The SCOTUS decision will inflame US politics at a time when it’s already deeply polarized .
The choice is clear in November and this will impact many of the close races . Governors and state legislatures will be very much more at the forefront and it’s likely you’ll see a lot of up ballot effect .
Make no mistake behind the scenes the Dems will know this is a gift from the court which could help them save the senate.
Yup, that and letting Trump back on Twitter.
Still, it remains to be seen if the court will actually do this. If they're religious ideologues they will, but if they're political hacks they won't: What a political hack would do would be to leak that they were going to overturn, then do something that doesn't actually technically overturn but lets states almost completely ban abortion in practice. After the leak this will appear moderate and not really do much for Dem turnout.
That's what I expect to happen. Some of the intended legislation in deep Red States, if Roe is overturned, is pretty grim, and would surely impact upon the Republicans' chances.
Not in deep Red states as most voters there are anti abortion, though it might drive up Democrat turnout in blue and purple states which are more pro choice
But they were voting Republican anyway. It will motivate Democrats and Independents and maybe some Republicans who think 'For the grace of God that could be me'.
Not sure about that and I think it’s lazy to make that assumption.
Sure, it will motivate white, middle class educated liberals to vote and get out their Handmaiden Tale’s outfits. But the Democrats have them anyway and they are concentrated in already heavily Blue areas.
However, there is a fair chunk of the Democrat base - particularly Black but also a good chunk of the Hispanic vote - which is socially conservative but votes Democrat.
Turn this into a supercharger electoral issue and you might find a good chunk of those voters decide to exit the Democrat base.
Then there is @SeaShantyIrish2’s point. People in the States are used to flying large distances for regular routine visits to see family etc given air travel is so connected. It actually takes nearly twice as long to get from Belfast to Liverpool by ferry than from Mobile Alabama to Boston MA. So saying people having to travel to get abortions is not going to be seen as necessarily an unreasonable point @BartholomewRoberts thinks to many people.
In any event, I think what happens is that you get springing up a whole organisational network (and funding the cost) helping women who want abortions from banned states to those where it is not.
About two thirds of American voters don't want Roe vs Wade overturned, according to the polls. So if there are Democratic voters who are anti-abortion, there must be even more Republicans who are pro-abortion. I suspect this move will backfire on the Republicans, who will have to go on the airwaves to defend this policy every time a thirteen year old gets raped by her uncle then dies in childbirth. Abortion will still happen anyway, just like it always did; the rich will find a friendly doctor willing to do it for the right price, while the poor will find some pills on the Internet or risk sepsis with a coat hanger. All brought to you by Donald Trump, a man who probably kept half on NYC's abortionists in business during the 1980s.
A good article on the history of abortion in the US.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1997/05/abortion-in-american-history/376851/ ...In one of the many curious twists that mark the history of abortion, the campaign to criminalize it was waged by the same professional group that, a century later, would play an important role in legalization: physicians. The American Medical Association's crusade against abortion was partly a professional move, to establish the supremacy of "regular" physicians over midwives and homeopaths. More broadly, anti-abortion sentiment was connected to nativism, anti-Catholicism, and, as it is today, anti-feminism. Immigration, especially by Catholics and nonwhites, was increasing, while birth rates among white native-born Protestants were declining. (Unlike the typical abortion patient of today, that of the nineteenth century was a middle- or upper-class white married woman.) Would the West "be filled by our own children or by those of aliens?" the physician and anti-abortion leader Horatio R. Storer asked in 1868. "This is a question our women must answer; upon their loins depends the future destiny of the nation." (It should be mentioned that the nineteenth-century women's movement also opposed abortion, having pinned its hopes on "voluntary motherhood"—the right of wives to control the frequency and timing of sex with their husbands.)
Nonetheless, having achieved their legal goal, many doctors—including prominent members of the AMA—went right on providing abortions. Some late-nineteenth-century observers estimated that two million were performed annually (which would mean that in Victorian America the number of abortions per capita was seven or eight times as high as it is today)....
One more country in the Middle East that’s no longer going to be neutral in this conflict.
(Waits for Lavrov to re-ignite the tensions with the OPEC Gulf States over oil production).
Israel are trying to stay neutral because they don't want Russia to kick the furniture over in Syria to the detriment of Israel.
There's also a lot of Israeli avionics in the Su-30M (and probably many other things) so they are trying to take the long view on the strategic value of the Israel-Russia relationship but Lavrov's making it difficult to sell neutrality in Jerusalem.
Probably more importantly, about 10% of the Israeli population is of Russian origin.
One more country in the Middle East that’s no longer going to be neutral in this conflict.
(Waits for Lavrov to re-ignite the tensions with the OPEC Gulf States over oil production).
Israel are trying to stay neutral because they don't want Russia to kick the furniture over in Syria to the detriment of Israel.
There's also a lot of Israeli avionics in the Su-30M (and probably many other things) so they are trying to take the long view on the strategic value of the Israel-Russia relationship but Lavrov's making it difficult to sell neutrality in Jerusalem.
Ah, good point about the Israeli avionics.
But keep it up Lavrov, let’s see how many more neutral countries can be turned against Russia in the coming weeks!
What a crappy article with many false premises and strawmen. Not addressing the point that NATO was there as an aggressor because no NATO state was at risk.
Also, having listened to Richard Shireff, ex Dep Comd SACEUR say how the UK should step up against Russia, that UK defense forces should be hosed with more money, and that "UK society should prepare itself" or words to that effect the credibility which anyone should give to: "four dozen former senior U.S. and NATO military and political officials, including SACEURs, undersecretaries of defense, deputy assistant secretaries, members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, CENTCOM, the NATO Military Committee and national chiefs of defense" is tiny.
Of course they are going to tell it how they want you to think it went.
NATO was not an aggressor, if it arrived in Afghanistan in 2005 then it was invited in by the Afghani government.
Being invited in by the government of a state does not make you an aggressor.
It means that NATO took sides with the Afghan govt and hence conducted an aggressive war against the Taleban. Which of course it lost but that's another discussion.
In 2005 it was a defensive war against the Taleban, not an aggressive war.
The Afghan campaign (rightly or wrongly - as I said, certainly unsuccessfully) was about picking a side and conducting a war of extreme aggression against the other side.
I know we have had this discussion previously when the villagers or wedding attendee victims of various NATO missile strikes should, in your opinion, have been grateful that they were obliterated in the cause of what you think was a defensive war but really, it was a war of aggression.
Legally speaking, that's dubious. It was certainly an aggressive war, but that's not the same thing - though I'd agree with you that NATO's involvement was questionable.
Iraq very probably was a war of aggression, despite the UN figleaf. since it was based on deliberate misinformation.
Anji Hunter on the radio today saying how in govt in 2003 everyone believed the security services that the UK was genuinely under threat from WMD...
Yes, that was and is the official line, and it's bollocks.
The SCOTUS decision will inflame US politics at a time when it’s already deeply polarized .
The choice is clear in November and this will impact many of the close races . Governors and state legislatures will be very much more at the forefront and it’s likely you’ll see a lot of up ballot effect .
Make no mistake behind the scenes the Dems will know this is a gift from the court which could help them save the senate.
Yup, that and letting Trump back on Twitter.
Still, it remains to be seen if the court will actually do this. If they're religious ideologues they will, but if they're political hacks they won't: What a political hack would do would be to leak that they were going to overturn, then do something that doesn't actually technically overturn but lets states almost completely ban abortion in practice. After the leak this will appear moderate and not really do much for Dem turnout.
That's what I expect to happen. Some of the intended legislation in deep Red States, if Roe is overturned, is pretty grim, and would surely impact upon the Republicans' chances.
Not in deep Red states as most voters there are anti abortion, though it might drive up Democrat turnout in blue and purple states which are more pro choice
And of course those figures are before an abortion ban.
I don't know where all this is going. It looks like a big chunk of America never really reconciled itself to the social reforms of the civil rights era.
Anyway Afghanistan was a defensive war since they started it with 9/11, which is the only time in NATO's entire history that Article 5 has been invoked.
So it'd be entirely appropriate for NATO to be involved, since it all began with an attack on a NATO state which led to Article 5 being invoked.
The Afghanistan operations weren't Article V missions. Article V was invoked but not utilised in those missions.
"Vowing to “build a firewall” around reproductive rights in California, the state’s Democratic leaders just announced plans to put a state constitutional amendment explicitly guaranteeing the right to an abortion on the November ballot."
The SCOTUS decision will inflame US politics at a time when it’s already deeply polarized .
The choice is clear in November and this will impact many of the close races . Governors and state legislatures will be very much more at the forefront and it’s likely you’ll see a lot of up ballot effect .
Make no mistake behind the scenes the Dems will know this is a gift from the court which could help them save the senate.
Yup, that and letting Trump back on Twitter.
Still, it remains to be seen if the court will actually do this. If they're religious ideologues they will, but if they're political hacks they won't: What a political hack would do would be to leak that they were going to overturn, then do something that doesn't actually technically overturn but lets states almost completely ban abortion in practice. After the leak this will appear moderate and not really do much for Dem turnout.
That's what I expect to happen. Some of the intended legislation in deep Red States, if Roe is overturned, is pretty grim, and would surely impact upon the Republicans' chances.
Not in deep Red states as most voters there are anti abortion, though it might drive up Democrat turnout in blue and purple states which are more pro choice
But they were voting Republican anyway. It will motivate Democrats and Independents and maybe some Republicans who think 'For the grace of God that could be me'.
Not sure about that and I think it’s lazy to make that assumption.
Sure, it will motivate white, middle class educated liberals to vote and get out their Handmaiden Tale’s outfits. But the Democrats have them anyway and they are concentrated in already heavily Blue areas.
However, there is a fair chunk of the Democrat base - particularly Black but also a good chunk of the Hispanic vote - which is socially conservative but votes Democrat.
Turn this into a supercharger electoral issue and you might find a good chunk of those voters decide to exit the Democrat base.
Then there is @SeaShantyIrish2’s point. People in the States are used to flying large distances for regular routine visits to see family etc given air travel is so connected. It actually takes nearly twice as long to get from Belfast to Liverpool by ferry than from Mobile Alabama to Boston MA. So saying people having to travel to get abortions is not going to be seen as necessarily an unreasonable point @BartholomewRoberts thinks to many people.
In any event, I think what happens is that you get springing up a whole organisational network (and funding the cost) helping women who want abortions from banned states to those where it is not.
About two thirds of American voters don't want Roe vs Wade overturned, according to the polls. So if there are Democratic voters who are anti-abortion, there must be even more Republicans who are pro-abortion. I suspect this move will backfire on the Republicans, who will have to go on the airwaves to defend this policy every time a thirteen year old gets raped by her uncle then dies in childbirth. Abortion will still happen anyway, just like it always did; the rich will find a friendly doctor willing to do it for the right price, while the poor will find some pills on the Internet or risk sepsis with a coat hanger. All brought to you by Donald Trump, a man who probably kept half on NYC's abortionists in business during the 1980s.
Even if Roe v Wade was repealed it would NOT end abortion in most US States, for starters as most do not have the Republican governor AND Republican controlled state legislatures needed to pass abortion bans.
However currently states like Alabama and Mississippi and Tennessee and Utah cannot impose abortion restrictions despite the fact most voters there want them and they have Republican governors and Republican state legislatures due to the Supreme Court mandate of US wide legal abortion via Roe v Wade
Yes, one thought. Over the past two weeksa this country appears to have the worst death rate from COVID of anywhere in the world! By not publicising daily figures, by not allowing free testing, by simply keeping quiet the government has seemingly convinced many people that the issue is not a major problem any more. Whereas we are not just living with COVID we are dying from it as well. I have had the four jabs but still wear a mask in enclosed places, even the Gym, I am usually the only one. Last week two regulars went down with it!!!
As you could conclude from your last paragraph, most people are more than ready to get on with their lives with this particular respiratory virus being just one of many risks that they encounter every day, including many other respiratory viruses. That being the case, there isn't much to be gained by a daily dose of doom porn at 4pm.
One more country in the Middle East that’s no longer going to be neutral in this conflict.
(Waits for Lavrov to re-ignite the tensions with the OPEC Gulf States over oil production).
Israel are trying to stay neutral because they don't want Russia to kick the furniture over in Syria to the detriment of Israel.
There's also a lot of Israeli avionics in the Su-30M (and probably many other things) so they are trying to take the long view on the strategic value of the Israel-Russia relationship but Lavrov's making it difficult to sell neutrality in Jerusalem.
Ah, good point about the Israeli avionics.
But keep it up Lavrov, let’s see how many more neutral countries can be turned against Russia in the coming weeks!
It's also deja vu all over again as of course Israel/Syria were the two great proxies for US/USSR during the cold war.
Labour's @JonAshworth: "It's shameful that pensioners have no choice but to sit on the bus all day to avoid racking up heating bills. For Johnson to respond by boasting about the London bus pass reveals just how out of touch this narcissistic PM is.”
Personally I wish the Daily Mail all the luck in the world in its quest to show that Starmer is a Grade A hypocrite and probably dishonest about covid rulebreaking too.
It is clear that some Tories on this site would be very happy with a one party state. But then, how could there still be betting on the outcome of elections?
You can get 2/1 on the LibDems winning control of Woking Council. 10 of the 30 seats are up for grabs and, knowing the area as I do, I think this is a value bet. They have made steady gains in recent times and they are already the largest party. It's clear that the party machine is up and running hard for this.
I've only seen LibDem posters up and there is a lot of anger directed towards the Conservatives. In addition the tory run minority council has squandered huge amounts of money and the council is now the third most most debt-ridden in the country.
Woking is only 26th on the LD target list for the next general election, no surprise they are targeting it
Although it might be a target in the GE, it is not being especially done so in these local elections. There are no calls for help even from boroughs without election (eg where I am and I am only 5 miles from Woking). It is and has been for many years a very tight and actively fought borough by both the Tories an LDs and with a Tory run borough who are in a minority and with financial issues it is prime territory for LD gains to take overall control. Just a tough set of circumstances for the Tories here really.
I expect the heaviest Tory losses on Thursday to be in anti Brexit areas which most dislike Boris.
Woking was 56% Remain, similar councils in Remain areas of the Home Counties like Guildford and South Oxfordshire have already gone LD so I would not be surprised to see the LDs take it.
