Trust the unsinkable politician fond of rebranding bombings as democracy to fix Britain’s energy woes
Tony Blair is back to explain how Britain should rescue itself, bringing along a new report from his Tony Blair Institute for Global Change that rebrands the country’s energy ambitions yet again.
Once upon a recent time, the dream was called ‘Clean Power 2030’. Now it has been reboxed and reissued as Cheaper Power 2030. Sounds like someone stumbled out of their green stupor long enough to take a good look at the bill and gulp.
Blair’s institute now says that the clean mission was “right for its time” but that “circumstances have changed.” No kidding. What did you expect when you build an energy plan out of little more than optimism and debt?
“Energy has shifted from being a national advantage to a growing constraint,” the report warns, citing Britain’s premium-grade power prices. “Clean electricity is the future of UK energy… Unless the foundations are fixed, however, the risks are clear: higher costs, weaker reliability, lost public confidence and a growing backlash against climate action.” Sounds like Brits are tired of paying luxury rates for basic necessities.
Affordability is now declared to be the new priority. Which is refreshing, considering that for years anyone who mentioned the financial side of going green was treated like they personally clubbed a penguin stranded on an ice floe.
The government’s own target of removing fossil fuels from the grid by 2030 has slipped into the realm of fiction. So the narrative now shifts to keeping things from getting worse in the short term, while promising Net Zero glory by 2050. Hence the Blair report title: “Cheaper Power 2030, Net Zero 2050: Resetting the UK’s Electricity Strategy for the Future.” Okay, so they’re just going to hit snooze on the hard part, okay? At least enough to lull everyone back to sleep so the government can keep rifling through their pockets.
Energy Secretary Ed Miliband insisted earlier this month that everything is under control. The decades-old grid “just needs investment,” he says, as if the same government that struggles to patch potholes will seamlessly modernize the entire power network to include their green fantasies while also paying for the conventional parts that actually work right now. But don’t worry, folks, those “hundreds of thousands of new jobs” arriving by 2030 under the UK’s ‘Clean Energy Jobs Plan’ will make it all possible, Miliband says. All the analysts calling the projects overpriced and a tax burden on the average citizen are just buzzkills.
Yes, under-investment helped create the mess. But not because they didn’t focus on green projects. The real issue is that every time a government tried to build anything essential that actually worked, protesters descended faster than a queue outside of Greggs at lunchtime. And the government was only too happy to take their orders.
Even Blair’s own Institute admits that high electricity costs stem from “decades of policy decisions.” All those levies, subsidies, and PR-friendly targets didn’t magically produce a functioning system. Shocking.
Now Britain, burdened with some of the world’s priciest electricity, wonders why businesses are leaving and families are sweating their utility bills. There’s a clue in there somewhere.
Meanwhile, the country spent £117 billion on imported energy last year. That’s twice the bill from 2021. The UK shut down homegrown production for moral points, only to buy the same fuel back at designer-label prices. But yes, trust the planning skills of these same establishment fixtures confidently projecting milestones for 2050.
Why 2050? Perhaps it pairs neatly with the digital ID push currently being marketed by Prime Minister Keir Starmer. Wouldn’t that be something? Something creepy.
His online videosshow happy young citizens celebrating the joy of not needing paper documents anymore, in a genre that could best be described as North Korean New Wave. The digital ID is supposed to help fight illegal immigration, mainly by verifying people that the UK government already let in. But don’t blame European leaders for the fact that they can’t control their own borders and need to introduce digital ID as a result. It’s Putin’s fault for sneaking migrants in like cheap canned soda and candy into a movie theatre, as they’ve taken to arguing recently.
Canada provides a glimpse of where this might go. In provinces like British Columbia, the digital ID plugs directly into health, taxes, employment, housing, court services, and more. If one system flags you as a problem, how many easily flipped switches would it take someday for the rest to follow? Add a forced march to Net Zero by 2050, and suddenly the word “dystopian” doesn’t feel exaggerated.
Call this desperate scramble to save the good soldier Green an expensive clown show. Blair’s crowd calls it a “recalibration.”
