The Sunday Ishmael: 24/05/2026

 

It costs £63,000 per year, per child, to attend this establishment. That cost includes board and lodging and  tuition. You have to buy your own clothes. There is a strict dress code.  To attend you must be male and aged between 13 and 18.  The cost of attending falls on the parent of the child unless a scholarship or bursary is made available. Without such, and most children are not in receipt of those benefits, a  family needs to earn £143,386 per year to send one child there and still retain sufficient income for the necessities of life. The median average salary in Britain is £37,430.

It costs £72,198 per year, per child, to attend this establishment. That cost includes board and lodging and tuition. You do not have to buy your own clothes, which are provided. There is a strict dress code for visitors. You will not be allowed to visit your child unless you adhere to the following guidance:

modest dress only, no work clothes (including uniforms and trousers with multiple pockets), no sports shirts or football shirts, no jumpers or shirts with hoods, no mobile phones, no offensive logos, no sunglasses or headscarves unless worn for religious reasons, no ripped jeans, no vest tops, no short skirts or dresses, they must be knee length.

To attend this establishment you must be male and aged between 15 and 18.  The cost of attending falls on the State. The boroughs supplying the largest numbers of young offenders to this institution e.g. Hounslow, Ealing, Brent, Croydon, Lambeth, Southwark, Newham, are in the bottom 10–20% for income. Because the majority of boys come from these areas, the best evidence‑based inference of household income  is likely to fall in the region of £18,000–£24,000 per year.

Eton, the first establishment, rigorously excludes the academically challenged and, upon leaving Eton, 80 to 90% go straight into Higher Education. Feltham, the second, and more expensive establishment, has a reoffending rate of 70% within a year of release.

Two institutions 20 miles apart. Two utterly different social worlds.

Measure	Feltham Boys	Eton Boys
Household income:	£18k–£24k	£200k+ typical
Neighbourhood deprivation:	Bottom 10%	Top 1–5%
Reoffending rate:	70%	negligible
University entry:	<5%	80–90%
Likelihood of custody:	extremely high	effectively zero

Two groups of boys, 20 miles apart, living in entirely different countries in terms of opportunity, risk, and outcomes. How very British.

Now, are Eton boys essentially more law abiding than the boys who end up in Feltham? Given what we know about the maturation of the brain, that's unlikely. A teenage boy is emotionally immature, neurologically impulsive, driven by peers, unable to link actions to consequences, shaped by pornography and lacking empathy and boundaries. A boy doesn't finish growing his brain until he's in his twenties. So what is going on with the Eton boys that keeps them out of Feltham?

Er- could that be class bias?

Middle‑class boys have better legal representation, parents who advocate, write letters, hire experts, schools that excuse behaviour as “out of character”, judges who do not want to disturb their career trajectory into university, more likely to get community sentences, rehabilitation, sealed records. Whereas working‑class boys have less effective advocacy - the overworked legal aid solicitor, schools that have already excluded them, histories of generational police contact, the stigma of their postcode, judges who see a “pattern” rather than a “mistake” and are more likely to get custody, even when the offence is similar. And, this is a seriously significant factor, middle class boys are more likely to have two parents in the home, whereas Feltham lads are more likely to have been raised by a single parent.

A Utopian solution might be to empty out Eton and replace its customers with the Feltham children. It would be cheaper for the state and if the fabled Eton education lived up to the promise on its website that: " we proudly offer a unique and outstanding education with endless opportunities. Growing up in our boarding community develops personal growth and lifelong friendships in the safety of our wrap-around pastoral care, while nurturing the value of leadership and service", then the saving in human misery to the countless victims of Feltham's graduates reoffending, would add to the jollity of the nation. Wouldn't work, of course, because by the time a child is sentenced to a Young Offender institution, he is already beyond redemption. Even at Eton. Although it would be nice to see them try, instead of wasting all that outstanding education and pastoral care on the already deeply-privileged.
You see, Feltham doesn't rehabilitate anybody. It contains the bodies of the imprisoned, whilst doing worse than nothing for their minds, souls and spirits. It is a horror show of violence and drug addiction. It takes dangerous children and turns them into dangerous men. There are reasons for this. YOIs are not therapeutic environments, staff turnover is high, boys are moved frequently, sentences are often too short for engagement in meaningful change work, the environment is violent, chaotic, and traumatising, group work is unsafe and privacy and trust are impossible.
YOIs are the worst possible setting for treating sexual offending in adolescents. They cannot rehabilitate sexual offenders. They can only punish them. And punishment in and of itself increases risk.
All this was in Judge Nicholas Rowland's mind on Thursday when he sentenced three teenage boys, two aged 15 and one aged 14, convicted of raping two girls in separate attacks. They were nasty, nasty offences, made worse by having been carefully planned, the use of a knife and filming the rapes. The film showed the boys, who were 13, 14 and 14 at the time of the rapes, laughing and encouraging each other. The victims, their families, the public, media and pundits are all agreed that the sentencing was ridiculously lenient and only a prison sentence would meet the gravity of the offending. Reading the comments, you'd think the three boys, who have 10 rape convictions between them, had got away scot free. Far from it. The two older boys, now 15, were given three-year Youth Rehabilitation Orders - the longest standard term for a YRO - with 180 days of intensive surveillance and supervision. The youngest boy was given an 18-month YRO. All three boys were also made subject to a three-month curfew and given a restraining order for 10 years not to contact their victims.
That sentence is serious and stands the best chance of changing the life course that they have been pursuing. The Youth Justice Board and NSPCC are very clear that the most effective interventions for child sex offenders are community‑based, specialist programmes delivered by trained psychologists over many months with family involvement, stable education and trauma‑informed practice. Programmes that work on empathy, consent, boundaries, pornography, peer pressure, and distorted beliefs have very low reoffending rates — often under 10%. Contrast that with custody, with its 70% reoffending rate.
The current media-led outcry wants none of those pesky fact thingies. It wants punishment, and will only be satisfied by the reintroduction of 18th century punishments: birching, transportation, hanging. Even though those savage punishments didn't deter children from offending. Historical criminology shows that Victorian youth offending rates were extremely high, pickpocketing, burglary, violence, and sexual offences were common. So why didn't harsh punishments deter children? Because the drivers of youth crime were the same then as now: poverty, neglect, lack of education, trauma, unstable homes, exploitation by adults, peer pressure, lack of opportunity and the use of alcohol and drugs. Punishment didn't work then and doesn't work now. If the media frenzy results in the sentencing being recalled and a Young Offender Institution sentence substituted, then be sure that the custodial sentence will be shorter and will have the effect of making bad worse.
In the meantime, just as householders have had to install Ring doorbells and burglar alarms to protect themselves from burglary, teenage girls should take from this sorry tale that they should protect themselves from rape as far as they are able - don't meet three stranger gypsy lads in an isolated place because they've sent a nice text, for pity's sake. It shouldn't be like that. But it is. ..................................................................................................

