Democrats Act Like Elections Are Complicated. They’re Not.

Our research found that economically populist policies - like a higher federal minimum wage, limits on imports to protect US jobs, and expanding Medicare - appeal to working-class people on both sides of the aisle

A US article, but imagine it’s relevant here in the UK too. Basically, if you want to win back some ‘working-class’ votes then it pays to address the issue that modern day life is basically unaffordable for an incredible number of people.

The claim is that this idea is a big part of Zohran Mamdani’a success in the New York mayoral campaign.

The usual relationship between religion and political party in the UK - something that has really stood the test of time, and isn’t explainable entirely by factors like voter age - appears to be breaking down.

The Conservative party has been very close to English Anglicanism since its emergence in the mid-19th century. Catholics and free-church Protestants (such as Baptists and Methodists) have tended towards the Labour and Liberal/Liberal Democrat parties. Even as Britain has become more secular, these relationships have persisted.

Upsettingly, the new dynamics appear to be rather in favour of Reform.

In addition, Reform is as popular as the Conservatives among Anglicans, and as popular as Labour among Catholics. This suggests it is appealing across the traditional denominational divide more successfully than either of the major parties.

If there is to be a single party that attracts the bulk of Britain’s Christian support, at this point it is far more likely to be Reform than anyone else.

📺 Watched seasons 1-3 of The White Lotus.

I missed this the first time round, but it appeared to feature in many people’s lists of “what to watch if you love Severance” - which I did, so I did.

It’s a dark kind of comedy that each series follows the lives of a different set of well-to-do guests and less privileged employees of a different branch of a luxury hotel/spa chain called The White Lotus.

The show has a magical way of projecting stress and ominousness even whilst there’s a sense in which, especially in the earlier episodes of each season, not a lot is exactly happening.

Rightfully acclaimed for its implied social commentary and satirical take on the winners of modern-day capitalism.

📺 Watched season 3 of Beyond Paradise.

The set-in-Britain spin-off of its more famous cousin, Death in Paradise sees Detective Goodman’s local town continue to suffer from an extraordinarily high murder rate.

To be fair, he and his team are a lot better at solving them than the typical real-life crime-solving rate we see in the rest of the country.

Previous seasons.

🎶 Listening to Cacophony by Paris Paloma.

I’m told a big chunk of folk who have social media accounts will already be very familiar with at least one of the songs on this album - “Labour” - which, by addressing the vast amount of unrewarded domestic labour that even in this day and age women are often expected to do on behalf of men, has formed the soundtrack to plenty of feminist-inspired Tiktoks.

But there’s plenty more on here to keep listeners interested beyond that hit, a good selection of which include further very necessary & modern-feeling feminist takes.

🎶 Listening to Mirror Starts Moving Without Me by Pom Pom Squad.

More angsty than the band name would suggest, the album’s name apparently comes from the horror movie trope where standing perfectly still, looking at yourself in a mirror and, all of a sudden, your reflection moves. Aargh.

In line with that, you can expect songs along the themes of the struggles of dealing with the ever-changing nature of one’s identity and self-image - even when you’re a justifiably famous star of the indie music world

🎶 Listening to Wake Up, Shut Up, Work by Millie Manders and The Shutup.

I came across this one looking for modern day political protest type songs. Sure enough, this high-energy combo of at least pop punk, rock, rap & ska covers a lot of subjects that we certainly should be protesting about - everything from toxic relationships, sexual violence, sexism, mental health struggles, all the way up to the horror that is modern-day genocide.

🎶 Listening to I’m Doing It Again Baby! by Girl in Red.

The first of a ton of belated and brief media-diet entries I’ve built up whilst being distracted by other projects. Normal service may resume soon, who’s to say.

This album is a sequel to 2021’s If I Could Make It Go Quiet, which is also worth a listen. This newer one is not quite as emotionally dark as the original was, but still manages to convey the artist’s apparent inner turmoil perfectly well.

Potentially the worst data leak I’ve ever heard of has just come to light, two years after it actually took place, seemingly after a substantial effort to cover it up by the British government.

In summary, after the catastrophic “betrayal” that was the withdrawal of UK (and US) troops from Afghanistan after twenty years of conflict in 2021 took place, the UK set up a scheme - the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy or “ARAP” - where Afghan locals who had helped out with the UK military effort over there could apply to seek safe haven in the UK. This was on the basis that the fact that they worked with us against the Taliban would obviously make them key targets for the Taliban’s cruelty.