The Tories are also likely to lose Tunbridge Wells on Thursday too partly for the same reasons as well as local factors
I agree generally, but sometimes local factors are a bigger aspect as you point out re Tunbridge Wells. That is certainly the case with Guildford. Guildford is not LD controlled. It is in coalition with Indies and the Indies made the bigger wins (some wards by huge margins eg mine). This was because of Tory scandals and the local plan. You only have to speak to Mole Valley Tories to find out about what happened to the Guildford Tories. No love lost at the time.
Re Tunbridge Wells - I have no knowledge although I used to live in Crowborough but lost contact now. A lovely area in which I believe you used to live also.
Remind me, what went down in Guildford? In Woking, the attitude of the council has been "it's either tower blocks or building houses on green spaces and golf courses."
But I don't see any tower blocks in Guildford, so I guess they went for new housing estates like this one:
Hi @tlg86 I wondered if you would post as I know you are in Woking. I lived in the Borough from being 9 until my early 30s and can tell lots of stories, some quite funny.
Guildford Tories implosion is a long story and pre dates the local plan. There was infighting, a councillor sent down for corruption related to this stuff, an attempted coup to try and impose an elected mayor, corruption in getting the signatures for the referendum which was eventually lost by 90%. 20,000 written objections (yes really 20,000) against the local plan, which was an utter shambles, but passed on the eve of the local election that they knew they were going to lose. Fell out with the Mole Valley Tories over all this.
Needless to say a significant number of Tories defected to the newly formed Indies. The LDs picked up what would have been their typical targets. The Indies stood in the safe Tory wards and slaughtered them with huge margins.
I live in a rock solid safe Tory ward. It now has 3 Indy borough councillors and a Indy county councillor.
That really is a brief summary. What happened really isn't a fair reflection on proper Tories and I'm sure they will be back, but they have been thrown out by their own supporters.
But is it simply nimbyism that did for the Tories? That is, we don't want tower blocks and we don't want new housing estates either.
No I don't think so. That is going on all over the SE. This was far more extreme which is why a number of the Tories left and joined the Indies.
BoZo should have hidden in a fridge again this morning
He is to address the Ukraine Parliament this morning, the first Western leader to do so, so not hiding in a fridge
I'm with you BigG.
Boris must go ..then again he is the greatest Wartime Prime Minister since Churchill, and he didn't really break any Covid rules, and the Gray report must be canned because it was written by a Labour shill, and Starmer broke loads of rules whilst Boris was ambushed by a cake. Phew!
Boris must go but he is recognised by Ukraine and their President for the support they have received in their fight against the war criminal that is Putin
Boris broke the covid rules and there is no dispute about that
Starmer may or may not have broken covid rules but they lied about Rayners's attendance and he looks uncomfortable when being asked questions by journalists. The media will no doubt only be satisfied when he agrees to a review and interview by Durham Police but as one voter said this morning, 'they are all the same' and that is a fairly widespread view
SKS didn't break the covid rules. And is being wrong about one person attending one of very many meetings receding into memory, in a busy day, a crime?
I think you ought to report yourself to the police for not ebing able to tell us instantly what size of spanner the lady on Mr Parrish's tractor movie was holding.
Starmer saying he didn't break the covid regulations is being challenged by Richard Holden, MP, the mail and others including 2 students who want the police to review the video they took
There is nothing unreasonable about questioning the veracity of those events
Sure! But Richard Holden has provided no new evidence. The two students have provided no new evidence. Cases do get reopened and re-examined but there has to be a reason to do so.
I don't know how else to explain this to you. Policing is evidence-based. The police have investigated the complain and investigated the evidence. Making the same complaint about the same evidence doesn't create a new line of enquiry. #
What could be done is that people could put in a complaint about the police that they have not properly carried out their duties. Which would be at least initially an internal investigation. As far as I know that hasn't been requested. Why not if the pursuit of justice is the motive and the complainants believe an actual crime has been committed?
The only new evidence seems to be Rayner being there too. If it was legal before I do not see how this changes it.
Which is the thing driving the Tories the most nuts. "SHE WAS THERE" "WHY DID LABOUR LIE" etc etc hasn't moved the police one bit. If as they have concluded from the primary evidence it was a campaign meeting then it doesn't matter if she was there or not.
Its like someone demanding to know if I was tucking into a Burger King at Luton airport last Friday. I get my many trips through Luton mixed up and say I didn't. Then it comes to light that I did enjoy Whopper goodness on that occasion. "WHY DID HE LIE" is met with "I was legally there".
Honestly don't get what Big_G and others are camping out for. Holden's letter presents no fresh evidence. The two Tiry students want to present the already reviewed evidence. Not liking someone doesn't provide a reason for the police to investigate baseless allegations.
A good friend of mine was dragged through the ringer maliciously by their ex who made baseless allegations so serious the police had to investigate. There was no evidence - none - so it was quickly dropped. The ex then goes even more off the scale demanding this and that for the police who eventually had to threaten her with action unless she stopped wasting their time.
Show us the evidence Big_G.
Evidence is for Richard Holden and others to provide and they are not going to let this go until they have been satisfied which of course could conclude Starmer was in compliance of covid regulations but equally it may not
They can whine all they want. You're absolutely right that it is for Holden et al to provide evidence - so why are you saying that his letter is sufficient for a police investigation to start?
After I've made my initial baseless allegation against you and the police rightly dismiss it, are you ok if I write them a letter with no evidence whatsoever and they go and pull you in again for interview on something they have already decided was not a crime?
Durham Police said they will respond to Holdens letter and that response will determine whether or not the matter concludes and what further steps may be taken by Holden and other conservative mps
Ah, I see a CUNNING PLAN. By continually dredging up this you are demonstrating your loyalty to the Tory Party, while surreptitiously drawing attention to the PM's appalling behaviour over, inter alia, the parties.
You therefore hope to see an end to Johnson's premiership while simultaneously avoiding the attention of the Conservative Party's Stasi, who would otherwise have binned you for disloyalty.
The government has quietly lost COVID and many of the public has got the impression it is not a problem anymore, discarding masks, ignoring social distancing and being discouraged, through pricing, of testing themselves.. The net result is that over the past two weeks this country has seemingly had the highest death rate in the world! I have had four jabs, weae a mask, even in the Gym, usually the only one, oh yes two regulars went down with it last week. IT is everwhere but we are unaware.
Saddam had invaded two other sovereign states Was supporting terrorism in Israel Had used WMD on his own people Had failed to comply with UN Inspectors for 10 years. Would in the view of the UN have re-started his WMD programme if sanctions had been removed
Anyway Afghanistan was a defensive war since they started it with 9/11, which is the only time in NATO's entire history that Article 5 has been invoked.
So it'd be entirely appropriate for NATO to be involved, since it all began with an attack on a NATO state which led to Article 5 being invoked.
The Afghanistan operations weren't Article V missions. Article V was invoked but not utilised in those missions.
No - though the US had a legal right to a proportionate response to 9/11 ... and cocked that response up.
Saddam had invaded two other sovereign states Was supporting terrorism in Israel Had used WMD on his own people Had failed to comply with UN Inspectors for 10 years. Would in the view of the UN have re-started its WMD programme if sanctions had been removed
Yep. A massive arsehole.
But our war was nevertheless "illegal" - in quotes because of course the concept is meaningless in such circumstances. Putin learnt well from the West in many regards.
Labour's @JonAshworth: "It's shameful that pensioners have no choice but to sit on the bus all day to avoid racking up heating bills. For Johnson to respond by boasting about the London bus pass reveals just how out of touch this narcissistic PM is.”
Labour's @JonAshworth: "It's shameful that pensioners have no choice but to sit on the bus all day to avoid racking up heating bills. For Johnson to respond by boasting about the London bus pass reveals just how out of touch this narcissistic PM is.”
The SCOTUS decision will inflame US politics at a time when it’s already deeply polarized .
The choice is clear in November and this will impact many of the close races . Governors and state legislatures will be very much more at the forefront and it’s likely you’ll see a lot of up ballot effect .
Make no mistake behind the scenes the Dems will know this is a gift from the court which could help them save the senate.
Yup, that and letting Trump back on Twitter.
Still, it remains to be seen if the court will actually do this. If they're religious ideologues they will, but if they're political hacks they won't: What a political hack would do would be to leak that they were going to overturn, then do something that doesn't actually technically overturn but lets states almost completely ban abortion in practice. After the leak this will appear moderate and not really do much for Dem turnout.
That's what I expect to happen. Some of the intended legislation in deep Red States, if Roe is overturned, is pretty grim, and would surely impact upon the Republicans' chances.
Not in deep Red states as most voters there are anti abortion, though it might drive up Democrat turnout in blue and purple states which are more pro choice
But they were voting Republican anyway. It will motivate Democrats and Independents and maybe some Republicans who think 'For the grace of God that could be me'.
Not sure about that and I think it’s lazy to make that assumption.
Sure, it will motivate white, middle class educated liberals to vote and get out their Handmaiden Tale’s outfits. But the Democrats have them anyway and they are concentrated in already heavily Blue areas.
However, there is a fair chunk of the Democrat base - particularly Black but also a good chunk of the Hispanic vote - which is socially conservative but votes Democrat.
Turn this into a supercharger electoral issue and you might find a good chunk of those voters decide to exit the Democrat base.
Then there is @SeaShantyIrish2’s point. People in the States are used to flying large distances for regular routine visits to see family etc given air travel is so connected. It actually takes nearly twice as long to get from Belfast to Liverpool by ferry than from Mobile Alabama to Boston MA. So saying people having to travel to get abortions is not going to be seen as necessarily an unreasonable point @BartholomewRoberts thinks to many people.
In any event, I think what happens is that you get springing up a whole organisational network (and funding the cost) helping women who want abortions from banned states to those where it is not.
About two thirds of American voters don't want Roe vs Wade overturned, according to the polls. So if there are Democratic voters who are anti-abortion, there must be even more Republicans who are pro-abortion. I suspect this move will backfire on the Republicans, who will have to go on the airwaves to defend this policy every time a thirteen year old gets raped by her uncle then dies in childbirth. Abortion will still happen anyway, just like it always did; the rich will find a friendly doctor willing to do it for the right price, while the poor will find some pills on the Internet or risk sepsis with a coat hanger. All brought to you by Donald Trump, a man who probably kept half on NYC's abortionists in business during the 1980s.
Even if Roe v Wade was repealed it would NOT end abortion in most US States, for starters as most do not have the Republican governor AND Republican controlled state legislatures needed to pass abortion bans.
However currently states like Alabama and Mississippi and Tennessee and Utah cannot impose abortion restrictions despite the fact most voters there want them and they have Republican governors and Republican state legislatures due to the Supreme Court mandate of US wide legal abortion via Roe v Wade
You need the southern drawl to do this properly -
"State rights today, state rights tomorrow ... state rights forever!"
The government has quietly lost COVID and many of the public has got the impression it is not a problem anymore, discarding masks, ignoring social distancing and being discouraged, through pricing, of testing themselves.. The net result is that over the past two weeks this country has seemingly had the highest death rate in the world! I have had four jabs, weae a mask, even in the Gym, usually the only one, oh yes two regulars went down with it last week. IT is everwhere but we are unaware.
People aren't doing that stuff (you excepted) because they don't want to. There is plenty of info about COVID around now. We can all see death rates, infection rates, MV bed utilisation, etc. And we (as a nation) have decided not to care.
And do we have the highest death rates currently? I know there was a reporting lag over Easter.
The SCOTUS decision will inflame US politics at a time when it’s already deeply polarized .
The choice is clear in November and this will impact many of the close races . Governors and state legislatures will be very much more at the forefront and it’s likely you’ll see a lot of up ballot effect .
Make no mistake behind the scenes the Dems will know this is a gift from the court which could help them save the senate.
Yup, that and letting Trump back on Twitter.
Still, it remains to be seen if the court will actually do this. If they're religious ideologues they will, but if they're political hacks they won't: What a political hack would do would be to leak that they were going to overturn, then do something that doesn't actually technically overturn but lets states almost completely ban abortion in practice. After the leak this will appear moderate and not really do much for Dem turnout.
That's what I expect to happen. Some of the intended legislation in deep Red States, if Roe is overturned, is pretty grim, and would surely impact upon the Republicans' chances.
Not in deep Red states as most voters there are anti abortion, though it might drive up Democrat turnout in blue and purple states which are more pro choice
But they were voting Republican anyway. It will motivate Democrats and Independents and maybe some Republicans who think 'For the grace of God that could be me'.
Not sure about that and I think it’s lazy to make that assumption.
Sure, it will motivate white, middle class educated liberals to vote and get out their Handmaiden Tale’s outfits. But the Democrats have them anyway and they are concentrated in already heavily Blue areas.
However, there is a fair chunk of the Democrat base - particularly Black but also a good chunk of the Hispanic vote - which is socially conservative but votes Democrat.
Turn this into a supercharger electoral issue and you might find a good chunk of those voters decide to exit the Democrat base.
Then there is @SeaShantyIrish2’s point. People in the States are used to flying large distances for regular routine visits to see family etc given air travel is so connected. It actually takes nearly twice as long to get from Belfast to Liverpool by ferry than from Mobile Alabama to Boston MA. So saying people having to travel to get abortions is not going to be seen as necessarily an unreasonable point @BartholomewRoberts thinks to many people.
In any event, I think what happens is that you get springing up a whole organisational network (and funding the cost) helping women who want abortions from banned states to those where it is not.
About two thirds of American voters don't want Roe vs Wade overturned, according to the polls. So if there are Democratic voters who are anti-abortion, there must be even more Republicans who are pro-abortion. I suspect this move will backfire on the Republicans, who will have to go on the airwaves to defend this policy every time a thirteen year old gets raped by her uncle then dies in childbirth. Abortion will still happen anyway, just like it always did; the rich will find a friendly doctor willing to do it for the right price, while the poor will find some pills on the Internet or risk sepsis with a coat hanger. All brought to you by Donald Trump, a man who probably kept half on NYC's abortionists in business during the 1980s.
Even if Roe v Wade was repealed it would NOT end abortion in most US States, for starters as most do not have the Republican governor AND Republican controlled state legislatures needed to pass abortion bans.
