If Covid would kill hundreds of thousands of people every year then the public would demand more measures. It doesn' t (yet) and so they don't.
But they do. Throughout the entire pandemic, poll after poll has shown the majority of the public to be more hawkish than the Government. One can welcome or deplore it, or argue that they would think differently if individually persuaded by this or that argument, but it's a fact, and one that puts politicians of all stripes in a difficult position.
Indeed. The liberals here on PB and on the backbenches are seriously out of whack with public opinion.
70% of people favour raising taxes on "higher earning Britons"
The great thing about "higher earning" people is that they are easy to define. 2X the salary of someone you ask is generally pretty accurate....
Especially in the Home Counties, there’s an awful lot of people in the top 10% who think they earn around average, and an awful lot in the top 5% who think of themselves as not much above the middle.
If it is mild, bring on the million cases a day. Let's get this done. OMICRON PARTY TIME!!!
The most telling thing I have seen from SA was the Doctor in Gauteng interviewed yesterday. It was not so much what she had to say but how she looked. She was very calm relaxed and happy. Compare and contrast to Javid two weeks ago before much was known about Omicron. (And Italian Doctors in Late Feb 2020)
I’m not opening the Dom Perignon yet. But maybe a nice Chablis with my oysters
Tomorrow the news could be grim, again
Paradoxically, if OMICRON THE MEH is super infectious but seriously mild then it could be the best thing to happen to the advanced world as it struggles with Delta. Let omicron take over ASAP
Forgive my ignorance of virology, but are we sure that omicron is definitely outcompeting the other variants? Could it be the case that they transmit/infect simultaneously/independently?
Genuine question.
Does anyone know?
It's definitely possible to be infected with 2 variants of coronavirus at the same time...
If OMICRON THE BARGAINER offered you a deal, would you take it?
ie how many deaths would be acceptable, if OMICRON THE MERCIFUL BUT CRUEL then brought Covid to an end as a pandemic, and it was tamed into a new flu?
I reckon I'd take 100,000 UK deaths this winter. Easy. 100,000 morbidly obese, stupidly antivax, very very old, sorry guys - bye. The rest of us get our lives back
In fact if OMICRON THE TRUTHFUL swore blind that he'd stop fucking us over, and turn into a cold by May, forever and ever, I might accept 500,000 deaths. Pretty steep, but there ya go. A million just seems too callous.
I'm guessing there is an olive left and that's all in the first martini but you are mixing/have ordered the second. Amiright?
Entirely sober. I reckon this is a cold calculation we are all quietly making. The bargaining stage
OK one more winter, take 200,000, I can cope, then just go away
We can endure a lot of pain, and a lot of death, and a lot of lockdown, what we cannot endure is that it might never stop. That this is it, forever. That is intolerable. So we make little mental bargains to get us thru the days
It's precisely those bargains that the government needs to make and let us know what they have decided. We are coming up to two years now and this might last a few more years. The public should be asked their views on this and also for extra funding for the NHS if that is what it will take for the NHS to be "protected" regardless of this or that virus.
Oh and what on earth are you doing sober? It's past one o'clock.
You cannot negotiate with the virus; and no-one has any idea what actions will lead to what level of deaths. All we can say - roughly - is certain actions - e.g. masks, wfh, vax - *reduces* infections and deaths. But we have no ides what the baseline of deaths will be for non-action, especially with Omicron.
Yes I get that but the lost years of restrictions needs to be put into the machine. It is not just stop deaths from Covid with nothing on the other side of the ledger.
If you took all regulations and restrictions away tomorrow I would say there would be around 10-20% mask wearing, for example. I believe the overwhelming majority of people want as normal a life as possible. If this is close to being accurate then a democratically-elected government must create a society that fulfils this desire.
We get n thousand road deaths each year. A tiny amount vs Covid but nevertheless the government has come to an agreement about an acceptable level of road deaths.
If Covid would kill hundreds of thousands of people every year then the public would demand more measures. It doesn' t (yet) and so they don't.
Of course people want as normal a life as possible. But most people are sensible enough to understand that it isn't always possible.
You are also going down a very deep and dangerous rabbit hole. Yes, we get lots of road deaths each year. We also invest heavily to try to reduce that figure, including bringing in legislation and laws that restrict what we can do in our cars - such as the use of mobile phones.
It's also a terrible analogy. Five people a day die on our roads. 161 died of Covid yesterday alone. Well over an order of magnitude higher.
Hardly any of these analogies for Covid really work. You need the key attributes of exponential growth of 'bad thing' based on person to person contact and for 'bad thing' to have the potential to overwhelm the health service.
The present boundaries of Ukraine were set by Stalin. It is the impossible country.
It would be better if Ukraine is dismembered with minimum loss of blood. But, one way or another, it will inevitably be dismembered.
Because no-one can put the House that Joe Built back together again.
Just as no-one could put the House that Tito Built back together again.
Complete nonsense. The Ethnolinguistic boundaries of Ukrainians were historically well beyond the Don, and in any event Russian speaking Ukrainians are just as loyal to Ukraine as Ukrainian speakers (and there is considerable code switching between the two languages as well as a common patois). Crimea was inhabited by large non Russian groups until 1941, including a large Tartar minority that Stalin sent en bloc to Siberia in one of his more egregious crimes. Russian claims on either Crimea or the Donbas have no legal basis at all. The Ukrainians, like the Czechs in 1938 are prepared to defend themselves, and the continuing aggression of Putin in Moldova, Georgia, and threats and claims against all his neighbours shows clearly that throwing away the legitimate defence of Ukrainian democratic sovereignty would not make any one safer.
Good to see you understand as much about Ukraine as about Wales -- a county on which you have repeatedly made disastrous predictions about a LibDem revival on pb.com.
Western Ukraine and Eastern Ukraine have little in common.
If there is war, Russia will take much more of Eastern Ukraine than if there is a plebiscite to decide the boundaries.
I have spent my whole academic and working life in CEE. You clearly have not. I just spent 2 days at a high level diplomatic conference with a group of acknowledged experts in the field. Don´t think I saw you there.
A Russian Plebiscite??? The Jeffersonian democracy that is Putin´s Russia will give a fair vote... Um, No.
Wales is not a county either.
You know nothing about Wales. Despite your endless LibDem bleatings on the subject.
I did not say "Russian" plebiscite. You appear to be ignorant of previous plebiscites organised by first the League of Nations and then the United Nations.
This would of course require Ukraine to accept that it will lose some territory, though the end result would be a more viable and stable state.
As it is, Ukraine will go to war, and have a much worse settlement imposed militarily on it.
The present boundaries of Ukraine were set by Stalin. It is the impossible country.
It would be better if Ukraine is dismembered with minimum loss of blood. But, one way or another, it will inevitably be dismembered.
Because no-one can put the House that Joe Built back together again.
Just as no-one could put the House that Tito Built back together again.
Complete nonsense. The Ethnolinguistic boundaries of Ukrainians were historically well beyond the Don, and in any event Russian speaking Ukrainians are just as loyal to Ukraine as Ukrainian speakers (and there is considerable code switching between the two languages as well as a common patois). Crimea was inhabited by large non Russian groups until 1941, including a large Tartar minority that Stalin sent en bloc to Siberia in one of his more egregious crimes. Russian claims on either Crimea or the Donbas have no legal basis at all. The Ukrainians, like the Czechs in 1938 are prepared to defend themselves, and the continuing aggression of Putin in Moldova, Georgia, and threats and claims against all his neighbours shows clearly that throwing away the legitimate defence of Ukrainian democratic sovereignty would not make any one safer.
Good to see you understand as much about Ukraine as about Wales -- a county on which you have repeatedly made disastrous predictions about a LibDem revival on pb.com.
Western Ukraine and Eastern Ukraine have little in common.
If there is war, Russia will take much more of Eastern Ukraine than if there is a plebiscite to decide the boundaries.
I have spent my whole academic and working life in CEE. You clearly have not. I just spent 2 days at a high level diplomatic conference with a group of acknowledged experts in the field. Don´t think I saw you there.
A Russian Plebiscite??? The Jeffersonian democracy that is Putin´s Russia will give a fair vote... Um, No.
Wales is not a county either.
A Russian Plebiscite will be run on the lines of Napoleon's various plebiscite.
I quite like the story of the one where he became First Consul - one his Marshall's lined up the Army on parade, announced that the table for voting Yes was there. And anyone wanting to vote No, or not vote, would be shot. On the spot.
If it is mild, bring on the million cases a day. Let's get this done. OMICRON PARTY TIME!!!
