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#ResultsWithDeKoder | Prannoy Roy (Prannoy Roy) breaks down Bihar’s vote share: 🔴#Mahagathbandhan’s vote share didn’t fall much 🔴NDA’s gains came almost entirely from Independents, NOT MGB 🔴Jan Suraaj gained significantly Watch how this shift powered NDA’s sweep⤵️
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!["You just hate Hichilema": The dramatic fall of Zambia's president By Sishuwa Sishuwa Hakainde Hichilema stood in the queue to becoming President of Zambia for 15 years before voters finally removed him from it in August 2021. This demonstrates how badly the man wanted this job. But it has taken him only five years in office to display his unfitness for the role. When it comes to the bigger national issues, such as safeguarding our cherished democracy, getting the best out of Zambia’s mineral wealth, respecting the constitution and the rule of law, fighting corruption beyond rhetoric, genuine promotion of national unity and equitable distribution of appointments to public service positions, sorting out the cost-of-living crisis and the deplorable conditions of life for most Zambians, Hichilema has lamentably failed. In fact, I would go as far as saying that the President has become a clear and present danger to Zambia’s economy, to our democracy, our constitutional order, our nationhood and its 'One Zambia Nation' foundation, and to the lives of ordinary Zambians. Voting Hichilema out of office will be the highest expression of patriotism. As I have previously stated, I am convinced that Hichilema will lose the election on 13 August. The only thing that can save him from defeat is pre-ballot death (of any candidate) or industrial scale vote-rigging. I really hope that we Zambians will never again elect a lying, tribal, corrupt, unpatriotic, vindictive, hypocritical, lawless, and undemocratic scumbag. In addition to his policy failures on major issues of public concern, one reason why Hichilema is losing the election (unless he rigs it on an industrial scale) is because of having extremist supporters, mostly Zambezi supremacists, who dismiss legitimate criticism of his leadership actions as hate speech and consequently enable his continued failure to be receptive to criticism, to reflect on the feedback provided by the governed, and to change for the better. When citizens (be it the Catholic Bishops, opposition parties, civic actors, or ordinary Zambians like me) raise governance concerns, they do so in the spirit of accountable democratic governance. They do not do so because they hate the president as a person, hate his ethnic identity, or hate where he was born. I insist that a better Zambia is possible but we won’t get it if we treat criticism of presidential leadership failure as expression of hate. Unfortunately, even Hichilema himself has embraced this warped thinking that any criticism of his leadership actions is hate speech. This attitude has deprived him of the much needed feedback on his leadership performance and capacity to listen to divergent views, consequently impoverishing his presidency. We must embrace the unfamiliar, eschew haste in passing judgement, and be more tolerant and understanding. These qualities are especially essential to those in public leadership roles. I once raised concern that we seem to have prepared different standards for this president compared to those who came before him. If a leader can only provide five hours of electricity to the people in a day, they have failed. If a leader can only increase the cost of living, they have failed. If a leader…I can go on. In addition to denying the president the benefit of legitimate public feedback on his performance, misconstruing criticism as hate makes it look like the responsibility of holding our public leaders to account falls on those who either love him or hail from the region where the president does not come from. If his supporters and Tongas, Lozis and Zambians from Northwestern Province join in calling out the wrongs of Hichilema, he will no longer play the tribal card of reducing all criticism of his leadership to ethnic hatred. In the uncritical minds of some of the president's supporters, I criticise Hichilema because I hate him! Most of the individuals who hold this view are people who repeatedly criticise me on this platform, even when their criticism is quite often devoid of reason or substance. I do not think those who criticise me do so because they hate me. I think they criticise me, even if I hold no elected public office, simply because they have a different take, different opinions, on things. Why is it so hard to apply the same logic to my criticism of an elected public leader like Hichilema who is accountable to us, the public? I have been providing regular political commentaries on Zambian affairs since 2009. Why was my much stronger criticism of Hichilema's predecessors, namely Rupiah Banda, Michael Sata, and Edgar Lungu, not considered hatred of these individual leaders? In fact, many of the individuals who today accuse me of harbouring hatred for Hichilema were people who were very happy with my much stinging criticism of the leadership failures of his predecessors. When I called Sata a tribalist and undemocratic leader who did not listen to advise, and provided evidence in support of my conclusions, they were happy to cheer me on, even as Sata's supporters said I was bitter and a Hichilema supporter. When I called Lungu a tribalist and corrupt leader, and provided evidence in support of my conclusions, they were happy to cheer me on, even as Lungu's supporters said I was bitter and petitioned the police to arrest me for sedition. Some of Hichilema's supporters, as part of the enjoyment of their exercise of the right to free expression, even insult me, call me names, or outrightly declare that they dislike me. Of course I would prefer content-based discussion, but if the best that anyone's mind can do is to insult me, I will consider their actions as part of the right to free expression. I recognise that people have the right to dislike me, to call me names, to wish me whatever they desire, to feel however they want about me. I have no problem with all this. I do not speak to be liked or secure the validation of anyone. I speak to express myself and I respect the right of other people to do the same. As I have repeatedly stated, free speech is not just for the people or thoughts we like or agree with; it is also for people we despise and opinions that we do not support. The important point is not the position I take on a given issue of public interest. It is the reasoning advanced in support of said position. If I say Hichilema is a lying, tribal, corrupt, unpatriotic, vindictive, hypocritical, lawless, and undemocratic scumbag, what is important is not simply this description; it is the reasons and evidence I have adduced in support of this conclusion. Anyone is welcome to challenge my conclusions or evidence, to say "I disagree with your argument for this and that reason." What I totally reject is the idea that criticism of a president's leadership actions amounts to hate; it does not. If I point out that Hichilema is failing to ensure adequate ethnic diversity in public appointments and provide evidence in support of this assertion, anybody else is welcome to demonstrate weakness in my stated point of view. If I point out that Hichilema is a compulsive liar and provide evidence in support of this assertion, anybody else is welcome to demonstrate weakness in my stated point of view. If I point out that Hichilema’s fight against corruption is a sham and provide evidence in support of this assertion, anybody else is welcome to demonstrate weakness in my stated point of view. If I point out that Hichilema is a compulsive liar and provide evidence in support of this assertion, anybody else is welcome to demonstrate weakness in my stated point of view. If I point out that Hichilema has eroded Zambia’s democracy and provide evidence in support of this assertion, anybody else is welcome to demonstrate weakness in my stated point of view. If I point out that Hichilema has failed to reduce the cost of living, as per his campaign promise, and provide evidence in support of this assertion, anybody else is welcome to demonstrate weakness in my stated point of view. If I point out that Hichilema (working in cohort with his friend Situmbeko Musokotwane) has facilitated the extraction of the country’s mineral wealth by multinational corporations without ensuring sufficient returns in revenue collection for Zambia and provide evidence in support of this assertion, anybody else is welcome to demonstrate weakness in my stated point of view. If I point out that Hichilema has failed to…and provide evidence in support of this assertion, anybody else is welcome to demonstrate weakness in my stated