of their party. Elsewhere, the Greens-CDU coalition has remained in charge in Baden-Württemberg, a CDU-SPD coalition has been formed in Rheinland-Pfalz, and left-wing coalitions of the SPD, the Greens and Die Linke are the most likely outcome of ongoing negotiations in Berlin and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. German democracy has the means to stop the fascist wave at the gates of power, and is so far succeeding.
In Poland only idiots and traitors can rejoice at the triumph of the AfD.
(Donald Tusk, 7 September 2026)
© Robert Fripp, John Wetton, 1974
I think this election coming up in Germany is incredibly important. I think it could decide the entire fate of Europe, maybe the fate of the world.
(Elon Musk, Fortune, 26 January 2025)
Muck said this about the previous federal election in Germany, when he already openly supported the neo-Nazis, but he could repeat it verbatim about their next election, scheduled for 25 March 2029 at the latest. The AfD's mediocre result in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and the left's victory in Berlin should not make us underestimate the existential threat to German democracy that the Muck-funded Putinist neo-Nazis represent. The Fash all across Europe feed on each other's successes, even the tiniest ones, and they and their Trumputinist backers live in the hope that a real big success anywhere will trigger a domino effect. They missed a symbolic one earlier this year when their puppet Viktor Orban was kicked out in Hungary in a landslide, and that means they are more determined than ever to score big elsewhere. Germany is at the top of their target list, and generic national polls continue to be quite worrying, especially as the coalition government and Merz himself have become so fragile that a snap election next year cannot be ruled out.
But the AfD coming close to 30% does not mean they will form the next German government. The German electoral law is craftily designed to make one-party governments impossible and favour coalitions, even the most unlikely ones. In the olden days, it was either social-democrats and liberals, the SPD and the FDP, or Christian-democrats and liberals, the CDU-CSU and the FDP, or the infamous Große Koalition of the arch-enemies, the CDU-CSU and the SPD. But the times of three-party politics are over now, as the spectrum expanded to five parties first with the Grünen and Die Linke in the 1990s, and now to seven with the AfD and the BSW. Right now, polls say that only five of seven will clear the 5% hurdle for representation in the Bundestag, but there is still more than enough time for this to change and make government formation a fucking headache.
The most striking feature of German voting intentions polls, continuously since their last general in 2025, is that there is no significant migration from one bloc to the other, but reshuffling of the votes within each bloc towards the more radical parties. From the CDU-CSU to the AfD on the right, as has been seen multiple times, and from the SPD to the Grünen and Die Linke on the left, as was again evidenced by the election in Berlin. Seat projections show that Germany must get ready for a Novelty Coalition that has never been tried before at federal level. 316 seats are needed for a majority, and only two combinations would reach this number. If could be the CDU-CSU plus the AfD, but this would unavoidably result in a split of the CDU-CSU that would nullify that option, so we can rule it out. So all that's left is a threesome of the CDU-CSU, the SPD and the Greens. This Schwarz-rot-grüne Koalition, or Kenya Flag coalition, has been tried thrice at state level and always held for a full term, so German voters may be convinced to accept it, albeit reluctantly, at federal level. Even if the key argument is a negative one, keeping the neo-Nazis out of reach of power.
The complacency of the social centre must be overcome in order to prevent further and broader radicalisation of that very centre.
(Liane Bednarz and Christoph Giesa, Dangerous Citizens, 2015)
© Robert Fripp, John Wetton, Bill Bruford, David Cross, 1974
This day and age, people are worried. People are scared of bogeymen. You’re not going to score points pretending those fears don’t exist.
(Jack McCoy, Law & Order, 2008)
Germany may be the biggest prize on the Fash Internationale's hit list, as the EU's most powerful nation and the most permeable to faux pacifism and Russian propaganda, but France is closer on the timeline, with a presidential election seven months away and a very likely snap legislative election immediately following. I tend to forget how many wannabe presidential candidates there are right now. Is it 18? Or 81? Or somewhere in between? Anyway, it's a fucking lot, according to the Very French Logic that every tribe must have a seat at the table. Some have no problem with splitting the vote, even if it means that the bloc they belong to will be eliminated from the second round. Some are ranting about primaries à la française, only proving they have no fucking scoobie how primaries actually work, and that it is a fucking stupid idea to import American political concepts you are totally illiterate about. Pollsters obviously can't survey all prospective candidates, so they prompt a select list that nevertheless has twelve to fifteen names in it. Bordering on the fucking ridiculous.
You have the names of the lucky ones included in the prompts in the legend, so I will not bore you with details of their biographies, which you can find on their Wokopedia pages. The chart above shows the results of the most recent poll by Ifop, but in a redacted and simplified version. They actually tested twenty candidates, which is a record so far, in ten different combinations. I scratched half of these because they involved wannabes who hove zero chance of even being present in the first round. Only three candidates have a real chance of being selected for the second round, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, Edouard Philippe and Marine Le Pen. Two others, Raphaël Glucksmann and Bruno Retailleau, will not reach the final stage but could be either kingmakers or terminators, depending on whom they support or oppose for the second round. Sadly, trends show that Le Pen will be competing in the second round no matter what, but the second spot could be decided on a knife-edge between Mélenchon and Philippe. There is a general consensus that the nightmare scenario would be Mélenchon vs Le Pen, woke far-left vs ethno-nationalist far-right, and also both The Russian Candidate in this game.
Back in the 1960s, Charles de Gaulle claimed that there was nothing between the Communist Party and himself, meaning that the centrists and social-democrats counted for nothing. This was wildly exaggerated, and soon proved wrong by the voters, but Emmanuel Macron has made a reboot of it come true. Between the National Rally and La France Insoumise, ten years of Macronism have left a field of ruins haunted by political zombies eager to eat each other's brains. There is a widespread feeling in French media that Macron is gambling on chaos in 2027, so he could stage a comeback in 2032. The French Constitution does not limit the President to two terms for life, like the Constitution of the United States, but just two consecutive terms, like the Constitution of Russia before Nosferatu elected himself President for life. Macron could thusly actually try his luck again after sitting out a term, but this is a very dangerous and hugely narcissistic attitude. Major social unrest is to be expected if either Mélenchon or Le Pen is elected, as well as a swing towards authoritarianism, bankruptcy and loss of international influence from both. France in 2032 could well be a field of ruins on top of a field of ruins, and that would be Macron's real legacy.