The most telling thing I have seen from SA was the Doctor in Gauteng interviewed yesterday. It was not so much what she had to say but how she looked. She was very calm relaxed and happy. Compare and contrast to Javid two weeks ago before much was known about Omicron. (And Italian Doctors in Late Feb 2020)
I’m not opening the Dom Perignon yet. But maybe a nice Chablis with my oysters
Tomorrow the news could be grim, again
Paradoxically, if OMICRON THE MEH is super infectious but seriously mild then it could be the best thing to happen to the advanced world as it struggles with Delta. Let omicron take over ASAP
Forgive my ignorance of virology, but are we sure that omicron is definitely outcompeting the other variants? Could it be the case that they transmit/infect simultaneously/independently?
Genuine question.
Does anyone know?
It went from being zero percent to bring almost three quarters of Covid cases in South Africa in a month, suggesting that it has been able to out-compete Delta, the previously dominant strain. If having had Omicron confers immunity to other variants then presumably other variants will be much diminished.
If Covid would kill hundreds of thousands of people every year then the public would demand more measures. It doesn' t (yet) and so they don't.
But they do. Throughout the entire pandemic, poll after poll has shown the majority of the public to be more hawkish than the Government. One can welcome or deplore it, or argue that they would think differently if individually persuaded by this or that argument, but it's a fact, and one that puts politicians of all stripes in a difficult position.
Indeed. The liberals here on PB and on the backbenches are seriously out of whack with public opinion.
70% of people favour raising taxes on "higher earning Britons"
The great thing about "higher earning" people is that they are easy to define. 2X the salary of someone you ask is generally pretty accurate....
Pretty much. On that poll voters oppose raising taxes on all Britons by 55% to 25% but support raising tax on rich, higher earning Britons ie not them by 67% to 17%.
Funny how voters are happy to back socialist levels of tax for the rich but are pure capitalists when it comes to their own tax bill!
The present boundaries of Ukraine were set by Stalin. It is the impossible country.
It would be better if Ukraine is dismembered with minimum loss of blood. But, one way or another, it will inevitably be dismembered.
Because no-one can put the House that Joe Built back together again.
Just as no-one could put the House that Tito Built back together again.
Complete nonsense. The Ethnolinguistic boundaries of Ukrainians were historically well beyond the Don, and in any event Russian speaking Ukrainians are just as loyal to Ukraine as Ukrainian speakers (and there is considerable code switching between the two languages as well as a common patois). Crimea was inhabited by large non Russian groups until 1941, including a large Tartar minority that Stalin sent en bloc to Siberia in one of his more egregious crimes. Russian claims on either Crimea or the Donbas have no legal basis at all. The Ukrainians, like the Czechs in 1938 are prepared to defend themselves, and the continuing aggression of Putin in Moldova, Georgia, and threats and claims against all his neighbours shows clearly that throwing away the legitimate defence of Ukrainian democratic sovereignty would not make any one safer.
Good to see you understand as much about Ukraine as about Wales -- a county on which you have repeatedly made disastrous predictions about a LibDem revival on pb.com.
Western Ukraine and Eastern Ukraine have little in common.
If there is war, Russian will take much more of Eastern Ukraine than if there is a plebiscite to decide the boundaries.
I don't think this is that straightforward.
In the last 100 years Russian / Soviet governments have on several occasions arranged the deaths of millions of Ukrainians.
Plus all forced relocations of populations, imposition of new minorities (a strategy also used by China).
I don't see Ukraine caving easily. And I wonder whether in the end the Russian population would choose to be in advanced, rich democracy rather than Putin's penumbra of failed states around Russia?
Are there similar examples in countries further down the road eg the Baltics?
I'd posit certain similarities to the China / Taiwan situation. Ukraine needs to be impossible for Russia to invade, ultimately.
I think there is a very strong Ukrainian identity in the West of the Ukraine. They will certainly fight.
But, the very Eastern part of the Ukraine -- I think Russia will take that and keep it as easily as they took the Crimea.
In the last 100 years Russian Soviet governments have on several occasions arranged the deaths of millions of Ukrainians.
Ukrainian nationalists do not have that much to be proud of either.
The role of Ukrainian nationalists in the Second World War and after was highly discreditable. The Ukrainian police, working for the Germans, played a crucial role in the liquidation of hundreds of thousands of Jews. There was also extensive ethnic cleansing of Poles from shared areas in Galicia.
And I wonder whether in the end the Russian population would choose to be in advanced, rich democracy rather than Putin's penumbra of failed states around Russia?
Well, the Russian population in the Crimea seem to have rejected this option of an "advanced, rich democracy" as opposed to Putin's penumbra.
In an ethnic fight, most people make their choice on ethnic grounds.
Agree in some measure.
However I think similar charges can be made against many, many European people groups, nations and religions - From French, Russian and Scandinavian to Croatian, Muslim and Indian. UK and similar were one of the few who did not sign up in large numbers, but it might have been different had we been occupied.
And these things do change - consider all those Franco-German wars, and how Poland now looks West, despite losing 20% of their population in WW2.
In 2014 when Russia invaded, there were very little credible armed forces at all in Ukraine.
ISTM that the long term Western strategy needs to be for Eastern Europe to look West, not East. Including eventually Russia itself.
If Covid would kill hundreds of thousands of people every year then the public would demand more measures. It doesn' t (yet) and so they don't.
But they do. Throughout the entire pandemic, poll after poll has shown the majority of the public to be more hawkish than the Government. One can welcome or deplore it, or argue that they would think differently if individually persuaded by this or that argument, but it's a fact, and one that puts politicians of all stripes in a difficult position.
Indeed. The liberals here on PB and on the backbenches are seriously out of whack with public opinion.
70% of people favour raising taxes on "higher earning Britons"
The great thing about "higher earning" people is that they are easy to define. 2X the salary of someone you ask is generally pretty accurate....
Especially in the Home Counties, there’s an awful lot of people in the top 10% who think they earn around average, and an awful lot in the top 5% who think of themselves as not much above the middle.
The number of times I've met someone who says -'Frankly, I'm rich" vs "Forget about the house, I'm poor etc etc"
Thinking of a relative who owned a mansion adjacent to the 9th hole at Wentworth Golf course.....
If Covid would kill hundreds of thousands of people every year then the public would demand more measures. It doesn' t (yet) and so they don't.
But they do. Throughout the entire pandemic, poll after poll has shown the majority of the public to be more hawkish than the Government. One can welcome or deplore it, or argue that they would think differently if individually persuaded by this or that argument, but it's a fact, and one that puts politicians of all stripes in a difficult position.
Indeed. The liberals here on PB and on the backbenches are seriously out of whack with public opinion.
70% of people favour raising taxes on "higher earning Britons"
The great thing about "higher earning" people is that they are easy to define. 2X the salary of someone you ask is generally pretty accurate....
Pretty much. On that poll voters oppose raising taxes on all Britons by 55% to 25% but support raising tax on rich, higher earning Britons ie not them by 67% to 17%.
Funny how voters are happy to back socialist levels of tax for the rich but are pure capitalists when it comes to their own tax bill!
Yep everyone is happy for people they think are richer than them to pay more.
It becomes a problem when they discover they are actually rich enough to be one of the people expected to pay more.
The present boundaries of Ukraine were set by Stalin. It is the impossible country.
It would be better if Ukraine is dismembered with minimum loss of blood. But, one way or another, it will inevitably be dismembered.
Because no-one can put the House that Joe Built back together again.
Just as no-one could put the House that Tito Built back together again.
Complete nonsense. The Ethnolinguistic boundaries of Ukrainians were historically well beyond the Don, and in any event Russian speaking Ukrainians are just as loyal to Ukraine as Ukrainian speakers (and there is considerable code switching between the two languages as well as a common patois). Crimea was inhabited by large non Russian groups until 1941, including a large Tartar minority that Stalin sent en bloc to Siberia in one of his more egregious crimes. Russian claims on either Crimea or the Donbas have no legal basis at all. The Ukrainians, like the Czechs in 1938 are prepared to defend themselves, and the continuing aggression of Putin in Moldova, Georgia, and threats and claims against all his neighbours shows clearly that throwing away the legitimate defence of Ukrainian democratic sovereignty would not make any one safer.
Good to see you understand as much about Ukraine as about Wales -- a county on which you have repeatedly made disastrous predictions about a LibDem revival on pb.com.
Western Ukraine and Eastern Ukraine have little in common.
If there is war, Russian will take much more of Eastern Ukraine than if there is a plebiscite to decide the boundaries.
I don't think this is that straightforward.
In the last 100 years Russian / Soviet governments have on several occasions arranged the deaths of millions of Ukrainians.
Plus all forced relocations of populations, imposition of new minorities (a strategy also used by China).
I don't see Ukraine caving easily. And I wonder whether in the end the Russian population would choose to be in advanced, rich democracy rather than Putin's penumbra of failed states around Russia?