However currently states like Alabama and Mississippi and Tennessee and Utah cannot impose abortion restrictions despite the fact most voters there want them and they have Republican governors and Republican state legislatures due to the Supreme Court mandate of US wide legal abortion via Roe v Wade
There are at least thirteen states where an immediate ban will come into effect, as they have 'trigger laws' already enacted.
You can get 2/1 on the LibDems winning control of Woking Council. 10 of the 30 seats are up for grabs and, knowing the area as I do, I think this is a value bet. They have made steady gains in recent times and they are already the largest party. It's clear that the party machine is up and running hard for this.
I've only seen LibDem posters up and there is a lot of anger directed towards the Conservatives. In addition the tory run minority council has squandered huge amounts of money and the council is now the third most most debt-ridden in the country.
Woking is only 26th on the LD target list for the next general election, no surprise they are targeting it
Although it might be a target in the GE, it is not being especially done so in these local elections. There are no calls for help even from boroughs without election (eg where I am and I am only 5 miles from Woking). It is and has been for many years a very tight and actively fought borough by both the Tories an LDs and with a Tory run borough who are in a minority and with financial issues it is prime territory for LD gains to take overall control. Just a tough set of circumstances for the Tories here really.
I expect the heaviest Tory losses on Thursday to be in anti Brexit areas which most dislike Boris.
Woking was 56% Remain, similar councils in Remain areas of the Home Counties like Guildford and South Oxfordshire have already gone LD so I would not be surprised to see the LDs take it.
The Tories are also likely to lose Tunbridge Wells on Thursday too partly for the same reasons as well as local factors
I agree generally, but sometimes local factors are a bigger aspect as you point out re Tunbridge Wells. That is certainly the case with Guildford. Guildford is not LD controlled. It is in coalition with Indies and the Indies made the bigger wins (some wards by huge margins eg mine). This was because of Tory scandals and the local plan. You only have to speak to Mole Valley Tories to find out about what happened to the Guildford Tories. No love lost at the time.
Re Tunbridge Wells - I have no knowledge although I used to live in Crowborough but lost contact now. A lovely area in which I believe you used to live also.
Remind me, what went down in Guildford? In Woking, the attitude of the council has been "it's either tower blocks or building houses on green spaces and golf courses."
But I don't see any tower blocks in Guildford, so I guess they went for new housing estates like this one:
Hi @tlg86 I wondered if you would post as I know you are in Woking. I lived in the Borough from being 9 until my early 30s and can tell lots of stories, some quite funny.
Guildford Tories implosion is a long story and pre dates the local plan. There was infighting, a councillor sent down for corruption related to this stuff, an attempted coup to try and impose an elected mayor, corruption in getting the signatures for the referendum which was eventually lost by 90%. 20,000 written objections (yes really 20,000) against the local plan, which was an utter shambles, but passed on the eve of the local election that they knew they were going to lose. Fell out with the Mole Valley Tories over all this.
Needless to say a significant number of Tories defected to the newly formed Indies. The LDs picked up what would have been their typical targets. The Indies stood in the safe Tory wards and slaughtered them with huge margins.
I live in a rock solid safe Tory ward. It now has 3 Indy borough councillors and a Indy county councillor.
That really is a brief summary. What happened really isn't a fair reflection on proper Tories and I'm sure they will be back, but they have been thrown out by their own supporters.
That doesn't sound rock solid to me.
They couldn't have been more rock solid in the traditional sense. Seats that had never been lost they lost by landslides to the Indies.
Here is one example from before the locals. A by election in Lovelace. Always Tory. The Indies haven't formed yet. It is in Guildford Borough but Mole Valley constituency so Mole Valley Tories pick their candidate. Guildford Borough Tories refuse to help for their own borough seat!
LDs not only win but take 70% of the vote.
LD winner and Tory candidate later defect to the Indies when they are formed.
The government has quietly lost COVID and many of the public has got the impression it is not a problem anymore, discarding masks, ignoring social distancing and being discouraged, through pricing, of testing themselves.. The net result is that over the past two weeks this country has seemingly had the highest death rate in the world! I have had four jabs, weae a mask, even in the Gym, usually the only one, oh yes two regulars went down with it last week. IT is everwhere but we are unaware.
If it is everywhere but we are unaware then it is clearly not a problem and we can live with it being everywhere.
Keep your mask if you want, but don't expect others to try futilely to "stop the spread" of something we are OK with spreading.
Anyway Afghanistan was a defensive war since they started it with 9/11, which is the only time in NATO's entire history that Article 5 has been invoked.
So it'd be entirely appropriate for NATO to be involved, since it all began with an attack on a NATO state which led to Article 5 being invoked.
The Afghanistan operations weren't Article V missions. Article V was invoked but not utilised in those missions.
No - though the US had a legal right to a proportionate response to 9/11 ... and cocked that response up.
Again the term "legal" is not really relevant here. The US could do as it pleased because it was at that time the only superpower. Ideally they wanted the cover of UN agreement but didn't need it.
Keir ate curry is a stupid story befitting the Heil in its stupidity, but the Heil used a stock photo of Keir eating curry to attach to their stupid Keir ate a curry story is even stupider.
What kind of idiocy is this? Have we nothing smarter to discuss, are we all to be reduced to the most petulant and pathetic discussions imaginable? Ridiculous on all sides it seems.
BoZo should have hidden in a fridge again this morning
He is to address the Ukraine Parliament this morning, the first Western leader to do so, so not hiding in a fridge
I'm with you BigG.
Boris must go ..then again he is the greatest Wartime Prime Minister since Churchill, and he didn't really break any Covid rules, and the Gray report must be canned because it was written by a Labour shill, and Starmer broke loads of rules whilst Boris was ambushed by a cake. Phew!
Boris must go but he is recognised by Ukraine and their President for the support they have received in their fight against the war criminal that is Putin
Boris broke the covid rules and there is no dispute about that
Starmer may or may not have broken covid rules but they lied about Rayners's attendance and he looks uncomfortable when being asked questions by journalists. The media will no doubt only be satisfied when he agrees to a review and interview by Durham Police but as one voter said this morning, 'they are all the same' and that is a fairly widespread view
SKS didn't break the covid rules. And is being wrong about one person attending one of very many meetings receding into memory, in a busy day, a crime?
I think you ought to report yourself to the police for not ebing able to tell us instantly what size of spanner the lady on Mr Parrish's tractor movie was holding.
Starmer saying he didn't break the covid regulations is being challenged by Richard Holden, MP, the mail and others including 2 students who want the police to review the video they took
There is nothing unreasonable about questioning the veracity of those events
I don’t know why Labour continues with this line that it doesn’t matter and there is nothing to see here. If there was truly nothing, you think they would have a better argument. It’s clear from yours - who is not a Tory-at-any-cost voter - plus arguably the Best PM polling that the voters are sceptical of Labour’s stance. Blaming it on the machinations of the Daily Mail is a lazy argument.
Mudslinging. Dirty tricks. Negative campaigning.
It’s a fact in absence of any new significant evidence since last investigated, The Tories merely doing a throw spaghetti at the wall see what sticks. What significant new evidence has emerged that warrants a new or reopened investigation? The Tories and mail have brought nothing forward, they merely hoping the police could find some, but that is not how the process works, not how justice works.
The killer fact, unlike when the Tories partied during lockdown in Westminster, at this particular time of Starmer’s working meal, the rules were you could do a working meal in office. Unless Tories or friends in media, or anyone in public such as caterer who delivered a feast, comes forward with evidence it was different than the first investigation concluded, then it quite rightly remains closed. Simples.
The SCOTUS decision will inflame US politics at a time when it’s already deeply polarized .
The choice is clear in November and this will impact many of the close races . Governors and state legislatures will be very much more at the forefront and it’s likely you’ll see a lot of up ballot effect .
Make no mistake behind the scenes the Dems will know this is a gift from the court which could help them save the senate.
Yup, that and letting Trump back on Twitter.
Still, it remains to be seen if the court will actually do this. If they're religious ideologues they will, but if they're political hacks they won't: What a political hack would do would be to leak that they were going to overturn, then do something that doesn't actually technically overturn but lets states almost completely ban abortion in practice. After the leak this will appear moderate and not really do much for Dem turnout.
That's what I expect to happen. Some of the intended legislation in deep Red States, if Roe is overturned, is pretty grim, and would surely impact upon the Republicans' chances.
Not in deep Red states as most voters there are anti abortion, though it might drive up Democrat turnout in blue and purple states which are more pro choice
But they were voting Republican anyway. It will motivate Democrats and Independents and maybe some Republicans who think 'For the grace of God that could be me'.
Not sure about that and I think it’s lazy to make that assumption.
Sure, it will motivate white, middle class educated liberals to vote and get out their Handmaiden Tale’s outfits. But the Democrats have them anyway and they are concentrated in already heavily Blue areas.
However, there is a fair chunk of the Democrat base - particularly Black but also a good chunk of the Hispanic vote - which is socially conservative but votes Democrat.
Turn this into a supercharger electoral issue and you might find a good chunk of those voters decide to exit the Democrat base.
Then there is @SeaShantyIrish2’s point. People in the States are used to flying large distances for regular routine visits to see family etc given air travel is so connected. It actually takes nearly twice as long to get from Belfast to Liverpool by ferry than from Mobile Alabama to Boston MA. So saying people having to travel to get abortions is not going to be seen as necessarily an unreasonable point @BartholomewRoberts thinks to many people.
In any event, I think what happens is that you get springing up a whole organisational network (and funding the cost) helping women who want abortions from banned states to those where it is not.
About two thirds of American voters don't want Roe vs Wade overturned, according to the polls. So if there are Democratic voters who are anti-abortion, there must be even more Republicans who are pro-abortion. I suspect this move will backfire on the Republicans, who will have to go on the airwaves to defend this policy every time a thirteen year old gets raped by her uncle then dies in childbirth. Abortion will still happen anyway, just like it always did; the rich will find a friendly doctor willing to do it for the right price, while the poor will find some pills on the Internet or risk sepsis with a coat hanger. All brought to you by Donald Trump, a man who probably kept half on NYC's abortionists in business during the 1980s.
Even if Roe v Wade was repealed it would NOT end abortion in most US States, for starters as most do not have the Republican governor AND Republican controlled state legislatures needed to pass abortion bans.
However currently states like Alabama and Mississippi and Tennessee and Utah cannot impose abortion restrictions despite the fact most voters there want them and they have Republican governors and Republican state legislatures due to the Supreme Court mandate of US wide legal abortion via Roe v Wade
There are at least thirteen states where an immediate ban will come into effect, as they have 'trigger laws' already enacted.
Fair enough, if they have elected pro life Republican governors and Republican state legislatures in those states.
Now there is a Federal ban on abortion restrictions in every US state even if voters elect a pro life governor and state legislature due to Roe v Wade
Personally I wish the Daily Mail all the luck in the world in its quest to show that Starmer is a Grade A hypocrite and probably dishonest about covid rulebreaking too.
Wouldn't want you on a jury. How about some facts?
"Vowing to “build a firewall” around reproductive rights in California, the state’s Democratic leaders just announced plans to put a state constitutional amendment explicitly guaranteeing the right to an abortion on the November ballot."
NY Times blog
Of course, we end up in the iniquitous situation of inter-state medical tourism for those that can afford it, and serious medical risks for those who can't. The situation that Ireland found to be untenable and led ultimately to the liberalisation of their law in the area.
Anyway Afghanistan was a defensive war since they started it with 9/11, which is the only time in NATO's entire history that Article 5 has been invoked.
So it'd be entirely appropriate for NATO to be involved, since it all began with an attack on a NATO state which led to Article 5 being invoked.
The Afghanistan operations weren't Article V missions. Article V was invoked but not utilised in those missions.
No - though the US had a legal right to a proportionate response to 9/11 ... and cocked that response up.
Again the term "legal" is not really relevant here. The US could do as it pleased because it was at that time the only superpower. Ideally they wanted the cover of UN agreement but didn't need it.
While in practical terms, it wasn't going to make a difference as to whether they went in, it is relevant - see the poor precedent set by the invasion of Iraq, which others have used for justifying their own later actions.
Any international rules based system is going to be imperfect, but it is far better than the absence of one.
Another interesting vox pop getting the views of Russians on an important subject. What do they think of Zelensky? As ever with such videos there seems a clear generational divide.
Keir ate curry is a stupid story befitting the Heil in its stupidity, but the Heil used a stock photo of Keir eating curry to attach to their stupid Keir ate a curry story is even stupider.
What kind of idiocy is this? Have we nothing smarter to discuss, are we all to be reduced to the most petulant and pathetic discussions imaginable? Ridiculous on all sides it seems.
You seem to be discussing it..
That sounds more like meta-discussion. And my post, therefore, is meta-meta-discussion.
But If we don't start getting on with our life now, when will we? My brother, who's over seventy, has severe COPD, and has had his four jabs is well despite his wife testing positive a couple of weeks ago. She had one rough day but recovered quickly. Thanks to her vaccinations.
Old people have a tendency to die from viruses sometimes. "In the UK, RSV accounts for approximately 450,000 GP appointments, 29,000 hospitalisations and 83 deaths per year in children and adolescents, the majority in infants. It also has a major impact on elderly adults; 175,000 GP appointments, 14,000 hospitalisations and 8,000 deaths per year in the UK."
Yet how many people even know what RSV (respiratory syncytical virus) is?
If you wait for zero deaths, you might wait a long time.
The vaccines have disappointed? - No, I don't think so. I got it despite being vaxxed and had an unpleasant couple of weeks. It was quite nasty. But it was never scary. Eg I was never worried about hospital. This is the most important thing about vaccination and it works.
It was possible that vaccines would prove to be effective at stopping you getting ill at all, as well as just stopping severe disease. In practice the second of those has been achieved very well, the former less well. Its also true that prior to omicron the vaccines were actually doing pretty well against any infection. By no means 100%, but not bad. Remember also that the annual flu injections are not considered failures if they have effectiveness rates of around 60%.
We have now in the west (or UK at least) reached a situation where everyone has antibodies either from vaccination, disease or both. We are in a much better place than 2020. I went away at the weekend to North Devon. Eating out in pubs with no masks, attending an off road race with n covid rules. It was bliss.
