Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
I think Holyrood just edges a win, but that's certainly a formidable contestant.
Meanwhile I see that Corbyn jnr and his erstwhile pillion companion Ms Abbott - a serving Labour MP - are backing Putin in his aggression towards Ukraine.
What a revolting lot they are.
It is perfectly reasonable to believe that the boundaries of the Ukraine SSR within the USSR are not sensible boundaries for an independent Ukrainian state.
Ukraine, as currently configured, is like Yugoslavia, or the Austro-Hungarian empire.
Things will fall apart. They can fall apart slowly or quickly. Slow will cause more damage than quick.
That may be true, but it is a decision for the Ukranian people - not for a strong man and his 100,000 troops.
Not the Ukrainian people as a whole. The people in the disputed areas.
We should be applying pressure to the Ukraine to allow plebiscites in these disputed areas.
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
It is in Ukraine's interests to have the plebiscites.
They will lose less territory this way. They will lose more territory in any war.
There was already a “referendum” in Crimea - conducted by the Russians after they had annexed the territory, so hardly free and fair.
I have no problem with self-determination, but I have a huge issues with a massive drunken bear throwing his weight around Eastern Europe.
Meanwhile I see that Corbyn jnr and his erstwhile pillion companion Ms Abbott - a serving Labour MP - are backing Putin in his aggression towards Ukraine.
What a revolting lot they are.
It is perfectly reasonable to believe that the boundaries of the Ukraine SSR within the USSR are not sensible boundaries for an independent Ukrainian state.
Ukraine, as currently configured, is like Yugoslavia, or the Austro-Hungarian empire.
Things will fall apart. They can fall apart slowly or quickly. Slow will cause more damage than quick.
Supporting the remaking of nation's boundaries by the threat of, or use of armed force is not 'perfectly reasonable'.
Putin is behaving as a gangster.
Who is to say what the "nation" is. You?
Do you support our 1994 Treaty commitment?
The only reason I would support secession from Ukraine of say Crimea would be if was done under free and fair elections. However it's interesting how people who argue for the right of those to be free of Kiev rule also seem to assume that such breakaway entities would 'naturally' be satellites of Moscow.
I think we struggle to get our heads around situations like Ukraine because we are so unfamiliar with the emotions behind irredentism. It simply does not exist in the UK in any meaningful way: the equivalent would be people here yearning to reclaim Ireland for the union, or still feeling the pain and national humiliation of the American war of independence.
Separatism that leads to independence (see Ireland, USA, possibly Scotland in due course) is a very different beast from separatism that extends the influence of a hostile power, like Ukraine or the many frozen conflicts from Transnistria to Abkhazia to Nagorno Karabakh.
I am trying to think of a recent example of a plebiscite or other peaceful constitutional settlement that led to the transfer of sovereignty from one larger power to another, rather than for a larger power to a fledgling new country. I suppose German reunification comes closest, but E Germany was not an integral part of a larger state, just a military alliance.
Aren't there examples in Africa?
By plebiscite, the northern (Muslim) portion of British Cameroon chose to join Nigeria.
The southern portion joined the Federal Republic of Cameroon.
Where does calling a group of MPs "worse than Nazis" come in the "failed to prosecute Savile" to "vile Tory scum" scale?
"David Lammy says comparing ERG to Nazis ‘not strong enough’
David Lammy has said comparing the hard-Brexit European Research Group of Tory MPs to Nazis and proponents of South African apartheid was “not strong enough”, and suggested that the Brexit debate had allowed proponents of hard right views to flourish.
The Labour MP, who is a vocal campaigner for a second EU referendum, was asked on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show whether a comparison he previously made to the election of Adolf Hitler’s party in Germany and to South African white supremacists was appropriate.
“I would say that that wasn’t strong enough. In 1938 there were allies who hatched a plan for Hitler to annex part of Czechoslovakia, and Churchill said no, and he stood alone,” he said.
And what of various Tories accusing Corbyn of being a genocidal Stalinist, etc. We could go on here for hours.
The point is a fundamental change of both responding to internet conspiracy thinking, and bringing it straight into parliament as a last-ditch defence tactic. As mentioned many times now, the only person that is redolent of, is Trump.
Who exactly accused Corbyn of genocide?
Edit - And I'm certain that "worse than the Nazis" is a more terrible slur than "failed to prosecute Savile"
A pretty much the same example found immediately, for instance..
"The prime minister accused the Labour leader of victimising the country’s richest with a “relish and vindictiveness” not seen since the Soviet leader persecuted landowners in the 1930s."
Nothing about genocide then?
Not much different really, I wouldn't say. Johnson was essentially accusing him of wanting to do what Stalin did to landowners, which was class-based mass killing.
Corbyn employed Milne and Murray as his closest advisors.
Here's what that Tory rag Workers' Liberty has to say about them..
"Both Murray and Milne are frequently referred to in the bourgeois press as “Stalinists”. Some comrades may be inclined to dismiss this charge as right-wing slander. But both are on record defending Joseph Stalin. Here’s comrade Murray in the Morning Star of 17 December 1999 (yes, a while back, but there’s no evidence that he’s changed his opinion since):
“Next Tuesday is the 120th anniversary of the birth of Josef Stalin… you are still left paying your money and taking your choice. A socialist system embracing a third of the world and the defeat of Nazi Germany on the one hand. On the other, all accompanied by harsh measures imposed by a one-party regime.
“Nevertheless, if you believe that the worst crimes visited on humanity this century, from colonialism to Hiroshima and from concentration camps to mass poverty and unemployment have been caused by imperialism, then [Stalin’s birthday] might at least be a moment to ponder why the authors of those crimes and their hack propagandists abominate the name of Stalin beyond all others. It was, after all, Stalin’s best-known critic, Nikita Khrushchev, who remarked in 1956 that ‘against imperialists, we are all Stalinists’.”"
Looks like a bit more truth to Corbyn=Stalinist than ERG>Nazis.
The ERG were very happy to acquiesce with Farage's inflammatory poster campaign of generic brown people at the borders ; the clear presence of the far-right at many Brexit events ; the whipping up of fears of huge numbers of Turks ; the "Surrender Bill" rhetoric which whipped up the far right, who were out in very clear force once again for the very last Brexit event, the New Year celebration ; etc. I don't see much in it, personally.
Mr. Oracle, Boris Johnson deserves a great deal of criticism.
However, your comparison is utterly flawed. In one, the individual was condemning something, in another, he was marching happily beside banners of mass murderers (Mao, Stalin, Lenin) in a way nobody would tolerate of a Conservative MP doing with Hitler, Heydrich, and Himmler.
More or less off topic, listened to the latest episode of R4’s The Gathering Storm which featured a lot of Mike Flynn. He seems to be the absolute boy for QAnonists and Trumpers. Is there any chance of him being a candidate in 2024 or will it be his endorsement that counts?
Gen. Flynn has fallen out of favour with the qanon lot after that other fucking nutcase Lin Wood released a recording of Flynn describing Qanon as total nonsense.
There is no way the 2024 GOP candidate is anybody but Trump.
Unless the GOP win back the House and Senate in November I don't think Trump will run again. Pence remains my long shot prediction for GOP nominee
Good piece today in Nate Silver's Site on just that question, Hyufd.
Exec Summary: GOP will do well and possibly win back both.
The House will go GOP, the Senate won't in my view. Remember the only seat in the Senate up in 2022 the Democrats hold which voted for Trump in 2020 is Georgia.
Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania are all GOP held but Biden won them and also up, so the Democrats could even make gains.
Remember too the last 2 times the House changed majority party in 2010 and 2018 the Senate did not
Disagree. The GOP are likely to take the Senate.
The GOP mood on two most vulnerable holds - WI and PA - is looking more positive. In WI, it looks the Democrats are facing a bitter internecine battle and, in PA, the likely Republican candidate looks as though he can unite the vote.
You then have the Democrats vulnerable in at least three of their seats - NV, GA and AZ. In the last, it doesn't help the GOP doesn't have a candidate yet but Kelly is coming under attack both for the Border problems and with those comparing his stance with Sinema. In GA, Biden has appalling ratings and even Stacey Abrams didn't want to be near him when he visited. Warnock has better ratings but likely not enough. In NV, Cortez Masto is under a lot of pressure and, if Adam Laxalt becomes the GOP candidate, is going to be under more so.
In a really strong year, NH would also be at risk - Hassan is struggling to get above 45% in the polls even though she leads the likely GOP candidates. NH also tends to go quite heavily with the country in the mid-terms.
Where does calling a group of MPs "worse than Nazis" come in the "failed to prosecute Savile" to "vile Tory scum" scale?
"David Lammy says comparing ERG to Nazis ‘not strong enough’
David Lammy has said comparing the hard-Brexit European Research Group of Tory MPs to Nazis and proponents of South African apartheid was “not strong enough”, and suggested that the Brexit debate had allowed proponents of hard right views to flourish.
The Labour MP, who is a vocal campaigner for a second EU referendum, was asked on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show whether a comparison he previously made to the election of Adolf Hitler’s party in Germany and to South African white supremacists was appropriate.
“I would say that that wasn’t strong enough. In 1938 there were allies who hatched a plan for Hitler to annex part of Czechoslovakia, and Churchill said no, and he stood alone,” he said.
And what of various Tories accusing Corbyn of being a genocidal Stalinist, etc. We could go on here for hours.
The point is a fundamental change of both responding to internet conspiracy thinking, and bringing it straight into parliament as a last-ditch defence tactic. As mentioned many times now, the only person that is redolent of, is Trump.
Who exactly accused Corbyn of genocide?
Edit - And I'm certain that "worse than the Nazis" is a more terrible slur than "failed to prosecute Savile"
A pretty much the same example found immediately, for instance..
"The prime minister accused the Labour leader of victimising the country’s richest with a “relish and vindictiveness” not seen since the Soviet leader persecuted landowners in the 1930s."
Nothing about genocide then?
Not much different really, I wouldn't say. Johnson was essentially accusing him of wanting to do what Stalin did to landowners, which was class-based mass killing.
Corbyn employed Milne and Murray as his closest advisors.
Here's what that Tory rag Workers' Liberty has to say about them..
"Both Murray and Milne are frequently referred to in the bourgeois press as “Stalinists”. Some comrades may be inclined to dismiss this charge as right-wing slander. But both are on record defending Joseph Stalin. Here’s comrade Murray in the Morning Star of 17 December 1999 (yes, a while back, but there’s no evidence that he’s changed his opinion since):
“Next Tuesday is the 120th anniversary of the birth of Josef Stalin… you are still left paying your money and taking your choice. A socialist system embracing a third of the world and the defeat of Nazi Germany on the one hand. On the other, all accompanied by harsh measures imposed by a one-party regime.