Are there similar examples in countries further down the road eg the Baltics?
I'd posit certain similarities to the China / Taiwan situation. Ukraine needs to be impossible for Russia to invade, ultimately.
I think there is a very strong Ukrainian identity in the West of the Ukraine. They will certainly fight.
But, the very Eastern part of the Ukraine -- I think Russia will take that and keep it as easily as they took the Crimea.
In the last 100 years Russian Soviet governments have on several occasions arranged the deaths of millions of Ukrainians.
Ukrainian nationalists do not have that much to be proud of either.
The role of Ukrainian nationalists in the Second World War and after was highly discreditable. The Ukrainian police, working for the Germans, played a crucial role in the liquidation of hundreds of thousands of Jews. There was also extensive ethnic cleansing of Poles from shared areas in Galicia.
And I wonder whether in the end the Russian population would choose to be in advanced, rich democracy rather than Putin's penumbra of failed states around Russia?
Well, the Russian population in the Crimea seem to have rejected this option of an "advanced, rich democracy" as opposed to Putin's penumbra.
In an ethnic fight, most people make their choice on ethnic grounds.
Agree in some measure.
However I think similar charges can be made against many, many European people groups, nations and religions - From French, Russian and Scandinavian to Croatian, Muslim and Indian. UK and similar were one of the few who did not sign up in large numbers, but it might have been different had we been occupied.
And these things do change - consider all those Franco-German wars, and how Poland now looks West, despite losing 20% of their population in WW2.
In 2014 when Russia invaded, there were very little credible armed forces at all in Ukraine.
I think the Russians will have absolutely no difficulty in taking and holding the Donbas.
If it is mild, bring on the million cases a day. Let's get this done. OMICRON PARTY TIME!!!
The most telling thing I have seen from SA was the Doctor in Gauteng interviewed yesterday. It was not so much what she had to say but how she looked. She was very calm relaxed and happy. Compare and contrast to Javid two weeks ago before much was known about Omicron. (And Italian Doctors in Late Feb 2020)
I’m not opening the Dom Perignon yet. But maybe a nice Chablis with my oysters
Tomorrow the news could be grim, again
Paradoxically, if OMICRON THE MEH is super infectious but seriously mild then it could be the best thing to happen to the advanced world as it struggles with Delta. Let omicron take over ASAP
Forgive my ignorance of virology, but are we sure that omicron is definitely outcompeting the other variants? Could it be the case that they transmit/infect simultaneously/independently?
Genuine question.
Does anyone know?
It went from being zero percent to bring almost three quarters of Covid cases in South Africa in a month, suggesting that it has been able to out-compete Delta, the previously dominant strain. If having had Omicron confers immunity to other variants then presumably other variants will be much diminished.
You should add there are 2 ways in which Omicron out-competes Delta
Either it's more infectious or uses a different infection vector so has a far bigger population to target (as that includes the X% of South Africans who have already had Delta).
Both items are probably true but the second one means that without a booster job, Omicron has a population of 60+m in the UK that it could possibly infect.
If it is mild, bring on the million cases a day. Let's get this done. OMICRON PARTY TIME!!!
The most telling thing I have seen from SA was the Doctor in Gauteng interviewed yesterday. It was not so much what she had to say but how she looked. She was very calm relaxed and happy. Compare and contrast to Javid two weeks ago before much was known about Omicron. (And Italian Doctors in Late Feb 2020)
I’m not opening the Dom Perignon yet. But maybe a nice Chablis with my oysters
Tomorrow the news could be grim, again
Paradoxically, if OMICRON THE MEH is super infectious but seriously mild then it could be the best thing to happen to the advanced world as it struggles with Delta. Let omicron take over ASAP
Forgive my ignorance of virology, but are we sure that omicron is definitely outcompeting the other variants? Could it be the case that they transmit/infect simultaneously/independently?
Genuine question.
Does anyone know?
It went from being zero percent to bring almost three quarters of Covid cases in South Africa in a month, suggesting that it has been able to out-compete Delta, the previously dominant strain. If having had Omicron confers immunity to other variants then presumably other variants will be much diminished.
Is immunity always reciprocal?
If having Delta doesn't give full immunity to Omicron, how would having Omicron give full immunity to Delta?
I don't suppose that matters too much here - there's clearly just about enough immunity to Delta already. In Europe, though...
In the first bit She says we take a lesson from Crimea War. It may not register with us where Russians feel their Slav kinsfolk, Eastern Orthodox Russian speakers are under threat of being marginalised, so we have to try to get into the mindset of a patriotic Russian Slav (she doesn’t say how we do do that, and the next bit I can only translate as Pair Ron with his Hammer Out?) and that Ukraine is a bit of a ethno mess from the days of grand Lithuanian empire, that was very Catholic like the poles, its current border with Russia might actually be in wrong place for ongoing peace and happiness.
In the second bit she asks, partition anyone?
Has Malmesbury and Soup Dragon ever been seen in same room together?
Ha.
Ukraine is a concept, like Poland, that has been wheeled backwards and forwards across that part of Europe.
I had ancestors there and the joke goes - lived in Russia, Ukraine, Poland etc etc. Without having left the village....
If you want an "ethnically pure state".... IKARRRRRRAAAAAA!
But Malmesbury, that’s almost like you are saying nation-state is a nationalist dream and fiction, never really implemented, due to the inescapable plurality of social groups.
If it is mild, bring on the million cases a day. Let's get this done. OMICRON PARTY TIME!!!
The most telling thing I have seen from SA was the Doctor in Gauteng interviewed yesterday. It was not so much what she had to say but how she looked. She was very calm relaxed and happy. Compare and contrast to Javid two weeks ago before much was known about Omicron. (And Italian Doctors in Late Feb 2020)
I’m not opening the Dom Perignon yet. But maybe a nice Chablis with my oysters
Tomorrow the news could be grim, again
Paradoxically, if OMICRON THE MEH is super infectious but seriously mild then it could be the best thing to happen to the advanced world as it struggles with Delta. Let omicron take over ASAP
Forgive my ignorance of virology, but are we sure that omicron is definitely outcompeting the other variants? Could it be the case that they transmit/infect simultaneously/independently?
Genuine question.
Does anyone know?
It went from being zero percent to bring almost three quarters of Covid cases in South Africa in a month, suggesting that it has been able to out-compete Delta, the previously dominant strain. If having had Omicron confers immunity to other variants then presumably other variants will be much diminished.
Is immunity always reciprocal?
If having Delta doesn't give full immunity to Omicron, how would having Omicron give full immunity to Delta?
I don't suppose that matters too much here - there's clearly just about enough immunity to Delta already. In Europe, though...
There was a study out this week which seemed to suggest plasma from people with Omicron would neutralise Delta far more effectively than vice versa.
The present boundaries of Ukraine were set by Stalin. It is the impossible country.
It would be better if Ukraine is dismembered with minimum loss of blood. But, one way or another, it will inevitably be dismembered.
Because no-one can put the House that Joe Built back together again.
Just as no-one could put the House that Tito Built back together again.
Complete nonsense. The Ethnolinguistic boundaries of Ukrainians were historically well beyond the Don, and in any event Russian speaking Ukrainians are just as loyal to Ukraine as Ukrainian speakers (and there is considerable code switching between the two languages as well as a common patois). Crimea was inhabited by large non Russian groups until 1941, including a large Tartar minority that Stalin sent en bloc to Siberia in one of his more egregious crimes. Russian claims on either Crimea or the Donbas have no legal basis at all. The Ukrainians, like the Czechs in 1938 are prepared to defend themselves, and the continuing aggression of Putin in Moldova, Georgia, and threats and claims against all his neighbours shows clearly that throwing away the legitimate defence of Ukrainian democratic sovereignty would not make any one safer.
Good to see you understand as much about Ukraine as about Wales -- a county on which you have repeatedly made disastrous predictions about a LibDem revival on pb.com.
Western Ukraine and Eastern Ukraine have little in common.
If there is war, Russia will take much more of Eastern Ukraine than if there is a plebiscite to decide the boundaries.
I have spent my whole academic and working life in CEE. You clearly have not. I just spent 2 days at a high level diplomatic conference with a group of acknowledged experts in the field. Don´t think I saw you there.
A Russian Plebiscite??? The Jeffersonian democracy that is Putin´s Russia will give a fair vote... Um, No.
Wales is not a county either.
A Russian Plebiscite will be run on the lines of Napoleon's various plebiscite.
I quite like the story of the one where he became First Consul - one his Marshall's lined up the Army on parade, announced that the table for voting Yes was there. And anyone wanting to vote No, or not vote, would be shot. On the spot.
