The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Too many anachronisms for me plus unrealistic plotline. Good cinematography though.
Will he use the dontcha know there's a war on, I've work to do excuse?
Are these the same parties Ed Balls, Prince Harry or Pier Morgan attended?
I do find it really bizarre that anybody think you what total laugh, lets go to a fancy dress party as a Nazi. You have 1000s of options to choose from, no I want to go as Nazi. Same as black face, anybody going to a party in the past 20-30 years, it just doesn't enter your head.
Not most people, no. Unimaginative contrarians who seek a cheap shock reaction - evidently it happens a lot.
It's probably just as well that I am not French. From the BBC:
"US President Joe Biden has accused Russian forces of committing acts of "genocide" in Ukraine.
He said Russian President Vladimir Putin was trying to "wipe out the idea" of a Ukrainian identity.
Mr Biden has previously stopped short of references to genocide, instead accusing Moscow of "war crimes".
French President Emmanuel Macron later told French TV he was reluctant to use the term and warned against an "escalation of rhetoric".
Speaking to the public broadcaster France 2, the French President said he would be "careful with such terms today because these two peoples are brothers."
"I want to continue to try, as much as I can, to stop this war and rebuild peace. I am not sure that an escalation of rhetoric serves that cause," he added."
I mean, how on earth do you vote for this twat, even to stop Le Pen? Escalation of rhetoric? Jeez. Words fail me.
If there were a real hope of a negotiated peace, then I'd have some sympathy with Macron's position. Partly because a negotiator has to find common ground, not drive wedges, and partly because I really hate the devaluation of vital legal terms (like genocide and WMD) by many for political point-scoring and manipulation of the public's emotions.
But, and it is a huge BUT, even if the individual negotiators are acting in good faith, it is clear Putin never has been. Putin's own words show that the negotiations are dead (and will be until one side is exhausted or beaten on the battlefield).
And the Russians' own words, including those of Putin himself, are making a stronger case that genocide is indeed the correct term, more even than the hideous acts being uncovered on the ground (which themselves are prima facie proof of war crimes and crimes against humanity, but not, yet IMO, of genocide. Mariupol, once we get there, or Kherson, are both likely to provide direct proof of genocidal acts to match Russia's genocidal policies and doctrines).
So, yes, Macron is a dangerous egotistical twat. But even so, if I were French, I'd still have to vote for him.
Much of the Russian rhetoric has had genocidal tones and has done ever since it became crystal clear that the Ukrainians were not welcoming Russian tanks with flowers but with NLAWs. When civilians with hands tied behind their back are being butchered in the streets I think the time to be measured in your rhetoric may have passed.
If Le Pen didn't have Putin sympathies as well, I really don't know.
Will he use the dontcha know there's a war on, I've work to do excuse?
Are these the same parties Ed Balls, Prince Harry or Pier Morgan attended?
I do find it really bizarre that anybody think you what total laugh, lets go to a fancy dress party as a Nazi. You have 1000s of options to choose from, no I want to go as Nazi. Same as black face, anybody going to a party in the past 20-30 years, it just doesn't enter your head.
This was, according to the Jewish Chronicle[1], thought to have happened in the 80s. So easily over 30 years ago.
Stupid. Tasteless. But relevant to his position now? I'm not convinced.
Talking of fine art produced by war, allow me to recommend a Netflix series:
1864
It's very timely, as it is about a mad European war of invasion, fuelled by mystical nationalism, which turns into a disaster. In this case it is the Danish invasion of Prussia/Germany - in 1864 - which ended in bitter defeat for Denmark and the dismembering of the country, which lost 2/5 of its land and population
I had no idea about this war so the series is both educational, and fascinating
It is also seriously good drama, with compelling acting, and high production values. Definitely worth a shot. As it were
Yep, enjoyed it when it was on BBC4. It also has Borgen's alluringly husky voiced Sidse Babett Knudsen, plus at least a couple of others from same.
Yes, she has definite DILF vibes
She’s a dad?!
Dane!
🎶🎶There is nothing like a Dane, Nothing in the world ...🎶🎶
Also, in terms of War stories, what about M*A*S*H? The first really great TV series to bridge high and low art?
(And still showing on a continuous loop somewhere non Freeview. The jump from the end of the war back to the start the following night is an artistic point about life in itself, unfortunately.)
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Visually, 1917 is astounding. Plot? character? maybe not quite so much.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Nah it's ok. I can't get on with George whatsisface.
Dunkirk is the excellent one. The soundtrack reverberates still.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Too many anachronisms for me plus unrealistic plotline. Good cinematography though.
Yes, it really divides people. Some love it, some are indifferent to the point of dislike
Clearly, I loved it, despite the flaws. The hallucinatory night-sequences, in particular, are spell-binding
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Visually, 1917 is astounding. Plot? character? maybe not quite so much.
Yes, why didn't the eagles just deliver the message?
Talking of fine art produced by war, allow me to recommend a Netflix series:
1864
It's very timely, as it is about a mad European war of invasion, fuelled by mystical nationalism, which turns into a disaster. In this case it is the Danish invasion of Prussia/Germany - in 1864 - which ended in bitter defeat for Denmark and the dismembering of the country, which lost 2/5 of its land and population
I had no idea about this war so the series is both educational, and fascinating
It is also seriously good drama, with compelling acting, and high production values. Definitely worth a shot. As it were
Yep, enjoyed it when it was on BBC4. It also has Borgen's alluringly husky voiced Sidse Babett Knudsen, plus at least a couple of others from same.
Yes, she has definite DILF vibes
She’s a dad?!
Dane!
🎶🎶There is nothing like a Dane, Nothing in the world ...🎶🎶
Also, in terms of War stories, what about M*A*S*H? The first really great TV series to bridge high and low art?
(And still showing on a continuous loop somewhere non Freeview. The jump from the end of the war back to the start the following night is an artistic point about life in itself, unfortunately.)
A rare case of the thing without Donald Sutherland or Eliott Gould in it being better than the thing with Donald Sutherland or Eliott Gould in it.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
I thought it was disappointingly boring. I went wanting to like it but got fed up. A series of cliches run together by some clever cinematography.
Chickenhawk, however, is arguably the best war book I have ever read, certainly since Biggles of 266.
Talking of fine art produced by war, allow me to recommend a Netflix series:
1864
It's very timely, as it is about a mad European war of invasion, fuelled by mystical nationalism, which turns into a disaster. In this case it is the Danish invasion of Prussia/Germany - in 1864 - which ended in bitter defeat for Denmark and the dismembering of the country, which lost 2/5 of its land and population
I had no idea about this war so the series is both educational, and fascinating
It is also seriously good drama, with compelling acting, and high production values. Definitely worth a shot. As it were
Yep, enjoyed it when it was on BBC4. It also has Borgen's alluringly husky voiced Sidse Babett Knudsen, plus at least a couple of others from same.
Yes, she has definite DILF vibes
She’s a dad?!
Dane!
🎶🎶There is nothing like a Dane, Nothing in the world ...🎶🎶
Also, in terms of War stories, what about M*A*S*H? The first really great TV series to bridge high and low art?
(And still showing on a continuous loop somewhere non Freeview. The jump from the end of the war back to the start the following night is an artistic point about life in itself, unfortunately.)
A rare case of the thing without Donald Sutherland or Eliott Gould in it being better than the thing with Donald Sutherland or Eliott Gould in it.
It's probably just as well that I am not French. From the BBC:
"US President Joe Biden has accused Russian forces of committing acts of "genocide" in Ukraine.
He said Russian President Vladimir Putin was trying to "wipe out the idea" of a Ukrainian identity.
Mr Biden has previously stopped short of references to genocide, instead accusing Moscow of "war crimes".
French President Emmanuel Macron later told French TV he was reluctant to use the term and warned against an "escalation of rhetoric".
Speaking to the public broadcaster France 2, the French President said he would be "careful with such terms today because these two peoples are brothers."
"I want to continue to try, as much as I can, to stop this war and rebuild peace. I am not sure that an escalation of rhetoric serves that cause," he added."
I mean, how on earth do you vote for this twat, even to stop Le Pen? Escalation of rhetoric? Jeez. Words fail me.
If there were a real hope of a negotiated peace, then I'd have some sympathy with Macron's position. Partly because a negotiator has to find common ground, not drive wedges, and partly because I really hate the devaluation of vital legal terms (like genocide and WMD) by many for political point-scoring and manipulation of the public's emotions.
But, and it is a huge BUT, even if the individual negotiators are acting in good faith, it is clear Putin never has been. Putin's own words show that the negotiations are dead (and will be until one side is exhausted or beaten on the battlefield).
And the Russians' own words, including those of Putin himself, are making a stronger case that genocide is indeed the correct term, more even than the hideous acts being uncovered on the ground (which themselves are prima facie proof of war crimes and crimes against humanity, but not, yet IMO, of genocide. Mariupol, once we get there, or Kherson, are both likely to provide direct proof of genocidal acts to match Russia's genocidal policies and doctrines).
