Daily catch-up: A European Union of 28 states of equal population

Plus Corbyn and his MPs, locked in a loveless partnership, and some Hazlitt

Lovely map of the European Union, divided into 28 states of equal population (18m each), by Alasdair Gunn last year. Sorry about the picture quality: zoomable version here. Via Brilliant Maps and Tim Bale.

• YouGov has its first poll of Labour Party members and registered and affiliated supporters since Jeremy Corbyn's election in The Times today (pay wall): 66% say Corbyn is "doing well". That is why talk of Labour MPs ousting him is premature. Gary Gibbon has a good account of the mood of the parliamentary party. "Nothing is set in stone just yet. Nothing except Tom Watson’s face."

Corbyn and his MPs are locked in a loveless partnership: they cannot go on, but neither side can deselect the other for some time. MPs cannot get rid of Corbyn yet. Apart from its being undemocratic so soon after he was elected, the members and supporters would just re-elect him (after the National Executive had ruled that he would be a candidate if challenged). Nor can party members get rid of MPs until after the boundary review that will not be completed until October 2018. It is possible that Corbyn might resign: it cannot be much fun. If he did, the hard left couldn't run a candidate: the race might be between Hilary Benn, Dan Jarvis, Stella Creasy, Angela Eagle and Andy Burnham. But Corbyn will feel a duty to carry on.

YouGov's other findings are that 57% of the party say Corbyn should lead them into next election; 52% support automatic reselection of MPs; 30% back airstrikes in Syria.

• Here, thanks to Lloyd Bracey, is William Hazlitt on writing:

It is not easy to write a familiar style. Many people mistake a familiar for a vulgar style, and suppose that to write without affectation is to write at random. On the contrary, there is nothing that requires more precision, and, if I may so say, purity of expression, than the style I am speaking of. It utterly rejects not only all unmeaning pomp, but all low, cant phrases, and loose, unconnected, slipshod allusions. It is not to take the first word that offers, but the best word in common use; it is not to throw words together in any combinations we please, but to follow and avail ourselves of the true idiom of the language.

Political Essays, 1819.

• And finally, thanks to Sam (via Moose Allain) ‏for this:

"You can spell the word 'upside down' upside down by using other letters of the alphabet: umop apisdn."