And how he had to take the crown from the pope and put it on himself. If we were there observing all this surely we would look at each other and say, it’s all about him, isn’t it?
The present boundaries of Ukraine were set by Stalin. It is the impossible country.
It would be better if Ukraine is dismembered with minimum loss of blood. But, one way or another, it will inevitably be dismembered.
Because no-one can put the House that Joe Built back together again.
Just as no-one could put the House that Tito Built back together again.
Complete nonsense. The Ethnolinguistic boundaries of Ukrainians were historically well beyond the Don, and in any event Russian speaking Ukrainians are just as loyal to Ukraine as Ukrainian speakers (and there is considerable code switching between the two languages as well as a common patois). Crimea was inhabited by large non Russian groups until 1941, including a large Tartar minority that Stalin sent en bloc to Siberia in one of his more egregious crimes. Russian claims on either Crimea or the Donbas have no legal basis at all. The Ukrainians, like the Czechs in 1938 are prepared to defend themselves, and the continuing aggression of Putin in Moldova, Georgia, and threats and claims against all his neighbours shows clearly that throwing away the legitimate defence of Ukrainian democratic sovereignty would not make any one safer.
Good to see you understand as much about Ukraine as about Wales -- a county on which you have repeatedly made disastrous predictions about a LibDem revival on pb.com.
Western Ukraine and Eastern Ukraine have little in common.
If there is war, Russian will take much more of Eastern Ukraine than if there is a plebiscite to decide the boundaries.
I don't think this is that straightforward.
In the last 100 years Russian / Soviet governments have on several occasions arranged the deaths of millions of Ukrainians.
Plus all forced relocations of populations, imposition of new minorities (a strategy also used by China).
I don't see Ukraine caving easily. And I wonder whether in the end the Russian population would choose to be in advanced, rich democracy rather than Putin's penumbra of failed states around Russia?
Are there similar examples in countries further down the road eg the Baltics?
I'd posit certain similarities to the China / Taiwan situation. Ukraine needs to be impossible for Russia to invade, ultimately.
I think there is a very strong Ukrainian identity in the West of the Ukraine. They will certainly fight.
But, the very Eastern part of the Ukraine -- I think Russia will take that and keep it as easily as they took the Crimea.
In the last 100 years Russian Soviet governments have on several occasions arranged the deaths of millions of Ukrainians.
Ukrainian nationalists do not have that much to be proud of either.
The role of Ukrainian nationalists in the Second World War and after was highly discreditable. The Ukrainian police, working for the Germans, played a crucial role in the liquidation of hundreds of thousands of Jews. There was also extensive ethnic cleansing of Poles from shared areas in Galicia.
And I wonder whether in the end the Russian population would choose to be in advanced, rich democracy rather than Putin's penumbra of failed states around Russia?
Well, the Russian population in the Crimea seem to have rejected this option of an "advanced, rich democracy" as opposed to Putin's penumbra.
In an ethnic fight, most people make their choice on ethnic grounds.
Agree in some measure.
However I think similar charges can be made against many, many European people groups, nations and religions - From French, Russian and Scandinavian to Croatian, Muslim and Indian. UK and similar were one of the few who did not sign up in large numbers, but it might have been different had we been occupied.
And these things do change - consider all those Franco-German wars, and how Poland now looks West, despite losing 20% of their population in WW2.
In 2014 when Russia invaded, there were very little credible armed forces at all in Ukraine.
ISTM that the long term Western strategy needs to be for Eastern Europe to look West, not East. Including eventually Russia itself.
One issue I do think I see is that unlike others, Ukraine has not yet grown GDP enough to be noticeably better off than Russia.
If Covid would kill hundreds of thousands of people every year then the public would demand more measures. It doesn' t (yet) and so they don't.
But they do. Throughout the entire pandemic, poll after poll has shown the majority of the public to be more hawkish than the Government. One can welcome or deplore it, or argue that they would think differently if individually persuaded by this or that argument, but it's a fact, and one that puts politicians of all stripes in a difficult position.
Indeed. The liberals here on PB and on the backbenches are seriously out of whack with public opinion.
For me you have to split these 'liberals' into 2 groups.
1. Those who recognize the realities of Covid, and thus the periodic need for distancing to fight waves, but argue for a more 'trust the people' approach, ie less law and more guidance.
2. Those with head in the sand about the virus and its consequences, prone to narcissism and virtue-signalling, "God I love freedom, me", and to softhead paranoia about being 'locked down forever' by 'power crazy scientists' and the advent of the 'big brother biosecurity state'.
Number 1 are liberals, true and fair. Number 2 are something else.
If it is mild, bring on the million cases a day. Let's get this done. OMICRON PARTY TIME!!!
The most telling thing I have seen from SA was the Doctor in Gauteng interviewed yesterday. It was not so much what she had to say but how she looked. She was very calm relaxed and happy. Compare and contrast to Javid two weeks ago before much was known about Omicron. (And Italian Doctors in Late Feb 2020)
I’m not opening the Dom Perignon yet. But maybe a nice Chablis with my oysters
Tomorrow the news could be grim, again
Paradoxically, if OMICRON THE MEH is super infectious but seriously mild then it could be the best thing to happen to the advanced world as it struggles with Delta. Let omicron take over ASAP
Forgive my ignorance of virology, but are we sure that omicron is definitely outcompeting the other variants? Could it be the case that they transmit/infect simultaneously/independently?
Genuine question.
Does anyone know?
It went from being zero percent to bring almost three quarters of Covid cases in South Africa in a month, suggesting that it has been able to out-compete Delta, the previously dominant strain. If having had Omicron confers immunity to other variants then presumably other variants will be much diminished.
Is immunity always reciprocal?
If having Delta doesn't give full immunity to Omicron, how would having Omicron give full immunity to Delta?
I don't suppose that matters too much here - there's clearly just about enough immunity to Delta already. In Europe, though...
So immunity is complex, with lots of layers. Most of the chatter about omicron concerns neutralising antibodies - those that circulate after infection/immunisation and are able to stop infection completely, usually by binding to things like the spike protein. For the vaccinations, I believe, but may be wrong, that it is the spike protein that has been shown to the immune system, and this is what the nAb's are targetting. Hence the concern if the spike protein changes too much for the initial nAB response to stop the infection in its tracks. However there are more layers than that, as other parts of the system store information about how to make new nAb's for instance and able to rapidly flood the body with them.
So even if immunity wanes, or is less than perfect for a new variant, the idea is that serious disease/death is kept at bay by the next levels of the immune system being more able to react than for a naive body.
Generally although omicron has significant change in the spike, it is still the case that existing nAb's can neutralise it, it just may need a lot more of them. Hence boosters, which look to give a big increase in the antibodies (and possibly fairly long lived too, from what little evidence I've seen).
Beware anyone who bangs on about antibodies and vaccine escape - its likely that their knowledge is a bit thin on the whole immune system.
The present boundaries of Ukraine were set by Stalin. It is the impossible country.
It would be better if Ukraine is dismembered with minimum loss of blood. But, one way or another, it will inevitably be dismembered.
Because no-one can put the House that Joe Built back together again.
Just as no-one could put the House that Tito Built back together again.
Complete nonsense. The Ethnolinguistic boundaries of Ukrainians were historically well beyond the Don, and in any event Russian speaking Ukrainians are just as loyal to Ukraine as Ukrainian speakers (and there is considerable code switching between the two languages as well as a common patois). Crimea was inhabited by large non Russian groups until 1941, including a large Tartar minority that Stalin sent en bloc to Siberia in one of his more egregious crimes. Russian claims on either Crimea or the Donbas have no legal basis at all. The Ukrainians, like the Czechs in 1938 are prepared to defend themselves, and the continuing aggression of Putin in Moldova, Georgia, and threats and claims against all his neighbours shows clearly that throwing away the legitimate defence of Ukrainian democratic sovereignty would not make any one safer.
Good to see you understand as much about Ukraine as about Wales -- a county on which you have repeatedly made disastrous predictions about a LibDem revival on pb.com.
Western Ukraine and Eastern Ukraine have little in common.
If there is war, Russian will take much more of Eastern Ukraine than if there is a plebiscite to decide the boundaries.
I don't think this is that straightforward.
In the last 100 years Russian / Soviet governments have on several occasions arranged the deaths of millions of Ukrainians.
Plus all forced relocations of populations, imposition of new minorities (a strategy also used by China).
I don't see Ukraine caving easily. And I wonder whether in the end the Russian population would choose to be in advanced, rich democracy rather than Putin's penumbra of failed states around Russia?
Are there similar examples in countries further down the road eg the Baltics?
I'd posit certain similarities to the China / Taiwan situation. Ukraine needs to be impossible for Russia to invade, ultimately.