Off course covid is still there. Some people are dying. At the moment we are on the reverse slope of the wave and pretty soon its likely we will have minimal covid and no restrictions. For the greater part that is entirely due to the disappointing vaccines.
What a crappy article with many false premises and strawmen. Not addressing the point that NATO was there as an aggressor because no NATO state was at risk.
Also, having listened to Richard Shireff, ex Dep Comd SACEUR say how the UK should step up against Russia, that UK defense forces should be hosed with more money, and that "UK society should prepare itself" or words to that effect the credibility which anyone should give to: "four dozen former senior U.S. and NATO military and political officials, including SACEURs, undersecretaries of defense, deputy assistant secretaries, members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, CENTCOM, the NATO Military Committee and national chiefs of defense" is tiny.
Of course they are going to tell it how they want you to think it went.
NATO was not an aggressor, if it arrived in Afghanistan in 2005 then it was invited in by the Afghani government.
Being invited in by the government of a state does not make you an aggressor.
It means that NATO took sides with the Afghan govt and hence conducted an aggressive war against the Taleban. Which of course it lost but that's another discussion.
In 2005 it was a defensive war against the Taleban, not an aggressive war.
The Afghan campaign (rightly or wrongly - as I said, certainly unsuccessfully) was about picking a side and conducting a war of extreme aggression against the other side.
I know we have had this discussion previously when the villagers or wedding attendee victims of various NATO missile strikes should, in your opinion, have been grateful that they were obliterated in the cause of what you think was a defensive war but really, it was a war of aggression.
Legally speaking, that's dubious. It was certainly an aggressive war, but that's not the same thing - though I'd agree with you that NATO's involvement was questionable.
Iraq very probably was a war of aggression, despite the UN figleaf. since it was based on deliberate misinformation.
Anji Hunter on the radio today saying how in govt in 2003 everyone believed the security services that the UK was genuinely under threat from WMD...
I always thought the calculus sounded a bit upside down.
If we knew Iraq had WMD we wouldn't have invaded because we'd have been scared of the WMD. That we went ahead with it shows we thought they *didn't* have WMD.
So we invaded Iraq because we thought they didn't have WMD and said we were doing it because we thought they did.
(I really must reread that Catch 22 novel one day)
Keir ate curry is a stupid story befitting the Heil in its stupidity, but the Heil used a stock photo of Keir eating curry to attach to their stupid Keir ate a curry story is even stupider.
What kind of idiocy is this? Have we nothing smarter to discuss, are we all to be reduced to the most petulant and pathetic discussions imaginable? Ridiculous on all sides it seems.
You seem to be discussing it..
That sounds more like meta-discussion. And my post, therefore, is meta-meta-discussion.
Isn't "meta discussion" what happens on Facebook, WhatsApp et al?
Labour's @JonAshworth: "It's shameful that pensioners have no choice but to sit on the bus all day to avoid racking up heating bills. For Johnson to respond by boasting about the London bus pass reveals just how out of touch this narcissistic PM is.”
BoZo should have hidden in a fridge again this morning
He is to address the Ukraine Parliament this morning, the first Western leader to do so, so not hiding in a fridge
I'm with you BigG.
Boris must go ..then again he is the greatest Wartime Prime Minister since Churchill, and he didn't really break any Covid rules, and the Gray report must be canned because it was written by a Labour shill, and Starmer broke loads of rules whilst Boris was ambushed by a cake. Phew!
Boris must go but he is recognised by Ukraine and their President for the support they have received in their fight against the war criminal that is Putin
Boris broke the covid rules and there is no dispute about that
Starmer may or may not have broken covid rules but they lied about Rayners's attendance and he looks uncomfortable when being asked questions by journalists. The media will no doubt only be satisfied when he agrees to a review and interview by Durham Police but as one voter said this morning, 'they are all the same' and that is a fairly widespread view
SKS didn't break the covid rules. And is being wrong about one person attending one of very many meetings receding into memory, in a busy day, a crime?
I think you ought to report yourself to the police for not ebing able to tell us instantly what size of spanner the lady on Mr Parrish's tractor movie was holding.
Starmer saying he didn't break the covid regulations is being challenged by Richard Holden, MP, the mail and others including 2 students who want the police to review the video they took
There is nothing unreasonable about questioning the veracity of those events
I don’t know why Labour continues with this line that it doesn’t matter and there is nothing to see here. If there was truly nothing, you think they would have a better argument. It’s clear from yours - who is not a Tory-at-any-cost voter - plus arguably the Best PM polling that the voters are sceptical of Labour’s stance. Blaming it on the machinations of the Daily Mail is a lazy argument.
Mudslinging. Dirty tricks. Negative campaigning.
It’s a fact in absence of any new significant evidence since last investigated, The Tories merely doing a throw spaghetti at the wall see what sticks. What significant new evidence has emerged that warrants a new or reopened investigation? The Tories and mail have brought nothing forward, they merely hoping the police could find some, but that is not how the process works, not how justice works.
The killer fact, unlike when the Tories partied during lockdown in Westminster, at this particular time of Starmer’s working meal, the rules were you could do a working meal in office. Unless Tories or friends in media, or anyone in public such as caterer who delivered a feast, comes forward with evidence it was different than the first investigation concluded, then it quite rightly remains closed. Simples.
With most workplaces, if you have alcohol during work time - especially during work time - it’s a sackable offence.
Anyway, take it you believe the “it was a honest mistake we forgot about Rayner” line. Given that, I’m sure you will be generous if BJ trots out the same line.
Yes, one thought. Over the past two weeksa this country appears to have the worst death rate from COVID of anywhere in the world! By not publicising daily figures, by not allowing free testing, by simply keeping quiet the government has seemingly convinced many people that the issue is not a major problem any more. Whereas we are not just living with COVID we are dying from it as well. I have had the four jabs but still wear a mask in enclosed places, even the Gym, I am usually the only one. Last week two regulars went down with it!!!
Easter figures have hugely messed things up. Idiots used partial data to suggest increases in rates which were actually down to reporting days.
You should know this by now.
Please carry on wearing a mask if it makes you feel safer. We are living with covid and some people are dying from it. Sadly they are typically elderly and with other health issues. Covid will be on the death certificate as will heart problems, liver disease, etc.
Labour's @JonAshworth: "It's shameful that pensioners have no choice but to sit on the bus all day to avoid racking up heating bills. For Johnson to respond by boasting about the London bus pass reveals just how out of touch this narcissistic PM is.”
Anyway Afghanistan was a defensive war since they started it with 9/11, which is the only time in NATO's entire history that Article 5 has been invoked.
So it'd be entirely appropriate for NATO to be involved, since it all began with an attack on a NATO state which led to Article 5 being invoked.
The Afghanistan operations weren't Article V missions. Article V was invoked but not utilised in those missions.
No - though the US had a legal right to a proportionate response to 9/11 ... and cocked that response up.
Again the term "legal" is not really relevant here. The US could do as it pleased because it was at that time the only superpower. Ideally they wanted the cover of UN agreement but didn't need it.
While in practical terms, it wasn't going to make a difference as to whether they went in, it is relevant - see the poor precedent set by the invasion of Iraq, which others have used for justifying their own later actions.
Any international rules based system is going to be imperfect, but it is far better than the absence of one.
Oh absolutely. That has been my entire point since the Russian invasion. Putin saw how the US behaved in 2003 and thought - oh that's how you do it.
The SCOTUS decision will inflame US politics at a time when it’s already deeply polarized .
The choice is clear in November and this will impact many of the close races . Governors and state legislatures will be very much more at the forefront and it’s likely you’ll see a lot of up ballot effect .
Make no mistake behind the scenes the Dems will know this is a gift from the court which could help them save the senate.
Yup, that and letting Trump back on Twitter.
Still, it remains to be seen if the court will actually do this. If they're religious ideologues they will, but if they're political hacks they won't: What a political hack would do would be to leak that they were going to overturn, then do something that doesn't actually technically overturn but lets states almost completely ban abortion in practice. After the leak this will appear moderate and not really do much for Dem turnout.
That's what I expect to happen. Some of the intended legislation in deep Red States, if Roe is overturned, is pretty grim, and would surely impact upon the Republicans' chances.
Not in deep Red states as most voters there are anti abortion, though it might drive up Democrat turnout in blue and purple states which are more pro choice
But they were voting Republican anyway. It will motivate Democrats and Independents and maybe some Republicans who think 'For the grace of God that could be me'.
Not sure about that and I think it’s lazy to make that assumption.
Sure, it will motivate white, middle class educated liberals to vote and get out their Handmaiden Tale’s outfits. But the Democrats have them anyway and they are concentrated in already heavily Blue areas.
However, there is a fair chunk of the Democrat base - particularly Black but also a good chunk of the Hispanic vote - which is socially conservative but votes Democrat.
Turn this into a supercharger electoral issue and you might find a good chunk of those voters decide to exit the Democrat base.
Then there is @SeaShantyIrish2’s point. People in the States are used to flying large distances for regular routine visits to see family etc given air travel is so connected. It actually takes nearly twice as long to get from Belfast to Liverpool by ferry than from Mobile Alabama to Boston MA. So saying people having to travel to get abortions is not going to be seen as necessarily an unreasonable point @BartholomewRoberts thinks to many people.
In any event, I think what happens is that you get springing up a whole organisational network (and funding the cost) helping women who want abortions from banned states to those where it is not.
About two thirds of American voters don't want Roe vs Wade overturned, according to the polls. So if there are Democratic voters who are anti-abortion, there must be even more Republicans who are pro-abortion. I suspect this move will backfire on the Republicans, who will have to go on the airwaves to defend this policy every time a thirteen year old gets raped by her uncle then dies in childbirth. Abortion will still happen anyway, just like it always did; the rich will find a friendly doctor willing to do it for the right price, while the poor will find some pills on the Internet or risk sepsis with a coat hanger. All brought to you by Donald Trump, a man who probably kept half on NYC's abortionists in business during the 1980s.
Even if Roe v Wade was repealed it would NOT end abortion in most US States, for starters as most do not have the Republican governor AND Republican controlled state legislatures needed to pass abortion bans.
However currently states like Alabama and Mississippi and Tennessee and Utah cannot impose abortion restrictions despite the fact most voters there want them and they have Republican governors and Republican state legislatures due to the Supreme Court mandate of US wide legal abortion via Roe v Wade
As always it's a question of democracy vs liberty. If Alabama passed a law saying that people called Peter were not allowed access to life saving medical procedures would that be okay? And if not why is it okay for those laws to be passed with respect to pregnant women? What about when pro life states block pregnant women from travelling to pro choice states in case they have a termination? This Scotus ruling will prove to be the Dredd Scott of the abortion debate, a reactionary over-reach by activist judges that forces the issue to be resolved at a federal level. If it takes a civil war to settle it I wouldn't be entirely surprised.
BoZo should have hidden in a fridge again this morning
He is to address the Ukraine Parliament this morning, the first Western leader to do so, so not hiding in a fridge
I'm with you BigG.
Boris must go ..then again he is the greatest Wartime Prime Minister since Churchill, and he didn't really break any Covid rules, and the Gray report must be canned because it was written by a Labour shill, and Starmer broke loads of rules whilst Boris was ambushed by a cake. Phew!
Boris must go but he is recognised by Ukraine and their President for the support they have received in their fight against the war criminal that is Putin
Boris broke the covid rules and there is no dispute about that
Starmer may or may not have broken covid rules but they lied about Rayners's attendance and he looks uncomfortable when being asked questions by journalists. The media will no doubt only be satisfied when he agrees to a review and interview by Durham Police but as one voter said this morning, 'they are all the same' and that is a fairly widespread view
SKS didn't break the covid rules. And is being wrong about one person attending one of very many meetings receding into memory, in a busy day, a crime?
I think you ought to report yourself to the police for not ebing able to tell us instantly what size of spanner the lady on Mr Parrish's tractor movie was holding.
Starmer saying he didn't break the covid regulations is being challenged by Richard Holden, MP, the mail and others including 2 students who want the police to review the video they took
There is nothing unreasonable about questioning the veracity of those events
Sure! But Richard Holden has provided no new evidence. The two students have provided no new evidence. Cases do get reopened and re-examined but there has to be a reason to do so.
I don't know how else to explain this to you. Policing is evidence-based. The police have investigated the complain and investigated the evidence. Making the same complaint about the same evidence doesn't create a new line of enquiry. #
What could be done is that people could put in a complaint about the police that they have not properly carried out their duties. Which would be at least initially an internal investigation. As far as I know that hasn't been requested. Why not if the pursuit of justice is the motive and the complainants believe an actual crime has been committed?
The only new evidence seems to be Rayner being there too. If it was legal before I do not see how this changes it.
Which is the thing driving the Tories the most nuts. "SHE WAS THERE" "WHY DID LABOUR LIE" etc etc hasn't moved the police one bit. If as they have concluded from the primary evidence it was a campaign meeting then it doesn't matter if she was there or not.
Its like someone demanding to know if I was tucking into a Burger King at Luton airport last Friday. I get my many trips through Luton mixed up and say I didn't. Then it comes to light that I did enjoy Whopper goodness on that occasion. "WHY DID HE LIE" is met with "I was legally there".
Honestly don't get what Big_G and others are camping out for. Holden's letter presents no fresh evidence. The two Tiry students want to present the already reviewed evidence. Not liking someone doesn't provide a reason for the police to investigate baseless allegations.
A good friend of mine was dragged through the ringer maliciously by their ex who made baseless allegations so serious the police had to investigate. There was no evidence - none - so it was quickly dropped. The ex then goes even more off the scale demanding this and that for the police who eventually had to threaten her with action unless she stopped wasting their time.
Show us the evidence Big_G.
Evidence is for Richard Holden and others to provide and they are not going to let this go until they have been satisfied which of course could conclude Starmer was in compliance of covid regulations but equally it may not
They can whine all they want. You're absolutely right that it is for Holden et al to provide evidence - so why are you saying that his letter is sufficient for a police investigation to start?
After I've made my initial baseless allegation against you and the police rightly dismiss it, are you ok if I write them a letter with no evidence whatsoever and they go and pull you in again for interview on something they have already decided was not a crime?