“Nevertheless, if you believe that the worst crimes visited on humanity this century, from colonialism to Hiroshima and from concentration camps to mass poverty and unemployment have been caused by imperialism, then [Stalin’s birthday] might at least be a moment to ponder why the authors of those crimes and their hack propagandists abominate the name of Stalin beyond all others. It was, after all, Stalin’s best-known critic, Nikita Khrushchev, who remarked in 1956 that ‘against imperialists, we are all Stalinists’.”"
Looks like a bit more truth to Corbyn=Stalinist than ERG>Nazis.
The ERG were very happy to acquiesce with Farage's inflammatory poster campaign of generic brown people at the borders ; the clear presence of the far-right at many Brexit events ; the whipping up of fears of huge numbers of Turks ; the "Surrender Bill" rhetoric which whipped up the far right ; I don't see much in it, personally.
"Worse than Nazis"
Not complaining about some posters is WORSE than genocide?
NEW: Jacob Rees-Mogg has been appointed to minister for "Brexit Opportunities and Government efficiency" in the Cabinet Office. He will attend Cabinet, but it's a demotion to Minister of State.
The Left - from the top down - has been smearing, abusing and dehumanizing the Tories for decades. From Nye Bevan calling them “lower than vermin” to Angela Rayner’s “racist scum” to those lefty wankers spitting and howling at tories going into their Conference in Manchester
So they can fuck off with this moaning about Starmer. No one has called him a rat or a Nazi. The narcissistic mewling is pathetic
Conservative politicians, and especially Conservative Prime Ministers, should not be descending to the levels of Angela Rayner and the 'lefty wankers'. Particularly when the LOTO has higher standards.
I half agree. What Boris said was clumsy, ill-advised and ugly. But it really isn’t on the same level as “lower than vermin”, “worse than Nazis”, “horrible racist scum”
Even the whole Never Kissed A Tory thing, which seems playful, is actually quite dehumanizing and objectionable. It implies that your political opponents are somehow not fit for breeding. Not in the same species.
Vile
And the Left has been doing this for many decades. And when it comes back to bite them, my how they whine
The Left - from the top down - has been smearing, abusing and dehumanizing the Tories for decades. From Nye Bevan calling them “lower than vermin” to Angela Rayner’s “racist scum” to those lefty wankers spitting and howling at tories going into their Conference in Manchester
So they can fuck off with this moaning about Starmer. No one has called him a rat or a Nazi. The narcissistic mewling is pathetic
I think you'll find a lot of the people endorsing the 'scum' comments don't have much sympathy with Mr Starmer. Come on Sean, this came right from the top and was a clear endorsement of conspiracy nuttery. The US should teach us that no good comes from that.
Where does calling a group of MPs "worse than Nazis" come in the "failed to prosecute Savile" to "vile Tory scum" scale?
"David Lammy says comparing ERG to Nazis ‘not strong enough’
David Lammy has said comparing the hard-Brexit European Research Group of Tory MPs to Nazis and proponents of South African apartheid was “not strong enough”, and suggested that the Brexit debate had allowed proponents of hard right views to flourish.
The Labour MP, who is a vocal campaigner for a second EU referendum, was asked on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show whether a comparison he previously made to the election of Adolf Hitler’s party in Germany and to South African white supremacists was appropriate.
“I would say that that wasn’t strong enough. In 1938 there were allies who hatched a plan for Hitler to annex part of Czechoslovakia, and Churchill said no, and he stood alone,” he said.
And what of various Tories accusing Corbyn of being a genocidal Stalinist, etc. We could go on here for hours.
The point is a fundamental change of both responding to internet conspiracy thinking, and bringing it straight into parliament as a last-ditch defence tactic. As mentioned many times now, the only person that is redolent of, is Trump.
Who exactly accused Corbyn of genocide?
Edit - And I'm certain that "worse than the Nazis" is a more terrible slur than "failed to prosecute Savile"
A pretty much the same example found immediately, for instance..
"The prime minister accused the Labour leader of victimising the country’s richest with a “relish and vindictiveness” not seen since the Soviet leader persecuted landowners in the 1930s."
Nothing about genocide then?
Not much different really, I wouldn't say. Johnson was essentially accusing him of wanting to do what Stalin did to landowners, which was class-based mass killing.
Corbyn employed Milne and Murray as his closest advisors.
Here's what that Tory rag Workers' Liberty has to say about them..
"Both Murray and Milne are frequently referred to in the bourgeois press as “Stalinists”. Some comrades may be inclined to dismiss this charge as right-wing slander. But both are on record defending Joseph Stalin. Here’s comrade Murray in the Morning Star of 17 December 1999 (yes, a while back, but there’s no evidence that he’s changed his opinion since):
“Next Tuesday is the 120th anniversary of the birth of Josef Stalin… you are still left paying your money and taking your choice. A socialist system embracing a third of the world and the defeat of Nazi Germany on the one hand. On the other, all accompanied by harsh measures imposed by a one-party regime.
“Nevertheless, if you believe that the worst crimes visited on humanity this century, from colonialism to Hiroshima and from concentration camps to mass poverty and unemployment have been caused by imperialism, then [Stalin’s birthday] might at least be a moment to ponder why the authors of those crimes and their hack propagandists abominate the name of Stalin beyond all others. It was, after all, Stalin’s best-known critic, Nikita Khrushchev, who remarked in 1956 that ‘against imperialists, we are all Stalinists’.”"
Looks like a bit more truth to Corbyn=Stalinist than ERG>Nazis.
And Murray is married to Susan Michie, who wanted to keep us all locked up for all eternity even after we had vaccines to try and cause the collapse of the capitalist economy.
Meanwhile I see that Corbyn jnr and his erstwhile pillion companion Ms Abbott - a serving Labour MP - are backing Putin in his aggression towards Ukraine.
What a revolting lot they are.
It is perfectly reasonable to believe that the boundaries of the Ukraine SSR within the USSR are not sensible boundaries for an independent Ukrainian state.
Ukraine, as currently configured, is like Yugoslavia, or the Austro-Hungarian empire.
Things will fall apart. They can fall apart slowly or quickly. Slow will cause more damage than quick.
Supporting the remaking of nation's boundaries by the threat of, or use of armed force is not 'perfectly reasonable'.
Putin is behaving as a gangster.
Who is to say what the "nation" is. You?
Do you support our 1994 Treaty commitment?
The only reason I would support secession from Ukraine of say Crimea would be if was done under free and fair elections. However it's interesting how people who argue for the right of those to be free of Kiev rule also seem to assume that such breakaway entities would 'naturally' be satellites of Moscow.
I think we struggle to get our heads around situations like Ukraine because we are so unfamiliar with the emotions behind irredentism. It simply does not exist in the UK in any meaningful way: the equivalent would be people here yearning to reclaim Ireland for the union, or still feeling the pain and national humiliation of the American war of independence.
Separatism that leads to independence (see Ireland, USA, possibly Scotland in due course) is a very different beast from separatism that extends the influence of a hostile power, like Ukraine or the many frozen conflicts from Transnistria to Abkhazia to Nagorno Karabakh.
I am trying to think of a recent example of a plebiscite or other peaceful constitutional settlement that led to the transfer of sovereignty from one larger power to another, rather than for a larger power to a fledgling new country. I suppose German reunification comes closest, but E Germany was not an integral part of a larger state, just a military alliance.
Aren't there examples in Africa?
By plebiscite, the northern (Muslim) portion of British Cameroon chose to join Nigeria.
The southern portion joined the Federal Republic of Cameroon.
Wasn't there an example in the 1950s whereby a chunk of France moved over to the FRG? Not the Saarland one of 1935, but after the war.
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
Plebiscite at gunpoint after invasion? Is it July 1940 again?
I think Russia was wrong to take Crimea by force ... but there was also no way that Ukraine would have allowed a plebiscite on secession, so Ukraine was wrong as well.
Yet again, if there is a massive war, Ukraine will lose more territory than if some plebiscites are held in Luhansk and Donetsk.
Except that no-one asked about a plebiscite on secession for the Crimea. Just an invasion. So Ukraine was in the wrong for not allowing something that wasn't asked for?
Russia has been busy creating "facts on the ground" in Crimea. See the Yugoslav wars, China in Tibet etc etc.
Boris's dead cat worked. Week two and even the nation's premier politics site is still talking about the smear rather than any other issue that might threaten Boris's hegemony.
Yepp. I stupidly got involved myself this morning. Must ignore trolls.
At which a million irony meters all went off in unison.
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
The Left - from the top down - has been smearing, abusing and dehumanizing the Tories for decades. From Nye Bevan calling them “lower than vermin” to Angela Rayner’s “racist scum” to those lefty wankers spitting and howling at tories going into their Conference in Manchester
So they can fuck off with this moaning about Starmer. No one has called him a rat or a Nazi. The narcissistic mewling is pathetic
Question - when MPs get murdered is that also "narcissistic mewling"?
Park left vs right. Park "woke". And remember that everyone on all sides are human beings. We have had MPs on both sides of the house murdered in recent memory by nutters. So it is in everyone's interests not to fan the nutter flames as Liar did and his sycophants repeated because the nutters don't care for your definitions of partisanship, they just see a target.
Meanwhile I see that Corbyn jnr and his erstwhile pillion companion Ms Abbott - a serving Labour MP - are backing Putin in his aggression towards Ukraine.
What a revolting lot they are.
It is perfectly reasonable to believe that the boundaries of the Ukraine SSR within the USSR are not sensible boundaries for an independent Ukrainian state.
Ukraine, as currently configured, is like Yugoslavia, or the Austro-Hungarian empire.
Things will fall apart. They can fall apart slowly or quickly. Slow will cause more damage than quick.
That may be true, but it is a decision for the Ukranian people - not for a strong man and his 100,000 troops.
Not the Ukrainian people as a whole. The people in the disputed areas.
We should be applying pressure to the Ukraine to allow plebiscites in these disputed areas.
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
It is in Ukraine's interests to have the plebiscites.
They will lose less territory this way. They will lose more territory in any war.
There was already a “referendum” in Crimea - conducted by the Russians after they had annexed the territory, so hardly free and fair.
I have no problem with self-determination, but I have a huge issues with a massive drunken bear throwing his weight around Eastern Europe.
My point is that the UN could be asking to organise the plebiscite now in Donetsk. For Crimea, it is too late.
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Yes, it does, on reflection. The Kiwi thing is just a sad brutalist blob, ugly but inert. Holyrood contrives to be actively painful to look at.
Plus I imagine Holyrood cost seventy thousand times more
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
I like Tugendhat but think it highly unlikely he gets to the final 2. More likely Hunt would face Sunak in the membership vote or a rightwinger like Truss or Raab or Patel.
I also think the Leaver Sunak would easily beat the former Remainer Tugendhat in any membership vote.