What do you do for fun? Juggle chainsaws? Sometimes there’s just one too many.
(Jack McCoy, Law & Order, 2008)
© Robert Fripp, John Wetton, Bill Bruford, David Cross, Richard Palmer-James, 1974
Corner stores!? What is a corner store? I've never heard that term. I know what a corner store is, but I've never heard it described, a 'corner store'.
(Donald Trump, 17 April 2026)
There is no doubt that the elections for the House of Representatives will be hard-fought, but poll after poll says that the Republicans are increasingly unlikely to snatch victory from the claws of defeat. The gap in voting intentions is widening, with the Democrats leading by double digits in half of the polls. Trump's attempts to rig the elections are also failing one by one in the courts, and there is not enough time left now to have these rulings reversed on appeal. The suppression of postal votes has failed, attempts at massive disenfranchisement have been quashed in 26 states so far, and validated in none. The popular discontent may even have reached the point where a massive swing towards the Democrats will nullify the effects of the Trump-dictated gerrymandering in a handful or Republican states. Right now, the most recent batch of polls has the Democrats on 52.3% of the popular vote and 232 projected seats, and the Republicans on 44.5% and 203 seats.
But there is more happening than just what the generic polls say. You just have to dig deeper to find it, and it is quite enlightening. YouGov, polling on behalf of The Economist, have tried a new approach. They split the Democrats into three groups. From left to right, Socialists, Liberals and Moderates. And the Republicans into three groups too. From left to right, Conservatives, Libertarians and MAGA. Then they pitted them against each other in six different combinations, asking their panel how they would vote if the candidates in their district, which you surely remember is American for constituency, specifically belonged to one of these groups. The results, and the seat projections you can deduce from them, are very encouraging for the Democrats, and especially the Democratic Socialists.
Even against a Conservative Republican, one supposed to be on the "reasonable" wing of the party, a Democratic Socialist candidate would win by 8%. The margin would rise to 11% against a Libertarian and 17% against a MAGA. The Trumpist propaganda, painting the Democratic Socialists as Communist terrorists, has totally failed, and they are now accepted as a normal and legitimate component of the Democratic Party, especially by the younger voters. This acceptance has a name and a face, two in fact. Donald Trump and Zohran Mamdani. The rejection of Trump has become so widespread that he is taking down the whole Republican brand with him. Mamdani has communicated so much and so well about his achievements as Mayor of New York City that he has become a household name and made democratic socialism a perfectly acceptable option for millions of voters. He has also toned down part of his rhetoric. More importantly, he has shifted his persona from some sort of firebrand to a pragmatic and efficient manager in a matter of months. In British terms, imagine somebody campaigning as Corbyn and ruling as Burnham. And that's how the Republican narrative backfired, and the Democrats have massively improved their standing in the polls.
The Republicans are wonderful people. We're dealing with very sick people. The Democrats are sick; there's something wrong. They're like terrorists.
(Donald Trump, 30 March 2026)
© Robert Fripp, 1973
I inherited high prices, and then from the first day, they started using the word ‘affordability'. It was a new word. Nobody ever heard the word.
(Donald Trump, 26 August 2026)
The Senate elections are not going better for Trump and his court. The Republicans suffered a heavy self-inflicted blow when the Republican National Committee decided to pull the plug on their Senate campaign in North Carolina and reroute the resources to Kansas. The North Carolina seat was competitive from the start, as the Republicans held it by only 1.8% in 2020. But it could probably have been saved if the MAGA lobby had not hounded down incumbent Senator Thom Tillis and forced him to stand down for wrongthink, and Democrats are now predicted to flip it on a double-digit margin. Kansas, on the other hand, looked safe as it was held by Republicans on a 11.4% margin in 2020. But popular discontent has reached such a level that it is now predicted to be on a knife-edge, with the latest batch of polls predicting a Democratic gain by 1%. There is summat of a pattern emerging here, totally unfavourable to the Republicans, who are now predicted to lose seven seats to the Democrats and one to a rogue unpredictable Independent. Not the situation anyone would have anticipated even six months ago.
The transfer of resources from North Carolina to Kansas has a deeper meaning than just a change of priorities, or conceding in advance a seat that was lost anyway. It is also a sign that the Republicans are skint, also not something any pundit would have predicted. In Texas, probably the most iconic of all flips Republican Ken Paxton, who should benefit from the incumbency factor, has raised $9.2m and has $1.7m cash on hand. But his Democratic challenger James Talarico has raised $68.6m and has $21.5m left in the bank. In the seven States where the Democrats are predicted to gain a seat, they have raised $147m total, and the Republicans only $106m. As of this week, the Democrats have $44m cash on hand and the Republicans $62m. Clearly, the Democrats are on the offensive across the board while the Republicans have underspent, possibly because the battleground is so much larger than they expected that they no longer know which seats they should prioritise. This is the Democratic National Committee's dream come true: outspending the Republicans and turning their campaign into a flock of headless chicken. With less than four weeks left until Election Day, there is no way the Republicans can turn the tide without cheating.
Affordability is interesting because the Democrats caused affordability.
(Donald Trump, 26 August 2026)
© Robert Fripp, John Wetton, Richard Palmer-James, 1974
A lot of voters are very angry at Republicans, to be honest with you. They are not angry with me, but they are angry with Republicans.
(Donald Trump, 9 August 2026)
On 3 November, most of the United States will also vote for their State Legislatures. Due to the nature of American federalism, these legislatures have a lot more power than our devolved Parliaments and even the German Landtage. So these elections are just as important in the eyes of the American public as the elections for Congress, in terms of impact on their everyday life. There are 99 Chambers, as Nebraska has a unicameral legislature, classed as s Senate for statistical purposes. The Nebraska legislature is also constitutionally non-partisan, but actually Republican. Democrats currently have a majority in 19 State Houses and 20 State Senates, Republicans in 28 State Houses and 29 State Senates. Both chambers of the Alaska Legislature are in the hands of a coalition of Democrats and non-MAGA Republicans, and the Minnesota State House is tied. 88 chambers in 46 states are up this year, as some states hold these elections on odd years. The current trends of polling predict significant successes for the Democrats, starting with the State Houses.