Durham Police said they will respond to Holdens letter and that response will determine whether or not the matter concludes and what further steps may be taken by Holden and other conservative mps
Ah, I see a CUNNING PLAN. By continually dredging up this you are demonstrating your loyalty to the Tory Party, while surreptitiously drawing attention to the PM's appalling behaviour over, inter alia, the parties.
You therefore hope to see an end to Johnson's premiership while simultaneously avoiding the attention of the Conservative Party's Stasi, who would otherwise have binned you for disloyalty.
Shall we just get straight to the point and say you cannot question SKS’ behaviour under any circumstances and that anyone doing so is just a Tory shrill?
And then people criticise the partisan nature of politics.
What a crappy article with many false premises and strawmen. Not addressing the point that NATO was there as an aggressor because no NATO state was at risk.
Also, having listened to Richard Shireff, ex Dep Comd SACEUR say how the UK should step up against Russia, that UK defense forces should be hosed with more money, and that "UK society should prepare itself" or words to that effect the credibility which anyone should give to: "four dozen former senior U.S. and NATO military and political officials, including SACEURs, undersecretaries of defense, deputy assistant secretaries, members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, CENTCOM, the NATO Military Committee and national chiefs of defense" is tiny.
Of course they are going to tell it how they want you to think it went.
NATO was not an aggressor, if it arrived in Afghanistan in 2005 then it was invited in by the Afghani government.
Being invited in by the government of a state does not make you an aggressor.
It means that NATO took sides with the Afghan govt and hence conducted an aggressive war against the Taleban. Which of course it lost but that's another discussion.
In 2005 it was a defensive war against the Taleban, not an aggressive war.
The Afghan campaign (rightly or wrongly - as I said, certainly unsuccessfully) was about picking a side and conducting a war of extreme aggression against the other side.
I know we have had this discussion previously when the villagers or wedding attendee victims of various NATO missile strikes should, in your opinion, have been grateful that they were obliterated in the cause of what you think was a defensive war but really, it was a war of aggression.
Legally speaking, that's dubious. It was certainly an aggressive war, but that's not the same thing - though I'd agree with you that NATO's involvement was questionable.
Iraq very probably was a war of aggression, despite the UN figleaf. since it was based on deliberate misinformation.
Anji Hunter on the radio today saying how in govt in 2003 everyone believed the security services that the UK was genuinely under threat from WMD...
I always thought the calculus sounded a bit upside down.
If we knew Iraq had WMD we wouldn't have invaded because we'd have been scared of the WMD. That we went ahead with it shows we thought they *didn't* have WMD.
So we invaded Iraq because we thought they didn't have WMD and said we were doing it because we thought they did.
(I really must reread that Catch 22 novel one day)
Labour's @JonAshworth: "It's shameful that pensioners have no choice but to sit on the bus all day to avoid racking up heating bills. For Johnson to respond by boasting about the London bus pass reveals just how out of touch this narcissistic PM is.”
What would you suggest the Government do about pensioners heating bills, increase the state pension even more than it has been with the triple lock?
In any case, who has their heating on all day even in the winter? I was brought up to put on a jumper.
I have a great deal of sympathy with this point. Am surprised, however, that there hasn't been any attempt to make it from the government.
What's the point? They'd immediately get howled down as "out of touch" by people who think it's a human right to heat their houses to 22°C all winter.
Well perhaps. However, it is part of the job of a government (usually), to tell folk unpopular stuff they don't want to hear, but which is in the national interest. It could be tied to Ukraine as a patriotic thing to do. This lot don't seem interested at all.
Labour's @JonAshworth: "It's shameful that pensioners have no choice but to sit on the bus all day to avoid racking up heating bills. For Johnson to respond by boasting about the London bus pass reveals just how out of touch this narcissistic PM is.”
What would you suggest the Government do about pensioners heating bills, increase the state pension even more than it has been with the triple lock?
In any case, who has their heating on all day even in the winter? I was brought up to put on a jumper.
I have a great deal of sympathy with this point. Am surprised, however, that there hasn't been any attempt to make it from the government.
What's the point? They'd immediately get howled down as "out of touch" by people who think it's a human right to heat their houses to 22°C all winter.
Human right or not, sensible or not, the political angle is that some people can afford to heat their houses to 22°C all winter and some can't, hence a one rule for them attack line.
I met my brother and his wife in Grasmere. He lives in Amsterdam and has had a Ukrainian mother and seventeen year old son living with them for six weeks. The son speaks reasonable English the mother not at all but she has a Dutch to Ukrainian app and conversation isn't difficult. How long they stay is unknown
They're both well educated and are enjoying learning about Dutch culture. The son had always wanted to travel west and was originally hoping their destination was England. Once they have registered in an EU country they can't move freely which is why they didn't register in Poland or the Czech Republic which were their first ports of call......
Later I met an English woman who had just left Russia. She has lived in Moscow for twenty five years and she loves her life there. She left because foreigners were advised to leave. She had a reasonably harrowing journey via Turkey and had arrived at her aunt's house in the UK a few days earlier. She had a media job in Moscow and was fascinating. She's a very bright lady. The extraordinary thing is that she believes Russia is in the right.
The conversation is too long to get into but she refutes the argument that the Russians are ill informed. She herself is multi lingual and reads the European press every day. Though not everyone's a fan of Putin the vast majority support his actions. She believes NATO is a threat to Russia and Putin had no alternative but to do what he did
Interesting; leaving questions behind like:
If so informed and supportive, why leave the country you love merely because someone advises you to. Does she not trust the hosts she supports?
Does she really refute or merely reject the 'ill informed' argument. Does she say why media channels have been closed down?
Does she think this is a war?
What sort of threat is NATO to Russia, and why invade a non NATO country because of it?
What surprised me more than any of those questions is why someone intelligent and with a similar background to myself-she is even a Guardian reader-would think a war in Europe was anything other than an abomination. And she did call it 'a war' though I got the impression she thought it less of 'a war' than we do.
Her reason for leaving what was obviously a comfortable lifestyle was that foreigners had been advised to leave -I assumed by the British government-and she worried that if she didn't leave then it might be impossible. The ex pats left en masse apparently and her media job had gone by then.
Though she talked freely we were in danger of being at such cross purposes I listened more than I asked questions. She did mention the fascists in Mariupol which was how she explained the bombing and she did say that it wasn't a new war but a continuation of the previous one.
What a crappy article with many false premises and strawmen. Not addressing the point that NATO was there as an aggressor because no NATO state was at risk.
Also, having listened to Richard Shireff, ex Dep Comd SACEUR say how the UK should step up against Russia, that UK defense forces should be hosed with more money, and that "UK society should prepare itself" or words to that effect the credibility which anyone should give to: "four dozen former senior U.S. and NATO military and political officials, including SACEURs, undersecretaries of defense, deputy assistant secretaries, members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, CENTCOM, the NATO Military Committee and national chiefs of defense" is tiny.
Of course they are going to tell it how they want you to think it went.
NATO was not an aggressor, if it arrived in Afghanistan in 2005 then it was invited in by the Afghani government.
Being invited in by the government of a state does not make you an aggressor.
It means that NATO took sides with the Afghan govt and hence conducted an aggressive war against the Taleban. Which of course it lost but that's another discussion.
In 2005 it was a defensive war against the Taleban, not an aggressive war.
The Afghan campaign (rightly or wrongly - as I said, certainly unsuccessfully) was about picking a side and conducting a war of extreme aggression against the other side.
I know we have had this discussion previously when the villagers or wedding attendee victims of various NATO missile strikes should, in your opinion, have been grateful that they were obliterated in the cause of what you think was a defensive war but really, it was a war of aggression.
Legally speaking, that's dubious. It was certainly an aggressive war, but that's not the same thing - though I'd agree with you that NATO's involvement was questionable.
Iraq very probably was a war of aggression, despite the UN figleaf. since it was based on deliberate misinformation.
Anji Hunter on the radio today saying how in govt in 2003 everyone believed the security services that the UK was genuinely under threat from WMD...
Yes, that was and is the official line, and it's bollocks.
The government has quietly lost COVID and many of the public has got the impression it is not a problem anymore, discarding masks, ignoring social distancing and being discouraged, through pricing, of testing themselves.. The net result is that over the past two weeks this country has seemingly had the highest death rate in the world! I have had four jabs, weae a mask, even in the Gym, usually the only one, oh yes two regulars went down with it last week. IT is everwhere but we are unaware.
BoZo should have hidden in a fridge again this morning
He is to address the Ukraine Parliament this morning, the first Western leader to do so, so not hiding in a fridge
I'm with you BigG.
Boris must go ..then again he is the greatest Wartime Prime Minister since Churchill, and he didn't really break any Covid rules, and the Gray report must be canned because it was written by a Labour shill, and Starmer broke loads of rules whilst Boris was ambushed by a cake. Phew!
Boris must go but he is recognised by Ukraine and their President for the support they have received in their fight against the war criminal that is Putin
Boris broke the covid rules and there is no dispute about that
Starmer may or may not have broken covid rules but they lied about Rayners's attendance and he looks uncomfortable when being asked questions by journalists. The media will no doubt only be satisfied when he agrees to a review and interview by Durham Police but as one voter said this morning, 'they are all the same' and that is a fairly widespread view
SKS didn't break the covid rules. And is being wrong about one person attending one of very many meetings receding into memory, in a busy day, a crime?
I think you ought to report yourself to the police for not ebing able to tell us instantly what size of spanner the lady on Mr Parrish's tractor movie was holding.
Starmer saying he didn't break the covid regulations is being challenged by Richard Holden, MP, the mail and others including 2 students who want the police to review the video they took
There is nothing unreasonable about questioning the veracity of those events
I don’t know why Labour continues with this line that it doesn’t matter and there is nothing to see here. If there was truly nothing, you think they would have a better argument. It’s clear from yours - who is not a Tory-at-any-cost voter - plus arguably the Best PM polling that the voters are sceptical of Labour’s stance. Blaming it on the machinations of the Daily Mail is a lazy argument.
Mudslinging. Dirty tricks. Negative campaigning.
It’s a fact in absence of any new significant evidence since last investigated, The Tories merely doing a throw spaghetti at the wall see what sticks. What significant new evidence has emerged that warrants a new or reopened investigation? The Tories and mail have brought nothing forward, they merely hoping the police could find some, but that is not how the process works, not how justice works.
The killer fact, unlike when the Tories partied during lockdown in Westminster, at this particular time of Starmer’s working meal, the rules were you could do a working meal in office. Unless Tories or friends in media, or anyone in public such as caterer who delivered a feast, comes forward with evidence it was different than the first investigation concluded, then it quite rightly remains closed. Simples.
With most workplaces, if you have alcohol during work time - especially during work time - it’s a sackable offence.
Anyway, take it you believe the “it was a honest mistake we forgot about Rayner” line. Given that, I’m sure you will be generous if BJ trots out the same line.
Here's your problem. The police have established this to be a legal campaign event. So Rayner being forgotten about is about as big as crime as me forgetting that I bought a sandwich last week.
The SCOTUS decision will inflame US politics at a time when it’s already deeply polarized .
The choice is clear in November and this will impact many of the close races . Governors and state legislatures will be very much more at the forefront and it’s likely you’ll see a lot of up ballot effect .
Make no mistake behind the scenes the Dems will know this is a gift from the court which could help them save the senate.
Yup, that and letting Trump back on Twitter.
Still, it remains to be seen if the court will actually do this. If they're religious ideologues they will, but if they're political hacks they won't: What a political hack would do would be to leak that they were going to overturn, then do something that doesn't actually technically overturn but lets states almost completely ban abortion in practice. After the leak this will appear moderate and not really do much for Dem turnout.
That's what I expect to happen. Some of the intended legislation in deep Red States, if Roe is overturned, is pretty grim, and would surely impact upon the Republicans' chances.
Not in deep Red states as most voters there are anti abortion, though it might drive up Democrat turnout in blue and purple states which are more pro choice
But they were voting Republican anyway. It will motivate Democrats and Independents and maybe some Republicans who think 'For the grace of God that could be me'.
Not sure about that and I think it’s lazy to make that assumption.
Sure, it will motivate white, middle class educated liberals to vote and get out their Handmaiden Tale’s outfits. But the Democrats have them anyway and they are concentrated in already heavily Blue areas.
However, there is a fair chunk of the Democrat base - particularly Black but also a good chunk of the Hispanic vote - which is socially conservative but votes Democrat.
Turn this into a supercharger electoral issue and you might find a good chunk of those voters decide to exit the Democrat base.
Then there is @SeaShantyIrish2’s point. People in the States are used to flying large distances for regular routine visits to see family etc given air travel is so connected. It actually takes nearly twice as long to get from Belfast to Liverpool by ferry than from Mobile Alabama to Boston MA. So saying people having to travel to get abortions is not going to be seen as necessarily an unreasonable point @BartholomewRoberts thinks to many people.
In any event, I think what happens is that you get springing up a whole organisational network (and funding the cost) helping women who want abortions from banned states to those where it is not.
About two thirds of American voters don't want Roe vs Wade overturned, according to the polls. So if there are Democratic voters who are anti-abortion, there must be even more Republicans who are pro-abortion. I suspect this move will backfire on the Republicans, who will have to go on the airwaves to defend this policy every time a thirteen year old gets raped by her uncle then dies in childbirth. Abortion will still happen anyway, just like it always did; the rich will find a friendly doctor willing to do it for the right price, while the poor will find some pills on the Internet or risk sepsis with a coat hanger. All brought to you by Donald Trump, a man who probably kept half on NYC's abortionists in business during the 1980s.
A good article on the history of abortion in the US.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1997/05/abortion-in-american-history/376851/ ...In one of the many curious twists that mark the history of abortion, the campaign to criminalize it was waged by the same professional group that, a century later, would play an important role in legalization: physicians. The American Medical Association's crusade against abortion was partly a professional move, to establish the supremacy of "regular" physicians over midwives and homeopaths. More broadly, anti-abortion sentiment was connected to nativism, anti-Catholicism, and, as it is today, anti-feminism. Immigration, especially by Catholics and nonwhites, was increasing, while birth rates among white native-born Protestants were declining. (Unlike the typical abortion patient of today, that of the nineteenth century was a middle- or upper-class white married woman.) Would the West "be filled by our own children or by those of aliens?" the physician and anti-abortion leader Horatio R. Storer asked in 1868. "This is a question our women must answer; upon their loins depends the future destiny of the nation." (It should be mentioned that the nineteenth-century women's movement also opposed abortion, having pinned its hopes on "voluntary motherhood"—the right of wives to control the frequency and timing of sex with their husbands.)
