Historian, playwright, broadcaster. Chair of Govs. Hon. Visiting Fellow at Anglia Ruskin University. Author of British History for Dummies. And other things.
Joined December 2009
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Hey @BBCLookEast where are you? We're getting @BBCLondonNews here tonight!
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What has become clear these past few days and weeks is that Pope Leo XIV and King Charles III have two things in common:
a) each combines religious and political supreme authority
b) neither is afraid of Donald Trump
Both of these set them apart from just every other world leader
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Superlative thread. Proper historical balance instead of tured old faux-patriotic posturing. Explains how an army that had triumphed in 1763 could not win in 1775-83. (Would welcome thoughts on the French contribution, too.)
America 250th.
There's 1 thing I wish people knew about the Revolutionary War: the Brits didn't lose because they were slow and we had trees.
They lost because they were a high speed, low drag, tactically-adaptable force, whose gov't asked them to do the impossible.
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Since we're still in Eastertide, I seem to recall that, on the cross, Jesus said a convicted thief on the cross next to him would be heading straight to paradise. Looks like Jesus was soft on crime too.
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It is a damning condemnation of the American Constitution that the President can openly threaten wholesale war crimes sgainst the civilian population of another country and there is no official leader of an Opposition to call him out or effective system to hold him to account.
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The three Unforgivables:
1. Beginning an email "I hope you are well". ( And if I'm not? Just tell me what you want to say)
2. Using "Y'all" for You. This is deserving of summary punishment.
3. Calling Mandelson a "US Ambassador". He was BRITISH ambassador TO the US. Get it right.
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It is worth reminding those who need to hear that the 'special relationship', if there is one (and there probably is) is with the United States, and not with any individual or administration.
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Okayyyy, I misread 'Counterterror officers' in a @thetimes headline as 'Countertenor officers' and my imagination went into overdrive.
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Master and Commander is an absolute masterpiece of a film - intelligent, superbly historically accurate, exciting, poignant at times and funny at others. It doesn't have a theme tune, yet it makes beautiful, sometimes haunting use of music and sound.
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Sean Lang πΊπ¦ π¬π§ π¨π¦ retweeted
Mar 28
As a British MP I can tell you what βshowing upβ looks like.
It looks like 457 British soldiers who died in Afghanistan.
NATO has only ever gone to war for one country. Yours.
The question isnβt whether NATO showed up, itβs whether we forgive you for pretending otherwise.
Mar 27
PRESIDENT TRUMP: NATO wasnβt there for us. We send billions of dollars to them every year to protect them. We would have always been there for them. But based on their actions, I guess we donβt have to be, do we?
Why would we be there for them if theyβre not there for us?
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Thrilled and delighted to see my play THIS IS NOT A SHAKESPEARE PLAY performed by Neale Wade Academy in the Coram Schools Shakespeare Festival. It's about mystery and magic in a school production Macbeth, and it's to introduce children to the power and magic of Shakespeare.
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Powerful testimony.
Mar 17
I would not wish on you, Owen Jones, even one day of living under the conditions Iranians endure in Iran. Because you wonβt last long!
I am a woman who lived in Iran until I was 22. What do you know about torture and rape being used as weapons to control your behaviour? What do you know about children being taken from schools and their bodies being checked for signs of pellets from attending protests? What do you know about mothers keeping the bodies of their children on ice all night because they are terrified the regime will steal them? Yes, the regime is even afraid of dead bodies and takes them so families cannot bury their loved ones.
What do you know about executions at dawn? What do you know about mock executions, when they put a rope around your neck, pull you up, then drop you down? What do you know about going out with your friends and being arrested just for having fun? What do you know about police banging on your door with a gun because you are having a party? What do you know about women prisoners being raped so they are no longer virgins when they are executed? What do you know about students being thrown off campus buildings for protesting? What do you know about the regime installing machine guns in the middle of the street and massacring its own people? What do you know about families being forced to walk among hundreds of corpses to find their loved ones? What do you know about nurses being gang-raped repeatedly? What do you know about being forced to pray, forced to cover up? What do you know about being Iranian and living in hell?
You do not even understand propaganda, so why do you speak? Be quiet and let the voices of those who have been denied access to the internet #DigitalBlackOutIranβ for almost three weeks be heard. You think you are standing with the oppressed. You are not!
Once again, a white man wants to play the hero and save us. We do not want saving. Just stop feeding the regimeβs propaganda.
#Iran
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Sean Lang πΊπ¦ π¬π§ π¨π¦ retweeted
Mar 17
I would not wish on you, Owen Jones, even one day of living under the conditions Iranians endure in Iran. Because you wonβt last long!
I am a woman who lived in Iran until I was 22. What do you know about torture and rape being used as weapons to control your behaviour? What do you know about children being taken from schools and their bodies being checked for signs of pellets from attending protests? What do you know about mothers keeping the bodies of their children on ice all night because they are terrified the regime will steal them? Yes, the regime is even afraid of dead bodies and takes them so families cannot bury their loved ones.
What do you know about executions at dawn? What do you know about mock executions, when they put a rope around your neck, pull you up, then drop you down? What do you know about going out with your friends and being arrested just for having fun? What do you know about police banging on your door with a gun because you are having a party? What do you know about women prisoners being raped so they are no longer virgins when they are executed? What do you know about students being thrown off campus buildings for protesting? What do you know about the regime installing machine guns in the middle of the street and massacring its own people? What do you know about families being forced to walk among hundreds of corpses to find their loved ones? What do you know about nurses being gang-raped repeatedly? What do you know about being forced to pray, forced to cover up? What do you know about being Iranian and living in hell?
You do not even understand propaganda, so why do you speak? Be quiet and let the voices of those who have been denied access to the internet #DigitalBlackOutIranβ for almost three weeks be heard. You think you are standing with the oppressed. You are not!
Once again, a white man wants to play the hero and save us. We do not want saving. Just stop feeding the regimeβs propaganda.
#Iran
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Although 'fewer than six items' is correct, 'fewer' being the adjective attached to 'items', 'six items or fewer' should be 'six items or less' because 'less' refers to the number: 'six or a number less than six'.
The girl who corrected a supermarket's grammar was mistaken.
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Talking of Mandelson wrongly as 'US Ambassador' when he was the BRITISH Ambassador TO the US is not just lazy journalism: it suggests Mandelson is somehow someone else's problem. No, he was a British ambassador and he is a British problem.
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Say it loud: Sometimes 'less' is right and 'fewer'is wrong.
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Why can no news outlet understand the basic point that a UK ambassador to the US is a BRITISH ambassador, NOT a US ambassador??? #itsprettybasic
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