Skip to main content
Elon Musk and Twitter: all that is solid melts into air
KEITH FLETT pours scorn on the liberal-minded pretensions of the ‘world's richest man’ and his claim that Twitter can be an open forum for free debate, somehow abstracted from the perversions of capitalism
The Twitter social media app showing Elon Musk running on a mobile phone
More from this author
STILL MARCHING: A May Day demo makes its way through London, 1973
Features / 1 May 2025
1 May 2025

KEITH FLETT revisits the 1978 origins of Britain’s May Day bank holiday — from Michael Foot’s triumph to Thatcher’s reluctant acceptance — as Starmer’s government dodges calls to expand our working-class celebrations

Features / 14 April 2025
14 April 2025
From bemoaning London’s ‘cockneys’ invading seaside towns to negotiating holiday rents, the founders of scientific socialism maintained a wry detachment from Victorian Easter customs while using the break for health and politics, writes KEITH FLETT
TURNING POINT: The anti-cuts plan put forward by Tony Benn (
Features / 31 March 2025
31 March 2025
Facing economic turmoil, Jim Callaghan’s government rejected Tony Benn’s alternative economic strategy in favour of cuts that paved the way for Thatcherism — and the cuts-loving Labour of the present era, writes KEITH FLETT
Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Chancellor of the Exchequer
Features / 17 March 2025
17 March 2025
Starmer’s slash-and-burn approach to disability benefits represents a fundamental break with Labour’s founding mission to challenge the idle rich rather than punish the vulnerable poor, argues KEITH FLETT
Similar stories
Elon Musk flashes his t-shirt that reads ‘DOGE’ to the m
Editorial: / 11 March 2025
11 March 2025
Features / 23 January 2025
23 January 2025
JOE GILL hazards a guess: Musk’s salute was a message to all of the world’s far-right legions: now is our time
Elon Musk speaks at a campaign rally for Donald Trump in New
Editorial: / 4 December 2024
4 December 2024