Nonetheless, having achieved their legal goal, many doctors—including prominent members of the AMA—went right on providing abortions. Some late-nineteenth-century observers estimated that two million were performed annually (which would mean that in Victorian America the number of abortions per capita was seven or eight times as high as it is today)....
The line about preserving the population was also the reason why abortion was banned in Stalinist Russia and Ceausescu’s Romania
Labour's @JonAshworth: "It's shameful that pensioners have no choice but to sit on the bus all day to avoid racking up heating bills. For Johnson to respond by boasting about the London bus pass reveals just how out of touch this narcissistic PM is.”
What would you suggest the Government do about pensioners heating bills, increase the state pension even more than it has been with the triple lock?
In any case, who has their heating on all day even in the winter? I was brought up to put on a jumper.
I have a great deal of sympathy with this point. Am surprised, however, that there hasn't been any attempt to make it from the government.
What's the point? They'd immediately get howled down as "out of touch" by people who think it's a human right to heat their houses to 22°C all winter.
Well perhaps. However, it is part of the job of a government (usually), to tell folk unpopular stuff they don't want to hear, but which is in the national interest. It could be tied to Ukraine as a patriotic thing to do. This lot don't seem interested at all.
The last politician who told people unpopular things that they didn't want to hear was May during the 2017 election campaign. Seeing how that turned out, I expect it will be a long time before any politican of either main party does the same again.
Labour's @JonAshworth: "It's shameful that pensioners have no choice but to sit on the bus all day to avoid racking up heating bills. For Johnson to respond by boasting about the London bus pass reveals just how out of touch this narcissistic PM is.”
What would you suggest the Government do about pensioners heating bills, increase the state pension even more than it has been with the triple lock?
In any case, who has their heating on all day even in the winter? I was brought up to put on a jumper.
I have a great deal of sympathy with this point. Am surprised, however, that there hasn't been any attempt to make it from the government.
Everyone is different. I prefer a cooler house than the wife, for instance.
When I've been charity collecting I've knocked on thousands of doors over the years (in December). The number of really warm houses you encounter is astonishing. I recall one guy coming to the door in just shorts. The heat from the house was like getting off a plane a tropical country.
https://www.kindtowomen.com/ <- this is a good documentary about the legalisation of abortion in UK, or rather mainly on what it was like before legalisation. (Conflict of interest statement: I know the producer and my dad's an interviewee.)
It paints a picture of what things might be like in US states that criminalise abortion, although the introduction of pharmacological methods for early abortion change the situation somewhat.
Another interesting vox pop getting the views of Russians on an important subject. What do they think of Zelensky? As ever with such videos there seems a clear generational divide.
Incredible how many attack Zelensky on the basis that he was a comedian before being president. Putin was a mediocre mid level bureaucrat in a corrupt system, who never achieved anything other than ingratiating himself with superiors. That is why the drunk Yeltsin appointed him as VP. He wanted someone he didn't feel inferior to.
Keir ate curry is a stupid story befitting the Heil in its stupidity, but the Heil used a stock photo of Keir eating curry to attach to their stupid Keir ate a curry story is even stupider.
What kind of idiocy is this? Have we nothing smarter to discuss, are we all to be reduced to the most petulant and pathetic discussions imaginable? Ridiculous on all sides it seems.
You seem to be discussing it..
That sounds more like meta-discussion. And my post, therefore, is meta-meta-discussion.
Isn't "meta discussion" what happens on Facebook, WhatsApp et al?
And meta meta discussion is reposting from Facebook on Twitter and talking about it there.
BoZo should have hidden in a fridge again this morning
He is to address the Ukraine Parliament this morning, the first Western leader to do so, so not hiding in a fridge
I'm with you BigG.
Boris must go ..then again he is the greatest Wartime Prime Minister since Churchill, and he didn't really break any Covid rules, and the Gray report must be canned because it was written by a Labour shill, and Starmer broke loads of rules whilst Boris was ambushed by a cake. Phew!
Boris must go but he is recognised by Ukraine and their President for the support they have received in their fight against the war criminal that is Putin
Boris broke the covid rules and there is no dispute about that
Starmer may or may not have broken covid rules but they lied about Rayners's attendance and he looks uncomfortable when being asked questions by journalists. The media will no doubt only be satisfied when he agrees to a review and interview by Durham Police but as one voter said this morning, 'they are all the same' and that is a fairly widespread view
SKS didn't break the covid rules. And is being wrong about one person attending one of very many meetings receding into memory, in a busy day, a crime?
I think you ought to report yourself to the police for not ebing able to tell us instantly what size of spanner the lady on Mr Parrish's tractor movie was holding.
Starmer saying he didn't break the covid regulations is being challenged by Richard Holden, MP, the mail and others including 2 students who want the police to review the video they took
There is nothing unreasonable about questioning the veracity of those events
Sure! But Richard Holden has provided no new evidence. The two students have provided no new evidence. Cases do get reopened and re-examined but there has to be a reason to do so.
I don't know how else to explain this to you. Policing is evidence-based. The police have investigated the complain and investigated the evidence. Making the same complaint about the same evidence doesn't create a new line of enquiry. #
What could be done is that people could put in a complaint about the police that they have not properly carried out their duties. Which would be at least initially an internal investigation. As far as I know that hasn't been requested. Why not if the pursuit of justice is the motive and the complainants believe an actual crime has been committed?
The only new evidence seems to be Rayner being there too. If it was legal before I do not see how this changes it.
Which is the thing driving the Tories the most nuts. "SHE WAS THERE" "WHY DID LABOUR LIE" etc etc hasn't moved the police one bit. If as they have concluded from the primary evidence it was a campaign meeting then it doesn't matter if she was there or not.
Its like someone demanding to know if I was tucking into a Burger King at Luton airport last Friday. I get my many trips through Luton mixed up and say I didn't. Then it comes to light that I did enjoy Whopper goodness on that occasion. "WHY DID HE LIE" is met with "I was legally there".
Honestly don't get what Big_G and others are camping out for. Holden's letter presents no fresh evidence. The two Tiry students want to present the already reviewed evidence. Not liking someone doesn't provide a reason for the police to investigate baseless allegations.
A good friend of mine was dragged through the ringer maliciously by their ex who made baseless allegations so serious the police had to investigate. There was no evidence - none - so it was quickly dropped. The ex then goes even more off the scale demanding this and that for the police who eventually had to threaten her with action unless she stopped wasting their time.
Show us the evidence Big_G.
Evidence is for Richard Holden and others to provide and they are not going to let this go until they have been satisfied which of course could conclude Starmer was in compliance of covid regulations but equally it may not
They can whine all they want. You're absolutely right that it is for Holden et al to provide evidence - so why are you saying that his letter is sufficient for a police investigation to start?
After I've made my initial baseless allegation against you and the police rightly dismiss it, are you ok if I write them a letter with no evidence whatsoever and they go and pull you in again for interview on something they have already decided was not a crime?
Durham Police said they will respond to Holdens letter and that response will determine whether or not the matter concludes and what further steps may be taken by Holden and other conservative mps
Ah, I see a CUNNING PLAN. By continually dredging up this you are demonstrating your loyalty to the Tory Party, while surreptitiously drawing attention to the PM's appalling behaviour over, inter alia, the parties.
You therefore hope to see an end to Johnson's premiership while simultaneously avoiding the attention of the Conservative Party's Stasi, who would otherwise have binned you for disloyalty.
Shall we just get straight to the point and say you cannot question SKS’ behaviour under any circumstances and that anyone doing so is just a Tory shrill?
And then people criticise the partisan nature of politics.
Questioning his behaviour is fine! But this is making allegations of crimes being committed without evidence. Asking the police to investigate someone for something the police have judged to be legal.
You seem supportive of this Tory attack. So I can make an allegation against you and make a complaint to the police. The examine my evidence, judge it not to provide evidence of a crime and end their investigation.
What you want then is that I get my friends to start a campaign for the police to investigate you anyway. That the police should interview you for the non-crime about the non-evidence and that you are the person who has to provide the evidence that your non-suspicious legal behaviour was above board.
BoZo should have hidden in a fridge again this morning
He is to address the Ukraine Parliament this morning, the first Western leader to do so, so not hiding in a fridge
I'm with you BigG.
Boris must go ..then again he is the greatest Wartime Prime Minister since Churchill, and he didn't really break any Covid rules, and the Gray report must be canned because it was written by a Labour shill, and Starmer broke loads of rules whilst Boris was ambushed by a cake. Phew!
Boris must go but he is recognised by Ukraine and their President for the support they have received in their fight against the war criminal that is Putin
Boris broke the covid rules and there is no dispute about that
Starmer may or may not have broken covid rules but they lied about Rayners's attendance and he looks uncomfortable when being asked questions by journalists. The media will no doubt only be satisfied when he agrees to a review and interview by Durham Police but as one voter said this morning, 'they are all the same' and that is a fairly widespread view
SKS didn't break the covid rules. And is being wrong about one person attending one of very many meetings receding into memory, in a busy day, a crime?
I think you ought to report yourself to the police for not ebing able to tell us instantly what size of spanner the lady on Mr Parrish's tractor movie was holding.
Starmer saying he didn't break the covid regulations is being challenged by Richard Holden, MP, the mail and others including 2 students who want the police to review the video they took
There is nothing unreasonable about questioning the veracity of those events
I don’t know why Labour continues with this line that it doesn’t matter and there is nothing to see here. If there was truly nothing, you think they would have a better argument. It’s clear from yours - who is not a Tory-at-any-cost voter - plus arguably the Best PM polling that the voters are sceptical of Labour’s stance. Blaming it on the machinations of the Daily Mail is a lazy argument.
Mudslinging. Dirty tricks. Negative campaigning.
It’s a fact in absence of any new significant evidence since last investigated, The Tories merely doing a throw spaghetti at the wall see what sticks. What significant new evidence has emerged that warrants a new or reopened investigation? The Tories and mail have brought nothing forward, they merely hoping the police could find some, but that is not how the process works, not how justice works.
The killer fact, unlike when the Tories partied during lockdown in Westminster, at this particular time of Starmer’s working meal, the rules were you could do a working meal in office. Unless Tories or friends in media, or anyone in public such as caterer who delivered a feast, comes forward with evidence it was different than the first investigation concluded, then it quite rightly remains closed. Simples.
With most workplaces, if you have alcohol during work time - especially during work time - it’s a sackable offence.
Anyway, take it you believe the “it was a honest mistake we forgot about Rayner” line. Given that, I’m sure you will be generous if BJ trots out the same line.
This is an election why it’s important to vote Conservative in local elections, why it’s important to have Conservative councillors and Conservative councils. So Why can’t Tories campaign positively in this election, like all the other parties are - but they are using up their media time just to sling mud - don’t the Tories have any good news to share? 🙂
Tories who lose their seats this week will be mightily impressed the Tories fought a negative campaign, and wasted so much time and energy on the Partygate and currygate Westminster bubble twaddle, I suspect 🙄
BoZo should have hidden in a fridge again this morning
He is to address the Ukraine Parliament this morning, the first Western leader to do so, so not hiding in a fridge
I'm with you BigG.
Boris must go ..then again he is the greatest Wartime Prime Minister since Churchill, and he didn't really break any Covid rules, and the Gray report must be canned because it was written by a Labour shill, and Starmer broke loads of rules whilst Boris was ambushed by a cake. Phew!
Boris must go but he is recognised by Ukraine and their President for the support they have received in their fight against the war criminal that is Putin
Boris broke the covid rules and there is no dispute about that
Starmer may or may not have broken covid rules but they lied about Rayners's attendance and he looks uncomfortable when being asked questions by journalists. The media will no doubt only be satisfied when he agrees to a review and interview by Durham Police but as one voter said this morning, 'they are all the same' and that is a fairly widespread view
SKS didn't break the covid rules. And is being wrong about one person attending one of very many meetings receding into memory, in a busy day, a crime?
I think you ought to report yourself to the police for not ebing able to tell us instantly what size of spanner the lady on Mr Parrish's tractor movie was holding.
Starmer saying he didn't break the covid regulations is being challenged by Richard Holden, MP, the mail and others including 2 students who want the police to review the video they took
There is nothing unreasonable about questioning the veracity of those events
I don’t know why Labour continues with this line that it doesn’t matter and there is nothing to see here. If there was truly nothing, you think they would have a better argument. It’s clear from yours - who is not a Tory-at-any-cost voter - plus arguably the Best PM polling that the voters are sceptical of Labour’s stance. Blaming it on the machinations of the Daily Mail is a lazy argument.
Mudslinging. Dirty tricks. Negative campaigning.
It’s a fact in absence of any new significant evidence since last investigated, The Tories merely doing a throw spaghetti at the wall see what sticks. What significant new evidence has emerged that warrants a new or reopened investigation? The Tories and mail have brought nothing forward, they merely hoping the police could find some, but that is not how the process works, not how justice works.
The killer fact, unlike when the Tories partied during lockdown in Westminster, at this particular time of Starmer’s working meal, the rules were you could do a working meal in office. Unless Tories or friends in media, or anyone in public such as caterer who delivered a feast, comes forward with evidence it was different than the first investigation concluded, then it quite rightly remains closed. Simples.
With most workplaces, if you have alcohol during work time - especially during work time - it’s a sackable offence.
Anyway, take it you believe the “it was a honest mistake we forgot about Rayner” line. Given that, I’m sure you will be generous if BJ trots out the same line.
Here's your problem. The police have established this to be a legal campaign event. So Rayner being forgotten about is about as big as crime as me forgetting that I bought a sandwich last week.
TBH, I don’t really care who did what. A lot of people broke lockdown rules. And SKS having a beer is not a capital offence.
What he should do though is, if he criticising someone’s else’s behaviour, is be whiter than white. His attempts to explain it all don’t seem that great either. Same for his supporters as well. If you are going to demand BJ resigns and in the same breath say “it’s all overblown with Starmer” you’re backing your side not playing the facts.