The Republicans are predicted to lose their majorities in the State Houses of Arizona, Michigan, New Hampshire and Wisconsin. The Democrats would also switch the Minnesota State House, which is tied since the 2024 elections. The same patterns are visible in State Senates, as the Democrats are expected to flip Arizona, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. This would lead to a true Blue Wave, with the overall picture switching from 57 Republican chambers and 39 Democratic chambers to 49 for the Republicans and 48 for the Democrats. It would be both a setback and a warning sign for the Trump administration and the MAGA ideologues, as it would reduce their opportunities to expand anti-abortion or discriminatory legislation, which is totally determined by state laws. It would also signal the electorate's willingness to move towards stronger social policies, such as about the minimum wage, that state laws can set at a higher level than the federal minimum of $7.25 per hour. Aye, that's £5.5, less than half the UK's minimum wage. Significant rises could gain momentum, not just in states that will flip, but also in already Democratic states where the Democratic Socialists increase their influence.
With 4,959 seats up in State Houses and 1,184 in State Senates, these elections are the perfect opportunity for voters to carry on with a very American contradiction. The national political climate may be hugely confrontational, very us-and-them, but it often doesn't work that way at state level. A significant number of voters, especially among those who self-identify as Independents, see no problem in splitting their vote, choosing one party for the State House and the other for the State Senate. With a vast multitude of seats up for grabs, the personality of the candidates also becomes more of a factor than in Congressional elections. This is how you get Democratic majorities in red states, or Republican majorities in blue states, or hugely disproportionate majorities for either party here and there. The Democrats' best chance is that the anti-Trump swing towards them will be massive enough to nullify these local factors, and so far it is working.
A lot of people are saying I’m one of the greatest presidents ever.
(Donald Trump, 9 August 2026)
© Robert Fripp, David Cross, Richard Palmer-James, 1973
We like getting along with everybody. One of the reasons that I'm so successful, I get along with everybody.
(Donald Trump, 1 September 2026)
The last brick in the wall of this year's elections in the United States are the elections for Governors, who have much stronger powers than the First Ministers of Scotland and Wales. Activist Governors, usually from the party opposed to the President, have often used their position to curb the impact of national policies in their state, or even nullify it. This usually goes with an ambition to stand at the next Presidential election, as shown these days by California's Gavin Newsom. The Democrats currently hold 24 governorships and the Republicans 26. 36 seats are up, 18 for each party, as the 14 other states hold gubernatorial elections either on odd years, or on Presidential years for four-year terms. There are 18 open seats where incumbents are either retiring or term-limited, Newsom among them after two terms. The overall picture is again favourable for the Democrats, with a predicted net gain of two.
These predictions hint that the Democrats could face their only loss in this election cycle, losing the Governorship of Kansas, a usually strongly Republican state. This is an interesting contradiction with the Senate election, where Kansas is predicted to flip from Red to Blue. But the farmers, who own 90% of the state's land, wouldn't want to put all their eggs in the same basket, would they? This is also linked to the economic situation, worse in Kansas than the US average, so it's kind of fair that both parties would take the blame and feel the slap of discontent there. At the end of the day, the overall picture points to significant victories for the Democrats, and has swung more and more their way in recent weeks. Significantly, the magnitude of their gains is pretty similar in all four categories of elections, compared to the party strengths after the previous ones that were held in 2024 for Congress, and in 2025 for the Governors and State Legislatures. So this is not an isolated phenomenon, but a true national wave, which the Republicans will not be able to deny. Unless they try and suppress it with some judicial or constitutional coup, which I certainly would not put past them.
But, in troubled times, election campaigns are like tales told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. It feels like running blindfolded through a forest, unable to foresee the events that will derail you. In a word, anything can happen. Including on Election Day, and even after all votes are counted and all seats declared. This is what The Washington Post warns against in a recent article about the possible scenarios. The fourth one includes open interference with the voting process, modelled on what Nosferatu's goons did during the Russian pseudo-election. Then you have instant denial-cum-DARVO from the Orange Baboon, casting doubt about the legitimacy and validity of the results, and launching unfounded accusations of fraud, just like he did when he encouraged the failed coup attempt on 6 January 2021. Finally, we could have what Americans like best, multiple complaints and court challenges against elections the Republicans lost. This is probably the most likely post-election scenario, designed to delay the proclamation of the final official results, and possibly even the swearing in of the newly-elected Representatives and Senators. Always expect the worst from sore losers.
Trump can imitate speech but he can’t get anywhere near intelligence. Just endless repetitions, changes of subject and a desperate need to score points. All of which would be easily programmable by a first-year undergraduate computer science student.
(John Crace, The Guardian, 15 September 2026)
© Robert Fripp, John Wetton, Bill Bruford, David Cross, 1974
Note: the date in the caption is wrong, it is from April 30th, 1974 in Providence
The triple lock. No party had dared touch it. Terrified that old people would take their revenge at the ballot box. Andy was prepared to rip it up and replace it with a double lock.
(John Crace, The Guardian, 29 September 2026)
When the time came to draft a budget, one of every Chancellor's headaches was the pension triple lock. Which, for those at the back of the class near the radiator, is the mechanism by which state pensions increased in line with wages, or in line with prices or by 2.5%, whichever was highest. It was definitely a live grenade in the middle of a minefield inside the elephant in the room. Great Britain is ageing, like pretty much all of the Western World, so politicians have come to think of pensioners as untouchable sacred cows. Just bear in mind that persons aged 65+ account for one quarter of the electorate and have the highest turnout of all age brackets. So handling them like fragile porcelain definitely made fucking sense, if you were determined to overlook the triple lock's obvious multiplying effect on spending. But what happened next looked like summat of magic trick to tun public opinion around. BMG Research polled us pre-emptively, before Burnham had announced anything and laid out his case, and found a majority unequivocally supporting the triple lock. But this was just the staring point, and a different story soon unfolded.
