Best Of

Trump seems to have lost what little mind he still possessed.

Trump sues Murdoch and Wall Street Journal over Epstein article
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c23g5xpggzmo

Even in the vanishingly unlikely event that he wins, the amount of dirty laundry that will be aired about him is going to be enormously embarrassing.

I suppose the question is whether his base will actually care. Very probably not given they're all even more delusional than he is, but if even just a few of them do that has alarming implications for the Republicans in the mid-terms.

JD Vance was saying "We must have this Epstein birthday letter released!"

Was then told in short order by Trump to STFU.

Vance can see the prize edging ever nearer.

I will not be entirely surprised to see Trump have a significant "health event" in the next ix months. actual or manufactured. After images of his bloated feet, they have had to release details of his vein condition:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c1jw1pdyp0jo

That will go with his vain condition.

This is quite something. The ex-head of the UK’s Secret Intelligence Service is interviewed by CNN about “Israel, Syria and the Druze”

He makes the crucial point that the Druze are Muslims

https://x.com/hearnimator/status/1945790676131512454?s=46&t=bulOICNH15U6kB0MwE6Lfw

Only problem, the Druze are not Muslims. How come I know that - and he doesn’t? He was the head of the SIS. His job is to know basic facts like this

We are absolutely screwed. We are led by idiots. In all regards

Bit like head of BBC News not knowing the Hamas government and Hamas fighters are one and the same thing and both designated as terrorists.

I genuinely despair at the basic intellectual capabilities of those who govern us. From the prime minister and the chancellor down, the military, the civil servants, the judiciary

What if there is no vast conspiracy to ruin Britain, the simple fact is: they’re all morons?

Not so much morons as deliberately educationally/intellectually ignorant.

That to reach the top you have to recite what are deemed the 'established' facts and beliefs and anyone asking questions is told to shut up.

I remember discussing this with a military historian, about how was it so many fools ended up commanding the armies of Austria-Hungary, Italy, and Russia, during WWI.

He replied that they had two vital skills. They knew how to tell superiors what they wished to hear; and they knew how to put down more competent rivals.

For all those on here saying 16 and 17 year olds should not be allowed to vote because they do not possess the capacity to discern lies from facts can I throw a word into the pot? Brexit.

If lacking clarity and possessing an inability to assimilate facts from lies should deny a franchise, can I remind you all of those people who voted to leave the European Union due to their inability to assimilate facts from lies?

My conclusion? If 16 and 17 year olds are not up to the cognitive requirement for voting, should "Leave" voters also be removed from the electoral roll?

"People who disagree with me shouldn't get to vote" isn't necessarily the most compelling of democratic arguments.

For age, a line has to be drawn somewhere. The only disagreement is where.

Well yes that too.

But if the argument is if voters are incapable of making rational decisions I say fair enough. I also say voters voting to impose economic sanctions on themselves are incapable of making rational decisions, so should they be allowed to vote?

Your argument is "people who voted the "wrong" way on an issue that I feel passionately about shouldn't be allowed to vote."

It's a pathetically weak argument.

My argument is by voting to sabotage their own economic interests in the Referendum they demonstrated a cognitive incompetence which should question whether they have the capacity to vote, and therefore should they be allowed to vote?

That's just you being endlessly bitter about an outcome that you dislike. Get over it. I've had to get over being on the losing end of political campaigns.

As a Tory in the last fifty years you've only lost four!

For all those on here saying 16 and 17 year olds should not be allowed to vote because they do not possess the capacity to discern lies from facts can I throw a word into the pot? Brexit.

If lacking clarity and possessing an inability to assimilate facts from lies should deny a franchise, can I remind you all of those people who voted to leave the European Union due to their inability to assimilate facts from lies?

My conclusion? If 16 and 17 year olds are not up to the cognitive requirement for voting, should "Leave" voters also be removed from the electoral roll?

"People who disagree with me shouldn't get to vote" isn't necessarily the most compelling of democratic arguments.

For age, a line has to be drawn somewhere. The only disagreement is where.

Well yes that too.

But if the argument is if voters are incapable of making rational decisions I say fair enough. I also say voters voting to impose economic sanctions on themselves are incapable of making rational decisions, so should they be allowed to vote?

Your argument is "people who voted the "wrong" way on an issue that I feel passionately about shouldn't be allowed to vote."

It's a pathetically weak argument.

My argument is by voting to sabotage their own economic interests in the Referendum they demonstrated a cognitive incompetence which should question whether they have the capacity to vote, and therefore should they be allowed to vote?

Be careful demanding intellectual cut-offs for who can vote, they might set a bar that catches you out too.

