Media | Steve Woods

Number Ten reacts to Signalgate

30/03/2025 Steve WoodsLanguage, Media, Politics, Social Media

The international political news has been dominated in the last week by what has become known as Signalgate.

For a few days earlier this month a group of United States national security leaders used insecure communications services and personal devices to conduct a group chat on the Signal messaging service about imminent military operations against the Houthis in Yemen. Among the chat’s members were Vice President JD Vance, top White House staff, three Cabinet secretaries and the directors of two intelligence agencies.

However, National Security Advisor Mike Waltz erroneously added Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic to the group.

Discussions in the group included sharing details of planned airstrikes, including types of aircraft and missiles, as well as launch and attack times. Furthermore, Vice-President JD Vance and Defense Secretary used the group to denigrate allegedly freeloading European allies.

Signalgate has raised concerns inter alia about US national security leaders’ information security practices, what other sensitive information the group might have revealed, whether they were following the Federal Records Act and other related legislation (they were not. Ed.), not to mention accountability within the Trump regime.

So far the British political establishment has either been silent or said very little about Signalgate with one notable exception. Alleged Labour prime minister ‘Sir’ Keir Starmer might not have approached this matter with an open mouth, but that does not mean that Downing Street has been completely silent: one just has to know where to look to find comment.

In this case it’s the Mastodon social media network.

Larry the Downing Street cat is a name not unfamiliar to this blog (posts passim). His latest tongue-in-cheek comment mocks the abject incompetence of the sycophantic MAGA louts the disgraced former 45th president and current disgraceful 47th president of the United States of America, insurrectionist, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual predator, business fraudster, congenital liar and golf cheat commonly known as Donald John Trump.

By so doing, Larry has done what the appeasing Starmer would never do: openly mock Trump’s extreme right wing regime.

Keep up the good work, Larry!
Welcome to Birmingham

29/03/2025 Steve WoodsMedia, Oddities, Politics

The Reform UK Party Ltd., the private company/cult of personality masquerading as a political party, launched its campaign for the 2025 English local government elections with a rally at Birmingham’s Utilita Arena yesterday evening.

However, the charlatan commonly known as Nigel Farage was not the only one waiting to welcome delegates to the rally.

Our old friends from Led By Donkeys were also present, projecting their messages onto the side of the building, much to the bemusement of the local constabulary (judging from the video. Ed.).

Delegates were greeted by a large picture of Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin (aka Vlad the Invader. Ed.) and Mr Farage, after the political activists projected the image onto the big screen, with the caption: “Vladimir and Nigel welcome you to Birmingham”.

Led By Donkeys have plenty of experience of this kind of action: just ask the disgraced – and disgraceful – former UK prime minister, one Mary Elizabeth Truss (posts passim).
In your own time, Bristol City Council!

26/03/2025 Steve WoodsBristol, Language, Media, Politics

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
The best part of 30 years ago,the late cycle campaigner Chris Hutt of Bristol’s Cyclebag remarked that perhaps the simplest way in which mobility within the city could be improved would be to tweak the timings of pedestrian crossings so that they switched over to the pedestrian green phase within seconds of the button being pushed.

Fifteen years after Chris’ death it looks like something similar to what he suggested is finally being implemented – albeit half-heartedly – by Bristol City Council.

Today’s Bristol Post reports that around 100 crossings – i.e. a fraction of those in the city – will be changed as suggested by Chris all that time ago.The change has been described by councillors as a “cost-effective way to get traffic-calming measures” that have already proved popular on some busy roads. The setting, known as “pre-timed max”, will also be installed on new crossings as they are provided.

In addition, the tweak will only be made to stand-alone pedestrian crossings, not those associated with junctions where they are just as badly needed and could be equally as beneficial.

Commenting on the scheme, Green Councillor Emma Edwards said: “When people realised what had happened, I got phone calls saying ‘can we have one down here and there, and it would be useful here’. Residents really love them and it’s such a cost-effective way to get traffic calming measures in and to help with things like school routes.”

What has taken you so long, Bristol City Council?

Your ‘umble scribe’s best guess is that the idea was filed away in the “not invented here” cabinet combined with the propensity of highways department staff not being able to see beyond the bonnet of their respective motorised tinned three-piece suites.

Given these shortcomings, your correspondent is only prepared to give the council one extremely grudging cheer.
Telling the truth costs NZ diplomat his job

06/03/2025 Steve WoodsLanguage, Media, Politics

The BBC reports that New Zealand’s right wing new Zealand First party foreign minister Winston Peters has dismissed his country’s high commissioner (that’s Commonwealth speak for ambassador. Ed.) to London after the latter told a few home truths about the disgraced former 45th president and current disgraceful 47th president of the United States of America, insurrectionist, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual predator, business fraudster, congenital liar and golf cheat commonly known as Donald John Trump.

According to the BBC:
At an event in London on Tuesday, High Commissioner Phil Goff compared efforts to end the war between Russia and Ukraine to the 1938 Munich Agreement, which allowed Adolf Hitler to annex part of Czechoslovakia without any involvement of the Czechoslovak government.