Agreed. OGH is safe in his Rishi bet if Tugendhat is the other option.
I actually think he is safe in his bet regardless of who Rishi faces - unless it is discovered Rishi is the Downing Street partymeister....
As you two guys are far closer to Tory politics than Libdem supporting me, how possible are the following?
As the candidate to move Party to the centre, Hunt may not run himself but back Tugendhat instead?
From outside the tainted and discredited cabinet, Harper is the candidate of the right, Tuggendhat candidate to shift to centre, if those two names go forward to the membership, Harper is clear winner isn’t he? The mood of the party membership is to stay right or is there appetite to move to centre?
Interesting appointment. A job of going through the mound of EU legislation that was transposed into UK law, and identifying what can be got rid of.
A couple of good ideas already today, in revising the transport compensation scheme and not adopting the new EU car standards (which are easy if you’re VW Group or Daimler, but a pain in the arse if you’re Lotus or Aston Martin, let alone Ariel or Caterham).
It continues to baffle me (it may be your distance from the UK) that the red tape gets branded as being the EU's fault. We have drowned ourselves in Red Tape at huge cost and disruption, it wasn't there before Brexit and we chose to impose it on ourselves.
I will be delighted if Jacob Rees-Mogg gets the scissors out and frees the country from its red tape trade prison. But doing so will not be a Brexit bonus. Just a return to the status quo ante.
Incidentally, this idea that we start rolling back on safety standards. That is explicitly what this very government insisted it would not do.
The video of Starmer being hounded is extremely distressing. What is happening to our country.
It's nothing new, unfortunately.
I don’t recall this bleating when Farage was attacked. Or indeed Douglas Carswell in circs very similar to Starmer
Most of us are rightly appalled by physical attacks on anyone, politicians included.
The point that you and the other Johnson apologists are trying to distract us from is that this attack on Starmer was caused, in part at least, by your man's slurs about Savile, slurs that brave sir Boris won't have the guts to repeat outside parliament.
You weren't exactly rushing to condemn the mob surrounding Rees-Mogg's house though, were you?
Meanwhile I see that Corbyn jnr and his erstwhile pillion companion Ms Abbott - a serving Labour MP - are backing Putin in his aggression towards Ukraine.
What a revolting lot they are.
It is perfectly reasonable to believe that the boundaries of the Ukraine SSR within the USSR are not sensible boundaries for an independent Ukrainian state.
Ukraine, as currently configured, is like Yugoslavia, or the Austro-Hungarian empire. *
Things will fall apart. They can fall apart slowly or quickly. Slow will cause more damage than quick.
(* Or the UK)
Are you suggesting these things are best determined by Mr Putin? Also I find it rather arrogant of you to assume that the UK will inevitably fall apart.
I think it is very, very, very unlikely that N Ireland will be with us in 50 years.
And Scotland must also be at least evens to leave on that timescale.
It seems more arrogant to assume that the UK will carry on for ever as some immutable state.
Even my mother (a DUP voter) thinks that NI will separate from GB. She says it has already started
It hasn't, Unionist Parties still win more votes than Nationalist Parties in NI.
Plus if Starmer becomes PM in 2024 as polls predict, he will align GB closer to the EEA and CU effectively removing the Irish Sea border anyway
It's the total of NONUnionist parties that counts. The folk in the middle are not going to be very impressed with the rUK government, and even less so with Mr Johnson than the Scots. Remember his personal rating is down there in the Moho level in NI.
The Alliance is the middle party and still opposes a border poll
How much longer? Even now they are certainly open to it - not 'opposes', so much as not supporting it but ...
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
Plebiscite at gunpoint after invasion? Is it July 1940 again?
I think Russia was wrong to take Crimea by force ... but there was also no way that Ukraine would have allowed a plebiscite on secession, so Ukraine was wrong as well.
Yet again, if there is a massive war, Ukraine will lose more territory than if some plebiscites are held in Luhansk and Donetsk.
More or less off topic, listened to the latest episode of R4’s The Gathering Storm which featured a lot of Mike Flynn. He seems to be the absolute boy for QAnonists and Trumpers. Is there any chance of him being a candidate in 2024 or will it be his endorsement that counts?
Gen. Flynn has fallen out of favour with the qanon lot after that other fucking nutcase Lin Wood released a recording of Flynn describing Qanon as total nonsense.
There is no way the 2024 GOP candidate is anybody but Trump.
Unless the GOP win back the House and Senate in November I don't think Trump will run again. Pence remains my long shot prediction for GOP nominee
Good piece today in Nate Silver's Site on just that question, Hyufd.
Exec Summary: GOP will do well and possibly win back both.
The House will go GOP, the Senate won't in my view. Remember the only seat in the Senate up in 2022 the Democrats hold which voted for Trump in 2020 is Georgia.
Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania are all GOP held but Biden won them and also up, so the Democrats could even make gains.
Remember too the last 2 times the House changed majority party in 2010 and 2018 the Senate did not
If Biden's rating remains at its current level, the Senate will surely go Republican. Georgia, New Hampshire, and Nevada would all be likely to flip, perhaps Colorado as well.
More or less off topic, listened to the latest episode of R4’s The Gathering Storm which featured a lot of Mike Flynn. He seems to be the absolute boy for QAnonists and Trumpers. Is there any chance of him being a candidate in 2024 or will it be his endorsement that counts?
Gen. Flynn has fallen out of favour with the qanon lot after that other fucking nutcase Lin Wood released a recording of Flynn describing Qanon as total nonsense.
There is no way the 2024 GOP candidate is anybody but Trump.
Unless the GOP win back the House and Senate in November I don't think Trump will run again. Pence remains my long shot prediction for GOP nominee
Good piece today in Nate Silver's Site on just that question, Hyufd.
Exec Summary: GOP will do well and possibly win back both.
The House will go GOP, the Senate won't in my view. Remember the only seat in the Senate up in 2022 the Democrats hold which voted for Trump in 2020 is Georgia.
Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania are all GOP held but Biden won them and also up, so the Democrats could even make gains.
Remember too the last 2 times the House changed majority party in 2010 and 2018 the Senate did not
Disagree. The GOP are likely to take the Senate.
The GOP mood on two most vulnerable holds - WI and PA - is looking more positive. In WI, it looks the Democrats are facing a bitter internecine battle and, in PA, the likely Republican candidate looks as though he can unite the vote.
You then have the Democrats vulnerable in at least three of their seats - NV, GA and AZ. In the last, it doesn't help the GOP doesn't have a candidate yet but Kelly is coming under attack both for the Border problems and with those comparing his stance with Sinema. In GA, Biden has appalling ratings and even Stacey Abrams didn't want to be near him when he visited. Warnock has better ratings but likely not enough. In NV, Cortez Masto is under a lot of pressure and, if Adam Laxalt becomes the GOP candidate, is going to be under more so.
In a really strong year, NH would also be at risk - Hassan is struggling to get above 45% in the polls even though she leads the likely GOP candidates. NH also tends to go quite heavily with the country in the mid-terms.
Ps MI is not Republican held in the Senate.
The Democrats still lead in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Arizona and Georgia and Nevada in most current Senate polls however. Though apologies, you are correct on Michigan
I think this was mentioned here previously - now officially announced:
Under a new £80 million contract with Bristol-based Centreline, four BAe146 aircraft, will be replaced by two more sustainable aircraft to continue the UK’s global engagement.
The new planes will be more sustainable thanks to their smaller engines, leading to a reduction in fuel burn and emissions. They will also be able to fly further, providing the UK greater opportunity to engage with key allies and partners.
The video of Starmer being hounded is extremely distressing. What is happening to our country.
It's nothing new, unfortunately.
I don’t recall this bleating when Farage was attacked. Or indeed Douglas Carswell in circs very similar to Starmer
Most of us are rightly appalled by physical attacks on anyone, politicians included.
The point that you and the other Johnson apologists are trying to distract us from is that this attack on Starmer was caused, in part at least, by your man's slurs about Savile, slurs that brave sir Boris won't have the guts to repeat outside parliament.
I don't think that claim is defensible - the attack would have happened anyway, it (probably) would just have had one fewer word in it.
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
Plebiscite at gunpoint after invasion? Is it July 1940 again?
I think Russia was wrong to take Crimea by force ... but there was also no way that Ukraine would have allowed a plebiscite on secession, so Ukraine was wrong as well.
Yet again, if there is a massive war, Ukraine will lose more territory than if some plebiscites are held in Luhansk and Donetsk.
Except that no-one asked about a plebiscite on secession for the Crimea. Just an invasion. So Ukraine was in the wrong for not allowing something that wasn't asked for?
Russia has been busy creating "facts on the ground" in Crimea. See the Yugoslav wars, China in Tibet etc etc.
Did you support the break up of Yugoslavia? Why is it necessary for the Ukraine to remain in one piece and Yugoslavia to be dismantled.
I'd say, Yugoslavia was dismantled by the West because Serbia was Russia's ally.
Ukraine is being kept intact by the West to spite Russia.
But let's hear your explanation as to why it was right to dismantle Yugoslavia but wrong to suggest the same for Ukraine.
And can we have the magnificent image of drunken bears, please, in the reply
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
I see from some online lists of “the ten ugliest buildings in the world” that Holyrood AND the Kiwi Parliament both make the list, so this is clearly a keenly fought contest
The tragedy is that Holyrood is in EDINBURGH, one of the loveliest cities on the globe. It would be fine, if still weird and hideous, in Swindon or Stockport. It’s like putting the old Birmingham Bull Ring in Venice
I like Tugendhat but think it highly unlikely he gets to the final 2. More likely Hunt would face Sunak in the membership vote or a rightwinger like Truss or Raab or Patel.
I also think the Leaver Sunak would easily beat the former Remainer Tugendhat in any membership vote.
Agreed. OGH is safe in his Rishi bet if Tugendhat is the other option.
I actually think he is safe in his bet regardless of who Rishi faces - unless it is discovered Rishi is the Downing Street partymeister....
As you two guys are far closer to Tory politics than Libdem supporting me, how possible are the following?
As the candidate to move Party to the centre, Hunt may not run himself but back Tugendhat instead?
From outside the tainted and discredited cabinet, Harper is the candidate of the right, Tuggendhat candidate to shift to centre, if those two names go forward to the membership, Harper is clear winner isn’t he? The mood of the party membership is to stay right or is there appetite to move to centre?
I'm not sure Hunt is ready to give up the chance to be PM just yet. He lost to Boris last time, but still had plenty of Westminster support (although many of those who were so fervently anti-Boris are no longer MP's....)
The candidates (apart from Hunt) with any chance of getting put to the membership will be from the Cabinet.
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
Plebiscite at gunpoint after invasion? Is it July 1940 again?