So, yes, Macron is a dangerous egotistical twat. But even so, if I were French, I'd still have to vote for him.
Macron's comments, by conflating Russian and Ukrainians as "one" which "really means it isn't genocide" kind of leads to me Eddie Izzards quote in Dressed to kill:
"Pol Pot killed one point seven million Cambodians, died under house arrest, well done there. Stalin killed many millions, died in his bed, aged seventy-two, well done indeed. And the reason we let them get away with it is they killed their own people. And we're sort of fine with that.....Hitler tried to kill people next door. Ah....silly man. After a couple of years we won't stand for that, will we?"
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Nah it's ok. I can't get on with George whatsisface.
Dunkirk is the excellent one. The soundtrack reverberates still.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
I thought it was disappointingly boring. I went wanting to like it but got fed up. A series of cliches run together by some clever cinematography.
Chickenhawk, however, is arguably the best war book I have ever read, certainly since Biggles of 266.
Have you tried A Rumor of War?
Brilliant and harrowing. Almost as good as Dispatches
This could be complete and utter balderdash but I'm just wondering if we might be about to see an Indian Alliance.
A what?
Rishi Sunak - Priti Patel
To bring down Boris and set up one or other as the heir ...
It looks to me anyway as if Boris is in more, not less, trouble now than last night. Things are starting to happen. Take a peak at the mailonline leader.
The Oryx equipment tally https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-documenting-equipment.html is running at 3.7 Russian to 1 Ukrainian. Even if the Ukrainian hits are better reported we can assume at least 3 to 1. The Ukrainians are also capturing a lot of reusable kit in that number. It would be a reasonable assumption that military manpower losses are 3 to 5 Russians for each Ukrainian. Unfortunately uncounted and large civilian casualties.
Interest rates on student loans to hit 12% in England. Outrageous.
Covered on previous thread.....outrageous for the country as we ultimately will all pick up the tab when the loan isn't repaid in full, basically irrelevant on the level of the individual student.
Depends what they earn and how much they repay. My daughter has been paying back her maintenance loans for about 5 years now and the capital debt is still increasing because she is relatively low paid. The risk here is that the capital for many, many more people will increase beyond the point they can hope to repay with the consequence that they pay a higher tax rate for their entire working lives for 3 or 4 years of fun at the start. Its a very bad deal.
The statistics show that this is already the case. For the umpteenth time, for basically everybody but those that managed to get a very highly paid job quite quickly out of university, a student loan is just a graduate tax.
I need to check, but also am I right in thinking that this 12% is only on the "new style" student loans. They changed the system in 2012.
I think that is right and that it is also going to be capped in the future but anyone who expects to make reasonable money really should borrow from a bank, not The Student Loan company. Much, much better rates.
The practical effect of this will be to further divide society. Those whose families can afford to pay their fees for them will be better off for the vast bulk of their working lives. Those from more ordinary backgrounds will not.
Another sad byproduct of it is that it creates an economic generational divide: a graduate in a decent career who graduated before the new fees came in is going to have a realistic prospect of being debt free by say their mid 30s. They will have hundreds of pounds more of disposable income a month. That will feed its way through into being better placed for that new car, or that mortgage, or extra savings for a rainy day.
The young really have been f***ed royally in the past decade.
That isn't quite right either.
When fees were £3k, people were normally getting £15k of loans / debt. Also, you had to pay the £3k fees upfront every year, so middle class families got hammered. Poor got support, rich no problem. But it was your family, not what you earned after the degree. Now the weight falls on those who most benefit from the degree, nothing to do with your family.
Then the level you starting repaying was much lower, so if you earned middle salary say £30-35k a year, you had to repay % of more of you income but still not really enough to be paying off the £15k very quickly.
Interest rates on student loans to hit 12% in England. Outrageous.
Covered on previous thread.....outrageous for the country as we ultimately will all pick up the tab when the loan isn't repaid in full, basically irrelevant on the level of the individual student.
Depends what they earn and how much they repay. My daughter has been paying back her maintenance loans for about 5 years now and the capital debt is still increasing because she is relatively low paid. The risk here is that the capital for many, many more people will increase beyond the point they can hope to repay with the consequence that they pay a higher tax rate for their entire working lives for 3 or 4 years of fun at the start. Its a very bad deal.
The statistics show that this is already the case. For the umpteenth time, for basically everybody but those that managed to get a very highly paid job quite quickly out of university, a student loan is just a graduate tax.
I need to check, but also am I right in thinking that this 12% is only on the "new style" student loans. They changed the system in 2012.
I think that is right and that it is also going to be capped in the future but anyone who expects to make reasonable money really should borrow from a bank, not The Student Loan company. Much, much better rates.
The practical effect of this will be to further divide society. Those whose families can afford to pay their fees for them will be better off for the vast bulk of their working lives. Those from more ordinary backgrounds will not.
You are wrong here. The maths are that paying the fees upfront / paying them off quickly isn't really a sensible idea. Martin Lewis bangs on about it endlessly. If you have £50k burning a hole in your pocket, you are going to be better off taking that money and buying a house. Both in terms of getting on the housing ladder, reduced mortgage and by historic standards increase in property price over the course of that 30 years.
Its literally a graduate tax, and the high earners are going to end up forking out a lot more than those on £30-40k a year. Remember its 9% on what you earn after £27-28k. So somebody on £30k a year really isn't paying much. Those on £60-70k, paying a lot, make a lot larger contributions over their life time.
I say the above as somebody who did this (from money I earned myself). I wrote the Student Loan people a massive cheque and paid it all off when I was 22-23. In hindsight it was a stupid thing to do, I could have bought a house paying down a big portion of it with the deposit, rather than renting for a number of years and ultimately paying a load more for a house.
I don't think it is as simple as that. When student loans started they were cheap money with a fixed, low interest rate. Paying that off and then borrowing at a higher rate, for a mortgage or carloan for example, made no sense. But it is no longer cheap debt. For those who earn more than £40k (picked out of the air) that means it does make sense to pay it down because you will be able to borrow the same money cheaper.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Nah it's ok. I can't get on with George whatsisface.
Dunkirk is the excellent one. The soundtrack reverberates still.
Parts of Dunkirk absolutely superb.
Not sure it is Ken Branagh's finest hour though.
I saw it in a full fat sound-enhanced or capable cinema and for me the constant menace of the soundtrack the whole way through, that reverberating hum that was never absent and foretold danger and terror was fabulous. And it rightly won an Oscar.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Nah it's ok. I can't get on with George whatsisface.
Dunkirk is the excellent one. The soundtrack reverberates still.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
I thought it was disappointingly boring. I went wanting to like it but got fed up. A series of cliches run together by some clever cinematography.
Chickenhawk, however, is arguably the best war book I have ever read, certainly since Biggles of 266.
Have you tried A Rumor of War?
Brilliant and harrowing. Almost as good as Dispatches
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
I thought it was disappointingly boring. I went wanting to like it but got fed up. A series of cliches run together by some clever cinematography.
Chickenhawk, however, is arguably the best war book I have ever read, certainly since Biggles of 266.
Have you tried A Rumor of War?
Brilliant and harrowing. Almost as good as Dispatches
Got to be (from a strong list of contenders) All Quiet on the Western Front. Stunning and memorable.
Birdsong also good in that vein.
Plenty of others, of course, as you say no idea what OLB was thinking.
It's probably just as well that I am not French. From the BBC:
"US President Joe Biden has accused Russian forces of committing acts of "genocide" in Ukraine.
He said Russian President Vladimir Putin was trying to "wipe out the idea" of a Ukrainian identity.
Mr Biden has previously stopped short of references to genocide, instead accusing Moscow of "war crimes".
French President Emmanuel Macron later told French TV he was reluctant to use the term and warned against an "escalation of rhetoric".
Speaking to the public broadcaster France 2, the French President said he would be "careful with such terms today because these two peoples are brothers."
"I want to continue to try, as much as I can, to stop this war and rebuild peace. I am not sure that an escalation of rhetoric serves that cause," he added."
I mean, how on earth do you vote for this twat, even to stop Le Pen? Escalation of rhetoric? Jeez. Words fail me.
If there were a real hope of a negotiated peace, then I'd have some sympathy with Macron's position. Partly because a negotiator has to find common ground, not drive wedges, and partly because I really hate the devaluation of vital legal terms (like genocide and WMD) by many for political point-scoring and manipulation of the public's emotions.
But, and it is a huge BUT, even if the individual negotiators are acting in good faith, it is clear Putin never has been. Putin's own words show that the negotiations are dead (and will be until one side is exhausted or beaten on the battlefield).
