Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Draghi and Italy - dependent on Russia for gas - throw a major spanner in the talk of an EU united front to punish Putin with tough sanctions. So much for “whatever it takes”.
I’m bored of saying Putin hasn’t got lucky with this division, but has for years plotted it whilst we oblivious went about our business - like the Martians plotting invasion in HG Wells book.
Italian politics has been partly franchised by the Russians for a long time. Unless you believe that Romano Prodi got his information on Morro from a seance.....
That’s quite a claim!
Actually what is the claim? Some factions are that close with Putin’s McMafia they can receive and utilise Russian intelligence, not just money, to destabilise their political opponents? [moon rabbit shrugs] ]Italian politics always been a basket case compared to UK, even some still young in their twenties has known this for years.
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
1. We bought a quarter of the planet's corrupt, cowardly and incompetent rulers. 2. gunboats.
3. We’ve gone downhill recently and not as we were?
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
It's very much the case that in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king.
I think Frank Herbert was correct that it's not so much that power corrupts, as that power attracts pathological personalities.
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
For the past year or so, I'd say that Johnson, for all his faults, has made the right calls on COVID. Perhaps that was just luck, but then, it's good to be lucky.
I'd say he's made better calls than his political opponents and most of his counterparts elsewhere in the west. A long way from making the right calls though. Thi gs really turned the corner when Matt Hancock was replaced.
Breaking: The Queen has tested positive for Covid-19 this morning, the palace has confirmed. The 95-year-old Queen is experiencing 'mild cold-like' symptoms. BUT is expecting to continue 'light duties' at Windsor this week. https://twitter.com/MattSunRoyal/status/1495363945733005312
The odds are not very good.....
What are the hospitalisation rates for the triple jabbed (very) elderly ?
Worth bearing in mind that I'm assuming these are figures for all those aged 85+, so that would include men (who are more vulnerable to Covid), and whoever doesn't have the full three doses.
Less than 7%. Deaths lag, so the numbers dying on 14 February relate to cases 2-4 weeks earlier. (With a caveat that I don't know if it still works that way in very old people, of if death happens quicker).
HMQ also gets much better medical treatment than most of us.
I’m worried for our Queen ☹️ She’s already looking so much more fragile since she lost her husband.
One of our neighbours made a dramatic decline in frailty between her 89th and 90th birthdays. Perhaps what was so remarkable was how vital she had still been at 89. A decade's worth of ageing suddenly caught up.
It’s how it tends to happen doesn’t it? Like a clock running out of tick tock 😕
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
For the past year or so, I'd say that Johnson, for all his faults, has made the right calls on COVID. Perhaps that was just luck, but then, it's good to be lucky.
Yes - some the opposition were they in power would have have got wrong - specifically on vaccine procurement (EU scheme) and roll out priorities (public servants ahead of oldies). On lockdowns his instincts in general have been good but that’s more of a mixed bag. Still doesn’t make him fit for office.
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
Covid restrictions have been scrapped because of the combination of Omicron and vaccination has massively reduced risk.
It seems he would prefer the current situation to be more dangerous.
Of course he would, if it gives him something with which to bash the government.
To be fair to Starmer, he’s played a straight bat through the pandemic, with reasonable differences of opinion as to the way forward, but having the advice shared with him and being generally supportive of the strategy.
Many others on the left, have given the impression of cheering for the virus.
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Take the French Revolutionary/Napoleonic wars. The quality of British military leadership was mostly abysmal. Yet somehow, Nelson and Wellington (who were both pretty flawed men, in numerous ways) ended up in the right place at the right time.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
Breaking: The Queen has tested positive for Covid-19 this morning, the palace has confirmed. The 95-year-old Queen is experiencing 'mild cold-like' symptoms. BUT is expecting to continue 'light duties' at Windsor this week. https://twitter.com/MattSunRoyal/status/1495363945733005312
The odds are not very good.....
What are the hospitalisation rates for the triple jabbed (very) elderly ?
Worth bearing in mind that I'm assuming these are figures for all those aged 85+, so that would include men (who are more vulnerable to Covid), and whoever doesn't have the full three doses.
Less than 7%. Deaths lag, so the numbers dying on 14 February relate to cases 2-4 weeks earlier. (With a caveat that I don't know if it still works that way in very old people, of if death happens quicker).
HMQ also gets much better medical treatment than most of us.
One presumes that the Palace doctor has a cabinet full of the latest monoclonal antibodies, the new Pfizer treatment, high dose vitamin drips, and maybe even some ivermectin.
I think the queen will be fine. Though, when she reappears again, I look forward to the new FBPE conspiracy theory that actually she’s dead & has been replaced by a body double, so that butcher Boris could get on with his reopening plans.
Vice President Kamala Harris, echoing President Joe Biden's comments Friday, tells CNN's @NatashaBertrand in Munich "We believe that Putin has made his decision, period," to invade Ukraine, adding "nothing's being held back" in sharing intelligence with allies.
*off topic, though great to have a TSE thread again
Is it really all down to Putin making his mind up? If it was London or Washington and rest of war bunker said no, it wouldn’t matter what the leaders preference was? Why would it be different in Moscow? What I’m practically saying is, if Putin, and those agreeing with him were asked by the generals, what’s the clarity of the mission we can achieve and withdraw without it being open ended or creeping into something else, and Putin and his allies can’t convincingly define that, then surely it won’t happen?
If at some point the Ukraine leadership want a face to face with Russian counterpart’s, what would the Ukrainians hope to get from that? They would use it just to emphasise how belligerent their position is, like how Liz Truss used her Moscow trip?
These are two good questions for this latest Sunday in pre war build up?
Although Igor the Incinerator (Putin’s likely successor if the worst happened to Putin this week) is no doubt on side with sabre rattling to get Donetsk up everyone’s agenda, and dialogue on it not kicked into long grass like any criminal investigation into Boris Johnson, I’m not convinced Igor is on side with invasion, because Surely there’s internal politics and factions on things within Moscow government too, and Igors already allowed unease of generals to seep like a message into world news?
Why do I think Igor as successor? Is this not the same path which brought Putin into the job? What do we know about Igor? His take on pursuing Greater Russian Nationalism from behind his desk at GRU has been brazen, merciless and blood thirsty, like a dalek, he’s likely to be far worse than Putin to deal with especially if he’s been courting the military these past years. ☹️
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
1. We bought a quarter of the planet's corrupt, cowardly and incompetent rulers. 2. gunboats.
3. We’ve gone downhill recently and not as we were?
2 is important. For a long time (1700s to mid Victorian age) the Royal Navy was the world's premier military force, and we held our own until WW1. Whereas we have always been relatively shit at fighting wars and could never recruit levies of the size our European enemies could.
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Take the French Revolutionary/Napoleonic wars. The quality of British military leadership was mostly abysmal. Yet somehow, Nelson and Wellington (who were both pretty flawed men, in numerous ways) ended up in the right place at the right time.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
Not so much in the navy, where promotion was on merit
Breaking: The Queen has tested positive for Covid-19 this morning, the palace has confirmed. The 95-year-old Queen is experiencing 'mild cold-like' symptoms. BUT is expecting to continue 'light duties' at Windsor this week. https://twitter.com/MattSunRoyal/status/1495363945733005312
The odds are not very good.....
What are the hospitalisation rates for the triple jabbed (very) elderly ?
Worth bearing in mind that I'm assuming these are figures for all those aged 85+, so that would include men (who are more vulnerable to Covid), and whoever doesn't have the full three doses.
Less than 7%. Deaths lag, so the numbers dying on 14 February relate to cases 2-4 weeks earlier. (With a caveat that I don't know if it still works that way in very old people, of if death happens quicker).
HMQ also gets much better medical treatment than most of us.
Looking at peaks, the numbers for the 85+ seem to line up as
Cases Peak -> Admissions peak 11 days later -> Deaths peak 20 days later
Which give us Case/Admission Ratio of 4-5 and a Case/Fatality Ratio of 15-19
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
For the past year or so, I'd say that Johnson, for all his faults, has made the right calls on COVID. Perhaps that was just luck, but then, it's good to be lucky.
Yes - some the opposition were they in power would have have got wrong - specifically on vaccine procurement (EU scheme) and roll out priorities (public servants ahead of oldies). On lockdowns his instincts in general have been good but that’s more of a mixed bag. Still doesn’t make him fit for office.
Pretty sure you can add that that does make him fit for office to your choice hot takes though.
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
It's interesting to wonder how Pitt(s), Gray, Peel, Palmerston, Gladstone and Disraeli would be regarded today. My inclination is to think that they'd be giants.
We certainly have much to thank Gladstone for introducing proper merit to the civil service.
You wouldn’t be wishing the worst because you think it might be good for the zero covidiots, would you?
The only idiots I see around are the right wing boneheads.
But then capitalists have never cared if they kill other people on their way to line their pockets.
The Herald of Free Enterprise. Cut corners, shave time, make profit.
The Herald, really? I’d have thought Railtrack would make for a better example of capitalists compromising safety.
Anyway, went London for the first time in a month yesterday. Not so many people wearing masks on the tube.
It’s over.
Was about 50/50 when I was there last weekend. I'm working on the assumption either that TfL has no powers of enforcement or that flouting of the rules is so widespread that they have given up. But yes, it's effectively over.
Breaking: The Queen has tested positive for Covid-19 this morning, the palace has confirmed. The 95-year-old Queen is experiencing 'mild cold-like' symptoms. BUT is expecting to continue 'light duties' at Windsor this week. https://twitter.com/MattSunRoyal/status/1495363945733005312
The odds are not very good.....
What are the hospitalisation rates for the triple jabbed (very) elderly ?
Worth bearing in mind that I'm assuming these are figures for all those aged 85+, so that would include men (who are more vulnerable to Covid), and whoever doesn't have the full three doses.
Less than 7%. Deaths lag, so the numbers dying on 14 February relate to cases 2-4 weeks earlier. (With a caveat that I don't know if it still works that way in very old people, of if death happens quicker).
HMQ also gets much better medical treatment than most of us.
HMQ probably gets the same medical treatment as most of us, only without the waiting lists.
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Take the French Revolutionary/Napoleonic wars. The quality of British military leadership was mostly abysmal. Yet somehow, Nelson and Wellington (who were both pretty flawed men, in numerous ways) ended up in the right place at the right time.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
Not so much in the navy, where promotion was on merit
There was so system of purchasing commissions in the RN; but one usually needed powerful connections to get ahead. Also, once you reached the rank of Commander, promotion was then strictly on the basis of seniority (as in the East India Company's army) with the result that some capable people were denied important commands, and some duffers who ought to have been retired years previously found themselves in charge.