I think Russia was wrong to take Crimea by force ... but there was also no way that Ukraine would have allowed a plebiscite on secession, so Ukraine was wrong as well.
Yet again, if there is a massive war, Ukraine will lose more territory than if some plebiscites are held in Luhansk and Donetsk.
In the short term.
As far as I can see, there is little support, even in majority Russia speaking areas of Ukraine for secession. There are various "pro-Russian" parties, but not even they are all calling for joining Russia.
Interesting appointment. A job of going through the mound of EU legislation that was transposed into UK law, and identifying what can be got rid of.
A couple of good ideas already today, in revising the transport compensation scheme and not adopting the new EU car standards (which are easy if you’re VW Group or Daimler, but a pain in the arse if you’re Lotus or Aston Martin, let alone Ariel or Caterham).
Not particularly difficult. Car manufacturers produce the same models to lower safety standards in markets such as India and Latin America. They can do the same in the UK post Brexit.
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
I see from some online lists of “the ten ugliest buildings in the world” that Holyrood AND the Kiwi Parliament both make the list, so this is clearly a keenly fought contest
The tragedy is that Holyrood is in EDINBURGH, one of the loveliest cities on the globe. It would be fine, if still weird and hideous, in Swindon or Stockport. It’s like putting the old Birmingham Bull Ring in Venice
Opposite the magnificent Palace of Holyroodhouse too
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
Plebiscite at gunpoint after invasion? Is it July 1940 again?
I think Russia was wrong to take Crimea by force ... but there was also no way that Ukraine would have allowed a plebiscite on secession, so Ukraine was wrong as well.
Yet again, if there is a massive war, Ukraine will lose more territory than if some plebiscites are held in Luhansk and Donetsk.
In the short term.
As far as I can see, there is little support, even in majority Russia speaking areas of Ukraine for secession. There are various "pro-Russian" parties, but not even they are all calling for joining Russia.
I guess we could check your opinion in a plebiscite ?
Meanwhile I see that Corbyn jnr and his erstwhile pillion companion Ms Abbott - a serving Labour MP - are backing Putin in his aggression towards Ukraine.
What a revolting lot they are.
It is perfectly reasonable to believe that the boundaries of the Ukraine SSR within the USSR are not sensible boundaries for an independent Ukrainian state.
Ukraine, as currently configured, is like Yugoslavia, or the Austro-Hungarian empire.
Things will fall apart. They can fall apart slowly or quickly. Slow will cause more damage than quick.
That may be true, but it is a decision for the Ukranian people - not for a strong man and his 100,000 troops.
Not the Ukrainian people as a whole. The people in the disputed areas.
We should be applying pressure to the Ukraine to allow plebiscites in these disputed areas.
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
It is in Ukraine's interests to have the plebiscites.
They will lose less territory this way. They will lose more territory in any war.
There was already a “referendum” in Crimea - conducted by the Russians after they had annexed the territory, so hardly free and fair.
I have no problem with self-determination, but I have a huge issues with a massive drunken bear throwing his weight around Eastern Europe.
My point is that the UN could be asking to organise the plebiscite now in Donetsk. For Crimea, it is too late.
I love the image of massive drunken bears.
The prerequisite for any discussions to start, must be that the massive drunken bear f***s off back to its cave.
So Javid wants to get the NHS waiting list time below a year by March 2025? I remember it being 18 weeks in the bad old days of the Labour government.
I'm finalising my proposed contract to go PAYE. For the first time ever I am not just taking private health insurance, I am writing it in blood into the contract.
I hope you didn't support lockdowns.
It wasn't the lockdowns that caused the waiting list, it was the pandemic. If the operating staff are working ICU then they aren't operating. They weren't furloughed!
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
I see from some online lists of “the ten ugliest buildings in the world” that Holyrood AND the Kiwi Parliament both make the list, so this is clearly a keenly fought contest
The tragedy is that Holyrood is in EDINBURGH, one of the loveliest cities on the globe. It would be fine, if still weird and hideous, in Swindon or Stockport. It’s like putting the old Birmingham Bull Ring in Venice
Actually I like Holyrood. It wasn't worth the money spent on it - I think you should be disciplined with the public purse. But it is a genuinely interesting piece of modern architecture, of which there is very little in Scotland.
The Left - from the top down - has been smearing, abusing and dehumanizing the Tories for decades. From Nye Bevan calling them “lower than vermin” to Angela Rayner’s “racist scum” to those lefty wankers spitting and howling at tories going into their Conference in Manchester
So they can fuck off with this moaning about Starmer. No one has called him a rat or a Nazi. The narcissistic mewling is pathetic
Conservative politicians, and especially Conservative Prime Ministers, should not be descending to the levels of Angela Rayner and the 'lefty wankers'. Particularly when the LOTO has higher standards.
I half agree. What Boris said was clumsy, ill-advised and ugly. But it really isn’t on the same level as “lower than vermin”, “worse than Nazis”, “horrible racist scum”
Even the whole Never Kissed A Tory thing, which seems playful, is actually quite dehumanizing and objectionable. It implies that your political opponents are somehow not fit for breeding. Not in the same species.
Vile
And the Left has been doing this for many decades. And when it comes back to bite them, my how they whine
An unedifying spectacle on all sides
But the left started it with "never kiss a Tory!" But the right were there first with the Freikorps! What else could we do when the communists were killing their way to power?! Oh you mean like in the Thermidorian Reaction? Which was a response to the out of control Jacobins! Who who merely overthrowing a conservative absolutism!
Etc.
There we go, we've now done all the whataboutery. Well done everyone, another fine match.
I'll remain convinced your condemnation of whataboutery is dismayingly partisan unless you post this in response to every comment on the thread.
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
Plebiscite at gunpoint after invasion? Is it July 1940 again?
I think Russia was wrong to take Crimea by force ... but there was also no way that Ukraine would have allowed a plebiscite on secession, so Ukraine was wrong as well.
Yet again, if there is a massive war, Ukraine will lose more territory than if some plebiscites are held in Luhansk and Donetsk.
In the short term.
As far as I can see, there is little support, even in majority Russia speaking areas of Ukraine for secession. There are various "pro-Russian" parties, but not even they are all calling for joining Russia.
I guess we could check your opinion in a plebiscite ?
Finding a decent amount of support for a plebiscite would be a starting point. All the polls etc I could find seem to indicate that finding bits of Ukraine that want to be bits of Russia will be a bit hard.
Or should we say that Russia needs to hold a plebiscite on everything West of the Urals joining Ukraine?
Mr. Oracle, Boris Johnson deserves a great deal of criticism.
However, your comparison is utterly flawed. In one, the individual was condemning something, in another, he was marching happily beside banners of mass murderers (Mao, Stalin, Lenin) in a way nobody would tolerate of a Conservative MP doing with Hitler, Heydrich, and Himmler.
I really don't see much difference. The subject I believe we started on was the ERG, and I raised their fellow travellers. Tommy Robinson and some of his sympathisers were at several Brexit events, and were certainly not particularly ostracised or diminished, for instance, alongside more moderate nationalists and Conservatives.
Here's are some of the same Tommy's supporters performing Nazi salutes, at different events :
Isn't it interesting that throwing rotten fruit at politicians used to be regarded as a legitimate form of protest, including by politicians themselves. If you tried doing that these days you'd probably get arrested under terrorist legislation.
Interesting appointment. A job of going through the mound of EU legislation that was transposed into UK law, and identifying what can be got rid of.
A couple of good ideas already today, in revising the transport compensation scheme and not adopting the new EU car standards (which are easy if you’re VW Group or Daimler, but a pain in the arse if you’re Lotus or Aston Martin, let alone Ariel or Caterham).
It continues to baffle me (it may be your distance from the UK) that the red tape gets branded as being the EU's fault. We have drowned ourselves in Red Tape at huge cost and disruption, it wasn't there before Brexit and we chose to impose it on ourselves.
I will be delighted if Jacob Rees-Mogg gets the scissors out and frees the country from its red tape trade prison. But doing so will not be a Brexit bonus. Just a return to the status quo ante.
Incidentally, this idea that we start rolling back on safety standards. That is explicitly what this very government insisted it would not do.
I'm not aware of a proposal to "roll back on safety standards"?
I like Tugendhat but think it highly unlikely he gets to the final 2. More likely Hunt would face Sunak in the membership vote or a rightwinger like Truss or Raab or Patel.
I also think the Leaver Sunak would easily beat the former Remainer Tugendhat in any membership vote.
Agreed. OGH is safe in his Rishi bet if Tugendhat is the other option.
I actually think he is safe in his bet regardless of who Rishi faces - unless it is discovered Rishi is the Downing Street partymeister....
As you two guys are far closer to Tory politics than Libdem supporting me, how possible are the following?
As the candidate to move Party to the centre, Hunt may not run himself but back Tugendhat instead?
From outside the tainted and discredited cabinet, Harper is the candidate of the right, Tuggendhat candidate to shift to centre, if those two names go forward to the membership, Harper is clear winner isn’t he? The mood of the party membership is to stay right or is there appetite to move to centre?
I'm not sure Hunt is ready to give up the chance to be PM just yet. He lost to Boris last time, but still had plenty of Westminster support (although many of those who were so fervently anti-Boris are no longer MP's....)
The candidates (apart from Hunt) with any chance of getting put to the membership will be from the Cabinet.
Doesn't this depend on the circumstances of Johnson's departure and how thoroughly he has managed to make the existing Cabinet complicit in defending him? E.g. you can imagine a situation where the final partygate report makes it impossible for some of his most enthusiastic supporters to retain any credibility due to the untrue defences they have been prepared to make on the radio - that's just a hypothetical example, but given his record of co-opting others to defend his unacceptable behaviour, it's likely that the particular piece of unacceptable behaviour that finally sees him removed from office will cause collateral damage to some of his current allies.
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
Plebiscite at gunpoint after invasion? Is it July 1940 again?
I think Russia was wrong to take Crimea by force ... but there was also no way that Ukraine would have allowed a plebiscite on secession, so Ukraine was wrong as well.
Yet again, if there is a massive war, Ukraine will lose more territory than if some plebiscites are held in Luhansk and Donetsk.
Except that no-one asked about a plebiscite on secession for the Crimea. Just an invasion. So Ukraine was in the wrong for not allowing something that wasn't asked for?
Russia has been busy creating "facts on the ground" in Crimea. See the Yugoslav wars, China in Tibet etc etc.
Did you support the break up of Yugoslavia? Why is it necessary for the Ukraine to remain in one piece and Yugoslavia to be dismantled.
I'd say, Yugoslavia was dismantled by the West because Serbia was Russia's ally.
Ukraine is being kept intact by the West to spite Russia.
But let's hear your explanation as to why it was right to dismantle Yugoslavia but wrong to suggest the same for Ukraine.
