That latest Epstein file dump has set off a political bomb in the UK
Mandelson gone
Starmer damaged (as he chose to appoint Mandelson as Ambassador knowing some of his past issues with Epstein)
His Chief of Staff (McSweeney) is very likely to get pushed out (he lobbied hard for Mandelson)
Labour has now also been tarred with the same corrupt brush as the Tories.
The gift that keeps on giving.
Is it similar to the US, where scandal forces Democrats to quit, but scandal gets totally ignored by Republicans?
I donāt think weāre quite there yet but give it time
Cuba continues to spiral downwards.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/cuba-travel-warning-9.7073480
And McSweeney (PM Chief of Staff) has now resigned as predicted.
Anybody connected to Mandelson is on the chopping block now due the Epstein link.
Its like the night of the long knives UK edition. The press smell blood in the water now.
Do you have the link to this story?
Going to a meeting this afternoon with the other former Canadian investment manager who owned a piece of Thames Water and TW may come up (it has many times previously!).
Sure. Here you go:
A variation (which I donāt have access to yet) of this slide was one of many that were discussed yesterday at the investment seminar I attended. Their slide showed that the top 20% of income earners in the US provide 63% of total spending.
This skewing has lasted for more than 25 years so is not new. This spending is somewhat fuelled by high asset values so possibly it would take a massive correction in equity values to return to the pre-2000 less skewed spending distribution?
One bright spot in the UK is that the judiciary is still ok
Labour rolled over to pro-Israel interests in the UK and proscribed a tiny activist group called Palestine Action for breaking into an army base and spray painting some planes.
This was disgraceful behavior by the Govt which was protested by people from all walks of life.
The UK already has laws in place to deal with the things like trepassing, and damage to public property. Instead, they were swayed by the pro-Israel lobby and decided on an extremely heavy-handed response.
Government lost in the high court after a judicial review.
My London SILās aunt and uncle were arrested several times for attending Palestine Action protests. They will be overjoyed to hear this.
Update on the Irish project. After a 10 month wait (one day off from what Iād marked down on my calendar as the expected date) someone started processing my application and wants two āclarificationsā. One is just a clarification that my dadās name is listed without a middle name on the birth certificate and with on the death certificate. An affidavit from me should handle that. I think the other one will require getting a new copy of my grandparentās marriage certificate. The person processing the application says that what I sent was a marriage license, which is true enough - the license gets signed by the person officiating the marriage, then files it with the county, at which time it becomes the marriage certificate. And thatās what I sent them, complete with co clerks certification and stamp. But they donāt see it that way and Iāve already tried a chat with them to get them into seeing it for what it is, without success. Itās an old copy (~1985), so Iām hoping a newer copy will be acceptable. So Iām back with having to try to deal with the Cook Co clerkās office. Iāve been told that if things go well, it will still take 60 days to get what I need from the co clerk. Iāve made an in-person appointment with them at a branch office for Tuesday, hoping to short-circuit the process a little, but Iāve been told Iāll almost certainly just be sent away.
Countries are pretty strict when it comes to granting citizenship? When I applied to work in the UK on a āgranny visaā I just went into the UK High Commission Office with all my documentation and they gave me my visa on the spot and they had a cup of tea with me. But it was only a work visa.
From what I have been told, they are getting a lot pickier because Ireland is currently swamped by Citizenship applications due to Brexit.
No biscuit??? 
Iām sure there were biscuits but it was over 35 years ago so I donāt recall the type. I do recall it was the head of the High Commission that I met with and that we discussed my Barnardo grandmother.
Until the UK accepts (publicly) that Brexit has been a failure, and that it was a Russian influence operation (the paper on Russian influence in Govt was buried. It has never been released) that drove some of the voteā¦it will just keep getting poorer.
The headline numbers are brutal. UK GDP is now 6ā8 per cent smaller than it would have been by 2025 ā worse than forecast, not better. That is a permanent loss of national income, not a blip.
Investment has collapsed. UK business investment is 18 per cent lower than in comparable economies, as firms put money on hold or moved it elsewhere. Employment and productivity are both around 4 per cent lower, locking in weaker wage growth and lower living standards.
That is some deep-level stuff.
The moon landing was faked. The paper on it was buried. Astronauts have been dying off mysteriously.