They really do take their politics seriously in America, don't they? Another attempt on the President's life. Another assassin shot dead. Some people just don't deserve democracy.

.................................................................................

There are four splendid anthologies of the writings of stanislav and mr ishmael, compiled by his friend, mr verge, the house filthster. You can buy them from Amazon or Lulu. Here's how:

Honest Not Invent, Vent Stack, Ishmael’s Blues, and the latest, Flush Test (with a nice picture of the late, much lamented, Mr Harris of Lanarkshire taking a piss on a totem pole) are available from Lulu and Amazon. If you buy from Amazon, it would be nice if you could give a review on their website.

IIshmaelites wishing to buy a copy from lulu should follow these steps 

please register an account first, at lulu.com. This is advisable because otherwise paypal seems to think it's ok to charge in dollars, and they then apply their own conversion rate, which might put the price up slightly for a UK buyer. Once the new account is set up, follow one of the links below (to either paperback or hardback) or type "Ishmael’s Blues" into the Lulu Bookstore search box. Click on the “show explicit content” tab, give the age verification box a date of birth such as 1 January 1960, and proceed.

Link for Hardcover : https://tinyurl.com/je7nddfr

Link for Paperback : https://tinyurl.com/3jurrzux

https://www.lulu.com/shop/ishmael-smith/flush-test/paperback/product-9yjvn7.html?q=Flush+Test&page=1&pageSize=4

At checkout, try WELCOME15 in the coupon box, which (for the moment) takes 15% off the price before postage. If this code has expired by the time you reach this point, try a google search for "Lulu.com voucher code" and see what comes up.

With the 15% voucher, PB (including delivery to a UK address) should be £16.84; HB £27.04.

The Sunday Ishmael: 17/05/2026

 Apologies, Commentariat, I'm aware that I have been neglecting you, but just to let you know I'm in the throes of an imminent house move. It has been creeping up on me, like Christmas does - one day it is January and you are eating up the festive left overs, but before you know it people are organising parties and ordering turkeys. Again. Anyway, I'm in full panic mode. Even the post delivery functionary runs away after throwing letters into the house for fear of being bubble wrapped and boxed.  

That's how the post is delivered here - the door is flung open, the parcel or letters dropped on the floor and photographed and off they go. The other day I received one of those self congratulatory emails from Royal Mail: "We have delivered your parcel, mrs ishmael, how did we do?" And there's a photo of the parcel inside the hall. Except it wasn't my hall. It was some generic white-painted hall, with absolutely no identifying features. Fortunately, the driver had several deliveries in the immediate vicinity and I was able to leap out at him before he could make his getaway. Puzzled, he got out and approached. "Look", I said, "I've got an email saying you've delivered my parcel. But you haven't."

"There's a photo, showing the delivery."

"Maybe so, but it isn't a photo of my house. And there's no parcel."

I was going on to explain about the lack of identifying features and offer to show him the photo, but he held up his finger and said; 

"Stop talking now."

"What...."

"No, Stop Talking. I'm Thinking."

And so he was. I could see the Thoughts going on across the troubled brow. Abruptly, he stopped Thinking and turned to his van. "But my parcel" I wailed.

"I will go and look for it," he reassured me and drove off.

Despite the bubble wrap, I have been aware that it has been a spiffing week in politics. Everyone conspiring and lying and doing the noble thing. Who is running the country while this is going on? Why, the Civil Service, of course, like they always do. Thrown into a frenzy by the Local Elections and Plaid's Welsh triumph, the Labour lot believe that all they have to do is to find a more charismatic leader than Starmer the Nasal Borer and they won't be out of a job. As mr ishmael said: " The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men think of their careers."

Joker Josh Simons - he it was who suggested that Channel smuggling gangs should be put on a barge and sent to Scotland. Anas Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader, said that was "stupid" and "cringe". Labour MSP Monica Lennon said: "There should be no place in the Labour Party for these disgraceful comments." Simons apologised, saying the remarks were made "in jest". The Scottish Labour lot don't do humour. That was in February 2024. Two years later it was reported that Simons had been responsible for investigating the private affairs of journalists who had published an article unfavourable to Labour Together, a think tank he ran. Simons was accused of naming them to British intelligence, and falsely linking them to pro-Russian propaganda. On 28 February 2026, he resigned his ministerial positions, stating that while he had been cleared of breaching the Ministerial Code, the allegations had become a "distraction" from the government's work. So when gorgeous, pouting Andy Burnham needed a seat in Parliament so that he could save Britain, the obvious candidate to resign his seat and do the noble thing was Jesting Josh - being a bit of an embarrassment. Burnam's not necessarily a shoe-in, though, despite being Northern, playing football and having pretty eyes.