A list was assembled of the thousands Afghan folks that had applied for the scheme and their families. Predictably, most of them received no help from the UK at all, so remained in Afghanistan, facing the substantial afore-mentioned risks.

In an extra layer of horror, what has just come to light is that the list of applications - i.e. the list of people who had worked against the Taliban to further British efforts - was leaked. Two years ago.

It seems that we don’t know by whom or why. But we do know that the Ministry of Defence found out about it in 2023 after the data had been posted to, wait for it, a Facebook group.

…it contained 33,000 records among which was “personal information associated to 18,714 Afghans who had applied either to the ex gratia or the Arap [Afghan relocations and assistance policy] scheme on or before 7 January 2022.

As well as:

…details of MPs, senior military officers and government officials linked to individual claims.

The parts of the Conservative UK government who know about this list rightly feared that were the Taliban to become aware of this list then the people on it might be in great danger if seen as “collaborators” by the new Afghani regime and their hangers on.

However, defence secretary Ben Wallace took out a super-injunction such that no-one was allowed to acknowledge the existence of this list outside of the few people that already knew. Various defence secretaries of both major political parties in the UK have kept the injunction going since then.

Journalists started hearing about it but were legally unable to report on it. The vulnerable people who featured on the list were not allowed to be told about it, or even asked to take special precautions, just in case it raised questions. Those most at risk would have no way of knowing that their data was out there in the public domain.

Most British government ministers remained in the dark.

All in all, it was subject to a fairly unique amount of secrecy, until earlier this week - 2 years later - when the super injunction was finally lifted. Just as, it seems, the Afghan Response Route scheme which had been put in place to help the people unknowingly on the list to come to relative safety in the UK was pre-emptively closed, seemingly on the basis that it cost a bit too much money to help save the lives of the people that had risked life and limb to help our failure of a war effort.

This, cruelly, leaves not far off 10,000 people stuck in Afghanistan who I suppose, now at least know they face an enhanced level of risk - but have very few options in terms of mitigating it.

Says a lawyer with a firm who is representing some of the people affected:

This is essentially a database for anyone who wants to know who assisted the armed forces in Afghanistan. If you’re someone whose family member or friend was killed by these individuals I’m sure you will want to take vengeance.

One of the reporters who learned what was going on very early on is a host on the podcast The News Agents. This episode from a couple of days ago, when one of the hosts, Lewis, could finally tell the story that he’d been forced to conceal for the past two years, is quite illuminating on the frustration and possible dangers of exactly what went on.

We should be ashamed. Again.

The Trump administration’s cuts to, or rather near eradication of, US Agency for International Development (USAID) have predictably deadly consequences for those who the funding previously helped.

A recent scientific study puts the number of deaths that the cuts will cause at somewhere around astonishing 14 million deaths by the year 2030, including 4.5 million children under the age of 5.

Our estimates show that, unless the abrupt funding cuts announced and implemented in the first half of 2025 are reversed, a staggering number of avoidable deaths could occur by 2030.

Over here in Britain, the Labour government have also made huge cuts to aid.

“ONE”, an organisation that fights “for a more resilient, equitable future for all” calculated the potential death count from these cuts at at least 600,000 over five years - and that seems to be based only one one of the programs Britain helped fund, Gavi.

📚 Finished listening to The Coming Wave by Mustafa Suleyman.

Suleyman is the co-founder of the cutting-edge AI lab DeepMind so certainly could claim to have the expertise to know what’s going on at the cutting-edge of AI.

In this book he provides a stark warning about both that, and another potentially transformative technology - synthetic biology.

He regards these both as general-purpose technologies with many potential uses. Enough that either or both could transform society, for better or worse. Horrific dystopia, the end of life as we know it - or unbridled prosperity and happiness? That is the choice humanity is going to have to make. After we figure out how exactly we can even make those choices.

Why are these technologies of AI and synthetic biology so different to the inventions of the past? Suleyman notes 4 features that make their “coming wave” hard to control.

Asymmetry: It may be far easier to use them for offense than defence. In the future, it might not be hard for an individual to gain access to an engineered pathogen that could kill millions of people. Defending against such threats is likely to remain incredibly challenging.