There is a Very British Paradox at work here. Our full state pension is £12,548 per annum, with a qualifying period of 35 years of National Insurance contributions. It is actually not as bad as we have been told, as it is 83% of the French state pension or 86% of the German state pension, but with a shorter qualifying period. In the EU, the full pension is commonly granted after 40 to 45 years of contributions, with the Netherlands peaking at an impossible 50 years. The legal retirement age is not really a factor, as it is set between 64 and 67 in comparable EU countries, versus 66 in the UK. Also bear in mind that pension pots are the exception in most EU countries, where the whole system is founded on the state pension being the sole source of income. This is why comparisons based on amounts spent on state pensions only are biased and misleading. The most common rule is also that pensions increase in line with inflation, with nothing similar to our triple lock. Oddly, BMG Research did not poll that option, but focused on how we feel pensions should evolve relative to wages. There is a rather wide consensus that the state pension should rise at the sane rate as average wages, but this is only a partial view if other options are not tested. It also flings the door wide open to reopening the case in any year when wages fall behind prices, which has happened often in the past and will happen again.
By the way, official data show that the state pension has increased by 10.1% in 2023 in line with prices, 8.5% in 2024 in line with wages, 4.1% in 2025 in line with wages, and 4.8% in 2026 in line with wages. Aggregated over four years, the state pension has thusly increased more then both prices and wages, thanks to the use of the most favourable factor every year. In fact, the very nature of the triple lock means it has always been that way ever since it was enforced by the Coalition Government fifteen years ago. Which was certainly fair to pensioners at the time, but can certainly be considered unfair to working people whose wages have progressed less, besides being a unsustainable budget nightmare in the long run. BMG Research quickly showed us the first brick on the road to reform, simply by dropping the binary choice between supporting or opposing the triple lock, and offering a non-binary spectrum of five options. And you thusly got a hint that public opinion could be turned, with a simple alignment of pensions on inflation emerging as the most popular option. Admittedly supported by just one third of us, but keeping the triple lock alive was suddenly supported by only a fifth, far from the clear majority from the binary question.
Of course, there was a way out of this conundrum, and Any Burnham walked us through it at the Labour Conference. Or, if you go past the headlines about "scrapping the triple lock", and look at what Andy actually announced, it becomes obvious he led us up the garden path like no PM had done since Boris Johnson. Andy channelled his Inner Keir Starmer and sold us a change that changes nothing, and kicks the can of worms into the long grass until after the next election, so it won't come back to bite him in the arse during the next campaign. After 2030, or one year into the next term, state pensions will still rise in line with prices or by 2.5%, and in line with wages. The third lock has not been actually repealed, it has just been diluted, as pensions will be readjusted if they fall behind the rise of wages over time. The reform just removes the infamous "ratchet effect" that we have had in plain sight recently. So pensions will no longer be racing ahead of wages, which is good, but it could have been better. If Burnham had wanted a real ballsy reform, and also follow the proverbial "best international practice", he would have announced that state pensions would rise only in line with prices, effective immediately, and that's it. That's what a really bold politician would have done. Andy could have got his name carved in gold in the marble of history, as The Special One who chose to boldly go where no PM had gone before. Too bad he chose instead to make himself look like the same sort of craftily cunning triangulator as the others.
This was Andy Unplugged. Unmediated. That most elusive of hybrids. The career politician who can still make the political personal and deliver it fearlessly.
(John Crace, The Guardian, 29 September 2026)
© Robert Fripp, John Wetton, Richard Palmer-James, 1973
Kemi is also keen to keep pensioners happy. We will retain the triple lock, she says. Even though half the shadow cabinet know it’s completely unaffordable. Old people definitely have to be kept sweet, as they are about the last section of the country who actually votes Tory.
(John Crace, The Guardian, 4 October 2026)
Thank Dog again for our beloved pollsters at YouGov, who once again enlightened us about what actually happened in our minds, demonstrating how Burnham had led us up the garden path to acceptance of change. It took them four steps, four speed-polls in succession, three of them before the Labour Conference and Burnham's announcements, and one more ex post facto. In the Before, YouGov found out that we did support the triple lock, just as BMG Research had already detected. Then they introduced a new option, switching to the double lock, which may have been just a hypothetical rumoured to be under consideration, or possibly leaked by some "anonymous source close to the Prime Minister" so that it could be tested under the cloak of plausible deniability. And we also supported it, albeit less enthusiastically than the Coalition's triple lock.
Then came the cunning sleight of hand. First we were probed about the still hypothetical National Care Service, which is consensually recognised as a proper way to deal with a genuine national emergency, and predictably supported it overwhelmingly. Then, in the After, all YouGov had to do was ask again about the reformed lock, but this time explicitly linking it to the National Care Service we had just massively approved. Simples. And here you have it. Support for Andy's double lock increasing by 5% when it ceases to be a hypothetical and becomes government policy with a clear and clearly popular objective. This is the poll most media chose to headline with, without emphasising too loudly that it is still a lower level of support than the triple lock got just one week before. But it will increase soon, don't doubt it, and you can only admire Andy's talent for flipping public opinion in his favour.
This triple lock thingy also granted us the Fun Moment Of The Week, with Shitweasel's column about the Labour Conference in The Islington North Gazette. Basically, Burnham's speech was good because he had channelled his inner Owen Jones, because Owen Jones is The Chosen One who always knows best, and decides what's wrong and what's right. Shitweasel just opposed the reform of the triple lock in the name of the poorer pensioners. Which only says that Shitweasel sucks at maths as much as he sucks at politics. You don't need a PhD in molecular astrophysics to see that, with the current infamous ratchet effect, those with the higher pensions get a fucking lot more extra pounds than they will under the revised double lock in normal years. A bonus for the rich, mate. But Shitweasel does not see the obvious, which will only surprise those who have forgotten that this is the lad who once got his arse handed to him on a silver platter by Andrew Neill, of all people, because he got income tax and wealth tax mixed up, and almost burst into tears at the humiliation while Alastair Campbell and Rory Stewart watched in amused amazement.
The left should indeed feel emboldened. The winds are shifting in our direction.
(Owen Jones, The Guardian, 30 September 2026)
© Robert Fripp, John Wetton, Bill Bruford, David Cross, 1974
As someone with the touch of Harry Potter’s Dementors, ready to suck the joy out of any occasion, John Healey knows that anything that can go wrong almost certainly will go wrong.