Burnham  told a national newspaper in 2008: "I had an email in my constituency office saying 'what mascara do you use?' I can only say, hand on heart, that I have never, ever worn mascara."

The problem is that Joss' sacrifice may be in vain, because the Makerfield constituency is now strongly Reform, as demonstrated in the local elections last week. It would be just too, too amusing if Burnham resigned as Mayor of Manchester, Simons resigned as MP for Makerfield and the upshot was that Nigel Farage gained another Parliamentary seat, Manchester lost a Labour Mayor and Starmer remains Prime Minister.

The other candidate who would like to be Prime Minister is Streeting - a gay Metropolitan elite Europhile. He, too has pretty eyes and is careful always to wear blue ties and a blue suit, despite being Labour, to enhance his blue eyes.  

He is chubby, charming, chubby, a good communicator, chubby, but despite all these good attributes he blew it by assuring the nation that he would have Britain back in Europe as soon as possible. Which bit of the Reform message did he not understand?

Which bit of Reform's success did he not get? Starmer said he got it, he really got it, and his work to subvert the will of the anti-European British public has been stealthy and covert. Chubby Wes, a stranger to subtlety and the fact that the powerful Red Wall - which elected the Labour lot with a majority to die for - has now turned in force to a party that is specifically anti-European, led by a man who understands the power of  a pint and a fag.

And is Britain ready for a Chubby Gay Prime Minister?

Then there's this. A mandelsonian connection. Julie Birchell described it as Streeting's "Albatross with an unusual interest in Farrow and Ball paint colours."

"Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved." (Helen Keller)

Kemi Badenoch, who just gets more and more Prime Ministerial, summed up Labour's problem beautifully today. She said that it is all very well having a plan to get elected, but you then have to have a plan to govern. I thought that is what a manifesto sets out to do. But, having been elected, they so far failed to meet the legitimate expectations of voters who thought they had voted for a Labour Government, they are now scratching round like Tories to find someone who can pull the trick off again. 

 Lugubrious Will Self on Kuenssberg looked like a hirsute Ancient Mariner who has spent the night lecturing passing sailors on the moral failings of the electorate.
His eyes said: “I have read more books than you, and frankly I regret you.”
His beard said: “I have been lost at sea since 1998.”
His tone said: “Why must I explain democracy to people who insist on participating in it.”

He actually said, more or less, never mind all this pissing about with personality leadership contests, like a political Miss World - doesn't anyone realise we are at war and do something about governing this country? I have blood cancer and the Russians have hacked London's blood data.

Are they trying to get you, Will? 

Interviewed in February this year by the Telegraph, he required the interviewer to sit at a safe distance on the opposite side of the room to him, whilst as a precaution against infection he sat by an open window. The interview was to promote his new book, The Quantity Theory of Morality, which he wrote in six weeks (“and it’s as tight as a trap”). He seems to have overcome his infection worries, for this morning he larged it on the Kuenssberg Show, cheek by jowl with Joss Simons, Laura and Jo Coburn, and within waving distance of Kemi, and he may have mentioned the book and the blood cancer. And the Russians. 

There was a time when mr ishmael would mention, almost en passant, Will Self in these columns. Here's  mr ishmael, at his most coruscatingly contemptuous.

"Nothing, neither the work of God or man, is safe from New Labour, all is now the servant of government, the land as well as the people; whence came such tyranny?

The entire apparatus of Power, as never before, skews all before it, towards its own interests. A handful of malevolent freaks owns the national press; the national broadcaster run by effete totalitarianistes nouvelle, fronted by Establishment gabshites, ensures that political coverage stops far short of reporting - much less interviewing - Difference, broadcasters and Westminster politicians all joined in a gross daisy chain, each up the other’s arse, like some devilish, de Sadeian tableau from 120 Days of Sodom, de-coupling occasionally, to shit in our faces.

The hereditary Dimblebys, arguably the most influential current affairs broadcasters - by dint of their father’s connections - studiously leaping on any voice of dissent which has not been, in advance, excluded from their dreary pretend shows and strangling it, maintaining, at all costs, a status quo of filthy, smirking, Hoonish rottenness. On next week’s Question Time the panel will consist of War, Plague, Famine and the broadcaster and writer Will Self. Clap when you are told to by the floor manager. Or else.

We now have a twice-disgraced Gilbert and Sullivanesque baron, a First Secretary of Everything, a freaky blackmailer, a man brilliant enough to run Trade and Industry like none before – Oh, Peter is so wonderful - yet too fey to understand his mortgage application form, scolding and tut-tutting us for our impertinence in questioning him; his shabby, snot-eating, putative master skulking in dark places, shredding his nails, grinding his teeth in misery, yet unembarrassed that his former tormentor now keeps him in place and keeps him in line;

Mandelson and Brown in happier days. Not gone. And not forgotten.

this, the United Kingdom, is gay Ruritania, closet pansies bitching at one another over the national corpse; gay wives, gay husbands, a cottaging elite, gay admirals and field marshals posturing and twittering, this way and that, at the prime minister’s bidding; select committees flirting outrageously with this ghastly man, Mandelson, as though parliament was Danny le Rue’s nightclub, whilst chiding us that we should do better by them, tighten our belts, that they might slacken theirs. 