And the Russians' own words, including those of Putin himself, are making a stronger case that genocide is indeed the correct term, more even than the hideous acts being uncovered on the ground (which themselves are prima facie proof of war crimes and crimes against humanity, but not, yet IMO, of genocide. Mariupol, once we get there, or Kherson, are both likely to provide direct proof of genocidal acts to match Russia's genocidal policies and doctrines).
So, yes, Macron is a dangerous egotistical twat. But even so, if I were French, I'd still have to vote for him.
Much of the Russian rhetoric has had genocidal tones and has done ever since it became crystal clear that the Ukrainians were not welcoming Russian tanks with flowers but with NLAWs. When civilians with hands tied behind their back are being butchered in the streets I think the time to be measured in your rhetoric may have passed.
If Le Pen didn't have Putin sympathies as well, I really don't know.
I think that the argument is that the Russians need to have an off-ramp. It is the same argument made by senior people in the US military. If Putin and Russia are cast into the wilderness forever then they have no incentive to step back from the brink, and the whole thing keeps escalating. It's not a very noble kind of argument, and in the case of Putin who seems to have become an irredeemable danger to world peace I'm not even sure it's correct, but you can certainly understand why people are making it.
Interest rates on student loans to hit 12% in England. Outrageous.
Covered on previous thread.....outrageous for the country as we ultimately will all pick up the tab when the loan isn't repaid in full, basically irrelevant on the level of the individual student.
Depends what they earn and how much they repay. My daughter has been paying back her maintenance loans for about 5 years now and the capital debt is still increasing because she is relatively low paid. The risk here is that the capital for many, many more people will increase beyond the point they can hope to repay with the consequence that they pay a higher tax rate for their entire working lives for 3 or 4 years of fun at the start. Its a very bad deal.
The statistics show that this is already the case. For the umpteenth time, for basically everybody but those that managed to get a very highly paid job quite quickly out of university, a student loan is just a graduate tax.
I need to check, but also am I right in thinking that this 12% is only on the "new style" student loans. They changed the system in 2012.
I think that is right and that it is also going to be capped in the future but anyone who expects to make reasonable money really should borrow from a bank, not The Student Loan company. Much, much better rates.
The practical effect of this will be to further divide society. Those whose families can afford to pay their fees for them will be better off for the vast bulk of their working lives. Those from more ordinary backgrounds will not.
You are wrong here. The maths are that paying the fees upfront / paying them off quickly isn't really a sensible idea. Martin Lewis bangs on about it endlessly. If you have £50k burning a hole in your pocket, you are going to be better off taking that money and buying a house. Both in terms of getting on the housing ladder, reduced mortgage and by historic standards increase in property price over the course of that 30 years.
Its literally a graduate tax, and the high earners are going to end up forking out a lot more than those on £30-40k a year. Remember its 9% on what you earn after £27-28k. So somebody on £30k a year really isn't paying much. Those on £60-70k, paying a lot, make a lot larger contributions over their life time.
I say the above as somebody who did this (from money I earned myself). I wrote the Student Loan people a massive cheque and paid it all off when I was 22-23. In hindsight it was a stupid thing to do, I could have bought a house paying down a big portion of it with the deposit, rather than renting for a number of years and ultimately paying a load more for a house.
I don't think it is as simple as that. When student loans started they were cheap money with a fixed, low interest rate. Paying that off and then borrowing at a higher rate, for a mortgage or carloan for example, made no sense. But it is no longer cheap debt. For those who earn more than £40k (picked out of the air) that means it does make sense to pay it down because you will be able to borrow the same money cheaper.
Talking specifically about the post 2012 loan system Its really not true. Those on £40k will never get close to paying off their £50k loan at any interest rate. There is no point taking out a big loan of £30-40k to pay it off, when the contributions won't be anything close to that over your lifetime.
Martin Lewis has done the calculations and written about this endlessly and always says its better not to pay it off even if you either have the capital and definitely don't take a loan to do so.
This could be complete and utter balderdash but I'm just wondering if we might be about to see an Indian Alliance.
A what?
Rishi Sunak - Priti Patel
To bring down Boris and set up one or other as the heir ...
It looks to me anyway as if Boris is in more, not less, trouble now than last night. Things are starting to happen. Take a peak at the mailonline leader.
Seems to me that there may well be Prima Facie evidence of a Downing Street Conspiracy to Pervert the Course of Justice, the denial for example when it would seem they, including the PM, knew what had happened. Maybe Sue Gray and the CPS are on this! If so, wow.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Nah it's ok. I can't get on with George whatsisface.
Dunkirk is the excellent one. The soundtrack reverberates still.
Parts of Dunkirk absolutely superb.
Not sure it is Ken Branagh's finest hour though.
I saw it in a full fat sound-enhanced or capable cinema and for me the constant menace of the soundtrack the whole way through, that reverberating hum that was never absent and foretold danger and terror was fabulous. And it rightly won an Oscar.
SKB I could take or leave I agree.
I loved the famous single take sequence in Dunkirk, but the rest of it I found stodgy and dull. The mirror image of opinions on 1917
The Oryx equipment tally https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-documenting-equipment.html is running at 3.7 Russian to 1 Ukrainian. Even if the Ukrainian hits are better reported we can assume at least 3 to 1. The Ukrainians are also capturing a lot of reusable kit in that number. It would be a reasonable assumption that military manpower losses are 3 to 5 Russians for each Ukrainian. Unfortunately uncounted and large civilian casualties.
There’s a credible suggestion from those numbers, that the Ukranian army now has *more* tanks than it did six weeks ago.
They won’t all be serviceable, but then again many of them didn’t appear very serviceable when they rolled into Ukraine in the first place.
Interest rates on student loans to hit 12% in England. Outrageous.
Covered on previous thread.....outrageous for the country as we ultimately will all pick up the tab when the loan isn't repaid in full, basically irrelevant on the level of the individual student.
Depends what they earn and how much they repay. My daughter has been paying back her maintenance loans for about 5 years now and the capital debt is still increasing because she is relatively low paid. The risk here is that the capital for many, many more people will increase beyond the point they can hope to repay with the consequence that they pay a higher tax rate for their entire working lives for 3 or 4 years of fun at the start. Its a very bad deal.
The statistics show that this is already the case. For the umpteenth time, for basically everybody but those that managed to get a very highly paid job quite quickly out of university, a student loan is just a graduate tax.
I need to check, but also am I right in thinking that this 12% is only on the "new style" student loans. They changed the system in 2012.
I think that is right and that it is also going to be capped in the future but anyone who expects to make reasonable money really should borrow from a bank, not The Student Loan company. Much, much better rates.
The practical effect of this will be to further divide society. Those whose families can afford to pay their fees for them will be better off for the vast bulk of their working lives. Those from more ordinary backgrounds will not.
Another sad byproduct of it is that it creates an economic generational divide: a graduate in a decent career who graduated before the new fees came in is going to have a realistic prospect of being debt free by say their mid 30s. They will have hundreds of pounds more of disposable income a month. That will feed its way through into being better placed for that new car, or that mortgage, or extra savings for a rainy day.
The young really have been f***ed royally in the past decade.
That isn't quite right either.
When fees were £3k, people were normally getting £15k of loans / debt. Also, you had to pay the £3k fees upfront every year, so middle class families got hammered. Poor got support, rich no problem. But it was your family, not what you earned after the degree. Now the weight falls on those who most benefit from the degree, nothing to do with your family.
Then the level you starting repaying was much lower, so if you earned middle salary say £30-35k a year, you had to repay % of more of you income but still not really enough to be paying off the £15k very quickly.
That's not right about paying £3k up front. The £3k fees started in 2006-07, which was my second year at uni. I paid my £1,200 up front in 2005-06, but then was given a loan for the £1,200 in the second and third years. Those students starting in 2006-07 and later never paid fees up front.
It's probably just as well that I am not French. From the BBC:
"US President Joe Biden has accused Russian forces of committing acts of "genocide" in Ukraine.
He said Russian President Vladimir Putin was trying to "wipe out the idea" of a Ukrainian identity.
Mr Biden has previously stopped short of references to genocide, instead accusing Moscow of "war crimes".
French President Emmanuel Macron later told French TV he was reluctant to use the term and warned against an "escalation of rhetoric".
Speaking to the public broadcaster France 2, the French President said he would be "careful with such terms today because these two peoples are brothers."
"I want to continue to try, as much as I can, to stop this war and rebuild peace. I am not sure that an escalation of rhetoric serves that cause," he added."
I mean, how on earth do you vote for this twat, even to stop Le Pen? Escalation of rhetoric? Jeez. Words fail me.
If there were a real hope of a negotiated peace, then I'd have some sympathy with Macron's position. Partly because a negotiator has to find common ground, not drive wedges, and partly because I really hate the devaluation of vital legal terms (like genocide and WMD) by many for political point-scoring and manipulation of the public's emotions.
But, and it is a huge BUT, even if the individual negotiators are acting in good faith, it is clear Putin never has been. Putin's own words show that the negotiations are dead (and will be until one side is exhausted or beaten on the battlefield).