Firstly he's damaged the Ukrainian economy and reminded them that their freedom from Moscow comes at a price - the threat of military action. He's also helped to prop up mini me Lukashenko who's been under pressure from protesters who believe that he rigged the 2020 election.
He's de facto annexed Belarus while everyone was looking at Ukraine.
That's actually a good point - and one that will give Putin some nice Brownie Points with the Greater Russian Nationalists.
Could it be enough for the climb down? My guess is that it isn't, sadly.
Surely Belarus was already all-but annexed.
Pretty much. but each step will make the Greater Russian Nationalists feel a warmth in their hearts. Nothing like getting Kyiv, of course.
Firstly he's damaged the Ukrainian economy and reminded them that their freedom from Moscow comes at a price - the threat of military action. He's also helped to prop up mini me Lukashenko who's been under pressure from protesters who believe that he rigged the 2020 election.
He's de facto annexed Belarus while everyone was looking at Ukraine.
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
For the past year or so, I'd say that Johnson, for all his faults, has made the right calls on COVID. Perhaps that was just luck, but then, it's good to be lucky.
Whilst some calls people would have made differently, Covid is one area where, for instance, the Britain Trump claims go too far, as Boris actually has largely followed advice and been on message (though even Trump has been on message on vaccines more than some of his supporters).
Breaking: The Queen has tested positive for Covid-19 this morning, the palace has confirmed. The 95-year-old Queen is experiencing 'mild cold-like' symptoms. BUT is expecting to continue 'light duties' at Windsor this week. https://twitter.com/MattSunRoyal/status/1495363945733005312
The odds are not very good.....
What are the hospitalisation rates for the triple jabbed (very) elderly ?
Worth bearing in mind that I'm assuming these are figures for all those aged 85+, so that would include men (who are more vulnerable to Covid), and whoever doesn't have the full three doses.
Less than 7%. Deaths lag, so the numbers dying on 14 February relate to cases 2-4 weeks earlier. (With a caveat that I don't know if it still works that way in very old people, of if death happens quicker).
HMQ also gets much better medical treatment than most of us.
Looking at peaks, the numbers for the 85+ seem to line up as
Cases Peak -> Admissions peak 11 days later -> Deaths peak 20 days later
Which give us Case/Admission Ratio of 4-5 and a Case/Fatality Ratio of 15-19
From 25 Jan to 14 Feb then, to use single day figures for convenience, 5.1%. And probably lower as even some of those oldies will be incidental deaths. And as it continues to decrease, the CFR for someone catching Covid today is even lower. Adding in HMQ's triple vaccine status and superior medical treatment, she's probably down to 1-2%.
Er, I think I may have just inadvertently made a betting post.
I think the queen will be fine. Though, when she reappears again, I look forward to the new FBPE conspiracy theory that actually she’s dead & has been replaced by a body double, so that butcher Boris could get on with his reopening plans.
The @EHRCChair asks those – and it is a minority – who seek to undermine the EHRC: what they hope to achieve and who they think will protect and advance #equality and #humanrights in the U.K. if they have their wish?
Vice President Kamala Harris, echoing President Joe Biden's comments Friday, tells CNN's @NatashaBertrand in Munich "We believe that Putin has made his decision, period," to invade Ukraine, adding "nothing's being held back" in sharing intelligence with allies.
*off topic, though great to have a TSE thread again
Is it really all down to Putin making his mind up? If it was London or Washington and rest of war bunker said no, it wouldn’t matter what the leaders preference was? Why would it be different in Moscow? What I’m practically saying is, if Putin, and those agreeing with him were asked by the generals, what’s the clarity of the mission we can achieve and withdraw without it being open ended or creeping into something else, and Putin and his allies can’t convincingly define that, then surely it won’t happen?
If at some point the Ukraine leadership want a face to face with Russian counterpart’s, what would the Ukrainians hope to get from that? They would use it just to emphasise how belligerent their position is, like how Liz Truss used her Moscow trip?
These are two good questions for this latest Sunday in pre war build up?
Although Igor the Incinerator (Putin’s likely successor if the worst happened to Putin this week) is no doubt on side with sabre rattling to get Donetsk up everyone’s agenda, and dialogue on it not kicked into long grass like any criminal investigation into Boris Johnson, I’m not convinced Igor is on side with invasion, because Surely there’s internal politics and factions on things within Moscow government too, and Igors already allowed unease of generals to seep like a message into world news?
Why do I think Igor as successor? Is this not the same path which brought Putin into the job? What do we know about Igor? His take on pursuing Greater Russian Nationalism from behind his desk at GRU has been brazen, merciless and blood thirsty, like a dalek, he’s likely to be far worse than Putin to deal with especially if he’s been courting the military these past years. ☹️
Ukrainians - "emphasise how belligerent their position is" ???? Since when is "Don't invaded my country" belligerent?
Like Napoleon, Putin has to manage a coalition of power brokers behind him. He is riding a tiger, which can eat him at any time.
A successor to Putin is not predictable. Putin himself was supposed to be a puppet figurehead, who got out of control.
In Paraguay, General Rodríguez overthrew Stroessner. Rodríguez was corrupt and a fully paid up member of the goose-stepping military.
He freed the political prisoners, unbanned the opposition, introduced real democracy, and stepped down after one term as elected (genuinely) president. Then died. People are still going WTF??
Breaking: The Queen has tested positive for Covid-19 this morning, the palace has confirmed. The 95-year-old Queen is experiencing 'mild cold-like' symptoms. BUT is expecting to continue 'light duties' at Windsor this week. https://twitter.com/MattSunRoyal/status/1495363945733005312
The odds are not very good.....
What are the hospitalisation rates for the triple jabbed (very) elderly ?
Worth bearing in mind that I'm assuming these are figures for all those aged 85+, so that would include men (who are more vulnerable to Covid), and whoever doesn't have the full three doses.
Less than 7%. Deaths lag, so the numbers dying on 14 February relate to cases 2-4 weeks earlier. (With a caveat that I don't know if it still works that way in very old people, of if death happens quicker).
HMQ also gets much better medical treatment than most of us.
Looking at peaks, the numbers for the 85+ seem to line up as
Cases Peak -> Admissions peak 11 days later -> Deaths peak 20 days later
Which give us Case/Admission Ratio of 4-5 and a Case/Fatality Ratio of 15-19
From 25 Jan to 14 Feb then, to use single day figures for convenience, 5.1%. And probably lower as even some of those oldies will be incidental deaths. And as it continues to decrease, the CFR for someone catching Covid today is even lower. Adding in HMQ's triple vaccine status and superior medical treatment, she's probably down to 1-2%.
Er, I think I may have just inadvertently made a betting post.
Firstly he's damaged the Ukrainian economy and reminded them that their freedom from Moscow comes at a price - the threat of military action. He's also helped to prop up mini me Lukashenko who's been under pressure from protesters who believe that he rigged the 2020 election.
He's de facto annexed Belarus while everyone was looking at Ukraine.
That's actually a good point - and one that will give Putin some nice Brownie Points with the Greater Russian Nationalists.
Could it be enough for the climb down? My guess is that it isn't, sadly.
Surely Belarus was already all-but annexed.
Pretty much. but each step will make the Greater Russian Nationalists feel a warmth in their hearts. Nothing like getting Kyiv, of course.
Breaking: The Queen has tested positive for Covid-19 this morning, the palace has confirmed. The 95-year-old Queen is experiencing 'mild cold-like' symptoms. BUT is expecting to continue 'light duties' at Windsor this week. https://twitter.com/MattSunRoyal/status/1495363945733005312
The odds are not very good.....
What are the hospitalisation rates for the triple jabbed (very) elderly ?
That includes incidentals and 85+ people will have a lot of those. The primary death certificate reason put against ONS incidence is probably a better measure.
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Take the French Revolutionary/Napoleonic wars. The quality of British military leadership was mostly abysmal. Yet somehow, Nelson and Wellington (who were both pretty flawed men, in numerous ways) ended up in the right place at the right time.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
Not so much in the navy, where promotion was on merit
There was so system of purchasing commissions in the RN; but one usually needed powerful connections to get ahead. Also, once you reached the rank of Commander, promotion was then strictly on the basis of seniority (as in the East India Company's army) with the result that some capable people were denied important commands, and some duffers who ought to have been retired years previously found themselves in charge.
Though this was moderated by the use of the rank of Commodore - which was there to allow important commands of squadrons to go to an effective officer, rather than by seniority. And there was always the Yellow for the less useful Admirals...
Sever flood warnings on the Mersey at Didsbury. Quite apart from the curiosity of the nationwide cloudburst, however, coherent that turns out to be, it's turning out to be a bad one over the Peak District more generally..
I think the queen will be fine. Though, when she reappears again, I look forward to the new FBPE conspiracy theory that actually she’s dead & has been replaced by a body double, so that butcher Boris could get on with his reopening plans.
Firstly he's damaged the Ukrainian economy and reminded them that their freedom from Moscow comes at a price - the threat of military action. He's also helped to prop up mini me Lukashenko who's been under pressure from protesters who believe that he rigged the 2020 election.
He's de facto annexed Belarus while everyone was looking at Ukraine.
Breaking: The Queen has tested positive for Covid-19 this morning, the palace has confirmed. The 95-year-old Queen is experiencing 'mild cold-like' symptoms. BUT is expecting to continue 'light duties' at Windsor this week. https://twitter.com/MattSunRoyal/status/1495363945733005312
The odds are not very good.....
What are the hospitalisation rates for the triple jabbed (very) elderly ?
Worth bearing in mind that I'm assuming these are figures for all those aged 85+, so that would include men (who are more vulnerable to Covid), and whoever doesn't have the full three doses.
Less than 7%. Deaths lag, so the numbers dying on 14 February relate to cases 2-4 weeks earlier. (With a caveat that I don't know if it still works that way in very old people, of if death happens quicker).
HMQ also gets much better medical treatment than most of us.
Looking at peaks, the numbers for the 85+ seem to line up as
Cases Peak -> Admissions peak 11 days later -> Deaths peak 20 days later
Which give us Case/Admission Ratio of 4-5 and a Case/Fatality Ratio of 15-19
From 25 Jan to 14 Feb then, to use single day figures for convenience, 5.1%. And probably lower as even some of those oldies will be incidental deaths. And as it continues to decrease, the CFR for someone catching Covid today is even lower. Adding in HMQ's triple vaccine status and superior medical treatment, she's probably down to 1-2%.