............................................................

Ah, the politicians and commentators of yesteryear. Where are they now, I wonder?  Wonder no longer, mrs ishmael. They are still here.

There are four splendid anthologies of the writings of stanislav and mr ishmael, compiled by his friend, mr verge, the house filthster. You can buy them from Amazon or Lulu. Here's how:

Honest Not Invent, Vent Stack, Ishmael’s Blues, and the latest, Flush Test (with a nice picture of the late, much lamented, Mr Harris of Lanarkshire taking a piss on a totem pole) are available from Lulu and Amazon. If you buy from Amazon, it would be nice if you could give a review on their website.

IIshmaelites wishing to buy a copy from lulu should follow these steps 

please register an account first, at lulu.com. This is advisable because otherwise paypal seems to think it's ok to charge in dollars, and they then apply their own conversion rate, which might put the price up slightly for a UK buyer. Once the new account is set up, follow one of the links below (to either paperback or hardback) or type "Ishmael’s Blues" into the Lulu Bookstore search box. Click on the “show explicit content” tab, give the age verification box a date of birth such as 1 January 1960, and proceed.

Link for Hardcover : https://tinyurl.com/je7nddfr

Link for Paperback : https://tinyurl.com/3jurrzux

https://www.lulu.com/shop/ishmael-smith/flush-test/paperback/product-9yjvn7.html?q=Flush+Test&page=1&pageSize=4

At checkout, try WELCOME15 in the coupon box, which (for the moment) takes 15% off the price before postage. If this code has expired by the time you reach this point, try a google search for "Lulu.com voucher code" and see what comes up.

With the 15% voucher, PB (including delivery to a UK address) should be £16.84; HB £27.04.

The Sunday Ishmael: 10/05/2026

  Even though he lost, he thinks he's won, puir wee deluded little tortoise heid. 

"Ye see, the people of Scotland have returned us to government for another five years, in a landslide.  It is a resounding vote of confidence in the SNP."

"Oh no it isn't. Only 53.2% of the electorate bothered to vote."

"Oh, yes, it is. It is an overwhelming mandate for an Independence Referendum. If Westminster refuse it, that's a massive democratic deficit."

"Bollocks. They'll just say no. How many actually voted for you, Swinehead?"

"I'm not telling."

" Okay, how many seats have you got?"

"58."

"How many seats did the others get?"

"71, but, no matter, we are experts in running a minority government."

"Hmm. What does that tell us? Oh, yes, most people don't want you in power. No majority for you, Swiney."

"Our minority government will be successful at furthering the SNP's progressive agenda."

"God help us, then. I'm already paying more tax than I would in England, and now I've got to pay for the SNP's bribes - ten grand to everyone buying their first house, and an extra 40 quid a week for new babies, and there's already a 5 billion Black Hole in the Scottish finances."

"We achieved 38% of the vote."

"See? Most people don't want you. 53.2% who turned out to vote of the 3, 784,094 registered Scottish voters is 2013138. You got 38% of that - which is 764992.44. That's all."

"We will talk to all the parties. Except Reform. They are rude. Divisive and discriminatory. Racist. Not like the Greens. The Greens will side with us."

"The Greens are as anti-semitic as Jeremy Corbynites."

"That's not racist."

Seriously - it is the only form of racism that is entirely acceptable to the progressive liberal establishment. Not just in Islington, but also in Holyrood. 

Anyway, it is not the outcome I'd hoped for, but you know I'd anticipated it, the Scots being so forgiving of incompetence, fraud and cronyism. The nationalists secured 58 seats; Scottish Labour and Reform came joint second with 17; the Scottish Greens won 15; the Scottish Conservatives ended with 12 and the Scottish Lib Dems 10. The Greens and the SNP both want to break up the United Kingdoms, so they are natural bedfellows. Reform did astonishingly well in Scotland, securing almost 400,000 votes and winning 17 seats - having had only 1 seat previously - a turncoat Tory. They are rude, though. There was lots of shock and horror at the reported twitterings of one new Reform counsellor in England, who opined on social media that Nigerians should be melted down and used to fill in the potholes. Richard Tice, Farage's Deputy, (do you think he uses Grecian 2000, or is it a full hairdresser job?)

laughed it off, preferring to focus on "thank goodness someone cares enough about our Nigel to give him £5 million for his security. No, honest, not a scandal, he wasn't an MP at the time so the question of declaring it in the Member's Interests register just didn't arise."

 I must say, I personally would feel much more secure if a kindly benefactor gave me £5 million. I'd feel better with a mere £5 grand. Hell, yes, even £500 would be welcome. 

I've probably confused our foreign readers and those who would much rather not be paying attention. Britain had two different sorts of election on Thursday last. Scotland and Wales had their national elections, and England had local government elections. Local government, or, The Council, attends to local issues for local people. Schools, roads, dustbins, planning. Proper Government is Westminster, down London. Pretend Government is Scotland's Holyrood in Edinburgh and Wales' government is The Senedd in Cardiff. The Welsh have booted Labour out and voted in a chap with an unpronounceable name and extraordinarily large ears.

Rhun ap Iorwerth - ssh, don't mention the ears.

That's enough Welsh nonsense, it's bad enough keeping up with Scottishery. 

The BBC have a spiteful little arrangement in the Scottish politics studio. 

They have a very high desk with high stools for the interviewees to perch on. Like one of those godverdomme kitchen islands. The purpose is clearly to render uncomfortable the interviewees as their buttock cheeks clench to hold them to the stool. Maybe the producers hope they will be so worried about falling off that they will let slip important items of Government policy. Long-legged blokes are usually ok, but it goes hard on short fat girls in skirts.