And the Russians' own words, including those of Putin himself, are making a stronger case that genocide is indeed the correct term, more even than the hideous acts being uncovered on the ground (which themselves are prima facie proof of war crimes and crimes against humanity, but not, yet IMO, of genocide. Mariupol, once we get there, or Kherson, are both likely to provide direct proof of genocidal acts to match Russia's genocidal policies and doctrines).
So, yes, Macron is a dangerous egotistical twat. But even so, if I were French, I'd still have to vote for him.
Much of the Russian rhetoric has had genocidal tones and has done ever since it became crystal clear that the Ukrainians were not welcoming Russian tanks with flowers but with NLAWs. When civilians with hands tied behind their back are being butchered in the streets I think the time to be measured in your rhetoric may have passed.
If Le Pen didn't have Putin sympathies as well, I really don't know.
I think that the argument is that the Russians need to have an off-ramp. It is the same argument made by senior people in the US military. If Putin and Russia are cast into the wilderness forever then they have no incentive to step back from the brink, and the whole thing keeps escalating. It's not a very noble kind of argument, and in the case of Putin who seems to have become an irredeemable danger to world peace I'm not even sure it's correct, but you can certainly understand why people are making it.
The "offramp" argument is a respectable one but against it is the point that Putin in place will be forced to try further aggression in the future. I suspect that a momentous collapse of the Russian state is on the cards with all the dangers and opportunities that presents. Timeframe? One month to two years. I think Putin has bet the regime and the state on this disastrous venture and they don't look like backing out while they still can (withdraw and lie about a "victory" and hope sanctions are lifted).
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
I thought it was disappointingly boring. I went wanting to like it but got fed up. A series of cliches run together by some clever cinematography.
Chickenhawk, however, is arguably the best war book I have ever read, certainly since Biggles of 266.
Have you tried A Rumor of War?
Brilliant and harrowing. Almost as good as Dispatches
No I haven't. I will give it a go.
You're in for a treat. It is superb. These reviews do not lie. eg:
"To call this the best book about Vietnam is to trivialize it. A Rumour of War is a dangerous and even subversive book, the first to insist that readers asks themselves the questions: How would I have acted? To what lengths would I have gone to survive? A terrifying book, it will make the strongest among us weep" (Los Angeles Times Book Review)
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
I thought it was disappointingly boring. I went wanting to like it but got fed up. A series of cliches run together by some clever cinematography.
Chickenhawk, however, is arguably the best war book I have ever read, certainly since Biggles of 266.
I read it as a teenager and thought a) this is what I want to do and b) I can't believe that military endeavours are really this chaotic and idiotically organised.
'Come and See' is the Russian war film you all need to be watching. There's an English subs version on YouTube.
Memorably described by one critic as 'a visceral freefall into atrocity'.
Will quietly add that to the watch list. Not too sure the missus is up for watching too many Russki war movies at the moment though!
Eisenstein's Alexander Nevsky is a fantastic film. WW2 propaganda about the Russian prince defeating the Teutonic Knights, used thousands of Red Army soldiers as extras in the middle of the war.
Interest rates on student loans to hit 12% in England. Outrageous.
Covered on previous thread.....outrageous for the country as we ultimately will all pick up the tab when the loan isn't repaid in full, basically irrelevant on the level of the individual student.
Depends what they earn and how much they repay. My daughter has been paying back her maintenance loans for about 5 years now and the capital debt is still increasing because she is relatively low paid. The risk here is that the capital for many, many more people will increase beyond the point they can hope to repay with the consequence that they pay a higher tax rate for their entire working lives for 3 or 4 years of fun at the start. Its a very bad deal.
The statistics show that this is already the case. For the umpteenth time, for basically everybody but those that managed to get a very highly paid job quite quickly out of university, a student loan is just a graduate tax.
I need to check, but also am I right in thinking that this 12% is only on the "new style" student loans. They changed the system in 2012.
I think that is right and that it is also going to be capped in the future but anyone who expects to make reasonable money really should borrow from a bank, not The Student Loan company. Much, much better rates.
The practical effect of this will be to further divide society. Those whose families can afford to pay their fees for them will be better off for the vast bulk of their working lives. Those from more ordinary backgrounds will not.
Another sad byproduct of it is that it creates an economic generational divide: a graduate in a decent career who graduated before the new fees came in is going to have a realistic prospect of being debt free by say their mid 30s. They will have hundreds of pounds more of disposable income a month. That will feed its way through into being better placed for that new car, or that mortgage, or extra savings for a rainy day.
The young really have been f***ed royally in the past decade.
That isn't quite right either.
When fees were £3k, people were normally getting £15k of loans / debt. Also, you had to pay the £3k fees upfront every year, so middle class families got hammered. Poor got support, rich no problem. But it was your family, not what you earned after the degree. Now the weight falls on those who most benefit from the degree, nothing to do with your family.
Then the level you starting repaying was much lower, so if you earned middle salary say £30-35k a year, you had to repay % of more of you income but still not really enough to be paying off the £15k very quickly.
That's not right about paying £3k up front. The £3k fees started in 2006-07, which was my second year at uni. I paid my £1,200 up front in 2005-06, but then was given a loan for the £1,200 in the second and third years. Those students starting in 2006-07 and later never paid fees up front.
Must be misremembering. My apologises.
It doesn't alter the central premise though, that people still ran up big loans in combination with the level at which repayments started was much lower. So although headline rate was lower, you were paying that rate on a lot more income, but at same time few people still manage to repay the principle over the 25-30 years.
When £1200 fees came in, the balance was the other way, student loan smaller / less debt and a more people paid off the principle. But they were still paying most of their working lives, at a smaller monthly % but on a larger amount of their income.
Ultimately all that has happened a load of debt has been shifted onto the public as a whole. Most student are hardly repaying the £27k a year in fees over their working lives, let alone the rest of the debt.
Will he use the dontcha know there's a war on, I've work to do excuse?
Are these the same parties Ed Balls, Prince Harry or Pier Morgan attended?
I do find it really bizarre that anybody think you what total laugh, lets go to a fancy dress party as a Nazi. You have 1000s of options to choose from, no I want to go as Nazi. Same as black face, anybody going to a party in the past 20-30 years, it just doesn't enter your head.
Apparently Mr Davis was photographed in the 1980s.
On topic, I think the cumulative load of FPNs is what will finish off PM Johnson.
Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.
Why? Diminishing returns innit?
You underestimate the enormity of what has happened in the past less-than-24-hours. It is now literally and without exaggeration the case that Johnson could hoick his breeks down and shit on the despatch box with absolute impunity.
On topic, I think the cumulative load of FPNs is what will finish off PM Johnson.
Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.
Why? Diminishing returns innit?
You underestimate the enormity of what has happened in the past less-than-24-hours. It is now literally and without exaggeration the case that Johnson could hoick his breeks down and shit on the despatch box with absolute impunity.
The volume of FPNs increase the fine amount, so it is isn't difficult to imagine a scenario of 'Boris Johnson fined £10,000 for his sixth breach of the rules.'
On topic, I think the cumulative load of FPNs is what will finish off PM Johnson.
Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.
Why? Diminishing returns innit?
You underestimate the enormity of what has happened in the past less-than-24-hours. It is now literally and without exaggeration the case that Johnson could hoick his breeks down and shit on the despatch box with absolute impunity.
The volume of FPNs increase the fine amount, so it is isn't difficult to imagine a scenario of 'Boris Johnson fined £10,000 for his sixth breach of the rules.'
Since we're on the war stuff, one of my favourite reads of the last few years is Solzhenitsyn's last book, Apricot Jam: and Other Stories. I liked August 1914 but got lost with the rest of the Red Wheel stuff and the mystical holy Russia thing seemed a bit bonkers. This book is the opposite: humane, funny, and the technical stuff about being a sound ranging artillery observer is just plain interesting. Still some characteristic sardonc bleakness mind.
Wiki reminds me that AIS's parents were respectively of Russian & Ukranian descent. I wonder if he was still around what he'd have made of the current war; I fear he may have plumped for the 'patriotic' view.
Will he use the dontcha know there's a war on, I've work to do excuse?
Are these the same parties Ed Balls, Prince Harry or Pier Morgan attended?
I do find it really bizarre that anybody think you what total laugh, lets go to a fancy dress party as a Nazi. You have 1000s of options to choose from, no I want to go as Nazi. Same as black face, anybody going to a party in the past 20-30 years, it just doesn't enter your head.
Apparently Mr Davis was photographed in the 1980s.
NEW: Information Commissioner's Office found "insufficient evidence" to prosecute two people suspected of unlawfully disclosing CCTV from the Department of Health and Social Care involving Matt Hancock and his former aide Gina Coladangelol snogging in the office. https://twitter.com/MinnieStephC4/status/1514234466494996481
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Nah it's ok. I can't get on with George whatsisface.
