Welcome to a half-real, altered hallucinogenic world that is known as the day after the budget

Is this the real life?

- John Crace

Is this just fantasy? Neither actually. It's a bizarre hybrid, an altered hallucinogenic universe. Where up is down and down is up. Everything is always slightly out of reach. A world otherwise known as "the day after the budget".

A day when politicians and amateur commentators are guaranteed to talk more doggybollox than on any other day of the year. A day when everyone gets their 15 minutes of shame.

You would have thought that Rachel Reeves must have got something right. It's not many chancellors who get a guarded thumbs up from the left wing of the Labour party and the financial markets. In fact, that might be a fiscal first. OK, so all the rightwing politicians and media wasted no time in trashing the budget as the worst in living memory, but they were always going to say that, regardless of what was in it. Don't forget that these were the same politicians and commentators who had rushed to praise Liz Truss.