“Circumstances have changed,” they say. Yes. The numbers finally demanded attention. If only because everyone could feel the impact of the sticker shock. The Clean Power plan was “right for its time,” they insist. But everything is right until the invoice arrives. Then it magically becomes “right for later.” Say, around 2050.
Team Blair now wants a “full-spectrum” energy strategy. Britain already had one of those, until politicians dismantled it to win environmental bragging rights. Now the same people who broke the system are promising to fix it. First, it was clean power. Now it’s cheap power. Next year? Whatever power is still available, perhaps.
Maybe that’s progress. But it just looks more like repackaged promises sold by master rebrander Blair, who once pushed grand foreign crusades and bombing campaigns as “democracy.”
If “circumstances have changed,” then maybe what really needs recalibrating isn’t the grid, but rather the people running it, who seem to be part of a recycling program of their own, consisting uniquely of British elites spewing whatever nonsense they think they can sell in an effort to cling to power and influence.
The origin of the craft spotted over Germany remains unclear, with some incidents proven to have no links to Moscow, Sahra Wagenknecht has said
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz is misleading the public about a drone threat allegedly posed by Russia, Sahra Wagenknecht, the leader of the left-wing BSW party, has said. The chancellor did not hesitate to link recent unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) sightings across Germany to Moscow even though he had no evidence, she told the broadcaster ZDF on Thursday.
According to Wagenknecht, Merz was blowing the issue out of proportion, with the German media unquestioningly adopting his point of view, even though evidence pointed in the other direction.
“Mr. Merz goes on TV… and lies,” she said, adding that the chancellor made his statements after some of the incidents had either been proven to have no connection to Russia or turned out to have never happened at all. “It’s simply a vague suspicion, which has been largely refuted, and then discussed by the chancellor on public television.”
She was referring to the chancellor’s interview with the German broadcaster ARD earlier this month, when he said that “our suspicion is that Russia is behind most of these drone launches” and called the UAVs a “serious threat to our security.”
The interview came just days after the German police said that a drone incident at Frankfurt airport was caused by a local UAV enthusiast. Claims of drone sightings near a military base in northern Germany in early October were also refuted by the Bundeswehr, which stated that “there were no registered drone overflights” in the area, “contrary to the media reports.”
Several drone sightings were reported over critical German infrastructure earlier this month. One such incident led to dozens of canceled flights at Munich airport. The developments prompted some officials, including Merz, to claim the drone flights had been orchestrated by Moscow.
Moscow has repeatedly denied any connection to the incidents. Berlin has “no reasons” to blame Moscow for the recent drone sightings, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in early October, commenting on Merz’s interview with ARD. “Europe is full of politicians who tend to blame Russia for everything,” he said at the time, calling the accusations “baseless.”
Production of F-15EX and F-35A aircraft will need to be significantly ramped up to meet a goal set by Donald Trump, according to news outlet Breaking Defense
The US Air Force (USAF) needs to build hundreds of new fighter jets within the next ten years to meet President Donald Trump’s defense objectives, the Breaking Defense news outlet has reported, citing an unclassified force structure plan.
Submitted to Congress this month, the plan states that the USAF must field 1,558 combat-coded fighter jets to fulfill its global obligations under Trump’s Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance (INDSG). The goal is almost 300 higher than the estimated 1,271 fighters expected to be in service in 2026.
The document says the USAF aims to reach an interim target of 1,369 fighters by early 2030, but warns that limited funding, industrial capacity, and competing modernization demands could delay progress.
The report identifies the F-15EX and F-35A as key to reaching the jet target. It states that Boeing could produce up to two-dozen F-15EX aircraft per year by 2027, expanding up to 36 annually with “additional funding for facilities.”
Lockheed Martin, meanwhile, could supply as many as 100 F-35As per year by 2030, which are described as the “foundation of the USAF fighter force structure.” However, the document notes that this production rate would require expanded facilities, additional funding, and the resolution of hardware and software shortages affecting new upgrades to the F-35.