(John Crace, The Guardian, 28 September 2026)
The obvious problem with Andy Burnham channelling his inner Fantastic Mister Fox, and making everybody happy ever after, is that someone will have to draft a Budget including all of it, or else people will feel let down. Andy does not look that bovvered, probably hoping that, in Charles de Gaulle's immortal words, l'intendance suivra. So the nightmare has landed squarely in John Healey's lap, and he now has about a fortnight to make the numbers add up, or find a way to tell us that they do even if they don't. But there will be a conflict of interest between his incarnations, and we can only guess which one will prevail. The First Healey who channelled his inner Oliver Twist to ask for more as Defence Secretary? Or the Second Healey who has to explain the reality of tough choices to his Cabinet bandmates as Chancellor? BMG Research added their brick to this wall, surveying again the mythical tough choice between defence and welfare, and what they found could plausibly offer Healey a safe escape route from that perennially toxic debate.
We will obviously get the full song and dance again from some MPs from the loopy far-left or on the left fringe of Labour. Bairns or bombs, guns or peanut butter, stealing from the poor and whatnot. Which actually makes no fucking sense for two obvious reasons. First, defence and welfare are not the only two domains of government spending, so it's absurd to always pit them against each other as if nothing else existed. Second, the underlying assumption of that questioning is that the Budget has to be a zero-sum game, that you can only reallocate existing finite resources. This is stupid and manipulative, as any government can choose to discard this daft axiom by increasing the pool of resources through taxation. This door should definitely not be shut tight on ideological pretexts, Rachel Reeves' approach, as the overall level of taxation in the UK is just the OECD average, and actually on the low end of the range for comparable countries. BMG Research has selected two options that have already been discussed, and could possibly emerge some day as government policy.
The first option is the so-called "mansion tax", which is actually a wealth tax that you can also call a property tax. It actually exists in France, as a watered down ersatz to the genuine wealth tax that existed there before Macron. You can probably expect about £3bn per annum from this one. The second proposed option is a windfall tax on banks, more appropriately called an excess profit tax, because that's whit it is. Bringing back into the public purse the proceeds of profiteering. Well, part of them, as you could expect only about £5bn per annum before the banksters start squealing red murder and threatening you with a plague of locusts. Both are popular, so there is no political risk involved, and the combination of the two would amount to only 0.25% of GDP. You can hardly argue, unless you are a fiscally-illiterate twat like Andrew Griffith or Vigilante Bob Jenrick, that it would bleed the British economy to death. Bear in mind too that pushing taxation as a share of GDP to the same level as Poland would generate around £70bn per annum, and pushing it to the same level as Germany would generate roughly £110bn. You really can't call either confiscatory tax-obsessed collectivists, or argue that taxation harms their economy. Well, I guess bad faith taxphobes can, but that doesn't mean Healey should listen.
As well as being a bit miserable, Healey is also a realist. He knows things are tough and likely to get tougher. But he is the current fall guy. The Chancellor tasked with fixing the unfixable.
(John Crace, The Guardian, 28 September 2026)
© Robert Fripp, 1973
Here is rare clearcut proof of the power of political persuasion. Party conference speeches, the lifeblood of political obsessives, rarely reach the public beyond a brief news clip. But this time was different.
(Polly Toynbee, The Guardian, 1 October 2026)
When even The Islington Gazette's perennial Starmer groupie Polly Toynbee tells you that something special happened at the Labour Conference, you have to believe that it did. But was it the Coronation of Andy Burnham? The Second Coming of Andy Burnham? The Assumption of Andy Burnham? Or was it something simpler and more down-to-Earth, like Andy putting his mouth where his heart is, and signalling Labour's swing back to the left after Starmer's slow lurch to the right? I guess it must have been that, or else Shitweasel wouldn't have written yet another piece of crap in The Guardian, demanding credit for it. Opinium has extracted eight key proposals from Burnham's Conference speech, all of which illustrate the swing to the left, with a strong focus on housing policies, which the mediataro-punditarial complex have overlooked because the triple lock story makes for juicier headlines. Their probe indeed shows widespread support, even if some doubts remain about the triple lock and Great Britain Grid. But bolder decentralised housing management and the nationalisation of water companies are definite fan favourites.
Labour's greatest expectation now is that the Celebration Of The Burnham will benefit the whole party and turn support for the Prime Minister's speech into votes. They will be helped by Zack Polanski's inane leadership successfully transitioning the Green Party of England and Wales from the Hochseeflotte at Jutland into the Hochseeflotte at Scapa Flow. By Kemi Badenoch's lack of leadership too, though building success upon the corpses of your enemies floating down the river looks like another victory by default. Another question from Opinium's poll, from a totally different angle, already highlights the limitations of the Burnham Manifesto. Albeit with the usual contradictions, as it is puzzling that a majority supporting Burnham's most iconic proposals translates into only a third crediting him with the right priorities. Another quarter of us credit him with both right and wrong priorities, so what's missing here is a follow-up question pinpointing which proposals exactly are considered wrong priorities. The reform of the triple lock, possibly. Or the electoral reform, I hope. Alas, poor Andy, we will never know.
Of course, the popular verdict does not reflect the Adoration of Burnham some in the friendly media are indulging in, but it is nevertheless encouraging for Labour. Support is higher than Labour's voting intentions, and opposition lower then the combined votes for the Conservatives and Reform. Even the significant number of fence-sitters is a positive signal, as it means many are ready to give Burnham the benefit of goodwill for the time being. They may be more judgmental and less positive in the near future, so it's up to Burnham to make good on hie promises and attract more support once concrete measures are announced. Even if you are ready to cut him some slack, as I am, he still has to prove himself a strong and reliable leader. So far, he has only proved he is a strong and reliable party leader, which is far from meaning the same. Conference speeches, however inspired they sound, and no matter how many sacred cows they target, mean nothing at the end of the day. Burnham still has to convince us that he is more than the Workaround Prime Minister who will save Labour from electoral extinction just by not being Starmer. And all the speeches in the world won't make a fucking difference.
Andy Burnham’s speech spun the dial on public opinion on several political hot potatoes, defining who he is.
(Polly Toynbee, The Guardian, 1 October 2026)
© Robert Fripp, John Wetton, Bill Bruford, David Cross, Richard Palmer-James, 1974
What happens at 11pm this Friday the 31st of January 2020 marks the point of no return. Once we’ve left, we’re never coming back and the rest frankly is detail.