point of view. Simply dismissing my criticism as an expression of my alleged hatred for Hichilema is most unhelpful. Those who do so are depriving me the opportunity to learn what I do not know and Hichilema the opportunity to adjust his leadership style and change for the better. While I do not hesitate to share my opinions on matters of public concern, I also retain the intellectual integrity of one who is willing to abandon their point of view if its weakness can be shown. I have repeatedly stated that I harbour no hatred against Hichilema. What I hate is his bad leadership, whose meaning I have explained in the article below. There is no constitutional democracy in the world that requires citizens to love their elected leaders. Loving individuals is the responsibility of their spouses and family members. Once these individuals step up to hold elective public office, we owe them one thing: accountability or feedback on their performance. No elected public leader or their supporter should burden me or another person with any demand for affirmation or affection. In a functioning democracy, the duty of citizens is to hold their elected leaders to account so that they deliver basic services and do not undermine accountable democratic governance. This is what I have been doing across different administrations, including this one. As early as December 2021, when I analysed Hichilma's first 100 days in office, I raised governance concerns of his leadership in the hope that he could address them so that they do not grow into bigger problems. He did not listen. In 2022, when he was celebrating one year in office, I raised governance concerns of his leadership in the hope that he could address them so that they do not grow into bigger problems. He did not listen. In 2023, I raised governance concerns of his leadership in the hope that he could address them so that they do not grow into bigger problems. He did not listen. In 2024, I raised governance concerns of his leadership in the hope that he could address them so that they do not grow into bigger problems. He did not listen. In fact, as did his predecessor in 2021 in response to my criticism of the abuse of state institutions to fix critics and opponents, the president asked his supporters to report me to the police for alleged hate speech against him! In 2025, I raised governance concerns of his leadership in the hope that he could address them so that they do not grow into bigger problems. He did not listen. This year and for the many reasons that I shared in the interview on the link below, Hichilema is losing the election because he did not listen to criticism that we, as citizens, raised about his performance. He is also losing the election because of his extremist supporters who, in addition to a wilful but harmful failure to hold him to account, dismiss legitimate criticism of his leadership from other people as hate speech. What a pity! What a wasted opportunity! I have just read a story on a ruling party platform casually dismissing Global Witness's report that "Ahead of Zambia's general election...First Quantum Minerals and its associates have been running a decades-long covert influence campaign distorting the copper-rich nation's democracy" and that the Canadian firm has "become his [Hichilema's] largest funder in the upcoming 2026 election after pledging up to $50 million in support." The report adds that "FQM has reaped enormous benefits: major changes to Zambia's tax regime have save the company $771 million between 2022 and 2025, and it has been shielded from legal scrutiny." Rather than interrogating these grave concerns, the publisher, the Zambian Watchdog which is run from State House, is treating the issue so casually when Global Witness, a very credible international outlet, raises serious corruption and governance allegations. In January 2019, I raised questions about Hichilema's relationship with foreign mining firms, but was told by his supporters that I just hate him. Today, we are ere. The net result is that Hichilema, who in opposition politics had positioned himself as the reformist leader Zambia needed to reclaim its democracy, eliminate corruption, unite the country, and set it on the path to economic recovery, has, in power, turned out to be nearly everything he detested about his predecessor and, in some cases, much worse. Under his watch, corruption has thrived on a massive scale, the economy is a shambles, ethnic divisions have worsened, Zambia’s previously principled foreign policy has been shredded into something unrecognisable, and democracy is essentially non-existent. The man who was expected to lead reform has instead transitioned into an aspiring despot. Unless he rigs the election, or eliminates his main rival, Zambians should prepare for a new administration after 13 August. Many voters have reached a point of no return and it is too late for Hichilema to change their mind. A combination of failure to listen and the "you just hate Hichilema" brigade has destroyed his once promising presidency. I see many people expressing surprise at the huge turnout at Brian Mundubile's rallies. What they miss is that the turnout reflects the revulsion against Hichilema rather than genuine support for Brian. Even if Brian was not there, voters would have rallied behind another candidate through which to express their opposition to Hichilema as a result of his major policy failures. As early as 2023, wen I noticed Hichilema's direction of travel, I warned that the greatest opposition that he and the UPND face is a politically alert and informed citizenry, not an opposition party: “The biggest opposition that Hichilema faces is the people, particularly if he fails to lower the cost of living and tackle the huge unemployment outside the health and education sectors. They can stop opposition rallies like Edgar Lungu and the PF tried to do but if Zambians would have decided in a year or two that Hichilema must go at the next election, there is nothing that he can do to stop them....Even if Hichilema tries to, he cannot stop the people’s will. Even if he succeeds in killing the PF and in his manoeuvres to block his main political opponents from running in 2026, another platform and another candidate to serve as the outlet of opposition will be found. The voters will support any visionary patriot they see as better placed to be used as the vehicle for removing Hichilema just like they chose him as the vehicle for removing Lungu. Please tell him”. Hichilema did not listen. Again. This continued failure to listen prompted my conclusion two years later that "Many Zambians may not know yet who they will vote for in the 2026 presidential election, but they already know who they won’t vote for." The truth is that I tried to warn Hichilema in good time and at different points that he was heading in the wrong direction. The President, dripping with arrogance, did not listen. Think of it this way. A bus (representing a political party in power) is transporting passengers (active citizens) from Intercity terminus (2021, being the departure point of where we did not want to be anymore) to Nakonde (2026, being the arrival point of destination before subsequently deciding whether to book the same bus for the return trip). After leaving Intercity, some passengers notice that the bus is heading towards Livingstone (a wrong destination that takes us back to before 2021). A few of us (active citizens) decide to stand up (holding the leader to account) and confront both the driver (the president) and his conductor (Minister of Finance), demanding an explanation for why we are heading to Livingstone when we were promised that we woud be taken to Nakonde. Other passengers, mainly those who came from the ethnic group of the driver and conductor, defended the duo even before it could respond to our concerns. They repeatedly told us that "You just hate the driver. Please sit down!" One or two relatives of the conductor joined in support, saying the "The driver and the conductor are excellent and one of them has even won awards for stellar performance on his duties, including his remarkable capacity to understand direction of travel"! That is how some passengers kept quiet. I kept on talking, especially after we reached Choma in the hope that if we turned atthat point, we woudl not wast more time. I talked because I could not get off the bus at undesigned stations, so the only solution was to appeal to the driver to change course. I explained that it would be an act of extreme irresponsibility on my part as an active passenger to wait until the bus has reached Livingstone before holding the driver to account about the direction of travel. That is why I tried to warn the driver that we were headed in the wrong direction. Unfortunately, other passengers said we should just sit back comfortably, enjoy the ride which