Dunkirk is the excellent one. The soundtrack reverberates still.
Parts of Dunkirk absolutely superb.
Not sure it is Ken Branagh's finest hour though.
I saw it in a full fat sound-enhanced or capable cinema and for me the constant menace of the soundtrack the whole way through, that reverberating hum that was never absent and foretold danger and terror was fabulous. And it rightly won an Oscar.
SKB I could take or leave I agree.
I loved the famous single take sequence in Dunkirk, but the rest of it I found stodgy and dull. The mirror image of opinions on 1917
No, the single take sequence is in 1917.
Dunkirk is the one with three intertwined time-lines (Air, Sea, Beach).
In all this talk of war films it struck me that one military character who's never pictured in an actual war is James Bond. Unless I've missed one, all the Bond films take place in peacetime.
Since we're on the war stuff, one of my favourite reads of the last few years is Solzhenitsyn's last book, Apricot Jam: and Other Stories. I liked August 1914 but got lost with the rest of the Red Wheel stuff and the mystical holy Russia thing seemed a bit bonkers. This book is the opposite: humane, funny, and the technical stuff about being a sound ranging artillery observer is just plain interesting. Still some characteristic sardonc bleakness mind.
Wiki reminds me that AIS's parents were respectively of Russian & Ukranian descent. I wonder if he was still around what he'd have made of the current war; I fear he may have plumped for the 'patriotic' view.
I disagree. If he was still around he'd hate the Mad, Late-Stage Putin and he would identify this invasion as Fascism in action.
He was a patriot, with a hint of mysticism maybe, but certainly not a Dugin
Re war films, despite some flaws, I've always enjoyed Cross of Iron.
While not, strictly speaking a war film, I also enjoyed a lot Power Play, with Peter O'Toole and James Pleasance, which is a fictionalised version of Lutwark's book on successful coups d'etat.
In all this talk of war films it struck me that one military character who's never pictured in an actual war is James Bond. Unless I've missed one, all the Bond films take place in peacetime.
Bond's military career is a part of his back story, but I don't recall it any of the films.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Nah it's ok. I can't get on with George whatsisface.
Dunkirk is the excellent one. The soundtrack reverberates still.
Parts of Dunkirk absolutely superb.
Not sure it is Ken Branagh's finest hour though.
I saw it in a full fat sound-enhanced or capable cinema and for me the constant menace of the soundtrack the whole way through, that reverberating hum that was never absent and foretold danger and terror was fabulous. And it rightly won an Oscar.
SKB I could take or leave I agree.
I loved the famous single take sequence in Dunkirk, but the rest of it I found stodgy and dull. The mirror image of opinions on 1917
No, the single take sequence is in 1917.
Dunkirk is the one with three intertwined time-lines (Air, Sea, Beach).
You're quite right. My mistake. The single take sequence is in Atonement - which is "about" Dunkirk
I am now starting to wonder if I have actually seen "Dunkirk", which either renders my last two hours of commentary laughably irrelevant. Or Dunkirk is so forgettable it is shite
I love war movies. I can't believe I missed a famous one? I am now going to check
Interest rates on student loans to hit 12% in England. Outrageous.
Covered on previous thread.....outrageous for the country as we ultimately will all pick up the tab when the loan isn't repaid in full, basically irrelevant on the level of the individual student.
For a sizeable proportion, it’s a moot point anyway as they’ll never pay them off until they are automatically written off.
The current student loan regime is pretty much a graduate tax in all but name really. The sheer size of the borrowing and the unfavourable interest rate make it incredibly difficult to clear the balance. As much as the top up fee system before it was a blow to students in the late noughties, it was much more realistic that repayment would eventually be made and the interest rate was much less punishing being linked as it is to BOE base or inflation, whichever is lower.
A key change (not announced as part of the original press release) is that the minimum earnings threshold going forward is only going to increase by RPI and not average earnings.
In the long run (which 30/40 years of the loan is) average earnings should beat RPI, so more "tax" is going to be paid going forward.
The Oryx equipment tally https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-documenting-equipment.html is running at 3.7 Russian to 1 Ukrainian. Even if the Ukrainian hits are better reported we can assume at least 3 to 1. The Ukrainians are also capturing a lot of reusable kit in that number. It would be a reasonable assumption that military manpower losses are 3 to 5 Russians for each Ukrainian. Unfortunately uncounted and large civilian casualties.
Sadly I think you may be being too optimistic there, nether Ukrainians troops or Ukraine civilians have a reason to photograph upload or share photos of there own equipment being destroyed, and Russian troops have had there phones taken off them. Ukrainian losses may be similar to Russians and if not, that would be become the Ukrainians have less equipment to start with.
As for Solders killed, Sadly, I think it most likely that the Ukrainians have lost a lot more than the Russians,
Re war films, despite some flaws, I've always enjoyed Cross of Iron.
While not, strictly speaking a war film, I also enjoyed a lot Power Play, with Peter O'Toole and James Pleasance, which is a fictionalised version of Lutwark's book on successful coups d'etat.
Now that's interesting about Luttwak's book, thank you.
Since we're on the war stuff, one of my favourite reads of the last few years is Solzhenitsyn's last book, Apricot Jam: and Other Stories. I liked August 1914 but got lost with the rest of the Red Wheel stuff and the mystical holy Russia thing seemed a bit bonkers. This book is the opposite: humane, funny, and the technical stuff about being a sound ranging artillery observer is just plain interesting. Still some characteristic sardonc bleakness mind.
Wiki reminds me that AIS's parents were respectively of Russian & Ukranian descent. I wonder if he was still around what he'd have made of the current war; I fear he may have plumped for the 'patriotic' view.
I disagree. If he was still around he'd hate the Mad, Late-Stage Putin and he would identify this invasion as Fascism in action.
He was a patriot, with a hint of mysticism maybe, but certainly not a Dugin
Don't you have an aged Russo sympatico relative? Age does funny things to folk. His last book as mentioned would give me hope on that score, but we'll never know.
Will he use the dontcha know there's a war on, I've work to do excuse?
Are these the same parties Ed Balls, Prince Harry or Pier Morgan attended?
I do find it really bizarre that anybody think you what total laugh, lets go to a fancy dress party as a Nazi. You have 1000s of options to choose from, no I want to go as Nazi. Same as black face, anybody going to a party in the past 20-30 years, it just doesn't enter your head.
Apparently Mr Davis was photographed in the 1980s.
In all this talk of war films it struck me that one military character who's never pictured in an actual war is James Bond. Unless I've missed one, all the Bond films take place in peacetime.
I think three is one from the 80s where he goes to Afghanistan, set during the Russian invasion, but cant remember which.
Will he use the dontcha know there's a war on, I've work to do excuse?
Are these the same parties Ed Balls, Prince Harry or Pier Morgan attended?
I do find it really bizarre that anybody think you what total laugh, lets go to a fancy dress party as a Nazi. You have 1000s of options to choose from, no I want to go as Nazi. Same as black face, anybody going to a party in the past 20-30 years, it just doesn't enter your head.
Apparently Mr Davis was photographed in the 1980s.
Re war films, despite some flaws, I've always enjoyed Cross of Iron.
While not, strictly speaking a war film, I also enjoyed a lot Power Play, with Peter O'Toole and James Pleasance, which is a fictionalised version of Lutwark's book on successful coups d'etat.
Now that's interesting about Luttwak's book, thank you.
You can find the whole film on Youtube. It does have a pretty vile torture scene presided over by Pleasance, who is meek but terrifying as a security chief.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Nah it's ok. I can't get on with George whatsisface.
Dunkirk is the excellent one. The soundtrack reverberates still.
Parts of Dunkirk absolutely superb.
Not sure it is Ken Branagh's finest hour though.
I saw it in a full fat sound-enhanced or capable cinema and for me the constant menace of the soundtrack the whole way through, that reverberating hum that was never absent and foretold danger and terror was fabulous. And it rightly won an Oscar.
SKB I could take or leave I agree.
I loved the famous single take sequence in Dunkirk, but the rest of it I found stodgy and dull. The mirror image of opinions on 1917
No, the single take sequence is in 1917.
Dunkirk is the one with three intertwined time-lines (Air, Sea, Beach).
You're quite right. My mistake. The single take sequence is in Atonement - which is "about" Dunkirk
I am now starting to wonder if I have actually seen "Dunkirk", which either renders my last two hours of commentary laughably irrelevant. Or Dunkirk is so forgettable it is shite
I love war movies. I can't believe I missed a famous one? I am now going to check
Interest rates on student loans to hit 12% in England. Outrageous.
Covered on previous thread.....outrageous for the country as we ultimately will all pick up the tab when the loan isn't repaid in full, basically irrelevant on the level of the individual student.
For a sizeable proportion, it’s a moot point anyway as they’ll never pay them off until they are automatically written off.