(Nigel Farage, Farewell speech to the European Parliament, 29 January 2020)
Andy Burnham has also reopened a can of worms, which may end up looking like throwing a boomerang into a minefield if he does not handle it cunningly, or handles it like Keir Starmer would have. This is of course Brexit Reversal, or Breturn, or whatever, the idea that the UK should come to its senses and rejoin the European Union before Russia invades us. The Great British Public have already gone through this transition, as bespoke opinion polls have shown a majority to rejoin since the summer of 2021. The last YouGov poll found 52% willing to rejoin versus 27% choosing to stay out. At an actual referendum, if such a constitutional monstrosity were allowed to happen again, that would be 66-34 to rejoin. Reform UK emerges as the sole bastion of the True Leavers, as even a third of Conservative voters would vote to rejoin. Hitherto unknown pollster The Messina Group has surveyed the various ways Burnham could take us down the Yellow Brick Road to the Strawberry Fields of Breturn, found that it would be a vote-booster for Labour, but also that we are again not afraid of supporting mutually exclusive options.
Rejoining the EU is the favourite option, but just amending the current agreement with the EU is almost as popular. This is not how it works in the real world, you have to choose. Interestingly, TMG has added "associate membership" to the usual array of options. The only problem is that associate membership of the European Union does not exist. It looks like Ursula von der Leyen made it up off the cuff, to offer Mark Carney a semblance of resolute support in the war between Canada and Trumpistan. Right now, it is an undefined variable, a void concept that exists as nothing more than a two-word soundbite, lacking any substance. It will not progress any further because defining it would require months, if not years, of debate between the 27 EU members, will literally zero chance of reaching an agreement on anything even remotely workable. So it makes sense to work only on the options we have now, not on a pie in the sky even the Robert Webb Space Telescope couldn't detect. Opinium has surveyed the way we want Burnham to proceed in this delicate matter, and we totally want all options to be on the table before we make a decision.
You may not have noticed something significant in the wording of Opinium's second question. It does not mention a referendum, showing that this pollster, unlike their colleagues, knows how our parliamentary democracy works. If you want to implement a significant reform, you do not resort to an unconstitutional trick that will only trigger a foreign-funded campaign of hate, lies and deception by the Europhobic Fash. You do it the proper way, you include it in your Manifesto for the next general election and let the people be the judge. If you win the election, you have a mandate and can proceed in accordance with the foundational principle of parliamentary sovereignty. This is how British democracy works, and why Burnham, or any future Prime Minister, must resist pressure to hold a referendum. Oddly, Andy's most solid opposition to serious proposals about our relationship to the EU will probably come from behind him, the Lexiteer Labour backbenchers who have learned nothing over the last ten years, and still stick to the cretinous talking points of the pre-pubescent Shitweasel of a decade ago. So the first stage of Andy's move towards clarification of Labour's position, far from Starmer's non-committal "appease all" attitude, must be bringing back the lost sheep to the flock. Or have them deselected for the next election, as their obsolete attitude only plays into the hands of our homegrown Fash and our foreign enemies, the Orange Baboon and Nosferatu.
In Britain, hard-right revisionism packed itself into the single, self-destructive nuclear option of Brexit. An anti-liberal, populist discourse of people against elites, democracy against Parliament, which May nibbled at and Johnson swallowed whole.
(Edmund Fawcett, Conservatism: The Fight for a Tradition, 2020)
© Robert Fripp, Ian McDonald, Greg Lake, Michael Giles, Peter Sinfield, 1969
You now bump into Labour MPs who are visibly collapsing under the strain of having to walk around with an optimistic perma-grin.
(John Crace, The Guardian, 28 September 2026)
Thank Dog again for Nigel Farage's abysmal stupidity, that he showed again with his hyperbolic squealing about the government's anti-disinformation unit, the National Centre For Information Defence, which was widely approved by the other parties. He even got his Orwell reference wrong, mentioning the "Ministry of Information", when it was the Ministry of Truth in Nineteen Eighty-Four. Stupid and illiterate, classic Farage. Why would anyone find fault with a strategy to effectively counter the spread of Russian disinformation, except those who spread Russian disinformation? Benito is just like the Orange Baboon, we should always believe him when he reveals the truth about himself. The trend of voting intentions confirms that Reform is still going down, albeit uncomfortably slowly, while Labour seems to have risen above their earlier plateau, with a Conference Bounce that could definitely be anticipated after al these tales of the Second Coming of Andy Burnham. Polls even show a belated Labour Bounce in Scotland now, for fuck's sake.
My current snapshot of polls includes the last five, conducted by Opinium, Survation, More In Common, YouGov and Find Out Now between 30 September and 7 October. That's a super-sample of 11,014, or 31% of the depth of the Mariana Trench in feet and it still leads straight to a hung Parliament, but now Labour is just one step away from a majority. The good news for Labour is that they would bag more seats than the Conservatives and Reform combined. Which is really good so long as you don't mention that much of this is the result of Restore Britain snatching a sizeable part of the Reform vote. Being saved from the Fash by the Ultra-Fash is just one of many paradoxes we have to live with. A Lab-Lib Pact would get a comfortable majority with 386 seats, but that would be sort of a gamble. You can expect the LibDems to support the Brexit Reversal, electoral reform and the National Care Service, but what would be the price to pay? Mister Ed's most obvious bargaining chip right now is to repeal the repeal of the triple lock, but that could be one red line too far for Burnham.
Now Andy Burnham's first Labour Conference as Prime Minister has come and gone, which was another opportunity for a flurry of new policy announcements to convince us that the situation is not totally hopeless. Too bad every time you glimpsed a "Hope Again" sign, you felt like screaming back "Try Again". Especially about the still very gaseous plan for electoral reform, that is understood to mean a transition towards proportional representation. But what would PR deliver? I simulated it from the most recent poll from More In Common, which is fairly representative of the current trends. You can have either just separate national lists for England, Scotland and Wales, or add regional lists in England. You can have a 5% threshold for representation, as in Germany, or no threshold at all. The exact method changes the results visibly when some parties clear the threshold in only part of the nations and regions, and in every case we get a totally unfit Parliament, with no path to a majority. The only way to approach it would be a Hydra Coalition of Labour, LibDems, Greens, SNP and Plaid Cymru. It's safe to bet that it would have a shorter lifespan than Liz Truss' government, so the only option would be a caretaker National Unity government and a snap election. That's where the slippery slope to a generation of instability and impotence is thrown wide open. Until somebody takes back control of the chaos and manages to get first-past-the-post reinstated.
