We have entered a new phase of government where almost everything the Prime Minister does is aimed at placating his MPs. Everything — from staff changes at No. 10 to the makeup of the whips’ office — is designed to show that he is listening to backbenchers https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/boriss-bunker-the-pms-defensive-strategy
A tweet alleging that the photo of Boris + tinsel + champagne bottle was faked: photoshopped
I am skeptical. The bottle does look a tiny bit suspect, but the tinsel? Maybe the first photo is the fake?
DYOR
Edit: actually I am sure that it is the more innocent pic which is the deceptive one. Which makes it all murkier. Dom Cummings eking out the evidence slooooooooowly?
Why bother faking it? It wasn't particularly damning in my opinion, just more of the same.
I was expecting to see him dancing naked on the dancefloor with a bottle in one hand and a girl in the other that he was snogging. I was really disappointed.
Has anyone thought of a PB North gathering? Taz, Gallowgate, Pulpstar (?), Cyclefree, eek, cookie, Mr.Ed (?), Another Richard, TSE, Barty, even Big G, maybe, flatlander, etc...? Apologies to anyone I have missed. BJO too? And Valiant.
Great idea.
I would be up for a meeting in the north of England too. As I say in 2016 I went to Manchester but London is just too far.
Do London and Millom on the same night, with a video link between them so everyone can introduce themselves to each other.
I shall be in London on March 2.
Glasgow or Manchester would be better places for a Northern gathering. Good bars in each.
A tweet alleging that the photo of Boris + tinsel + champagne bottle was faked: photoshopped
I am skeptical. The bottle does look a tiny bit suspect, but the tinsel? Maybe the first photo is the fake?
DYOR
Edit: actually I am sure that it is the more innocent pic which is the deceptive one. Which makes it all murkier. Dom Cummings eking out the evidence slooooooooowly?
Ooh if that was faked, which the Mirror have form for, then that is serious.
Interesting comment on that link, if the bottle were genuine then where are the glasses? A bit weird to have an open bottle but no glasses on the table. 🥂
There is more than one photo of the tinsel. I am pretty sure that is real. But of course tinsel is nothing. No rule broken
The bottle DOES look odd, slightly oversized and tilted, and it suddenly appears. Why was it not in the first photos?
It seems big. It looks like a magnum of Veuve Clicquot?
But it could also be an odd angle and just this Sainsbury's prosecco?
Without the bottle the photo has zero meaning, PM in background of man looking at the computer, PM fiddling with his top button. The bottle creates the agenda that it is a picture of a party. The bottle is oddly big and is at the wrong angle compared to the sanitiser
Why did these people say peadophile protector to Gove when they surrounded him in October?
I think we already dealt with that. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/feb/08/no-10-chernobyl-boris-johnson-keir-starmer-mob ...Anyway: we go again. One calendar week after Johnson tried to wriggle off the “partygate” hook by shouting something grim about Keir Starmer and Jimmy Savile, Keir Starmer was beset in the street by a mob shouting something grim about him and Jimmy Savile. It’s important to be clear that they were shouting a load of other grim stuff, too – but I’m afraid that isn’t the get-out Downing Street seems to think it is. In fact, it just underlines why no prime minister, ever, should be feeding dangerous conspiracy theories, which run the gamut from anti-vax all the way to antisemitism, via a selection of paedophile-based nonsense and much else besides. If recent rallies and demos have taught us anything, it’s that there is, increasingly, plenty of overlap. These days, all sorts of persuasions are fellow travellers.
You need to be against ALL this stuff, elementally, not just the bits that can’t get you out of a hole in the House of Commons. It’s the same with mobs: the mob that targeted Jacob Rees-Mogg and his son a while back was just as bad as the mob that surrounded Starmer and David Lammy on Monday, as was the mob that repeatedly abused Dominic Cummings in his own street. They’re all a pox and a signpost of worse to come, and no politician who truly cares about their country should pander to them....
That only works, though, if there was outrage at the time it happened to Gove.
Which there wasn't.
You're arguing that it's therefore OK to have a PM who panders to conspiracy theorists ?
Scottish Covid powers to be extended by six months - this is interesting because if Scotland & England diverge, and England opens up, we’ll be able to see whether this works well for England or results in thousands more deaths.
Yes, without a definite opinion on the extent of restrictions still needed (if any) I'm concerned that the relaxation is being made as part of BJ's charm offensive to backbenchers. I'd prefer it if he limited himself to reshuffles and speeches than to public health issues.
It's possible but seems unlikely that it's wise to have no restrictions whatsoever, and it would be helpful to see the opinion of the sientific advisers on this - has it been published?
It is not just a healthcare issue. It is an economic and social as well as healthcare issue. And the healthcare issue isn't just Covid.