The Munich Agreement was signed on 30th September 1938, by Nazi Germany, the United Kingdom (represented by prime minister Neville Chamberlain. Ed.), France and Fascist Italy and provided for the German annexation of part of Czechoslovakia called the Sudetenland, where more than three million people, mainly ethnic Germans, lived.

Neville Chamberlain returned triumphantly to Britain proclaiming he’d achieved “peace in our time” and waving a piece of paper allegedly including Hitler’s signature above his head.

One of the critics of Chamberlain was Winston Churchill, who was to succeed Chamberlain as the UK’s second wartime prime minister. Churchill remarked:

You had the choice between war and dishonour. You chose dishonour, yet you will have war.

Mr Goff noted that, “President Trump has restored the bust of Churchill to the Oval Office. But do you think he really understands history?”

In support of Mr Goff, Trump’s woeful knowledge of history is a matter of public record. In July 2019 claimed in a speech Continental Army “manned the air” and “took over the airports” during the Revolutionary War, despite the fact that the Wright brothers’ first flight did not take place in 1903, one hundred and twenty years after the end of the American revolution.

The BBC piece describes Mr Goff as “a veteran politician who had been high commissioner since January 2023. Before that, he served for two terms as mayor of Auckland, New Zealand’s largest city, and was leader of the Labour Party from 2008 to 2011. He had also held several ministerial portfolios, including justice, foreign affairs and defence“.
Nanny meets fascism

09/02/2025 Steve WoodsLanguage, Media, Politics, Social Media

In 1964, Walt Disney released Mary Poppins starring Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke, the man with the worst Cockney accent ever to be recorded for release on celluloid.

One of the film’s biggest song and dance tunes was a catchy little number sung by the two stars and entitled “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious“.

According to the song’s Wikipedia page, songwriters the Sherman Brothers have given several conflicting explanations for the word’s origin, in one instance claiming to have coined it themselves, based on their memories of having created double-talk words as children. At another time they are on record as having written the following:

When we were little boys in the mid-1930s, we went to a summer camp in the Adirondack Mountains, where we were introduced to a very long word that had been passed down in many variations through many generations of kids. … The word as we first hear it was super-cadja-flawjalistic-espealedojus.

Scroll forward sixty-one years from Mary Poppins on the silver screen and Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious has become part of the English language.

Furthermore, as my social media timeline this week has revealed, the word itself has been parodied and used as a pun in connection with one person in particular, the disgraced 47th and 45th president of the United States, insurrectionist, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual predator, business fraudster, congenital liar and golf cheat commonly known as Donald John Trump, who is currently dealing enthusiastically and vindictively with punishing political opponents, as well as dismantling the federal government as part of his mission to Make America Grate Again (or something like that. Ed.)

Sounds about right!
Daleks preferable to Musk

06/02/2025 Steve WoodsMedia, Oddities, Politics, Social Media

As part of the background to TV science fiction series Dr Who, which has graced TV screens since 1963, one learns that the planet Skaro, home of the Daleks, suffered a thousand-year war between two societies: the Kaleds and the Thals. During this period, many natives of Skaro became badly mutated by fallout from nuclear weapons and chemical warfare. The Kaled government believed in genetic purity and swore to “exterminate the Thals” for being inferior. Believing his own society was becoming weak and that it was his duty to create a new master race from the ashes of his people, a Kaled scientist named Davros genetically modified several Kaleds into squid-like life-forms he called Daleks, removing such “weaknesses” as mercy and sympathy whilst enhancing other behaviours such as aggression and the survival instinct.

The Daleks are just about the nastiest characters ever to appear on Doctor Who: they are portrayed as violent, merciless and pitiless cyborg aliens, completely absent of any emotion other than hate, who demand total conformity to the will of the Dalek with the highest authority. Your ‘umble scribe well remembers cowering behind the settee fifty-two years ago.

However, there are worse creatures in the universe according to your correspondent’s social media timeline.

Goose-step forward fascist man-baby Elon Musk, a man with a now undisputed reputation for gesture politics.

In a poll by British science fiction writer Charlie Stross, the South African-born man-baby and best buddy of the disgraced 47th and 45th president of the United States, insurrectionist, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual predator, business fraudster, congenital liar and golf cheat, one Donald John Trump, is beating the Skaro aliens hands-down over the most evil incarnation of government.

You will obey or you will be exterminated!

Where’s a Tardis when one’s needed?
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Rachel buys magic beans

27/01/2025 Steve WoodsLanguage, Media, Politics

The 1734 tale of “The Story of Jack Spriggins and the Enchanted Bean“, better known nowadays as “The History of Jack and the Bean-Stalk” in the version published in 1807, all hinges on Jack, the poor country boy and the hero of the story swapping the family cow at market for a handful of magic beans, much to the dismay of his mother.

What has a fairy tale about gullibility have to do with the current the Chancellor of the Exchequer, one Rachel Jane Reeves, who despite her qualifications from New College, Oxford (PPE) and the London School of Economics (doctorate in economics) appears to suffer from the same ailment as young Jack?