Andy's own talking point, that PR would make our politics "less point-scoring, more problem-solving", doesn't stand the test of reality. Just look at Germany, the proverbial poster nation of eternal consensus brought on by PR and coalitions. It just didn't work that way recently, when Russian terrorist attacks and neo-Nazis in Sachsen-Anhalt conveniently drew attention away from the inconvenient reality. That the CDU's coalition with the SPD was ten seconds away from imploding due to recurring irreconcilable differences over pensions and care reforms. The neo-Nazis literally saved Friedrich Merz's arse as the SPD backed down from triggering a government breakup in times of perceived national emergency. This is just more evidence that PR does not create a culture of consensus, that point-scoring remains alive and kicking, and that the whole narrative about the alleged virtues of PR is just a pile of fuming dog shit. Now, Burnham has granted himself a win-win, appeasing the PR zealots first by appointing a transpartisan National Commission that will deliver its conclusions in two years, and plausibly lean towards advocating PR. Then refine it and make it a Manifesto pledge for the next general, which will thusly still be fought under first-past-the-post, and that will kick the can of worms to the next Parliament, like the triple lock reform. And you just cross your fingers that it dies in the House of Lords. Simples.
That’s a smart politician. Wants to put out the fires before they start.
(Anita Van Buren, Law & Order, 2007)
© Robert Fripp, 1974
FPTP’s winner-takes-all design, though harsh on smaller parties, has done a sterling job of keeping extremists out of British politics for decades, even as the far right surged across Europe.
(Gaby Hinsliff, The Guardian, 26 February 2026)
The zealots of proportional representation base their position on the belief that fair representation of the political nuances requires an allocation of seats in strict proportion to the shares of the popular vote. This is both an absolute and an axiom, which is a statement that is by definition unquestionable because it is the cornerstone in which further reasoning and arguments are rooted. In philosophy, just as in mathematics, an axiom does not have to fulfil the burden of proof, it has to be taken as self-evident. In maths, the very content and wording of axioms even means that they cannot be demonstrated, you just have to take it or the whole edifice crumbles. Which is also the very definition of the Articles of Faith of any cult. The zealots' other talking point is that PR is some sort of a moral obligation because an overwhelming majority of We The People support it. Now we have an Opinium poll to enlighten us, first about the kind of electoral system we actually want.
These results are fucking hilarious as they prove absolutely jack shit. If the zealots try and use this poll as evidence that three quarters of us support PR, you just have to counter them with the full poll, which shows conclusive support for options that are mutually exclusive with PR. Keeping an MP for each constituency is self-explanatory. Ranked choice, which is the core of the Single Transferable Vote used for Council elections in Scotland, is basically just an elaborate twist of first-past-the-post. It is totally obvious if you use it to fill just one seat, in which case it becomes Instant Runoff. Using it to fill two or three seats in a multi-member constituency does not make it less of a majority system. The replies here are clearly incompatible, so nobody can use them honestly to prove any point. But Opinium also probed us about the kind of process the government should follow if they intend to carry on with electoral reform. Here too, there is definitely food for thought.
Less than a fifth of us opine that the electoral law should be changed before the next general, a clear hint that we don't consider it a priority or feel any sense of urgency. Another third want to keep FPTP, so there is definitely acceptance of the need for change, but that does not preclude giving more thought to which change. That leaves half of us supporting the intermediate options, which are complementary rather than contradictory. Reviewing the voting system is just what Andy Burnham has just done, if you admit that his National Commission is genuine and not the fig leaf from under which PR will crawl out of the woodwork. This actually fits with the scenario that I suggested earlier. Take your time, think it through, submit the final draft to the people's decision at the next general. Of course, this carries the risk that PR would get an unquestionable mandate as part of a winning Manifesto, but this is also a full democratic process. Furthermore, there would still be Parliamentary scrutiny during the next term before the final decision is reached. Nobody could possibly object to that, could they?
Electoral reform doesn’t guarantee that we could all just vote for what we want, instead of endlessly against what we fear. Cutting deals with rival parties in the coalition governments produced more frequently under PR means more horse trading, not less.
(Gaby Hinsliff, The Guardian, 26 February 2026)
© Robert Fripp, John Wetton, Richard Palmer-James, 1974
Disagreeing with Urdu election material is silly. The more interesting question is why Polanski is campaigning in Urdu in a constituency with hardly any Urdu speakers.
(Owen Winter, 15 September 2026)
Now Labour have prevailed at the Holborn and St Pancras by-election, the one that was totally theirs to lose, but they couldn't afford to lose. Sagal Abdi-Wali was Labour's obvious choice, being leader of Camden Borough Council and all that, and thusly the highest-ranking Labour elected official in the constituency, But there was nevertheless a flaw, as Abdi-Wali was a supporter of Keir Starmer when he was the local MP and Prime Minister, paving the way for guilt by association with all his sins. Especially as Camden Council, under her leadership, refused to divest from companies linked to Israel, and she skipped hustings to avoid tough questions about it. So all the accusations that could have been cast at an elderly balding white man could be used in the exact same way against a Somalia-born Muslim woman, which was really fucking bad luck for Labour. But, even with the group that had supported Andrew Feinstein in 2024 now standing behind Polanski, hoping it would boost his performance, he still lost. Oddly, nobody bothered to poll this by-election despite its obvious significance, so all we had before Election Day was projections from MRP models, based on extrapolating from national voting intentions. However imperfect this might be, it actually proved accurate. Not quite spot on, but they got the winner right, which is all that matters in the end.
Then events in the last week before the election could only lead you to the conclusion that Polanski knew that the writing was on the wall all along. Insisting that the election was knife-edge, when all expert testimony pointed to it being like 3-to-2 against him, sounded a bit odd. Insisting that he would carry on as leader of the Green Party even if he lost sounded more like a pre-emptive self-serving attempt at calling for mercy when the bell tolled. The truth is that Zack will plausibly face an early termination, not because he lost an unwinnable by-election, but because he has driven the Green Party into a brick wall. The spectacular drop in Green voting intentions, from the first party on the left to single digits and a tie with the LibDems, started when Starmer was still Prime Minister. Labour's Burnham Bounce was just an accelerating factor, not the root cause, and it is easy to conclude that Zack himself was. Coincidentally, a recent YouGov poll asked us if we like or dislike our parties and leaders. Not their policies, not how they do their job, just them up close and personal. The verdict on the Greens generally, and Zack personally, is quite unequivocally harsh.
