I like the Andrew Rawnsley, and Toby Helm’s roundup of Starmer’s first 11 weeks in office.

There’s a bit of controversy around gifts and staff salaries, but on closer look he seems to be mostly being very practical. He’s not afraid to point out where the other side left a mess, but I like that he’s also not afraid of accepting responsibility. This conscientious approach ties in rather well with this house redecoration metaphor he’s been going for. It all feels very sensible. At the minute he sounds like a tremendously good house renovation expert. And that’s great. It feels safe.

Nevertheless there’s this yearning to get a feel for his wider ambitions for the country because I think people realise that a country is in fact more complicated than a house. Having a small glimpse of his vision, even if it’s just a description of the house he sees, would give us an idea of what he thinks might be possible. And that’s important because it’s not just about him, it’s about the team around him, the institutions around him, and all the rest of it, and he’s the one with the best visibility of that right now.

I think people want to understand what he feels is possible. Maybe it’s a complete refurb of everything, or maybe it’s just a few key rooms in the house, or maybe it’s just to be in maintenance mode for a while only changing the furniture. People will likely be fine with most of the possibilities as long as it’s feasible, as long as it’s achievable.

In this article they mention the "house redecoration" metaphor, cleaning up cracks and mold, but I seem to remember reading or hearing elseshere about "house renovation" as the metaphor with suggestion of more foundational changes. The country is a much more multi-dimensional and realtime changing complexity thing than a house. It’s more like a giant living organism. That's why a description of his vision is so important, or even just an honest description of his approach to finding the right vision fit for the nation if it hasn’t been compleately figured out yet.

I wonder whether Starmer has some Elon Musk qualities in him. Perhaps even dare I say it a better, more british version of Elon Musk. I hesitate to mention Musk as I know he’s a bit of an enfant terrible at the minute, especially among UK elites, but wouldn’t it be cool if Starmer got the country firing on all cylinders in a way comparable to how Musk is helping to push US tech forward.

I keep thinking back to the unbelievable Danny Boyle London Olympics opening ceremony. That really was something wasn’t it? I want this Labour journey to be the next chapter in that story, but even better, less painful, more fun, and even more incredible and amazing. Are we just taking on a new scene in that story, or a whole new section, or is it all just foundational stuff to even make that a possibility? It’s all good.

Where are we at Keir mate, what do you reckon?

PS - In the original version of this article I confused Keir with Keith. Totally unintentional. That’s the sort of thing that happens in hectic environments. I did know Keir was Keir, but for some reason, I suppose because it’s not a name my brain is familiar with, Keir became Keith, and I just realised it now. Sorry mate, I’ve updated the article and url.

It occurred to be after writing about Marty Bent and Matt Odell’s recent interaction on Trumps sketchy looking crypto venture, that what if they themselves are scammers?

I think this type of thing is going to become ever more frequent. Noone is going to be able to trust anyone. I’m not alone in thinking this. Andrew Keen and Keith Tear get into that, along with a bunch of other interesting topics in the latest Keen On episode.

As for Marty and Matt, it certainly doesn’t sound like they are scammers, but I’ve heard some serious meta meta meta shit this week. It’s worrying that with AI deep fakes, in the future, you literally won’t be able to tell. In fact ironically it will be just as difficult for the scammers to convince you they are real as it will be for the real folks to convince you they aren’t fake.

Asymptote prison for everyone.

There are bound to be some very strange 2nd and 3rd order effects. The most obvious I can think of is real fakes, where people will be put up against each other by puppet masters, but without the full data set, so they will be fake but they might have many real qualities. A sort of modern RL version of Team America.

Fuck yeah!....Fuck Yeah?

I thought this was an interesting exchange on multiple levels. Marty Bent and Matt Odell on the Trump family World Liberty Be Defined crypto project on Rabbit Hole Recap podcast [1:19:20]:

MO: What are your thoughts on the World Liberty Be Defined shitcoin thing he has?

MB: It’s complete bullshit. What are you doing Trump family? People are like you’re doing all these scammy business deals, you’re gonna launch a shitcoin 2 months before the election?

MO: So many people hate him on the left, if he looses, they are going to come after us harder because of all this bullshit. You realise that right?

MB: Yes.

MO: Like they group us in with the crypto bullshit. They are not going to be like, oh the Bitcoiners were against World Liberty Coin.

MB: Yeah terrible timing. Terrible look. You are associating with people that run a network called Rug Radio? An overt insinuation that they are going to dump on retail? [laughs]

MO: Pretty bad.

MB: It’s very bad. These crypto scammers they know how to wiggle their way in. The fact that he did a spaces with his...I’m not sure if you listened to any of it?

MO: I didn’t. I know it existed.

MB: Not impressive people.

MO: Blah blah blah politics blah blah [...] stay humble and stack sats.

This exchange is a great example of why I really like their podcast. They really are in it for furthering Bitcoin, for making the protocol better. They might be on the right of the political spectrum but they will still call out weird shit even if it’s from their preferred candidate.