The German-Baltic Chamber of Commerce has written to the Lithuanian government warning that German investors may close their plants in the country unless a "constructive solution to restore Lithuanian-Chinese economic relations" is found
Germany really are a mercantilist nation. Shameful.
To be fair this is a chamber of commerce ie an industry group not the government. Still, what with this and Nordstream2 there does seem to be a degree of realpolitik gone mad in some corners of the German economy.
The Nordstream debate is interesting, as it's a wedge between the new German government partners. It's built, ready to use, and would help dampen the soaring gas price. Everyone agrees that if Russia actually attacked Ukraine then it shouldn't be opened for a long time, if ever. The SPD and CDU are in favour of opening it if they don't, the Greens are against, both because they don't like gas (fossil fuel) and they don't like Russia (and do like Ukraine). Not sure what the FDP thinks - does anyone know?
The obvious deal to be done is for Putin to stop willy-waving and the pipeline to open after a few months, after which it becomes a profitable lever to restrain Putin from a return to willy-waving. I think that's what will happen in the end, but Putin is populist enough to be unpredictable.
Putin doesn’t care about profits.
Nordstream 2 absolutely fucks Ukraine.
It allows Russia to bypass them and cut off the transit fees.
It will be a strategic calamity for the West.
But Gerhard Schroeder and other German politicians are richer than they were.
Nordstream 2 fucks the Ukrainians, and I get that.
But you are equally asking German consumers to accept higher priced gas, because it includes transit fees, solely to benefit the Ukrainians.
Irrespective, the big news - driven no doubt by Putin turning the screws - is that two LNG import terminal projects in Germany are now going to be built. Germany's dependence on Russian gas - with Nordstream 2 or without it - will diminish, because for the first time it will be able to directly import LNG from the US, Australia or elsewhere.
Indeed, the law of unintended consequences is that a whole host of LNG projects have been greenlighted in the last few months. The most important of these is that Mozambique LNG is now actually going to happen. (If the Russians had waited another six or twelve months it might have gotten permanently shelved. Now, it is not inconceivable the first cargoes flow in 2024. I suspect there will be no shortage of European buyers for the gas. Amazing to think that six months ago, everyone thought it was dead.)
Nah I’m asking Germans to accept higher prices to preserve Germany’s strategic flexibility and an independent Ukraine. That’s the sort of call the government should make - while at the same time looking to other sources such as LNG.
Otherwise they are weakening their position for a handful of silver
There is a small cost to achieve strategic resilience that the West hasn’t been willing to pay for decades, due to the transactional nature of its politics. It’s highly disturbing to me. I would make it my number one policy objective. The trouble is, there’s not many votes in it. Because the public has been fed a fairy tale that History Ended, the West won and human progress can only go forwards. In a globalised world, it also requires the nationalisation or quasi nationalisation of chunks of industry, which everyone has been taught is always wrong.
Another example is the reluctance of certain libertarians to shield the food and farmingt sector from total free marketry post-Brexit - heaven help the UK if this happens and a crisis comes along.
For a country with an import dependency on food, it’s a dereliction of duty not to have built a long term strategic nutrient reserve. It could be easily achieved by outsourcing it to the supermarkets and providing free financing for the increased working capital requirement / capex for the storage facilities. We could live our whole lives and people would wonder why we needed it. Equally an extraneous event could happen at any time and it might be the difference between maintaining order in society or seeing it quickly turn to dust.
Indeed, and a particularly odd piece of neglect by the ruling Brexiter faction given their frequent referencing of WW2 and Churchill - who was more frightened by that very issue of import dependency than anything else, at least when it came to the Battle of the Atlantic.
There used to be food reserves into the 1950s and 1960s, I believe,though some at least of that was for after the Bomb dropped.
Yes, though it is odd that Churchill never gave Coastal Command any Lancasters, preferring to bomb cows and cabbages, and later civilians.
Was that actually Churchill's decision? (I think CC did get some Lancasters, powered by a different engine because bomber command didn't want them.)
Coastal Command got Liberators because Bomber Command did not want them. I don't think they ever got Lancasters, though I can't be bothered to check at 9am on Christmas Eve. (There was more but I was mysteriously logged out while replying.)
They got an influx of Liberators because they could be adapted to operate over super long distances from about 1943 and weren't great for night bombing. Without that range there were sections of the Atlantic that were essentially unprotected. Coastal command did have access to some extraordinary machines though - my father flew with them from 1942 over the atlantic and then Indian ocean, mostly in Catalinas. He always claimed Churchill fought Coastal Commands corner v Harris who just wanted to focus on area bombing. Not sure if thats entirely true.
I've not come across a really good, deep history book on this one. The reasoning behind the various protagonists positions is not really explored.
In WWI, after the convoy system got going, some offensive minded Admirals instead on establishing hunter-killer patrols. Destroyers charged around at full speed - steamed a zillion miles and never saw a U-boat. With no sensors, they resorted to methodically patrolling in a fixed grid. Which the U-boat captains rapidly noticed.
In WWII, a series of layers of intelligence meant that (largely) the location of U-boats was known to a few dozen miles, for much of the war. This wasn't just the famous Enigma, but Huff-Duff and understanding Doenitz's rather rigid tactics was often enough.
The sources and comprehensiveness of the information was rather closely held - so Harris, Spaatz etc had no idea of the plot running at the Admiralty building. Instead Costal Command patrols were handed to the squadron's - search *this* box today - Given the accuracy of the location information, ASV and (at the end of the war) sonobuoys, it was quite possible to find the submarines, from there....
To an outsider, the searches looked completely random. It looked exactly like the WWI offensive nonsense, all over again.
In addition, the primary effect of the patrols wasn't to kill submarines. Though they did get a few. The major effect was causing the U-boats to dive. Which limited them to a literal walking pace - far slower than a convoy. The problem with that was that the only way to understand the effectiveness of this was to read the Fish cypher stuff. And Harris and Co. weren't "read in" on ULTRA.
So to the outsiders in this effort, Costal Command was chasing all over the ocean at random. To the insiders, they were punching the Germans in the gut, with some precision.
The failure to bring the European strategic bomber commands (American and British) into ULTRA* is a strange one, which has not been explained, as far as I know.
*They were given pieces of the intelligence, not the whole picture or where it was coming from.
We only lost my father last month (at 98) he has trove of primary as well as secondary material on Coastal Command I will work through. He said the crews were often unclear on what basis they were given specific areas to cover (your boxes) but also that the RAF were specifically told 'not to bother with' certain lumbering German planes which he believed in retrospect was because they were providing valuable chatter that was capturable via intel resources. As you say they rarely actually sank U-Boats. Flew out of Castle Archdale down a narrow air corridor allowed to them by the Republic, though apparently it was standard to wander out of the corridor for kicks.
IIRC Pol Roger was trying to release a Pint bottle (suitable metric amount, I think) for quite a while.
There was (apparently) a fair bit of research that people wanted something in between a half bottle and a full bottle for 2 people to share.
So pint sized bottles could have been issued at any point and the 'banned' bit is as accurate as the EUSSR forbade UJs on our bangers bullshit?
Perhaps they could write “568ml “ on it, but not “1 pint”, or perhaps it was actually banned. Wine from Jura often comes in a 62cl “clavelin” bottle, so that at least was grandfathered in.
Difficult decision ahead in terms of whether to give a 4th vaccine with the immunity of the booster waning after 10 weeks.
Do we start giving out a 4th jab in the New Year particularly aimed at the over 60s, those vulnerable and those who work in healthcare settings who had their boosters back in October and November. This is what Israel is starting to do right now and we have followed their lead often during this pandemic.
Or do we wait for an Omicron designed vaccine from Pfizer, Moderna et al.
The worry is that Omicron is mainly affecting the young right now as the vaccine wall from the booster is protecting older people and those vulnerable. But the vaccine could be about to wane for millions of people in the demographic groups in which we don't know what Omicron's real severity is. Look at the research including the Scotland study, not enough data when it comes to people over 65 and how they fare with Omicron.
Get Christmas out at the way first but the government needs to be on the ball with this in the new year.
Hang on:
In an individual, vaccine efficacy (ignoring for a moment different variants) is *always* changing.
During the initial post injection period, antibody response rises and rises... then after a certain point, it starts to slowly decline.
So (lazily using efficacy number), you might have someone who has 60% protection against symptomatic Delta at the point of booster. Over the following - say - three weeks that will rise to 95% or so. It will then start to wane at a rate of (say) 1.5% per week. (Not 1.5 percentage points, 1.5%.)
That means it'll take eight to nine months before you get back to the efficacy pre-booster.
The question - therefore - is "at what efficacy level do you think you need to boost protection again?"
80% against hospitalisation? 75%?
What's the figure?
More important, perhaps, are:
-supply (though this never seems to be an issue ) -public sentiment
As pointed out below, it doesn't seem like we will ever reach herd immunity due to re-infection. In the minds of many young people, myself included, the social contract was that restrictions would ease as boosters were delivered.
Hibs fans and, weirdly, Roddy Dunlop both pointed this breach out yesterday. What's the point in 3, 4, 5 jabs for young people if we make no progress towards normality?
You won't find me cycling out to the Royal Highland show in the rain again to get jab number 4.
"What's the point in 3, 4, 5 jabs for young people if we make no progress towards normality?"
Are you living in some parallel universe?
Normality is 90% back.
Yeah, we have to wear masks on public transport, and in shops. There's the stupid dance on the way to the bathrooms with putting on the mask.
But other than that... well, what's changed?
Dunno how things differ in California but it certainly doesn’t feel 90% normal here.
Yes, but that's not due to government diktat: that's due to people changing their behaviour.
People stop going out when they worry. It's why diseases have these curious waves.
The behavioural changes I’ve seen are nothing to do with worry about getting sick but worry about being told to isolate at home for a sniffle. And that’s a direct consequence of government diktat.
LFTs are free.
You have a sniffle, you spend 5 minutes and check if you have Covid and are infectious.
Some of the hysteria about "lockdown" has almost been pitiful.
We have never been locked down in the UK. At its worst I was outside running every day and going to the shop for supplies. Being allowed out of your home is not lockdown. Ask the people in places like Dubai what lockdown is really like...
Oh bollocks.
That's like saying that a prisoner on a six month sentence in a light security jail has never been imprisoned because ask someone in a gulag with hard, forced manual labour and a life sentence what imprisonment is really like.
We were locked down. That others were locked down even harder doesn't change that.
We mustn't allow the lockdown lovers to reinterpret society so that only a complete and total abandonment of our civil liberties classes as lockdown and everything lighter than that is A-OK.
We shouldn't let people who don't care how many people have to die for *their* freedom to reinterpret society, either.
Everyone has to die.
Unless you've discovered immortality when I wasn't looking.
I really struggle to see any reasonable point you're trying to make with this. Yes, everyone has to die. The point is that we rather try to prevent unavoidable deaths. Often those of people we may never meet.
The really troubling thing about your comment is that it can be used to excuse any number of hideous excesses - perhaps some even you wouldn't agree with.
I'm assuming autocorrect?
Nope, can't blame autocorrect; the mistake was mine. Having an excited seven-year old jumping on the bed as I type. That's my excuse, anyway. Yes, I meant avoidable deaths. Sorry.
There was a time when having someone jumping on the bed with me heralded excitement. Now it just means there's a kid who has had too much sugar ...
You're obviously excellent at this parenting lark, given that you've got a seven year-old yet are still in bed at 9.32.
We do tag-team parenting: one of us looks after him whilst the other does their own thing. Since I'm about to take him out for his daily 2K run, it's my turn to relax. Then Mrs J will take over as I shower and load up the car (I may even get dressed between the two...)
You're going to get dressed after going out for a 2K run but before you load up the car?
I didn't realise undressed running was a thing. 🤯
I was once accused of being the Naked Rambler. Whilst I was wearing clothes. (We were in the same town in East Scotland (Dornie, I think) at the same time during our walks.)
But no, 'between the two' means between the shower and loading the car. I assumed PBers would not be dirty enough to assume I run in the nuddie. Then I remembered what PB is like ...