The report cautions that production delays, sustainment shortfalls, and retirements of older aircraft, such as A-10s and some F-22s, could considerably offset projected gains. It also notes a $400 million annual deficit in sustainment funding, and warns that competing modernization programs such as the upcoming sixth-generation F-47 fighter may further slow progress.
Trump’s INDSG calls for the US military to close capability gaps in order to prepare for a potential conflict with China, which Washington has designated as its primary strategic rival. The Pentagon has also been pressing to boost missile production output severalfold amid concerns about readiness for a possible confrontation, particularly around the self-governing island of Taiwan.
Beijing has repeatedly rejected US accusations of military aggression and has criticized Washington for stoking tensions by arming Taipei and expanding its regional presence.
Dalya Attar became the first Orthodox Jewish woman to serve in the Maryland Senate this January
US federal officials have charged a Maryland Democratic state senator with extortion for allegedly masterminding a blackmail scheme involving secretly filmed explicit videos, according to an indictment unsealed on Thursday.
Dalya Attar, who was first elected to the Maryland House of Delegates in 2018 and was re-elected in 2022, became the first Orthodox Jewish woman to serve in the Maryland State Senate earlier this year.
Court documents allege that Attar devised a plan to stop a former employee from speaking out against her 2022 re-election bid. Prosecutors say she conspired with her brother, Joseph Attar, and Baltimore police officer Kalman Finkelstein, who had worked on her campaign.
Staring in 2020, they worked to threaten the ex-employee into silence, using covertly taken videos of her in bed with a married man, the court documents alleged. According to WhatsApp messages cited in the case, Attar said she wanted the ex-consultant to be “a nonissue in my mind.”
“Two years later [she] is still looking to screw me badly… even more reason why the lady should be afraid to come out with anything at any point,” Attar was cited as saying.
The group allegedly conspired to follow the ex-consultant’s movements using a tracker on her loaned car, and to secure intimate videos of her with her lover by installing cameras disguised as smoke detectors, the court documents said. The victim was staying at an apartment owned by Finklestein’s family at the time.
The indictment says that Joseph Attar later approached the ex-consultant’s lover to threaten them with the release of the video and demanding she “stay out of this election.”
All three have been charged with extortion, wiretapping, and other offenses, and face a sentence of at least 20 years if convicted on all counts.
Russian crude is essential for the Hungarian economy due to the country’s landlocked geographical position, Viktor Orban has said
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has announced his intention to persuade US President Donald Trump to grant Budapest an exemption from the latest sanctions on Russian oil companies during his visit to Washington next week.
Last week, the US administration introduced restrictions against Russian energy majors Rosneft and Lukoil, alleging a lack of commitment by Moscow to the Ukraine peace process. Hungary, along with neighboring Slovakia, remains particularly exposed to the curbs as most of its crude imports arrive from Russia via pipeline due to lack of access to seaborne shipments.
Speaking on state radio on Friday, Orban reiterated that landlocked Hungary has no viable alternatives to Russian crude, and that replacing it would push the country toward an economic crisis.
“We have to make them [the US administration] understand this strange situation if we want exceptions to the American sanctions that are hitting Russia,” Orban said.
He specified that the energy issue must be resolved in the wake of the economic cooperation package currently being negotiated between Washington and Budapest, which includes requests and proposals for further US investment in Hungary.
Hungary, Slovakia, and EU aspirant Serbia – which, unlike most other members of the bloc, maintain a neutral stance on the Ukraine conflict and continue to purchase Russian oil – face pressure from Brussels and Washington to reduce their energy reliance on Moscow.
Earlier this year, EU energy ministers backed a European Commission proposal to completely phase out Russian oil and gas by 2028 as part of sanctions against Moscow. Budapest and Bratislava have condemned the plan, saying they would continue to import Russian crude due to national security interests.
Conducting even a symbolic detonation would require time, money, and expertise, sources have told the newspaper
Resuming nuclear tests in the US would take years and cost hundreds of millions of dollars, the Washington Post reported on Thursday, citing experts. The Nevada Test Site, where the US carried out its last nuclear detonation over three decades ago, now uses computer simulations instead of live explosions.