Er, I think I may have just inadvertently made a betting post.
FWIW, the mean life expectancy of a woman the Queen's age is only about three years anyway, so there's considerably more than a 2% probability of her shuffling off some time this year regardless of whether or not she suffers significant Covid symptoms. Probably closer to 20%..
Sever flood warnings on the Mersey at Didsbury. Quite apart from the curiosity of the nationwide cloudburst, however, coherent that turns out to be, it's turning out to be a bad one over the Peak District more generally..
I may wander down to Jackson's Bridge later and take a look. There is something mesmeric about a river approaching flood levels. Last winter, flood combined with snow, lending the while thing an eerie silence. Then the floodgates were opened and Sale Water Park flooded. Which was the system working as intended, but still quite awesome to see.
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Take the French Revolutionary/Napoleonic wars. The quality of British military leadership was mostly abysmal. Yet somehow, Nelson and Wellington (who were both pretty flawed men, in numerous ways) ended up in the right place at the right time.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
Not so much in the navy, where promotion was on merit
There was so system of purchasing commissions in the RN; but one usually needed powerful connections to get ahead. Also, once you reached the rank of Commander, promotion was then strictly on the basis of seniority (as in the East India Company's army) with the result that some capable people were denied important commands, and some duffers who ought to have been retired years previously found themselves in charge.
Once you got to Captain though ("made post") there were some options. Poor captains could be assigned to poor ships, or military backwaters. Or just left on the beach on half pay. Commodore was an appointment, not a rank, so they could appoint a good captain, not the most senior (in fact, that was often the whole point, to prevent the most senior captain in a flotilla from being in charge). And you could get to Rear Admiral and suddenly find yourself retired as there was no command for you, they would reach down the list to the best captain coming close to seniority. And they could make sure they gave the right commands to the right people. Nelson commanded the fleet at Trafalgar as a Vice Admiral, and was only a Rear at the Nile.
I think the queen will be fine. Though, when she reappears again, I look forward to the new FBPE conspiracy theory that actually she’s dead & has been replaced by a body double, so that butcher Boris could get on with his reopening plans.
I am sure people used to joke about the Queen Mother having died long before she did, and that she was kept going with animotronics.
We did in my family anyway.
In Russia, people still joke that Chernenko was one of the best leaders, having been dead for his entire time in office.
Similar in tone, though different cause, to the joke about the Earl of Bath (sort of)being PM for 2 days being:
the most wise and honest of all administrations, the minister having ... never transacted one rash thing; and, what is more marvellous, left as much money in the T[reasur]y as he found in it.
Boris Johnson is going to muscle his way on to the Regency Council isn't he?
He's not going to sit idly by whilst Sir Lindsay Hoyle and Dominic Raab whilst Raab take part?
I think a regency with the Queen semi-retired but still doing a little oversight as she sees fit is more likely than an abdication, but any attempt to politicise such a handover could just possibly force the latter.
How would 'gave the Queen no choice but to abdicate' sit on Boris's CV?
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Take the French Revolutionary/Napoleonic wars. The quality of British military leadership was mostly abysmal. Yet somehow, Nelson and Wellington (who were both pretty flawed men, in numerous ways) ended up in the right place at the right time.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
Not so much in the navy, where promotion was on merit
There was so system of purchasing commissions in the RN; but one usually needed powerful connections to get ahead. Also, once you reached the rank of Commander, promotion was then strictly on the basis of seniority (as in the East India Company's army) with the result that some capable people were denied important commands, and some duffers who ought to have been retired years previously found themselves in charge.
Once you got to Captain though ("made post") there were some options. Poor captains could be assigned to poor ships, or military backwaters. Or just left on the beach on half pay. Commodore was an appointment, not a rank, so they could appoint a good captain, not the most senior (in fact, that was often the whole point, to prevent the most senior captain in a flotilla from being in charge). And you could get to Rear Admiral and suddenly find yourself retired as there was no command for you, they would reach down the list to the best captain coming close to seniority. And they could make sure they gave the right commands to the right people. Nelson commanded the fleet at Trafalgar as a Vice Admiral, and was only a Rear at the Nile.
Yes, there ways around the system.
Horatio Hornblower resorted to assassination, in order to get rid of a captain who was a liability.
Sever flood warnings on the Mersey at Didsbury. Quite apart from the curiosity of the nationwide cloudburst, however, coherent that turns out to be, it's turning out to be a bad one over the Peak District more generally..
I may wander down to Jackson's Bridge later and take a look. There is something mesmeric about a river approaching flood levels. Last winter, flood combined with snow, lending the while thing an eerie silence. Then the floodgates were opened and Sale Water Park flooded. Which was the system working as intended, but still quite awesome to see.
As the name suggests, the Ouse floods frequently and profusely.
Boris Johnson is going to muscle his way on to the Regency Council isn't he?
He's not going to sit idly by whilst Sir Lindsay Hoyle and Dominic Raab whilst Raab take part?
I think a regency with the Queen semi-retired but still doing a little oversight as she sees fit is more likely than an abdication, but any attempt to politicise such a handover could just possibly force the latter.
How would 'gave the Queen no choice but to abdicate' sit on Boris's CV?
Boris Johnson would be seen as a pound shop Stanley Baldwin.
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
Covid restrictions have been scrapped because of the combination of Omicron and vaccination has massively reduced risk.
It seems he would prefer the current situation to be more dangerous.
Of course he would, if it gives him something with which to bash the government.
To be fair to Starmer, he’s played a straight bat through the pandemic, with reasonable differences of opinion as to the way forward, but having the advice shared with him and being generally supportive of the strategy.
Many others on the left, have given the impression of cheering for the virus.
Not that impressed with him trying to turn a foreign policy threat into a question of party funding
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Take the French Revolutionary/Napoleonic wars. The quality of British military leadership was mostly abysmal. Yet somehow, Nelson and Wellington (who were both pretty flawed men, in numerous ways) ended up in the right place at the right time.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
Not so much in the navy, where promotion was on merit
There was so system of purchasing commissions in the RN; but one usually needed powerful connections to get ahead. Also, once you reached the rank of Commander, promotion was then strictly on the basis of seniority (as in the East India Company's army) with the result that some capable people were denied important commands, and some duffers who ought to have been retired years previously found themselves in charge.
Once you got to Captain though ("made post") there were some options. Poor captains could be assigned to poor ships, or military backwaters. Or just left on the beach on half pay. Commodore was an appointment, not a rank, so they could appoint a good captain, not the most senior (in fact, that was often the whole point, to prevent the most senior captain in a flotilla from being in charge). And you could get to Rear Admiral and suddenly find yourself retired as there was no command for you, they would reach down the list to the best captain coming close to seniority. And they could make sure they gave the right commands to the right people. Nelson commanded the fleet at Trafalgar as a Vice Admiral, and was only a Rear at the Nile.
Yes, there ways around the system.
Horatio Hornblower resorted to assassination, in order to get rid of a captain who was a liability.
I'm sure that occasionally happened, just as in Vietnam, some officers got dragged.
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Take the French Revolutionary/Napoleonic wars. The quality of British military leadership was mostly abysmal. Yet somehow, Nelson and Wellington (who were both pretty flawed men, in numerous ways) ended up in the right place at the right time.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
Not so much in the navy, where promotion was on merit
There was so system of purchasing commissions in the RN; but one usually needed powerful connections to get ahead. Also, once you reached the rank of Commander, promotion was then strictly on the basis of seniority (as in the East India Company's army) with the result that some capable people were denied important commands, and some duffers who ought to have been retired years previously found themselves in charge.
Once you got to Captain though ("made post") there were some options. Poor captains could be assigned to poor ships, or military backwaters. Or just left on the beach on half pay. Commodore was an appointment, not a rank, so they could appoint a good captain, not the most senior (in fact, that was often the whole point, to prevent the most senior captain in a flotilla from being in charge). And you could get to Rear Admiral and suddenly find yourself retired as there was no command for you, they would reach down the list to the best captain coming close to seniority. And they could make sure they gave the right commands to the right people. Nelson commanded the fleet at Trafalgar as a Vice Admiral, and was only a Rear at the Nile.
Yes, there ways around the system.
Horatio Hornblower resorted to assassination, in order to get rid of a captain who was a liability.
I'm sure that occasionally happened, just as in Vietnam, some officers got dragged.
Have been stuck in an echo chamber for 24 hours. Went something like this: Me: “Shame about Sarah Smith” “She’s a liar” “Doubt it: but anyway, the misogyny & abuse…” “Was no misogyny or abuse” “Here’s proof of that abuse” “But… Did I mention she’s a liar?” 🤦🏻♂️🤷♂️
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Take the French Revolutionary/Napoleonic wars. The quality of British military leadership was mostly abysmal. Yet somehow, Nelson and Wellington (who were both pretty flawed men, in numerous ways) ended up in the right place at the right time.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
Not so much in the navy, where promotion was on merit
There was so system of purchasing commissions in the RN; but one usually needed powerful connections to get ahead. Also, once you reached the rank of Commander, promotion was then strictly on the basis of seniority (as in the East India Company's army) with the result that some capable people were denied important commands, and some duffers who ought to have been retired years previously found themselves in charge.
Once you got to Captain though ("made post") there were some options. Poor captains could be assigned to poor ships, or military backwaters. Or just left on the beach on half pay. Commodore was an appointment, not a rank, so they could appoint a good captain, not the most senior (in fact, that was often the whole point, to prevent the most senior captain in a flotilla from being in charge). And you could get to Rear Admiral and suddenly find yourself retired as there was no command for you, they would reach down the list to the best captain coming close to seniority. And they could make sure they gave the right commands to the right people. Nelson commanded the fleet at Trafalgar as a Vice Admiral, and was only a Rear at the Nile.
Yes, there ways around the system.
Horatio Hornblower resorted to assassination, in order to get rid of a captain who was a liability.
I'm sure that occasionally happened, just as in Vietnam, some officers got dragged.
Vice President Kamala Harris, echoing President Joe Biden's comments Friday, tells CNN's @NatashaBertrand in Munich "We believe that Putin has made his decision, period," to invade Ukraine, adding "nothing's being held back" in sharing intelligence with allies.
