I start with the results in Europe and what they mean for Ukraine but also what they hint at in the UK and US elections. In the UK I believe that Reform is now ahead of the Tories in the North, the Midlands, Wales, East Anglia and the South West. I discuss its likely vote (large) and seats (small) and just how few seats the wretched Tories will win. In the US I discuss two now convicted felons: President Trump and Hunter Biden concluding neither conviction alters the November race much but the failing mental health of Hunter’s Dad is becoming more of an issue. I suggest that 4 states considered swing states are now firmly Republican while at leat two, maybe more, considered likely Dem are now “in play”.The polling data looks ever more grim for President Biden and his candidacy in November is increasingly less of a given. In Ukraine it gets worse and worse for Ukraine as I detail.

I rather wish I had not bothered watering my vegetables today as God has just watered them with a vengeance. Wales really has been wet this summer which, like the drought of a couple of years ago, will be cited by the GroupThink as definitive proof of global warming.

By Far Right, or as they sometimes put it Fascist, they mean anyone who questions the narrative that record immigration creates diversity, wealth and is a wholly good thing, who believes that there is no shame in being proud of your nation state and its past or that there are not 108 genders and that our kids should not be sexualised at primary school. If you dare question man made global warming, giving unlimited and unquestioning support to Ukraine or suggest that the reaction to covid was overblown you may also be deemed far right or a fascist. So who do I mean by “they”?

Barely a day goes by when I do not find a reason to hate the BBC even more. Today there are two.

This is the first basket of strawberries from the garden. Both Joshua and Jaya are happy to assist in picking although the former eats almost as many as he picks and the latter is more into supervising. The first two baskets have generated gifts for three neighbours, two trays of frozen berries for the autumn, two school snack boxes for Joshua, two litres of ice cream and 2 kg of strawberry jam.

Those who know the Welsh Hovel in which I live will remember that the most hovelish part was a two room office from the Edwardian era, tacked on to the original 1650 farmhouse. My priority since we arrived five years ago has been renovating the main house and barns and transforming the fields and garden. This year I finally addressed the office block as you can see below.

Of course the answer is “no.” Okay, troops following his orders killed up to 20,000 French civilians but nobody, that I am aware of, is suggesting that old Ike was guilty of a war crime.  But here is the rub: Allied Forces did not text French civilians suggesting they leave areas near the Normandy beaches,they did not drop millions of leaflets warning them to scarper, the bombardment that proceeded the landings was not pin point accurate and targetted it was, as they say about Gaza “indiscriminate.”

The BBC’s Radio 4 is going overboard on D Day coverage. Quite right too.  This is an 80 year anniversary of of the key and most glorious events in British history. But that history is being rewritten.

I think the author of this piece, Zoe Williams, is a pal, or used to be, of my public sector working, lefty little sister N. But at least N is not this mad. Zoe reckons if you start working out at the gym you will become more right wing. No, this is not a parody, folks really do pay to read this nonsense.

It is a pity, for Edenmoor in Co. Donegal is a fine place and has been restored well since my late father and I visited it back in the mid eighties. That was before the Good Friday agreement and as dad and I drove through the border counties from Belfast there was more than one inappropriate joke made about IRA men lurking in the shadows around the next corner.

I start with Nigel Farage and his decision to lead Reform and stand in Clacton. What does it mean for the results for Reform, Labour and the wretched Tories? I put this in context of a mood of unease and unhappiness across Europe ahead of EU elections this weekend where insurgents will make big gains. I voted Tory last time and was planning to spoil my ballot paper. this time. I may still do that on July 4th but many of us who are disgusted with the entire political class will back Farage. I don’t like some of what he says, notably on immigration. But we should have a debate on that subject and the established parties just won’t allow that.  Then it is to the US where I sense the kangaroo court conviction of Donald Trump does not change the likely outcome. Then to Ukraine where the western media is distracting us again. The real story is not Kharkov but Chasov Yar. That is bad for Ukraine and that, in turn, is bad for Biden and Western leaders some of whose rhetoric is now simply insane.

I have built four strawberry patches here at the Welsh Hovel. Joshua and I have weeded hard and this year we are set for a bumper crop. Last week the first red appeared on the strawberries this weekend we have red strawberries. Joshua wanders into the main patch for a snack several times a day. Soon there will be jam and ice cream made, although the first ice cream of the year will be elderflower and will be made later today. But for pudding at lunchtime today it was strawberries and cream. And there is plenty more where that all came from.

The big elderflower bush is at the top of the top field at the far end next to the graveyard. A track around that field was cut but is already growing back rapidly and will need strimming again this weekend. As for the area around the bush and around the olive, mulberry and sweet chestnut trees I have planted up there, Mr Strimmer is needed badly.

I start with the latest peace plan rejected by the West. What is America’s plan B as Ukraine loses more and more ground and men? Then to two interesting aspects of the Ameroican election in the swing states: the Muslim vote organising Abandonbiden24.com and voter registrations.

I bring you the tweet below from the wretched Guardian. It seems that Corbynite filmmaker Ken Loach has quit as patron of a small London cinema over an “Israeli film festival screening.” That is just a tad misleading.  The screening is of a film, a film about a festival. Yes it is the Nova festival where on October 7 2023 hundreds of young Israelis were raped, sodomised, beheaded, shot, abducted and the film presents footage of that day.  That Loach quits as he cannot bear to see his Hamas rapist pals in action is in character for loathsome Ken. That the Guardian deceives with its headline, making it sound like a normal BDS protest against a new Israeli movie is equally predictable but still disgraceful.