Well, Ms Reeves seems to have been sold a complete fantasy by her civil service minders in the advice given to her in respect of her proposed announcement later this week of a third runway at London’s Heathrow airport to counter any opposition, as reported yesterday in The Times.

The proposals for a third runaway at the capital’s main airport have long been a source of opposition and the latest incarnation thereof has drawn opposition from Energy Secretary Ed Miliband, London mayor Sadiq Khan and local London MPs Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith and Chiswick), Fleur Anderson (Putney), Marsha de Cordova (Battersea), John McDonnell (Hayes & Harlington) and Ruth Cadbury (Brentford & Isleworth).

And the complete fantasy bought by Ms Reeves? As justification for airport expansion, she is on record as saying the third runaway is justified because of recent aviation fuel innovations.

“Sustainable aviation fuel is changing carbon emissions from flying.”

The only drawback to her argument is that there is, of course, no such thing as sustainable aviation fuel. As reported by The Guardian in 2024, a paper on sustainable jet fuels from the Institute for Policy Studies found that expectations for these were not realistic. Chuck Collins, co-author of the report remarked as follows:

To bring these fuels to the scale needed would require massive subsidies, the trade-offs would be unacceptable and would take resources aware from more urgent decarbonization priorities.

It’s a huge greenwashing exercise by the aviation industry. It’s magical thinking that they will be able to do this.

A further study by The Royal Society in 2023 found that over half of the UK’s agricultural land would be needed to produce biofuel to meet the country’s existing aviation fuel demand.

Not only is Ms Reeves indulging in greenwashing, there's an accusation of hypocrisy on the charge sheet too. She was prepared to argue against the expansion of Leeds Bradford airport near her Yorkshire constituency due to concerns about air and noise pollution.

As The Times piece helpfully points out:

In 2020, Reeves objected to a new terminal for the Leeds Bradford airport near her constituency, arguing that it “would significantly increase air and noise pollution” and “undermine vital efforts to ensure that Leeds upholds its commitment to become a carbon neutral city by 2030.”
Morning Star hits nail on head

21/01/2025 Steve WoodsMedia, Politics

The Morning Star is one of Britain’s few left-wing news publications.

As such and unlike other media outlets, it can be guaranteed not to be overly sycophantic where the person of the disgraced 47th and 45th president of the United States of America, insurrectionist, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual predator, business fraudster, congenital liar and golf cheat, one Donald John Trump is concerned.

Today’s front page needs no further comment.

Make America Grate Again

Needless to say, the Morning Star’s front page did not make it into the shots of national newspaper front pages provided each day by Sky News and what passes for BBC News. Too close to the truth perhaps.

The closest any of the major papers came to criticism was the Daily Star; and it didn’t hold back.

Two bibles for double insincerity…
Nearly 90 French organisations are leaving X

15/01/2025 Steve WoodsMedia, Politics, Social Media, Tech

In an opinion piece which appeared on Tuesday in Le Monde (paywalled), 86 French associations and federations announced they are collectively leaving X, a cesspit of far-right intolerance, ignorance, paranoia, misinformation, flat-out lying, and malicious abuse formerly known as Twitter, on 20th January, the date of convicted felon and sexual predator Donald Trump’s inauguration as the 47th United States president. By supporting the “Hello leave X” initiative, they are also appealing to the public to leave the platform en masse.

The LDH (Ligue des droits de l’Homme – Human Rights League) jointly set up the HelloQuitteX collective in partnership with the CNRS (Centre national de la recherche scientifique – National Scientific Research Centre) and was also asked to sign the opinion piece initiated by the poverty and homeless charity Emmaüs France. Moreover, it decided not to post any more content on X due to both the configuration of its algorithms, which encourage the proliferation of hateful content and spread conspiracy theories and climate scepticism, and the lack of moderation.

The LDH believes that X is no longer the digital street (however imperfect) that it could have been, due to the manipulation of the conditions for making public debate possible by Elon Musk and, as a result, the lack of visibility of the principles that it upholds in defending human rights and equality.

It is also a basic call to arms for democracy, implying the solidarity of all stakeholders in civil society and politics who share the same values. This entails promoting and advocating digital spaces that respect and ensure the protection of pluralism, respectful debate and reason.

The LDH is therefore inviting all those who share these values to leave en bloc if possible on 20th and follow them on Mastodon or Bluesky instead.

In other news, the German army has announced it is also abandoning X. Auf Wiedersehen, Elon!
What We Leave Behind

09/01/2025 Steve WoodsLanguage, Media, Oddities, Politics

Your ‘umble scribe’s recent stay in Sydney coincided with the Sydney Festival, a major arts festival held for three weeks in January every year since its inception in 1977.

On my penultimate day in Australia your correspondent had arranged to visit the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia and arrived rather early. While waiting to rendezvous, a volunteer for Cave Urban outside a gazebo at Tallawoladah Lawn persuaded yours truly to take part in What We Leave Behind, a participatory event involving lots of split bamboo, market pens and people’s imaginations.

Members of the public were invited to leave messages of hope for the planet on strips of bamboo which are being woven into a structure.
My positive message: “Let homo sapiens finally live up to its Latin species name“.

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