*off topic, though great to have a TSE thread again
Is it really all down to Putin making his mind up? If it was London or Washington and rest of war bunker said no, it wouldn’t matter what the leaders preference was? Why would it be different in Moscow? What I’m practically saying is, if Putin, and those agreeing with him were asked by the generals, what’s the clarity of the mission we can achieve and withdraw without it being open ended or creeping into something else, and Putin and his allies can’t convincingly define that, then surely it won’t happen?
If at some point the Ukraine leadership want a face to face with Russian counterpart’s, what would the Ukrainians hope to get from that? They would use it just to emphasise how belligerent their position is, like how Liz Truss used her Moscow trip?
These are two good questions for this latest Sunday in pre war build up?
Although Igor the Incinerator (Putin’s likely successor if the worst happened to Putin this week) is no doubt on side with sabre rattling to get Donetsk up everyone’s agenda, and dialogue on it not kicked into long grass like any criminal investigation into Boris Johnson, I’m not convinced Igor is on side with invasion, because Surely there’s internal politics and factions on things within Moscow government too, and Igors already allowed unease of generals to seep like a message into world news?
Why do I think Igor as successor? Is this not the same path which brought Putin into the job? What do we know about Igor? His take on pursuing Greater Russian Nationalism from behind his desk at GRU has been brazen, merciless and blood thirsty, like a dalek, he’s likely to be far worse than Putin to deal with especially if he’s been courting the military these past years. ☹️
Ukrainians - "emphasise how belligerent their position is" ???? Since when is "Don't invaded my country" belligerent?
Like Napoleon, Putin has to manage a coalition of power brokers behind him. He is riding a tiger, which can eat him at any time.
A successor to Putin is not predictable. Putin himself was supposed to be a puppet figurehead, who got out of control.
In Paraguay, General Rodríguez overthrew Stroessner. Rodríguez was corrupt and a fully paid up member of the goose-stepping military.
He freed the political prisoners, unbanned the opposition, introduced real democracy, and stepped down after one term as elected (genuinely) president. Then died. People are still going WTF??
Unfortunately your mention of riding the tiger has given me an earworm (Dio's Holy Diver) and I think I am going to have to play it to get it out of my system
Boris Johnson is going to muscle his way on to the Regency Council isn't he?
He's not going to sit idly by whilst Sir Lindsay Hoyle and Dominic Raab whilst Raab take part?
I think a regency with the Queen semi-retired but still doing a little oversight as she sees fit is more likely than an abdication, but any attempt to politicise such a handover could just possibly force the latter.
How would 'gave the Queen no choice but to abdicate' sit on Boris's CV?
Boris Johnson would be seen as a pound shop Stanley Baldwin.
Real Conservatives oust monarchs.
One obviously appreciates that there is no possibility of this happening, BUT - it would be highly amusing if Charles's first move as (acting) head of state were to fire Johnson and tell Parliament to pick someone less unsuitable.
Firstly he's damaged the Ukrainian economy and reminded them that their freedom from Moscow comes at a price - the threat of military action. He's also helped to prop up mini me Lukashenko who's been under pressure from protesters who believe that he rigged the 2020 election.
He's de facto annexed Belarus while everyone was looking at Ukraine.
That's actually a good point - and one that will give Putin some nice Brownie Points with the Greater Russian Nationalists.
Could it be enough for the climb down? My guess is that it isn't, sadly.
Surely Belarus was already all-but annexed.
Pretty much. but each step will make the Greater Russian Nationalists feel a warmth in their hearts. Nothing like getting Kyiv, of course.
Or Kiev even
Putin is going to HAVE to invade, if only for the certainty of ever after being taunted as the Kiev Chicken.....
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Take the French Revolutionary/Napoleonic wars. The quality of British military leadership was mostly abysmal. Yet somehow, Nelson and Wellington (who were both pretty flawed men, in numerous ways) ended up in the right place at the right time.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
Not so much in the navy, where promotion was on merit
There was so system of purchasing commissions in the RN; but one usually needed powerful connections to get ahead. Also, once you reached the rank of Commander, promotion was then strictly on the basis of seniority (as in the East India Company's army) with the result that some capable people were denied important commands, and some duffers who ought to have been retired years previously found themselves in charge.
Once you got to Captain though ("made post") there were some options. Poor captains could be assigned to poor ships, or military backwaters. Or just left on the beach on half pay. Commodore was an appointment, not a rank, so they could appoint a good captain, not the most senior (in fact, that was often the whole point, to prevent the most senior captain in a flotilla from being in charge). And you could get to Rear Admiral and suddenly find yourself retired as there was no command for you, they would reach down the list to the best captain coming close to seniority. And they could make sure they gave the right commands to the right people. Nelson commanded the fleet at Trafalgar as a Vice Admiral, and was only a Rear at the Nile.
Yes, there ways around the system.
Horatio Hornblower resorted to assassination, in order to get rid of a captain who was a liability.
I'm sure that occasionally happened, just as in Vietnam, some officers got dragged.
Corbet was a strict disciplinarian, who regularly beat his men for the slightest infractions: so brutal was his regime that he provoked two mutinies, one simply at the rumour he was coming aboard a ship. These uprisings caused him to become even more vicious in his use of punishments and when he took his frigate HMS Africaine into action off Île Bourbon, his men failed to support him and may even have murdered him
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Take the French Revolutionary/Napoleonic wars. The quality of British military leadership was mostly abysmal. Yet somehow, Nelson and Wellington (who were both pretty flawed men, in numerous ways) ended up in the right place at the right time.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
Not so much in the navy, where promotion was on merit
There was so system of purchasing commissions in the RN; but one usually needed powerful connections to get ahead. Also, once you reached the rank of Commander, promotion was then strictly on the basis of seniority (as in the East India Company's army) with the result that some capable people were denied important commands, and some duffers who ought to have been retired years previously found themselves in charge.
Once you got to Captain though ("made post") there were some options. Poor captains could be assigned to poor ships, or military backwaters. Or just left on the beach on half pay. Commodore was an appointment, not a rank, so they could appoint a good captain, not the most senior (in fact, that was often the whole point, to prevent the most senior captain in a flotilla from being in charge). And you could get to Rear Admiral and suddenly find yourself retired as there was no command for you, they would reach down the list to the best captain coming close to seniority. And they could make sure they gave the right commands to the right people. Nelson commanded the fleet at Trafalgar as a Vice Admiral, and was only a Rear at the Nile.
Yes, there ways around the system.
Horatio Hornblower resorted to assassination, in order to get rid of a captain who was a liability.
I'm sure that occasionally happened, just as in Vietnam, some officers got dragged.
Draghi and Italy - dependent on Russia for gas - throw a major spanner in the talk of an EU united front to punish Putin with tough sanctions. So much for “whatever it takes”.
I’m bored of saying Putin hasn’t got lucky with this division, but has for years plotted it whilst we oblivious went about our business - like the Martians plotting invasion in HG Wells book.
Italian politics has been partly franchised by the Russians for a long time. Unless you believe that Romano Prodi got his information on Morro from a seance.....
Strangely the Italians and Greeks seem to have swapped places in this respect. They were both subject to a lot of both Russian and U.S. infliuence during the cold war period, ofcourse, including damaging Russian Communist Party infiltration, and on the right the often sinister Gladio project from the US, with its sponsorship of various fascist local loons.
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
Covid restrictions have been scrapped because of the combination of Omicron and vaccination has massively reduced risk.
It seems he would prefer the current situation to be more dangerous.
Of course he would, if it gives him something with which to bash the government.
To be fair to Starmer, he’s played a straight bat through the pandemic, with reasonable differences of opinion as to the way forward, but having the advice shared with him and being generally supportive of the strategy.
Many others on the left, have given the impression of cheering for the virus.
Not that impressed with him trying to turn a foreign policy threat into a question of party funding
The first two are also imbecilic afaics.
If this is to do with prorogation, AIUI he was advised by the senior legal officer that it was alright, and a court verdict declared it unlawful later.
Boris Johnson is going to muscle his way on to the Regency Council isn't he?
He's not going to sit idly by whilst Sir Lindsay Hoyle and Dominic Raab whilst Raab take part?
I think a regency with the Queen semi-retired but still doing a little oversight as she sees fit is more likely than an abdication, but any attempt to politicise such a handover could just possibly force the latter.
How would 'gave the Queen no choice but to abdicate' sit on Boris's CV?
Boris Johnson would be seen as a pound shop Stanley Baldwin.
Real Conservatives oust monarchs.
No they don't. Real Tories support all monarchs, even divorcees like Prince Charles as long as the sovereign supports their right to remarry under the 1772 Royal Marriages Act, as the Queen did when Charles married Camilla in 2005 (whereas George Vth never supported Edward Prince of Wales' marrying Wallace Simpson) and as long as they are Protestants as per the The Succession to the Crown Act of 1707 and so they can be Supreme Governor of the Church of England
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Take the French Revolutionary/Napoleonic wars. The quality of British military leadership was mostly abysmal. Yet somehow, Nelson and Wellington (who were both pretty flawed men, in numerous ways) ended up in the right place at the right time.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
Not so much in the navy, where promotion was on merit
There was so system of purchasing commissions in the RN; but one usually needed powerful connections to get ahead. Also, once you reached the rank of Commander, promotion was then strictly on the basis of seniority (as in the East India Company's army) with the result that some capable people were denied important commands, and some duffers who ought to have been retired years previously found themselves in charge.
Once you got to Captain though ("made post") there were some options. Poor captains could be assigned to poor ships, or military backwaters. Or just left on the beach on half pay. Commodore was an appointment, not a rank, so they could appoint a good captain, not the most senior (in fact, that was often the whole point, to prevent the most senior captain in a flotilla from being in charge). And you could get to Rear Admiral and suddenly find yourself retired as there was no command for you, they would reach down the list to the best captain coming close to seniority. And they could make sure they gave the right commands to the right people. Nelson commanded the fleet at Trafalgar as a Vice Admiral, and was only a Rear at the Nile.
Yes, there ways around the system.
Horatio Hornblower resorted to assassination, in order to get rid of a captain who was a liability.
I'm sure that occasionally happened, just as in Vietnam, some officers got dragged.
Corbet was a strict disciplinarian, who regularly beat his men for the slightest infractions: so brutal was his regime that he provoked two mutinies, one simply at the rumour he was coming aboard a ship. These uprisings caused him to become even more vicious in his use of punishments and when he took his frigate HMS Africaine into action off Île Bourbon, his men failed to support him and may even have murdered him
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
Covid restrictions have been scrapped because of the combination of Omicron and vaccination has massively reduced risk.
It seems he would prefer the current situation to be more dangerous.
Of course he would, if it gives him something with which to bash the government.