I think there is a very strong Ukrainian identity in the West of the Ukraine. They will certainly fight.
But, the very Eastern part of the Ukraine -- I think Russia will take that and keep it as easily as they took the Crimea.
In the last 100 years Russian Soviet governments have on several occasions arranged the deaths of millions of Ukrainians.
Ukrainian nationalists do not have that much to be proud of either.
The role of Ukrainian nationalists in the Second World War and after was highly discreditable. The Ukrainian police, working for the Germans, played a crucial role in the liquidation of hundreds of thousands of Jews. There was also extensive ethnic cleansing of Poles from shared areas in Galicia.
And I wonder whether in the end the Russian population would choose to be in advanced, rich democracy rather than Putin's penumbra of failed states around Russia?
Well, the Russian population in the Crimea seem to have rejected this option of an "advanced, rich democracy" as opposed to Putin's penumbra.
In an ethnic fight, most people make their choice on ethnic grounds.
Agree in some measure.
However I think similar charges can be made against many, many European people groups, nations and religions - From French, Russian and Scandinavian to Croatian, Muslim and Indian. UK and similar were one of the few who did not sign up in large numbers, but it might have been different had we been occupied.
And these things do change - consider all those Franco-German wars, and how Poland now looks West, despite losing 20% of their population in WW2.
In 2014 when Russia invaded, there were very little credible armed forces at all in Ukraine.
ISTM that the long term Western strategy needs to be for Eastern Europe to look West, not East. Including eventually Russia itself.
Notwithstanding the collaborators, the Nazis considered most Ukrainians to be subhuman.
If Covid would kill hundreds of thousands of people every year then the public would demand more measures. It doesn' t (yet) and so they don't.
But they do. Throughout the entire pandemic, poll after poll has shown the majority of the public to be more hawkish than the Government. One can welcome or deplore it, or argue that they would think differently if individually persuaded by this or that argument, but it's a fact, and one that puts politicians of all stripes in a difficult position.
Indeed. The liberals here on PB and on the backbenches are seriously out of whack with public opinion.
70% of people favour raising taxes on "higher earning Britons"
The great thing about "higher earning" people is that they are easy to define. 2X the salary of someone you ask is generally pretty accurate....
Especially in the Home Counties, there’s an awful lot of people in the top 10% who think they earn around average, and an awful lot in the top 5% who think of themselves as not much above the middle.
Oh, I know a family in DC. The wife is a highly paid government scientist, they live in a great neighbourhood, have a lovely home and two or three cars. Now, they probably aren't in the 1% in the US, but they're definitely in the 1% globally.
If Covid would kill hundreds of thousands of people every year then the public would demand more measures. It doesn' t (yet) and so they don't.
But they do. Throughout the entire pandemic, poll after poll has shown the majority of the public to be more hawkish than the Government. One can welcome or deplore it, or argue that they would think differently if individually persuaded by this or that argument, but it's a fact, and one that puts politicians of all stripes in a difficult position.
Indeed. The liberals here on PB and on the backbenches are seriously out of whack with public opinion.
70% of people favour raising taxes on "higher earning Britons"
The great thing about "higher earning" people is that they are easy to define. 2X the salary of someone you ask is generally pretty accurate....
Especially in the Home Counties, there’s an awful lot of people in the top 10% who think they earn around average, and an awful lot in the top 5% who think of themselves as not much above the middle.
Oh, I know a family in DC. The wife is a highly paid government scientist, they live in a great neighbourhood, have a lovely home and two or three cars. Now, they probably aren't in the 1% in the US, but they're definitely in the 1% globally.
And yet they bitch about "the 1%".
I think anyone on minimum wage in the UK is well into the top 10% globally.
If it is mild, bring on the million cases a day. Let's get this done. OMICRON PARTY TIME!!!
The most telling thing I have seen from SA was the Doctor in Gauteng interviewed yesterday. It was not so much what she had to say but how she looked. She was very calm relaxed and happy. Compare and contrast to Javid two weeks ago before much was known about Omicron. (And Italian Doctors in Late Feb 2020)
I’m not opening the Dom Perignon yet. But maybe a nice Chablis with my oysters
Tomorrow the news could be grim, again
Paradoxically, if OMICRON THE MEH is super infectious but seriously mild then it could be the best thing to happen to the advanced world as it struggles with Delta. Let omicron take over ASAP
Forgive my ignorance of virology, but are we sure that omicron is definitely outcompeting the other variants? Could it be the case that they transmit/infect simultaneously/independently?
Genuine question.
Does anyone know?
It went from being zero percent to bring almost three quarters of Covid cases in South Africa in a month, suggesting that it has been able to out-compete Delta, the previously dominant strain. If having had Omicron confers immunity to other variants then presumably other variants will be much diminished.
Is immunity always reciprocal?
If having Delta doesn't give full immunity to Omicron, how would having Omicron give full immunity to Delta?
I don't suppose that matters too much here - there's clearly just about enough immunity to Delta already. In Europe, though...
There was a study out this week which seemed to suggest plasma from people with Omicron would neutralise Delta far more effectively than vice versa.
Thanks, that's useful to know. So Omicron should just replace Delta in that case, assuming it is more infectious.
Drakeford really is an old woman, he would be better off focusing on getting most Welsh people having their boosters done then he would have zero need of a Christmas lockdown
If Covid would kill hundreds of thousands of people every year then the public would demand more measures. It doesn' t (yet) and so they don't.
But they do. Throughout the entire pandemic, poll after poll has shown the majority of the public to be more hawkish than the Government. One can welcome or deplore it, or argue that they would think differently if individually persuaded by this or that argument, but it's a fact, and one that puts politicians of all stripes in a difficult position.
Indeed. The liberals here on PB and on the backbenches are seriously out of whack with public opinion.
70% of people favour raising taxes on "higher earning Britons"
The great thing about "higher earning" people is that they are easy to define. 2X the salary of someone you ask is generally pretty accurate....
Pretty much. On that poll voters oppose raising taxes on all Britons by 55% to 25% but support raising tax on rich, higher earning Britons ie not them by 67% to 17%.
Funny how voters are happy to back socialist levels of tax for the rich but are pure capitalists when it comes to their own tax bill!
Not guilty. I back higher taxes on people like ME.
Cue, "So send a cheque to HMRC then. Nobody's stopping you."
Me: "No, I believe in funding public services with taxation not charity."
Drakeford really is an old woman, he would be better off focusing on getting most Welsh people having their boosters done then he would have zero need of a Christmas lockdown
What a sexist comment from you.
How dare you demean women like that.
Edit - Given the profile of the Tory not sure you should be throwing old out as an insult either.
Drakeford really is an old woman, he would be better off focusing on getting most Welsh people having their boosters done then he would have zero need of a Christmas lockdown
Hmm, what does that say about Mr Johnson? Mr Drakeford is well ahead on boosters.
Drakeford really is an old woman, he would be better off focusing on getting most Welsh people having their boosters done then he would have zero need of a Christmas lockdown
He is a Corbynista in collusion with the Greens doing what all the left always do and try to dictate every part of everyone's lives
Fortunately there are many who will just ignore him
The present boundaries of Ukraine were set by Stalin. It is the impossible country.
It would be better if Ukraine is dismembered with minimum loss of blood. But, one way or another, it will inevitably be dismembered.
Because no-one can put the House that Joe Built back together again.
Just as no-one could put the House that Tito Built back together again.
Complete nonsense. The Ethnolinguistic boundaries of Ukrainians were historically well beyond the Don, and in any event Russian speaking Ukrainians are just as loyal to Ukraine as Ukrainian speakers (and there is considerable code switching between the two languages as well as a common patois). Crimea was inhabited by large non Russian groups until 1941, including a large Tartar minority that Stalin sent en bloc to Siberia in one of his more egregious crimes. Russian claims on either Crimea or the Donbas have no legal basis at all. The Ukrainians, like the Czechs in 1938 are prepared to defend themselves, and the continuing aggression of Putin in Moldova, Georgia, and threats and claims against all his neighbours shows clearly that throwing away the legitimate defence of Ukrainian democratic sovereignty would not make any one safer.
Good to see you understand as much about Ukraine as about Wales -- a county on which you have repeatedly made disastrous predictions about a LibDem revival on pb.com.
Western Ukraine and Eastern Ukraine have little in common.
If there is war, Russia will take much more of Eastern Ukraine than if there is a plebiscite to decide the boundaries.
I have spent my whole academic and working life in CEE. You clearly have not. I just spent 2 days at a high level diplomatic conference with a group of acknowledged experts in the field. Don´t think I saw you there.
A Russian Plebiscite??? The Jeffersonian democracy that is Putin´s Russia will give a fair vote... Um, No.