Incidentally, on this morning's run I might have got 'accidentally' lost and gone off-path in the dark. Which is good, because it is another line on my map of runs. And bad because I had to 'run' through what appeared to be run-off from a pig farm.
Those trainers are being retired. And yes, I did have a shower afterwards, and the socks are in the bin as well.
My sister-in-law once found herself sitting next to the naked rambler on s flight to Edinburgh. She didn't know it was him until, when the seatbelt signs were switched off, he went to the loo and returned starkers. So she summoned a flight attendant, and asked if she could change seat. Needless to say, the reason for the request was swiftly understood.
There then ensued a comic exchange between the crew and the rambler:
"I'm sorry, sir, you can't stay like that". "Why not?" "You're disturbing the other passengers." "There's no disturbance", pointing to the fact that everyone was deeply engrossed in their newspapers pretending not to notice.
In the end he remained starkers, and on landing was escorted off the plane by a very embarrassed policeman.
IIRC Pol Roger was trying to release a Pint bottle (suitable metric amount, I think) for quite a while.
There was (apparently) a fair bit of research that people wanted something in between a half bottle and a full bottle for 2 people to share.
So pint sized bottles could have been issued at any point and the 'banned' bit is as accurate as the EUSSR forbade UJs on our bangers bullshit?
Perhaps they could write “568ml “ on it, but not “1 pint”, or perhaps it was actually banned. Wine from Jura often comes in a 62cl “clavelin” bottle, so that at least was grandfathered in.
Spirits being 70cl rather than the international 75cl standard is also an EU law from 1990. However, it’s rather a good one, because it divides into 30 25ml or 20 35ml measures exactly.
I'm old enough to remember September/October 2020 and the "its not rising / the rise is linear / it has already peaked" discourse on here.
I remember arguing with one particular user about this - and it does rather undermine their current ramblings about how we should all go out and infect each other.
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Boris hasn't been a useless PM. He was a very good PM for his first two years.
He's been overwhelmed by events now. That didn't make him the wrong choice at the time, it means it's time for a new choice.
That's the advantage of democracy over alternatives. Even good leaders burn out and there needs to be a peaceful and orderly way to replace them.
Aren't most champagne-producers French? Would they change bottles for just one market? Though come to think of it, didn't Pol Roger talk about reintroducing pints a few years back?
I'm old enough to remember September/October 2020 and the "its not rising / the rise is linear / it has already peaked" discourse on here.
I’m old enough to remember when we were regularly assured on here that Omicron was not milder, and that the South African doctors were wrong and should be ignored.
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Boris hasn't been a useless PM. He was a very good PM for his first two years.
He's been overwhelmed by events now. That didn't make him the wrong choice at the time, it means it's time for a new choice.
That's the advantage of democracy over alternatives. Even good leaders burn out and there needs to be a peaceful and orderly way to replace them.
He wasn't, he's been this terrible for years, you've just discovered it recently as the image of brilliance has warn off.
He negotiated a Brexit deal so terrible he's having to re-negotiate it because it doesn't work.
I'm old enough to remember September/October 2020 and the "its not rising / the rise is linear / it has already peaked" discourse on here.
I’m old enough to remember when we were regularly assured on here that Omicron was not milder, and that the South African doctors were wrong and should be ignored.
Funny old world.
Who said the doctors were wrong?
I never said that, I just said we should be cautious and I hoped I was wrong. I already said I am glad to be - even though many accused me of wanting a lockdown
Okay, time for me to take another substantial break from PB. The hysteria on here is creeping back. Have a great Christmas - enjoy it. See you in the New Year.
OK I'll just come out and say it. Aldi's £13.99 "house" champagne is fantastic at that or any price.
Right perfect timing. I have to get something in for New Year. Went Nyetimber last time based on PB discussions - liked but not not blown away. Had Chapel Down at a wedding this year which seemed better to me (but I did drink a lot of it so not sure it was a valid tasting'). So what is current PB consensus on best English sparkling? Or is everyone nailed on Aldi
OK I'll just come out and say it. Aldi's £13.99 "house" champagne is fantastic at that or any price.
Right perfect timing. I have to get something in for New Year. Went Nyetimber last time based on PB discussions - liked but not not blown away. Had Chapel Down at a wedding this year which seemed better to me (but I did drink a lot of it so not sure it was a valid tasting'). So what is current PB consensus on best English sparkling? Or is everyone nailed on Aldi
IIRC Pol Roger was trying to release a Pint bottle (suitable metric amount, I think) for quite a while.
There was (apparently) a fair bit of research that people wanted something in between a half bottle and a full bottle for 2 people to share.
So pint sized bottles could have been issued at any point and the 'banned' bit is as accurate as the EUSSR forbade UJs on our bangers bullshit?
Perhaps they could write “568ml “ on it, but not “1 pint”, or perhaps it was actually banned. Wine from Jura often comes in a 62cl “clavelin” bottle, so that at least was grandfathered in.
It seems yellow wine has to be in the 62cl bottle. And a pint of wine in a bottle would be illegal. As would a half litre of sparkling wine, but not still wine. Whereas in a glass you could serve a pint of champagne, but not a pint of still wine. What a load of cobblers.
I'm old enough to remember September/October 2020 and the "its not rising / the rise is linear / it has already peaked" discourse on here.
I’m old enough to remember when we were regularly assured on here that Omicron was not milder, and that the South African doctors were wrong and should be ignored.
Funny old world.
I came back from a month long hiatus to say that I wasn't worried about Omicron and PB shouldn't either so I hope this isn't directed at me.
Aren't most champagne-producers French? Would they change bottles for just one market? Though come to think of it, didn't Pol Roger talk about reintroducing pints a few years back?
All champagne producers are French.
Not just French of course, from the control region...or is it.....
Apparently there is the village in Switzerland called Champagne who have made a still wine named after the village since the 1600s....
OK I'll just come out and say it. Aldi's £13.99 "house" champagne is fantastic at that or any price.
Right perfect timing. I have to get something in for New Year. Went Nyetimber last time based on PB discussions - liked but not not blown away. Had Chapel Down at a wedding this year which seemed better to me (but I did drink a lot of it so not sure it was a valid tasting'). So what is current PB consensus on best English sparkling? Or is everyone nailed on Aldi
Sainsbury’s has Heidseck Monopole Blue Label at £14 at the moment, which is exceptional value.
OK I'll just come out and say it. Aldi's £13.99 "house" champagne is fantastic at that or any price.
Right perfect timing. I have to get something in for New Year. Went Nyetimber last time based on PB discussions - liked but not not blown away. Had Chapel Down at a wedding this year which seemed better to me (but I did drink a lot of it so not sure it was a valid tasting'). So what is current PB consensus on best English sparkling? Or is everyone nailed on Aldi
My non-drinking brother in law will probably have stocked up with some piss-water lager as usual. However, I think there may be a bottle or two of single malt lurking somewhere in the house, so all is not lost.
IIRC Pol Roger was trying to release a Pint bottle (suitable metric amount, I think) for quite a while.
There was (apparently) a fair bit of research that people wanted something in between a half bottle and a full bottle for 2 people to share.
So pint sized bottles could have been issued at any point and the 'banned' bit is as accurate as the EUSSR forbade UJs on our bangers bullshit?
Perhaps they could write “568ml “ on it, but not “1 pint”, or perhaps it was actually banned. Wine from Jura often comes in a 62cl “clavelin” bottle, so that at least was grandfathered in.
It seems yellow wine has to be in the 62cl bottle. And a pint of wine in a bottle would be illegal. As would a half litre of sparkling wine, but not still wine. Whereas in a glass you could serve a pint of champagne, but not a pint of still wine. What a load of cobblers.
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Boris hasn't been a useless PM. He was a very good PM for his first two years.
He's been overwhelmed by events now. That didn't make him the wrong choice at the time, it means it's time for a new choice.
That's the advantage of democracy over alternatives. Even good leaders burn out and there needs to be a peaceful and orderly way to replace them.
He wasn't, he's been this terrible for years, you've just discovered it recently as the image of brilliance has warn off.
He negotiated a Brexit deal so terrible he's having to re-negotiate it because it doesn't work.
It was May and Robbins that fucked us over with the backstop and promising to sort out NI first which was arse over tit.
He negotiated a fantastic Brexit deal much better than anyone expected. It included Article 16 so it could be iterated into an even better one, which is now being done.
He then negotiated a great Trade Agreement that gives us zero tariffs and zero quotas and zero governance requirements to meet their rules.
Then his government handled Covid so well we were the first major country on the entire planet to get vaccinated. He also ensured that restrictions were withheld until absolutely necessary rather than putting them in prematurely.
Then in the Summer we were the only nation in Europe AFAIK and one of the only developed ones on the planet to remove all major restrictions.
9/10 for the first two years. Some mistakes made, but trivial stuff really.
It's the last couple of months where the wheels have come off. Now he's thinking of putting restrictions in from "caution" which never happened last year. He's changed and not in a good way.
How serious of a problem is it that a vaccine which needs constant boosters perfectly suits interests or big pharma? Is there evidence that’s slowing down development of next gen (inc. sterilising) vaccines?
If GSK, or anyone else, could develop a next gen sterilizing vaccine then they would instantly win tens of billions of pounds of business from Pfizer. Why wouldn't they?
I don't know why people persist with the myth that Christmas has anything to do with a baby two thousand years ago.
I know, it’s the same at Easter. You can be perfectly happy eating chocolate mini eggs and using a few days off to redecorate the spare room, yet these annoying killjoys keep trying to bring religion into it.
Personally I think we need to take Easter back to its pagan roots. I am sick of it being perverted by all these recent add ons about crucifixions and caves.
It would be nice if schools could educate people about the real histories of holidays. There is some historical evidence to show that 25 December was a holiday to celebrity a birthday, but it was celebrating the birth of the Zoroastrian sun god Mithra not a baby.
The interconnections of a Persian sun god [as perceived by the Romans], Roman traditions and the Norse traditions all form a fascinating history of the festival we now know as Christmas and the traditions of food, merriment, drink and gifts etc that go with that have been celebrated now for well over two and a half thousand years.
Except for when the Puritans tried and failed to cancel it. So that brings cancel culture into the conversation too.
I wonder who was there to record Mithra's birth on 25th December? All this stuff is made up anyway so it doesn't really matter in the end which religion has overwritten the previous one. I like to see it as a way to celebrate the passing of the shortest day of the year and that Spring will be on the way.
Oh absolutely that's what its about. That's what its always been about.
Its just amusing when people bemoan feasting and drinking and gift giving etc as not being "the true meaning" of the holiday.
They literally are "the true meaning" and have been for about two and a half thousand years at least, minus the puritan era.
When the Church adopted Saturnalia as the birth of Jesus, society kept all the Pagan festivities which have largely passed through to today, despite the best wishes of the Puritans to stamp them out.
It’s funny how non-believers feel the need to denigrate other people’s faith.
It suggests a certain lack of confidence
I'm an agnostic, but I have the greatest respect for the moral teachings of Jesus, and envy those blessed with the certainty of belief*.
* Belief meaning certainty of either the existence or non-existence of God.
My facebook-friend-vicar usually posts lengthily at this time of year on the subject of how we've got the Christmas Story all wrong and the circumstances actually weren't small and unpromising and humble but great and triumphant, and God had provided the best entrance into the world possible for his son/himself; I often think that while he knows more theology than anyone else I might know, and he might technically be right, he is missing at least some aspects of the story's cultural significance beyond Christianity. But that's a separate point entirely.
Well I'm afraid your facebook-friend-vicar doesn't know as much theology as you seem to think, if that's his view.
Jesus was almost certainly not born in Bethlehem but in a humble little, and utterly insignificant, village called Nazareth near the important Sepphoris. When after his death the early followers decided, or believed, him to be their (latest) Christ it became a significant Messianic problem. The heir of David was supposed to have been born in Bethlehem according to one prophecy. The earliest gospel, Mark's, made no mention of Jesus' birth at all. Later, Luke, writing around 50 years after Jesus' death made up a census story (which is tripe) and shunted the holy family on a journey south to Bethlehem. He parked some shepherds into the manger to make it all seem very humble. Meanwhile Matthew, writing even later, decided to go the full monty on the kingly status of Jesus and made up a story about a star (which doesn't appear in Mark, Luke or John) and the Magi from the east (same).