included some morsels of food delivered by the bus, and trust the driver because other drivers before him were much worse. In the end, we arrived in Livingstone, our undesired destination. Just when we were arriving, we saw another bus, loading passing from there directly to Nakonde. The driver, upon realising the cost of his failure to listen and the disappointment in the eyes of the passengers, urged everyone to sit down, promising that he would take us to Nakonde if we give him more time. With the exception of those who came from the driver's ethnic group and the auxiliary ones, most passengers, who had shown great faith in his driving skills by paying (voting) the fare for the bus as their mode of transport from Intercity to Nakonde, have left the bus for the other. These include those who had adopted silence during the journey after realising that the driver, aided by the choir mentioned, was not a listening kind. As I write this post, the alternative bus is almost full. The same passengers who accused those of us who, along the way, advised the driver to change course, of harbouring hatred for the driver are now wondering why nearly everyone is leaving the bus we came with for an alternative one that is promising to take us directly to Nakonde. One of the driver's supporters, reiterating the driver's earlier appeal that we should stick to the bus that brought us to Livingstone, just shouted at us a moment ago: "The alternative bus will take you to a wrong destination. Its driver cannot be trusted; just stick to this one because you won't have to pay a new fare". The supporter is overlooking the point that we are already at a wrong destination, the current driver has betrayed our trust, and that we would rather repose our trust in another person. It is not good to remain on a bus, driven by a person who does not listen, out of the fear that an alternative one might be driven by someone who could be worse. Let us try the alternative bus. If its driver takes us to a wrong destination, we will disembark from the bus we are about to jump onto, as we have done before, and find another one until we reach Nakonde. For me and other active passengers, such has been the the current driver's betrayal of our trust that we have reached a point of no return. We cannot trust this driver anymore, especially that when we tried to correct him, no one explained to us why our concerns were unfounded. We were just told that we hate hate the driver or his ethic group or or the province where he comes from. Recently, Dr Lee Habasonda, a lecturer in political science at the University of Zambia, told Reuters (watch the video clip on the link below) that electoral success is a matter of thresholds – of grievances, feelings, frustrations, etc. Lee’s view is that once a certain threshold or tipping point has been reached, "no matter your manifesto, ideology, lies" or whatever those in power do or say, the voters will "decide to change government" because they would have reached a point of no return. Emotionally, many Zambian voters, including some that I know who voted for Hichilema in 2021, have passed that threshold where no matter what Hichilema or UPND does, these voters will reject him. This is because the threshold, or the point of no return, has been reached. As Lee argued, those in power "may say we have already won this election when they campaign but the political coalitions and realignment" suggest otherwise. When the opposition wins next month, we will need to advise them to get non-sycophants at State House and in the critical posts in the civil service. It is important that they understand that unless there is a clear shift away from the harmful culture we have raised concerns about, we will be compelled to challenge them with the same resolve we previously applied to both the PF and UPND governments. On my part, I promise that I will always be on the side of the people. You will not find me in government even after the election. Once Hichilema is out of office, I will leave him alone and my attention will shift to holding to account the next set of public leaders. As I made clear in 2021, I am content serving as an academic and I will work, as part of my civic duty, to hold the new Government to account as I did with previous Governments. I am not available for or interested in any form of government job. For now, Iet me continue listening to the attached song. Chalo chesu.](https://image.24vids.com/tw-2078449842368483816/amplify_video_thumb/2078427007344427008/img/tCO3n_fY3sOVQlej.jpg)
![Clive Lewis's Water Bill - bringing water back to the people 💯 Please watch, listen or read this transcript. Because this is the sort of leadership Labour needs 👏 Clive Lewis MP He even calls for PR 👏 Clive Lewis (Norwich South) (Lab) Margaret Thatcher’s revolution tore up the rulebook on political and economic management. She rewrote it with a single unwavering principle: that the pursuit of profit would serve the public good, even when it came to vital public services—even when it came to water. We often say that society stands on the shoulders of giants, but giants cast long shadows, and Thatcherism’s shadow looms dark over our water system today. Whether we see ourselves standing on her shoulders or trapped in her shadow, one thing is undeniable: she proved that the world can be made differently. And if it can be made differently once, it can be made differently again. That, as the brilliant anthropologist David Graeber understood, is the hidden truth of the world. It is something we create and can choose to create anew. We can do it better. Today, I want to show this House and this country that water is the lens through which we can imagine something better—a better way of running our economy, a better way of safeguarding our environment and a better way of empowering the public, for whom democracy supposedly exists. But that requires something very difficult: it requires us to break free from the constraints of our imagination and to let go of the idea that this economic model is all there is or all there ever could be. It saddens me to say that the Government’s Water (Special Measures) Act 2025 perfectly exemplifies this failure of imagination. One of its leading proponents has a particular rhetorical flourish they love to use when dismissing calls for public ownership of water. They say, “I’m more interested in the purity of our water than the purity of our ideology.” I love that quote. I love it because it lays bare just how deeply the ideology of privatisation, and all that goes with it, has embedded itself. So entrenched is it within our collective consciousness that we no longer recognise it as an ideology. We no longer see it for what it is: a systemic exploitation of a common resource for private gain. Instead, it has simply become the natural order of things. But how much longer can this go on? Since the crash of 2008, this ideology has been faltering under the weight of its own contradictions, yet its grip on British politics remains vice-like. Austerity, exploitation and corporate price gouging are still treated not as choices but as inevitabilities. Why? Because too many politicians on both sides of the House refuse to contemplate alternatives. For those on the other side of the House—on the Opposition Benches—I get it: this is their ideology. They are defending their class, and I would imagine they would go further still if they could. But on this side of the House, we have no excuse. We should be standing up for our class: working-class people—the public. Instead, we wrap their ideology in the language of fiscal responsibility, economic prudence and stewardship of the economy. But it is not fiscal responsibility when we balance the books on broken backs. It is not stewardship when the ship has been sold off and the crew left to drown. It is not prudence. It is power maintenance. Neil Coyle (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (Lab) I hope the engineers can check that the microphones and speakers are working while I ask a quick question. My hon. Friend mentions Members on this side of the House. There are far more of us on this side since July last year than there were in 2019, with a very different approach taken in our manifestos. Does he fear that the shift in tone he is suggesting is one of the reasons that we did so badly in 2019 but so well last year? Clive Lewis No, I do not. We have a distorted electoral system. Bring on proportional representation, because if we had PR, we would have had a different Government in 2019 and most definitely in 2017. Sometimes politicians have to do what they believe to be right and lead from the front. I think we should lead from the front. Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Ind) I compliment the hon. Member on his Bill. To help his argument, there was overwhelming opinion poll support for public ownership of water in 2017 and 2019, and there still is today. Clive Lewis I thank the right hon. Member for his point. I will come on to this later, and I hope other Members will pick up on it, but the fact that the public are way ahead of this House on the issue of public ownership is one of the reasons why so many people are losing faith in the two-party political system. One only has to look at some political parties whose Members are not in their place—at the Reform party, for example, which has a policy of public ownership of water. Yes, its Members will privatise the NHS, but they understand how popular this is, and they are ahead of the curve—they are ahead of us on this side. Neil Coyle Really? Clive Lewis On the issue of water, yes, I would say they are, because whether I like it or not, Reform has a policy for water to be owned 50% by pension companies and 50% by the public. As much as it grieves me to say it, that is a policy of public ownership. They are populist; they are listening to a popular voice. Mr James Frith (Bury North) (Lab) Will my hon. Friend give way? Clive Lewis I will make some progress and then give way, and I will also try to keep the volume down a little bit. This is about the maintenance of a political and economic model that was never built to serve the public—a model designed to shield the wealth of asset holders, landlords, shareholders, corporations and, yes, privatised water companies. But here is the great irony: the very greed, recklessness and contempt of the water industry—its excesses—have cracked open the door, and through that crack, we glimpse an opportunity. It is an opportunity to shatter the myth of privatisation’s inevitability, to break free from the narrow, self-imposed rules that have caged our Government’s economic choices, to expose its failures, to challenge its dominance and, above all, to show this country that there is an alternative—an alternative that is democratic, sustainable and run in the interests of the many, not the few. We can do it better. Mr Frith My hon. Friend is making a typically impassioned speech. He says the general public are ahead of us. Where might that same public be when faced with the bill for bringing in the nationalisation he is clearly wedded to? Furthermore, in the event that we do not have to buy the water industry but seize it, the implications of that seizure will cause an economic collapse. At what point will he take responsibility for either of those scenarios when confronting a public who are, he says, ahead of us on this issue? Clive Lewis I will obviously come to many of those points later in my speech, but let me make this point now: I do not believe in nationalisation, and this Bill has nothing to do with nationalisation. This is about giving the public a say over their water. It is about governance, standards and democracy. Mr Frith Will my hon. Friend give way? Clive Lewis No, my hon. Friend has made his point. Mr Frith On this point? Clive Lewis No, I am going to carry on and make some progress. You made your point. Let the public— Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani) Order. Mr Lewis, I do not believe I was making a point at all. Clive Lewis My apologies, Madam Deputy Speaker; I should have said that my hon. Friend made his point. The clock is ticking. The climate crisis is no longer a distant warning. It is our lived reality. Rising droughts, creeping desertification, depleted aquifers, wildfires, systemic collapse—these are no longer projections; they are the forecast turned fact. Preparing for this future and adapting to what is now inevitable has never been more urgent. The evidence is sobering. The UK’s water resources are under mounting pressure and not just from the climate emergency, but from rising demand and population growth. Experts now project that England could face significant water supply deficits as early as 2034 unless we act decisively. That is not a distant horizon; it is a little over a decade away. But while the threat has grown, our resilience has shrunk, because while the climate crisis has intensified, our water infrastructure has stood still, or, worse, been sold off, hollowed out and left to rot. In the 35 years before privatisation almost 100 reservoirs were built; in the 35 years since privatisation, not one major English reservoir has been built. But it gets worse, because in that same period private water companies have sold off 25 reservoirs without replacing one. Instead of investing in resilience, they have extracted value: £72 billion paid out in dividends while pipes leak, rivers choke, and the public pays the price. My hon. Friend the Member for Bury North (Mr Frith) asks how we can afford it; how can we not afford it? That is not mismanagement; it is a betrayal. If scientists tell us the climate crisis is an existential threat to humanity and to this country— Grahame Morris (Easington) (Lab) Will my hon. Friend give way? Clive Lewis One second. If scientists tell us the climate crisis is an existential threat to humanity and to this country, we must treat it as such: an existential conflict. In that context, the actions of these companies—selling off reservoirs, failing to invest, polluting our water—are not just negligent; they are acts that actively undermine our national water security. In any other existential crisis, we might call that what it is: sabotage. And in a time of national peril, sabotage has another name: treason. Let me explain why this matters to me personally. When I served on tour in Afghanistan back in 2009—not in a boy band—I experienced something utterly alien to me: the gnawing fear of thirst; not the mild irritation of forgetting a water bottle, but the deep physical worry that there may not be enough clean water to get through the day. In Britain, we have been blessed: water falls from the sky; it fills our rivers, it soaks our fields, and we joke about it—it is part of who we are. But in Afghanistan there was no humour; only heat, dust and desperation. There I saw children trekking miles through the desert, not for food, not for money, but to beg for clean bottled water. Once we have seen that, and once we have felt that fear, we can never take water for granted again. We never again believe it is something we can waste or pollute or privatise without consequence. That is why I have brought forward this Bill: because anger is not enough; outrage, no matter how justified, will not fix the pipes, stop the sewage or fill the reservoirs. We need a plan. We need a strategy. We need a future. We can do it better. My Water Bill delivers that. It sets out the high standards our country deserves and the democratic governance our water system desperately needs. First, it establishes clear, ambitious targets to stop the sewage in our rivers and on our beaches, to restore our water to high ecological and chemical standards, and to deliver universal, affordable access to water as a basic human right—a right we have never had before in this country. It demands a system designed not just to extract profit but to adapt, to build resilience in the face of climate change, and to harness nature-based solutions that work with the environment, not against it. Secondly, it transforms governance. The Bill introduces representation for workers and local communities on the boards of water companies. It gives voting rights to employees and customers, so that those who use and maintain a system have a real say in how it is run. Water is not a commodity but a common good, and those who depend on it and pay for it should help govern it. Thirdly, the Bill lays the foundations for a democratic future. It establishes a commission on water ownership to advise the Secretary of State on long-term strategy, looking at international best practice, especially in OECD countries, where public water ownership is the norm, not the exception. Crucially, it creates a citizens assembly on water ownership to bring the public into the process, to deliberate, debate and decide how we can govern this most precious of resources. The public care, but how do I know that? I know because a small fraction of them are in the Public Gallery today, having travelled here from all over the country; I know because of the thousands of emails that have been sent to MPs across the House; and I know because those people will never stop campaigning until this injustice is resolved. They know that we can protect something not by selling it off, but by standing up for it, involving people in its care and ensuring that it serves the public, today, tomorrow and for generations to come. My Bill offers a pathway out of crisis. It offers control, resilience and democracy. It is not just about cleaning up our rivers, but about cleaning up the system that allowed them to be polluted in the first place. Privatisation is not just a