Wales is not a county either.
A Russian Plebiscite will be run on the lines of Napoleon's various plebiscite.
I quite like the story of the one where he became First Consul - one his Marshall's lined up the Army on parade, announced that the table for voting Yes was there. And anyone wanting to vote No, or not vote, would be shot. On the spot.
And how he had to take the crown from the pope and put it on himself. If we were there observing all this surely we would look at each other and say, it’s all about him, isn’t it?
If Covid would kill hundreds of thousands of people every year then the public would demand more measures. It doesn' t (yet) and so they don't.
But they do. Throughout the entire pandemic, poll after poll has shown the majority of the public to be more hawkish than the Government. One can welcome or deplore it, or argue that they would think differently if individually persuaded by this or that argument, but it's a fact, and one that puts politicians of all stripes in a difficult position.
Indeed. The liberals here on PB and on the backbenches are seriously out of whack with public opinion.
70% of people favour raising taxes on "higher earning Britons"
The great thing about "higher earning" people is that they are easy to define. 2X the salary of someone you ask is generally pretty accurate....
Pretty much. On that poll voters oppose raising taxes on all Britons by 55% to 25% but support raising tax on rich, higher earning Britons ie not them by 67% to 17%.
Funny how voters are happy to back socialist levels of tax for the rich but are pure capitalists when it comes to their own tax bill!
Yep everyone is happy for people they think are richer than them to pay more.
It becomes a problem when they discover they are actually rich enough to be one of the people expected to pay more.
Well, maybe I'm weird, but when I was working I thought I should pay more tax. I was on a good, but not ridiculous, salary - just in the top 20%, I'd guess. Why did I think this? For the common good, to create a more decent and less selfish society. I would have rather taken home a couple of hundred less a month and seen much better public services - NHS, local authorities, cleaner streets, better public transport and so on; and I also thought (and still think) that benefits for those unable to work should be more generous.
414,645 booster vaccinations in 🇬🇧 yesterday (407,851 the previous Wednesday)
🏴 340,615 🏴 39,327 🏴 20,314 NI 14,389
While it is too slow, it is worth noting that the UK has delivered booster shots to a third of the population (total) by now. That puts us second behind only Israel in the whole world. And the UK is still on a sharply rising path. On current trends, you'd expect it to pass Israel around Christmas.
It's also worth noting that Europe is beginning to get a move on. A month ago just 4% of Germans had had a booster. Today it's almost 19%.
I've just realised that I knew the Solicitor General and MP for Cheltenham Alex Chalk when he was about 13 or 14. I didn't know him well at all, but I was pretty good friends with his younger sister Nicola for a little while and met him quite a few times.
Drakeford really is an old woman, he would be better off focusing on getting most Welsh people having their boosters done then he would have zero need of a Christmas lockdown
What a sexist comment from you.
How dare you demean women like that.
Edit - Given the profile of the Tory not sure you should be throwing old out as an insult either.
In the first bit She says we take a lesson from Crimea War. It may not register with us where Russians feel their Slav kinsfolk, Eastern Orthodox Russian speakers are under threat of being marginalised, so we have to try to get into the mindset of a patriotic Russian Slav (she doesn’t say how we do do that, and the next bit I can only translate as Pair Ron with his Hammer Out?) and that Ukraine is a bit of a ethno mess from the days of grand Lithuanian empire, that was very Catholic like the poles, its current border with Russia might actually be in wrong place for ongoing peace and happiness.
In the second bit she asks, partition anyone?
Has Malmesbury and Soup Dragon ever been seen in same room together?
Ha.
Ukraine is a concept, like Poland, that has been wheeled backwards and forwards across that part of Europe.
I had ancestors there and the joke goes - lived in Russia, Ukraine, Poland etc etc. Without having left the village....
If you want an "ethnically pure state".... IKARRRRRRAAAAAA!
But Malmesbury, that’s almost like you are saying nation-state is a nationalist dream and fiction, never really implemented, due to the inescapable plurality of social groups.
More, I'm saying the actuality of nation-states is that they are are a plurality of social groups and always have been.
The "There are no such things as nation states" people are also wack jobs, who get fearfully confused by the Nigerian woman who is adamant that she is German (for example)
Drakeford really is an old woman, he would be better off focusing on getting most Welsh people having their boosters done then he would have zero need of a Christmas lockdown
What a sexist comment from you.
How dare you demean women like that.
Edit - Given the profile of the Tory not sure you should be throwing old out as an insult either.
Ageist as well.
That's another chunk of the electorate told to **** off next time HYUFD goes electioneering. 53% of the remainder, perhaps more, given age related death rates in the two sexes.
414,645 booster vaccinations in 🇬🇧 yesterday (407,851 the previous Wednesday)
🏴 340,615 🏴 39,327 🏴 20,314 NI 14,389
While it is too slow, it is worth noting that the UK has delivered booster shots to a third of the population (total) by now. That puts us second behind only Israel in the whole world. And the UK is still on a sharply rising path. On current trends, you'd expect it to pass Israel around Christmas.
It's also worth noting that Europe is beginning to get a move on. A month ago just 4% of Germans had had a booster. Today it's almost 19%.
If Covid would kill hundreds of thousands of people every year then the public would demand more measures. It doesn' t (yet) and so they don't.
But they do. Throughout the entire pandemic, poll after poll has shown the majority of the public to be more hawkish than the Government. One can welcome or deplore it, or argue that they would think differently if individually persuaded by this or that argument, but it's a fact, and one that puts politicians of all stripes in a difficult position.
Indeed. The liberals here on PB and on the backbenches are seriously out of whack with public opinion.
70% of people favour raising taxes on "higher earning Britons"
The great thing about "higher earning" people is that they are easy to define. 2X the salary of someone you ask is generally pretty accurate....
Especially in the Home Counties, there’s an awful lot of people in the top 10% who think they earn around average, and an awful lot in the top 5% who think of themselves as not much above the middle.
Oh, I know a family in DC. The wife is a highly paid government scientist, they live in a great neighbourhood, have a lovely home and two or three cars. Now, they probably aren't in the 1% in the US, but they're definitely in the 1% globally.
And yet they bitch about "the 1%".
I think anyone on minimum wage in the UK is well into the top 10% globally.
You can do a similar mental trick with time. Today's poverty would look good to an impoverished person in 1575. Although this leads to 4 Yorkshiremen territory if you're not careful. Point is, for many things the relative measurement is more meaningful than the absolute. Maybe for most things.
414,645 booster vaccinations in 🇬🇧 yesterday (407,851 the previous Wednesday)
🏴 340,615 🏴 39,327 🏴 20,314 NI 14,389
While it is too slow, it is worth noting that the UK has delivered booster shots to a third of the population (total) by now. That puts us second behind only Israel in the whole world. And the UK is still on a sharply rising path. On current trends, you'd expect it to pass Israel around Christmas.
It's also worth noting that Europe is beginning to get a move on. A month ago just 4% of Germans had had a booster. Today it's almost 19%.
In the first bit She says we take a lesson from Crimea War. It may not register with us where Russians feel their Slav kinsfolk, Eastern Orthodox Russian speakers are under threat of being marginalised, so we have to try to get into the mindset of a patriotic Russian Slav (she doesn’t say how we do do that, and the next bit I can only translate as Pair Ron with his Hammer Out?) and that Ukraine is a bit of a ethno mess from the days of grand Lithuanian empire, that was very Catholic like the poles, its current border with Russia might actually be in wrong place for ongoing peace and happiness.
In the second bit she asks, partition anyone?
Has Malmesbury and Soup Dragon ever been seen in same room together?
Ha.
Ukraine is a concept, like Poland, that has been wheeled backwards and forwards across that part of Europe.
I had ancestors there and the joke goes - lived in Russia, Ukraine, Poland etc etc. Without having left the village....
If you want an "ethnically pure state".... IKARRRRRRAAAAAA!
But Malmesbury, that’s almost like you are saying nation-state is a nationalist dream and fiction, never really implemented, due to the inescapable plurality of social groups.
More, I'm saying the actuality of nation-states is that they are are a plurality of social groups and always have been.
The "There are no such things as nation states" people are also wack jobs, who get fearfully confused by the Nigerian woman who is adamant that she is German (for example)
EDIT: IKARRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAA!
That’s cool thanks. The answer is actually nuanced in the middle between nationalists and the no such thing as nation state whack jobs, along the lines of
“The term “nationalism” is generally used to describe two phenomena: 1. the attitude that the members of a nation have when they care about their national identity, and 2. the actions that the members of a nation take when seeking to achieve (or sustain) self-determination. 3. (1) raises questions about the concept of a nation (or national identity), which is often defined in terms of common origin, ethnicity, or cultural ties, and specifically about whether an individual’s membership in a nation should be regarded as non-voluntary or voluntary. (2) raises questions about whether self-determination must be understood as involving having full statehood with complete authority over domestic and international affairs, or whether something less is required.”
