Can You Please Stop Telling Me To Live My Best Life Please
Thoughts On The Advice Pandemic
Dear modern digital culture. Please stop telling me how to be the best version of me. I'm ok with being, with the exception of the odd day here and there, the fifth or sixth best version of me, with all the chaos, foibles and happy unpredictability that entails: tomcox.substack.com/p/can-you-pl...
08.07.2025 10:48
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Rachel Reeves hints at tax rises in autumn budget after welfare bill U-turn
Initially aimed at saving Β£5.5bn, the watered-down welfare bill now leaves the government with an estimated Β£5.5bn black hole - close to breaching the chancellor's fiscal rules set out last year.
Rachel Reeves hints at tax rises in autumn.
The bottom 20% pay a higher proportion of income in taxes than the richest 20%. This must change.
Tax capital gains and dividends at same rate as wages, charge them NIC too.
Levy wealth tax, financial transactions tax, windfall tax on profiteers.
05.07.2025 16:18
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One big happy family
01.07.2025 13:37
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Hear me out: what if E.T. never went back to space and just slowly became a rock troll so he could be with Elliott forever?
30.06.2025 09:36
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Some 100 private jets will fly to Venice for Jeff Bezos' wedding, and I recycle yoghurt cup lids.
24.06.2025 10:45
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1. Rolls-Royce SMR selected to build small modular nuclear reactors
2. Thousands of jobs to be created as government announces multi-billion-pound investment to build Sizewell C
3. System to distribute surplus food to the most vulnerable
4. Fairer system for debt collection
5. Compensation to postmasters reaches Β£1 billion milestone
6. Winter fuel allowance reinstated with Β£35k cap
7. Β£187m Tech First scheme to get school kids ready to work in AI
8. Extend ban on destructive bottom trawling
9. Β£86 billion boost to science and tech to turbocharge economy
10. Β£113bn of new capital investment in homes, transport and energy at the forefront of the spending review
11. Over 6,000 arrests and 9,000 visits carried out across the UK in illegal working
12. Digital marketplace to help change how the UK public sector buys technology
Another raft of good things being undertaken by our hard working Labour government. Just in last 7 days. All on Gov website because itβs not in the media!
10.06.2025 09:27
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Yes, Iβve noticed none of this is reported by MSM.
10.06.2025 13:48
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Non-voters are Nigel Farageβs secret weapon
The βhang the paedos, fund the NHSβ constituency is not moving left.
Low information, low education, high prejudice. Like those new voters who turned out for Trump in November.
05.06.2025 15:11
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Quite the compliment coming from one of my favorite accounts on this platform.
Thanks for all you do, Rick!
From your fan, Marπ«
02.05.2025 21:03
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A country lane on the southern edge of Dartmoor.
A Cornish country lane in May
A country lane on the edge of the Quantocks
Another lovely Dartmoor lane in spring
AREN'T COUNTRY LANES BRILLIANT?
I'm keeping the paywall permanently off this lane-themed piece I wrote, to try to tempt people to subscribe to my Substack: tomcox.substack.com/p/once-upon-...
P.S. It works much better if you read it right to the end. I promise.
There's an audio version too.
21.04.2025 15:09
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The White House. The actual White House.
This is the attitude of every abuser, who is now fearful of the consequences of their abuse.
10.04.2025 09:58
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A country lane on Dartmoor at Sunset.
A Cornish country lane in summer.
A country lane on the edge of the Quantocks.
Another lovely Dartmoor lane.
Aren't country lanes brilliant?
tomcox.substack.com/p/once-upon-...
12.04.2025 14:29
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Five linoprint bookmark designs by my mum, Jo.
Look at these beautiful linoprint bookmarks - made by my mum, Jo - that have just arrived in the post.
I'll be sending these out for free to the next 20 people who order a hardback of my recent novel, 1983, direct from me.
Details below...
12.04.2025 13:14
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I hope everyone realizes that scrubbing historical references from web sites is no different than burning books
12.04.2025 12:14
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A photograph of the sun setting over the River Severn, as viewed from an ancient hill fort in Gloucestershire, but which I'm passing off as the landscape in my novel Villager - inaccurately, since the book is set in Devon, although more specifically is also set on a moor that is supposed to serve as a parallel universe version of Dartmoor, with its own legends, ghosts and lost psychedelic music.
I've removed the paywall permanently from this piece, which is a chapter from my novel Villager, told entirely in the form of an online village message board. If you like it, you'll probably like the book. If you don't, you won't... tomcox.substack.com/p/the-villag...
15.01.2025 09:58
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@fpwellman.bsky.social: You canβt say, on one hand, "I can't trust the government, theyβre all bureaucrats," and then say, on the other hand, "Well, they're all criminals because the government said soβso letβs ship them to El Salvador forever."
You're fucking losing your minds if you think so.
05.04.2025 15:41
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Please share!!! This is getting ridiculousβthey just canβt accept a loss. Please help spread the word to North Carolina. The North Carolina Court of Appeals ruled in a 2-1 decision that over 60,000 votes cast in last yearβs closely contested state Supreme Court race must be verified and recounted.
05.04.2025 02:44
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Wake Up! Your House is Burning!
05.04.2025 15:57
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The image is a screenshot of a tweet from Comrade Sisko (@Pinko69420
), accompanied by two fist bump emojis. The tweet includes a photo of a person sitting in a car, wearing a gray Bass Pro Shops cap and glasses. Overlaid on the image is white text that reads: "Let's start with a 200% tariff on podcast equipment for straight men." The background outside the car window shows a clear sky, power lines, and some buildings.
Guys really do love to hear themselves talk, huh.
05.04.2025 16:00
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Quite a lot more writing (to say the least) on this theme - and others - here, most of which is free to read for three months after it appears: tomcox.substack.com
03.04.2025 09:51
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Oh those hummingbird hawk moths are incredible. Iβve only seen them a few times!
03.04.2025 10:23
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What a Trump victory will mean, is the completion of the annihilation of Palestine and others, abandoning of Ukraine/Europe to aid Russia's invasion, US/ Israeli war against Iran, the return of CIA death squads in the Middle East and Africa, economic collapse, and so on.
Nov 5, 2024
30.03.2025 20:04
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I have this charming book and I'd recommend it
30.03.2025 20:19
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29.03.2025 15:26
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NEW: Today in Instanbul, Turkey.
A people fighting for democracy & against authoritarianism. This is how you do it!
Chairman of Republican Peopleβs Party, ΓzgΓΌr Γzel:
βToday, 2.2 million of our citizens overflowed Maltepe Square. This is just the beginning. This nation will not remain silent.β πΉπ·
29.03.2025 14:38
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