problem—it is the problem. We can do it better. I can hear some people on the Labour Benches thinking, “But we have just passed”— Dawn Butler (Brent East) (Lab) You can hear thinking? Clive Lewis I can now—for my next trick, I can hear thinking! I can hear them thinking, “But we have just passed the Water (Special Measures) Act 2025, Clive, so what are you talking about?” Yes, we have, but I am afraid to say it has been watered down—[Interruption.] Sorry, I had to get that one in—it was all going so well. The Act does not live up to what was promised, it does not deliver what is needed, and it certainly does not live up to its name. Do not get me wrong: it is a start. Grahame Morris I congratulate my good and hon. Friend on making an excellent speech and on advocating for public ownership of water and the opportunity to make things better. Does he agree that the mismanagement of the water companies under privatisation is a huge indictment of the whole principle? In my area, bills are way above inflation and huge dividends are being paid by borrowing money. At the very least, should our Government not be looking at stopping the payment of bonuses and share dividends while sewage pollution continues, and we have appalling mismanagement of the industry? Clive Lewis I thank my hon. Friend for his question. I agree with him wholeheartedly and I am just about to come to that point in relation to what the Water (Special Measures) Act does and does not do. It addresses some of those points, but as we have already discussed, privatisation is not just a problem, but the problem, and it is a big part of why so much has gone wrong. Unfortunately, the Water (Special Measures) Act does not live up to what was promised or what is needed, and it certainly does not live up to its name. However, it is a start, and I praise my colleagues on the Front Bench, including the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice (Emma Hardy), who has done so much work in this area. Unfortunately, the Act is not a solution. Remarkably, my Government’s Water (Special Measures) Act does not even define what clean water means. There are no standards or targets—just vague intentions handed over once again to a regulatory system that has already failed us and to the companies that caused the mess in the first place. It says nothing about better governance, and absolutely nothing about the big, fat, humongous elephant in the room: who owns our water? If we do not deal with ownership, we cannot deal with accountability. If we cannot deal with accountability, we can forget clean water. No—we must go further on clean water standards, corporate accountability and what happens when companies fail. Noah Law (St Austell and Newquay) (Lab) Does my hon. and gallant Friend accept that there is increased accountability in the Water (Special Measures) Act through the fact that many companies in the industry are now rewriting their articles of association to ensure that they are accountable not just to shareholders, but to the customers and users of water? Clive Lewis After 35 years of abject failure, it is too little, too late. My Bill would put the final nail in the coffin of this sorry chapter of our country’s water and water system. Neil Coyle Sticking with the puns, I commend my hon. Friend on his gallons of passion; he is always making waves. He criticises the Government’s legislation, which is obviously not yet in effect, but does he think that the Cunliffe commission will go any way towards addressing some of the concerns he has outlined? Clive Lewis Unfortunately, I do not, because again the elephant in the room—who owns our water—has been ruled out of the Cunliffe commission’s operational process. It cannot actually look at that issue. I have no issue with Sir Jon Cunliffe, but let us not forget that he originates from the Treasury—he probably has Treasury brain. That economic orthodoxy is part of the reason why we are in the place that we are. I do not have so much confidence in the Cunliffe commission, but I do have far more confidence in the People’s Commission on the Water Sector, which is being run by academics and which will report at the same time. I will be very interested to hear what it says. Neil Coyle Will my hon. Friend give way? Clive Lewis Those are the reasons why I have brought forward this Bill. The Government’s Act does none of those things, but my Bill does. Take just one example— Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani) Order. I believe Mr Lewis probably cannot hear interventions, because he is so loud himself. Members should intervene loudly if they wish to intervene. Clive Lewis I did hear the intervention, but I wanted to make some progress. Take this one example. Under this Bill, if a water company breaches the terms of its licence with a major sewage discharge, it can forget shareholder payout and piling on more debt. If it does it twice, it is in the last chance saloon. After three strikes, it is out—licence terminated and on its bike—and those price-gouging, asset-stripping, river-killing vulture capitalist outfits will be rolled into the sunset without a penny in compensation. What about those water infrastructure assets that they have been sweating for private gain? They go back into the public realm, thank you very much. If they start whining about debts, do not worry: we will do a full audit of what they invested, what they racked up in debt, what they paid out in dividends and what they stuffed into bloated executive pay packets. I will tell you this, Madam Deputy Speaker: I am yet to see a single privatised English water company walk away with anything other than a well-earned spanking and a sharp haircut for its creditors. Those assets will belong to the public once again, and we will not pay a penny more than they are worth. I can hear people thinking, “Where will the money come from? How will you invest in publicly owned water without the private sector?” I will tell them where it has not come from in these past 35 years—I am mind-reading again. Mark Ferguson (Gateshead Central and Whickham) (Lab) Will my hon. Friend give way? Clive Lewis I will just make some progress, and then I will give way. I am on a roll. Let me tell the House where the money has not come from for these past 35 years. It has not come from private shareholders or long-term thinking, and it certainly has not come from some mythical well of benevolent capitalism. The private companies have put in less than nothing; in fact, they have racked up more than £60 billion in debt. Thames Water has paid more than £7.2 billion in dividends since privatisation, and is now £15.2 billion in debt and counting—work that out. Now, it is trying to plug the hole with a £3 billion emergency loan that will cost 10% in annual interest. That is more than half a billion pounds a year, just for interest payments, courtesy of our bills. That money will not build a reservoir, fix a pipe or clean a river, but it will keep a rotten system afloat for a little longer. Noah Law My hon. and gallant Friend makes an impassioned case for public ownership—something that, in the right context, I am sure Members on all sides of the House can celebrate. On the point about the cost of financing to the public, though, does he agree that while there are some serious indiscretions in parts of the industry, such as in Thames Water’s case, this conversation about the appropriate financing model would be better entertained at a time when the cost of capital in the private water industry was not lower than the cost of public sector borrowing, on which, of course, we are in a very difficult situation? Clive Lewis The cheapest borrowing in the country, without a doubt, is public sector borrowing. The private water industry, which has had 35 years to sort this mess out, is not going to find investment. It is up to its eyeballs in debt. It is relying on a 50% increase in our bills by 2030, if we include inflation, and that is in the middle of a cost of living crisis. How can we justify that? The answer is that we cannot. Mr Frith The day after the seizure of public assets that my hon. Friend is describing, billions and billions of pounds of debt will come with it. What does he propose to do with that debt, other than refinancing, which is exactly where we are at now with the industry requirement to refinance the debt to try to keep bills down? Instead, he is advocating that the public purse take on that private debt. Clive Lewis At the beginning of my now seemingly rather long speech, I think I referred to a failure of imagination. Ask what Margaret Thatcher would have done when she was faced with similar problems. She would have fought her way through it. She changed the very fabric of our economy, our democracy and our politics, and she made it work. We can do the same, because the public are behind us. They want this