Gillian Mackay, MSP, Scottish Green Co Leader.

Gillian Mackay did the buttock clench dance this morning on the Sunday Show, while seated next to her was 

Scotland, not a country for beautiful men

Thomas Kerr, MSP (Reform). Reform's exclusion from political co-operation and people not talking to him was dismissed by Kerr as "political posturing before we set foot in the chamber." He added that:  "scunnered and angry people are." A bit Obi Wan Kenobi, that. And he didn't want them to have the free bus travel the Greens had promised them.

The forced proximity to the deplorable Reformite, coupled with the high stool and  the need to display demonstrably contemptuous body language resulted in Gillian leaning perilously further and further away from her offensively bearded fellow guest.  Oh, I wish she had fallen off. But no, she remained fully in command of stool and brief. She told us all about the cohort of new transgender MSPs. I think I have mentioned how forgiving the Scottish people are. But Q.'s election really does take the biscuit. Q is an Indian citizen, who does not hold British citizenship or permanent residency, but nevertheless was elected to serve the good people of Edinburgh and Lothian East as their MSP. He or she attends the University of St. Andrews on a student visa and is fundraising for a graduate visa to remain in the UK after the student visa expires. Asked why the Greens had fielded him/her as a candidate who might well be required to leave the country before the parliamentary term expires, Gillian responded that she was confident that the Home Office would extend the visa to allow Q to remain to continue his/her Parliamentary duties. Alas, she's probably right. But really, is Q. a politician or a student? How can he or she concentrate on his/her studies whilst representing his /her constituents? Isn't studying the whole reason for him/her being in Scotland? Is this whole thing just a little bit Alice in Wonderland? 

Q. Mannivannan. Fucked if I know.

The other transgender Green MSP is Iris Duane.

I remember when the Green Party were all about pretty flowers, saving whales and not using hairspray.

Labour took a beating, in the national devolved nations and in the local elections. Fortunately, Keir Starmer is not letting it get him down, nor is he taking it personally. He is committed to staying in Downing Street for ten years. He has a plan. That plan is Gordon Brown.

No, I know. Really. The fiscally prudent former Prime Minister. The one who burned all the money and saved the world. Sir Keir Starmer's Master Plan is to get him out of retirement and ask his advice. Just as he was enjoying his retirement, up there in Kirkcaldy - here's mr ishmael reporting on the Brown retirement back in May 2010.

Sunday, 23 May 2010

SNOTTY IN RETIREMENT.

"No more than two garments in the changing room"

Hello, Gordon here, Prime Minister Emeritus, and as I said, not for me the glittering prizes of the speaking circuit, Oh, no, not like some people I could mention. Who have NohVaaahl-ewes. No, I always said it would be charity work for me. And here I am, my first day, volunteering in Oxfam, Kirkcaldy, or wherever the fuck this shithole is,

No, no, I'm sure it's a very nice place, full of people I put on the dole and made homeless, it was the right thing for the country. And, more than ever, they need my help and that's why I am here, sorting out the bri-nylon shirts for them, some of them, you know, they're not too bad at all, a bit smelly and sort of yellow under the armpits, rather like a tired old government full of thieves and arseholes but, Hey, beggars can't be choosers. And that's what we are now, thanks to me, a nation of proud beggars in second-hand clothes, forced into driving little MickyMouse cars, because of the price of petrol, I don't drive, myself, being too stupid, and so the Mrs, who looks after me, dropped me off here at ten o' clock, we don't open earlier, because the old people who work here are often up all night being incontinent, or having nightmares about means-tested benefits and can only manage to totter in here at ten, and anyway, that's the time that their bus passes start working, thanks, I might add, to me, eleven million pensioners lifted in to poverty, meanest pension in Europe, that's what we can do, together, as Labour, Och, would you listen to me, sounding-off like I was still prime minister. Which, of course, I am. But nobody is to know, until I have helped Mr CallMeDave and Mr IAgreeWithHim sort out this pickle they've got themselves into, with the NoMoney business, Don't know what they're complaining about. When I took office on that bright, glorious May morning in nineteen-ninety-seven, there was plenty of money, burnt a treat, it did. And anyway, they can always get Mr King to print them some more.

There's quite a lot of stock, here, it's almost as if it was worthless, like the government bonds, and the pound; there's these things, here, piles of them, all folded-up by the volunteers, hankies, they're called, can't imagine what they're for, one of the nutter volunteers - they've all been out in the Sun too long, you know, apart from me, or else they've missed their medication, which is something they shouldn't do - said they were for blowing your nose into but I can't see the point of that, why would you do that when there's so much hunger in the world, best to just eat those bogies right up and afterwards wipe your fingers on your tie, like I do. It's the right thing for the country. And the world. Which I saved. And don't you forget it. Talking of which, I phoned my friend President Obama, the other night, to offer him some advice on the global situation but it must have been a crossed line because all I could hear was some rather unpleasant coloured people, laughing and swearing at me. I must get my new government to look into these communications difficulties. Only not Mr Blunkett, the blind bastard. Or Mr Reid. Maybe my old friend Peter Mandelson, he's very good at communications.