The fact is that Jesus was a Northern nobody. His followers also had thick northern accents.
His birth was utterly humdrum.
The historicity of Jesus is a fascinating topic.
Do you mean 'the study of the historical Jesus?'
The 'historicity of Jesus' is a conspiracy theory by fundie pseudoscholars like Carrier, Murdock, Doherty and the Prices.
It’s a noun meaning historical authenticity. Don’t read anything more into it than that.
In New Testament studies it carries a definite meaning, I.e. the attempts to question whether Jesus was actually historically authentic. All such attempts having been consistently debunked as pseudoscholarly and in many cases actually fraudulent, peddled by religious fundies. So I'd advise you to steer clear of it.
Don't you mean atheist/anti-theist fundies? Be a bit strange if religious fundamentalists were peddling literature which questioned the existence of Jesus. But yeah, the majority of secular scholars - let alone actual Christian scholars - accept there was a historical Jesus, and those who don't are basically considered as reputable on the matter as Piers Corbyn is on Covid and Climatology.
Difficult decision ahead in terms of whether to give a 4th vaccine with the immunity of the booster waning after 10 weeks.
Do we start giving out a 4th jab in the New Year particularly aimed at the over 60s, those vulnerable and those who work in healthcare settings who had their boosters back in October and November. This is what Israel is starting to do right now and we have followed their lead often during this pandemic.
Or do we wait for an Omicron designed vaccine from Pfizer, Moderna et al.
The worry is that Omicron is mainly affecting the young right now as the vaccine wall from the booster is protecting older people and those vulnerable. But the vaccine could be about to wane for millions of people in the demographic groups in which we don't know what Omicron's real severity is. Look at the research including the Scotland study, not enough data when it comes to people over 65 and how they fare with Omicron.
Get Christmas out at the way first but the government needs to be on the ball with this in the new year.
Hang on:
In an individual, vaccine efficacy (ignoring for a moment different variants) is *always* changing.
During the initial post injection period, antibody response rises and rises... then after a certain point, it starts to slowly decline.
So (lazily using efficacy number), you might have someone who has 60% protection against symptomatic Delta at the point of booster. Over the following - say - three weeks that will rise to 95% or so. It will then start to wane at a rate of (say) 1.5% per week. (Not 1.5 percentage points, 1.5%.)
That means it'll take eight to nine months before you get back to the efficacy pre-booster.
The question - therefore - is "at what efficacy level do you think you need to boost protection again?"
80% against hospitalisation? 75%?
What's the figure?
More important, perhaps, are:
-supply (though this never seems to be an issue ) -public sentiment
As pointed out below, it doesn't seem like we will ever reach herd immunity due to re-infection. In the minds of many young people, myself included, the social contract was that restrictions would ease as boosters were delivered.
Hibs fans and, weirdly, Roddy Dunlop both pointed this breach out yesterday. What's the point in 3, 4, 5 jabs for young people if we make no progress towards normality?
You won't find me cycling out to the Royal Highland show in the rain again to get jab number 4.
"What's the point in 3, 4, 5 jabs for young people if we make no progress towards normality?"
Are you living in some parallel universe?
Normality is 90% back.
Yeah, we have to wear masks on public transport, and in shops. There's the stupid dance on the way to the bathrooms with putting on the mask.
But other than that... well, what's changed?
Dunno how things differ in California but it certainly doesn’t feel 90% normal here.
Yes, but that's not due to government diktat: that's due to people changing their behaviour.
People stop going out when they worry. It's why diseases have these curious waves.
The behavioural changes I’ve seen are nothing to do with worry about getting sick but worry about being told to isolate at home for a sniffle. And that’s a direct consequence of government diktat.
LFTs are free.
You have a sniffle, you spend 5 minutes and check if you have Covid and are infectious.
Some of the hysteria about "lockdown" has almost been pitiful.
We have never been locked down in the UK. At its worst I was outside running every day and going to the shop for supplies. Being allowed out of your home is not lockdown. Ask the people in places like Dubai what lockdown is really like...
Oh bollocks.
That's like saying that a prisoner on a six month sentence in a light security jail has never been imprisoned because ask someone in a gulag with hard, forced manual labour and a life sentence what imprisonment is really like.
We were locked down. That others were locked down even harder doesn't change that.
We mustn't allow the lockdown lovers to reinterpret society so that only a complete and total abandonment of our civil liberties classes as lockdown and everything lighter than that is A-OK.
We shouldn't let people who don't care how many people have to die for *their* freedom to reinterpret society, either.
Everyone has to die.
Unless you've discovered immortality when I wasn't looking.
I really struggle to see any reasonable point you're trying to make with this. Yes, everyone has to die. The point is that we rather try to prevent unavoidable deaths. Often those of people we may never meet.
The really troubling thing about your comment is that it can be used to excuse any number of hideous excesses - perhaps some even you wouldn't agree with.
I'm assuming autocorrect?
Nope, can't blame autocorrect; the mistake was mine. Having an excited seven-year old jumping on the bed as I type. That's my excuse, anyway. Yes, I meant avoidable deaths. Sorry.
There was a time when having someone jumping on the bed with me heralded excitement. Now it just means there's a kid who has had too much sugar ...
You're obviously excellent at this parenting lark, given that you've got a seven year-old yet are still in bed at 9.32.
We do tag-team parenting: one of us looks after him whilst the other does their own thing. Since I'm about to take him out for his daily 2K run, it's my turn to relax. Then Mrs J will take over as I shower and load up the car (I may even get dressed between the two...)
You're going to get dressed after going out for a 2K run but before you load up the car?
I didn't realise undressed running was a thing. 🤯
I was once accused of being the Naked Rambler. Whilst I was wearing clothes. (We were in the same town in East Scotland (Dornie, I think) at the same time during our walks.)
But no, 'between the two' means between the shower and loading the car. I assumed PBers would not be dirty enough to assume I run in the nuddie. Then I remembered what PB is like ...
Incidentally, on this morning's run I might have got 'accidentally' lost and gone off-path in the dark. Which is good, because it is another line on my map of runs. And bad because I had to 'run' through what appeared to be run-off from a pig farm.
Those trainers are being retired. And yes, I did have a shower afterwards, and the socks are in the bin as well.
My sister-in-law once found herself sitting next to the naked rambler on s flight to Edinburgh. She didn't know it was him until, when the seatbelt signs were switched off, he went to the loo and returned starkers. So she summoned a flight attendant, and asked if she could change seat. Needless to say, the reason for the request was swiftly understood.
There then ensued a comic exchange between the crew and the rambler:
"I'm sorry, sir, you can't stay like that". "Why not?" "You're disturbing the other passengers." "There's no disturbance", pointing to the fact that everyone was deeply engrossed in their newspapers pretending not to notice.
In the end he remained starkers, and on landing was escorted off the plane by a very embarrassed policeman.
I once commented online that I thought he was a bit of a numpty. In response, someone sent me an email saying that the Naked Rambler was a freedom fighter, and that he was going to hack my accounts and crash my website.
I pointed out that this was not the best way of convincing me that I was wrong ...
In my experience a standard wine bottle provides enough for a pint with a small top up. Perfect really.
I've always thought champagne is best served in a dimpled pint mug.
Good choice. That way you have plenty of room to add the lemonade.
Back in the day, a former employer used to serve beer and wine after 3pm on a Friday. I'm not a beer drinker and the wine was truly terrible, £3.99 a bottle Chateau du Plonk tier stuff. So for many years my standard at work tipple was a pint, half red wine and half (full fat, none of this diet malarkey) coke. It was surprisingly quaffable.
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Boris hasn't been a useless PM. He was a very good PM for his first two years.
He's been overwhelmed by events now. That didn't make him the wrong choice at the time, it means it's time for a new choice.
That's the advantage of democracy over alternatives. Even good leaders burn out and there needs to be a peaceful and orderly way to replace them.
He wasn't, he's been this terrible for years, you've just discovered it recently as the image of brilliance has warn off.
He negotiated a Brexit deal so terrible he's having to re-negotiate it because it doesn't work.
It was May and Robbins that fucked us over with the backstop and promising to sort out NI first which was arse over tit.
He negotiated a fantastic Brexit deal much better than anyone expected. It included Article 16 so it could be iterated into an even better one, which is now being done.
He then negotiated a great Trade Agreement that gives us zero tariffs and zero quotas and zero governance requirements to meet their rules.
Then his government handled Covid so well we were the first major country on the entire planet to get vaccinated. He also ensured that restrictions were withheld until absolutely necessary rather than putting them in prematurely.
Then in the Summer we were the only nation in Europe AFAIK and one of the only developed ones on the planet to remove all major restrictions.
9/10 for the first two years. Some mistakes made, but trivial stuff really.
It's the last couple of months where the wheels have come off. Now he's thinking of putting restrictions in from "caution" which never happened last year. He's changed and not in a good way.
9/10, you honestly embarrass yourself with this drivel.
I wouldn't give Starmer 9/10, I wouldn't give Blair 9/10!
Does anyone know how long you have to have been a Conservative party member in order to be able to vote in leadership elections? I assume there's some sort of time period between joining and being able to do so.
Does anyone know how long you have to have been a Conservative party member in order to be able to vote in leadership elections? I assume there's some sort of time period between joining and being able to do so.
OK I'll just come out and say it. Aldi's £13.99 "house" champagne is fantastic at that or any price.
Right perfect timing. I have to get something in for New Year. Went Nyetimber last time based on PB discussions - liked but not not blown away. Had Chapel Down at a wedding this year which seemed better to me (but I did drink a lot of it so not sure it was a valid tasting'). So what is current PB consensus on best English sparkling? Or is everyone nailed on Aldi
Sainsbury’s has Heidseck Monopole Blue Label at £14 at the moment, which is exceptional value.
I'm a big fan of Lidl's Comte de Senneval Champagne. £13.99 at moment, but usually cheaper if you buy in say October.
I shall sipping a glass or two tomorrow before lunch.
I don't know why people persist with the myth that Christmas has anything to do with a baby two thousand years ago.
I know, it’s the same at Easter. You can be perfectly happy eating chocolate mini eggs and using a few days off to redecorate the spare room, yet these annoying killjoys keep trying to bring religion into it.
Personally I think we need to take Easter back to its pagan roots. I am sick of it being perverted by all these recent add ons about crucifixions and caves.
It would be nice if schools could educate people about the real histories of holidays. There is some historical evidence to show that 25 December was a holiday to celebrity a birthday, but it was celebrating the birth of the Zoroastrian sun god Mithra not a baby.
The interconnections of a Persian sun god [as perceived by the Romans], Roman traditions and the Norse traditions all form a fascinating history of the festival we now know as Christmas and the traditions of food, merriment, drink and gifts etc that go with that have been celebrated now for well over two and a half thousand years.
Except for when the Puritans tried and failed to cancel it. So that brings cancel culture into the conversation too.
I wonder who was there to record Mithra's birth on 25th December? All this stuff is made up anyway so it doesn't really matter in the end which religion has overwritten the previous one. I like to see it as a way to celebrate the passing of the shortest day of the year and that Spring will be on the way.
Oh absolutely that's what its about. That's what its always been about.
Its just amusing when people bemoan feasting and drinking and gift giving etc as not being "the true meaning" of the holiday.
They literally are "the true meaning" and have been for about two and a half thousand years at least, minus the puritan era.
When the Church adopted Saturnalia as the birth of Jesus, society kept all the Pagan festivities which have largely passed through to today, despite the best wishes of the Puritans to stamp them out.
It’s funny how non-believers feel the need to denigrate other people’s faith.
It suggests a certain lack of confidence
I'm an agnostic, but I have the greatest respect for the moral teachings of Jesus, and envy those blessed with the certainty of belief*.
* Belief meaning certainty of either the existence or non-existence of God.