to work. Mr Frith rose— Mark Ferguson rose— Clive Lewis I will make some progress. Let us recap, because I do not want to go on too long; I want to conclude, if I can. That money from Thames Water—that half a billion pounds in interest payments—will keep a rotten system afloat for just a little longer. The myth of privatisation is that the private sector will act in the long-term interests of the British public because it wants to turn a profit. That is preposterous, as is proven by the state of our water, and exhibit A is Thames Water. We can now turn to the question of where the investment will come from. Under public ownership, it will come from the only place it ever should have—from us, the public—and every penny of it will go back into the system. It will go into the pipes, the rivers, the seas we swim in and the water we drink. There will be a direct relationship between what we pay and what we get, with no offshore dividends, no bloated bonuses and no debt-laden shell games—just clean, accountable, democratic water. When I was in Afghanistan, every soldier had one critical duty: to stay hydrated. To dehydrate was considered a military offence, because it put the soldier and their team at risk. If someone ran out of water, we did not debate markets or metrics; we shared what we had. We had each other’s backs. As the desert-dwelling Fremen in James Herbert’s novel “Dune” believed: “A man’s flesh is his own; the water belongs to the tribe”. It is time our water returned to the tribe, to the people, to the public. We can do better; we must, and with this Bill, we will. I commend it to the House.](https://image.24vids.com/tw-1905614329543532962/amplify_video_thumb/1905612252947865600/img/4N7RnIbeKkSuIXsR.jpg)
![If you want to understand the Joe FlipperHead, Olivia Lamb, Karen Read and Aidan TurtleBoy Kearney chaos; FlipperHead (a guy named Nick from Philly) got confirmation Aidan recorded Karen Read. Then the recordings leaked. Basically, Olivia works for Aidan as a paralegal, now, but Olivia used to be close to Karen in the past (and Olivia and FlipperHead used to be close, as well, on a personal level). FlipperHead, for his part, is loyal to Olivia and Karen but FlipperHead doesn't like Aidan (much like other people close to Karen). Aidan, in turn, seems to be using Olivia to discredit Flipperhead (potentially without Olivia's permission). VIDEO TRANSCRIPT: [Opening remarks on social media and focus] Grant: [Lindsey Gaetani's] been talking about on social media, but let's get to that second. What I wanna start with—let me find the tab—I wanna start with the developments related to Aidan Kearney and Karen Read, okay? So we're gonna jump right into that, and what I have here is the actual discussion. Now, if you go on my X, you will be able to see the entire transcript. I'm gonna try to scroll with you as the video plays. It's a lot, okay? And then we're gonna do part two as well. So eventually, we're gonna hit part two of the transcript. I'm gonna pause, and we're gonna go to the second video. Now, this discussion—the reason why I wanna go over this—is I was listening to it, and I was like, "Wait a minute, I speak this language that they're all talking. I understand sort of the subtext of all of this, but they weren't really talking on the surface." It's a conversation between somebody named Chris, who Aidan Kearney calls a "koala," somebody named Joe Flipperhead—who's actually named Nick from Philadelphia, who was apparently close to a woman named Olivia Lamb, who is gonna come up in this as well. Now, Olivia Lamb did a lot of social media posts about the Karen Read and John O'Keefe trial on her profile on Twitter under Olivia. Now, then Olivia started—in a public announcement—saying that she started working for Aidan Kearney. And what you're gonna hear in this conversation is there's also a woman named—who else? There's a woman who's Australian that Aidan also knows named Lily. She introduces herself in the beginning, and then she's kind of the moderator-mediator. And then there's another woman that pops up in the middle named Erika Walsh. She only speaks two or three times. She's one of Turtle Boy's moderators. She interjects at two random times: one, when someone starts talking about Meredith; and two, when Aidan starts saying how bad the content of the conversation in question—that was allegedly recorded and sent to Karen Read, between Aidan and Karen—is for Karen. And then there's a third unknown voice that pops up at the end, who sounds like—it's a female, she's American. I don't know her voice, but it sounds like she's very close to Joe Flipperhead, this guy Nick. And she uses this phrase about Nick "leaving Olivia's ass" in a way that makes me think maybe this girl is close to Nick, and like, she got close to him after Olivia and Nick separated. Now you might say to yourself, "Oh dear God, why—first of all, Grant, why do you know all this?" These people post a lot; I don't know. Tracking this thing is something I've been doing for a while. So it's not like I went into it because I wanted to know who the hell Joe Flipperhead was, or Olivia Lamb was. They entered into a world that I knew a lot about because they were trying to cover this case. And so inevitably, I just had them on my radar, and when things pop up like this, I just connect the dots. [Background on Olivia Lamb] In terms of Olivia though—so she, I don't know. There was this weird situation, I think, at the end of trial one for Karen Read. So somewhere in—I don't know—late 2024, summer 2024 or so. Weird situation where Olivia kind of then, for a few months, wasn't around as much, or she was, but not as much. And then she came back around for Aidan and said she was working on his team or something. Now, Olivia—I don't think Olivia Lamb's necessarily a bad person. I think whoever she is, and whatever she's doing, is very intelligent. But if you kind of look into that family, her mom is named Christina Lamb, and her mom does boutique consulting for law firms. I think her mom might be a lawyer, but she doesn't really—I think the way that she does consulting is more like tactically how lawyers should think about how a case is presented in the public, et cetera, stuff like that. And you have to tie this into this Elizabeth Dombrowski person out of New York that runs this Good Counsel Legal Services that proclaimed that Jen Altman and whoever else were paralegals for Aidan. You see what I'm saying? And what I think Olivia's role is—I think she just does PR. She does some paralegal work clearly, but I think she's mostly like a PR specialist. But I think why there's so much obfuscation—and I'm giving you all this background, because the conversation you're about to hear makes no sense if you don't know all this background. The context there, I think, is that—I think Olivia is a person. Like, I think she is real. But I think the reason why there's so many smoke and mirrors is that she's a conduit for implausible deniability. In the world of public relations—especially this kind of public relations—is incredibly important. So I think she's like a conduit for more entrenched public relations interests, which—okay, fine. I don't see that as per se evil. I'm a critical theorist. So I study propaganda. So like, if you are doing anything that emerged from Edward Bernays's systemic weaponization of his uncle Sigmund Freud's study of the mass psychology of the mind—if you do any of that—you're inevitably gonna catch my attention. Not because I necessarily per se think it's evil, but because that's my wheelhouse. Like, I reconstruct public relations and then I figure out what's driving that. Okay. So she—Olivia—got on my radar because of that, not necessarily because she's evil. Same, because I never really saw it. Now maybe some of the witnesses in the trial would think differently, but that's not my role here. I am like—I'm an objective observer. And um, Olivia was never really cruel. Like she just does PR. So I wouldn't necessarily say like everything she did was like right. But if you look at her style, it's not polemical. It's not—it's mostly analytical. Okay. So that's not an aphoristic or manipulative or evil person really. That's a PR specialist. And this guy, Nick—very similar, Joe Flipperhead. Okay. If you look at his posts—like, I wouldn't exactly say he's a cruel human being, you know, like he memes and stuff. Okay. He's kind of like Dave Cullinane a little bit, but he's just like a human. And you can hear it in this conversation. Like Joe is the one who's really holding Aidan accountable. Joe Flipperhead—whose name is Nick—he's from Philly. And um, I noticed 'cause I watched the stream of them one time—I don't know—he seems all right. I don't have anything against him or Olivia. In fact, I think they did a damn good job, at least Joe. Because what you'll also see here is there's another