And can we have the magnificent image of drunken bears, please, in the reply
Yugoslavia wasn't carved up for bits to be gobbled up by another state. If it had been broken up for Italy to take a chunk of the north or Greece to occupy the south, that would be a very different prospect to what actually happened.
The two situations are really nothing like each other.
Mr. Oracle, Boris Johnson deserves a great deal of criticism.
However, your comparison is utterly flawed. In one, the individual was condemning something, in another, he was marching happily beside banners of mass murderers (Mao, Stalin, Lenin) in a way nobody would tolerate of a Conservative MP doing with Hitler, Heydrich, and Himmler.
I really don't see much difference. The subject I believe we started on was the ERG, and I raised their fellow travellers. Tommy Robinson was at several Brexit events and was not ostracised or diminished, for instance, alongside more moderate nationalsts, which sometimes included Tory politicians.
Here's are some of the same Tommy's supporters performing Nazi salutes at a different event :
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
Plebiscite at gunpoint after invasion? Is it July 1940 again?
I think Russia was wrong to take Crimea by force ... but there was also no way that Ukraine would have allowed a plebiscite on secession, so Ukraine was wrong as well.
Yet again, if there is a massive war, Ukraine will lose more territory than if some plebiscites are held in Luhansk and Donetsk.
Except that no-one asked about a plebiscite on secession for the Crimea. Just an invasion. So Ukraine was in the wrong for not allowing something that wasn't asked for?
Russia has been busy creating "facts on the ground" in Crimea. See the Yugoslav wars, China in Tibet etc etc.
Did you support the break up of Yugoslavia? Why is it necessary for the Ukraine to remain in one piece and Yugoslavia to be dismantled.
I'd say, Yugoslavia was dismantled by the West because Serbia was Russia's ally.
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
It is known as "The Beehive" which fits for several reasons.
So Javid wants to get the NHS waiting list time below a year by March 2025? I remember it being 18 weeks in the bad old days of the Labour government.
I'm finalising my proposed contract to go PAYE. For the first time ever I am not just taking private health insurance, I am writing it in blood into the contract.
I hope you didn't support lockdowns.
It wasn't the lockdowns that caused the waiting list, it was the pandemic. If the operating staff are working ICU then they aren't operating. They weren't furloughed!
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
Plebiscite at gunpoint after invasion? Is it July 1940 again?
I think Russia was wrong to take Crimea by force ... but there was also no way that Ukraine would have allowed a plebiscite on secession, so Ukraine was wrong as well.
Yet again, if there is a massive war, Ukraine will lose more territory than if some plebiscites are held in Luhansk and Donetsk.
Except that no-one asked about a plebiscite on secession for the Crimea. Just an invasion. So Ukraine was in the wrong for not allowing something that wasn't asked for?
Russia has been busy creating "facts on the ground" in Crimea. See the Yugoslav wars, China in Tibet etc etc.
Did you support the break up of Yugoslavia? Why is it necessary for the Ukraine to remain in one piece and Yugoslavia to be dismantled.
I'd say, Yugoslavia was dismantled by the West because Serbia was Russia's ally.
Ukraine is being kept intact by the West to spite Russia.
But let's hear your explanation as to why it was right to dismantle Yugoslavia but wrong to suggest the same for Ukraine.
And can we have the magnificent image of drunken bears, please, in the reply
Ha Ha ha.
I see now.
Yugoslavia dismantled itself. In a civil war. Which is what is *not* happening in Ukraine.
Yugoslavia broke up. The parts of Yugoslavia left, of their own volition. The Serbians wanted lots of bits of other parts of the former Yugoslavia (there were other disputes, but this was the main one). The Serbs (who had most of the forms Yugoslav armies equipment) then fought a long war to do this. The resolution of the war was when the other parts of Yugoslavia were given the weapons to defend themselves.
None of this applies to Ukraine where the government runs the country - with a lot of arguing from the citizenry, true, but no signs of break up.
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
I see from some online lists of “the ten ugliest buildings in the world” that Holyrood AND the Kiwi Parliament both make the list, so this is clearly a keenly fought contest
The tragedy is that Holyrood is in EDINBURGH, one of the loveliest cities on the globe. It would be fine, if still weird and hideous, in Swindon or Stockport. It’s like putting the old Birmingham Bull Ring in Venice
Actually I like Holyrood. It wasn't worth the money spent on it - I think you should be disciplined with the public purse. But it is a genuinely interesting piece of modern architecture, of which there is very little in Scotland.
Actually in my experience architects of my acquaintance seem quite keen on it. Whether that's a good thing..
One of them was able to clear up one minor mystery for me, why a (as I thought) pistol grip motif was repeated on the exterior; they are trees apparently. Boring..
The video of Starmer being hounded is extremely distressing. What is happening to our country.
It's nothing new, unfortunately.
I don’t recall this bleating when Farage was attacked. Or indeed Douglas Carswell in circs very similar to Starmer
Most of us are rightly appalled by physical attacks on anyone, politicians included.
The point that you and the other Johnson apologists are trying to distract us from is that this attack on Starmer was caused, in part at least, by your man's slurs about Savile, slurs that brave sir Boris won't have the guts to repeat outside parliament.
You weren't exactly rushing to condemn the mob surrounding Rees-Mogg's house though, were you?
If I'd condoned it you might have some sort of point as it is it's just more pathetic whataboutery which appears to becoming the default option for some iather than dealing with the actual point being made.
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
Plebiscite at gunpoint after invasion? Is it July 1940 again?
I think Russia was wrong to take Crimea by force ... but there was also no way that Ukraine would have allowed a plebiscite on secession, so Ukraine was wrong as well.
Yet again, if there is a massive war, Ukraine will lose more territory than if some plebiscites are held in Luhansk and Donetsk.
Except that no-one asked about a plebiscite on secession for the Crimea. Just an invasion. So Ukraine was in the wrong for not allowing something that wasn't asked for?
Russia has been busy creating "facts on the ground" in Crimea. See the Yugoslav wars, China in Tibet etc etc.
Did you support the break up of Yugoslavia? Why is it necessary for the Ukraine to remain in one piece and Yugoslavia to be dismantled.
I'd say, Yugoslavia was dismantled by the West because Serbia was Russia's ally.
Ukraine is being kept intact by the West to spite Russia.
But let's hear your explanation as to why it was right to dismantle Yugoslavia but wrong to suggest the same for Ukraine.
And can we have the magnificent image of drunken bears, please, in the reply
Yugoslavia wasn't carved up for bits to be gobbled up by another state. If it had been broken up for Italy to take a chunk of the north or Greece to occupy the south, that would be a very different prospect to what actually happened.
The two situations are really nothing like each other.
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
I see from some online lists of “the ten ugliest buildings in the world” that Holyrood AND the Kiwi Parliament both make the list, so this is clearly a keenly fought contest
The tragedy is that Holyrood is in EDINBURGH, one of the loveliest cities on the globe. It would be fine, if still weird and hideous, in Swindon or Stockport. It’s like putting the old Birmingham Bull Ring in Venice
Opposite the magnificent Palace of Holyroodhouse too
Holyrood Palace is not magnificent at all, frankly. A dump inside. Clutters its surroundings. At least the Parliament is as low down as possible.
This was what was wanted for the Scottish Pmt - but oh no, it was a 'nationalist shibboleth' to the Unionists. (TBF there were practical issues, but did they try to solve them? No, the primary reason given was because it was already a symbol of independence.)
Instead the Blairite administration "gave" us the Holyrood building (which tbf has its merits especially internally) and left the Scots with the blame for the high price.
The Manx Tynwald is probably the most Covid-safe parliament in the world:
Do you realise how much you have just screwed up my search facility with that one careless post?!!!!
Now as long as this thread is active I will have to put an extra letter into the search when I go looking to see if I have had any replies to my comments.
In what I think is huge danger to the government getting re-elected, Clear water developing now between government and opposition over a big call in credit crunch management. Libdems throwing their weight behind windfall tax on the energy firms making higher profits.
The windfall could not have been budgeted in in terms of investment, so cannot harm any investment if the windfall is merely taxed? If tax system cannot take into account vast profits are being made simply from market volatility, surely that is simply wrong, a bit of Robin Hood in these situations is only fair and good if Capitalism is to work properly? Otherwise you will endorse impoverished consumers having to pay through the nose for energy vital to them, at the same time those who own the energy firms are raking in profit. That has to be both capitalism gone wrong and an insane political position to defend?
Has there been any polling on Windfall tax in last few weeks?
Mr. Oracle, Boris Johnson deserves a great deal of criticism.
However, your comparison is utterly flawed. In one, the individual was condemning something, in another, he was marching happily beside banners of mass murderers (Mao, Stalin, Lenin) in a way nobody would tolerate of a Conservative MP doing with Hitler, Heydrich, and Himmler.
I really don't see much difference. The subject I believe we started on was the ERG, and I raised their fellow travellers. Tommy Robinson was at several Brexit events and was not ostracised or diminished, for instance, alongside more moderate nationalsts, which sometimes included Tory politicians.
Here's are some of the same Tommy's supporters performing Nazi salutes at a different event :
ERG worse than Nazis because of Tommy Robinson who isn't in the ERG?
This is some really weak sauce you're serving.
Come on. What Nazis have any Tories employed, like Corbyn employed Stalinists (according to Workers' Liberty)?
As I understand it, Milne claims he was a conviinced Stalinist about as long ago as one of Farage's teachers said he was singing Nazi songs, in the early '80s as a young man at Dulwich college. And in the broader sense already mentioned below, no Brexiter Conservatives that I heard raised any objection whatsover to Tommy Robinson's supporters being at several Brexit events.
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
Unionists, nae taste.
Discuss.
Holyrood is lovely on the inside. Very calm.
There are three problems with the outside:
- Couldn't ruin the view from the palace. - the stupid security box extension wart on the original sweeping facade - concrete, rather than our lovely sandstone (or some fun with granite from Aberdeen, harling with shells from the Hebrides etc)
Could've looked like the extension to the national museum
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
Plebiscite at gunpoint after invasion? Is it July 1940 again?
I think Russia was wrong to take Crimea by force ... but there was also no way that Ukraine would have allowed a plebiscite on secession, so Ukraine was wrong as well.
Yet again, if there is a massive war, Ukraine will lose more territory than if some plebiscites are held in Luhansk and Donetsk.
Except that no-one asked about a plebiscite on secession for the Crimea. Just an invasion. So Ukraine was in the wrong for not allowing something that wasn't asked for?
Russia has been busy creating "facts on the ground" in Crimea. See the Yugoslav wars, China in Tibet etc etc.
Did you support the break up of Yugoslavia? Why is it necessary for the Ukraine to remain in one piece and Yugoslavia to be dismantled.