To be fair to Starmer, he’s played a straight bat through the pandemic, with reasonable differences of opinion as to the way forward, but having the advice shared with him and being generally supportive of the strategy.
Many others on the left, have given the impression of cheering for the virus.
Not that impressed with him trying to turn a foreign policy threat into a question of party funding
The first two are also imbecilic afaics.
If this is to do with prorogation, AIUI he was advised by the senior legal officer that it was alright, and a court verdict declared it unlawful.
It was a rare instance where I found some of the reasoning in the judgement less than convincing.
For me, the prorogation in its intent was wrong regardless of whether it was lawful or not - as you note, a lower court had considered it lawful (in England anyway), so it was at least up for debate - so the judgement didn't matter a great deal.
Firstly he's damaged the Ukrainian economy and reminded them that their freedom from Moscow comes at a price - the threat of military action. He's also helped to prop up mini me Lukashenko who's been under pressure from protesters who believe that he rigged the 2020 election.
He's de facto annexed Belarus while everyone was looking at Ukraine.
That's actually a good point - and one that will give Putin some nice Brownie Points with the Greater Russian Nationalists.
Could it be enough for the climb down? My guess is that it isn't, sadly.
Surely Belarus was already all-but annexed.
Pretty much. but each step will make the Greater Russian Nationalists feel a warmth in their hearts. Nothing like getting Kyiv, of course.
Or Kiev even
Putin is going to HAVE to invade, if only for the certainty of ever after being taunted as the Kiev Chicken.....
Which tabloid is going to send the office junior chasing Putin around in a chicken suit… and how long would they last in the role?
Boris Johnson is going to muscle his way on to the Regency Council isn't he?
He's not going to sit idly by whilst Sir Lindsay Hoyle and Dominic Raab whilst Raab take part?
I think a regency with the Queen semi-retired but still doing a little oversight as she sees fit is more likely than an abdication, but any attempt to politicise such a handover could just possibly force the latter.
How would 'gave the Queen no choice but to abdicate' sit on Boris's CV?
George VIth was Prince Regent for George IIIrd as Prince of Wales for 9 years, almost as long as the 10 years he was King.
Not necessarily a great precedent for Charles if as Prince of Wales he ends up Prince Regent for the Queen
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
Covid restrictions have been scrapped because of the combination of Omicron and vaccination has massively reduced risk.
It seems he would prefer the current situation to be more dangerous.
Of course he would, if it gives him something with which to bash the government.
To be fair to Starmer, he’s played a straight bat through the pandemic, with reasonable differences of opinion as to the way forward, but having the advice shared with him and being generally supportive of the strategy.
Many others on the left, have given the impression of cheering for the virus.
Some leftists and the FBPE crowd.
Plus some of the NHS worshipers - who seem to yearn for more deaths and destruction every time their religion is ignored and their temples are profaned ie restrictions are eased.
Meanwhile, I posted this yesterday but Michelle O'Neill's interview with Sky News is interesting. She's urging the Irish Government to prepare for a united Ireland.
Ever since Boris Johnson threw the north under his Brexit bus, the dye was cast for a united Ireland. It's just a question of when.
Which raises the intriguing prospect for rejoiners who wish to be EU citizens that if they live in the north then even without Irish ancestry they might be carried back into the EU.
I don't think that's terribly surprising or interesting
The difference now is that there's a fair chance she is about to become first minister.
If you don't find the current situation in Northern Ireland interesting then fair enough but most people who have studied the province and its troubles for the past 70 years will not agree with you. And the prospect of a Sinn Fein first minister is ... well, wow.
The latest Northern Ireland Stormont polling has SF on just 23% ie clearly below the 27% they got in 2017. The only reason they might come first is the DUP have fallen even further from 28% in 2017 to 19% now as they have leaked votes to TUV, who are still on 6% despite a small DUP recovery from their nadir of 13% last summer.
The big winner is Alliance who are only 4% behind the DUP now and Sinn Fein looks to have stabilised around 23% even though that's 4% down on last time. It would be wonderful if the DUP came third given their recent behaviour although I don't expect that to happen.
Firstly he's damaged the Ukrainian economy and reminded them that their freedom from Moscow comes at a price - the threat of military action. He's also helped to prop up mini me Lukashenko who's been under pressure from protesters who believe that he rigged the 2020 election.
He's de facto annexed Belarus while everyone was looking at Ukraine.
That's actually a good point - and one that will give Putin some nice Brownie Points with the Greater Russian Nationalists.
Could it be enough for the climb down? My guess is that it isn't, sadly.
Surely Belarus was already all-but annexed.
Pretty much. but each step will make the Greater Russian Nationalists feel a warmth in their hearts. Nothing like getting Kyiv, of course.
Or Kiev even
Putin is going to HAVE to invade, if only for the certainty of ever after being taunted as the Kiev Chicken.....
Which tabloid is going to send the office junior chasing Putin around in a chicken suit… and how long would they last in the role?
Pussy Riot aren't far off doing that. I think their courage is comparable with many other notable Soviet/Russian dissidents, but their anarchy and lack of 'respectability' makes them an uncomfortable prospect for a lot of western liberals.
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
Covid restrictions have been scrapped because of the combination of Omicron and vaccination has massively reduced risk.
It seems he would prefer the current situation to be more dangerous.
Of course he would, if it gives him something with which to bash the government.
To be fair to Starmer, he’s played a straight bat through the pandemic, with reasonable differences of opinion as to the way forward, but having the advice shared with him and being generally supportive of the strategy.
Many others on the left, have given the impression of cheering for the virus.
Not that impressed with him trying to turn a foreign policy threat into a question of party funding
The first two are also imbecilic afaics.
If this is to do with prorogation, AIUI he was advised by the senior legal officer that it was alright, and a court verdict declared it unlawful.
It was a rare instance where I found some of the reasoning in the judgement less than convincing.
For me, the prorogation in its intent was wrong regardless of whether it was lawful or not - as you note, a lower court had considered it lawful (in England anyway), so it was at least up for debate - so the judgement didn't matter a great deal.
I was actually referring to the govt legal adviser - not sure which one it is. But your poiny is a good one, and Sorry Femi has never relied much on evidence over rhetoric. (Showing my slip a little.)
The development of Mens Rea after the fact is an interesting phenonemon, and the alternative (had opinion X and testified opinion Y) has not been proven.
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
Meanwhile, I posted this yesterday but Michelle O'Neill's interview with Sky News is interesting. She's urging the Irish Government to prepare for a united Ireland.
Ever since Boris Johnson threw the north under his Brexit bus, the dye was cast for a united Ireland. It's just a question of when.
Which raises the intriguing prospect for rejoiners who wish to be EU citizens that if they live in the north then even without Irish ancestry they might be carried back into the EU.
I don't think that's terribly surprising or interesting
The difference now is that there's a fair chance she is about to become first minister.
If you don't find the current situation in Northern Ireland interesting then fair enough but most people who have studied the province and its troubles for the past 70 years will not agree with you. And the prospect of a Sinn Fein first minister is ... well, wow.
The latest Northern Ireland Stormont polling has SF on just 23% ie clearly below the 27% they got in 2017. The only reason they might come first is the DUP have fallen even further from 28% in 2017 to 19% now as they have leaked votes to TUV, who are still on 6% despite a small DUP recovery from their nadir of 13% last summer.
The big winner is Alliance who are only 4% behind the DUP now and Sinn Fein looks to have stabilised around 23% even though that's 4% down on last time. It would be wonderful if the DUP came third given their recent behaviour although I don't expect that to happen.
Even if the DUP came third I think they still end up as deputy leader because the Alliance doesn't count as a Unionist party.
Have been stuck in an echo chamber for 24 hours. Went something like this: Me: “Shame about Sarah Smith” “She’s a liar” “Doubt it: but anyway, the misogyny & abuse…” “Was no misogyny or abuse” “Here’s proof of that abuse” “But… Did I mention she’s a liar?” 🤦🏻♂️🤷♂️
Firstly he's damaged the Ukrainian economy and reminded them that their freedom from Moscow comes at a price - the threat of military action. He's also helped to prop up mini me Lukashenko who's been under pressure from protesters who believe that he rigged the 2020 election.
He's de facto annexed Belarus while everyone was looking at Ukraine.
That's actually a good point - and one that will give Putin some nice Brownie Points with the Greater Russian Nationalists.
Could it be enough for the climb down? My guess is that it isn't, sadly.
Surely Belarus was already all-but annexed.
Pretty much. but each step will make the Greater Russian Nationalists feel a warmth in their hearts. Nothing like getting Kyiv, of course.
Or Kiev even
Putin is going to HAVE to invade, if only for the certainty of ever after being taunted as the Kiev Chicken.....
Which tabloid is going to send the office junior chasing Putin around in a chicken suit… and how long would they last in the role?
Pussy Riot aren't far off doing that. I think their courage is comparable with many other notable Soviet/Russian dissidents, but their anarchy and lack of 'respectability' makes them an uncomfortable prospect for a lot of western liberals.
I lost track of them after they were locked up the first time but (FWIW) good on them
Vice President Kamala Harris, echoing President Joe Biden's comments Friday, tells CNN's @NatashaBertrand in Munich "We believe that Putin has made his decision, period," to invade Ukraine, adding "nothing's being held back" in sharing intelligence with allies.
*off topic, though great to have a TSE thread again
Is it really all down to Putin making his mind up? If it was London or Washington and rest of war bunker said no, it wouldn’t matter what the leaders preference was? Why would it be different in Moscow? What I’m practically saying is, if Putin, and those agreeing with him were asked by the generals, what’s the clarity of the mission we can achieve and withdraw without it being open ended or creeping into something else, and Putin and his allies can’t convincingly define that, then surely it won’t happen?
If at some point the Ukraine leadership want a face to face with Russian counterpart’s, what would the Ukrainians hope to get from that? They would use it just to emphasise how belligerent their position is, like how Liz Truss used her Moscow trip?
These are two good questions for this latest Sunday in pre war build up?
Although Igor the Incinerator (Putin’s likely successor if the worst happened to Putin this week) is no doubt on side with sabre rattling to get Donetsk up everyone’s agenda, and dialogue on it not kicked into long grass like any criminal investigation into Boris Johnson, I’m not convinced Igor is on side with invasion, because Surely there’s internal politics and factions on things within Moscow government too, and Igors already allowed unease of generals to seep like a message into world news?