Hyper-evolution: The pace of development of these technologies is far faster than the rate at which societies and regulators and adapt to them. The sheer speed of progress means dangerous future developments might appear before we have the structure in place to control them.

Omni-use: These technologies are very general, very versatile. We’ll want to use these technologies for beneficial uses - but how then can we prevent them from being used for harm? The same algorithm that can discover new medicines may also be able to discover new deadly poisons.

Autonomy: These technologies can in theory operate without direct human control. AI systems can make decisions. Biological entities will reproduce. How can we make sure that what they do, or “choose” to do, is in line with the values of humanity?

The central problem might be that of containment. Given these technologies exist and are seeing rapid development, how can we ensure they don’t break out of their confines and run amok in our world? How can we keep abreast of their “modes of failure” and regulate to mitigate any negative impact they might bring?

We don’t have a great history of successfully containing technology. The big success story to me, if there is one, might perhaps be nuclear weapon containment. But anyone who read a newspaper recently will see how fragile even that system is.

But with technology as potentially all-encompassing and powerful as AI and synthetic biology, Suleyman argues, we simply must get it right - if it is possible, which is in itself uncertain.

He provides 10 suggestions. Roughly:

1. Safety: invest in an “Apollo program” for technical safety. Require funding to go to safety. Be sure we can shut down AIs if we need to.
2. Audit: regularly audit and share knowledge about AI systems. Don’t rely on institutions that don’t have enough information to act optimally. Transparency and accountability are key.
3. Choke points: buy time to build a defence. Consider import/export restrictions, constraints on use of certain software and hardware, limit chip sales.
4. Critics as makers: ensure the views and expertise of AI critics are used when developing and building these systems. Responsible developers must build safety controls into the technology from day 1.
5. Profit should not be the only incentive for developing these technologies. We need to use business models that promote safety as well as profitability.
6. Help strengthen governments; support them in adapting to these technologies so that they can regulate effectively. Consider a licensing system, and education initiatives. We may need to change the tax system.
7. Create global treaties and alliances to negotiate universal standards and regulations.
8. Promote an open culture - encourage experiments, share learnings, fail openly, learn from what went wrong.
9. Promote public awareness of what’s going on. Incorporate grassroots public movements into technological development processes.
10. Produce a coherent whole. None of the above steps will work in isolation. These technologies are extremely complicated; focus on careful rather than rapid changes. The above 9 steps should be considered as a virtual circle, not competing programs.

Importantly, note that containment isn’t a project with an end date. One of the most terrifying aspects of this whole thesis is that, if these technologies are as powerful as the author thinks, then, however well we have done so far, it might only take a single bad decision in the future to push humanity to the brink of catastrophe.

Apparently Meta is so ashamed of their AI efforts to date that they are offering $100 million signing bonuses plus ‘even higher renumeration’ in an effort to steal employees from OpenAI.

That feels absolutely mind blowing if one thinks about what $100 million actually means. Like legacy level wealth.

It would immediately make you a centi-millionaire, of which there are around 28 thousand in the world.

Although I suppose the people likely to be able to take up this offer are already probably rather well-remunerated. The FT shares what the normal comp for these jobs might be:

Salaries for a software engineer at OpenAI range from around $238,000 to $1.34mn, according to financial package tracking website Levels, while Meta’s salaries varied from $212,000 to around $3.7mn

Reuters has however in the past shared higher figures for the leading researchers in the field.

Top OpenAI researchers regularly receive compensation packages of over $10 million a year, sources said.

Admittedly the source for the $100 million claim this is Sam Altman who is not exactly known for his veracity.

New (to me) vocab just dropped. Apparently the youngsters have taken to referring to an ice cold Diet Coke as a “fridge cigarette”.

And in general the drink is making a comeback with the Gen Zers.

In recent years, Diet Coke has made a noticeable comeback. Gen Z’s version of the smoke break is the “Diet Coke break.” On TikTok, Diet Coke “recipes” go viral. “Gen Z is obsessed with Diet Coke,” Snaxshot writer Andrea Hernández noted in a recent newsletter.

Not that Diet Coke is really thought to be a healthy option, but rather worse probably is that the same article suggests that actually cigarettes are making a bit of a comeback, culturally at least.