Well, there's some Danielle Steele books just come in and some Wilbur Smith, too, so I'd better go and dust them off, put those sticky wee price labels on them - although I do think two pounds ninety-nine is a bit stiff, even if the money does go to the savages out in Africa - and put them over here with the James Galway cassettes and the pink bedside lamps, funny how one generation's sought-after and hard-won belongings are so swiftly revealed as worthless trash but still, that's the miracle of economic growth, or Boom, which I invented and Bust, which is nothing to do with me. Look around, if only there was a poet, here, like my former young friend, stanislav, how he might mock these greasy Brevill sandwichmakers, these made-in-Taiwan brass plaques and magazine racks, displaying Constable's England, blurred wee prints of Mr Breughel's Hunters In The Snow, once delighted-in, now discarded, like a reviled and useless prime minister. It's one of the great strengths of the family, you know, of which I have a young one, that when parents die the children can't even be arsed to look at their parents' treasures but just fuck them all off down the charity shop, quick, so they can get the house sold-off, before Mr Osborne wants a chunk of it. The embellishments of family life, ghastly, cheap and vulgar, hastened away by grasping kin, to charity shops: it's a sort of a metaphor, really, for people who aren't up to the job, and just cling on, being a nuisance. But I'm not like that, I still talk to my father, John, up in Heaven, he made me what I am, I owe it all to him; well, I owe quite a lot to you, too. But you've no chance.

I think I'll like working in Oxfam, I've already made some new friends

My new Cabinet at a working lunch. I was in charge.

and they all do exactly as I tell them to. It's an onerous responsibility on me, me being barking mad and a criminal lunatic but I had a wee fish supper with the manager the other night and he said that after he'd had a good go at being in charge and when the place was about to go bust then I could be in charge. But to start off I'd better just come in two half-days a week. Taking things easy, that's the thing for old people like me, with a young family. Divorce, what, me and Sarah-George, no, well, she hasn't mentioned it to me, anyway.

Well, I must rush, I'll just go and Hoover round those people, the ones trying to look at the books. Best to let them know who's Boss of this charity shop. (Me.)

And then I'll go home and have a wee sit-down, and hold my willy, for a few years.

...................................................................................

There’s something very Starmer about calling in Gordon Brown when things feel wobbly. He tried Mandelson, and we know how that ended. And now he's reached into the Kirkcaldy Oxfam shop and pulled out Gordon Brown like a smelly old winter coat.

But here's the catch - he really is old - well, he's only 75, but he's really not aged well. It must be all those years in the charity shop. So, the Cabinet need to order a nice new Ouija board from Amazon, just in case Gordon shuffles off to his final reward. Is there anybody there? Preferably with economic experience? But who else might manifest alongside Gordon, like a Victorian ghost in his nightie, shuffling and muttering about fiscal prudence? Next week: Harold Wilson appointed Minister for AI. The week after: Clement Attlee brought back to steady the ship. By June, Starmer will be consulting Pitt the Younger.

Sharon Graham, Unite's General Secretary, reckons Labour is about to become extinct. "(Labour voters) didn’t expect their Labour Government to pit pensioners against the disabled. They didn’t expect accounting rules to be the top priority. They are asking what Labour is for. Labour lost the towns, swathes of the Midlands and the north. They are becoming the Party of the professional middle class. Not a cross-class coalition, but a strictly middle-class centrist party. Rootless. Unmoored from its history and from the working class."

On the Laura Kuenssberg show this morning, she reminded Starmer that Labour's job is to represent working people. That's why the trade unions set it up in the first place and why they continue to provide its funding - funding raised by the subs of trade union members. Should the unions choose, they could turn off that tap.

.................................................................................

There are four splendid anthologies of the writings of stanislav and mr ishmael, compiled by his friend, mr verge, the house filthster. You can buy them from Amazon or Lulu. Here's how:

Honest Not Invent, Vent Stack, Ishmael’s Blues, and the latest, Flush Test (with a nice picture of the late, much lamented, Mr Harris of Lanarkshire taking a piss on a totem pole) are available from Lulu and Amazon. If you buy from Amazon, it would be nice if you could give a review on their website.

IIshmaelites wishing to buy a copy from lulu should follow these steps 

please register an account first, at lulu.com. This is advisable because otherwise paypal seems to think it's ok to charge in dollars, and they then apply their own conversion rate, which might put the price up slightly for a UK buyer. Once the new account is set up, follow one of the links below (to either paperback or hardback) or type "Ishmael’s Blues" into the Lulu Bookstore search box. Click on the “show explicit content” tab, give the age verification box a date of birth such as 1 January 1960, and proceed.

Link for Hardcover : https://tinyurl.com/je7nddfr

Link for Paperback : https://tinyurl.com/3jurrzux

https://www.lulu.com/shop/ishmael-smith/flush-test/paperback/product-9yjvn7.html?q=Flush+Test&page=1&pageSize=4

At checkout, try WELCOME15 in the coupon box, which (for the moment) takes 15% off the price before postage. If this code has expired by the time you reach this point, try a google search for "Lulu.com voucher code" and see what comes up.

With the 15% voucher, PB (including delivery to a UK address) should be £16.84; HB £27.04.

Me, next, Me.

The Sunday Ishmael: 03/05/2026

What's the rant today, mrs ishmael?

Well, with some reluctance, I guess it has to be the election. Even though it is tedious as hell, with politicians attempting to score points and making unsustainable promises, on their obvious understanding that the voting public is brain dead and will vote for their own advantage however unfeasible the promises to give them £10 grand to buy a house, pay them to have babies, give them free child care, pay their energy bills, assist their old people to die neatly and provide new walk-in GP clinics for those that survive.

What, mrs ishmael? Where's this land, then, where the manna, milk and honey flow?

Scotland the Brave, of course. Where Brian Cox and Billy Connolly don't live. Every day more election leaflets are thrust into my letter box. One deluded SNP activist didn't run away fast enough when I saw him coming through my garden gate. As I flung open my door, he muttered, "just delivering election material, miss," before scuttling off before I could discuss independence with him and carefully explain that England won't pay the Barnet Formula block grant should Scotland secede from the United Kingdom. Coward.