The current student loan regime is pretty much a graduate tax in all but name really. The sheer size of the borrowing and the unfavourable interest rate make it incredibly difficult to clear the balance. As much as the top up fee system before it was a blow to students in the late noughties, it was much more realistic that repayment would eventually be made and the interest rate was much less punishing being linked as it is to BOE base or inflation, whichever is lower.
A key change (not announced as part of the original press release) is that the minimum earnings threshold going forward is only going to increase by RPI and not average earnings.
In the long run (which 30/40 years of the loan is) average earnings should beat RPI, so more "tax" is going to be paid going forward.
And for middling professionals it is a marginal tax rate of 42%. (20+13+9). For a very long time.
The systems aids: the rich, expats, the feckless, the unemployable.
On topic, I think the cumulative load of FPNs is what will finish off PM Johnson.
Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.
Why? Diminishing returns innit?
You underestimate the enormity of what has happened in the past less-than-24-hours. It is now literally and without exaggeration the case that Johnson could hoick his breeks down and shit on the despatch box with absolute impunity.
The volume of FPNs increase the fine amount, so it is isn't difficult to imagine a scenario of 'Boris Johnson fined £10,000 for his sixth breach of the rules.'
That will prove to be awkward for him.
If that's the way the law works its a badly designed law.
If someone commits a serious crime that results in prison, or multiple of such crimes sentenced together, then the prison sentence tends to be served concurrently not consecutively or exponentially increasing sentences.
It makes sense to have FPN for past offenders be escalating, but only for breaches made after the first FPN was resolved surely? While ignorance is no excuse, if someone didn't realise they were breaking the law and did the same thing as part of their routine every morning then to stack exponential fines years later is quite worrying if normal people are being treated like that.
On topic, I think the cumulative load of FPNs is what will finish off PM Johnson.
Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.
Why? Diminishing returns innit?
You underestimate the enormity of what has happened in the past less-than-24-hours. It is now literally and without exaggeration the case that Johnson could hoick his breeks down and shit on the despatch box with absolute impunity.
The volume of FPNs increase the fine amount, so it is isn't difficult to imagine a scenario of 'Boris Johnson fined £10,000 for his sixth breach of the rules.'
That will prove to be awkward for him.
If that's the way the law works its a badly designed law.
If someone commits a serious crime that results in prison, or multiple of such crimes sentenced together, then the prison sentence tends to be served concurrently not consecutively or exponentially increasing sentences.
It makes sense to have FPN for past offenders be escalating, but only for breaches made after the first FPN was resolved surely? While ignorance is no excuse, if someone didn't realise they were breaking the law and did the same thing as part of their routine every morning then to stack exponential fines years later is quite worrying if normal people are being treated like that.
"if someone didn't realise they were breaking the law"
Hardly relevant to the case where 'someone' wrote the thing, mind.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Nah it's ok. I can't get on with George whatsisface.
Dunkirk is the excellent one. The soundtrack reverberates still.
Parts of Dunkirk absolutely superb.
Not sure it is Ken Branagh's finest hour though.
I saw it in a full fat sound-enhanced or capable cinema and for me the constant menace of the soundtrack the whole way through, that reverberating hum that was never absent and foretold danger and terror was fabulous. And it rightly won an Oscar.
SKB I could take or leave I agree.
I loved the famous single take sequence in Dunkirk, but the rest of it I found stodgy and dull. The mirror image of opinions on 1917
No, the single take sequence is in 1917.
Dunkirk is the one with three intertwined time-lines (Air, Sea, Beach).
You're quite right. My mistake. The single take sequence is in Atonement - which is "about" Dunkirk
I am now starting to wonder if I have actually seen "Dunkirk", which either renders my last two hours of commentary laughably irrelevant. Or Dunkirk is so forgettable it is shite
I love war movies. I can't believe I missed a famous one? I am now going to check
Interest rates on student loans to hit 12% in England. Outrageous.
Covered on previous thread.....outrageous for the country as we ultimately will all pick up the tab when the loan isn't repaid in full, basically irrelevant on the level of the individual student.
Depends what they earn and how much they repay. My daughter has been paying back her maintenance loans for about 5 years now and the capital debt is still increasing because she is relatively low paid. The risk here is that the capital for many, many more people will increase beyond the point they can hope to repay with the consequence that they pay a higher tax rate for their entire working lives for 3 or 4 years of fun at the start. Its a very bad deal.
The statistics show that this is already the case. For the umpteenth time, for basically everybody but those that managed to get a very highly paid job quite quickly out of university, a student loan is just a graduate tax.
I need to check, but also am I right in thinking that this 12% is only on the "new style" student loans. They changed the system in 2012.
I think that is right and that it is also going to be capped in the future but anyone who expects to make reasonable money really should borrow from a bank, not The Student Loan company. Much, much better rates.
The practical effect of this will be to further divide society. Those whose families can afford to pay their fees for them will be better off for the vast bulk of their working lives. Those from more ordinary backgrounds will not.
Another sad byproduct of it is that it creates an economic generational divide: a graduate in a decent career who graduated before the new fees came in is going to have a realistic prospect of being debt free by say their mid 30s. They will have hundreds of pounds more of disposable income a month. That will feed its way through into being better placed for that new car, or that mortgage, or extra savings for a rainy day.
The young really have been f***ed royally in the past decade.
That isn't quite right either.
When fees were £3k, people were normally getting £15k of loans / debt. Also, you had to pay the £3k fees upfront every year, so middle class families got hammered. Poor got support, rich no problem. But it was your family, not what you earned after the degree. Now the weight falls on those who most benefit from the degree, nothing to do with your family.
Then the level you starting repaying was much lower, so if you earned middle salary say £30-35k a year, you had to repay % of more of you income but still not really enough to be paying off the £15k very quickly.
That's not right about paying £3k up front. The £3k fees started in 2006-07, which was my second year at uni. I paid my £1,200 up front in 2005-06, but then was given a loan for the £1,200 in the second and third years. Those students starting in 2006-07 and later never paid fees up front.
Must be misremembering. My apologises.
It doesn't alter the central premise though, that people still ran up big loans in combination with the level at which repayments started was much lower. So although headline rate was lower, you were paying that rate on a lot more income, but at same time few people still manage to repay the principle over the 25-30 years.
When £1200 fees came in, the balance was the other way, student loan smaller / less debt and a more people paid off the principle. But they were still paying most of their working lives, at a smaller monthly % but on a larger amount of their income.
Ultimately all that has happened a load of debt has been shifted onto the public as a whole. Most student are hardly repaying the £27k a year in fees over their working lives, let alone the rest of the debt.
I do agree with much of this but I would like to see the data about the proportion of people who fail to pay the 2006-7 loans off. Certainly among those I know, a number have achieved this and not on what I would necessarily consider to be megabucks city salaries (though some were and they got through the repayment obviously much more quickly). Key thing I always thought about the 2006 regime was that although it was always a real possibility you would never pay it off, with a fair wind and a decent career you would probably get there in time. Which is obviously different to the new regime where it’s a bit of a pipe dream except to those who are really the country’s top graduate earners.
Will he use the dontcha know there's a war on, I've work to do excuse?
Are these the same parties Ed Balls, Prince Harry or Pier Morgan attended?
I do find it really bizarre that anybody think you what total laugh, lets go to a fancy dress party as a Nazi. You have 1000s of options to choose from, no I want to go as Nazi. Same as black face, anybody going to a party in the past 20-30 years, it just doesn't enter your head.
A fun quiz question is along the lines which US President was elected despite the emergence of photographic evidence of him dressing up as a Nazi?
A lot of people go to Clinton as someone who might have done something stupid like that at a student fancy dress party, or Trump as someone who might have done something stupid like that last Thursday. But, of course, it's Reagan for a minor role in a film back in 1942.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Nah it's ok. I can't get on with George whatsisface.
Dunkirk is the excellent one. The soundtrack reverberates still.
Parts of Dunkirk absolutely superb.
Not sure it is Ken Branagh's finest hour though.
I saw it in a full fat sound-enhanced or capable cinema and for me the constant menace of the soundtrack the whole way through, that reverberating hum that was never absent and foretold danger and terror was fabulous. And it rightly won an Oscar.
SKB I could take or leave I agree.
I loved the famous single take sequence in Dunkirk, but the rest of it I found stodgy and dull. The mirror image of opinions on 1917
No, the single take sequence is in 1917.
Dunkirk is the one with three intertwined time-lines (Air, Sea, Beach).
You're quite right. My mistake. The single take sequence is in Atonement - which is "about" Dunkirk
I am now starting to wonder if I have actually seen "Dunkirk", which either renders my last two hours of commentary laughably irrelevant. Or Dunkirk is so forgettable it is shite
I love war movies. I can't believe I missed a famous one? I am now going to check
When you've see one Dunkirk film.......
Spoiler alert
Most of the soldiers get away.
I am contractually obliged to make a 51st Highland Division reference here.