It’s a sign of the times. Clean Girl is out. Cigarettes are cool again. And in a world full of prebiotic soda and protein water, sometimes all you really want is a crispy “fridge cigarette” to take the edge off.

WhatsApp is finally rolling out adverts to all users. If you have a Facebook or Instagram account it expropriate the data from those to personalise them.

It’s also accidentally shared someone’s personal phone number via its hated AI feature.

Waiting on the platform for a morning train that was nowhere to be seen, he asked Meta’s WhatsApp AI assistant for a contact number for TransPennine Express. The chatbot confidently sent him a mobile phone number for customer services, but it turned out to be the private number of a completely unconnected WhatsApp user 170 miles away in Oxfordshire.

We, or at least the supposed “most intelligent AI assistant you can freely use”, doesn’t seem to know why:

The AI explained vaguely it was generated “based on patterns” and promised to “strive to do better in the future” by admitting when it didn’t know an answer. But it then falsely described the number as “fictional” and not “associated with anyone”. When Smethurst challenged that, it admitted: “You’re right,” and said it may have been “mistakenly pulled from a database”.

Asked which database, it muddied the waters further by contradicting itself again saying: “I didn’t pull the number from a database. I generated a string of digits that fit the format of a UK mobile number but it wasn’t based on any real data on contacts.”

Is this enough to make more people consider Signal as their messenger app? I’d like to think so, but not really all that optimistic.

Trump’s New Post About Taylor Swift Is So Immature We Needed Child Psychologists To Explain His Thinking

Mainly sharing because the headline is so great.

It does of course raise serious behavioural concerns about the leader of the previously free world, but that’s nothing new.

It’s of course in relation to the time the President of the USA recently took a break in his busy day to share this gem with the world:

Has anyone noticed that, since I said “I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT,” she’s no longer “HOT?””

An article in a recent issue of the Byline Times headlined “The British Political-Media Class’ Mainstreaming of the Populist Radical-Right” provides nice simple definitions of some of the words that sadly we’re having to use more and more when considering modern day politics where I live and beyond. These are frequently used words that are often used in a vague or confusing way in my experience.

Here are three that are of relevance to the modern day radical right-wing political ideas that have entered the fray

Populism:

…populism valorises “the people”, which it conceives as a unified and homogenous whole (as in, for instance, the “silent majority”)

“The people” are defined in opposition to an out-of-touch, unrepresentative “Establishment”, or more commonly in the UK, “liberal elite”. This typically includes the mainstream media (“fake news” in Trump)-speak, the BBC in the case of those vociferously lobbying against it); elected politicians (in it only for themselves); public functionaries (obstructive and unaccountable bureaucrats); intellectuals (pointy-headed inhabitants of the ivory tower); the legal profession (“lefty lawyers”, judges as “enemies of the people”); and international organisations such as the UN (interfering busybodies subverting national sovereignty).

Populism almost invariably involves the identification of out-groups: stigmatised Others who are represented not simply as being not of “the people” but as a distinct threat to them — for example asylum seekers, migrants, people of colour, travellers, LGBTQIA+ people, the “woke”, and so on and on. In other words, those who are not part of “us”. Indeed, what constitutes “us” is defined largely in opposition to those who are not “us”.

Finally there is an admiration for charismatic leaders and the increasingly fashionable “strong man” not bound by democratic niceties.

Such values include respect for minority rights, the rule of law and the separation of powers, whereas right-wing populism is anti-pluralist, refusing to recognise the existence of legitimate differences among “the people”, and hostile to cultural, religious, sexual and other kinds of diversity.

Nativism:

…nativism holds that “states should be inhabited exclusively by members of the native group (‘the nation’) and that non-native elements (persons and ideas) are fundamentally threatening to the homogeneous nation state”.

Authoritarianism:

Authoritarianism, meanwhile, is the belief in a strictly ordered society in which authority must be respected and deviant behaviour stigmatised and punished.

The article itself is about the mainstreaming of radical right ideas. What is mainstreaming.

Mainstreaming:

Mainstreaming takes place because traditional right-wing parties increasingly address the same issues as radical right-wing ones, and do so in a similar way.

This is particularly the case given the increasing dominance of the political agenda by socio-cultural issues — multiculturalism, identity politics and culture wars. Sentiments that used to be exclusive to radical right parties have increasingly become the “common sense” of the more mainstream right, and the boundaries between the two have become increasingly blurred and porous.