My facebook-friend-vicar usually posts lengthily at this time of year on the subject of how we've got the Christmas Story all wrong and the circumstances actually weren't small and unpromising and humble but great and triumphant, and God had provided the best entrance into the world possible for his son/himself; I often think that while he knows more theology than anyone else I might know, and he might technically be right, he is missing at least some aspects of the story's cultural significance beyond Christianity. But that's a separate point entirely.
Well I'm afraid your facebook-friend-vicar doesn't know as much theology as you seem to think, if that's his view.
Jesus was almost certainly not born in Bethlehem but in a humble little, and utterly insignificant, village called Nazareth near the important Sepphoris. When after his death the early followers decided, or believed, him to be their (latest) Christ it became a significant Messianic problem. The heir of David was supposed to have been born in Bethlehem according to one prophecy. The earliest gospel, Mark's, made no mention of Jesus' birth at all. Later, Luke, writing around 50 years after Jesus' death made up a census story (which is tripe) and shunted the holy family on a journey south to Bethlehem. He parked some shepherds into the manger to make it all seem very humble. Meanwhile Matthew, writing even later, decided to go the full monty on the kingly status of Jesus and made up a story about a star (which doesn't appear in Mark, Luke or John) and the Magi from the east (same).
The fact is that Jesus was a Northern nobody. His followers also had thick northern accents.
His birth was utterly humdrum.
The historicity of Jesus is a fascinating topic.
Do you mean 'the study of the historical Jesus?'
The 'historicity of Jesus' is a conspiracy theory by fundie pseudoscholars like Carrier, Murdock, Doherty and the Prices.
It’s a noun meaning historical authenticity. Don’t read anything more into it than that.
In New Testament studies it carries a definite meaning, I.e. the attempts to question whether Jesus was actually historically authentic. All such attempts having been consistently debunked as pseudoscholarly and in many cases actually fraudulent, peddled by religious fundies. So I'd advise you to steer clear of it.
Don't you mean atheist/anti-theist fundies? Be a bit strange if religious fundamentalists were peddling literature which questioned the existence of Jesus. But yeah, the majority of secular scholars - let alone actual Christian scholars - accept there was a historical Jesus, and those who don't are basically considered as reputable on the matter as Piers Corbyn is on Covid and Climatology.
Not really the question though is it. I’m happy to acknowledge his actual historical existence, but I’m a bit sceptical about all the loaves and fishes stuff - and I have to say I don’t really buy the idea that he was the son of God.
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Yet who beat Corbyn, delivered Brexit and won the biggest Tory majority since Thatcher? BoJo. Which leader has the highest percentage of adults boosted in their nation in the G7? BoJo
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Boris hasn't been a useless PM. He was a very good PM for his first two years.
He's been overwhelmed by events now. That didn't make him the wrong choice at the time, it means it's time for a new choice.
That's the advantage of democracy over alternatives. Even good leaders burn out and there needs to be a peaceful and orderly way to replace them.
He wasn't, he's been this terrible for years, you've just discovered it recently as the image of brilliance has warn off.
He negotiated a Brexit deal so terrible he's having to re-negotiate it because it doesn't work.
It was May and Robbins that fucked us over with the backstop and promising to sort out NI first which was arse over tit.
He negotiated a fantastic Brexit deal much better than anyone expected. It included Article 16 so it could be iterated into an even better one, which is now being done.
He then negotiated a great Trade Agreement that gives us zero tariffs and zero quotas and zero governance requirements to meet their rules.
Then his government handled Covid so well we were the first major country on the entire planet to get vaccinated. He also ensured that restrictions were withheld until absolutely necessary rather than putting them in prematurely.
Then in the Summer we were the only nation in Europe AFAIK and one of the only developed ones on the planet to remove all major restrictions.
9/10 for the first two years. Some mistakes made, but trivial stuff really.
It's the last couple of months where the wheels have come off. Now he's thinking of putting restrictions in from "caution" which never happened last year. He's changed and not in a good way.
9/10, you honestly embarrass yourself with this drivel.
I wouldn't give Starmer 9/10, I wouldn't give Blair 9/10!
Indeed I agree, as far as I know you've never written even a single negative comment about Starmer, you've been 100% positive towards him.
So my rating of Boris at his prime is quite literally a decimation for Boris relative to how you treat Starmer.
I don't know why people persist with the myth that Christmas has anything to do with a baby two thousand years ago.
I know, it’s the same at Easter. You can be perfectly happy eating chocolate mini eggs and using a few days off to redecorate the spare room, yet these annoying killjoys keep trying to bring religion into it.
Personally I think we need to take Easter back to its pagan roots. I am sick of it being perverted by all these recent add ons about crucifixions and caves.
It would be nice if schools could educate people about the real histories of holidays. There is some historical evidence to show that 25 December was a holiday to celebrity a birthday, but it was celebrating the birth of the Zoroastrian sun god Mithra not a baby.
The interconnections of a Persian sun god [as perceived by the Romans], Roman traditions and the Norse traditions all form a fascinating history of the festival we now know as Christmas and the traditions of food, merriment, drink and gifts etc that go with that have been celebrated now for well over two and a half thousand years.
Except for when the Puritans tried and failed to cancel it. So that brings cancel culture into the conversation too.
I wonder who was there to record Mithra's birth on 25th December? All this stuff is made up anyway so it doesn't really matter in the end which religion has overwritten the previous one. I like to see it as a way to celebrate the passing of the shortest day of the year and that Spring will be on the way.
Oh absolutely that's what its about. That's what its always been about.
Its just amusing when people bemoan feasting and drinking and gift giving etc as not being "the true meaning" of the holiday.
They literally are "the true meaning" and have been for about two and a half thousand years at least, minus the puritan era.
When the Church adopted Saturnalia as the birth of Jesus, society kept all the Pagan festivities which have largely passed through to today, despite the best wishes of the Puritans to stamp them out.
It’s funny how non-believers feel the need to denigrate other people’s faith.
It suggests a certain lack of confidence
I'm an agnostic, but I have the greatest respect for the moral teachings of Jesus, and envy those blessed with the certainty of belief*.
* Belief meaning certainty of either the existence or non-existence of God.
My facebook-friend-vicar usually posts lengthily at this time of year on the subject of how we've got the Christmas Story all wrong and the circumstances actually weren't small and unpromising and humble but great and triumphant, and God had provided the best entrance into the world possible for his son/himself; I often think that while he knows more theology than anyone else I might know, and he might technically be right, he is missing at least some aspects of the story's cultural significance beyond Christianity. But that's a separate point entirely.
Well I'm afraid your facebook-friend-vicar doesn't know as much theology as you seem to think, if that's his view.
Jesus was almost certainly not born in Bethlehem but in a humble little, and utterly insignificant, village called Nazareth near the important Sepphoris. When after his death the early followers decided, or believed, him to be their (latest) Christ it became a significant Messianic problem. The heir of David was supposed to have been born in Bethlehem according to one prophecy. The earliest gospel, Mark's, made no mention of Jesus' birth at all. Later, Luke, writing around 50 years after Jesus' death made up a census story (which is tripe) and shunted the holy family on a journey south to Bethlehem. He parked some shepherds into the manger to make it all seem very humble. Meanwhile Matthew, writing even later, decided to go the full monty on the kingly status of Jesus and made up a story about a star (which doesn't appear in Mark, Luke or John) and the Magi from the east (same).
The fact is that Jesus was a Northern nobody. His followers also had thick northern accents.
His birth was utterly humdrum.
The historicity of Jesus is a fascinating topic.
Do you mean 'the study of the historical Jesus?'
The 'historicity of Jesus' is a conspiracy theory by fundie pseudoscholars like Carrier, Murdock, Doherty and the Prices.
It’s a noun meaning historical authenticity. Don’t read anything more into it than that.
In New Testament studies it carries a definite meaning, I.e. the attempts to question whether Jesus was actually historically authentic. All such attempts having been consistently debunked as pseudoscholarly and in many cases actually fraudulent, peddled by religious fundies. So I'd advise you to steer clear of it.
Don't you mean atheist/anti-theist fundies? Be a bit strange if religious fundamentalists were peddling literature which questioned the existence of Jesus. But yeah, the majority of secular scholars - let alone actual Christian scholars - accept there was a historical Jesus, and those who don't are basically considered as reputable on the matter as Piers Corbyn is on Covid and Climatology.
Not really the question though is it. I’m happy to acknowledge his actual historical existence, but I’m a bit sceptical about all the loaves and fishes stuff - and I have to say I don’t really buy the idea that he was the son of God.
Well you could still be Jewish or Muslim then even if not Christian that does not necessarily mean you are an atheist. Obviously for Christians however we believe Christ is the Messiah and this period celebrates his birth, even if for non Christians it is mainly a festival to ease the arriving winter gloom
Glad to see the Govt is sorting out the major issues with the EU. I've got my blue passport (actually it is quite good) and now I will be able to buy pints of wine. Bliss.
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Yet who beat Corbyn, delivered Brexit and won the biggest Tory majority since Thatcher? BoJo. Which leader has the highest percentage of adults boosted in their nation in the G7? BoJo
And never forget @CorrectHorseBattery was a huge Corbyn fanbois and now champions Starmer
As for Boris I was fine with him until the Paterson debacle and I expect him to go in 2022
I've never seen Die Hard or Home Alone so could not usefully comment but they are right that The Muppet Christmas Carol is the greatest Christmas film. God bless us, every one!
Love the Muppet Christmas Carol but It's A Wonderful Life is the greatest Christmas film IMHO.
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Boris hasn't been a useless PM. He was a very good PM for his first two years.
He's been overwhelmed by events now. That didn't make him the wrong choice at the time, it means it's time for a new choice.
That's the advantage of democracy over alternatives. Even good leaders burn out and there needs to be a peaceful and orderly way to replace them.
He wasn't, he's been this terrible for years, you've just discovered it recently as the image of brilliance has warn off.
He negotiated a Brexit deal so terrible he's having to re-negotiate it because it doesn't work.
It was May and Robbins that fucked us over with the backstop and promising to sort out NI first which was arse over tit.
He negotiated a fantastic Brexit deal much better than anyone expected. It included Article 16 so it could be iterated into an even better one, which is now being done.
He then negotiated a great Trade Agreement that gives us zero tariffs and zero quotas and zero governance requirements to meet their rules.
Then his government handled Covid so well we were the first major country on the entire planet to get vaccinated. He also ensured that restrictions were withheld until absolutely necessary rather than putting them in prematurely.
Then in the Summer we were the only nation in Europe AFAIK and one of the only developed ones on the planet to remove all major restrictions.
9/10 for the first two years. Some mistakes made, but trivial stuff really.
It's the last couple of months where the wheels have come off. Now he's thinking of putting restrictions in from "caution" which never happened last year. He's changed and not in a good way.
9/10, you honestly embarrass yourself with this drivel.
I wouldn't give Starmer 9/10, I wouldn't give Blair 9/10!
Indeed I agree, as far as I know you've never written even a single negative comment about Starmer, you've been 100% positive towards him.
So my rating of Boris at his prime is quite literally a decimation for Boris relative to how you treat Starmer.
As usual you're not telling the truth.
During the early part of this year when his ratings were falling through the floor, I said he had a year to turn it around, or resign. His early Shadow Cabinets were poor, with people like Dodds, who I called a non-entity and I said it was ridiculous she was put there. He put a poor strategic team including comms into place and I said that.
He was responsible for a poor candidate in Hartlepool and had a poor elections team. That indeed was a very poor election.
So yes, I've written plenty negative about him. It is you who gives Johnson a 9/10 that needs interrogating, I can't believe you honestly think that.
Glad to see the Govt is sorting out the major issues with the EU. I've got my blue passport (actually it is quite good) and now I will be able to buy pints of wine. Bliss.
I don't think I have ever come across the expression "a pint of wine" outside accounts of the Royal Navy's rations in the 18th century. The Brexiters do like to go back in time, or so the unintended mental associations tell me ...