I'd say, Yugoslavia was dismantled by the West because Serbia was Russia's ally.
Ukraine is being kept intact by the West to spite Russia.
But let's hear your explanation as to why it was right to dismantle Yugoslavia but wrong to suggest the same for Ukraine.
And can we have the magnificent image of drunken bears, please, in the reply
Ha Ha ha.
I see now.
Yugoslavia dismantled itself. In a civil war. Which is what is *not* happening in Ukraine.
Yugoslavia broke up. The parts of Yugoslavia left, of their own volition. The Serbians wanted lots of bits of other parts of the former Yugoslavia (there were other disputes, but this was the main one). The Serbs (who had most of the forms Yugoslav armies equipment) then fought a long war to do this. The resolution of the war was when the other parts of Yugoslavia were given the weapons to defend themselves.
None of this applies to Ukraine where the government runs the country - with a lot of arguing from the citizenry, true, but no signs of break up.
Are you a Tankie or something?
"... but no signs of break up. "
Ukraine is breaking up. That is why there is a crisis.
Still, "the government runs the country" and "there are no tanks in Baghdad".
The Left - from the top down - has been smearing, abusing and dehumanizing the Tories for decades. From Nye Bevan calling them “lower than vermin” to Angela Rayner’s “racist scum” to those lefty wankers spitting and howling at tories going into their Conference in Manchester
So they can fuck off with this moaning about Starmer. No one has called him a rat or a Nazi. The narcissistic mewling is pathetic
Conservative politicians, and especially Conservative Prime Ministers, should not be descending to the levels of Angela Rayner and the 'lefty wankers'. Particularly when the LOTO has higher standards.
I half agree. What Boris said was clumsy, ill-advised and ugly. But it really isn’t on the same level as “lower than vermin”, “worse than Nazis”, “horrible racist scum”
Even the whole Never Kissed A Tory thing, which seems playful, is actually quite dehumanizing and objectionable. It implies that your political opponents are somehow not fit for breeding. Not in the same species.
Vile
And the Left has been doing this for many decades. And when it comes back to bite them, my how they whine
An unedifying spectacle on all sides
But the left started it with "never kiss a Tory!" But the right were there first with the Freikorps! What else could we do when the communists were killing their way to power?! Oh you mean like in the Thermidorian Reaction? Which was a response to the out of control Jacobins! Who who merely overthrowing a conservative absolutism!
Etc.
There we go, we've now done all the whataboutery. Well done everyone, another fine match.
I'll remain convinced your condemnation of whataboutery is dismayingly partisan unless you post this in response to every comment on the thread.
The thing about Leon's post that provoked me to respond was the "doing this for many decades" bit. I thought that this was a painfully short-sighted view when we have hundreds of years of ideological conflict at our disposal.
I haven't even gotten to the roundheads and the cavaliers yet. I've got a Freeborn John to play against your Prince Rupert, and Restoration to offset your Lord Protector too. Personally I won't be fully satisfied until we're arguing about Boudica's sacking of St Albans.
I think you should be focussing your comments on Abel's unacceptable provocation of Cain.
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
I see from some online lists of “the ten ugliest buildings in the world” that Holyrood AND the Kiwi Parliament both make the list, so this is clearly a keenly fought contest
The tragedy is that Holyrood is in EDINBURGH, one of the loveliest cities on the globe. It would be fine, if still weird and hideous, in Swindon or Stockport. It’s like putting the old Birmingham Bull Ring in Venice
Actually I like Holyrood. It wasn't worth the money spent on it - I think you should be disciplined with the public purse. But it is a genuinely interesting piece of modern architecture, of which there is very little in Scotland.
Actually in my experience architects of my acquaintance seem quite keen on it. Whether that's a good thing..
One of them was able to clear up one minor mystery for me, why a (as I thought) pistol grip motif was repeated on the exterior; they are trees apparently. Boring..
Architects defending enormously expensive architecture. Amazebombs. Next thing you’ll have virologists denying that risky virological research could possibly lead to a lab leak, and that coronavirus must have come from a pangolin fucking a wasp in a pet shop
Holyrood reminds me a little of the British Library. Both enormously expensive. Both long delayed. Both intensely disappointing. Both have rather fine interiors, but sad exteriors. Tho Holyrood is much uglier
Both are stoutly defended by architects. Of course
So Javid wants to get the NHS waiting list time below a year by March 2025? I remember it being 18 weeks in the bad old days of the Labour government.
I'm finalising my proposed contract to go PAYE. For the first time ever I am not just taking private health insurance, I am writing it in blood into the contract.
I hope you didn't support lockdowns.
It wasn't the lockdowns that caused the waiting list, it was the pandemic. If the operating staff are working ICU then they aren't operating. They weren't furloughed!
"Stay at home. Protect the NHS".
Yes, the public stayed at home, NHS workers didn't. Chris Whitty explained it well to a hard of thinking Tory MP:
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
Unionists, nae taste.
Discuss.
Holyrood is lovely on the inside. Very calm.
There are three problems with the outside:
- Couldn't ruin the view from the palace. - the stupid security box extension wart on the original sweeping facade - concrete, rather than our lovely sandstone (or some fun with granite from Aberdeen, harling with shells from the Hebrides etc)
Could've looked like the extension to the national museum
The Museum extension was sandstone from Moray, Clashach Quarry on the coast I find on checking.
The Pmt does tbf use Caithness flagstone slabs - rather nice.
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
I see from some online lists of “the ten ugliest buildings in the world” that Holyrood AND the Kiwi Parliament both make the list, so this is clearly a keenly fought contest
The tragedy is that Holyrood is in EDINBURGH, one of the loveliest cities on the globe. It would be fine, if still weird and hideous, in Swindon or Stockport. It’s like putting the old Birmingham Bull Ring in Venice
Actually I like Holyrood. It wasn't worth the money spent on it - I think you should be disciplined with the public purse. But it is a genuinely interesting piece of modern architecture, of which there is very little in Scotland.
Actually in my experience architects of my acquaintance seem quite keen on it. Whether that's a good thing..
One of them was able to clear up one minor mystery for me, why a (as I thought) pistol grip motif was repeated on the exterior; they are trees apparently. Boring..
At the risk of pseudishness, it's a very organic building. There hardly any parallel lines, which is probably why it cost so much. As architects have built almost nothing but blocks for the past 500 years for major buildings. Holyrood is something different.
The Manx Tynwald is probably the most Covid-safe parliament in the world:
Do you realise how much you have just screwed up my search facility with that one careless post?!!!!
Now as long as this thread is active I will have to put an extra letter into the search when I go looking to see if I have had any replies to my comments.
Aaaaaaaarrrrggghhhh!!!!!!!!!
Just wait till we get on to the paternity of Castor and Pollux
I'm losing patience with Tory MPs but who do we see as possible candidates?
Sunak Truss Mordaunt Tugendhat Harper
Any others?
Raab and Patel and Gove and Hunt
Yes. Across the two posts looking like a good list.
However, as the secret voting whittles them down, they coalesce around their wings of the party? The next part of the game is who backs who when they either don’t run or get whittled out. Does it boil down to just two factions, right and centre, 1 candidate from each to the membership? Or are there other distinct platforms who can muscle in to the final 2? 🤔
In what I think is huge danger to the government getting re-elected, Clear water developing now between government and opposition over a big call in credit crunch management. Libdems throwing their weight behind windfall tax on the energy firms making higher profits.
The windfall could not have been budgeted in in terms of investment, so cannot harm any investment if the windfall is merely taxed? If tax system cannot take into account vast profits are being made simply from market volatility, surely that is simply wrong, a bit of Robin Hood in these situations is only fair and good if Capitalism is to work properly? Otherwise you will endorse impoverished consumers having to pay through the nose for energy vital to them, at the same time those who own the energy firms are raking in profit. That has to be both capitalism gone wrong and an insane political position to defend?
Has there been any polling on Windfall tax in last few weeks?
What about the losses they made in the previous financial year?
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
Unionists, nae taste.
Discuss.
Holyrood is lovely on the inside. Very calm.
There are three problems with the outside:
- Couldn't ruin the view from the palace. - the stupid security box extension wart on the original sweeping facade - concrete, rather than our lovely sandstone (or some fun with granite from Aberdeen, harling with shells from the Hebrides etc)
Could've looked like the extension to the national museum
What do you expect from the unionists, typical Labour shambles.
Shirley-Anne Somerville accuses opposition MSPs of "deliberately misunderstanding" plans to "undercut" some school classroom doors as part of efforts to improve ventilation. She says this may actually be needed if installation of extractor fans changes the air pressure in a room …..
The "misunderstanding" may stem somewhat from the fact this is completely different from the reasoning the Scottish government was offering last week - Nicola Sturgeon certainly never mentioned concerns about changes in air pressure in a lengthy FMQs exchange on the topic
Mr. Oracle, Boris Johnson deserves a great deal of criticism.
However, your comparison is utterly flawed. In one, the individual was condemning something, in another, he was marching happily beside banners of mass murderers (Mao, Stalin, Lenin) in a way nobody would tolerate of a Conservative MP doing with Hitler, Heydrich, and Himmler.
I really don't see much difference. The subject I believe we started on was the ERG, and I raised their fellow travellers. Tommy Robinson was at several Brexit events and was not ostracised or diminished, for instance, alongside more moderate nationalsts, which sometimes included Tory politicians.
Here's are some of the same Tommy's supporters performing Nazi salutes at a different event :
ERG worse than Nazis because of Tommy Robinson who isn't in the ERG?
This is some really weak sauce you're serving.
Come on. What Nazis have any Tories employed, like Corbyn employed Stalinists (according to Workers' Liberty)?
As I understand it, Milne claims he was a conviinced Stalinist about as long ago as one of Farage's teachers said he was singing Nazi songs, in the early '80s as a young man at Dulwich college. And in the broader sense already mentioned below, no Brexiter Conservatives that I heard raised any objection whatsover to Tommy Robinson's supporters being at several Brexit events.
That's utterly feeble.
I bring you the Duck à l'Orange of a Socialist magazine describing Corbyn's closest advisors as Stalinist.
You come back with chicken nuggets dipped in orange squash.
Tories didn't complain about Tommy Robinson's supporters?!
SURELY you can find something better than that. I mean, something real at least.
Despite the belief of almost everyone on pb.com, a plebiscite in the Crimea will actually reveal that the overwhelmingly Russian population wants to be in Russia.
Plebiscite at gunpoint after invasion? Is it July 1940 again?
I think Russia was wrong to take Crimea by force ... but there was also no way that Ukraine would have allowed a plebiscite on secession, so Ukraine was wrong as well.
Yet again, if there is a massive war, Ukraine will lose more territory than if some plebiscites are held in Luhansk and Donetsk.