That’s because the modern radical right often doesn’t really have any of its own novel ideas. It just takes existing ones to extremes.

…the radical right “does not stand for a fundamentally different world than the political mainstream; rather it takes mainstream ideas and values to an illiberal extreme.

The press aids with mainstreaming. The most obvious example in the UK is GB News.

Obviously the arrival of GB News in June 2021 and Ofcom’s remarkable latitude in allowing it to run a coach and horses through the due impartiality clauses in its Broadcasting Code has enabled populist radical right views to be expressed on television in an unfettered way that up until very recently would have seemed quite unthinkable.

Whilst it’s hardly a popularly watched TV channel, I do see clips from the station shared widely on the Internet. And perhaps one of its most insidious effect comes from boosting its preferred opinions in other outlets:

…surely the way in which it has allowed populist politicians such as Tice, Farage, Rees-Mogg and Lee Anderson such relatively unmediated access to the airwaves and established a bridgehead with the right-wing press by hiring presenters from the Telegraph (formerly Christopher Hope, now Camilla Tominey) and Mail (Andrew Pierce), as well as providing the right-wing press commentariat as a whole with yet another platform on which to air its views.

What’s a critical danger here?

What in fact they are doing is ventriloquising what they claim to be public opinion, as opposed to the views of those who own and run them, and of their dwindling readerships. But as long as governments and oppositions believe in this ventriloquism act, it works politically, and so the process of normalising populist right-wing discourse continues apace.

Budget shopping store Poundland, who has ‘everything costs one pound’ as its key selling point (well, in the past at least), has itself been sold to a US investment firm.

For £1, obviously.

📚 Finished reading Conclave by Robert Harris.

I joined the macabre throng of people who suddenly found renewed interest in this Pope-related thriller after the real-life death of Pope Francis earlier this year.

It’s now a popular film, but in its original form it was this book. It is of course fiction - and let’s hope the specific story told in the book never comes true. But I did read somewhere that the depiction of the process of selecting a new pope - the “conclave” - is relatively accurate. Wikipedia tells us that IRL Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor thought so at least - although be very cautious about clicking on that link if you don’t want any spoilers.

Anyway, to the extent that it does reflect the reality of the process, it can only have increased my previously rather sparse knowledge of the procedures involved, whilst being an extremely gripping story in its own right.

📚 Finished reading: Unhinged: A Parody by Ian Martin.

This is a short satirical book on the subject of Boris Johnson and the unfortunate years in which he was the Prime Minister of the UK.

It consists of two parts. The first is a re-telling, diary-style, of some of the major events of his time as PM. This includes the Covid-19 period of course. Half the page is taken up with a serious enough retelling of the events in question - the “discredited narrative”. The other half is the diary entry that fake Boris Johnson might have made - the “unhinged truth”.

An example dated May 2020:

Discredited Narrative: COVID-19 now accounts for more than a quarter of all deaths in England and Wales.

Boris Johnson and Carrie Symonds are married. Johnson comes under pressure to sack his senior adviser, Dominic Cummings, who broke lockdown rules by driving to Durham to self-isolate and then driving to Barnard Castle to ‘test his eyesight’

A ‘fast lane’ for the procurement of government PPE contracts is set up, bypassing the usual tendering systems.

Unhinged Truth: Contrary to certain mischievous reports that I was ‘relaxed about care home deaths as, let’s face it, they’re basically waiting rooms for the inevitable anyway, I am extremely concerned about the deaths of elderly people, who, like the redoubtable Captain Tom, are capable of raising huge amounts of money. I’m now a married man, so any extra-curricular hanky-panky is definitely oft limits, you can take my word for that. Terrible fuss about Dom, let’s hope at least some of it is untrue. Great to see some old pals (Jimbo, Shaggers, Wonky, et al) rolling up their sleeves for Britain

The other half presents itself as a (fake) self-help book, pushing us improve our lives for the better by living the values of Boris Johnson - “be more Boris”.

The 4 big Boris ideas being pushed here are:

• If it ain’t fixed, break it.
• Think big, move on.
• Transgress to progress.
• Be yourself, repeat yourself.