President Donald Trump this week announced that he had “instructed the Department of War to start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis [with Russia and China],” declaring that preparations would begin immediately.
It remains unclear whether he was referring to underground nuclear detonations, which none of the three nations have conducted for decades. Moscow has warned that any US nuclear explosion would prompt a symmetrical response.
The Post pointed out that if Washington were to proceed, the task would fall not to the Pentagon but to the Department of Energy, specifically the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), which oversees the Nevada Test Site. Experts said reviving testing there would come at significant costs.
Ernest Moniz, who led the Department of Energy under President Barack Obama, estimated that even a “stunt” explosion conducted with no regard to gathering scientific data would still take “maybe a year” to prepare. Corey Hinderstein, a former senior NNSA official, said the agency would need to excavate a new vertical shaft at the cost of some $100 million.
Paul Dickman, a longtime nuclear official, warned that the US may struggle to find personnel with hands-on testing experience. He said competent test directors are “not bureaucrats [or] a PowerPoint crowd” but rather people with “a lot of dirt under their fingernails.”
Washington has long relied on computer simulations and so-called subcritical tests – experiments that stop short of a nuclear explosion – to maintain confidence in its stockpile. The last of more than 1,000 tests conducted by the US took place in 1992.
Trump’s order coincided with announcements by Russian President Vladimir Putin, who reported successful tests of two advanced nuclear systems: the unlimited-range Burevestnik cruise missile and the Poseidon underwater drone. Both reportedly employ breakthrough compact nuclear reactors as propulsion units.
Members of the Trump administration have been seeking increased security after the killing of Charlie Kirk, the outlet has said
High-ranking US officials, including Secretary of War Pete Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, have left their homes in Washington and moved to military bases outside the capital, The Atlantic has reported.
Members of the administration of US President Donald Trump have been seeking increased security after the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk in September, the outlet reported on Thursday.
Following Kirk’s murder in Utah, the White House designated Antifa a domestic terrorist organization, which The Atlantic has reported led to left-wing protests, threats against officials, and publication of their addresses online.
One unnamed senior member of the Trump administration who spoke to the outlet also cited “a specific foreign threat” as a reason for leaving his private home to live on a military base.
A total of six top US officials are currently living at military bases, occupying residences designated for senior commanders, the report read.
Both Hegseth and Rubio are staying at the so-called ‘Generals’ Row’ at Fort McNair, located on the confluence of the Potomac River and the Anacostia River in Washington, D.C., according to defense sources.
Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem has moved to a home designated for the Coast Guard commandant at Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling, while Secretary of the Army Dan Driscoll opted for Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall, the report added.
Military bases outside the capital appear to be running out of housing space due to high demand among members of Trump’s team, with The Atlantic citing a former official who claimed that Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard had also applied for a home at Fort McNair, but was denied.
The New York Times reported that some former residents of ‘Generals’ Row’ have “expressed frustration” over the fact that civilian officials are occupying homes at the base instead of admirals and generals.
Military commanders “at any time there is an emergency… [have] got to be able to respond quickly to whatever crisis is taking place… I think that was part of the reason for having that housing close by,” former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told the paper.
Naomi Seibt has accused the German government of targeting her for her political views while Antifa reportedly sends her death threats
German influencer and free speech advocate Naomi Seibt has officially applied for asylum in the US, claiming she is being persecuted in Germany for her political views and support for the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.
The 25-year-old, who has been dubbed the “anti-Greta” for her opposition to feminism and climate-change narratives, announced in a post on X on Wednesday that she is “the first German applying for asylum under [US President Donald Trump] due to political persecution.”
In her post, Seibt said she has faced intelligence surveillance and state media defamation, claiming her communications have been intercepted and her family harassed by reporters working for public broadcasters.
She also claimed to be receiving death threats from Antifa, which she said the German police have ignored because “no physical harm had occurred yet.” Seibt stated that while Trump has “correctly” designated Antifa as a terrorist organization, the German government “silently condones” their attacks on regular citizens, treating them as “soldiers for their agenda.”