You get the feeling that they thought “Hey, this worked in Gorton and Denton. Holborn and St Pancras has Muslims too”.
(Owen Winter, 15 September 2026)
© Robert Fripp, John Wetton, 1974
The movement for self-determination in Scotland is gathering pace, with growing international attention on the issue and a welcome acknowledgement from the Prime Minister of the principle that Scotland should have a referendum when it is likely that people would vote for independence.
(John Swinney, 20 September 2026)
We have been gifted a new Scottish poll by Norstat, which is a Half-Full Scottish or even a One-Third-Full Scottish, depending on your angle of observation. They did not survey our voting intentions for the next general election or the next Scottish Parliament election, but only for a hypothetical second Independence referendum. Not just about our voting intentions if it happens before the Sun turns supernova, but also about some additional elements that may explain why we feel the way we feel about Independence. The baseline is that this poll confirms that the support for Independence has grown recently. Four out of five Indyref polls conducted since the last Holyrood election have found Yes in the lead, which is actually the continuation of a favourable streak that started just after the 2024 general election. According to Norstat's last, that would be a 7% swing from No to Yes.
Amusingly, they also asked how we would vote if Nigel Farage became Prime Minister. Which is a waste of time as everybody knows, even Benito himself, that he will never be Prime Minister. Of course, it is good to know that The Fash At Number Ten would generate a 20% swing towards Independence, but then why not test how our attitude would change if Kemi Badenoch became Prime Minister? Or, just for the comedy value, if Zack Polanski did, even if not even the Borough of Camden would vote for him. The conditions that could lead to a second referendum, short of going straight to an unilateral declaration of independence, are more relevant. Of course, there is nothing new under the sun, and the three prerequisites probed by Norstat have been on the table for a long time, polled every now and then, and we are still stuck in a stalemate with no referendum in sight.
Requesting a referendum if we elect a majority of pro-Independence MSPs is a familiar tune, but hopelessly delusional. We got that majority at all three Scottish Parliament elections since the first referendum, and it changed fuck all. Also bear in mind that we never got a majority of the votes for the notionally pro-independence parties, even if it came really close in 2021. But the current tone is set by the 2026 election, where the combined votes for the SNP and the Greens reached only 41%. Then the reference to Northern Ireland is legitimate and should also be extended to Wales, but this provision has been in the Northern Ireland Act since 1998, and no Border Poll has ever happened since. Because the decision to hold one remains in the hands of the UK Government, the same situation as in Scotland. The solution is obviously not to rely on the UK Government's goodwill, as they will not be swayed even if 80% of us supported a referendum within the next year, which is far from the case. The only way to break the deadlock would be the full transfer of constitutional powers to the Scottish Parliament, with some sort of restraining clause similar to Northern Ireland's to avoid the temptation of a Neverendum. Which is, or course, as likely as Zack Polanski moving to Number Ten in 2029.
I will ask MSPs to affirm to the people who elected them their belief that Scotland is not a region, it is a proud and ancient nation, and that our future is for us to decide.
(John Swinney, 20 September 2026)
© Robert Fripp, John Wetton, Bill Bruford, David Cross, Richard Palmer-James, 1974
This is a principle that every MSP in the chamber, regardless of their view on what that future should look like, should be able to sign up to, so there is no reason why this motion cannot pass unanimously.
(John Swinney, 20 September 2026)
After all this foreplay, Norstat had to poll how ready we are for a second Indyref. A quarter of us absolutely do not want one ever, and you could even argue it is actually a large third. Because accepting a referendum only after another ten years is just the subdued way to say you do not want one without plainly saying you do not want one. The cowards' option. The other interesting result is that Reform voters are far less reluctant to hold a referendum than Conservative voters, and even LibDems. What they have in mind could actually be to get rid of the fucking needy Jocks with their begging bowls, or summat, but I can live with that if it increases support for a short-term referendum. Right now, we could reach a compromise about a deadline five years away, certainly not the most satisfactory solution.
Let us not forget the obvious prerequisite, that the nominally pro-Independence parties actually campaign for it. Of course, they both will pass strongly-worded conference motions, as they do every year. But these are as useful as a bog roll in a flash flood, and even those who draft them do not give a fucking shit what happens beyond the self-congratulatory headline in The Scottish Pravda. If we switch back from the conferences' cloud cuckoo land to the real world, we are hitting a brick wall with a crowbar while we need a loup de guerre to take it down. It is safe to bet that the UK Government will persevere in their stubbornness for the next seven generations, and refuse to hold a second referendum no matter what Scottish political parties and public opinion say. But Norstat also found that their attitude strengthens The Cause.
Only a few of us would lose faith and get less supportive of Independence if the UK Government carried on denying us our fundamental right to decide our own future, and exercise our unalienable right to self-determination. Not that it actually matters anyway, as none of the English parties is willing to listen and admit we have a case. We must also be careful what we wish for. Are polls showing Yes 4% ahead enough to want a referendum at all costs, even if there are a dozen of them in succession? Didn't the polls say that Remain would win in 2016? Even YouGov's exit poll did, if I remember correctly. More importantly, as this would be the focus, would the SNP's post-independence policies stand the test of a full campaign? Shouldn't the SNP first strongarm the UK Governement for a broader devolution deal? This is certainly what I would do if I got only 38% of the vote at the last election and was forced into a minority government. There is a majority for the principle of independence, and this majority should be heard, no matter how inconvenient it is for SW1. But what would a vote on the reality of independence deliver, if that reality was the SNP's agenda with a touch of Green?
After yet another SNP landslide victory, and with most opinion polls now showing independence as the most popular option, there is clearly a growing acceptance on all sides that Westminster’s anti-democratic position has become unsustainable.
(John Swinney, 20 September 2026)
© Robert Fripp, John Wetton, Bill Bruford, David Cross, Richard Palmer-James, 1974
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Five weeks without you already, my sweet angel
Sundown dazzling day, gold through my eyes
But my eyes turned within only see starless and bible black