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Yet who beat Corbyn, delivered Brexit and won the biggest Tory majority since Thatcher? BoJo. Which leader has the highest percentage of adults boosted in their nation in the G7? BoJo
And never forget @CorrectHorseBattery was a huge Corbyn fanbois and now champions Starmer
As for Boris I was fine with him until the Paterson debacle and I expect him to go in 2022
I remember you calling for Johnson to resign last year and then magically when his ratings improved you were back on side.
You and Philip are the biggest Johnson fanboys here, so I will wear your accusations at me with pride.
As I said to you, I've voted Tory, Lib Dem and Labour.
Perhaps the Tories should try to appeal more to people under the age of 40, who they are currently losing at an incredible rate. I am sure they don't care but a party I could vote for surely isn't a bad thing.
There is a difficult debate coming down the line in the UK. The focus is on boosters which is a red herring.
The issue is the totally unvaxxed. It is this cohort that is filling up the hospitals.
So if we are to have further restrictions people will begin to look at these people and perhaps note their ethnicity.
And then there will be a debate about whether to lock everyone down on account of the unvaxxed or introduce vaxports or something else.
Whatever happens it will do nothing for national cohesion.
Yes, mandatory vax and a big increase in health spending thus capacity. These are the domestic biggies going forward. But 'vax the world let them know it's beat the pandemic time' should be top of the pops imo.
I don't know why people persist with the myth that Christmas has anything to do with a baby two thousand years ago.
I know, it’s the same at Easter. You can be perfectly happy eating chocolate mini eggs and using a few days off to redecorate the spare room, yet these annoying killjoys keep trying to bring religion into it.
Personally I think we need to take Easter back to its pagan roots. I am sick of it being perverted by all these recent add ons about crucifixions and caves.
It would be nice if schools could educate people about the real histories of holidays. There is some historical evidence to show that 25 December was a holiday to celebrity a birthday, but it was celebrating the birth of the Zoroastrian sun god Mithra not a baby.
The interconnections of a Persian sun god [as perceived by the Romans], Roman traditions and the Norse traditions all form a fascinating history of the festival we now know as Christmas and the traditions of food, merriment, drink and gifts etc that go with that have been celebrated now for well over two and a half thousand years.
Except for when the Puritans tried and failed to cancel it. So that brings cancel culture into the conversation too.
I wonder who was there to record Mithra's birth on 25th December? All this stuff is made up anyway so it doesn't really matter in the end which religion has overwritten the previous one. I like to see it as a way to celebrate the passing of the shortest day of the year and that Spring will be on the way.
Oh absolutely that's what its about. That's what its always been about.
Its just amusing when people bemoan feasting and drinking and gift giving etc as not being "the true meaning" of the holiday.
They literally are "the true meaning" and have been for about two and a half thousand years at least, minus the puritan era.
When the Church adopted Saturnalia as the birth of Jesus, society kept all the Pagan festivities which have largely passed through to today, despite the best wishes of the Puritans to stamp them out.
It’s funny how non-believers feel the need to denigrate other people’s faith.
It suggests a certain lack of confidence
I'm an agnostic, but I have the greatest respect for the moral teachings of Jesus, and envy those blessed with the certainty of belief*.
* Belief meaning certainty of either the existence or non-existence of God.
My facebook-friend-vicar usually posts lengthily at this time of year on the subject of how we've got the Christmas Story all wrong and the circumstances actually weren't small and unpromising and humble but great and triumphant, and God had provided the best entrance into the world possible for his son/himself; I often think that while he knows more theology than anyone else I might know, and he might technically be right, he is missing at least some aspects of the story's cultural significance beyond Christianity. But that's a separate point entirely.
Well I'm afraid your facebook-friend-vicar doesn't know as much theology as you seem to think, if that's his view.
Jesus was almost certainly not born in Bethlehem but in a humble little, and utterly insignificant, village called Nazareth near the important Sepphoris. When after his death the early followers decided, or believed, him to be their (latest) Christ it became a significant Messianic problem. The heir of David was supposed to have been born in Bethlehem according to one prophecy. The earliest gospel, Mark's, made no mention of Jesus' birth at all. Later, Luke, writing around 50 years after Jesus' death made up a census story (which is tripe) and shunted the holy family on a journey south to Bethlehem. He parked some shepherds into the manger to make it all seem very humble. Meanwhile Matthew, writing even later, decided to go the full monty on the kingly status of Jesus and made up a story about a star (which doesn't appear in Mark, Luke or John) and the Magi from the east (same).
The fact is that Jesus was a Northern nobody. His followers also had thick northern accents.
His birth was utterly humdrum.
The historicity of Jesus is a fascinating topic.
Do you mean 'the study of the historical Jesus?'
The 'historicity of Jesus' is a conspiracy theory by fundie pseudoscholars like Carrier, Murdock, Doherty and the Prices.
It’s a noun meaning historical authenticity. Don’t read anything more into it than that.
In New Testament studies it carries a definite meaning, I.e. the attempts to question whether Jesus was actually historically authentic. All such attempts having been consistently debunked as pseudoscholarly and in many cases actually fraudulent, peddled by religious fundies. So I'd advise you to steer clear of it.
Don't you mean atheist/anti-theist fundies? Be a bit strange if religious fundamentalists were peddling literature which questioned the existence of Jesus. But yeah, the majority of secular scholars - let alone actual Christian scholars - accept there was a historical Jesus, and those who don't are basically considered as reputable on the matter as Piers Corbyn is on Covid and Climatology.
Not really the question though is it. I’m happy to acknowledge his actual historical existence, but I’m a bit sceptical about all the loaves and fishes stuff - and I have to say I don’t really buy the idea that he was the son of God.
Sure, Christianity's supernatural and metaphysical claims are certainly a lot more questionable, to say the least. But it's still the case that there are some particularly virulent atheists who are sceptical about Jesus' existence. Including some posters on PB, I might add.
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Yet who beat Corbyn, delivered Brexit and won the biggest Tory majority since Thatcher? BoJo. Which leader has the highest percentage of adults boosted in their nation in the G7? BoJo
And never forget @CorrectHorseBattery was a huge Corbyn fanbois and now champions Starmer
As for Boris I was fine with him until the Paterson debacle and I expect him to go in 2022
I remember you calling for Johnson to resign last year and then magically when his ratings improved you were back on side.
You and Philip are the biggest Johnson fanboys here, so I will wear your accusations at me with pride.
As I said to you, I've voted Tory, Lib Dem and Labour.
You're right I'm a fan of 2019 Boris. That's because I liked what 2019 Boris stood for. I opposed May and IDS and voted against May and Hague.
That doesn't make me a partisan, it makes me someone who likes or liked Boris.
You're a partisan. You mirror the Labour Party. If it's Corbyn in charge then Corbyn is great, once he's gone he was awful.
I had the self awareness to oppose Theresa May from before she became PM until she resigned because I don't like what the authoritarianism she stands for.
Perhaps the Tories should try to appeal more to people under the age of 40, who they are currently losing at an incredible rate. I am sure they don't care but a party I could vote for surely isn't a bad thing.
Thatcher managed it
Boris won a landslide despite losing most voters under 39.
Thatcher and Cameron in 2010 did win voters over 25 but they did not win pensioners by as big a margin as Boris did
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Boris hasn't been a useless PM. He was a very good PM for his first two years.
He's been overwhelmed by events now. That didn't make him the wrong choice at the time, it means it's time for a new choice.
That's the advantage of democracy over alternatives. Even good leaders burn out and there needs to be a peaceful and orderly way to replace them.
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Yet who beat Corbyn, delivered Brexit and won the biggest Tory majority since Thatcher? BoJo. Which leader has the highest percentage of adults boosted in their nation in the G7? BoJo
And never forget @CorrectHorseBattery was a huge Corbyn fanbois and now champions Starmer
As for Boris I was fine with him until the Paterson debacle and I expect him to go in 2022
I remember you calling for Johnson to resign last year and then magically when his ratings improved you were back on side.
You and Philip are the biggest Johnson fanboys here, so I will wear your accusations at me with pride.
As I said to you, I've voted Tory, Lib Dem and Labour.
You're right I'm a fan of 2019 Boris. That's because I liked what 2019 Boris stood for. I opposed May and IDS and voted against May and Hague.
That doesn't make me a partisan, it makes me someone who likes or liked Boris.
You're a partisan. You mirror the Labour Party. If it's Corbyn in charge then Corbyn is great, once he's gone he was awful.
I had the self awareness to oppose Theresa May from before she became PM until she resigned because I don't like what the authoritarianism she stands for.
Can you see the difference?
You're a partisan, literally the most hyper-partisan person here.
We're just going around and around in circles, I'll agree to disagree with you on this
I don't know why people persist with the myth that Christmas has anything to do with a baby two thousand years ago.
I know, it’s the same at Easter. You can be perfectly happy eating chocolate mini eggs and using a few days off to redecorate the spare room, yet these annoying killjoys keep trying to bring religion into it.
Personally I think we need to take Easter back to its pagan roots. I am sick of it being perverted by all these recent add ons about crucifixions and caves.
It would be nice if schools could educate people about the real histories of holidays. There is some historical evidence to show that 25 December was a holiday to celebrity a birthday, but it was celebrating the birth of the Zoroastrian sun god Mithra not a baby.
The interconnections of a Persian sun god [as perceived by the Romans], Roman traditions and the Norse traditions all form a fascinating history of the festival we now know as Christmas and the traditions of food, merriment, drink and gifts etc that go with that have been celebrated now for well over two and a half thousand years.
Except for when the Puritans tried and failed to cancel it. So that brings cancel culture into the conversation too.
I wonder who was there to record Mithra's birth on 25th December? All this stuff is made up anyway so it doesn't really matter in the end which religion has overwritten the previous one. I like to see it as a way to celebrate the passing of the shortest day of the year and that Spring will be on the way.
Oh absolutely that's what its about. That's what its always been about.
Its just amusing when people bemoan feasting and drinking and gift giving etc as not being "the true meaning" of the holiday.
They literally are "the true meaning" and have been for about two and a half thousand years at least, minus the puritan era.
When the Church adopted Saturnalia as the birth of Jesus, society kept all the Pagan festivities which have largely passed through to today, despite the best wishes of the Puritans to stamp them out.
It’s funny how non-believers feel the need to denigrate other people’s faith.
It suggests a certain lack of confidence
I'm an agnostic, but I have the greatest respect for the moral teachings of Jesus, and envy those blessed with the certainty of belief*.
* Belief meaning certainty of either the existence or non-existence of God.
I'm agnostic too, but IMO it's important for agnostics and atheists to know about religion as well - if only because it matters to others.
I'd argue my little 'un's school (state) is teaching religion rather well. There are Christians, Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs in his year, but no Jews to our knowledge. After our 2K run the other day, we were walking home and he told me about the history of Hanukkah and the Maccabees. I knew none of this, and he loved the story and the history. I love it when my son teaches me things!
We then got into a conversation about why some kids might not want people to know their religion, particularly in certain countries. His reaction: "That's stupid!".
I missed a few threads. Did Leon end up having a true spiritual experience after his jungle juice as many do, or did he interpret it as a manifestation of his own subconscious?
He met God. So, a manifestation of his own subconscious, yeah.
Having "experimented" a bit myself in my younger days, I still have moments where I wonder if I'm actually still twenty years old, all of this is a hallucination, and in reality I'm just twitching away on my mate's floor, at any moment liable to wake up.
Don't do drugs, kids.
But if you woke up, 20 years old, with all you know...
Straight to the bookies!
Use what you know to make a bit of money, then search out the young Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates - and be one of their first backers.....
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Yet who beat Corbyn, delivered Brexit and won the biggest Tory majority since Thatcher? BoJo. Which leader has the highest percentage of adults boosted in their nation in the G7? BoJo
And never forget @CorrectHorseBattery was a huge Corbyn fanbois and now champions Starmer
As for Boris I was fine with him until the Paterson debacle and I expect him to go in 2022
I remember you calling for Johnson to resign last year and then magically when his ratings improved you were back on side.
You and Philip are the biggest Johnson fanboys here, so I will wear your accusations at me with pride.
As I said to you, I've voted Tory, Lib Dem and Labour.