subtext. What this conversation is about is an allegation that Aidan Kearney sent a recorded conversation to Karen Read—a conversation with her—and then someone—nobody knows who—sent the recording to Karen's lawyers, David Yannetti and Alan Jackson. Now, what's weird about this is that there's also—and I don't like, whatever, I guess it is what it is—but the host, one of the hosts, Chris, this Australian guy—he might be a New Zealander, I don't know. But anyway, he starts saying directly to Aidan, "Listen Aidan, you went to lunch with Meredith—this Turtle Boy's former girlfriend—but her name is Meredith O'Neill (Meredith O). She's a person; she has an existence outside of Aidan Kearney and whether—a lot of people, I think, rightfully so, will take issue with some of the things Meredith has posted. But that's for her soul to deal with. She has to reckon with it, reflect on it, whatever the fuck, okay? That's separate from; she exists outside of the fact that she used to date Aidan Kearney." And I just wanna make that as a blanket point that like Aidan Kearney does not own someone's soul because they had some connection to him at any point in time. These people are independent people who have their own lives. So Meredith O'Neill is her name. And Meredith—like, clearly something happened between Aidan and Meredith because over the past few weeks—like, first of all, there's some more subtext to this, which is Aidan's paralegal team before Olivia Lamb came on was Courtney Healy and this woman named Tina Murray. Tina Murray —I didn't even know THE NAME until two weeks ago—but I had seen her before because she had silver hair when she was in court one time. I had no idea who it was, but she was sitting next to Courtney Healy. Now, way back when Aidan Kearney was incarcerated in late 2023, early 2024—apparently these two women, Courtney Healy and Tina Murray, were very close to Aidan Kearney. Someone had his logins, allegedly. They were helping like post for him while he was in jail, et cetera. Now, there's time back to that as well. Jen Altman is a key figure in all of this. And the reason why is that Jen Altman was the reason that Aidan Kearney and Karen Read got hooked up initially through Natalie Wiweke-Bershneider or whatever her name is. Jen Altman was also among this weird group of people. It was Tina Murray, Courtney Healy, Jen Altman, I think, and maybe just them three, who had access to Aidan in jail on a paralegal list. And at one point, Tim Bradl, Aidan's lawyer, wrote down that Jen Altman was a lawyer. She got so mad that she messaged Bradl, and then those messages got leaked. So there's all this discontent brewing within Aidan Kearney's kind of like organization, if you wanna call it. I'd call it more like a—yeah, it's like a hierarchy. And like he's at the—it's like a politician almost, but he's not a politician. You have like a top person at the top, and then you have all these staffers, and you have to manage the staffers. That's what he's dealing with. And he's gotta keep everybody like in line because like at one person breaks—especially a key—all right, two things. One, there's a reason you compartmentalize information, and you're not gonna be able to get in these type of operations because nobody needs to know everything. If you did that, then everyone would be a weak link. The problem is though, in order to compartmentalize in a bureaucracy or a schema like this, you have to have some people who actually know what's going on. Those people are liabilities. They're weak links. If you have someone who is too close and they know how you compartmentalized information, they'll see the full picture. They're the weak link. That's Courtney Healy, Tina Murray, Jen Altman, Meredith, Lindsey a little bit. These people are the weak links for Aidan because they see the full picture, whether they are aligned with him, don't like him, etc. etc. It's just they're the biggest weaknesses for him because they see the full picture. That's why he tries to either control them—in my opinion—or destroy them. But Aidan's in a real tough spot here because you can't run that playbook on Karen Read. Clearly, these people are incredibly loyal to her. Flipperhead, Olivia, etc. They may have been helping Aidan, but they're incredibly loyal to Karen. Now, what I've always suspected is that the whole point of charging Aidan Kearney was—one, he did bad things to the witnesses in the retrial, Lindsey Gaetani. He did bad things allegedly. Okay, the grand jury indicted him. But I think Brian Tully and the MSP unit that investigated Aidan—they were more interested in two different goals. Okay, they had parallel objectives beyond just the criminal proceeding. One: get information about who the target of the federal probe was after August of 2023. And it was Tully's unit and Matthew Farwell related to the Sandra Birchmore murder coverup. Number two: I think Tully wanted—and Kate Peter and Marty Keach wanted—Aidan Kearney and Michael Morrissey wanted Aidan Kearney to flip on Karen Read. It was a pressure tactic. It was always just a pressure tactic. That's what I fully believe. Now, I'm not saying he didn't do bad things. I just believe in the mind of the DA—these people were using pressure tactics to get Aidan Kearney in a tactical position where he would flip. Why do I think this? Well, a few things. One: in the fall of 2023, between like August and November, Aidan Kearney didn't need an intermediary with Karen Read. Natalie was out of the picture, although I'm suspect, because there's this new text from Natalie from August saying that like she was still loyal to Karen Read—although ostensibly they had a falling out in June of 2023 because Natalie called Karen late at night and she was upset about it. I always thought that was BS. Now I know why it was BS because there's also a March 24 message about like Joe Warren and Natalie wanting to go to court. I just have this suspicion that Natalie was never really like against Karen. What Natalie was doing was using Turtle Boy as leverage with Karen's permission—using it's called a limited hangout. Limited information about Turtle Boy's culpability for witness intimidation to the MSP so that the MSP would trust Natalie—so that Natalie could relay information back to Karen about the ongoing investigation of Karen and Aidan for conspiracy under 2747 and witness intimidation under 26813B. Now they did try to eventually indict Karen on that in March of 2024 at No True Bill, but they can do it again. They got more evidence—the state in May of 2024 about Aidan saying in Facebook messages that one Karen told him not to go to Lindsey Gaetani's apartment on December 23rd, 2023, and then some other stuff—basically where Aidan was implying that someone told him to run Jen McCabe's license plates. Who would that be? Karen Read. He didn't say it but he implied it to Jenna Rocco and Amy D'Angelis and whoever else was in that internal chat that got leaked. So I really believe that the reason why Aidan Kearney was such a liability to Karen Read—and why she was saying it out loud—is that Karen Read always saw Aidan Kearney as vulnerable to flip. Why? Because Brian Tully did his homework—whatever his motives were—and he found a few things. And I think that him and Kate Peter profiled Aidan Kearney. That's why Kate Peter had some role in this—because they thought Kate Peter should really like Aidan in a lot of ways because he used to be colleagues. Two: I think the state police thought she saw his psyche—Aidan's psyche—and could help them profile him. Three: I think Kate Peter is very hard into the world, and Tully and those other people in the unit could say like, "Yeah, we're worried about Birchmore; we got to do damage control here. Nothing's really wrong with the O'Keefe death investigation," and just—they're going to find out about Birchmore—and Kate would go along with it. That's my opinion. But Tully gets this video of Aidan that he had sent to Lindsey—and it's out there on the internet. I don't want to play the content; it's sad. But this is why I think this is what was in the prosecutor's mind when they were going—and the MSP's mind—when they were going after Kearney. Yes, he did bad things—especially to people that knew the DA and Tully like McCabe, Jen McCabe, etc. But also Aidan was an Achilles heel for Karen. Think about MSP, right? And the way we're analyzing Aidan's weaknesses via weak links in the compartmentalization chain. Okay, flip it around and think about MSP thinking about Karen. What's a weak link in her compartmentalization chain? Aidan Kearney. Now, in that regard, Aidan Kearney—if he flips on Karen Read—guarantees a conviction for Karen Read for the state, even if they can't get her on John's death. It was a backup plan. Second to that, I think though—it's a dynamic situation—and that something must have fucking happened