Except that no-one asked about a plebiscite on secession for the Crimea. Just an invasion. So Ukraine was in the wrong for not allowing something that wasn't asked for?
Russia has been busy creating "facts on the ground" in Crimea. See the Yugoslav wars, China in Tibet etc etc.
Did you support the break up of Yugoslavia? Why is it necessary for the Ukraine to remain in one piece and Yugoslavia to be dismantled.
I'd say, Yugoslavia was dismantled by the West because Serbia was Russia's ally.
Ukraine is being kept intact by the West to spite Russia.
But let's hear your explanation as to why it was right to dismantle Yugoslavia but wrong to suggest the same for Ukraine.
And can we have the magnificent image of drunken bears, please, in the reply
Ha Ha ha.
I see now.
Yugoslavia dismantled itself. In a civil war. Which is what is *not* happening in Ukraine.
Yugoslavia broke up. The parts of Yugoslavia left, of their own volition. The Serbians wanted lots of bits of other parts of the former Yugoslavia (there were other disputes, but this was the main one). The Serbs (who had most of the forms Yugoslav armies equipment) then fought a long war to do this. The resolution of the war was when the other parts of Yugoslavia were given the weapons to defend themselves.
None of this applies to Ukraine where the government runs the country - with a lot of arguing from the citizenry, true, but no signs of break up.
Are you a Tankie or something?
"... but no signs of break up. "
Ukraine is breaking up. That is why there is a crisis.
Still, "the government runs the country" and "there are no tanks in Baghdad".
The crisis is that the country next door keeps on invading Ukraine. And is tooling up for another go.
The reason that Russia invaded Ukraine the first time round was that their sponsored "insurgency" was falling apart from lack of local support.
So Javid wants to get the NHS waiting list time below a year by March 2025? I remember it being 18 weeks in the bad old days of the Labour government.
I'm finalising my proposed contract to go PAYE. For the first time ever I am not just taking private health insurance, I am writing it in blood into the contract.
I hope you didn't support lockdowns.
It wasn't the lockdowns that caused the waiting list, it was the pandemic. If the operating staff are working ICU then they aren't operating. They weren't furloughed!
"Stay at home. Protect the NHS".
Yes, the public stayed at home, NHS workers didn't. [gratuitous insult removed]
The public stayed home instead of getting their conditions seen to. And two years on, it's still essentially impossible for many of us to actually see a GP. We're reaping the whirlwind from changing the NHS into the National Covid Service.
The Left - from the top down - has been smearing, abusing and dehumanizing the Tories for decades. From Nye Bevan calling them “lower than vermin” to Angela Rayner’s “racist scum” to those lefty wankers spitting and howling at tories going into their Conference in Manchester
So they can fuck off with this moaning about Starmer. No one has called him a rat or a Nazi. The narcissistic mewling is pathetic
Conservative politicians, and especially Conservative Prime Ministers, should not be descending to the levels of Angela Rayner and the 'lefty wankers'. Particularly when the LOTO has higher standards.
I half agree. What Boris said was clumsy, ill-advised and ugly. But it really isn’t on the same level as “lower than vermin”, “worse than Nazis”, “horrible racist scum”
Even the whole Never Kissed A Tory thing, which seems playful, is actually quite dehumanizing and objectionable. It implies that your political opponents are somehow not fit for breeding. Not in the same species.
Vile
And the Left has been doing this for many decades. And when it comes back to bite them, my how they whine
An unedifying spectacle on all sides
But the left started it with "never kiss a Tory!" But the right were there first with the Freikorps! What else could we do when the communists were killing their way to power?! Oh you mean like in the Thermidorian Reaction? Which was a response to the out of control Jacobins! Who who merely overthrowing a conservative absolutism!
Etc.
There we go, we've now done all the whataboutery. Well done everyone, another fine match.
I'll remain convinced your condemnation of whataboutery is dismayingly partisan unless you post this in response to every comment on the thread.
The thing about Leon's post that provoked me to respond was the "doing this for many decades" bit. I thought that this was a painfully short-sighted view when we have hundreds of years of ideological conflict at our disposal.
I haven't even gotten to the roundheads and the cavaliers yet. I've got a Freeborn John to play against your Prince Rupert, and Restoration to offset your Lord Protector too. Personally I won't be fully satisfied until we're arguing about Boudica's sacking of St Albans.
I think you should be focussing your comments on Abel's unacceptable provocation of Cain.
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
I see from some online lists of “the ten ugliest buildings in the world” that Holyrood AND the Kiwi Parliament both make the list, so this is clearly a keenly fought contest
The tragedy is that Holyrood is in EDINBURGH, one of the loveliest cities on the globe. It would be fine, if still weird and hideous, in Swindon or Stockport. It’s like putting the old Birmingham Bull Ring in Venice
Actually I like Holyrood. It wasn't worth the money spent on it - I think you should be disciplined with the public purse. But it is a genuinely interesting piece of modern architecture, of which there is very little in Scotland.
Actually in my experience architects of my acquaintance seem quite keen on it. Whether that's a good thing..
One of them was able to clear up one minor mystery for me, why a (as I thought) pistol grip motif was repeated on the exterior; they are trees apparently. Boring..
At the risk of pseudishness, it's a very organic building. There hardly any parallel lines, which is probably why it cost so much. As architects have built almost nothing but blocks for the past 500 years for major buildings. Holyrood is something different.
it’s not different and it’s not special. It is shit. Sometimes you just have to be honest
Look at it
It’s like some terrible Parliament from a little known republic in the USSR where they ran out of money after 3 months and decided to finish by glueing old toilets onto a bus station and said “fuck it, that will do”
I'm losing patience with Tory MPs but who do we see as possible candidates?
Sunak Truss Mordaunt Tugendhat Harper
Any others?
Raab and Patel and Gove and Hunt
Yes. Across the two posts looking like a good list.
However, as the secret voting whittles them down, they coalesce around their wings of the party? The next part of the game is who backs who when they either don’t run or get whittled out. Does it boil down to just two factions, right and centre, 1 candidate from each to the membership? Or are there other distinct platforms who can muscle in to the final 2? 🤔
Right vs centre doesn't exactly map onto or populist vs reality-based or authoritarian vs liberal - e.g. Johnson could be seen as economic centre, populist, authorisation; Sunak right, reality-based, liberal; Truss right, populist, authoritarian.... and so on.
Shirley-Anne Somerville accuses opposition MSPs of "deliberately misunderstanding" plans to "undercut" some school classroom doors as part of efforts to improve ventilation. She says this may actually be needed if installation of extractor fans changes the air pressure in a room …..
The "misunderstanding" may stem somewhat from the fact this is completely different from the reasoning the Scottish government was offering last week - Nicola Sturgeon certainly never mentioned concerns about changes in air pressure in a lengthy FMQs exchange on the topic
Sommerville has been totally and utterly useless in every post she has held. She must have something real juicy on Sturgeon to not be sweeping the streets.
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
I see from some online lists of “the ten ugliest buildings in the world” that Holyrood AND the Kiwi Parliament both make the list, so this is clearly a keenly fought contest
The tragedy is that Holyrood is in EDINBURGH, one of the loveliest cities on the globe. It would be fine, if still weird and hideous, in Swindon or Stockport. It’s like putting the old Birmingham Bull Ring in Venice
Actually I like Holyrood. It wasn't worth the money spent on it - I think you should be disciplined with the public purse. But it is a genuinely interesting piece of modern architecture, of which there is very little in Scotland.
Actually in my experience architects of my acquaintance seem quite keen on it. Whether that's a good thing..
One of them was able to clear up one minor mystery for me, why a (as I thought) pistol grip motif was repeated on the exterior; they are trees apparently. Boring..
Architects defending enormously expensive architecture. Amazebombs. Next thing you’ll have virologists denying that risky virological research could possibly lead to a lab leak, and that coronavirus must have come from a pangolin fucking a wasp in a pet shop
Holyrood reminds me a little of the British Library. Both enormously expensive. Both long delayed. Both intensely disappointing. Both have rather fine interiors, but sad exteriors. Tho Holyrood is much uglier
Both are stoutly defended by architects. Of course
It was an observation, not a stout defence of architects. As with dildo knappers, it's always interesting to hear a professional view.
I like Tugendhat but think it highly unlikely he gets to the final 2. More likely Hunt would face Sunak in the membership vote or a rightwinger like Truss or Raab or Patel.
I also think the Leaver Sunak would easily beat the former Remainer Tugendhat in any membership vote.
Agreed. OGH is safe in his Rishi bet if Tugendhat is the other option.
I actually think he is safe in his bet regardless of who Rishi faces - unless it is discovered Rishi is the Downing Street partymeister....
As you two guys are far closer to Tory politics than Libdem supporting me, how possible are the following?
As the candidate to move Party to the centre, Hunt may not run himself but back Tugendhat instead?
From outside the tainted and discredited cabinet, Harper is the candidate of the right, Tuggendhat candidate to shift to centre, if those two names go forward to the membership, Harper is clear winner isn’t he? The mood of the party membership is to stay right or is there appetite to move to centre?
I'm not sure Hunt is ready to give up the chance to be PM just yet. He lost to Boris last time, but still had plenty of Westminster support (although many of those who were so fervently anti-Boris are no longer MP's....)
The candidates (apart from Hunt) with any chance of getting put to the membership will be from the Cabinet.
The key thing is that the party does not resile from its record or its policies. Just, some of them, from Boris personally. So any candidate who seems to offer a repudiation of Brexit, for instance, will not get very far. So you can forget Hunt or Tugendhat whatever their other merits may be.
Here’s a good PB quiz, as I sip my gin under the tropical moon
Here are some kiwis protesting vax outside the NZ Parliament. From the groaniad
Look at he state of that building. Is this the ugliest Parliament building in the world, or is that still Holyrood? Can anyone think of a worse example?
And what is the best?
That looks much better than Holyrood
Holyrood is a disaster. Nice on the inside, hideous on the outside. Should be flattened the minute the structure has served it’s useful life. About 40 years is fair service?
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
I see from some online lists of “the ten ugliest buildings in the world” that Holyrood AND the Kiwi Parliament both make the list, so this is clearly a keenly fought contest
The tragedy is that Holyrood is in EDINBURGH, one of the loveliest cities on the globe. It would be fine, if still weird and hideous, in Swindon or Stockport. It’s like putting the old Birmingham Bull Ring in Venice
Actually I like Holyrood. It wasn't worth the money spent on it - I think you should be disciplined with the public purse. But it is a genuinely interesting piece of modern architecture, of which there is very little in Scotland.
Actually in my experience architects of my acquaintance seem quite keen on it. Whether that's a good thing..
One of them was able to clear up one minor mystery for me, why a (as I thought) pistol grip motif was repeated on the exterior; they are trees apparently. Boring..