In any event, what we think doesn’t matter, it’s what the wider public thanks and there seems a fair bit of anecdotal evidence that people are not really buying the excuses of SKS.
Labour's @JonAshworth: "It's shameful that pensioners have no choice but to sit on the bus all day to avoid racking up heating bills. For Johnson to respond by boasting about the London bus pass reveals just how out of touch this narcissistic PM is.”
What would you suggest the Government do about pensioners heating bills, increase the state pension even more than it has been with the triple lock?
In any case, who has their heating on all day even in the winter? I was brought up to put on a jumper.
I have a great deal of sympathy with this point. Am surprised, however, that there hasn't been any attempt to make it from the government.
What's the point? They'd immediately get howled down as "out of touch" by people who think it's a human right to heat their houses to 22°C all winter.
Human right or not, sensible or not, the political angle is that some people can afford to heat their houses to 22°C all winter and some can't, hence a one rule for them attack line.
Which is why it needs a public information campaign. Needs to be pitched not primarily as a cost saving measure, but an energy security one. If you heat your home to 22°C, and do, you're doing Vlad's bidding. That kind of thing.
Btw. Not sure how anyone finds 22 inside comfortable. The population of Asia would think it stark bonkers.
Sorry to hear OGH had a bad time with covid. It seems as if there is no consistency with symptoms with new variants. The good news is we no longer seem to be recording excess deaths though I accept it isn't just about deaths. It's an unpleasant virus and long term health effects shouldn't be discounted.
Anyway Afghanistan was a defensive war since they started it with 9/11, which is the only time in NATO's entire history that Article 5 has been invoked.
So it'd be entirely appropriate for NATO to be involved, since it all began with an attack on a NATO state which led to Article 5 being invoked.
The Afghanistan operations weren't Article V missions. Article V was invoked but not utilised in those missions.
No - though the US had a legal right to a proportionate response to 9/11 ... and cocked that response up.
Again the term "legal" is not really relevant here. The US could do as it pleased because it was at that time the only superpower. Ideally they wanted the cover of UN agreement but didn't need it.
While in practical terms, it wasn't going to make a difference as to whether they went in, it is relevant - see the poor precedent set by the invasion of Iraq, which others have used for justifying their own later actions.
Any international rules based system is going to be imperfect, but it is far better than the absence of one.
Oh absolutely. That has been my entire point since the Russian invasion. Putin saw how the US behaved in 2003 and thought - oh that's how you do it.
A pretty bloody stupid conclusion for him to draw. Blimey what a clusterfuck was mine.
The SCOTUS decision will inflame US politics at a time when it’s already deeply polarized .
The choice is clear in November and this will impact many of the close races . Governors and state legislatures will be very much more at the forefront and it’s likely you’ll see a lot of up ballot effect .
Make no mistake behind the scenes the Dems will know this is a gift from the court which could help them save the senate.
Yup, that and letting Trump back on Twitter.
Still, it remains to be seen if the court will actually do this. If they're religious ideologues they will, but if they're political hacks they won't: What a political hack would do would be to leak that they were going to overturn, then do something that doesn't actually technically overturn but lets states almost completely ban abortion in practice. After the leak this will appear moderate and not really do much for Dem turnout.
That's what I expect to happen. Some of the intended legislation in deep Red States, if Roe is overturned, is pretty grim, and would surely impact upon the Republicans' chances.
Not in deep Red states as most voters there are anti abortion, though it might drive up Democrat turnout in blue and purple states which are more pro choice
But they were voting Republican anyway. It will motivate Democrats and Independents and maybe some Republicans who think 'For the grace of God that could be me'.
Not sure about that and I think it’s lazy to make that assumption.
Sure, it will motivate white, middle class educated liberals to vote and get out their Handmaiden Tale’s outfits. But the Democrats have them anyway and they are concentrated in already heavily Blue areas.
However, there is a fair chunk of the Democrat base - particularly Black but also a good chunk of the Hispanic vote - which is socially conservative but votes Democrat.
Turn this into a supercharger electoral issue and you might find a good chunk of those voters decide to exit the Democrat base.
Then there is @SeaShantyIrish2’s point. People in the States are used to flying large distances for regular routine visits to see family etc given air travel is so connected. It actually takes nearly twice as long to get from Belfast to Liverpool by ferry than from Mobile Alabama to Boston MA. So saying people having to travel to get abortions is not going to be seen as necessarily an unreasonable point @BartholomewRoberts thinks to many people.
In any event, I think what happens is that you get springing up a whole organisational network (and funding the cost) helping women who want abortions from banned states to those where it is not.
About two thirds of American voters don't want Roe vs Wade overturned, according to the polls. So if there are Democratic voters who are anti-abortion, there must be even more Republicans who are pro-abortion. I suspect this move will backfire on the Republicans, who will have to go on the airwaves to defend this policy every time a thirteen year old gets raped by her uncle then dies in childbirth. Abortion will still happen anyway, just like it always did; the rich will find a friendly doctor willing to do it for the right price, while the poor will find some pills on the Internet or risk sepsis with a coat hanger. All brought to you by Donald Trump, a man who probably kept half on NYC's abortionists in business during the 1980s.
Even if Roe v Wade was repealed it would NOT end abortion in most US States, for starters as most do not have the Republican governor AND Republican controlled state legislatures needed to pass abortion bans.
However currently states like Alabama and Mississippi and Tennessee and Utah cannot impose abortion restrictions despite the fact most voters there want them and they have Republican governors and Republican state legislatures due to the Supreme Court mandate of US wide legal abortion via Roe v Wade
As always it's a question of democracy vs liberty. If Alabama passed a law saying that people called Peter were not allowed access to life saving medical procedures would that be okay? And if not why is it okay for those laws to be passed with respect to pregnant women? What about when pro life states block pregnant women from travelling to pro choice states in case they have a termination? This Scotus ruling will prove to be the Dredd Scott of the abortion debate, a reactionary over-reach by activist judges that forces the issue to be resolved at a federal level. If it takes a civil war to settle it I wouldn't be entirely surprised.
In a democracy in a Federal nation like the US built on states' rights the states are allowed to do anything they wish not prevented by the US constitution or Federal law.
The US constitution gives rights to free speech, to bear arms, abolition of slavery and against cruel and unusual punishment. It does not give an automatic right to healthcare nor does it give a right to abortion on demand despite what a more liberal SC decided in Roe v Wade.
Respect for a minority of mainly southern states' having the right to impose pro life legislation if they wish is not incompatible with the constitution and does not need to lead to another civil war
Entirely off-topic but I have just jumped out of my chair at a massive bang as a door is slammed somewhere outside my office. Go out and have a look and yes the store room door is shut. Was open earlier when I went in. No windows or doors open and nobody else in the building...
BoZo should have hidden in a fridge again this morning
He is to address the Ukraine Parliament this morning, the first Western leader to do so, so not hiding in a fridge
I'm with you BigG.
Boris must go ..then again he is the greatest Wartime Prime Minister since Churchill, and he didn't really break any Covid rules, and the Gray report must be canned because it was written by a Labour shill, and Starmer broke loads of rules whilst Boris was ambushed by a cake. Phew!
Boris must go but he is recognised by Ukraine and their President for the support they have received in their fight against the war criminal that is Putin
Boris broke the covid rules and there is no dispute about that
Starmer may or may not have broken covid rules but they lied about Rayners's attendance and he looks uncomfortable when being asked questions by journalists. The media will no doubt only be satisfied when he agrees to a review and interview by Durham Police but as one voter said this morning, 'they are all the same' and that is a fairly widespread view
SKS didn't break the covid rules. And is being wrong about one person attending one of very many meetings receding into memory, in a busy day, a crime?
I think you ought to report yourself to the police for not ebing able to tell us instantly what size of spanner the lady on Mr Parrish's tractor movie was holding.
Starmer saying he didn't break the covid regulations is being challenged by Richard Holden, MP, the mail and others including 2 students who want the police to review the video they took
There is nothing unreasonable about questioning the veracity of those events
Sure! But Richard Holden has provided no new evidence. The two students have provided no new evidence. Cases do get reopened and re-examined but there has to be a reason to do so.
I don't know how else to explain this to you. Policing is evidence-based. The police have investigated the complain and investigated the evidence. Making the same complaint about the same evidence doesn't create a new line of enquiry. #
What could be done is that people could put in a complaint about the police that they have not properly carried out their duties. Which would be at least initially an internal investigation. As far as I know that hasn't been requested. Why not if the pursuit of justice is the motive and the complainants believe an actual crime has been committed?
The only new evidence seems to be Rayner being there too. If it was legal before I do not see how this changes it.
Which is the thing driving the Tories the most nuts. "SHE WAS THERE" "WHY DID LABOUR LIE" etc etc hasn't moved the police one bit. If as they have concluded from the primary evidence it was a campaign meeting then it doesn't matter if she was there or not.
Its like someone demanding to know if I was tucking into a Burger King at Luton airport last Friday. I get my many trips through Luton mixed up and say I didn't. Then it comes to light that I did enjoy Whopper goodness on that occasion. "WHY DID HE LIE" is met with "I was legally there".
Honestly don't get what Big_G and others are camping out for. Holden's letter presents no fresh evidence. The two Tiry students want to present the already reviewed evidence. Not liking someone doesn't provide a reason for the police to investigate baseless allegations.
A good friend of mine was dragged through the ringer maliciously by their ex who made baseless allegations so serious the police had to investigate. There was no evidence - none - so it was quickly dropped. The ex then goes even more off the scale demanding this and that for the police who eventually had to threaten her with action unless she stopped wasting their time.
Show us the evidence Big_G.
Evidence is for Richard Holden and others to provide and they are not going to let this go until they have been satisfied which of course could conclude Starmer was in compliance of covid regulations but equally it may not
They can whine all they want. You're absolutely right that it is for Holden et al to provide evidence - so why are you saying that his letter is sufficient for a police investigation to start?
After I've made my initial baseless allegation against you and the police rightly dismiss it, are you ok if I write them a letter with no evidence whatsoever and they go and pull you in again for interview on something they have already decided was not a crime?
Durham Police said they will respond to Holdens letter and that response will determine whether or not the matter concludes and what further steps may be taken by Holden and other conservative mps
Ah, I see a CUNNING PLAN. By continually dredging up this you are demonstrating your loyalty to the Tory Party, while surreptitiously drawing attention to the PM's appalling behaviour over, inter alia, the parties.
You therefore hope to see an end to Johnson's premiership while simultaneously avoiding the attention of the Conservative Party's Stasi, who would otherwise have binned you for disloyalty.
Shall we just get straight to the point and say you cannot question SKS’ behaviour under any circumstances and that anyone doing so is just a Tory shrill?
And then people criticise the partisan nature of politics.
Of course one can question SKS's behaviour! I wasn't saying that one couldn't.
You can get 2/1 on the LibDems winning control of Woking Council. 10 of the 30 seats are up for grabs and, knowing the area as I do, I think this is a value bet. They have made steady gains in recent times and they are already the largest party. It's clear that the party machine is up and running hard for this.
I've only seen LibDem posters up and there is a lot of anger directed towards the Conservatives. In addition the tory run minority council has squandered huge amounts of money and the council is now the third most most debt-ridden in the country.
Woking is only 26th on the LD target list for the next general election, no surprise they are targeting it
Although it might be a target in the GE, it is not being especially done so in these local elections. There are no calls for help even from boroughs without election (eg where I am and I am only 5 miles from Woking). It is and has been for many years a very tight and actively fought borough by both the Tories an LDs and with a Tory run borough who are in a minority and with financial issues it is prime territory for LD gains to take overall control. Just a tough set of circumstances for the Tories here really.
I expect the heaviest Tory losses on Thursday to be in anti Brexit areas which most dislike Boris.
Woking was 56% Remain, similar councils in Remain areas of the Home Counties like Guildford and South Oxfordshire have already gone LD so I would not be surprised to see the LDs take it.
The Tories are also likely to lose Tunbridge Wells on Thursday too partly for the same reasons as well as local factors
I agree generally, but sometimes local factors are a bigger aspect as you point out re Tunbridge Wells. That is certainly the case with Guildford. Guildford is not LD controlled. It is in coalition with Indies and the Indies made the bigger wins (some wards by huge margins eg mine). This was because of Tory scandals and the local plan. You only have to speak to Mole Valley Tories to find out about what happened to the Guildford Tories. No love lost at the time.
Re Tunbridge Wells - I have no knowledge although I used to live in Crowborough but lost contact now. A lovely area in which I believe you used to live also.
Remind me, what went down in Guildford? In Woking, the attitude of the council has been "it's either tower blocks or building houses on green spaces and golf courses."
But I don't see any tower blocks in Guildford, so I guess they went for new housing estates like this one:
Hi @tlg86 I wondered if you would post as I know you are in Woking. I lived in the Borough from being 9 until my early 30s and can tell lots of stories, some quite funny.
Guildford Tories implosion is a long story and pre dates the local plan. There was infighting, a councillor sent down for corruption related to this stuff, an attempted coup to try and impose an elected mayor, corruption in getting the signatures for the referendum which was eventually lost by 90%. 20,000 written objections (yes really 20,000) against the local plan, which was an utter shambles, but passed on the eve of the local election that they knew they were going to lose. Fell out with the Mole Valley Tories over all this.
Needless to say a significant number of Tories defected to the newly formed Indies. The LDs picked up what would have been their typical targets. The Indies stood in the safe Tory wards and slaughtered them with huge margins.
I live in a rock solid safe Tory ward. It now has 3 Indy borough councillors and a Indy county councillor.
That really is a brief summary. What happened really isn't a fair reflection on proper Tories and I'm sure they will be back, but they have been thrown out by their own supporters.
That doesn't sound rock solid to me.
@dixiedean So here are some numbers for the Horsley ward. I am comparing 2011 to 2019 because 2015 was mid scandal so resentment building up but not peaked yet:
2011 3 Tory candidates win with between 2700 and 3000 votes each 2 Lab/ 1 LD candidates each muster between 400 and 650 votes each
Pretty safe? 80+% of the vote for the Cons
2019 3 Indies win with between 2666 and 2907 votes each 3 Tories get between 532 and 947 votes each
If that is not a slaughter from a dominant position I don't know what is.
