Iz 🌟

So I think equivocating it as 'well what can Trump really do that's so bad compared to Biden/Harris aiding & abetting Israel' does miss just how insane Republicans are on the issue of Israel. Trump himself, maybe he's ambivalent (I think he doesn't care and will just respond positively to a Netanyahu ego rub and we know Bibi's been angling for that), but there's enough people who'd make up part of any cabinet in the GOP that would probably happily take every dollar currently going to Ukraine and redirect it straight into the hands of Israel. e.g: @1842243586894778664

I really can't quite believe how much mileage the right wing press is making out of Diego Garcia/Chagos Islands, islands the ICJ instructed us to give back in 2019 (specifically remember it after that election as an example of how the incoming Johnson gov was flouting international law again), and a process that was started under the last Tory government, due to complete about this time anyway. Really. Article after article about Britain in decline on the world stage and handwringing that the Falklands might be next. For a couple of strips of land with no native populations about as in the middle of nowhere as you can get that we were due to give back anyway, and in any case we're maintaining the lease on the military base. It's pathetic. Though the Sue Gray resignation might knock it off the front pages for a bit - particularly as her replacement seems to be Morgan McSweeney, the Labour strategist who is esssentially responsible for everything I dislike about the current incarnation of Labour. He's an effective operator but he's completely unlikeable. Possibly a bit like Cummings then.

oh my at that semi performance, 4th and getting votes from 19/28 in there - that's incredible! shame about the falloff tbh I think most of my voters carried through, just they were nearly all my voters - what a 100% right semi to land in. Congratulations Leww, that's a really great winner from you. Excellent hosting all the way through Lindsey and I loved the tarot theme, thanks for bringing us this contest.

ah, my points were super frontloaded, shame. Looking like a good result towards the top end, I think I voted for a decent amount of that top 10.

nice points exchange Dan *.

An 18! Thank you Jim :heart: and blacksquare and Ansel too!

I seem to be getting votes from all over the place, thank you, really good to be in a lot of them so far. If Taahino and Sandénia are the chosen pop ones I wouldn't mind that at all (yes I guess Chrissy is pop-rock, still valid).

that's a great haul from the first set, thank you Lindsey, Cameron and Rich

Sounds like a good plan Lindsey, I'm excited for this, I don't really know what to expect for my entry or who will win, it seems like quite an open contest to me.

Trump has no basis to claim that he can end the war, it's just his usual ego bullshit - and advocating for ending the war on anything that isn't on Ukraine's terms is Russian apologia (I mean in British and Irish terms this is like the UK coming back for the Republic). Sure you can have an anti-western perspective without being a Russian apologist, but on the issue of Ukraine the western perspective is the correct one, they need to be able to defend themselves from aggressive actors and money sent to Ukraine is directly defending the sphere of democracy by proxy. I find most anti-western perspectives on Ukraine tend to ignore it being its own state actor with desires to defend its own territory and instead focus on it being a pawn between Russia and the West, which makes it easier to justify Russian talking points.

Same, votes in. Felt very lopsided but while a few real nice ones made it out of SF1, most of my votes came from SF2. Helps that I didn't lose anything in the semi I guess.

The Vance vs Walz debate, I'm going to watch it a bit when I get a chance but from reactions and clips the impressions I'm getting are that it seems a lot more even than the presidential debate, where undisputably it went better for Harris than Trump. This is mainly because if there's anything at all that Vance is good at as a VP candidate, and there isn't much, is that he's so clearly a politics bro debate lord and is able to hold his own here while perhaps Walz has been sanded down by the sorts of communicators in the Democratic camp that didn't understand how he got so popular and have been coaching him to do the same liberal overexplaining spew. If I'm majorly wrong on any of this I'll correct it after I've watched some. That said, the clips that I've seen have Vance putting his foot in it by not condemning Jan 6, pivoting, and complaining about being fact-checked. Most major result is a big increase in both VP candidates favourables, in Walz' case from slightly positive to very positive, and in Vance's case from majorly negative to slightly negative. Probably won't impact on the race more than that but given it's the last scheduled debate might have more impact on the campaigns than most VP debates. Lol.

Funny word to use there, dictating. Israel and Russia are both run by warlords with no respect for territorial integrity of other sovereign nations and peace, they may use their global geopolitics concerns as an excuse but they should still be condemned and stopped. The West's failings doesn't mean you start supporting the other, worse and less free, empire.

I feel I might have to defer to BABYMETAL and their megitsune ('vixen') here: 🦊

Clearly we should just give in to fascists in Russia and let them roll over people in far-off countries if we deem the war is unwinnable, who cares, got mine at home here in the Anglosphere. Jesus Christ.

Oh we love a good escalation. :S To be fair, the reaction of the Lebanese prime minister to a ground invasion by Israel earlier today was surprisingly absent of the white-hot fury that another sovereign state was invading his borders so I suppose they knew this was coming. This does feel pretty dangerous.