And that is absolutely the government's job.
It would be helpful to see the opinion of the scientific advisors on smoking or eating Terry's Chocolate Oranges. But it shouldn't determine policy.
All the current measures (cases, various hospital stats, deaths) are down and have been for a substantial period of time.
What restrictions are actually left and what is their effect on R?
I would put supermarket mask wearing at around 70-80% and this is with guidance only (and store "policy"). Which includes, as far as I have seen, people arriving and leaving in their cars alone wearing masks. I think there will be a rump 20-30% who will continue to wear masks for some time. Perhaps NPXMP is one of those.
"It's possible but seems unlikely that it's wise to have no restrictions whatsoever" is the sentiment of someone both privileged and anxious. There will be many just like Nick I'm sure.
Mask wearing in shops seems to have pretty much ended in Yorkshire in my experience - it was only about 50% even before the restrictions ended.
Mask-wearing at Sainsbury's on Monday and on the bus yesterday remained at a high level.
There do seem to be regional and possibly socioeconomic class differences regarding restrictions.
Possibly affected by the levels of previous infection among the people you know.
Among the people I know the attitude seems to be that everyone's had it already (mostly either before vaccination or by Delta), that Omicron isn't anything to be afraid of and that covid isn't going to disappear so you might as well stop worrying and get on with your life.
For those people who have spent two years trying to avoid covid the mentality may well be different.
Has anyone thought of a PB North gathering? Taz, Gallowgate, Pulpstar (?), Cyclefree, eek, cookie, Mr.Ed (?), Another Richard, TSE, Barty, even Big G, maybe, flatlander, etc...? Apologies to anyone I have missed. BJO too? And Valiant.
Great idea.
I would be up for a meeting in the north of England too. As I say in 2016 I went to Manchester but London is just too far.
Do London and Millom on the same night, with a video link between them so everyone can introduce themselves to each other.
Yes, like Live Aid in 85, Wembley and Maddison Square Garden, it worked well.
I’ve been convinced since mid December that the RU invasion of UKR is very likely. But I recognize that a lot of people disagree (not least of all, many in UKR government — at least publicly)
It is always good to reevaluate your assumptions so let’s red team the alternatives 🧵
But NPXMP thinks it's a bluff. Nothing to worry about.
That is nothing compared to his eyepopping claim the other day that Taiwan has been crying wolf about China for decades and nobody believes them any more. Not sure which is more remarkable - still believing in Communism or believing it still resides in Russia or China.
One under appreciated point about the new coziness between the Russian and Chinese autocrats is that a new gas pipeline to China would render China impervious to threats of sanctions cutting gas supplies - which is currently a consideration regarding their policy towards Taiwan.
Why did these people say peadophile protector to Gove when they surrounded him in October?
I think we already dealt with that. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/feb/08/no-10-chernobyl-boris-johnson-keir-starmer-mob ...Anyway: we go again. One calendar week after Johnson tried to wriggle off the “partygate” hook by shouting something grim about Keir Starmer and Jimmy Savile, Keir Starmer was beset in the street by a mob shouting something grim about him and Jimmy Savile. It’s important to be clear that they were shouting a load of other grim stuff, too – but I’m afraid that isn’t the get-out Downing Street seems to think it is. In fact, it just underlines why no prime minister, ever, should be feeding dangerous conspiracy theories, which run the gamut from anti-vax all the way to antisemitism, via a selection of paedophile-based nonsense and much else besides. If recent rallies and demos have taught us anything, it’s that there is, increasingly, plenty of overlap. These days, all sorts of persuasions are fellow travellers.
You need to be against ALL this stuff, elementally, not just the bits that can’t get you out of a hole in the House of Commons. It’s the same with mobs: the mob that targeted Jacob Rees-Mogg and his son a while back was just as bad as the mob that surrounded Starmer and David Lammy on Monday, as was the mob that repeatedly abused Dominic Cummings in his own street. They’re all a pox and a signpost of worse to come, and no politician who truly cares about their country should pander to them....
That only works, though, if there was outrage at the time it happened to Gove.
Which there wasn't.
You're arguing that it's therefore OK to have a PM who panders to conspiracy theorists ?
No. I'm arguing that "it's all as bad" doesn't wash when nobody complained when Gove was targeted.
I was looking at this unspectacular article and it struck me that this would be perfect for a fifth Shakespearean tragedy. A powerful man brought down by a flaw in his character. It even contains a sprinkling of Doctor Faustus.
A middle ranking politician employs a devious genius to secure him the most powerful position in the land. If he succeeds the devious genius can have anything he wants.......
He wants the head of the mighty leaders wife. After much agonising the mighty leader offers him the head of anyone else but not his wife.