I am sure I am understanding it correctly and like it like this.
It’s the applying of it though, to the world we are in. A lot of the stronger identity people have does seem to be across current borders across the world!
The present boundaries of Ukraine were set by Stalin. It is the impossible country.
It would be better if Ukraine is dismembered with minimum loss of blood. But, one way or another, it will inevitably be dismembered.
Because no-one can put the House that Joe Built back together again.
Just as no-one could put the House that Tito Built back together again.
Complete nonsense. The Ethnolinguistic boundaries of Ukrainians were historically well beyond the Don, and in any event Russian speaking Ukrainians are just as loyal to Ukraine as Ukrainian speakers (and there is considerable code switching between the two languages as well as a common patois). Crimea was inhabited by large non Russian groups until 1941, including a large Tartar minority that Stalin sent en bloc to Siberia in one of his more egregious crimes. Russian claims on either Crimea or the Donbas have no legal basis at all. The Ukrainians, like the Czechs in 1938 are prepared to defend themselves, and the continuing aggression of Putin in Moldova, Georgia, and threats and claims against all his neighbours shows clearly that throwing away the legitimate defence of Ukrainian democratic sovereignty would not make any one safer.
Good to see you understand as much about Ukraine as about Wales -- a county on which you have repeatedly made disastrous predictions about a LibDem revival on pb.com.
Western Ukraine and Eastern Ukraine have little in common.
If there is war, Russia will take much more of Eastern Ukraine than if there is a plebiscite to decide the boundaries.
I have spent my whole academic and working life in CEE. You clearly have not. I just spent 2 days at a high level diplomatic conference with a group of acknowledged experts in the field. Don´t think I saw you there.
A Russian Plebiscite??? The Jeffersonian democracy that is Putin´s Russia will give a fair vote... Um, No.
Wales is not a county either.
A Russian Plebiscite will be run on the lines of Napoleon's various plebiscite.
I quite like the story of the one where he became First Consul - one his Marshall's lined up the Army on parade, announced that the table for voting Yes was there. And anyone wanting to vote No, or not vote, would be shot. On the spot.
And how he had to take the crown from the pope and put it on himself. If we were there observing all this surely we would look at each other and say, it’s all about him, isn’t it?
If OMICRON THE BARGAINER offered you a deal, would you take it?
ie how many deaths would be acceptable, if OMICRON THE MERCIFUL BUT CRUEL then brought Covid to an end as a pandemic, and it was tamed into a new flu?
I reckon I'd take 100,000 UK deaths this winter. Easy. 100,000 morbidly obese, stupidly antivax, very very old, sorry guys - bye. The rest of us get our lives back
In fact if OMICRON THE TRUTHFUL swore blind that he'd stop fucking us over, and turn into a cold by May, forever and ever, I might accept 500,000 deaths. Pretty steep, but there ya go. A million just seems too callous.
I'm guessing there is an olive left and that's all in the first martini but you are mixing/have ordered the second. Amiright?
Entirely sober. I reckon this is a cold calculation we are all quietly making. The bargaining stage
OK one more winter, take 200,000, I can cope, then just go away
We can endure a lot of pain, and a lot of death, and a lot of lockdown, what we cannot endure is that it might never stop. That this is it, forever. That is intolerable. So we make little mental bargains to get us thru the days
It's precisely those bargains that the government needs to make and let us know what they have decided. We are coming up to two years now and this might last a few more years. The public should be asked their views on this and also for extra funding for the NHS if that is what it will take for the NHS to be "protected" regardless of this or that virus.
Oh and what on earth are you doing sober? It's past one o'clock.
You cannot negotiate with the virus; and no-one has any idea what actions will lead to what level of deaths. All we can say - roughly - is certain actions - e.g. masks, wfh, vax - *reduces* infections and deaths. But we have no ides what the baseline of deaths will be for non-action, especially with Omicron.
Yes I get that but the lost years of restrictions needs to be put into the machine. It is not just stop deaths from Covid with nothing on the other side of the ledger.
If you took all regulations and restrictions away tomorrow I would say there would be around 10-20% mask wearing, for example. I believe the overwhelming majority of people want as normal a life as possible. If this is close to being accurate then a democratically-elected government must create a society that fulfils this desire.
We get n thousand road deaths each year. A tiny amount vs Covid but nevertheless the government has come to an agreement about an acceptable level of road deaths.
If Covid would kill hundreds of thousands of people every year then the public would demand more measures. It doesn' t (yet) and so they don't.
Of course people want as normal a life as possible. But most people are sensible enough to understand that it isn't always possible.
You are also going down a very deep and dangerous rabbit hole. Yes, we get lots of road deaths each year. We also invest heavily to try to reduce that figure, including bringing in legislation and laws that restrict what we can do in our cars - such as the use of mobile phones.
It's also a terrible analogy. Five people a day die on our roads. 161 died of Covid yesterday alone. Well over an order of magnitude higher.
Actually I think it might be a very good comparison if not analogy. Governments put a monetary value on people's lives. That value is not fixed but depends on what area of governance and risk you are talking about. So we find that the value of a statistical life for rail passengers (how much money the Government is willing to spend to save each life) is massively higher than the same value for car passengers. It has never been the case that the Government has a fixed value on human life. If it had been then either we would have had everyone in lockdown every winter (if the value had been high) or we would have made no safety improvements at all to our transport infrastructure (if the value had been too low).
In the context of Covid it is for society as a whole to decide what is an acceptable number of deaths for given levels of authoritarian regulation. We do it for Flu and set the bar very high. My personal view is we should have a similarly high bar for Covid. Sadly at the moment both the authoritarian political classes and much of the population seem to agree that it should be much lower. How long that will last when they find all their pubs and shops have disappeared and they are out of a job is another matter.
If OMICRON THE BARGAINER offered you a deal, would you take it?
ie how many deaths would be acceptable, if OMICRON THE MERCIFUL BUT CRUEL then brought Covid to an end as a pandemic, and it was tamed into a new flu?
I reckon I'd take 100,000 UK deaths this winter. Easy. 100,000 morbidly obese, stupidly antivax, very very old, sorry guys - bye. The rest of us get our lives back
In fact if OMICRON THE TRUTHFUL swore blind that he'd stop fucking us over, and turn into a cold by May, forever and ever, I might accept 500,000 deaths. Pretty steep, but there ya go. A million just seems too callous.
I'm guessing there is an olive left and that's all in the first martini but you are mixing/have ordered the second. Amiright?
Entirely sober. I reckon this is a cold calculation we are all quietly making. The bargaining stage
OK one more winter, take 200,000, I can cope, then just go away
We can endure a lot of pain, and a lot of death, and a lot of lockdown, what we cannot endure is that it might never stop. That this is it, forever. That is intolerable. So we make little mental bargains to get us thru the days
It's precisely those bargains that the government needs to make and let us know what they have decided. We are coming up to two years now and this might last a few more years. The public should be asked their views on this and also for extra funding for the NHS if that is what it will take for the NHS to be "protected" regardless of this or that virus.
Oh and what on earth are you doing sober? It's past one o'clock.
You cannot negotiate with the virus; and no-one has any idea what actions will lead to what level of deaths. All we can say - roughly - is certain actions - e.g. masks, wfh, vax - *reduces* infections and deaths. But we have no ides what the baseline of deaths will be for non-action, especially with Omicron.
Yes I get that but the lost years of restrictions needs to be put into the machine. It is not just stop deaths from Covid with nothing on the other side of the ledger.
If you took all regulations and restrictions away tomorrow I would say there would be around 10-20% mask wearing, for example. I believe the overwhelming majority of people want as normal a life as possible. If this is close to being accurate then a democratically-elected government must create a society that fulfils this desire.
We get n thousand road deaths each year. A tiny amount vs Covid but nevertheless the government has come to an agreement about an acceptable level of road deaths.
If Covid would kill hundreds of thousands of people every year then the public would demand more measures. It doesn' t (yet) and so they don't.
Of course people want as normal a life as possible. But most people are sensible enough to understand that it isn't always possible.
You are also going down a very deep and dangerous rabbit hole. Yes, we get lots of road deaths each year. We also invest heavily to try to reduce that figure, including bringing in legislation and laws that restrict what we can do in our cars - such as the use of mobile phones.
It's also a terrible analogy. Five people a day die on our roads. 161 died of Covid yesterday alone. Well over an order of magnitude higher.