Why do I think Igor as successor? Is this not the same path which brought Putin into the job? What do we know about Igor? His take on pursuing Greater Russian Nationalism from behind his desk at GRU has been brazen, merciless and blood thirsty, like a dalek, he’s likely to be far worse than Putin to deal with especially if he’s been courting the military these past years. ☹️
Ukrainians - "emphasise how belligerent their position is" ???? Since when is "Don't invaded my country" belligerent?
Like Napoleon, Putin has to manage a coalition of power brokers behind him. He is riding a tiger, which can eat him at any time.
A successor to Putin is not predictable. Putin himself was supposed to be a puppet figurehead, who got out of control.
In Paraguay, General Rodríguez overthrew Stroessner. Rodríguez was corrupt and a fully paid up member of the goose-stepping military.
He freed the political prisoners, unbanned the opposition, introduced real democracy, and stepped down after one term as elected (genuinely) president. Then died. People are still going WTF??
Gorbachev is perhaps the closest parallel - taking over a corrupt and sclerotic regime from the inside and peacefully winding it up (though he'd have ideally liked to keep it in a democratic form). Sadly, he's very unpopular for having presided over the splintering of the country - one reason for Putin's continuing support in the population, though I think it's off the peak now.
The @EHRCChair asks those – and it is a minority – who seek to undermine the EHRC: what they hope to achieve and who they think will protect and advance #equality and #humanrights in the U.K. if they have their wish?
Meanwhile, I posted this yesterday but Michelle O'Neill's interview with Sky News is interesting. She's urging the Irish Government to prepare for a united Ireland.
Ever since Boris Johnson threw the north under his Brexit bus, the dye was cast for a united Ireland. It's just a question of when.
Which raises the intriguing prospect for rejoiners who wish to be EU citizens that if they live in the north then even without Irish ancestry they might be carried back into the EU.
I don't think that's terribly surprising or interesting
The difference now is that there's a fair chance she is about to become first minister.
If you don't find the current situation in Northern Ireland interesting then fair enough but most people who have studied the province and its troubles for the past 70 years will not agree with you. And the prospect of a Sinn Fein first minister is ... well, wow.
The latest Northern Ireland Stormont polling has SF on just 23% ie clearly below the 27% they got in 2017. The only reason they might come first is the DUP have fallen even further from 28% in 2017 to 19% now as they have leaked votes to TUV, who are still on 6% despite a small DUP recovery from their nadir of 13% last summer.
The big winner is Alliance who are only 4% behind the DUP now and Sinn Fein looks to have stabilised around 23% even though that's 4% down on last time. It would be wonderful if the DUP came third given their recent behaviour although I don't expect that to happen.
The DUP won't come 3rd, the UUP on 14% are closer to the Alliance on 15.6% than the Alliance are to the DUP on 19.4%
Boris Johnson shouldn't have to resign if he receives a fixed penalty notice for breaching his coronavirus laws, James Cleverly tells @RidgeOnSunday: “I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a vacuum at the centre of government.” https://twitter.com/matt_dathan/status/1495320446702694400
I don’t think what the country needs at the moment is a moral vacuum at the centre of government, but here we are anyway.
Good piece today from Rawnsley. It isn't just our government that is a moral vacuum, but all our major institutions. The culture of an elite who can behave with impunity and cover up for each other is a characteristic of all our power structures.
What took him so long to realise? I've been saying this on here for years.
See here from autumn 2018 -
"Meanwhile, the Tories, lumbered with a dutiful leader doggedly pursuing an ill-thought through policy which its main proponents can now barely explain, let alone implement competently, pathetically latch onto the latest saviour politician for the post-May deluge......
Or Johnson with his messy hair, ill-fitting clothes, classical aphorisms, rather-too-pleased-with-itself wit and carefully crafted bumbling persona. That either of them should be viewed as serious contenders for the highest office suggests a failure to listen to what they say, to see that they mostly talk nonsense, sometimes dangerous, ill thought-out and harmful nonsense. It is a measure of how out of ideas and talent the Tories seem to be that amateurish eccentricity, incompetence in office and Boys Own enthusiasm are even thought of as serious contenders."
"Perhaps ...it is time to realise that even successful or vital sectors or professions can in reality be really rather more second-rate than we like to pretend. Perhaps we should stop deluding ourselves that our key institutions are as good as we sometimes rather vaingloriously claim. The police are not the only body of which this could be said, of course."
"What will it take for those in leadership positions to realise that being a leader is not about taking the money and the glory, not about using one position to lever yourself into other lucrative, high profile positions, not about walking away with a mealy-mouthed apology or self-exculpatory explanation but about taking responsibility for what happens when you are in charge?
For all the management books, courses, training, policies and procedures which infest corporate and public life these days, too many people in positions of responsibility behave as if they do not understand this fundamental fact. Too many behave like small children coming up with implausible stories for why their behaviour should be excused. Or think that somehow it has nothing to do with them. Too many don’t care because they know they will be indulged and get their sweeties no matter what. We wonder why the performance of so many of our institutions and services and companies is really rather mediocre. Is this any surprise when the tone from the top is, too often, “nothing to do with me” and “let me get out while the going’s good”?"
Or any of the other headers over the years I've written about leadership or about how we don't value the underpinnings of a healthy democratic society - scrutiny and the rule of law.
What he writes about has been going on for a while. The worship of finance which started under Thatcher and continued under Blair was an early sign of this sense of indispensability, impunity, lack of scrutiny and hubris leading to nemesis and a breach of trust which has helped corrode one of the vital elements of a well-functioning society.
I am going to change my name to Cassandra and demand my own ludicrously overpaid column in the Observer. Humph! 😡
And, I don't honestly think that things were much better in the past.
Just finished Andrew Roberts magnificent “George III” - if you think the current shower are a bunch of self-serving incompetent chancers you should see the ne’er-do-wells he had to work with!
You have to wonder how on earth we ended up ruling a quarter of the planet for a hundred years, given the number of corrupt, cowardly, and incompetent people in senior positions.
Presumably as we were far from unique in that respect.
Take the French Revolutionary/Napoleonic wars. The quality of British military leadership was mostly abysmal. Yet somehow, Nelson and Wellington (who were both pretty flawed men, in numerous ways) ended up in the right place at the right time.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
Not so much in the navy, where promotion was on merit
There was so system of purchasing commissions in the RN; but one usually needed powerful connections to get ahead. Also, once you reached the rank of Commander, promotion was then strictly on the basis of seniority (as in the East India Company's army) with the result that some capable people were denied important commands, and some duffers who ought to have been retired years previously found themselves in charge.
Once you got to Captain though ("made post") there were some options. Poor captains could be assigned to poor ships, or military backwaters. Or just left on the beach on half pay. Commodore was an appointment, not a rank, so they could appoint a good captain, not the most senior (in fact, that was often the whole point, to prevent the most senior captain in a flotilla from being in charge). And you could get to Rear Admiral and suddenly find yourself retired as there was no command for you, they would reach down the list to the best captain coming close to seniority. And they could make sure they gave the right commands to the right people. Nelson commanded the fleet at Trafalgar as a Vice Admiral, and was only a Rear at the Nile.
Yes, there ways around the system.
Horatio Hornblower resorted to assassination, in order to get rid of a captain who was a liability.
I'm sure that occasionally happened, just as in Vietnam, some officers got dragged.
Corbet was a strict disciplinarian, who regularly beat his men for the slightest infractions: so brutal was his regime that he provoked two mutinies, one simply at the rumour he was coming aboard a ship. These uprisings caused him to become even more vicious in his use of punishments and when he took his frigate HMS Africaine into action off Île Bourbon, his men failed to support him and may even have murdered him
Guess he didn't learn his lesson then.
Who, if anyone, would be the present day equivalent of Corbet?
Firstly he's damaged the Ukrainian economy and reminded them that their freedom from Moscow comes at a price - the threat of military action. He's also helped to prop up mini me Lukashenko who's been under pressure from protesters who believe that he rigged the 2020 election.
He's de facto annexed Belarus while everyone was looking at Ukraine.
That's actually a good point - and one that will give Putin some nice Brownie Points with the Greater Russian Nationalists.
Could it be enough for the climb down? My guess is that it isn't, sadly.
Surely Belarus was already all-but annexed.
Pretty much. but each step will make the Greater Russian Nationalists feel a warmth in their hearts. Nothing like getting Kyiv, of course.
Or Kiev even
Putin is going to HAVE to invade, if only for the certainty of ever after being taunted as the Kiev Chicken.....
Which tabloid is going to send the office junior chasing Putin around in a chicken suit… and how long would they last in the role?
Pussy Riot aren't far off doing that. I think their courage is comparable with many other notable Soviet/Russian dissidents, but their anarchy and lack of 'respectability' makes them an uncomfortable prospect for a lot of western liberals.
I lost track of them after they were locked up the first time but (FWIW) good on them
I guess part of their problem (insofar as it is a problem) is that they're a loose collective rather than a single heroic figure.
Meanwhile, I posted this yesterday but Michelle O'Neill's interview with Sky News is interesting. She's urging the Irish Government to prepare for a united Ireland.
Ever since Boris Johnson threw the north under his Brexit bus, the dye was cast for a united Ireland. It's just a question of when.
Which raises the intriguing prospect for rejoiners who wish to be EU citizens that if they live in the north then even without Irish ancestry they might be carried back into the EU.
I don't think that's terribly surprising or interesting
The difference now is that there's a fair chance she is about to become first minister.
If you don't find the current situation in Northern Ireland interesting then fair enough but most people who have studied the province and its troubles for the past 70 years will not agree with you. And the prospect of a Sinn Fein first minister is ... well, wow.
The latest Northern Ireland Stormont polling has SF on just 23% ie clearly below the 27% they got in 2017. The only reason they might come first is the DUP have fallen even further from 28% in 2017 to 19% now as they have leaked votes to TUV, who are still on 6% despite a small DUP recovery from their nadir of 13% last summer.
The big winner is Alliance who are only 4% behind the DUP now and Sinn Fein looks to have stabilised around 23% even though that's 4% down on last time. It would be wonderful if the DUP came third given their recent behaviour although I don't expect that to happen.
Even if the DUP came third I think they still end up as deputy leader because the Alliance doesn't count as a Unionist party.
Yes, though the DUP will not now go back into the Stormont Executive unless the UK government invokes Article 16 now anyway
The @EHRCChair asks those – and it is a minority – who seek to undermine the EHRC: what they hope to achieve and who they think will protect and advance #equality and #humanrights in the U.K. if they have their wish?
