Brett-Butler

This Estonia performance looks like an Orthodox Priest trying to exorcise a hip-hop group.

Not that they’re going to win, but wouldn’t think that San Marino would have a venue big enough to hold the Eurovision if they do. Think it’ll qualify.

Quite like Austria, could be a solid top 10.

At least Azerbaijan had the decency to send a crap song to Eurovision this year.

Ukraine’s is a banger.

When does the rock part of Cyprus start?

In other news, all the councillors in the ward of Middleton Park in Leeds are now from the continuity SDP party after they won another seat there.

"Get Lucky" by Daft Punk never got a proper music video, although short clips from what purported to be the music video were released. Don't know if it'll ever get a release.

Fandango’s theme charted at #44 in 2013, the same week that ‘Ding Dong the Witch Is Dead’ made #2. The WWF had a #4 hit in 1992, although I don’t think it was a wrestling theme.

The big question is will he gain 110% of the vote, or will he scrape through with just 100%?

Not foot-shooty, but interestingly nonetheless. A member of an iconic Britpop group could be joining the Commons - @1765390251676115392 The Tories have an 18k majority here, and Labour came 3rd behind the Lib Dem’s in 2019, so no guarantee he’ll get the win. But if he wants to be the MP, there’s no other way.

A strange fact I learned this evening - the former Mrs Bone signed the Tory candidate’s nomination papers. Rather awkward.

...and literally after I typed that, Labour has now withdrawn support for Azhar Ali in the Rochdale by-election, which means that if he ends up winning, he will sit as an independent MP. He will still be listed on the ballot as the Labour candidate, just like the Green candidate.

So, so far in the Rochdale by-election - - Labour's candidate has been forced to apologise for spreading anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, yet Labour are still standing behind him following an apology. I have seen some people commenting that Diane Abbot had the whip suspended for less offensive remarks, however I will leave the judging to others. - The Green's candidate, who is a Humanist activist, will no longer be campaigning after anti-Muslim tweets from 10 years ago resurfaced. - George Galloway has been endorsed by far-right ex-BNP member Nick Griffin. It's a real poo-nami. Suddenly the 50-1 odds on the Tories in this seat is looking like a decent shout.

U2 say hello - W3tLL4aeuPA

The Rochdale by-election is set for February 29th, the full list of candidates is below. Whilst in normal circumstances this would be a straight Labour win, there are a number of curveballs that could tip the scales a different way. George Galloway is running for the Workers Party (even though he seems to be only worker standing for the party, although the Derby North badman is also a member). He tends to show up at by-elections in areas where he thinks he can drum up the Muslim vote (Batley & Spen, Bradford West) . I'm presuming he's going full in on an anti-Israel campaign. Also standing is Simon Danczuk, who was the MP here between 2010 and 2017. Interestingly, he is standing for Reform UK. Those of us with a long memory and far too much interest in politics will recall that back when there were rumours of defections to Ukip, he was the sole Labour MP who was tipped to flip over, and after many years in the wilderness he's now joined their successor party. When he stood as an independent in 2017 after being kicked out of Labour he won 1.8% of the vote, so whilst I don't expect him to win, he could end up being a spoiler in a potential 3-way between Labour, Conservative and Galloway. Labour - Azhar Ali no description - Mark Coleman Reform UK - Simon Danczuk Liberal Democrats - Iain Donaldson Conservative - Paul Ellison Workers Party - George Galloway no description - Michael Howarth Independent - William Howarth Green - Guy Otten Monster Raving Loony - Ravin Subortna Independent - David Sully There are also two Tory defences on February 15th, both of which Labour will hope to make gains in.

“Shot at the Night” is The Killers’ best song, largely because it’s more or less just “Higher Love”.

I know that Brett-Butler’s quasi-contrarian, and inevitably wrong political predictions are a highlight of the New Year, so without further ado, here are my forecasts for 2024 - - a General Election will be called for June 2024. Labour come out the biggest party with a majority, albeit a slim one that only just creeps over the 325 threshold. They have difficulty getting their 1st budget through, due to an “awkward squad” of 10 Corbynite and post-Corbynite who refuse to endorse Starmer, claiming he’s too “right wing”. The possibility of defections for this lot remains a strong possibility in 2024, due to Jeremy Corbyn remaining in parliament, Corbyn standing under the “Peace and Justice Party” banner. The budget eventually gets through due to a few concessions, as well as support from the Lib Dem’s and SNP on a ‘policy by policy’ basis. The Lib Dems have their best election in a generation and climb to the 3rd most seats in parliament, with the SNP reduced to single figures, mainly due to Labour winning a strong plurality of Scottish seats. - Neither Trump nor Biden will stand in 2024. Although SCOTUS declares that Trump can stand in all 50 states, the confusion leads to the only other main contender, Nikki Haley, winning the nomination. Although Biden faces calls to stand down, he does not do so until he is forced to, at which point it is too late to run a full primary, meaning that vice president Kamala Harris becomes the default candidate for the Democrats. Thanks to independent candidate Robert Kennedy pulling just enough votes away from Harris in swing states, Nikki Haley becomes the first female person of colour to be US president. - the NI Assembly gets back up and running in September, after PM Starmer sets in motion legislation that would lead to an Assembly Election if it is not restored by the end of that month. - the 2024 EU elections sees a very sharp rise in extremist parties all across the European block, and this new voting rump leads the EU to bring in a border policy so extreme that it would even make Suella Braveman blush. As a result, we see strong left-wing backlash to the EU (although crucially, not until the Tories are out of power), and it puts the brakes on Labour calling for an effort to rejoin the EU. (Although somewhat hypocritically, Starmer does flirt with the idea of holding asylum seekers offshore to be processed in 2024, although this comes to nothing). - even though Labour expressed support for PR in their manifesto, it doesn’t form part of their plan for government, as their politicians know what side their bread is buttered on. - the Greens lose their only MP. - Kemi Badenoch becomes Tory leader, and leads the party to parity with Labour in opinion polls. At least 1 Labour Party member temporarily loses the whip in the year for remarks about Badenoch that are perceived to be racist against her.