At the risk of pseudishness, it's a very organic building. There hardly any parallel lines, which is probably why it cost so much. As architects have built almost nothing but blocks for the past 500 years for major buildings. Holyrood is something different.
it’s not different and it’s not special. It is shit. Sometimes you just have to be honest
Look at it
It’s like some terrible Parliament from a little known republic in the USSR where they ran out of money after 3 months and decided to finish by glueing old toilets onto a bus station and said “fuck it, that will do”
Not really. The Soviet style parliament is the Slovak one posted above. By all means criticise the Holyrood building - in my view the exterior is somewhat compromised - but it doesn't look at all Soviet.
Comments
I have no problem with self-determination, but I have a huge issues with a massive drunken bear throwing his weight around Eastern Europe.
By plebiscite, the northern (Muslim) portion of British Cameroon chose to join Nigeria.
The southern portion joined the Federal Republic of Cameroon.
However, your comparison is utterly flawed. In one, the individual was condemning something, in another, he was marching happily beside banners of mass murderers (Mao, Stalin, Lenin) in a way nobody would tolerate of a Conservative MP doing with Hitler, Heydrich, and Himmler.
‘A message to all politicians - one day, you will all be held to account,’ one prominent activist wrote on Telegram
https://twitter.com/lizziedearden/status/1491046827910909952?s=20&t=JipMrbT41vy-ImWuA-HHcg
The GOP mood on two most vulnerable holds - WI and PA - is looking more positive. In WI, it looks the Democrats are facing a bitter internecine battle and, in PA, the likely Republican candidate looks as though he can unite the vote.
You then have the Democrats vulnerable in at least three of their seats - NV, GA and AZ. In the last, it doesn't help the GOP doesn't have a candidate yet but Kelly is coming under attack both for the Border problems and with those comparing his stance with Sinema. In GA, Biden has appalling ratings and even Stacey Abrams didn't want to be near him when he visited. Warnock has better ratings but likely not enough. In NV, Cortez Masto is under a lot of pressure and, if Adam Laxalt becomes the GOP candidate, is going to be under more so.
In a really strong year, NH would also be at risk - Hassan is struggling to get above 45% in the polls even though she leads the likely GOP candidates. NH also tends to go quite heavily with the country in the mid-terms.
Ps MI is not Republican held in the Senate.
Not complaining about some posters is WORSE than genocide?
Well deserved, since he must carry some of the blame for the whole Paterson scandal.
Even the whole Never Kissed A Tory thing, which seems playful, is actually quite dehumanizing and objectionable. It implies that your political opponents are somehow not fit for breeding. Not in the same species.
Vile
And the Left has been doing this for many decades. And when it comes back to bite them, my how they whine
An unedifying spectacle on all sides
Russia has been busy creating "facts on the ground" in Crimea. See the Yugoslav wars, China in Tibet etc etc.
Any other type of protest —> not okay.
Under no circumstances should money be wasted on renovation.
Dewar was a sneeky wee bastard.
Park left vs right. Park "woke". And remember that everyone on all sides are human beings. We have had MPs on both sides of the house murdered in recent memory by nutters. So it is in everyone's interests not to fan the nutter flames as Liar did and his sycophants repeated because the nutters don't care for your definitions of partisanship, they just see a target.
I love the image of massive drunken bears.
Plus I imagine Holyrood cost seventy thousand times more
https://www.viator.com/en-CA/Dhaka-attractions/National-Parliament-House/d22495-a21798
As the candidate to move Party to the centre, Hunt may not run himself but back Tugendhat instead?
From outside the tainted and discredited cabinet, Harper is the candidate of the right, Tuggendhat candidate to shift to centre, if those two names go forward to the membership, Harper is clear winner isn’t he? The mood of the party membership is to stay right or is there appetite to move to centre?
I will be delighted if Jacob Rees-Mogg gets the scissors out and frees the country from its red tape trade prison. But doing so will not be a Brexit bonus. Just a return to the status quo ante.
Incidentally, this idea that we start rolling back on safety standards. That is explicitly what this very government insisted it would not do.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_United_States_Senate_elections
Massive game tonight for the erstwhile Heaton Norris Rovers, as it happens.
Under a new £80 million contract with Bristol-based Centreline, four BAe146 aircraft, will be replaced by two more sustainable aircraft to continue the UK’s global engagement.
The new planes will be more sustainable thanks to their smaller engines, leading to a reduction in fuel burn and emissions. They will also be able to fly further, providing the UK greater opportunity to engage with key allies and partners.
https://www.raf.mod.uk/news/articles/new-jets-to-enhance-uks-international-presence/?fbclid=IwAR3501cIvpnPpotbsg7vu9xc7Pbevuj7ikhNx6J7PlmafGRUvvLBcO2JBlo
As someone said of the -146 - the only aircraft with 5 APUs!
https://twitter.com/ShippersUnbound/status/1491050054127603713
Leader of the House is also the custodian in parliament for the complaints system
https://twitter.com/estwebber/status/1491051025712975874
I'd say, Yugoslavia was dismantled by the West because Serbia was Russia's ally.
Ukraine is being kept intact by the West to spite Russia.
But let's hear your explanation as to why it was right to dismantle Yugoslavia but wrong to suggest the same for Ukraine.
And can we have the magnificent image of drunken bears, please, in the reply
The tragedy is that Holyrood is in EDINBURGH, one of the loveliest cities on the globe. It would be fine, if still weird and hideous, in Swindon or Stockport. It’s like putting the old Birmingham Bull Ring in Venice
I like that! Good contender. Modest yet handsome
The candidates (apart from Hunt) with any chance of getting put to the membership will be from the Cabinet.
It’s not intrusively offensive, to my mind. Just banal and disappointing?
You defeat ideas you dislike with better ideas, and politicians you dislike at the ballot box.
Incidents of harassment and threats of violence, lead to authoritarian politicians trying to restrict further the right to protest outside Parliament.
Discuss.
Or should we say that Russia needs to hold a plebiscite on everything West of the Urals joining Ukraine?
Here's are some of the same Tommy's supporters performing Nazi salutes, at different events :
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/tommy-robinson-free-protest-nazi-salutes-london-violence-police-arrests-attacks-prison-a8393566.html
I
Sunak
Truss
Mordaunt
Tugendhat
Harper
Any others?
This is some really weak sauce you're serving.
Come on. What Nazis have any Tories employed, like Corbyn employed Stalinists (according to Workers' Liberty)?
I see now.
Yugoslavia dismantled itself. In a civil war. Which is what is *not* happening in Ukraine.
Yugoslavia broke up. The parts of Yugoslavia left, of their own volition. The Serbians wanted lots of bits of other parts of the former Yugoslavia (there were other disputes, but this was the main one). The Serbs (who had most of the forms Yugoslav armies equipment) then fought a long war to do this. The resolution of the war was when the other parts of Yugoslavia were given the weapons to defend themselves.
None of this applies to Ukraine where the government runs the country - with a lot of arguing from the citizenry, true, but no signs of break up.
Are you a Tankie or something?
One of them was able to clear up one minor mystery for me, why a (as I thought) pistol grip motif was repeated on the exterior; they are trees apparently. Boring..
“Opened in 1984 by Prince Charles”
That’s rather nice
This was what was wanted for the Scottish Pmt - but oh no, it was a 'nationalist shibboleth' to the Unionists. (TBF there were practical issues, but did they try to solve them? No, the primary reason given was because it was already a symbol of independence.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Royal_High_School#/media/File:Royal_High_School_Calton_Hill_Edinburgh.jpg
Instead the Blairite administration "gave" us the Holyrood building (which tbf has its merits especially internally) and left the Scots with the blame for the high price.
Now as long as this thread is active I will have to put an extra letter into the search when I go looking to see if I have had any replies to my comments.
Aaaaaaaarrrrggghhhh!!!!!!!!!
https://www.libdemvoice.org/davey-we-need-leaders-who-can-act-over-energy-supplies-69815.html
The windfall could not have been budgeted in in terms of investment, so cannot harm any investment if the windfall is merely taxed? If tax system cannot take into account vast profits are being made simply from market volatility, surely that is simply wrong, a bit of Robin Hood in these situations is only fair and good if Capitalism is to work properly? Otherwise you will endorse impoverished consumers having to pay through the nose for energy vital to them, at the same time those who own the energy firms are raking in profit. That has to be both capitalism gone wrong and an insane political position to defend?
Has there been any polling on Windfall tax in last few weeks?
There are three problems with the outside:
- Couldn't ruin the view from the palace.
- the stupid security box extension wart on the original sweeping facade
- concrete, rather than our lovely sandstone (or some fun with granite from Aberdeen, harling with shells from the Hebrides etc)
Could've looked like the extension to the national museum
Ukraine is breaking up. That is why there is a crisis.
Still, "the government runs the country" and "there are no tanks in Baghdad".
Holyrood reminds me a little of the British Library. Both enormously expensive. Both long delayed. Both intensely disappointing. Both have rather fine interiors, but sad exteriors. Tho Holyrood is much uglier
Both are stoutly defended by architects. Of course
https://twitter.com/bmay/status/1471485797530583046?t=oMcnutaZs8_LkXqVooVfhw&s=19
Out
And in
The Pmt does tbf use Caithness flagstone slabs - rather nice.
https://www.constructionenquirer.com/2013/06/12/scottish-parliament-stone-supplier-goes-under/
Modern architecture is generally pants compared to the 1st century AD in Rome.
I have another potential loser. Tho highly forgivable. South Sudan
However, as the secret voting whittles them down, they coalesce around their wings of the party? The next part of the game is who backs who when they either don’t run or get whittled out. Does it boil down to just two factions, right and centre, 1 candidate from each to the membership? Or are there other distinct platforms who can muscle in to the final 2? 🤔
The "misunderstanding" may stem somewhat from the fact this is completely different from the reasoning the Scottish government was offering last week - Nicola Sturgeon certainly never mentioned concerns about changes in air pressure in a lengthy FMQs exchange on the topic
https://twitter.com/BBCPhilipSim/status/1491054103497437186?s=20&t=k83p23d4dhC24zmfW-TldQ
I bring you the Duck à l'Orange of a Socialist magazine describing Corbyn's closest advisors as Stalinist.
You come back with chicken nuggets dipped in orange squash.
Tories didn't complain about Tommy Robinson's supporters?!
SURELY you can find something better than that. I mean, something real at least.
The reason that Russia invaded Ukraine the first time round was that their sponsored "insurgency" was falling apart from lack of local support.
Look at it
It’s like some terrible Parliament from a little known republic in the USSR where they ran out of money after 3 months and decided to finish by glueing old toilets onto a bus station and said “fuck it, that will do”
I think I might increase my bet on Truss.