For all those on here saying 16 and 17 year olds should not be allowed to vote because they do not possess the capacity to discern lies from facts can I throw a word into the pot? Brexit.

If lacking clarity and possessing an inability to assimilate facts from lies should deny a franchise, can I remind you all of those people who voted to leave the European Union due to their inability to assimilate facts from lies?

My conclusion? If 16 and 17 year olds are not up to the cognitive requirement for voting, should "Leave" voters also be removed from the electoral roll?

"People who disagree with me shouldn't get to vote" isn't necessarily the most compelling of democratic arguments.

For age, a line has to be drawn somewhere. The only disagreement is where.

Well yes that too.

But if the argument is if voters are incapable of making rational decisions I say fair enough. I also say voters voting to impose economic sanctions on themselves are incapable of making rational decisions, so should they be allowed to vote?

Your argument is "people who voted the "wrong" way on an issue that I feel passionately about shouldn't be allowed to vote."

It's a pathetically weak argument.

My argument is by voting to sabotage their own economic interests in the Referendum they demonstrated a cognitive incompetence which should question whether they have the capacity to vote, and therefore should they be allowed to vote?

That's just you being endlessly bitter about an outcome that you dislike. Get over it. I've had to get over being on the losing end of political campaigns.

For all those on here saying 16 and 17 year olds should not be allowed to vote because they do not possess the capacity to discern lies from facts can I throw a word into the pot? Brexit.

If lacking clarity and possessing an inability to assimilate facts from lies should deny a franchise, can I remind you all of those people who voted to leave the European Union due to their inability to assimilate facts from lies?

My conclusion? If 16 and 17 year olds are not up to the cognitive requirement for voting, should "Leave" voters also be removed from the electoral roll?

"People who disagree with me shouldn't get to vote" isn't necessarily the most compelling of democratic arguments.

For age, a line has to be drawn somewhere. The only disagreement is where.

£200 pounds a year income at the time of the Putney debates is £42k a year now (Bank of England inflation calculator)

Of course that needs to be income from land.

Elections will be much easier to hold, though.

Some of the reactions out there to votes at 16 have been hilarious. There is clearly a fear amongst the low-information voters that 16 year olds may be smarter than them. "They won't know what they are voting for" say the people who voted for brexit and then said "I didn't vote for that"

Ironically I think that one of the two parties who will do very well off this is Reform UK. The other is the Greens.

There needs to be a boundary between where you can and cannot vote (*). It therefore becomes a question of what age that boundary should sit. Some 16 year olds are wise beyond their years; others are low-information and/or naive. But the same can be said for 18 year olds, or even 50 year olds. Unless we set some form of test before voting, that is unavoidable.

So I ask you: why 16, and not 15? Or 14? Or 10? Why is setting the voting age at 18 wrong, and 16 right, but 14 wrong?

As for 'low-information': there are plenty of your fellow travelers on the left who are that as well...

(*) Unless you believe newborns should get the vote...

Why should newborns not have the vote when literally demented boomer millionaire pensioners can vote to keep their triple lock?

Because it would not be *their* vote. It would be their parent's vote.

Why not though?

We have a problem in this country (common in many others) with not enough children being born, partly - it seems - due to a lack of family-supportive policies. Why not multiply up parents' votes to address that?

I'm not sure how serious I am, but it would change the voter demographic somewhat. I could see shared tax allowances and transferred tax allowances for children happening and Scandinavian style childcare and parental leave...

Parents to transfer vote to their child as soon as they wish, but at latest by 16 (or 18, but I'm fine with 16 year olds having their own vote).

Some of the reactions out there to votes at 16 have been hilarious. There is clearly a fear amongst the low-information voters that 16 year olds may be smarter than them. "They won't know what they are voting for" say the people who voted for brexit and then said "I didn't vote for that"

Ironically I think that one of the two parties who will do very well off this is Reform UK. The other is the Greens.

There needs to be a boundary between where you can and cannot vote (*). It therefore becomes a question of what age that boundary should sit. Some 16 year olds are wise beyond their years; others are low-information and/or naive. But the same can be said for 18 year olds, or even 50 year olds. Unless we set some form of test before voting, that is unavoidable.

So I ask you: why 16, and not 15? Or 14? Or 10? Why is setting the voting age at 18 wrong, and 16 right, but 14 wrong?

As for 'low-information': there are plenty of your fellow travelers on the left who are that as well...

(*) Unless you believe newborns should get the vote...

Why should newborns not have the vote when literally demented boomer millionaire pensioners can vote to keep their triple lock?

Because it would not be *their* vote. It would be their parent's vote.

Ironically I have just deleted a comment on the heritability of voting. By and large voters follow their parents.

That stopped happening some decades back, and is one of the reasons for the long term decline of the two party system