Do the minority think that all humans deserve rights, or just those humans that agree with them?
Well, the people who don't agree with them, are, as is usually the case in such theological disputes, less than human. So they don't have human rights.
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
For the past year or so, I'd say that Johnson, for all his faults, has made the right calls on COVID. Perhaps that was just luck, but then, it's good to be lucky.
Ever since we found that we had effective vaccines the decisions have been rather obvious, though. Vaccinate as many people as possible, particularly those most at risk, as quickly as possible, and then enjoy the result of the vaccine ending the public health emergency.
What's surprising is that so many people have found it so difficult to make the mental adjustment that the vaccine really does reduce the risk sufficiently that the emergency is over.
If a triple-dosed 95 year old can catch Covid and not become seriously ill then, Covid certainly is over as a major threat to public health.
As I'm sure you know that's a non sequitur and a lie.
Some people get it worse than others. As you know full well.
But hopefully the Queen will be okay.
It's neither. Some people get the flu worse than others, indeed some die. Covid is approaching the severity of endemic flu, and it may have already got there given the stats we use are lagging indicators and don't differentiate between those ill from Covid and those who happen to have Covid and go into hospital for some other reason.
Or are you suggesting we develop further LFT and PCR tests and that in future anyone who gets a snotty nose is required to self isolate if it turns out to be a seasonal flu virus?
I don't think that correct. In a typical flu season we have about 1500 deaths due to influenza, and 25 000 where it was mentioned on a death certificate as an underlying or contributing factor to pneumonia. So roughly 500 per week, while so far this year we have had about 12 000 Covid related deaths .
Meanwhile, I posted this yesterday but Michelle O'Neill's interview with Sky News is interesting. She's urging the Irish Government to prepare for a united Ireland.
Ever since Boris Johnson threw the north under his Brexit bus, the dye was cast for a united Ireland. It's just a question of when.
Which raises the intriguing prospect for rejoiners who wish to be EU citizens that if they live in the north then even without Irish ancestry they might be carried back into the EU.
I don't think that's terribly surprising or interesting
The difference now is that there's a fair chance she is about to become first minister.
If you don't find the current situation in Northern Ireland interesting then fair enough but most people who have studied the province and its troubles for the past 70 years will not agree with you. And the prospect of a Sinn Fein first minister is ... well, wow.
The latest Northern Ireland Stormont polling has SF on just 23% ie clearly below the 27% they got in 2017. The only reason they might come first is the DUP have fallen even further from 28% in 2017 to 19% now as they have leaked votes to TUV, who are still on 6% despite a small DUP recovery from their nadir of 13% last summer.
The big winner is Alliance who are only 4% behind the DUP now and Sinn Fein looks to have stabilised around 23% even though that's 4% down on last time. It would be wonderful if the DUP came third given their recent behaviour although I don't expect that to happen.
It could well be Alliance voters that have the deciding votes on whether there is a border poll, and the result of the poll. Have there been any NI opinion polls indicating how they would vote?
Vice President Kamala Harris, echoing President Joe Biden's comments Friday, tells CNN's @NatashaBertrand in Munich "We believe that Putin has made his decision, period," to invade Ukraine, adding "nothing's being held back" in sharing intelligence with allies.
*off topic, though great to have a TSE thread again
Is it really all down to Putin making his mind up? If it was London or Washington and rest of war bunker said no, it wouldn’t matter what the leaders preference was? Why would it be different in Moscow? What I’m practically saying is, if Putin, and those agreeing with him were asked by the generals, what’s the clarity of the mission we can achieve and withdraw without it being open ended or creeping into something else, and Putin and his allies can’t convincingly define that, then surely it won’t happen?
If at some point the Ukraine leadership want a face to face with Russian counterpart’s, what would the Ukrainians hope to get from that? They would use it just to emphasise how belligerent their position is, like how Liz Truss used her Moscow trip?
These are two good questions for this latest Sunday in pre war build up?
Although Igor the Incinerator (Putin’s likely successor if the worst happened to Putin this week) is no doubt on side with sabre rattling to get Donetsk up everyone’s agenda, and dialogue on it not kicked into long grass like any criminal investigation into Boris Johnson, I’m not convinced Igor is on side with invasion, because Surely there’s internal politics and factions on things within Moscow government too, and Igors already allowed unease of generals to seep like a message into world news?
Why do I think Igor as successor? Is this not the same path which brought Putin into the job? What do we know about Igor? His take on pursuing Greater Russian Nationalism from behind his desk at GRU has been brazen, merciless and blood thirsty, like a dalek, he’s likely to be far worse than Putin to deal with especially if he’s been courting the military these past years. ☹️
Ukrainians - "emphasise how belligerent their position is" ???? Since when is "Don't invaded my country" belligerent?
Like Napoleon, Putin has to manage a coalition of power brokers behind him. He is riding a tiger, which can eat him at any time.
A successor to Putin is not predictable. Putin himself was supposed to be a puppet figurehead, who got out of control.
In Paraguay, General Rodríguez overthrew Stroessner. Rodríguez was corrupt and a fully paid up member of the goose-stepping military.
He freed the political prisoners, unbanned the opposition, introduced real democracy, and stepped down after one term as elected (genuinely) president. Then died. People are still going WTF??
Gorbachev is perhaps the closest parallel - taking over a corrupt and sclerotic regime from the inside and peacefully winding it up (though he'd have ideally liked to keep it in a democratic form). Sadly, he's very unpopular for having presided over the splintering of the country - one reason for Putin's continuing support in the population, though I think it's off the peak now.
Nope - Gorbachev was known as the reformer from long before his rise to power. He was a moderate on implementation, but hardline Communist in theory. So when he removed the savagery of the suppression of opposition to the regime, he was surprised to discover that he had accidentally pulled the whole thing down - he wasn't intending to reform the system. Just the implementation.
Rodríguez was corrupt, in bed with the drug cartels of the day, mostly owned by the CIA and generally as bad as you could get. Some say that the CIA bribed hm to introduce democracy. Others that he thought that he could ride a wave of popularity by introducing democracy and escape justice by doing so. Or maybe he just got religion? You could write one hell of screen play about that....
Rodríguez suceded in his aims. Gorbachev failed - deservedly.
EDT : PJ O'Rourke wrote about the Paraguay coup in Give War A Chance.
The @EHRCChair asks those – and it is a minority – who seek to undermine the EHRC: what they hope to achieve and who they think will protect and advance #equality and #humanrights in the U.K. if they have their wish?
Do the minority think that all humans deserve rights, or just those humans that agree with them?
Well, the people who don't agree with them, are, as is usually the case in such theological disputes, less than human. So they don't have human rights.
Or employment rights…..Or to be acknowledged as authors of enormously popular books…..or to hold views that do not uncritically match their own.
Firstly he's damaged the Ukrainian economy and reminded them that their freedom from Moscow comes at a price - the threat of military action. He's also helped to prop up mini me Lukashenko who's been under pressure from protesters who believe that he rigged the 2020 election.
He's de facto annexed Belarus while everyone was looking at Ukraine.
That's actually a good point - and one that will give Putin some nice Brownie Points with the Greater Russian Nationalists.
Could it be enough for the climb down? My guess is that it isn't, sadly.
Surely Belarus was already all-but annexed.
Pretty much. but each step will make the Greater Russian Nationalists feel a warmth in their hearts. Nothing like getting Kyiv, of course.
Firstly he's damaged the Ukrainian economy and reminded them that their freedom from Moscow comes at a price - the threat of military action. He's also helped to prop up mini me Lukashenko who's been under pressure from protesters who believe that he rigged the 2020 election.
He's de facto annexed Belarus while everyone was looking at Ukraine.
That's actually a good point - and one that will give Putin some nice Brownie Points with the Greater Russian Nationalists.
Could it be enough for the climb down? My guess is that it isn't, sadly.
Surely Belarus was already all-but annexed.
Pretty much. but each step will make the Greater Russian Nationalists feel a warmth in their hearts. Nothing like getting Kyiv, of course.
Or Kiev even
Putin is going to HAVE to invade, if only for the certainty of ever after being taunted as the Kiev Chicken.....
Which tabloid is going to send the office junior chasing Putin around in a chicken suit… and how long would they last in the role?
Pussy Riot aren't far off doing that. I think their courage is comparable with many other notable Soviet/Russian dissidents, but their anarchy and lack of 'respectability' makes them an uncomfortable prospect for a lot of western liberals.
I lost track of them after they were locked up the first time but (FWIW) good on them
I guess part of their problem (insofar as it is a problem) is that they're a loose collective rather than a single heroic figure.
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
For the past year or so, I'd say that Johnson, for all his faults, has made the right calls on COVID. Perhaps that was just luck, but then, it's good to be lucky.
Ever since we found that we had effective vaccines the decisions have been rather obvious, though. Vaccinate as many people as possible, particularly those most at risk, as quickly as possible, and then enjoy the result of the vaccine ending the public health emergency.
What's surprising is that so many people have found it so difficult to make the mental adjustment that the vaccine really does reduce the risk sufficiently that the emergency is over.
Or preferred life under lockdown. “I don’t want to go out and enjoy myself, so don’t want anyone else to be able to. Especially young people.”
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
For the past year or so, I'd say that Johnson, for all his faults, has made the right calls on COVID. Perhaps that was just luck, but then, it's good to be lucky.
Ever since we found that we had effective vaccines the decisions have been rather obvious, though. Vaccinate as many people as possible, particularly those most at risk, as quickly as possible, and then enjoy the result of the vaccine ending the public health emergency.
What's surprising is that so many people have found it so difficult to make the mental adjustment that the vaccine really does reduce the risk sufficiently that the emergency is over.
On @Malmesbury figures an over 85 year old with covid has a 25%+ chance of hospital admission, about 10% mortality.
Meanwhile, I posted this yesterday but Michelle O'Neill's interview with Sky News is interesting. She's urging the Irish Government to prepare for a united Ireland.
Ever since Boris Johnson threw the north under his Brexit bus, the dye was cast for a united Ireland. It's just a question of when.
Which raises the intriguing prospect for rejoiners who wish to be EU citizens that if they live in the north then even without Irish ancestry they might be carried back into the EU.
I don't think that's terribly surprising or interesting
The difference now is that there's a fair chance she is about to become first minister.
If you don't find the current situation in Northern Ireland interesting then fair enough but most people who have studied the province and its troubles for the past 70 years will not agree with you. And the prospect of a Sinn Fein first minister is ... well, wow.