The idea of 'country above party' that Labour have been sticking to is some evidence of this. The last Conservative government, throughout its lifespan was defined by 'party above country' with so many self-destructive decisions made by the leader of the day to try and retain power, and so many of the actions of its members were that of generally patronising 'we're in charge and you're not, plebs', focused on retaining power rather than the lip service they paid to improving the country. So outside of their already horrific policies, makes it easier to cast them as not good people. Which they are not. In contrast, Labour's top team are, as of now, aiming themselves towards public service and therefore come across as more altruistic. I don't know if they are, certainly some of the Labour right maneuvering against the left since 2019 has been very unpleasant. But the general gist I get from their public image is that they seem far more like normal people granted power and trying to improve people's lives than their counterparts ever were. For all Johnson/Farage etc portrayed themselves as a 'bloke down the pub', Starmer's persona is far more like what a normal middle-aged bloke actually is, not obsessed with power, for one.

fixed it. I'm leaning 60-40 towards Harris winning as to what I think will happen. I get the temptation to be pessimistic and it could easily be a loss but my gut says she has the edge. Obviously personally I'm all in on Kamala's glorious victory as probably the most left-wing candidate the US has seen in my lifetime and yes that does say an awful lot.

People, especially people who've relatively recently been thrust into fame, can't and shouldn't be expected to handle being the discussion of discourse online. Especially when you're being misconstrued for holding what seem like very common sentiments for a 26-year old progressive American. Honestly this is entirely normal and all support to her.

heh, getting points for predicting I'd be off by a bit on nearly all of them. Fun quiz, I did go straight for my first instinct (and mental maths where I could do that) so it's not surprising I missed out on the ones where you needed to be exactly correct to get any points, but I enjoyed taking part. Thanks for running it well Dan!

I actually do mean this as a defence of Starmer - not that I particularly want to be doing so - but this series of scandals isn't anything like the previous Labour government expenses scandal, or the Conservatives partying it up, or losing millions to dodgy private contractors. It's the media deciding that they need to make the Labour government unpopular, sitting back with a coffee and combing the publically available Register Of Financial Interests until they find something they can spin negatively. In some cases, it's invitations to the kinds of events that tend to get gifted gratis to corporate figures in the same way, cloying, but not an indication that public money is being spent improperly, and I've just Ctrl+F'd high-profile Tories from the last government and found very similar things in their lists. In Starmer's case, a replacement for his Arsenal season ticket in the stands that would now be a security risk. In other cases it's taking actions from rich Labour donors and putting a monetary value on them out of seemingly thin air, e.g. Lord Alli letting Starmer's son study for GCSEs in his house now has a value of £20,000... what? In any case, the fact we know about these, is that they are publically available so everyone knows exactly what MPs have taken money for, which is a good system. What the papers seem to be prescriptively suggesting by highlighting these as scandals is that no MP should take money from donors personally or receive any gift ever. Which is, even for someone like myself who believes public service should be for the most part, its own reward, faintly ridiculous. incidentally if you comb that same Register of Financial Interests for Rosie Duffield you find she's taken payment from the right-wing shitsite Unherd. So no, I wouldn't say this resignation is particularly left-wing, as much as she couched that letter in nice looking left-wing rhetoric, her actions within the PLP have been nothing like those of a democratic socialist and very much of a middle-class weathervane who found her first and only true cause in spitting hate at vulnerable people and playing the victim when people called her on it.

Don't think any of mine have charted on the UK charts, though some of the albums they're off have. Japan and possibly some European ones, certainly. E.g. Ado's 'Odo', which is top of my Spotify list, was a Japan #4 hit, following up her #1 'Usseewa' (Billboard Japan).

+30 Blind Channel - Dark Side +29 Little Simz - Introvert +28 CHVRCHES - He Said She Said +27 Måneskin - Zitii E Buoni +26 Masked Wolf – Astronaut In The Ocean +25 Olivia Rodrigo - Good 4 U +24 DJ Sabrina The Teenage DJ - Try Not To Be Afraid +23 Dave - In The Fire +22 Go_A - Shum +21 Black Country, New Road - Chaos Space Marine +20 Porter Robinson - Look At The Sky +19 Lana Del Rey - Arcadia +18 Japanese Breakfast - Be Sweet +17 CHVRCHES (feat. Robert Smith) - How Not to Drown +16 Wolf Alice - The Last Man On Earth +15 MUNA (feat. Phoebe Bridgers) - Silk Chiffon +14 Weeknd - Take My Breath +13 Imagine Dragons (feat. J.I.D) - Enemy +12 ABBA - I Still Have Faith In You +11 Lil Nas X & Jack Harlow - Industry Baby +10 Kid LAROI & Justin Bieber - Stay +9 Dua Lipa - Love Again +8 Lil Nas X - Montero (Call Me By Your Name) +7 Self Esteem - I Do This All The Time +6 Bicep (feat. Clara La San) - Saku +5 SZA - Good Days +4 Coldplay - Coloratura +3 ABBA - Don’t Shut Me Down +2 Weeknd - Save Your Tears (Original / Ariana Grande Remix) +1 Nathan Evans - Wellerman (Original / 220 KID & Billen Ted Remix)

Shame to lose Wholune at the end but I think actually all my votes qualified from semi 2 so good results there! listening through the semi 1 NQs and Persephonia and Aelandor seem like big losses already 3 Thanks for the hosting Lindsey, I liked the gifs ticking over to the reveal.

Danaeviia through, fantastic, would have been sad if it had lost out.