I AM SEEKING ASYLUM IN THE U.S. 🇩🇪🇺🇸
My name is Naomi Seibt,
I am the 1st German applying for asylum under President Trump due to political persecution.
As a free speech advocate and supporter of the AfD party, I am the target of • intelligence surveillance • state media… pic.twitter.com/rdsj4Qg4BB
She also cited paragraph 188 of the German Criminal Code, which was expanded under former Chancellor Angela Merkel and criminalizes insults, defamation, or libel against politicians, as an example of Berlin’s restrictions on free speech.
According to the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA), there were over 10,700 offences related to online hate speech reported in Germany in 2024. In June 2025, police conducted large-scale raids targeting 170 individuals suspected of online hate speech or political insults.
“The German government is supporting left-wing violence, covering up migrant crimes and silencing dissidents with mass house raids,” Seibt wrote, adding that the “tax-funded propaganda media” have monopolized the narrative and “constantly” defame both the Trump administration and late conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who was murdered during a free-speech event last month.
Seibt claimed that Europe has become a “breeding ground for tyranny” and praised Trump for defending free speech. She called on Europeans to stand up for what Trump’s MAGA movement represents and “turn it into MEGA – Make Europe Great Again.”
The weapons are an important part of America’s national security, the vice president has said
US Vice President J.D. Vance has said the resumption of nuclear arms testing by Washington is required to ensure that the weapons remain in working order.
On Thursday, US President Donald Trump announced that he had ordered the Pentagon to start nuclear weapons tests, citing strategic competition with Russia and China. “That process will begin immediately” in response to “other countries’ testing programs,” he said.
Vance told journalists later in the day that “it is an important part of American national security to make sure that this nuclear arsenal we have actually functions properly, and that is part of a testing regime.” The vice president did not elaborate on what type of nuclear tests the US would be carrying out.
Republican Senator Tom Cotton told Fox News that “we are not talking here about large-scale detonations with mushroom clouds in the desert or in the South Pacific. We are talking about very small, controlled, probably underground detonations.”
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov reacted to Trump’s announcement by noting “the statement by [Russian President Vladimir] Putin, which has been repeated many times, that, of course, if someone abandons the moratorium [on nuclear testing], then Russia will act accordingly.”
Responding to the US president’s claims of other countries carrying out nuclear tests, Peskov said “we are so far not aware of this.” He clarified that last week’s launch of Russia’s new Burevestnik cruise missile, which has a small nuclear reactor that gives it a virtually unlimited range, was “not a nuclear test.”
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun expressed hope that “the US will earnestly abide by its obligations under the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty and its commitment to a ‘moratorium on nuclear testing.’” Guo also urged Washington to “take concrete actions to uphold the international nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation regime, as well as global strategic balance and stability.”
The US halted nuclear arms testing in 1992 under a Congress-mandated moratorium. Russia’s last test took place during the Soviet period in 1990, while China’s was in 1996.
The US president has said the country can provide asylum to a maximum of 7,500 people per year
US President Donald Trump has slashed the cap on annual refugee admissions from 125,000 to 7,500, the lowest level in American history.
In a notice published in the Federal Register on Thursday, Trump argued that the new limit was “justified by humanitarian concerns or is otherwise in the national interest.”
He added that the admissions would “primarily”be allocated among white South Africans, as well as “other victims of illegal or unjust discrimination in their respective homelands.”
Trump has long called for an overhaul of US asylum regulations as part of his broader immigration crackdown and his stated goal of combating extremism. He has vowed to carry out “the largest deportation” in US history while also purging federal agencies of “woke” practices.
In February, Trump revoked the protected status of around 500,000 Haitian immigrants living in the US, arguing that migrants from Haiti and Central and South America included a significant number of violent criminals.
At the same time, the president said he wanted to offer refuge to descendants of white settlers from South Africa, whose black-led government he accused of committing genocide. He also condemned the country’s land reform program, which allows the seizure of property, most of it owned by white farmers.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa dismissed the genocide accusation as false and defended the land reform as an effort to reverse the legacy of apartheid.