The evil genius swears he'll get his revenge. Then starts the drip drip drip .....
Sadly - is anyone surprised? The presence of the Russian Team, sorry Russian Olympic Committee, no, no connection to the Russian state, no sirree is a joke, and was at the Summer games too.
I don't disagree.
But, if it's true, then I am still surprised considering she is a 15 year old. If proven then adults involved could be prosecuted.
It's very disappointing because figure skating has largely seemed free of doping. It's not a sport for muscle mass. Unlike athletics which I'm afraid I can no longer watch, and cycling which is equally disappointing.
But please don't think TeamGB are saints. British Cycling still has a LOT of unanswered questions as the likes of David Walsh have been keen to point out.
Interesting to see how many are left standing, untainted.
I semi-seriously think we should split the Olympics into clean vs take whatever the hell you want, with the penalty for doping in the clean jacked up to amputation of a limb. It's just silly to pretend the 100m record is anything other than 7.79 seconds.
The problem is a function of money and prestige that goes with the sport.
It is noticeable that the sports that don't have this problem are the ones where fame and fortune are not the result.
It is also noticeable that when fame and fortune come to a sport, the problem appears.
The Ancient Greeks knew this.
The film Chariots of Fire makes interesting viewing, to me, since all of this. The portrayal of "the powers that be" as muddy duddies and a bit racist for not liking professional sport has aged like milk.....
You'd be surprised. 3 or 4 years ago I did the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers - 200 yachts sailing Canaries - caribbean. Most are just cruising, about 25 are in the "racing" division. It's completely amateur, no serious yacht taking part, 50p prize money, dog with the waggiest tail stuff. Nonetheless one owner begged his crew, just before reaching St Lucia, to go along with his claim they hadn't motored at all when they had. They had had 2 weeks to decide how much they disliked him and told him to piss off. St Lucia is not a large island, and there was a dozen drunk yachties telling this story in every bar on the island to anyone who would listen
Bit of a long shot, but anyway. We have an SA chap, Dave, painting a spare room, nice lad. His forte is small boat building (ie wood) but he says he hasn't been able to find any hook ups or opportunities here (Glasgow) which I was slightly surprised about. I know you get up to this part of the world now and again, any insights or suggestions?
Edit: he's a very meticulous and reliable decorator, qualities which I'd imagine would be transferrable.
I'm seeing increasing signs of the war drums being rolled out in the grocery industry. Sales are contracting, prices are rising and consumers are the most pessimistic about food prices since 2013. More worrying is that the commodity prices being quoted going forward in some cases are catastrophic.
There has been enough food price inflation for people to notice, and thats despite a lot of it being absorbed by manufacturers and retailers. The next wave of inflationary pressures look more severe and there is no absorption left - prices will have to be passed on and that means people having to make some stark choices as prices go up as the money they can spend goes down.
I think the sunny optimist / amoral remaining Boris boosters don't understand just how bad April is going to be. Forget your sad attempts at boosterism, people are going to get absolutely slammed by the price of everything shooting up just as taxes go up and inflation makes them poorer.
I suspect that will kill Sunak's chances of ever being PM. His only hope lies in prising Johnson out of Number 10 and then using the change of management as an excuse for ameliorating the cost of living increases by reversing some of the tax decisions.
Sunak screwed up by not forcing a VONC last week - now by the time the election comes round the pain will be obvious (higher fuel costs, higher food costs) and then made worse as the April pay pocket arrives with less rather than more money in it.
I agree. The pain that a lot of people are going to feel will be harsh and their reaction will be visceral. Note the "loanshark chancellor" jibe by Starmer - Sunak laughed it off but it will stick as people find themselves struggling to make ends meet being told they are liable for loans to bail out BP.
BP is a commodity trader that also produces energy. It’s like Glencore.
They just put some profitable bets on - nothing to do with the Uk domestic market
Partygate is now so bloody boring. Is anyone - literally anyone (apart from @Scott_xP) excited by that latest photo?
The damage is done. Boris needs to go. But hurry up this is arse-achingly dull, now
Exactly my sentiments
It needs one final, breathtaking revelation, like the last few explosions of a big fireworks display. Cocaine snorting off a downing street official's back, say, or a naked conga.
Then on to more pressing matters like inflation and falling real wages.
What makes anyone think that Boris Johnson can deal effectively with inflation, falling real wages and all the other economic fundamentals about to hit the fan?
Even if he didn’t have an appalling track record on a wide range of issues, he has never shown any aptitude nor interest in the topic of economics. In fact he appears to neither know about nor care about the field. Beyond “Fuck business”, I cannot recall a single significant contribution by Johnson to economic discourse.