I have here John Swinney's

Swinney&Sturgeon'14.

election bumfluffery. He invites me to find out how NHS waiting times are coming down, and no, it isn't by killing the elderly and terminally ill, so be quiet at the back there. No, indeed, it is because the SNP has grown the NHS workforce by 20% since they came to office, back in 2007. Swinney has been a stalwart of the SNP forever, from way before he became a bald tortoise, back when he was young and beautiful, as you can see from his official portrait in 1999.

Swinney when he was 35. 

Time to turn back and descend the stair,

With a bald spot in the middle of my hair —
(They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”)
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,

My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin —
(They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”)
For I have known them all already, known them all:
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous—
Almost, at times, the Fool.*

The first SNP Government, led by Salmond, seated next to Sturgeon. Rear left, Swinney.

Those were the days, eh, John? Gilded youth. Before everybody was disgraced. Before the police came calling. Before the charges. Before the sex scandals. Before the embezzlement scandals. Before the campervan and the thistle jig of shit scandal.

Like Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus, his country called and he stepped up to deal with the shit after the fan was dripping with it.  Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus is known for his selfless leadership during a crisis when he was summoned to restore order after the Aequi threatened Rome. Cincinnatus, a patrician, returned to his farm after defeating the enemy in a single day.  

Do you suppose Tortoise Swinney  will return to his farm? No, me neither. 

It is his turn now, you see. 

Swinney, together with thousands of other political leaders - ok, it just seems like thousands as one yawns through interminable debates between this lot:

(Left to right, top row) First Minister and SNP leader John Swinney, Scottish Conservative leader Russell Findlay, Scottish Green Party co-leader Ross Greer. (Left to right bottom row) Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar, Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Alex Cole-Hamilton and Reform UK, Scotland leader Malcolm Offord, in Edinburgh, during the 2026 Scottish Election campaign. (Jane Barlow/PA) (PA Wire)

There's actually a woman as well, although it would have spoiled the beautiful trousered testosterone symmetry of the smirking males, above, to have included young Gillian Mackay the co-leader of the Scottish Greens since August 2025, MSP  for the Central Scotland region. 

During one of the debates, Baron Malcolm Offord of Garvel, caused much indignation by declaring that he owned six houses, five cars and six boats and has paid £45 million in tax,

thus setting out his credentials to become First Minister in a Reform-led Scottish Government. He said: "I was born in a tenement at 33 Bank Street in Greenock. Back then, Scottish education was the best in the UK and I got it all for free at Greenock Academy and Edinburgh University. I went to London 40 years ago with £2,000 in debt. I was full of ambition, I worked hard and I was successful. Today, I own six houses, five cars and six boats. In a 40-year business career, I've employed thousands of people and paid £45 million in tax. I don't say this to boast - but to ask you this question. Mr Greer, in your Scotland, do you want more people like me, or fewer people like me?"

Not hesitating for a moment, Ross Greer, Green Co-Leader and notable Ginge snapped back: "Fewer people like you."
Lord Offord is not noted for either subtlety, sensitivity or the ability to read a room. Crass, one could say, without fear of contradiction. 

In a Burns supper speech to a bowling club in 2018,  Offord made a joke. He said: "Fadi Fawaz, George Michael’s partner at the time of his death, takes the late singer’s ashes to a curry house after his death. Fawaz asks the chef to make a curry with the ashes. When asked why, Fawaz replies: 'I want to feel him oozing out of my arse one last time.'" 

So why is this monumental millionaire mountebank a Baron? Who fucking ennobled him? Look no further than Boris Johnson. Offord gave lots of money to the Conservative Party. That's how things are done in Britain. Networks, cronies, bribes donations. What? You thought it was a meritocracy? Ah, bless. Look at Mandelson's appointment. You don't think an advert was placed offering a vacancy of Ambassador to the United States? That C.V.s were submitted? That candidates were shortlisted and then interviewed? Maybe they had to do a Powerpoint presentation? 

Anyway, Offord, realising he was going nowhere with the Tories, is now Farage's best friend and Leader of Reform in Scotland. Did money exchange hands?

All millionaires together.

It is moot, anyway, because the forgiving Scottish public are determined to keep the SNP in power longer than

this boy

has been president of Russia - May 2000, by the way.

Survation's poll reckons that the SNP will net 61 of the 129 Holyrood seats - not a big majority, but if they form a coalition with the bat shit crazy Greens, as they did previously, then they'll have 71 and Swinney's day in the sun will have arrived again. No longer an attendant lord*, one that will do to swell a progress, Tortoise Swinney will continue in charge, god help us. 

Latest Projection by Survation, 26/04/2026

SNP = 61

Labour = 21

Reform UK = 19

Conservative= 12

Greens = 10

Liberal Democrats = 6

* Extracted from The Lovesong of J.Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Eliot.

Other elections are available this week. No doubt you'll have your own favourite. 

Here's mr ishmael on Coalition Government.