You are talking nonsense again - both @BartholomewRoberts and myself are wholly against Boris and I have already been had a two way text chat with my mp , who is a personal friend, to seek Boris's resignation
You do not seem to to be capable of understanding that for many Boris was fine, but that for me the Paterson debacle was just unacceptable and also the sleaze and wallpaper gate
Indeed everyone in my family want him replaced and we will continue to seek that conclusion
I don't know why people persist with the myth that Christmas has anything to do with a baby two thousand years ago.
I know, it’s the same at Easter. You can be perfectly happy eating chocolate mini eggs and using a few days off to redecorate the spare room, yet these annoying killjoys keep trying to bring religion into it.
Personally I think we need to take Easter back to its pagan roots. I am sick of it being perverted by all these recent add ons about crucifixions and caves.
It would be nice if schools could educate people about the real histories of holidays. There is some historical evidence to show that 25 December was a holiday to celebrity a birthday, but it was celebrating the birth of the Zoroastrian sun god Mithra not a baby.
The interconnections of a Persian sun god [as perceived by the Romans], Roman traditions and the Norse traditions all form a fascinating history of the festival we now know as Christmas and the traditions of food, merriment, drink and gifts etc that go with that have been celebrated now for well over two and a half thousand years.
Except for when the Puritans tried and failed to cancel it. So that brings cancel culture into the conversation too.
I wonder who was there to record Mithra's birth on 25th December? All this stuff is made up anyway so it doesn't really matter in the end which religion has overwritten the previous one. I like to see it as a way to celebrate the passing of the shortest day of the year and that Spring will be on the way.
Oh absolutely that's what its about. That's what its always been about.
Its just amusing when people bemoan feasting and drinking and gift giving etc as not being "the true meaning" of the holiday.
They literally are "the true meaning" and have been for about two and a half thousand years at least, minus the puritan era.
When the Church adopted Saturnalia as the birth of Jesus, society kept all the Pagan festivities which have largely passed through to today, despite the best wishes of the Puritans to stamp them out.
It’s funny how non-believers feel the need to denigrate other people’s faith.
It suggests a certain lack of confidence
I'm an agnostic, but I have the greatest respect for the moral teachings of Jesus, and envy those blessed with the certainty of belief*.
* Belief meaning certainty of either the existence or non-existence of God.
My facebook-friend-vicar usually posts lengthily at this time of year on the subject of how we've got the Christmas Story all wrong and the circumstances actually weren't small and unpromising and humble but great and triumphant, and God had provided the best entrance into the world possible for his son/himself; I often think that while he knows more theology than anyone else I might know, and he might technically be right, he is missing at least some aspects of the story's cultural significance beyond Christianity. But that's a separate point entirely.
Well I'm afraid your facebook-friend-vicar doesn't know as much theology as you seem to think, if that's his view.
Jesus was almost certainly not born in Bethlehem but in a humble little, and utterly insignificant, village called Nazareth near the important Sepphoris. When after his death the early followers decided, or believed, him to be their (latest) Christ it became a significant Messianic problem. The heir of David was supposed to have been born in Bethlehem according to one prophecy. The earliest gospel, Mark's, made no mention of Jesus' birth at all. Later, Luke, writing around 50 years after Jesus' death made up a census story (which is tripe) and shunted the holy family on a journey south to Bethlehem. He parked some shepherds into the manger to make it all seem very humble. Meanwhile Matthew, writing even later, decided to go the full monty on the kingly status of Jesus and made up a story about a star (which doesn't appear in Mark, Luke or John) and the Magi from the east (same).
The fact is that Jesus was a Northern nobody. His followers also had thick northern accents.
His birth was utterly humdrum.
The historicity of Jesus is a fascinating topic.
Do you mean 'the study of the historical Jesus?'
The 'historicity of Jesus' is a conspiracy theory by fundie pseudoscholars like Carrier, Murdock, Doherty and the Prices.
It’s a noun meaning historical authenticity. Don’t read anything more into it than that.
In New Testament studies it carries a definite meaning, I.e. the attempts to question whether Jesus was actually historically authentic. All such attempts having been consistently debunked as pseudoscholarly and in many cases actually fraudulent, peddled by religious fundies. So I'd advise you to steer clear of it.
Don't you mean atheist/anti-theist fundies? Be a bit strange if religious fundamentalists were peddling literature which questioned the existence of Jesus. But yeah, the majority of secular scholars - let alone actual Christian scholars - accept there was a historical Jesus, and those who don't are basically considered as reputable on the matter as Piers Corbyn is on Covid and Climatology.
Not really the question though is it. I’m happy to acknowledge his actual historical existence, but I’m a bit sceptical about all the loaves and fishes stuff - and I have to say I don’t really buy the idea that he was the son of God.
One thing I don't get is the whole "Born of David's line" business. If you go along with the whole virgin birth malarkey then he wasn't Joseph's biological son, so not of David's line.
I appreciate that there is one school of thought that 'virgin' was a mis-translation of 'young woman'.
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Yet who beat Corbyn, delivered Brexit and won the biggest Tory majority since Thatcher? BoJo. Which leader has the highest percentage of adults boosted in their nation in the G7? BoJo
And never forget @CorrectHorseBattery was a huge Corbyn fanbois and now champions Starmer
As for Boris I was fine with him until the Paterson debacle and I expect him to go in 2022
I remember you calling for Johnson to resign last year and then magically when his ratings improved you were back on side.
You and Philip are the biggest Johnson fanboys here, so I will wear your accusations at me with pride.
As I said to you, I've voted Tory, Lib Dem and Labour.
You do yourself no favours CHB.
Yesterday you responded to me saying you were a Socialist and less than 10 mins later you described yourself as a Social Democrat.
This morning you reveal you have voted Tory.
What were the circumstances that you voted Tory. Just asking for a friend!
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Yet who beat Corbyn, delivered Brexit and won the biggest Tory majority since Thatcher? BoJo. Which leader has the highest percentage of adults boosted in their nation in the G7? BoJo
And never forget @CorrectHorseBattery was a huge Corbyn fanbois and now champions Starmer
As for Boris I was fine with him until the Paterson debacle and I expect him to go in 2022
I remember you calling for Johnson to resign last year and then magically when his ratings improved you were back on side.
You and Philip are the biggest Johnson fanboys here, so I will wear your accusations at me with pride.
As I said to you, I've voted Tory, Lib Dem and Labour.
You do yourself no favours CHB.
Yesterday you responded to me saying you were a Socialist and less than 10 mins later you described yourself as a Social Democrat.
This morning you reveal you have voted Tory.
What were the circumstances that you voted Tory. Just asking for a friend!
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Yet who beat Corbyn, delivered Brexit and won the biggest Tory majority since Thatcher? BoJo. Which leader has the highest percentage of adults boosted in their nation in the G7? BoJo
And never forget @CorrectHorseBattery was a huge Corbyn fanbois and now champions Starmer
As for Boris I was fine with him until the Paterson debacle and I expect him to go in 2022
I remember you calling for Johnson to resign last year and then magically when his ratings improved you were back on side.
You and Philip are the biggest Johnson fanboys here, so I will wear your accusations at me with pride.
As I said to you, I've voted Tory, Lib Dem and Labour.
You do yourself no favours CHB.
Yesterday you responded to me saying you were a Socialist and less than 10 mins later you described yourself as a Social Democrat.
This morning you reveal you have voted Tory.
What were the circumstances that you voted Tory. Just asking for a friend!
Anyone know if there has actually been any shortages of turkeys, wine, chocolates etc etc etc this Christmas?
The fact the media isn't jammed full of stories of such, with voxpops of maureen of margate outraged, i think probably answers this question....10 Petrol stations changing over to a new fuel is enough for them to announce total fuel shortage meltdown reports, and actually cause a shortage.
Very happy to go over the elections in which I've voted Tory and Lib Dem in the past.
This feels very much like the Labour Party meetings I attended at the end of the Corbyn project when people were saying "we don't want those Tory votes anyway".
Perhaps you should do more to try and win the votes of people like me, they may be up for grabs one day
It does put a rather large dent in one's credibility, when they claim that they are surprised that BoJo turned out to be a totally useless PM when literally from the day he ran to be leader, most of us said this would be the outcome. It is why so many left the Tory Party.
Yet who beat Corbyn, delivered Brexit and won the biggest Tory majority since Thatcher? BoJo. Which leader has the highest percentage of adults boosted in their nation in the G7? BoJo
And never forget @CorrectHorseBattery was a huge Corbyn fanbois and now champions Starmer
As for Boris I was fine with him until the Paterson debacle and I expect him to go in 2022
I remember you calling for Johnson to resign last year and then magically when his ratings improved you were back on side.
You and Philip are the biggest Johnson fanboys here, so I will wear your accusations at me with pride.
As I said to you, I've voted Tory, Lib Dem and Labour.
You're right I'm a fan of 2019 Boris. That's because I liked what 2019 Boris stood for. I opposed May and IDS and voted against May and Hague.
That doesn't make me a partisan, it makes me someone who likes or liked Boris.
You're a partisan. You mirror the Labour Party. If it's Corbyn in charge then Corbyn is great, once he's gone he was awful.
I had the self awareness to oppose Theresa May from before she became PM until she resigned because I don't like what the authoritarianism she stands for.
Can you see the difference?
You're a partisan, literally the most hyper-partisan person here.
We're just going around and around in circles, I'll agree to disagree with you on this
If I'm a partisan why did I oppose Theresa May and William Hague and vote against them both? 🙄
I don't know why people persist with the myth that Christmas has anything to do with a baby two thousand years ago.
I know, it’s the same at Easter. You can be perfectly happy eating chocolate mini eggs and using a few days off to redecorate the spare room, yet these annoying killjoys keep trying to bring religion into it.
Personally I think we need to take Easter back to its pagan roots. I am sick of it being perverted by all these recent add ons about crucifixions and caves.
It would be nice if schools could educate people about the real histories of holidays. There is some historical evidence to show that 25 December was a holiday to celebrity a birthday, but it was celebrating the birth of the Zoroastrian sun god Mithra not a baby.
The interconnections of a Persian sun god [as perceived by the Romans], Roman traditions and the Norse traditions all form a fascinating history of the festival we now know as Christmas and the traditions of food, merriment, drink and gifts etc that go with that have been celebrated now for well over two and a half thousand years.
Except for when the Puritans tried and failed to cancel it. So that brings cancel culture into the conversation too.
I wonder who was there to record Mithra's birth on 25th December? All this stuff is made up anyway so it doesn't really matter in the end which religion has overwritten the previous one. I like to see it as a way to celebrate the passing of the shortest day of the year and that Spring will be on the way.
Oh absolutely that's what its about. That's what its always been about.
Its just amusing when people bemoan feasting and drinking and gift giving etc as not being "the true meaning" of the holiday.
They literally are "the true meaning" and have been for about two and a half thousand years at least, minus the puritan era.
When the Church adopted Saturnalia as the birth of Jesus, society kept all the Pagan festivities which have largely passed through to today, despite the best wishes of the Puritans to stamp them out.
It’s funny how non-believers feel the need to denigrate other people’s faith.
It suggests a certain lack of confidence
I'm an agnostic, but I have the greatest respect for the moral teachings of Jesus, and envy those blessed with the certainty of belief*.
* Belief meaning certainty of either the existence or non-existence of God.
My facebook-friend-vicar usually posts lengthily at this time of year on the subject of how we've got the Christmas Story all wrong and the circumstances actually weren't small and unpromising and humble but great and triumphant, and God had provided the best entrance into the world possible for his son/himself; I often think that while he knows more theology than anyone else I might know, and he might technically be right, he is missing at least some aspects of the story's cultural significance beyond Christianity. But that's a separate point entirely.
Well I'm afraid your facebook-friend-vicar doesn't know as much theology as you seem to think, if that's his view.