Actually I think it might be a very good comparison if not analogy. Governments put a monetary value on people's lives. That value is not fixed but depends on what area of governance and risk you are talking about. So we find that the value of a statistical life for rail passengers (how much money the Government is willing to spend to save each life) is massively higher than the same value for car passengers. It has never been the case that the Government has a fixed value on human life. If it had been then either we would have had everyone in lockdown every winter (if the value had been high) or we would have made no safety improvements at all to our transport infrastructure (if the value had been too low).
In the context of Covid it is for society as a whole to decide what is an acceptable number of deaths for given levels of authoritarian regulation. We do it for Flu and set the bar very high. My personal view is we should have a similarly high bar for Covid. Sadly at the moment both the authoritarian political classes and much of the population seem to agree that it should be much lower. How long that will last when they find all their pubs and shops have disappeared and they are out of a job is another matter.
I understand what you mean, but the issue is that Covid was an unknown quantity. The number of rail and road deaths is pretty constant at a certain level, with variation. Flu deaths are also a known quantity, with wider variations.
We could not say that for Covid when it started, and we can not say it for Omicron - although I am hopeful.
We can decide that an 'acceptable' number of deaths is: but we have no way of ensuring that Covid will happily say: "Oh, I've killed enough. I'll stop now." It is all too easy to reach the agreed level, and find out a week later you've doubled it and it is out of control.
We have more information on the earlier variants, including amongst vaccinated and unvaccinated populations, so we could - perhaps - do so for that. But now there's Omicron.
Road and rail accidents also do not have exponential growth (aside from very low figures), and it is much easier to lose control of a pandemic than it is a safety case.
Finally, there's the issue of the tyranny of the majority. It is not a random subset of the population being affected, but very specific groups. That makes me very uneasy.
Not sign of an Omicron induced arcing up of the national weekly rate of increase yet: 4/12 is 15% higher than the previous week and that rate of increase has been steady for around 5 days.
In the national figures, certainly, the influence of Omicron is still hidden in the foothills.
Comments
I did not say "Russian" plebiscite. You appear to be ignorant of previous plebiscites organised by first the League of Nations and then the United Nations.
This would of course require Ukraine to accept that it will lose some territory, though the end result would be a more viable and stable state.
As it is, Ukraine will go to war, and have a much worse settlement imposed militarily on it.
I quite like the story of the one where he became First Consul - one his Marshall's lined up the Army on parade, announced that the table for voting Yes was there. And anyone wanting to vote No, or not vote, would be shot. On the spot.
Funny how voters are happy to back socialist levels of tax for the rich but are pure capitalists when it comes to their own tax bill!
However I think similar charges can be made against many, many European people groups, nations and religions - From French, Russian and Scandinavian to Croatian, Muslim and Indian. UK and similar were one of the few who did not sign up in large numbers, but it might have been different had we been occupied.
And these things do change - consider all those Franco-German wars, and how Poland now looks West, despite losing 20% of their population in WW2.
In 2014 when Russia invaded, there were very little credible armed forces at all in Ukraine.
ISTM that the long term Western strategy needs to be for Eastern Europe to look West, not East. Including eventually Russia itself.
Thinking of a relative who owned a mansion adjacent to the 9th hole at Wentworth Golf course.....
It becomes a problem when they discover they are actually rich enough to be one of the people expected to pay more.
Lviv is a different matter.
Either it's more infectious
or uses a different infection vector so has a far bigger population to target (as that includes the X% of South Africans who have already had Delta).
Both items are probably true but the second one means that without a booster job, Omicron has a population of 60+m in the UK that it could possibly infect.
If having Delta doesn't give full immunity to Omicron, how would having Omicron give full immunity to Delta?
I don't suppose that matters too much here - there's clearly just about enough immunity to Delta already. In Europe, though...
1. Those who recognize the realities of Covid, and thus the periodic need for distancing to fight waves, but argue for a more 'trust the people' approach, ie less law and more guidance.
2. Those with head in the sand about the virus and its consequences, prone to narcissism and virtue-signalling, "God I love freedom, me", and to softhead paranoia about being 'locked down forever' by 'power crazy scientists' and the advent of the 'big brother biosecurity state'.
Number 1 are liberals, true and fair. Number 2 are something else.
However there are more layers than that, as other parts of the system store information about how to make new nAb's for instance and able to rapidly flood the body with them.
So even if immunity wanes, or is less than perfect for a new variant, the idea is that serious disease/death is kept at bay by the next levels of the immune system being more able to react than for a naive body.
Generally although omicron has significant change in the spike, it is still the case that existing nAb's can neutralise it, it just may need a lot more of them. Hence boosters, which look to give a big increase in the antibodies (and possibly fairly long lived too, from what little evidence I've seen).
Beware anyone who bangs on about antibodies and vaccine escape - its likely that their knowledge is a bit thin on the whole immune system.
And yet they bitch about "the 1%".
Politics For All
@PoliticsForAlI
· 1h
Police cars revolving light | BREAKING: Mark Drakeford has privately called for a full Christmas lockdown
Via @GuidoFawkes
Fingers crossed it really is mild...
https://youtu.be/ZoSddUk3Oj0
414,645 booster vaccinations in 🇬🇧 yesterday (407,851 the previous Wednesday)
🏴 340,615
🏴 39,327
🏴 20,314
NI 14,389
Cue, "So send a cheque to HMRC then. Nobody's stopping you."
Me: "No, I believe in funding public services with taxation not charity."
Them: "Typical bean peasant champagne socialist hypocrite!"
I am expecting as a minimum Drakeford to extend COVID passports to pubs, restaurants etc.
How dare you demean women like that.
Edit - Given the profile of the Tory not sure you should be throwing old out as an insult either.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-59491605
Fortunately there are many who will just ignore him
It's also worth noting that Europe is beginning to get a move on. A month ago just 4% of Germans had had a booster. Today it's almost 19%.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/covid-vaccine-booster-doses-per-capita?country=ISR~USA~FRA~ITA~GBR~DEU~BEL
The "There are no such things as nation states" people are also wack jobs, who get fearfully confused by the Nigerian woman who is adamant that she is German (for example)
EDIT: IKARRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAA!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/sports-personality/59505132
I voted for Tom Brady.
EDIT: There is a market!
https://www.betfair.com/exchange/plus/special-bets/market/1.177196899
I guess it makes sense that the person from the British Isles is favourite.
Damn Twitter. They’ve changed their website so you can’t click links without having to sign up / sign in.
Really damn annoying. I just want to read, not sign up / post anything.
Grr
NEW THREAD
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/covid-vaccine-booster-doses-per-capita?country=ISR~USA~FRA~ITA~GBR~DEU~BEL~CHL
Homework, homework !
I suspect Europe is later than us as they were 1-2 months behind last time.
Perhaps they are limited by people reaching the 6 month point?
“The term “nationalism” is generally used to describe two phenomena:
1. the attitude that the members of a nation have when they care about their national identity, and
2. the actions that the members of a nation take when seeking to achieve (or sustain) self-determination.
3.
(1) raises questions about the concept of a nation (or national identity), which is often defined in terms of common origin, ethnicity, or cultural ties, and specifically about whether an individual’s membership in a nation should be regarded as non-voluntary or voluntary. (2) raises questions about whether self-determination must be understood as involving having full statehood with complete authority over domestic and international affairs, or whether something less is required.”
I am sure I am understanding it correctly and like it like this.
It’s the applying of it though, to the world we are in. A lot of the stronger identity people have does seem to be across current borders across the world!
AZ-AZ–Moderna is my regimen I
am past caringdon't know how good that is supposed to be overallIn the context of Covid it is for society as a whole to decide what is an acceptable number of deaths for given levels of authoritarian regulation. We do it for Flu and set the bar very high. My personal view is we should have a similarly high bar for Covid. Sadly at the moment both the authoritarian political classes and much of the population seem to agree that it should be much lower. How long that will last when they find all their pubs and shops have disappeared and they are out of a job is another matter.
We could not say that for Covid when it started, and we can not say it for Omicron - although I am hopeful.
We can decide that an 'acceptable' number of deaths is: but we have no way of ensuring that Covid will happily say: "Oh, I've killed enough. I'll stop now." It is all too easy to reach the agreed level, and find out a week later you've doubled it and it is out of control.
We have more information on the earlier variants, including amongst vaccinated and unvaccinated populations, so we could - perhaps - do so for that. But now there's Omicron.
Road and rail accidents also do not have exponential growth (aside from very low figures), and it is much easier to lose control of a pandemic than it is a safety case.
Finally, there's the issue of the tyranny of the majority. It is not a random subset of the population being affected, but very specific groups. That makes me very uneasy.
In the national figures, certainly, the influence of Omicron is still hidden in the foothills.