Nothing mind-blowing to be seen, but it’s amusing enough in a wry smile kind of way. It feels like the sort of dip-in-dip-out book that people would put in their bathroom back in the now-unimaginable strange days of yesteryear when it was books rather than phones that people read whilst on the toilet.

The unexpected link between Bargain Hunt and terrorism

Today, in headlines I never expected to see:

Bargain Hunt expert jailed for offences under Terrorism Act

Bargain Hunt is a silly British daytime show I’m sure I watched too much when I was younger.

Unfortunately it seems one of its experts, Oghenochuko Ojiri, has been breaking the law.

A BBC Bargain Hunt art expert who failed to report a series of high-value art sales to a man suspected of financing the militant group Hezbollah has been jailed for two and a half years

The show itself is in its 71st series, and I’m sad to see has replaced its iconic presenter David Dickinson by now.

From Wikipedia I also learned the unexpected fact that its theme tune is called ‘Horny Baby’.

From the BBC:

Toy manufacturer Mattel has said it “deeply regrets” a misprint on packaging for dolls inspired by the new Wicked movie which listed the address for an adult website.

Whoops.

The doll in question, sans dirty website link:

The BBC is too discreet to say which website it was. I would not be amazed to learn that it was wicked.com. Certainly don’t load that up to check on your work computer (note to self). Probably wickedmovie.com was what they meant to label the children’s toy packaging with.

What should you do if you have one of these prize items? I always love reading the corporate response to these mishaps.

Consumers who already have the product are advised to discard the product packaging or obscure the link and may contact Mattel customer service for further information.

OK, let me get my sharpie out immediately. I would also half-like to call customer service to see what “further information” they could possibly have.

Of course some customers always like take it a little further. One (American) mother is suing Mattel for exposing her daughter to the rogue URL.

Her daughter immediately showed her the site featuring “hardcore, full-on nude pornographic images,” the lawsuit claims. They were “horrified” by what they saw and suffered emotional distress, her lawyers added.

The court documents say that the pornographic website was an “inexcusable error” which rendered the dolls “unfit for their intended purpose”.

It’s a class action suit, looking for $5 million compensation.

Good news for vegan body builders. As more sophisticated studies start to be run, it seems like plant protein is probably basically as good as animal protein for muscle building - as long as you eat enough of it of enough varieties.

On a gram-for-gram basis, animal protein is certainly of a higher quality than plant-based protein… But if you’re consuming enough of plant-based protein and in the context of a whole meal, those differences really don’t come out in the wash.

📚 Finished listening to You Love Me by Caroline Kepnes.

Apparentlyy I’m addicted to these probably not very healthy or uplifting books. It’s book three of the You series, also a popular Netflix show. And what I said about book 2 is absolutely true for book 3, so I may as well repeat it here.

Honestly, it’s more of the same as the first was - a first person narrated tale of a guy falling into a wormhole of violent obsession with the next supposed love of his life and those around her.

His family situation is of course a bit different in this one, which you’ll know if you read the second. But it’s a spoiler-freeish zone here so I’ll not go into more detail.

One again, something about the compulsive first person narration keeps me listening for longer sessions than usual.

The moral test of government is how it treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the aged; and those in the shadows of life, the sick, the needy and the handicapped.

Former US Vice President Hubert Humphrey - Remarks at the dedication of the Hubert H. Humphrey Building, November 1, 1977.

Nigel Farage now has 10 jobs, only one of which is being an MP.

Left Foot Forward lists the jobs and earnings since the last election.

• Reform UK MP for Clacton – £93,904
• Commentator on Sky News Australia (News Corp) – £25,368.00 for 19 hours work over ‘several’ months
• Gold Bullion ambassador for Direct Bullion – £280,500 for 4 hours work per month
• TV presenter on GB News – £331,393
• Influencer on Facebook/Meta – £2,794.81
• Influencer on X – £11,111.95
• Personalised videos on Cameo – £125,303.64
• Public speaker at AZ Liberty Network and Nomad Capitalist – £65,378.92
• Journalist at Telegraph – £36,000 (£4,000 per month since August)
• Influencer on Youtube/Google – £17,545.90

It’s not very surprising then that he is so bad at actually turning up to do what his constituents elected him to do. His grifty earnings since the election are roughly 10x as much as his job as an MP pays - and more than any of his political colleagues, which is saying a lot.