That contrasts with many PMs, who often appeared to be very interested in economics. Thatcher for example was always banging on about it. She clearly loved the topic: it stimulated her mind. Whatever stimulates Boris Johnson, or whatever passes for his “mind”, it is certainly not inflation or falling real wages.
I don’t think that we are going to be witnessing the downfall of Boris Johnson anytime soon (barring the Clowning Street cocaine snorting scenario you paint), so we are all about to find out just how big an economics genius Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson is.
Johnson, of course, is interested in only one topic: Johnson.
The core vote needs more and more pension spending and more and more healthcare, and they don't want to pay for it. It'll be left to Sunak to deal with that problem, and we can already see from the Old Gits' Arse-Wiping Tax Health and Social Care Levy how he intends to go about that: put up taxes on earned incomes until half the entire population is dependent on food banks.
So long as the rich elderly and their heirs are sufficiently bribed, nothing else matters. The only flaw in that particular plan is the impending collapse of the NHS - driven largely by the fact that the Government visits poor conditions and, in most cases, low wages upon a pissed off and depleted workforce, who will be sorely tempted to jack it in and go to work for private hospitals, hospitals abroad, or get a stress-free shift at Aldi.
Private healthcare is in finite supply and is very expensive: the opportunities for queue jumping are limited. If a sufficient number of olds with dodgy joints find themselves joining the back of a five-year waiting list for operations, then the Government might finally be under serious threat.
Then go on a hiring spree. Send a recruitment team out worldwide to find healthcare staff, and fast-track visas for them and their families. There will be many already in the NHS that are totally broken by the past two years, and desparately need some R&R downtime.
Oh, and a scrapping of any and all posts with words like “diversity” or “equality” in the job title.
Why not simply spend some time and effort training our existing staff and giving them a reason to stay on? Surgical training programmes are over subscribed and under delivered, not least because the juniors have been working respiratory medicine not setting bones these last 2 years.
Since we have elevated the barriers to recognition of overseas qualifications, overseas recruitment has become more difficult since Brexit. EEA qualifications are no longer recognised, and that was a big pool of staff. There are also significant worldwide shortages of staff, as this us an issue everywhere with aging populations, and covid recovery.
Incidentally the only "diversity officers" I ever meet are those working on health promotion and similar campaigns in undeserved communities. Vaccination and the like.
One "maybe we CAN quickly help by throwing money at it" idea would be: - If frontline medical staff spend a significant time of their days doing administration and jumping through hoops, recruiting administration assistants to help take that burden might free up more time for the medical staff (and thus both reduce time stress and allow for more actual medical work).
The drawback is the old lazy charge of "too many beancounters/useless management/administrators/etc" (even though the NHS has amongst the lowest such proportion in the world and thus loads a lot of this on to medical professionals), but it could well help, I would assume.
Comments
Glasgow or Manchester would be better places for a Northern gathering. Good bars in each.
This is *quite* convincing. The bottle is at the wrong angle.
https://twitter.com/DomMgy1/status/1491697814946131974?s=20
https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/the-brahmos-deal-and-indias-defence-exports/article38395523.ece
Possibly affected by the levels of previous infection among the people you know.
Among the people I know the attitude seems to be that everyone's had it already (mostly either before vaccination or by Delta), that Omicron isn't anything to be afraid of and that covid isn't going to disappear so you might as well stop worrying and get on with your life.
For those people who have spent two years trying to avoid covid the mentality may well be different.
Rest In Peace, Concorde
A middle ranking politician employs a devious genius to secure him the most powerful position in the land. If he succeeds the devious genius can have anything he wants.......
He wants the head of the mighty leaders wife. After much agonising the mighty leader offers him the head of anyone else but not his wife.
The evil genius swears he'll get his revenge. Then starts the drip drip drip .....
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/london-politics-news-live-met-065649350.html
We have an SA chap, Dave, painting a spare room, nice lad. His forte is small boat building (ie wood) but he says he hasn't been able to find any hook ups or opportunities here (Glasgow) which I was slightly surprised about. I know you get up to this part of the world now and again, any insights or suggestions?
Edit: he's a very meticulous and reliable decorator, qualities which I'd imagine would be transferrable.
Evidence of the same image both with and without the bottle would be the giveaway. Do we have that?
They just put some profitable bets on - nothing to do with the Uk domestic market
- If frontline medical staff spend a significant time of their days doing administration and jumping through hoops, recruiting administration assistants to help take that burden might free up more time for the medical staff (and thus both reduce time stress and allow for more actual medical work).
The drawback is the old lazy charge of "too many beancounters/useless management/administrators/etc" (even though the NHS has amongst the lowest such proportion in the world and thus loads a lot of this on to medical professionals), but it could well help, I would assume.