Jesus was almost certainly not born in Bethlehem but in a humble little, and utterly insignificant, village called Nazareth near the important Sepphoris. When after his death the early followers decided, or believed, him to be their (latest) Christ it became a significant Messianic problem. The heir of David was supposed to have been born in Bethlehem according to one prophecy. The earliest gospel, Mark's, made no mention of Jesus' birth at all. Later, Luke, writing around 50 years after Jesus' death made up a census story (which is tripe) and shunted the holy family on a journey south to Bethlehem. He parked some shepherds into the manger to make it all seem very humble. Meanwhile Matthew, writing even later, decided to go the full monty on the kingly status of Jesus and made up a story about a star (which doesn't appear in Mark, Luke or John) and the Magi from the east (same).
The fact is that Jesus was a Northern nobody. His followers also had thick northern accents.
His birth was utterly humdrum.
The historicity of Jesus is a fascinating topic.
Do you mean 'the study of the historical Jesus?'
The 'historicity of Jesus' is a conspiracy theory by fundie pseudoscholars like Carrier, Murdock, Doherty and the Prices.
It’s a noun meaning historical authenticity. Don’t read anything more into it than that.
In New Testament studies it carries a definite meaning, I.e. the attempts to question whether Jesus was actually historically authentic. All such attempts having been consistently debunked as pseudoscholarly and in many cases actually fraudulent, peddled by religious fundies. So I'd advise you to steer clear of it.
Don't you mean atheist/anti-theist fundies? Be a bit strange if religious fundamentalists were peddling literature which questioned the existence of Jesus. But yeah, the majority of secular scholars - let alone actual Christian scholars - accept there was a historical Jesus, and those who don't are basically considered as reputable on the matter as Piers Corbyn is on Covid and Climatology.
Not really the question though is it. I’m happy to acknowledge his actual historical existence, but I’m a bit sceptical about all the loaves and fishes stuff - and I have to say I don’t really buy the idea that he was the son of God.
Sure, Christianity's supernatural and metaphysical claims are certainly a lot more questionable, to say the least. But it's still the case that there are some particularly virulent atheists who are sceptical about Jesus' existence. Including some posters on PB, I might add.
I’m actually not that hostile to Christianity. In fact, I find Catholicism quite attractive: it’s long history, global reach, an ideology that offers a more attractive alternative to capitalist materialism - and I genuinely admire the current Pope. I attended a Xmas mass in the church off Marylebone High Street a couple of years’ ago, and enjoyed the sense of community, and the opportunity for peaceful contemplation. I thought I could even potentially start attending weekly. But then I saw that at the Church door a collection of leaflets opposing abortion, and it put me right off.
Anyone know if there has actually been any shortages of turkeys, wine, chocolates etc etc etc this Christmas?
The fact the media isn't jammed full of stories of such, with voxpops of maureen of margate outraged, i think probably answers this question....10 Petrol stations changing over to a new fuel is enough for them to announce total fuel shortage meltdown reports, and actually cause a shortage.
LOL! Probably!
But given our blessed media has the attention span of a gnat and how the focus has been on Omicron, I thought I'd throw the question out there lol!
Keir Starmer suggests Labour will hold back in seats where the Liberal Democrats are best placed to defeat Tory MPs at the next election
This intvw with @ayeshahazarika is the furthest he's gone to suggest an informal pact with other opposition parties
This would clearly be a sensible move - but let's see if this actually goes ahead as we've heard this before
Capitulation
Common sense - if Farage had stood down in the last election Boris would have had a 120 seat majority rather than 80.
There are a whole set of seats where it makes sense for Labour to stand down and use their campaigners in a neighbouring seat. For instance let the Lib Dems have Chesham, Beaconsfield and St Albans while labour focus on Hemel Hempstead, High Wycombe, Watford and Uxbridge.
Keir Starmer suggests Labour will hold back in seats where the Liberal Democrats are best placed to defeat Tory MPs at the next election
This intvw with @ayeshahazarika is the furthest he's gone to suggest an informal pact with other opposition parties
This would clearly be a sensible move - but let's see if this actually goes ahead as we've heard this before
Capitulation
Common sense - if Farage had stood down in the last election Boris would have had a 120 seat majority rather than 80.
There are a whole set of seats where it makes sense for Labour to stand down and use their campaigners in a neighbouring seat. For instance let the Lib Dems have Chesham, Beaconsfield and St Albans while labour focus on Hemel Hempstead, High Wycombe, Watford and Uxbridge.
It is utterly pointless from a Labour POV, putting any money into Guildford and Winchester.
Below I wrote that I thought Stephen Gough, the Naked Rambler, was a bit of a numpty.
The question is *why* I thought that (I still do, BTW): although it's not an easy question. Why did Gough not get much support (fnarr fnarr), when Speedo Mick has raised hundreds of thousands for charity ? Is it just that one had underpants on, whilst the other was fully nude? The fact one was raising money for charity, whilst the other was doing it for a cause?
It's not through prudery - nakedness doesn't bother me much. There's a traffic safety issue: people might be surprised to see someone naked and crash, but that's remote IMO. So why is he a numpty?
Mainly, I think it's because: *) He made it about *him*. He had a cause, but it seemed to be secondary. That might be related to: *) IMO he was not very persuasive during interviews. *) He did not know when to stop. Repeatedly insisting on being naked, and ending up in jail, makes it seem more like some form of weird mental illness than a cause. His kids suffered from his near ten yeas in jail. *) His is not what I would call a major cause. It is not exactly universal suffrage.
But neither do I think sending him to jail for ten years (in short terms) does much good for society, either.
I do wonder if a more persuasive person could have done much more with his cause.
Anyone know if there has actually been any shortages of turkeys, wine, chocolates etc etc etc this Christmas?
The fact the media isn't jammed full of stories of such, with voxpops of maureen of margate outraged, i think probably answers this question....10 Petrol stations changing over to a new fuel is enough for them to announce total fuel shortage meltdown reports, and actually cause a shortage.
Anyone know if there has actually been any shortages of turkeys, wine, chocolates etc etc etc this Christmas?
The fact the media isn't jammed full of stories of such, with voxpops of maureen of margate outraged, i think probably answers this question....10 Petrol stations changing over to a new fuel is enough for them to announce total fuel shortage meltdown reports, and actually cause a shortage.
LOL! Probably! But given our blessed media has the attention span of a gnat and how the focus has been on Omicron, I thought I'd throw the question out there lol!
The fuel crisis was frankly disgraceful. Up their with Peston causing a run on a bank.
The industry figures showed that when there was all the reports of shortages, the supply / demand across the network was perfectly adequate. Then there was the doom ladden reports, caused a massive spike in demand and of course 2 weeks later demand had totally dropped off with the same supply ad before.
Now there was an issue with the changing over of the fuel type and there isn't much / any headroom due to driver shortages across the industry, due to Brexit, pay and conditions, IR35 changes, insurance, lack of tests due to COVID.
But there wasn't a fuel shortage until the media caused it, based on something like 10 petrol stations being out for a day. There was still plenty of fuel across the 1000s of other petrol stations for everybody who wanted it
Keir Starmer suggests Labour will hold back in seats where the Liberal Democrats are best placed to defeat Tory MPs at the next election
This intvw with @ayeshahazarika is the furthest he's gone to suggest an informal pact with other opposition parties
This would clearly be a sensible move - but let's see if this actually goes ahead as we've heard this before
Capitulation
Common sense - if Farage had stood down in the last election Boris would have had a 120 seat majority rather than 80.
There are a whole set of seats where it makes sense for Labour to stand down and use their campaigners in a neighbouring seat. For instance let the Lib Dems have Chesham, Beaconsfield and St Albans while labour focus on Hemel Hempstead, High Wycombe, Watford and Uxbridge.
It is utterly pointless from a Labour POV, putting any money into Guildford and Winchester.
In a local sense, yes, of course. From a national perspective, it gives the impression that Labour aren't a standalone political party, and voting for them - anywhere - is a vote for some ill-defined coalition on terms yet to be agreed with parties you may not actually like or want to be in government. Meanwhile, since the Labour party has clearly given up on winning a majority on its own accord, and on governing for the entire country, their manifesto is worthless, because they'll be ale to junk any bits of it they weren't serious about and blame their coalition partners.
Difficult decision ahead in terms of whether to give a 4th vaccine with the immunity of the booster waning after 10 weeks.
Do we start giving out a 4th jab in the New Year particularly aimed at the over 60s, those vulnerable and those who work in healthcare settings who had their boosters back in October and November. This is what Israel is starting to do right now and we have followed their lead often during this pandemic.
Or do we wait for an Omicron designed vaccine from Pfizer, Moderna et al.
The worry is that Omicron is mainly affecting the young right now as the vaccine wall from the booster is protecting older people and those vulnerable. But the vaccine could be about to wane for millions of people in the demographic groups in which we don't know what Omicron's real severity is. Look at the research including the Scotland study, not enough data when it comes to people over 65 and how they fare with Omicron.
Get Christmas out at the way first but the government needs to be on the ball with this in the new year.
Hang on:
In an individual, vaccine efficacy (ignoring for a moment different variants) is *always* changing.
During the initial post injection period, antibody response rises and rises... then after a certain point, it starts to slowly decline.
So (lazily using efficacy number), you might have someone who has 60% protection against symptomatic Delta at the point of booster. Over the following - say - three weeks that will rise to 95% or so. It will then start to wane at a rate of (say) 1.5% per week. (Not 1.5 percentage points, 1.5%.)
That means it'll take eight to nine months before you get back to the efficacy pre-booster.
The question - therefore - is "at what efficacy level do you think you need to boost protection again?"
80% against hospitalisation? 75%?
What's the figure?
More important, perhaps, are:
-supply (though this never seems to be an issue ) -public sentiment
As pointed out below, it doesn't seem like we will ever reach herd immunity due to re-infection. In the minds of many young people, myself included, the social contract was that restrictions would ease as boosters were delivered.
Hibs fans and, weirdly, Roddy Dunlop both pointed this breach out yesterday. What's the point in 3, 4, 5 jabs for young people if we make no progress towards normality?
You won't find me cycling out to the Royal Highland show in the rain again to get jab number 4.
"What's the point in 3, 4, 5 jabs for young people if we make no progress towards normality?"
Are you living in some parallel universe?
Normality is 90% back.
Yeah, we have to wear masks on public transport, and in shops. There's the stupid dance on the way to the bathrooms with putting on the mask.
But other than that... well, what's changed?
Dunno how things differ in California but it certainly doesn’t feel 90% normal here.
Yes, but that's not due to government diktat: that's due to people changing their behaviour.
People stop going out when they worry. It's why diseases have these curious waves.
The behavioural changes I’ve seen are nothing to do with worry about getting sick but worry about being told to isolate at home for a sniffle. And that’s a direct consequence of government diktat.
LFTs are free.
You have a sniffle, you spend 5 minutes and check if you have Covid and are infectious.
And if you are you are then imprisoned in your home for a week to ten days for a sniffle, even if you're feeling fit and healthy.
Yes. Because most people aren't the kind of Total Phil that thinks infecting all and sundry is a good idea.
They are responsible even if you are not.
Most people are willing to go out if they have the sniffles.
Quite reasonably too.
Not with Covid they're not. I believe the appropriate phrase is "oh bollocks"
You are not - and never will be - anything other than a tiny supposedly libertarian voice singing the song of Piers Corbyn.
How would you know most people are not, when its never been legal to do so?
You also claimed most people liked masks but when it was legal to not wear one, most people didn't.
I fully expect the requirement to stay at home to be dropped next year and when it is, I expect only a minority will stay at home with the sniffles.
Just to remind you - Covid is a serious disease, quite apart from the mortality. Remember Long Covid. There is an apposite piece just out in the Graun:
All lies. People Die, So What. And should die. For Phil's personal bodily fluids liberty. He's as bad as Piers Corbyn.
That's a lie.
Piers Corbyn is unhinged and tells deranged untruths to deny Covid or the vaccinations.
I don't deny Covid. I'm OK to live with it. That's entirely different.
But you are denying Covid. Endlessly. Bemoaning people who have Covid not being allowed out with "the sniffles"
That's not denying Covid, that's a different prioritisation. Many people have no worse than the sniffles when Covid-positive.
I fully expect this battle to be won and by this time next year people with Covid sniffles will not be staying at home because it won't be legally mandated. Those with a semi-serious case will rest up with bed rest just as those with the flu or a bad cold have always done if they need to do so. But those with mild cases should and ultimately will be allowed to go about their business.