recently. Okay, and I've long thought—and we'll read Lindsey's post on this later because she was talking about it on Twitter overnight, and I was reading it this morning, and it made me think about this—I've long suspected that Kate Peter made a deal with Aidan Kearney in the past like 6-8 months. And the deal was involving the Norfolk DA and the people prosecuting Kearney, and the goal was to get Kearney to flip. And I also think Kate wants Kearney in the Netflix documentary that she's working on with Gretchen and Sandpaper—which, they don't really understand. Like, bro, you think you're getting my footage and me if you're going to enable Kate Peter and try to portray her as the Charlotte of the internet? What planet are you on? No. No, the answer is no. But anyway, I really believe that this deal was made because why else—and I think Karen found out about it—because why else would Karen—[we're going to—the conversation is going to clarify all this]—why else would Karen on Friday authorize Joe Flipperhead to release information that confirms that Aidan recorded Karen. Now, why Karen is not going to do this if she didn't hear the fucking recording? She's not a moron. She's a tactical genius. I'm telling you—I don't necessarily agree with all the things she's done. I personally think she's responsible for John's death, but like—she's a fucking tactical genius. And you have to understand in some sense—like she wouldn't do this unless it's real. Like someone sent her that recording, and I don't believe Aidan Kearney sent it to intermediaries because if Meredith is the closest person to him—or was—in the world, and he's going to lunch with her and will only play it for her allegedly—okay, there's no way in hell that he would just send it to people. I believe—whether through a fake account or otherwise—Aidan Kearney sent that to Karen's lawyers. That's just my opinion. I think there's strong reason for him to do it. It's a message. Okay. As a result, I think Karen Read doing this had to sense that this was the moment—like this was the moment where the decision was going to be made about whether or not he cooperated. And now is Aidan's kind of like signal flare that I'm thinking—from Karen Read's perspective—Aidan sending that recording to Jackson and Yannetti is a signal flare that if she doesn't act now, he's making the choice to flip on her. Okay, well, what did she just do? She in essence just put him in the worst position possible because he had to be able to—him and Kate Peter—had to sell the narrative in public that—and this is why I was on Lindsey's profile earlier. Let me see if I can bring that up—him and Kate Peter had to sell the narrative in public that Karen was worse than Aidan Kearney. All right, so let's take a look at Lindsey Gaetani's post here. Let's read this first and then let's look at the post from Kate Peter. So Kate Peter post last night: "Karen Read has killed a man before and to my knowledge, Aidan Kearney has yet to do anything like that. Take that as you will. Regardless, they're both giant DBAGs, but you can decide who is worse. My vote is Karen Read." That's Kate Peter—one of the closest people in the world right now to Brian Tully, Michael Morrissey, and the decision makers who were initially prosecuting Kearney—telling you in plain sight what's going on. So let's read Lindsey's post: "Yes, we already know a deal was made a long time ago. How cute of Kate trying to win over the turtle riders after she pretended she was still trying to put him in jail the past several months. Does anyone of the turtle riders know who Christine Gagne is? I have no idea who that is. Does anyone know who that is? That's the woman Kate Peter blamed for wiretapping charges with TB and the person she blamed when I asked her where her deleted Google Drive went with the state's evidence. Why would Kate blame this woman for deleting evidence when this woman's name was never mentioned during the grand jury or in a single email or police report? Interesting." Well, wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. So we know Kate Peter was providing evidence to the grand jury. We know that from the recently released court documents and discovery in the Kearney criminal case. Why was—why is Kate Peter blaming someone? Who is Christine Gagne, who—why is Kate blaming her when Kate was the one who was—there's evidence that Kate was directly providing this material to Tully, who was taking it to the grand jury. And by the way, I want people to understand: my anger here is not because Aidan Kearney was prosecuted. I think he should be held accountable. My anger here is because the people prosecuting him had ulterior motives. Lindsey Gaetani didn't have an ulterior motive. She was victimized. She was an unwitting pawn in this proxy war between Karen and the DOJ—Karen and the DOJ and Aidan on one side, and the Norfolk DA and the MSP unit on the other. But instead of trying to prosecute Aidan, it was all tactical. And nobody was told—that's the worst part. And that's why I'm so upset about all of this, because it was a disgrace. It was a disgrace to the process. If you're going to hold someone accountable, do it. You don't use it as leverage to get someone else. And if you're going to do that, be open with the people who are victimized. Otherwise, you are going to build resentment. Why would you ever want to be in a situation where you have to handle a victim? Because if they were made aware of what was actually going on, they would be upset. That is a very prime example—on its face example—that something is very wrong. Not because Aidan Kearney is absolved of liability or because I think he did nothing wrong. Absolutely not. No. Other way around. But because that kind of behavior—given impunity basically, because there's a larger fish—it's an abuse of prosecutorial discretion, not because the prosecution exists. In my opinion, a grand jury indicted him; he should be prosecuted. That's what happens when indictments get handed up. But because the aim of the prosecution was not to seek justice—it was to get—it was to pressure Kearney to flip on Karen Read. [Transition to the conversation] Now, to bring this all back—because we got to go—I want to look at this conversation here. I want to actually listen to this chat a minute. I'm going to explicate; I'm going to try to tell you what happens. "Hi, Bunny Towel. Hi, Christina. No haircut. But guess if you want to send donations—today's a good day for that. We got to get Towel to the end of the month. Towel's not going to be able to move very much for the next few days. So I could use some food if you want to send me some gift cards. I just need some help. All right. I'm a little towel. I got a lot going on. And anyway, so I'll—I'm sitting in my chair. That's as much as I can do right now. I can talk; my brain works. I can sit in my chair. I'm not doing anything else, but I should eat at some point. Anyway, so we're going to listen to this conversation because you have to think of all that background when you're analyzing. Why right now? Okay, why would Karen Read tactically right now burn Aidan Kearney? Aidan Kearney supporters are very loyal, but a lot of Aidan Kearney's base are becoming alienated because either they care more about Karen Read than Aidan Kearney or because Aidan Kearney's been on this weird tear recently where he like been attacking middle-aged women who are most of his fans. All right. Most of his fans are middle-aged women. And he goes after people's looks like whatever. So there's already this alienation happening. I believe the only reason Karen Read does this right now is because what it did—and what it's doing to Aidan Kearney—is it's decimating his support. Okay. Well, why are you decimating his support? Why are you forcing people to pick sides? Why would you do that right now? Either [he] cooperated or he's about to. All right. Now Karen Read—if she was—here's my read of this—if Karen Read was just going to cooperate, she wouldn't have done this this way. Okay. I'm sorry. It would have been completely different. I don't believe that she would have done it this way. I believe she would have done it a completely different way. And the reason why I believe that—we're going to read the text from Karen before we start listening to this. By the way, you can see I have the video here for you. What happened? By the way, just to give you a little more context. So this X Spaces that we're going to listen to—I have the full 37-minute X Space. This X Space, okay—it was before the text messages from Karen to Joe Flipperhead got released. So what you have to realize is these texts you're seeing on the screen got released because of this conversation. You're going to hear Joe Flipperhead say it.](https://image.24vids.com/tw-1972809333571502470/amplify_video_thumb/1972808166204137472/img/XOOS2z0jZvC0WHzY.jpg)