The latest Northern Ireland Stormont polling has SF on just 23% ie clearly below the 27% they got in 2017. The only reason they might come first is the DUP have fallen even further from 28% in 2017 to 19% now as they have leaked votes to TUV, who are still on 6% despite a small DUP recovery from their nadir of 13% last summer.
The big winner is Alliance who are only 4% behind the DUP now and Sinn Fein looks to have stabilised around 23% even though that's 4% down on last time. It would be wonderful if the DUP came third given their recent behaviour although I don't expect that to happen.
It could well be Alliance voters that have the deciding votes on whether there is a border poll, and the result of the poll. Have there been any NI opinion polls indicating how they would vote?
It does not matter as the Alliance leadership have already made clear they oppose a border poll at the moment, so a vote for the Alliance in May is a vote against a border poll as much as a vote for the Unionist parties is.
Meanwhile, I posted this yesterday but Michelle O'Neill's interview with Sky News is interesting. She's urging the Irish Government to prepare for a united Ireland.
Ever since Boris Johnson threw the north under his Brexit bus, the dye was cast for a united Ireland. It's just a question of when.
Which raises the intriguing prospect for rejoiners who wish to be EU citizens that if they live in the north then even without Irish ancestry they might be carried back into the EU.
I don't think that's terribly surprising or interesting
The difference now is that there's a fair chance she is about to become first minister.
If you don't find the current situation in Northern Ireland interesting then fair enough but most people who have studied the province and its troubles for the past 70 years will not agree with you. And the prospect of a Sinn Fein first minister is ... well, wow.
The latest Northern Ireland Stormont polling has SF on just 23% ie clearly below the 27% they got in 2017. The only reason they might come first is the DUP have fallen even further from 28% in 2017 to 19% now as they have leaked votes to TUV, who are still on 6% despite a small DUP recovery from their nadir of 13% last summer.
The big winner is Alliance who are only 4% behind the DUP now and Sinn Fein looks to have stabilised around 23% even though that's 4% down on last time. It would be wonderful if the DUP came third given their recent behaviour although I don't expect that to happen.
It could well be Alliance voters that have the deciding votes on whether there is a border poll, and the result of the poll. Have there been any NI opinion polls indicating how they would vote?
For anyone keeping track of what Boris Johnson has done to the Queen:
🔻 Lied to her 🔻 Implicated her in illegally shutting Parliament 🔻 Made her sit alone at her husband's funeral while his office were hungover 🔻 Scrapped covid restrictions and 3 weeks later she gets Covid
For the past year or so, I'd say that Johnson, for all his faults, has made the right calls on COVID. Perhaps that was just luck, but then, it's good to be lucky.
Ever since we found that we had effective vaccines the decisions have been rather obvious, though. Vaccinate as many people as possible, particularly those most at risk, as quickly as possible, and then enjoy the result of the vaccine ending the public health emergency.
What's surprising is that so many people have found it so difficult to make the mental adjustment that the vaccine really does reduce the risk sufficiently that the emergency is over.
On @Malmesbury figures an over 85 year old with covid has a 25%+ chance of hospital admission, about 10% mortality.
Less than that (at least for deaths) - because the current numbers are on descent and the lag.
Looking at peaks, the numbers for the 85+ seem to line up as
Cases Peak -> Admissions peak 11 days later -> Deaths peak 20 days later
Which give us Case/Admission Ratio of 4-5 and a Case/Fatality Ratio of 15-19
Firstly he's damaged the Ukrainian economy and reminded them that their freedom from Moscow comes at a price - the threat of military action. He's also helped to prop up mini me Lukashenko who's been under pressure from protesters who believe that he rigged the 2020 election.
He's de facto annexed Belarus while everyone was looking at Ukraine.
That's actually a good point - and one that will give Putin some nice Brownie Points with the Greater Russian Nationalists.
Could it be enough for the climb down? My guess is that it isn't, sadly.
Surely Belarus was already all-but annexed.
Pretty much. but each step will make the Greater Russian Nationalists feel a warmth in their hearts. Nothing like getting Kyiv, of course.
Or Kiev even
Putin is going to HAVE to invade, if only for the certainty of ever after being taunted as the Kiev Chicken.....
Which tabloid is going to send the office junior chasing Putin around in a chicken suit… and how long would they last in the role?
Pussy Riot aren't far off doing that. I think their courage is comparable with many other notable Soviet/Russian dissidents, but their anarchy and lack of 'respectability' makes them an uncomfortable prospect for a lot of western liberals.
I lost track of them after they were locked up the first time but (FWIW) good on them
I guess part of their problem (insofar as it is a problem) is that they're a loose collective rather than a single heroic figure.
Wiki doesn’t have anything after 2016?
They've backed Navalny I think, which may not be the most comfortable fit. Depressingly I imagine Putin has calculated that they're a mild threat that can be largely ignored. Doesn't lessen the degree of courage that it takes to go up against the Russian state though.
Are we entering a point where we need to start thinking about a possible regency?
The informal regency has been happening for a while, with Charles and William assuming more and more duties. The problem is the two black sheep who are the next adults in line.
Comments
Actually what is the claim? Some factions are that close with Putin’s McMafia they can receive and utilise Russian intelligence, not just money, to destabilise their political opponents? [moon rabbit shrugs] ]Italian politics always been a basket case compared to UK, even some still young in their twenties has known this for years.
Covid restrictions have been scrapped because of the combination of Omicron and vaccination has massively reduced risk.
It seems he would prefer the current situation to be more dangerous.
I think Frank Herbert was correct that it's not so much that power corrupts, as that power attracts pathological personalities.
A long way from making the right calls though.
Thi gs really turned the corner when Matt Hancock was replaced.
HMQ also gets much better medical treatment than most of us.
To be fair to Starmer, he’s played a straight bat through the pandemic, with reasonable differences of opinion as to the way forward, but having the advice shared with him and being generally supportive of the strategy.
Many others on the left, have given the impression of cheering for the virus.
Or rather, it was abysmal at the highest level. Junior and middle-ranking officers frequently performed wonders.
https://twitter.com/skepticalzebra/status/1495377086508597248
Why do I think Igor as successor? Is this not the same path which brought Putin into the job? What do we know about Igor? His take on pursuing Greater Russian Nationalism from behind his desk at GRU has been brazen, merciless and blood thirsty, like a dalek, he’s likely to be far worse than Putin to deal with especially if he’s been courting the military these past years. ☹️
Cases Peak -> Admissions peak 11 days later -> Deaths peak 20 days later
Which give us Case/Admission Ratio of 4-5
and a Case/Fatality Ratio of 15-19
We certainly have much to thank Gladstone for introducing proper merit to the civil service.
Sanctions
What’s next?
https://twitter.com/DAlperovitch/status/1495364777958428672
Er, I think I may have just inadvertently made a betting post.
We did in my family anyway.
https://twitter.com/joannaccherry/status/1495308915860516872
Like Napoleon, Putin has to manage a coalition of power brokers behind him. He is riding a tiger, which can eat him at any time.
A successor to Putin is not predictable. Putin himself was supposed to be a puppet figurehead, who got out of control.
In Paraguay, General Rodríguez overthrew Stroessner. Rodríguez was corrupt and a fully paid up member of the goose-stepping military.
He freed the political prisoners, unbanned the opposition, introduced real democracy, and stepped down after one term as elected (genuinely) president. Then died. People are still going WTF??
https://www7.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2018/04/21/the-palace-is-laying-the-groundwork-for-a-regency/
Boris Johnson is going to muscle his way on to the Regency Council isn't he?
He's not going to sit idly by whilst Sir Lindsay Hoyle and Dominic Raab whilst Raab take part?
the most wise and honest of all administrations, the minister having ... never transacted one rash thing; and, what is more marvellous, left as much money in the T[reasur]y as he found in it.
How would 'gave the Queen no choice but to abdicate' sit on Boris's CV?
Horatio Hornblower resorted to assassination, in order to get rid of a captain who was a liability.
Real Conservatives oust monarchs.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Corbet
Guess he didn't learn his lesson then.
If this is to do with prorogation, AIUI he was advised by the senior legal officer that it was alright, and a court verdict declared it unlawful later.
For me, the prorogation in its intent was wrong regardless of whether it was lawful or not - as you note, a lower court had considered it lawful (in England anyway), so it was at least up for debate - so the judgement didn't matter a great deal.
Not necessarily a great precedent for Charles if as Prince of Wales he ends up Prince Regent for the Queen
Plus some of the NHS worshipers - who seem to yearn for more deaths and destruction every time their religion is ignored and their temples are profaned ie restrictions are eased.
It would be wonderful if the DUP came third given their recent behaviour although I don't expect that to happen.
I think their courage is comparable with many other notable Soviet/Russian dissidents, but their anarchy and lack of 'respectability' makes them an uncomfortable prospect for a lot of western liberals.
The development of Mens Rea after the fact is an interesting phenonemon, and the alternative (had opinion X and testified opinion Y) has not been proven.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrés_Rodríguez_(politician)
Gorbachev is perhaps the closest parallel - taking over a corrupt and sclerotic regime from the inside and peacefully winding it up (though he'd have ideally liked to keep it in a democratic form). Sadly, he's very unpopular for having presided over the splintering of the country - one reason for Putin's continuing support in the population, though I think it's off the peak now.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10532375/Putin-aim-cyber-attacks-Britain-Home-Secretary-warns-UK-interests-targeted.html
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2022/02/19/britain-warns-russian-cyber-attacks-companies-urged-take-defensive/
What's surprising is that so many people have found it so difficult to make the mental adjustment that the vaccine really does reduce the risk sufficiently that the emergency is over.
Rodríguez was corrupt, in bed with the drug cartels of the day, mostly owned by the CIA and generally as bad as you could get. Some say that the CIA bribed hm to introduce democracy. Others that he thought that he could ride a wave of popularity by introducing democracy and escape justice by doing so. Or maybe he just got religion? You could write one hell of screen play about that....
Rodríguez suceded in his aims. Gorbachev failed - deservedly.
EDT : PJ O'Rourke wrote about the Paraguay coup in Give War A Chance.
Only a vote at Stormont for SF or the SDLP is a vote for a border poll
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/no-current-case-for-united-ireland-border-poll-alliance-party-1.4196502
Looking at peaks, the numbers for the 85+ seem to line up as
Cases Peak -> Admissions peak 11 days later -> Deaths peak 20 days later
Which give us Case/Admission Ratio of 4-5
and a Case/Fatality Ratio of 15-19
https://youtu.be/7xd0WlrSEik