Yes, we will transition to that but you're jumping the gun. Have a little patience. Hold onto a rational perspective. Don't become a fruitcake.
That mild ticking off duly rendered, and since it's Christmas, I'll add a stonking great positive. Hats off to your id change. The Philip Thompson back catalogue consists of the best part of 100k posts. To ditch it, effectively throwing away all of the kudos and authority that came with it, and start again from scratch as Bartholomew Roberts is very principled and brave.
I tried to think of an equivalently radical move from other fields and the 2 which sprung to mind are Cat Stevens at the height of his fame becoming Yusuf Islam and Nick Faldo remodelling his entire golf swing despite already being the European number 1.
Dylan going electric with Bringing It All Back Home.
Dylan acoustic? Shit Dylan electric? Shit
Never every understood why everyone goes on about him.
Keir Starmer suggests Labour will hold back in seats where the Liberal Democrats are best placed to defeat Tory MPs at the next election
This intvw with @ayeshahazarika is the furthest he's gone to suggest an informal pact with other opposition parties
This would clearly be a sensible move - but let's see if this actually goes ahead as we've heard this before
Capitulation
Common sense - if Farage had stood down in the last election Boris would have had a 120 seat majority rather than 80.
There are a whole set of seats where it makes sense for Labour to stand down and use their campaigners in a neighbouring seat. For instance let the Lib Dems have Chesham, Beaconsfield and St Albans while labour focus on Hemel Hempstead, High Wycombe, Watford and Uxbridge.
It is utterly pointless from a Labour POV, putting any money into Guildford and Winchester.
If you are a Corbynite only a Labour majority will do. After the LDs went into government with the Tories in 2010 for them a vote for the LDs rather than Labour is just a vote for Tory lite
Keir Starmer suggests Labour will hold back in seats where the Liberal Democrats are best placed to defeat Tory MPs at the next election
This intvw with @ayeshahazarika is the furthest he's gone to suggest an informal pact with other opposition parties
This would clearly be a sensible move - but let's see if this actually goes ahead as we've heard this before
Capitulation
Common sense - if Farage had stood down in the last election Boris would have had a 120 seat majority rather than 80.
There are a whole set of seats where it makes sense for Labour to stand down and use their campaigners in a neighbouring seat. For instance let the Lib Dems have Chesham, Beaconsfield and St Albans while labour focus on Hemel Hempstead, High Wycombe, Watford and Uxbridge.
It is utterly pointless from a Labour POV, putting any money into Guildford and Winchester.
In a local sense, yes, of course. From a national perspective, it gives the impression that Labour aren't a standalone political party, and voting for them - anywhere - is a vote for some ill-defined coalition on terms yet to be agreed with parties you may not actually like or want to be in government. Meanwhile, since the Labour party has clearly given up on winning a majority on its own accord, and on governing for the entire country, their manifesto is worthless, because they'll be ale to junk any bits of it they weren't serious about and blame their coalition partners.
That wasn't the case in 1997, when Labour won a landslide.
They didn't really try then in certain seats, they weren't seen then as not trying to win
Today we’ve published interim estimates of #COVID19 positivity between 13 and 19 December 2021.
The number of people testing positive for COVID-19 increased in all four UK nations, as did the number of infections compatible with the Omicron variant http://ow.ly/OCLA50HiM6t
Comments
“ on it, but not “1 pint”, or perhaps it was actually banned. Wine from Jura often comes in a 62cl “clavelin” bottle, so that at least was grandfathered in.
There then ensued a comic exchange between the crew and the rambler:
"I'm sorry, sir, you can't stay like that".
"Why not?"
"You're disturbing the other passengers."
"There's no disturbance", pointing to the fact that everyone was deeply engrossed in their newspapers pretending not to notice.
In the end he remained starkers, and on landing was escorted off the plane by a very embarrassed policeman.
Probably not, as the smaller bottle means they can get away with selling you a bit less beer for the same price.
It also has the advantage of allowing a bit of space for a head when you pour it into a standard pint glass.
He's been overwhelmed by events now. That didn't make him the wrong choice at the time, it means it's time for a new choice.
That's the advantage of democracy over alternatives. Even good leaders burn out and there needs to be a peaceful and orderly way to replace them.
Funny old world.
He negotiated a Brexit deal so terrible he's having to re-negotiate it because it doesn't work.
I never said that, I just said we should be cautious and I hoped I was wrong. I already said I am glad to be - even though many accused me of wanting a lockdown
On 4 October 2021, I resigned from my role as the Deputy Head of Software Engineering for Web and Data at @UKHSA.
This means that 1 January 2022 will mark my final day in the agency — but *not* on the dashboard, so this is not goodbye.
...[1/10]
https://twitter.com/Pouriaaa/status/1474331094233362432?t=JOxAm3GmF6ew-LWXiIUoIw&s=19
Balfour Hush Heath
Gusbourne
It seems yellow wine has to be in the 62cl bottle. And a pint of wine in a bottle would be illegal. As would a half litre of sparkling wine, but not still wine. Whereas in a glass you could serve a pint of champagne, but not a pint of still wine. What a load of cobblers.
Apparently there is the village in Switzerland called Champagne who have made a still wine named after the village since the 1600s....
https://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2021/04/18/swiss-village-champagne-loses-another-fight-to-get-name-on-wine-.html
He negotiated a fantastic Brexit deal much better than anyone expected. It included Article 16 so it could be iterated into an even better one, which is now being done.
He then negotiated a great Trade Agreement that gives us zero tariffs and zero quotas and zero governance requirements to meet their rules.
Then his government handled Covid so well we were the first major country on the entire planet to get vaccinated. He also ensured that restrictions were withheld until absolutely necessary rather than putting them in prematurely.
Then in the Summer we were the only nation in Europe AFAIK and one of the only developed ones on the planet to remove all major restrictions.
9/10 for the first two years. Some mistakes made, but trivial stuff really.
It's the last couple of months where the wheels have come off. Now he's thinking of putting restrictions in from "caution" which never happened last year. He's changed and not in a good way.
But yeah, the majority of secular scholars - let alone actual Christian scholars - accept there was a historical Jesus, and those who don't are basically considered as reputable on the matter as Piers Corbyn is on Covid and Climatology.
I pointed out that this was not the best way of convincing me that I was wrong ...
I wouldn't give Starmer 9/10, I wouldn't give Blair 9/10!
I shall sipping a glass or two tomorrow before lunch.
Damn few left, as my grandmother used to say.
So my rating of Boris at his prime is quite literally a decimation for Boris relative to how you treat Starmer.
A bit tetchy here today, so I offer this Christmas morsel of cheer...
As for Boris I was fine with him until the Paterson debacle and I expect him to go in 2022
www.crisis.org.uk
The thought of being homeless in this weather and when every else is indoors at the dinner table is too much.
During the early part of this year when his ratings were falling through the floor, I said he had a year to turn it around, or resign. His early Shadow Cabinets were poor, with people like Dodds, who I called a non-entity and I said it was ridiculous she was put there. He put a poor strategic team including comms into place and I said that.
He was responsible for a poor candidate in Hartlepool and had a poor elections team. That indeed was a very poor election.
So yes, I've written plenty negative about him. It is you who gives Johnson a 9/10 that needs interrogating, I can't believe you honestly think that.
You and Philip are the biggest Johnson fanboys here, so I will wear your accusations at me with pride.
As I said to you, I've voted Tory, Lib Dem and Labour.
Thatcher managed it
Keir Starmer suggests Labour will hold back in seats where the Liberal Democrats are best placed to defeat Tory MPs at the next election
This intvw with @ayeshahazarika is the furthest he's gone to suggest an informal pact with other opposition parties
This would clearly be a sensible move - but let's see if this actually goes ahead as we've heard this before
That doesn't make me a partisan, it makes me someone who likes or liked Boris.
You're a partisan. You mirror the Labour Party. If it's Corbyn in charge then Corbyn is great, once he's gone he was awful.
I had the self awareness to oppose Theresa May from before she became PM until she resigned because I don't like what the authoritarianism she stands for.
Can you see the difference?
A layered work of timeless genius.
Thatcher and Cameron in 2010 did win voters over 25 but they did not win pensioners by as big a margin as Boris did
We're just going around and around in circles, I'll agree to disagree with you on this
You do not seem to to be capable of understanding that for many Boris was fine, but that for me the Paterson debacle was just unacceptable and also the sleaze and wallpaper gate
Indeed everyone in my family want him replaced and we will continue to seek that conclusion
I appreciate that there is one school of thought that 'virgin' was a mis-translation of 'young woman'.
Like "reed sea" and "Red Sea".
Anyone know if there has actually been any shortages of turkeys, wine, chocolates etc etc etc this Christmas?
Yesterday you responded to me saying you were a Socialist and less than 10 mins later you described yourself as a Social Democrat.
This morning you reveal you have voted Tory.
What were the circumstances that you voted Tory. Just asking for a friend!
I found it because I was checking cluster options for postgresql v MySQL.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_democracy
Social democracy is a political, social, and economic philosophy within socialism
Clement Attlee was a social democrat, Harold Wilson was a social democrat, Tony Blair is a social democrat and Keir Starmer is a social democrat.
This feels very much like the Labour Party meetings I attended at the end of the Corbyn project when people were saying "we don't want those Tory votes anyway".
Perhaps you should do more to try and win the votes of people like me, they may be up for grabs one day
But given our blessed media has the attention span of a gnat and how the focus has been on Omicron, I thought I'd throw the question out there lol!
Labour and the Lib Dems spent more time fighting each other than the Tories!
There are a whole set of seats where it makes sense for Labour to stand down and use their campaigners in a neighbouring seat. For instance let the Lib Dems have Chesham, Beaconsfield and St Albans while labour focus on Hemel Hempstead, High Wycombe, Watford and Uxbridge.
Below I wrote that I thought Stephen Gough, the Naked Rambler, was a bit of a numpty.
The question is *why* I thought that (I still do, BTW): although it's not an easy question. Why did Gough not get much support (fnarr fnarr), when Speedo Mick has raised hundreds of thousands for charity ? Is it just that one had underpants on, whilst the other was fully nude? The fact one was raising money for charity, whilst the other was doing it for a cause?
It's not through prudery - nakedness doesn't bother me much. There's a traffic safety issue: people might be surprised to see someone naked and crash, but that's remote IMO. So why is he a numpty?
Mainly, I think it's because:
*) He made it about *him*. He had a cause, but it seemed to be secondary. That might be related to:
*) IMO he was not very persuasive during interviews.
*) He did not know when to stop. Repeatedly insisting on being naked, and ending up in jail, makes it seem more like some form of weird mental illness than a cause. His kids suffered from his near ten yeas in jail.
*) His is not what I would call a major cause. It is not exactly universal suffrage.
But neither do I think sending him to jail for ten years (in short terms) does much good for society, either.
I do wonder if a more persuasive person could have done much more with his cause.
Small mercies and all that.
The industry figures showed that when there was all the reports of shortages, the supply / demand across the network was perfectly adequate. Then there was the doom ladden reports, caused a massive spike in demand and of course 2 weeks later demand had totally dropped off with the same supply ad before.
Now there was an issue with the changing over of the fuel type and there isn't much / any headroom due to driver shortages across the industry, due to Brexit, pay and conditions, IR35 changes, insurance, lack of tests due to COVID.
But there wasn't a fuel shortage until the media caused it, based on something like 10 petrol stations being out for a day. There was still plenty of fuel across the 1000s of other petrol stations for everybody who wanted it
Dylan electric? Shit
Never every understood why everyone goes on about him.
They didn't really try then in certain seats, they weren't seen then as not trying to win
The number of people testing positive for COVID-19 increased in all four UK nations, as did the number of infections compatible with the Omicron variant http://ow.ly/OCLA50HiM6t
https://twitter.com/ONS/status/1474349435706613825?s=20
1 in:
England: 35
Wales: 45
NI: 40
Scotland: 65
1 in 20 in London - or about 450,000......and 1.6 million across England....