Interest rates on student loans to hit 12% in England. Outrageous.
Covered on previous thread.....outrageous for the country as we ultimately will all pick up the tab when the loan isn't repaid in full, basically irrelevant on the level of the individual student.
For a sizeable proportion, it’s a moot point anyway as they’ll never pay them off until they are automatically written off.
The current student loan regime is pretty much a graduate tax in all but name really. The sheer size of the borrowing and the unfavourable interest rate make it incredibly difficult to clear the balance. As much as the top up fee system before it was a blow to students in the late noughties, it was much more realistic that repayment would eventually be made and the interest rate was much less punishing being linked as it is to BOE base or inflation, whichever is lower.
A key change (not announced as part of the original press release) is that the minimum earnings threshold going forward is only going to increase by RPI and not average earnings.
In the long run (which 30/40 years of the loan is) average earnings should beat RPI, so more "tax" is going to be paid going forward.
And for middling professionals it is a marginal tax rate of 42%. (20+13+9). For a very long time.
The systems aids: the rich, expats, the feckless, the unemployable.
A fundamental flaw, there is absolutely no incentive to universities not to charge maximum fees (not just tuition) they can get away with. The kids are never repaying it, the tax payer ultimately picks up the tab. But it is hidden by the layers of the system, which even generally much more informed people on here fall into the trap of misunderstanding.
This is ultimately a terrible deal for the everybody, as excess cost, inefficiency and waste is hidden behind this opaque system and because an individual isn't directly paying the full cost never any market pressure. In that respect its part of the flaw in the US healthcare system, where vast majority of people, they get coverage through their job, thus patient never directly pays cost of treatment. Rather it is indirectly coming out of their reduced wages across the board to pay for the layers of hidden charging of companies using brokers to buy insurance to pay for the doctor / hospital. Its makes no odds to anybody if charging for a bandage is $50, because its get swallowed by the opaque system.
Unless Labour have a big lead in the NEV and the Tories suffer a latter Major year's loss of councillors, eg over 500 as they did in 1994 at the same stage in the cycle, then Boris should be OK
Interest rates on student loans to hit 12% in England. Outrageous.
Covered on previous thread.....outrageous for the country as we ultimately will all pick up the tab when the loan isn't repaid in full, basically irrelevant on the level of the individual student.
For a sizeable proportion, it’s a moot point anyway as they’ll never pay them off until they are automatically written off.
The current student loan regime is pretty much a graduate tax in all but name really. The sheer size of the borrowing and the unfavourable interest rate make it incredibly difficult to clear the balance. As much as the top up fee system before it was a blow to students in the late noughties, it was much more realistic that repayment would eventually be made and the interest rate was much less punishing being linked as it is to BOE base or inflation, whichever is lower.
A key change (not announced as part of the original press release) is that the minimum earnings threshold going forward is only going to increase by RPI and not average earnings.
In the long run (which 30/40 years of the loan is) average earnings should beat RPI, so more "tax" is going to be paid going forward.
And for middling professionals it is a marginal tax rate of 42%. (20+13+9). For a very long time.
The systems aids: the rich, expats, the feckless, the unemployable.
Keir Starmer says he has "absolutely nothing in common" with Boris Johnson
In a stinging attack on the PM's character, Starmer says he "can't fathom" his "utter disrespect" for the public, and that he's the "opposite" of an honest man
The Oryx equipment tally https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-documenting-equipment.html is running at 3.7 Russian to 1 Ukrainian. Even if the Ukrainian hits are better reported we can assume at least 3 to 1. The Ukrainians are also capturing a lot of reusable kit in that number. It would be a reasonable assumption that military manpower losses are 3 to 5 Russians for each Ukrainian. Unfortunately uncounted and large civilian casualties.
Sadly I think you may be being too optimistic there, nether Ukrainians troops or Ukraine civilians have a reason to photograph upload or share photos of there own equipment being destroyed, and Russian troops have had there phones taken off them. Ukrainian losses may be similar to Russians and if not, that would be become the Ukrainians have less equipment to start with.
As for Solders killed, Sadly, I think it most likely that the Ukrainians have lost a lot more than the Russians,
Oryx is the gold standard, requiring digital evidence. Since more far more Russian tanks and armoured vehicles are recorded as being destroyed and damaged it follows that more Russian troups have been killed or injured.
In all this talk of war films it struck me that one military character who's never pictured in an actual war is James Bond. Unless I've missed one, all the Bond films take place in peacetime.
I think three is one from the 80s where he goes to Afghanistan, set during the Russian invasion, but cant remember which.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Nah it's ok. I can't get on with George whatsisface.
Dunkirk is the excellent one. The soundtrack reverberates still.
Parts of Dunkirk absolutely superb.
Not sure it is Ken Branagh's finest hour though.
I saw it in a full fat sound-enhanced or capable cinema and for me the constant menace of the soundtrack the whole way through, that reverberating hum that was never absent and foretold danger and terror was fabulous. And it rightly won an Oscar.
SKB I could take or leave I agree.
I loved the famous single take sequence in Dunkirk, but the rest of it I found stodgy and dull. The mirror image of opinions on 1917
No, the single take sequence is in 1917.
Dunkirk is the one with three intertwined time-lines (Air, Sea, Beach).
You're quite right. My mistake. The single take sequence is in Atonement - which is "about" Dunkirk
I am now starting to wonder if I have actually seen "Dunkirk", which either renders my last two hours of commentary laughably irrelevant. Or Dunkirk is so forgettable it is shite
I love war movies. I can't believe I missed a famous one? I am now going to check
When you've see one Dunkirk film.......
Spoiler alert
Most of the soldiers get away.
I am contractually obliged to make a 51st Highland Division reference here.
The Twilight Zone had some good war episodes as well.
Judgement Night, Deaths Head Revisited and the Purple Testament being exceptional.
Das Boot is excellent and the film Stalingrad, from 1993, is excellent
It has Putinist vibes but I enjoyed the 2013 Stalingrad, kind of a martial arts movie meets spaghetti western at the Volga. Not really a fan of Enemy at the Gates, partly cos it has Jude Law in it and its cgi Stukas were a bit crap.
Sam Mendes' 1917 is magnificent
Nah it's ok. I can't get on with George whatsisface.
Dunkirk is the excellent one. The soundtrack reverberates still.
Parts of Dunkirk absolutely superb.
Not sure it is Ken Branagh's finest hour though.
I saw it in a full fat sound-enhanced or capable cinema and for me the constant menace of the soundtrack the whole way through, that reverberating hum that was never absent and foretold danger and terror was fabulous. And it rightly won an Oscar.
SKB I could take or leave I agree.
I loved the famous single take sequence in Dunkirk, but the rest of it I found stodgy and dull. The mirror image of opinions on 1917
No, the single take sequence is in 1917.
Dunkirk is the one with three intertwined time-lines (Air, Sea, Beach).
You're quite right. My mistake. The single take sequence is in Atonement - which is "about" Dunkirk
I am now starting to wonder if I have actually seen "Dunkirk", which either renders my last two hours of commentary laughably irrelevant. Or Dunkirk is so forgettable it is shite
I love war movies. I can't believe I missed a famous one? I am now going to check
When you've see one Dunkirk film.......
My absolute favourite World War One movie is O What A Lovely War, which is basically just songs
It is in my top 5 war films. I watched it again the other day, and it has not aged at all, it is still funny, tragic, witty, clever, acerbic, superbly imaginative, and the end is unbearably moving:
'Come and See' is the Russian war film you all need to be watching. There's an English subs version on YouTube.
Memorably described by one critic as 'a visceral freefall into atrocity'.
One Russian, no USSR Film I recently watched was 'InterGirl' which I had never hear of till somebody recommended it.
It was made near the end of the USSR, and was produced approximately at the same time as the Film US Film 'Pretty Woman' and the films have some big similarities.
'A clean living and attractive proustite and a rich bissness man fall in love and go off to get marred. could summarise both films. to some extent Intergirl is closer to the original plot for Pretty Woman.
However the difference in the setting and how the USSR tryes to address the wealth of overseas Bissnes men is very revelling. I would recommend.
Keir Starmer says he has "absolutely nothing in common" with Boris Johnson
In a stinging attack on the PM's character, Starmer says he "can't fathom" his "utter disrespect" for the public, and that he's the "opposite" of an honest man
Comments
Remember that they don’t care what the story happens to be today, it’s the division of Western society that is the goal.
"After genocide of 🇺🇦s in Bucha was widely covered,🇷🇺began to use them to remove evidence of its crimes.🇷🇺tries to identify witnesses of the atrocities via filtration camps & eliminate them"–🇺🇦intel https://t.me/DIUkraine/313
https://twitter.com/EuromaidanPress/status/1514219308901150723
If Le Pen didn't have Putin sympathies as well, I really don't know.
Stupid. Tasteless. But relevant to his position now? I'm not convinced.
