Because Friday night is Music Night.

Another week done at the coalface of capitalism, fortunately more weeks of capitalism to come. I’ve decided to treat myself to a new pair of smart boots in the sales after Christmas. I don’t have an extravagant lifestyle and I’m not a shopperholic. However I’ve always has a taste for decent shoes and boots.

I blame rude boys. I was into the music back in the day, but I was just as much impressed by how smartly turned out they were. At ten years of age I went, overnight, from being a scruffy urchin to begging my mum for a pair of brogues. I did my chores and eventually got the brogues, and I’ve not been a scruffy urchin since.

Have yourselves a good weekend whatever you’re up to. As always, feel free to share your top sounds down below –

I am asked below if I’m sure I’m happy at the General Election result. Of course I am, the way a man is happy with being stabbed in the arm instead of shot in the bollocks.

The good news is that we won’t be eating our pets and that the board of Zyklon B Ltd are a touch disappointed. The great news is that we will be regaining our sovereignty, independence and self-government on 31st January. And I have to admit that the list of treasonous MPs who are suddenly unemployed is fabulously long.

The result is a stupendous one for a man who has national electoral appeal, as someone in these here parts has explained. But the Tory majority might be too big.

Boris Johnson is what they call a One Nation Conservative. That’s code for a bit liberal, a bit wet, a bit taxy and a bit spendy. The idea that he’s a far-right racist is so wrong it’s laughable. Labour tried to paint him as a British Donald Trump because a focus on his policies would reveal that he’s not at all like the President politically. This is a man who governed London as a centre-leftist and wants to give an amnesty to illegal immigrants!

With such a large majority, Boris is free of any threat of rebellion from Tory ERG MPs (reminder: they are the Clean Brexiteers). So he is now free to implement his withdrawal agreement and get on with keeping the borders pretty open and ties with the EU pretty tight. Anyone still fearing that the UK and EU will become strangers is simply not paying attention.

So I’m happy and amused. Greatly amused in fact. I wish I could have stayed up for lefty twitter last night. Apparently it was hilarious. I like Boris’ personality and know he’s fundamentally a decent man who wants the best for people. But he’s still a Tory, a liberal-ish one at that, and we know that the first rule of British politics is that you Never Trust the Tories.

We’ll be out of the EU soon, but not quite as out as some of us would prefer.

The day of Trump’s Acquittal in the Senate draws closer as the House Judiciary Committee will vote on articles of impeachment today (along party lines). American voter fatigue has set in like a plague of locusts. And the eternal and parallel presidential campaign is being run like a Geek chorus with candidates who have less appeal than Jeremy Corbyn running for Mayor of Tel Aviv. The sentiment I dont understand is the false sense of triumph of the anti-Trump forces who cant see the forrest for the trees. Yes, he is guilty. But he is gonna walk like Bill Clinton with no greater stain than an unpaid dry cleaning bill. There are serious issues in this country, and we are running out of serious people.

Breaking: Exit poll forecasts biggest Conservative majority since Margaret Thatcher

Watch Election 2019 Live: The Results here https://t.co/ICyBaV57K8#ExitPoll #ElectionDay2019 #ITVElection2019 pic.twitter.com/8JyEEkFy5M

— ITV News (@itvnews) December 12, 2019

You have a choice between the bad and the very bad.

You have so many talented people in Britain. Pity that none of them will be in charge. Good luck dealing with a vindictive EU and an unfriendly US president.

Well I woke up this morning and I got myself a beer
Well I woke up this morning and I got myself a beer
The future’s uncertain and the end is always near

Anything less than zero tolerance against racism tarnishes Labour’s credentials as an anti-racist organisation. The pain and hurt within the Jewish community, and the damage to Labour, are undeniable and shaming. Yet Labour remains indispensable to progressive politics.

“Labour is institutionally anti-semitic, jews are living in fear of a Labour victory, but Corbyn will tax the rich more. So vote Labour.”

The Guardian editorial, today, is a disgrace.

So many unconsidered consequences have come to light, one wonders if any of the proponents of ” Brexit ” would vote for it now if they had a chance to do it over.

No consequent issue IMO is tougher than the issue of what happens to ” Ulster “, or more properly the six of the nine counties of Ulster that remain in the United Kingdom, separated by salt water from the rest of the United Kingdom.

To make a tortured story short, Northern Ireland, as part of the UK, is getting out of the EU, while the Republic of Ireland that shares the island with Northern Ireland is staying in. One of the most important features of the EU is a single market for goods and services within it. You can ship a truckload of goods from Holland to Germany without much or any paperwork, just as you would from NY to Pennsylvania. But if the UK leaves the EU and nothing else is done, you won’t necessarily be able to ship a truckload of Guinness from Dublin to Derry. A hard customs border between NI and the ROI is entirely unacceptable for multiple reasons. The apparent solution to be implemented once the UK elections are completed, is to have a kind of border in the Irish sea. Goods moving from the UK to either Ireland or to Northern Ireland will be subject customs checks.

This has angered many unionists in Northern Ireland. Some of them are angry all the time, but I digress. They see this a kind of separation of NI from the rest of the UK. It is indeed a kind of separation, but it is only that. Northern Ireland will remain part of the UK post Brexit. And the sea border could work to the advantage of the NI economy.

There is talk in Unionist circles of betrayal by PM Johnson, with no major party alternative for them to turn to, with Labour headed a hostile Corbyn.

There are mutterings of loyalist violence and or disruption once Brexit is passed if it includes an Irish Sea border.

The subject is discussed in this article from The Atlantic magazine, as first linked to by the excellent Daphne.

I think that an Irish sea invisible border is the best solution, and that there is no other decent solution. What in the world is Johnson supposed to do?

I don’t think that any disruption is justified.

Unionist concerns should be listened to. But then what?

I think part of the political fatigue setting in among those opposed to Trump is caused by the realization that he wont stop lying and that his supporters not only dont mind this, they revel in it. Each lie over the hours, days, weeks and months have the majority of the population thinking “surely this will be the final straw.” But it will never be. The lies will continue. He’ supporter by media types who lie with him. By politicians who lie with him. By supporters who lie with him. This isnt a debate point, it is a factual realization.
Gone are the days of Honest Abe or the George Washington who could never tell a lie. They’ve been cut down like Washington’s cherry tree. Here now ate the days of Orwell’s Memory hole, Machavelli’s lying prince and Stalin’s false propoganda.
Aesop’s The Boy Who Cried Wolf and Disney’s Pinocchio are stories that are Dead on Arrival.
The Republucans who will acquit Trump in the Senate have learned that Dishonesty is the Best policy. Instead of holding him accountable they will allow him to abuse his office for personal gain. Why? For their own gain.
It is a depressing reversal of two sides arguing over different but credible positions to the current status of the deceitful verse the facts. I doubt there is anything more appropriate to call this than a tangled web.

The New York Yankees are paying a picher $324 million over the course of a nine year contract. Good work if you can get it.
I doubt i shall ever recapture my boyhood enthusiasm for the game but this type of transaction just makes md feel like moving on to watching curling.
I get athletes deserve to be well paid, the market etc. But at some point dont you go “the gods must be crazy.” It isnt limited to baseball or American sports.
Add to this the prohibitive cost of a family attending professional sports games, the ludicrous ticket prices, price gouging food and merchandise and you think the people who control this are simply rotten.
I love sports, and there have always been issues in professional sports, but I feel like we are crossing the Rubicon of decency.

I can’t think of any. Or brown ones. All the climate alarmists are white. Climate hysteria is just another form of middle class, progressive, white guilt.