The show has always had political figures in it. For goodness sake, Christine Hamilton was a contestant in Series 1, a former member of the House of Lords was in Series 3, Thatcher's daughter won Series 5, and Lib Dem & Labour politicians have also shown up. Now I'm not a fan of politicians being in I'm a Celeb as I find it too much of a distraction, especially if they've been in frontline politics far too recently like Hancock, but to pretend that it's only now getting political is a bit disingenuous.

I'm not too sure what's worse about this Tweet - the fact that the Labour MP in question opposes the conversion of a house into flats for people with learning difficulties (even saying that it would lead to a rise of anti-social behavior!), but that she was so proud of doing so that she posted it ON HER OWN TWITTER/X FEED! If a Tory had done this, we would be hearing about the Nasty Party for weeks. @1722953776988815726

I'd say top 40. I don't think there would be that much interest in it, unless it is really, really good, and the last time supposed "last" Beatles singles came about, they didn't stick around for too long (although admittedly they did both go top 10, albeit in a different market environment).

The shadow foreign secretary Rachel Reeves is in hot water following an FT article that alleges that she plagiarised from a number of sources, including Wikipedia, for her book "The Women Who Made Modern Economics". In the Before Times, plagiarism of this type would be enough to derail a political career (which is the reason why Joe Biden became president in 2020, rather than in 1988). In this case, there'll be a few passive platitudes about mistakes being made, likely with a bit of whataboutery and "something something Tory press" thrown in, and it'll be forgotten come election time. It'll probably double sales of the book as well.

That’s a landslide indeed. Labour’s road to getting a majority rather than a plurality will rely on them flipping a good lot of the Scottish seats, so this result bodes well for them in 2024. The SNP though I can see returning to a rump party by the next election.

Ades3pQbeh8 If you're in to anime or manga, you'll already be familiar with One Piece, the fantasy-swashbuckling series about Monkey D Luffy & the Straw Hat pirates as they search for the fabled treasure known as the One Piece. The English language live-action adaptation debuted on Netflix a few weeks ago, and it's rather great, one of the few live-action English language anime adaptations that has gone down well with the critics. I've only seen 1 One Piece film and none of the nearly 2000 episodes of the anime, so I can't comment on how it compares to the long running series, but the Netflix adaptation has managed to transfer it to the more grounded live action without sacrificing the more ridiculous aspects of the series. Inaki Godoy is well cast as Luffy, portraying both his idiocy and determination in great measure, and the rest of the supporting cast do a great job. It's already been renewed for a 2nd series, so hopefully it will continue to be a hit. If you've not familiar with the original, it is still worth a watch if you were a fan of Pirates of the Caribbean.

I read the Times article when it came out yesterday, and have been watching the documentary today. It's a very powerful piece of journalism, and given the high bar for getting an article like that published in the UK press due to libel laws, we should take the very disturbing allegations very seriously indeed. Watching the clips of him from the late 00s, when he was at his peak as a comedian in the UK and when many of the allegations took place just shows just how much things have changed since then. In retrospect, the 00s seem to have been a time when every single one of the moral taboos of the preceding generations were being comprehensively demolished, including the taboos around sexuality (also on other matters - the fact that so many mainstream comedies at the time were able to get away with blackface without major uproar is particularly notable). From the mid-late 10s, we've seen the pendulum start to swing where we've seen a new set of moral taboos be set in place as to what is seen as acceptable within mainstream entertainment - some of them new, others more familiar. Russell Brand's rise coincided with the breaking of these taboos, which is why he was able to exploit it at the time, and why any critics of his behaviour at the time could be written off as reactionaries, prudes, or fuddy-duddies. There will be a lot of questions to be asked going forward as to why it has taken as long as it has been for him to have these allegations finally receive the light of day. If his behaviour was known about by the BBC, Channel 4, MTV, the Hollywood studios that employed him, or any of his political connections knew about these allegations at the time, and stood aside and did nothing, then they should be just a culpable as he is and should face judgement. It's surprising that he managed to escape scrutiny in 2013, just as the Jimmy Saville scandal led to Yewtree and the conviction of many British celebrities (just as Brand was starting his Citizen Smith schtick), and then again in 2017 when Me Too was bringing Hollywood offenders to justice when you consider of brazen his act was (Hidden in Plain Sight indeed). It makes you wonder if there are any household names doing something similar in 2023 that we will look back at in a similar way 10 years from now. As to how he got away with it for so long, one possibility is to do with that devilish root - money. In his prime he was making so much money for so many people, be it Channel 4, his book publishers and papers he worked for, his production companies, or the Hollywood studios he was making films for, and if the allegations came out at the time, then they would have stood to lose millions. Whilst I 100% disbelieve Brand's current output is the reason why they are going after him now, it is true that those who would have make money off of him now don't have anything to lose - he hasn't appeared on Channel 4 since 2019, and was appearing in Hollywood films up to last year - I don't think many other people are making megabucks from a self-produced YouTube channel. And on the subject of conspiracy theories - he's been a conspiracy theorist for a long time - at the height of his proto-Corbyn revolutionary stage, he was retweeting David Icke approvingly and not refuting the conspiracy that 9/11 was an inside job. The idea that his current conspiratory output is an attempt by him to put a guardrail around him so that other conpiracy nuts will back him up seems to far fetched even for him - the simplist explantion it that Russell Brand is, and always has been, an idiot.