[1] https://jewishlife.co.uk/community/news/exclusive-enfield-conservatives-chair-suspended-after-nazi-uniform-photo-emerges
Unless he u-turns again?
Nothing in the world ...🎶🎶
Also, in terms of War stories, what about M*A*S*H? The first really great TV series to bridge high and low art?
(And still showing on a continuous loop somewhere non Freeview. The jump from the end of the war back to the start the following night is an artistic point about life in itself, unfortunately.)
A senior U.S. defense official said that Russia's combat power is now hovering around 80% of pre-staged troops and equipment in Ukraine
https://twitter.com/JackDetsch/status/1514131226390667266
Dunkirk is the excellent one. The soundtrack reverberates still.
Clearly, I loved it, despite the flaws. The hallucinatory night-sequences, in particular, are spell-binding
I may have got my films mixed up.
Chickenhawk, however, is arguably the best war book I have ever read, certainly since Biggles of 266.
💬'We need a recognised leader in place'
Readers have their say on 'partygate' fines 👇 https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2022/04/13/arrogant-behaviour-causing-huge-resentment-telegraph-readers/?utm_content=politics&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=Echobox&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1649853526-2
"Pol Pot killed one point seven million Cambodians, died under house arrest, well done there. Stalin killed many millions, died in his bed, aged seventy-two, well done indeed. And the reason we let them get away with it is they killed their own people. And we're sort of fine with that.....Hitler tried to kill people next door. Ah....silly man. After a couple of years we won't stand for that, will we?"
Not sure it is Ken Branagh's finest hour though.
Brilliant and harrowing. Almost as good as Dispatches
When fees were £3k, people were normally getting £15k of loans / debt. Also, you had to pay the £3k fees upfront every year, so middle class families got hammered. Poor got support, rich no problem. But it was your family, not what you earned after the degree. Now the weight falls on those who most benefit from the degree, nothing to do with your family.
Then the level you starting repaying was much lower, so if you earned middle salary say £30-35k a year, you had to repay % of more of you income but still not really enough to be paying off the £15k very quickly.
SKB I could take or leave I agree.
Birdsong also good in that vein.
Plenty of others, of course, as you say no idea what OLB was thinking.
He was very proud of having obtained British citizenship.
He viewed it as the best passport in the world.
It's not a very noble kind of argument, and in the case of Putin who seems to have become an irredeemable danger to world peace I'm not even sure it's correct, but you can certainly understand why people are making it.
Memorably described by one critic as 'a visceral freefall into atrocity'.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matterhorn_(novel)
Martin Lewis has done the calculations and written about this endlessly and always says its better not to pay it off even if you either have the capital and definitely don't take a loan to do so.
Maybe Sue Gray and the CPS are on this! If so, wow.
Interesting comparison on Rotten Tomatoes
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/dunkirk_2017
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1917_2019
Critics marginally prefer Dunkirk; public marginally prefer 1917. Both highly rated, either way
maw-worm: Someone who insists they have done nothing wrong despite evidence to the contrary.
They won’t all be serviceable, but then again many of them didn’t appear very serviceable when they rolled into Ukraine in the first place.
https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/douglas-ross-ruth-davidson-partygate-26702736?utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=sharebar
"To call this the best book about Vietnam is to trivialize it. A Rumour of War is a dangerous and even subversive book, the first to insist that readers asks themselves the questions: How would I have acted? To what lengths would I have gone to survive? A terrifying book, it will make the strongest among us weep" (Los Angeles Times Book Review)
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Rumor-War-Philip-Caputo/dp/1847925138/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1649856027&sr=1-1
Nigel Mills sends Brady letter
Granit Xhaka: Arsenal fans disrespected me – our relationship will always be broken
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/granit-xhaka-arsenal-fans-disrespected-me-our-relationship-will-always-be-broken-0xlt62fq6
Poor sweet, innocent child.
Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.
It doesn't alter the central premise though, that people still ran up big loans in combination with the level at which repayments started was much lower. So although headline rate was lower, you were paying that rate on a lot more income, but at same time few people still manage to repay the principle over the 25-30 years.
When £1200 fees came in, the balance was the other way, student loan smaller / less debt and a more people paid off the principle. But they were still paying most of their working lives, at a smaller monthly % but on a larger amount of their income.
Ultimately all that has happened a load of debt has been shifted onto the public as a whole. Most student are hardly repaying the £27k a year in fees over their working lives, let alone the rest of the debt.
https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/exclusive-enfield-conservatives-chair-suspended-after-nazi-uniform-photo-emerges/
“I do not recall parading around… at the time I suspect I was a serving member of the British Army reserves.”
Slightly unusual to find a Tory admitting that he might have attended a party. But he [edit] was also described as a military uniform collector. *
What rank is he cosplaying btw? And what is that cuff title? I'm not at all into the details of SS uniforms. But it looks pretty realistic.
*In this version of the tweet. No idea whether this has been added or deleted re being a uniform collector.
https://www.trendsmap.com/twitter/tweet/1514140656607928321
You underestimate the enormity of what has happened in the past less-than-24-hours. It is now literally and without exaggeration the case that Johnson could hoick his breeks down and shit on the despatch box with absolute impunity.
That will prove to be awkward for him.
Wiki reminds me that AIS's parents were respectively of Russian & Ukranian descent. I wonder if he was still around what he'd have made of the current war; I fear he may have plumped for the 'patriotic' view.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiLVAz-Jczg
https://twitter.com/MinnieStephC4/status/1514234466494996481
Dunkirk is the one with three intertwined time-lines (Air, Sea, Beach).
He was a patriot, with a hint of mysticism maybe, but certainly not a Dugin
While not, strictly speaking a war film, I also enjoyed a lot Power Play, with Peter O'Toole and James Pleasance, which is a fictionalised version of Lutwark's book on successful coups d'etat.
I am now starting to wonder if I have actually seen "Dunkirk", which either renders my last two hours of commentary laughably irrelevant. Or Dunkirk is so forgettable it is shite
I love war movies. I can't believe I missed a famous one? I am now going to check
A key change (not announced as part of the original press release) is that the minimum earnings threshold going forward is only going to increase by RPI and not average earnings.
In the long run (which 30/40 years of the loan is) average earnings should beat RPI, so more "tax" is going to be paid going forward.
As for Solders killed, Sadly, I think it most likely that the Ukrainians have lost a lot more than the Russians,
His last book as mentioned would give me hope on that score, but we'll never know.
Was not especially impressed, hence my amnesia
Some nice images, tho
The systems aids: the rich, expats, the feckless, the unemployable.
If someone commits a serious crime that results in prison, or multiple of such crimes sentenced together, then the prison sentence tends to be served concurrently not consecutively or exponentially increasing sentences.
It makes sense to have FPN for past offenders be escalating, but only for breaches made after the first FPN was resolved surely? While ignorance is no excuse, if someone didn't realise they were breaking the law and did the same thing as part of their routine every morning then to stack exponential fines years later is quite worrying if normal people are being treated like that.
Hardly relevant to the case where 'someone' wrote the thing, mind.
https://medium.com/world-of-music/the-dunkirk-soundtrack-is-way-cleverer-than-you-think-18f5dc155d91
Most of the soldiers get away.
A lot of people go to Clinton as someone who might have done something stupid like that at a student fancy dress party, or Trump as someone who might have done something stupid like that last Thursday. But, of course, it's Reagan for a minor role in a film back in 1942.
This is ultimately a terrible deal for the everybody, as excess cost, inefficiency and waste is hidden behind this opaque system and because an individual isn't directly paying the full cost never any market pressure. In that respect its part of the flaw in the US healthcare system, where vast majority of people, they get coverage through their job, thus patient never directly pays cost of treatment. Rather it is indirectly coming out of their reduced wages across the board to pay for the layers of hidden charging of companies using brokers to buy insurance to pay for the doctor / hospital. Its makes no odds to anybody if charging for a bandage is $50, because its get swallowed by the opaque system.
In a stinging attack on the PM's character, Starmer says he "can't fathom" his "utter disrespect" for the public, and that he's the "opposite" of an honest man
Full iview tomorrow
https://www.politicshome.com/news/article/keir-starmer-says-he-has-absolutely-nothing-in-common-with-boris-johnson
It is in my top 5 war films. I watched it again the other day, and it has not aged at all, it is still funny, tragic, witty, clever, acerbic, superbly imaginative, and the end is unbearably moving:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_LhOO6Q6p8
It can bring me close to tears: just that ending sequence
It was made near the end of the USSR, and was produced approximately at the same time as the Film US Film 'Pretty Woman' and the films have some big similarities.
'A clean living and attractive proustite and a rich bissness man fall in love and go off to get marred. could summarise both films. to some extent Intergirl is closer to the original plot for Pretty Woman.
However the difference in the setting and how the USSR tryes to address the wealth of overseas Bissnes men is very revelling. I would recommend.