We face a future of unelected national governments, alliances of worthless, thieving, tyrannical fuckpigs - career politicians. There is so little faith in political parties, so scant a likelihood of majority acclamation that whichever concocted tribe of thieves, child molesters, drunks and traitors can feign a majority will barge into power, claiming, as do the current shit-eaters, that the country actually elected them, even though, resoundingly, we didn't. 
No-one elected a coalition;  we need to remember that  - because we are told daily that we did, as though millions of voters, acting in some telepathic conclave, elected just so many Conservatives and just so many LibDems, just enough of each to form our new-model government. 
The obvious purpose of these new governments will be to further spread the almost global dominance of consumeriste totalitairianisme nouvelle, to promote, among those people who are neither corporatists or members of MediaMinster, a barren insatiability, to promote a sense  of  national values based on the acquisition of stuff;  we see it already, the fathomless grievance of the i-phone addict, the poor wretch, trapped in his pathetic, digitised life, who knows that the next model will do so much more than the current one, and cannot postpone his purchase;  the zombies who foregather in the TopGear studio, cheering and applauding cars which they will never even see close-up, much less own; the fashionistas, gasping for the latest atrocities, torture garments  excreted from the demented, drug enfeebled  minds of grotesque, women-hating fairies.  And then there's the latest, franchised Hollywood blockbuster, the latest computer game, the latest album from whoever-it-is;  there's the multiple branches of Cruelty TeeVee - your voice is shit, your house is shit, your cooking is shit, your general knowledge is shit, you are the shittiest link, fuck off and die; there's even, I believe, a show  about your body and your face being shit, Embarrassing Bodies, isn't it?

Filthy bastards in MediaMinster promote divisions, black and brown against white, healthy against sick, young against old. Never, though, do they imperil the Great Divide, that between Rich and Poor.
And in this obscene digitised reality of hatred and dissatisfaction people are both tantalised and cudgelled by the property behemoth;  look, you don't need proper wages, they are told - and they believe it - the price of your house is tripling every five minutes;  we have made you millionaires.  

Already, we are no longer citizens, with rights; instead, if we are not hard-working families, we fall into some enemy group within, some group which must be corralled, oppressed, our rights  re-assessed by some poisonous, embittered rodent, worthless  tosser,  good for fuck all, too stupid, too up his own scabby arse to even lead  the brainless braying reptilian Westminstairians. 

And lets join the nasty Baron Offord in discussing George Michael - again, here's mr ishmael: 

SHOWBIZ NEWS, 

HAS-BEEN ARRESTED AGAIN.

  BLOW INTO WHAT, OFFICER?

  The Wham star and toilet-creeping, volunteer hand-jobber has crashed his car again, off his head, presumably,  on drink, other drugs  and narcissism.

But  that's Greek-Cypriots for you, always attention-seeking, if they're not smashing-up the dinner service the men're dancing with each other to that awful bazooka music and stuffing each others' olives; George Michael, Archbishop Makarios, Telly Savalas, they're all the same. Now that he doesn't sell any records of himself warbling and panting, George should set up in a nice kebabshop, with a nice wife, with a nice moustache. People who eat kebabs are all gay anyway, so there'd be lots of opportunities for him to sneak into the loo with a customer and give him a complimentary Jay Arthuropolis, whilst the Mrs was doing that YouWanChilyanLemon? thing, slicing the meat up with a huge shiny carving knife, bits of compressed lips and eyelids and foreskins, all spiced-up and half-cooked on a rotating Bunsen burner, fucking savages, humming along with Nana Moustache, singing the White Rose of Athens. That only gives people the runs,  le posterieur flambee; driving around off his vain, stupid, pansying head, like this, the self-obsessed arsehole'll kill somebody.

No business like showbusiness.

George Papadopolopolous,

I suffer for my Art.

Cunt.

George Michael (born Georgios Kyriakos Panayiotou; 25 June 1963 – 25 December 2016) was an English singer-songwriter and record producer. In the early hours of Christmas Day 2016, Michael died in bed at his home in Goring-on-Thames, at the age of 53. He was found by his partner, Fadi Fawaz. In March 2017, a senior coroner in Oxfordshire attributed Michael's death to natural causes due to dilated cardiomyopathy with myocarditis and fatty liver disease.

There are four splendid anthologies of the writings of stanislav and mr ishmael, compiled by his friend, mr verge, the house filthster. You can buy them from Amazon or Lulu. Here's how:

Honest Not Invent, Vent Stack, Ishmael’s Blues, and the latest, Flush Test (with a nice picture of the late, much lamented, Mr Harris of Lanarkshire taking a piss on a totem pole) are available from Lulu and Amazon. If you buy from Amazon, it would be nice if you could give a review on their website.

IIshmaelites wishing to buy a copy from lulu should follow these steps 

please register an account first, at lulu.com. This is advisable because otherwise paypal seems to think it's ok to charge in dollars, and they then apply their own conversion rate, which might put the price up slightly for a UK buyer. Once the new account is set up, follow one of the links below (to either paperback or hardback) or type "Ishmael’s Blues" into the Lulu Bookstore search box. Click on the “show explicit content” tab, give the age verification box a date of birth such as 1 January 1960, and proceed.

Link for Hardcover : https://tinyurl.com/je7nddfr

Link for Paperback : https://tinyurl.com/3jurrzux

https://www.lulu.com/shop/ishmael-smith/flush-test/paperback/product-9yjvn7.html?q=Flush+Test&page=1&pageSize=4

At checkout, try WELCOME15 in the coupon box, which (for the moment) takes 15% off the price before postage. If this code has expired by the time you reach this point, try a google search for "Lulu.com voucher code" and see what comes up.

With the 15% voucher, PB (including delivery to a UK address) should be £16.84; HB £27.04.

 The Luckiest Man alive, aged very nearly almost 86, is on tour in May and June in support of his latest country album "Long Long Road," co-written and produced by T Bone Burnett.

Question: Do you consider yourself a country artist primarily now? Or is this a detour?

Ringo Starr: Right now, that's all I am is a country artist. I think just “artist” is enough, you know? We play pop, we play rock, and we got back very strongly into country because of T Bone.