Entirely off-topic but I have just jumped out of my chair at a massive bang as a door is slammed somewhere outside my office. Go out and have a look and yes the store room door is shut. Was open earlier when I went in. No windows or doors open and nobody else in the building...
Another interesting vox pop getting the views of Russians on an important subject. What do they think of Zelensky? As ever with such videos there seems a clear generational divide.
Incredible how many attack Zelensky on the basis that he was a comedian before being president. Putin was a mediocre mid level bureaucrat in a corrupt system, who never achieved anything other than ingratiating himself with superiors. That is why the drunk Yeltsin appointed him as VP. He wanted someone he didn't feel inferior to.
Not just a comedian though. Actor and producer of his own successful company.
Labour's @JonAshworth: "It's shameful that pensioners have no choice but to sit on the bus all day to avoid racking up heating bills. For Johnson to respond by boasting about the London bus pass reveals just how out of touch this narcissistic PM is.”
What would you suggest the Government do about pensioners heating bills, increase the state pension even more than it has been with the triple lock?
In any case, who has their heating on all day even in the winter? I was brought up to put on a jumper.
I have a great deal of sympathy with this point. Am surprised, however, that there hasn't been any attempt to make it from the government.
What's the point? They'd immediately get howled down as "out of touch" by people who think it's a human right to heat their houses to 22°C all winter.
Well perhaps. However, it is part of the job of a government (usually), to tell folk unpopular stuff they don't want to hear, but which is in the national interest. It could be tied to Ukraine as a patriotic thing to do. This lot don't seem interested at all.
The last politician who told people unpopular things that they didn't want to hear was May during the 2017 election campaign. Seeing how that turned out, I expect it will be a long time before any politican of either main party does the same again.
Yes. But that was ineptitude of delivery, lack of strategy, and a complete misreading of the zeitgeist. Cameron and Thatcher made a virtue of saying things weren't great and you have to suffer to put it right.
Labour's @JonAshworth: "It's shameful that pensioners have no choice but to sit on the bus all day to avoid racking up heating bills. For Johnson to respond by boasting about the London bus pass reveals just how out of touch this narcissistic PM is.”
What would you suggest the Government do about pensioners heating bills, increase the state pension even more than it has been with the triple lock?
In any case, who has their heating on all day even in the winter? I was brought up to put on a jumper.
I have a great deal of sympathy with this point. Am surprised, however, that there hasn't been any attempt to make it from the government.
What's the point? They'd immediately get howled down as "out of touch" by people who think it's a human right to heat their houses to 22°C all winter.
Well perhaps. However, it is part of the job of a government (usually), to tell folk unpopular stuff they don't want to hear, but which is in the national interest. It could be tied to Ukraine as a patriotic thing to do. This lot don't seem interested at all.
The last politician who told people unpopular things that they didn't want to hear was May during the 2017 election campaign. Seeing how that turned out, I expect it will be a long time before any politican of either main party does the same again.
Not a good idea to do it during an election campaign. Otherwise, much less so.
BoZo should have hidden in a fridge again this morning
He is to address the Ukraine Parliament this morning, the first Western leader to do so, so not hiding in a fridge
I'm with you BigG.
Boris must go ..then again he is the greatest Wartime Prime Minister since Churchill, and he didn't really break any Covid rules, and the Gray report must be canned because it was written by a Labour shill, and Starmer broke loads of rules whilst Boris was ambushed by a cake. Phew!
Boris must go but he is recognised by Ukraine and their President for the support they have received in their fight against the war criminal that is Putin
Boris broke the covid rules and there is no dispute about that
Starmer may or may not have broken covid rules but they lied about Rayners's attendance and he looks uncomfortable when being asked questions by journalists. The media will no doubt only be satisfied when he agrees to a review and interview by Durham Police but as one voter said this morning, 'they are all the same' and that is a fairly widespread view
SKS didn't break the covid rules. And is being wrong about one person attending one of very many meetings receding into memory, in a busy day, a crime?
I think you ought to report yourself to the police for not ebing able to tell us instantly what size of spanner the lady on Mr Parrish's tractor movie was holding.
Starmer saying he didn't break the covid regulations is being challenged by Richard Holden, MP, the mail and others including 2 students who want the police to review the video they took
There is nothing unreasonable about questioning the veracity of those events
I don’t know why Labour continues with this line that it doesn’t matter and there is nothing to see here. If there was truly nothing, you think they would have a better argument. It’s clear from yours - who is not a Tory-at-any-cost voter - plus arguably the Best PM polling that the voters are sceptical of Labour’s stance. Blaming it on the machinations of the Daily Mail is a lazy argument.
Mudslinging. Dirty tricks. Negative campaigning.
It’s a fact in absence of any new significant evidence since last investigated, The Tories merely doing a throw spaghetti at the wall see what sticks. What significant new evidence has emerged that warrants a new or reopened investigation? The Tories and mail have brought nothing forward, they merely hoping the police could find some, but that is not how the process works, not how justice works.
The killer fact, unlike when the Tories partied during lockdown in Westminster, at this particular time of Starmer’s working meal, the rules were you could do a working meal in office. Unless Tories or friends in media, or anyone in public such as caterer who delivered a feast, comes forward with evidence it was different than the first investigation concluded, then it quite rightly remains closed. Simples.
With most workplaces, if you have alcohol during work time - especially during work time - it’s a sackable offence.
Anyway, take it you believe the “it was a honest mistake we forgot about Rayner” line. Given that, I’m sure you will be generous if BJ trots out the same line.
Here's your problem. The police have established this to be a legal campaign event. So Rayner being forgotten about is about as big as crime as me forgetting that I bought a sandwich last week.
TBH, I don’t really care who did what. A lot of people broke lockdown rules. And SKS having a beer is not a capital offence.
What he should do though is, if he criticising someone’s else’s behaviour, is be whiter than white. His attempts to explain it all don’t seem that great either. Same for his supporters as well. If you are going to demand BJ resigns and in the same breath say “it’s all overblown with Starmer” you’re backing your side not playing the facts.
In any event, what we think doesn’t matter, it’s what the wider public thanks and there seems a fair bit of anecdotal evidence that people are not really buying the excuses of SKS.
His attempts to explain it all don’t seem that great either. It being the legal campaign event. He doesn't have to explain legal things.
you’re backing your side They are not my side. I am a member of a different party.
not playing the facts. the facts that the event was a legal campaign event?
These students made a complaint and submitted their video as evidence. The police review the evidence, confirm the law at the time and say "no evidence of an offence". These are the facts. The rest is desperate political smear by the guilty.
As I keep saying, if you want a society where I can compel the police to keep investigating your legal activities by making baseless complaints without any evidence, then keep going the way you are.
Entirely off-topic but I have just jumped out of my chair at a massive bang as a door is slammed somewhere outside my office. Go out and have a look and yes the store room door is shut. Was open earlier when I went in. No windows or doors open and nobody else in the building...
Entirely off-topic but I have just jumped out of my chair at a massive bang as a door is slammed somewhere outside my office. Go out and have a look and yes the store room door is shut. Was open earlier when I went in. No windows or doors open and nobody else in the building...
This was the last post Dale ever posted…
Aliens! Suggested Leon.
Its my ghost called Jim Shives. Died here at work in 1895 and appears not to have left. Have seen him. Heard him. He leaves us objects. Its fine - as long as he isn't slamming the sodding door shut.
...this is a good documentary about the legalisation of abortion in UK, or rather mainly on what it was like before legalisation. (Conflict of interest statement: I know the producer and my dad's an interviewee.)
It paints a picture of what things might be like in US states that criminalise abortion, although the introduction of pharmacological methods for early abortion change the situation somewhat.
That also makes it more likely, in US states which ban abortion, that any miscarriages will be investigated by law enforcement.
(Had to remove your link as it was doing horrid things to the HTML)
There are many ways to measure stuff. One way is people who die within 28 days of a positive test. Earlier in the pandemic this was a really useful tool as it gave a quick estimate of how many were dying of covid, while not being correct in every case (the classic being the positive test 27 days ago, followed by a car crash death - unsure if that EVER happened to anyone). Now, with omicron, more people are dying with covid rather than from it, and tbh the best thing is to wait for the death certificate. However death certificates will mention covid as a contributing cause, as well as other things. Most of those dying are elderly (over half are over 80) and will have been frail. Not great for them, but covid is probably doing what pneumonia has always done for the elderly.
The SCOTUS decision will inflame US politics at a time when it’s already deeply polarized .
The choice is clear in November and this will impact many of the close races . Governors and state legislatures will be very much more at the forefront and it’s likely you’ll see a lot of up ballot effect .
Make no mistake behind the scenes the Dems will know this is a gift from the court which could help them save the senate.
Yup, that and letting Trump back on Twitter.
Still, it remains to be seen if the court will actually do this. If they're religious ideologues they will, but if they're political hacks they won't: What a political hack would do would be to leak that they were going to overturn, then do something that doesn't actually technically overturn but lets states almost completely ban abortion in practice. After the leak this will appear moderate and not really do much for Dem turnout.
That's what I expect to happen. Some of the intended legislation in deep Red States, if Roe is overturned, is pretty grim, and would surely impact upon the Republicans' chances.
Not in deep Red states as most voters there are anti abortion, though it might drive up Democrat turnout in blue and purple states which are more pro choice
But they were voting Republican anyway. It will motivate Democrats and Independents and maybe some Republicans who think 'For the grace of God that could be me'.
Not sure about that and I think it’s lazy to make that assumption.
Sure, it will motivate white, middle class educated liberals to vote and get out their Handmaiden Tale’s outfits. But the Democrats have them anyway and they are concentrated in already heavily Blue areas.
However, there is a fair chunk of the Democrat base - particularly Black but also a good chunk of the Hispanic vote - which is socially conservative but votes Democrat.
Turn this into a supercharger electoral issue and you might find a good chunk of those voters decide to exit the Democrat base.
Then there is @SeaShantyIrish2’s point. People in the States are used to flying large distances for regular routine visits to see family etc given air travel is so connected. It actually takes nearly twice as long to get from Belfast to Liverpool by ferry than from Mobile Alabama to Boston MA. So saying people having to travel to get abortions is not going to be seen as necessarily an unreasonable point @BartholomewRoberts thinks to many people.
In any event, I think what happens is that you get springing up a whole organisational network (and funding the cost) helping women who want abortions from banned states to those where it is not.
About two thirds of American voters don't want Roe vs Wade overturned, according to the polls. So if there are Democratic voters who are anti-abortion, there must be even more Republicans who are pro-abortion. I suspect this move will backfire on the Republicans, who will have to go on the airwaves to defend this policy every time a thirteen year old gets raped by her uncle then dies in childbirth. Abortion will still happen anyway, just like it always did; the rich will find a friendly doctor willing to do it for the right price, while the poor will find some pills on the Internet or risk sepsis with a coat hanger. All brought to you by Donald Trump, a man who probably kept half on NYC's abortionists in business during the 1980s.
Even if Roe v Wade was repealed it would NOT end abortion in most US States, for starters as most do not have the Republican governor AND Republican controlled state legislatures needed to pass abortion bans.
However currently states like Alabama and Mississippi and Tennessee and Utah cannot impose abortion restrictions despite the fact most voters there want them and they have Republican governors and Republican state legislatures due to the Supreme Court mandate of US wide legal abortion via Roe v Wade
As always it's a question of democracy vs liberty. If Alabama passed a law saying that people called Peter were not allowed access to life saving medical procedures would that be okay? And if not why is it okay for those laws to be passed with respect to pregnant women? What about when pro life states block pregnant women from travelling to pro choice states in case they have a termination? This Scotus ruling will prove to be the Dredd Scott of the abortion debate, a reactionary over-reach by activist judges that forces the issue to be resolved at a federal level. If it takes a civil war to settle it I wouldn't be entirely surprised.
That's one take. Another take is that the SC is stopping being activist and returning the US to a situation similar to the UK in which difficulty issues are dealt with by a democratic process and legislation. By 'federal level' you mean 'by a democratic process'.
It seems to me that neither extreme wants to accept that the democratic process has a legitimacy that the SC doesn't have, and that both sides only approve of the SC when it does what it wants.
Entirely off-topic but I have just jumped out of my chair at a massive bang as a door is slammed somewhere outside my office. Go out and have a look and yes the store room door is shut. Was open earlier when I went in. No windows or doors open and nobody else in the building...
This was the last post Dale ever posted…
Aliens! Suggested Leon.
Its my ghost called Jim Shives. Died here at work in 1895 and appears not to have left. Have seen him. Heard him. He leaves us objects. Its fine - as long as he isn't slamming the sodding door shut.
It's not a ghost. It's probably someone opened a door or window elsewhere in the building.
Entirely off-topic but I have just jumped out of my chair at a massive bang as a door is slammed somewhere outside my office. Go out and have a look and yes the store room door is shut. Was open earlier when I went in. No windows or doors open and nobody else in the building...
You got ghosts...
Are you bothered? You may or may not be a believer, but a decent priest can exorcise if you are concerned. (I'm not a believer, but exorcisms often work. Its a bit like doswing, which seems to work too)
BoZo should have hidden in a fridge again this morning
He is to address the Ukraine Parliament this morning, the first Western leader to do so, so not hiding in a fridge
I'm with you BigG.
Boris must go ..then again he is the greatest Wartime Prime Minister since Churchill, and he didn't really break any Covid rules, and the Gray report must be canned because it was written by a Labour shill, and Starmer broke loads of rules whilst Boris was ambushed by a cake. Phew!
Boris must go but he is recognised by Ukraine and their President for the support they have received in their fight against the war criminal that is Putin
Boris broke the covid rules and there is no dispute about that
Starmer may or may not have broken covid rules but they lied about Rayners's attendance and he looks uncomfortable when being asked questions by journalists. The media will no doubt only be satisfied when he agrees to a review and interview by Durham Police but as one voter said this morning, 'they are all the same' and that is a fairly widespread view
SKS didn't break the covid rules. And is being wrong about one person attending one of very many meetings receding into memory, in a busy day, a crime?
I think you ought to report yourself to the police for not ebing able to tell us instantly what size of spanner the lady on Mr Parrish's tractor movie was holding.
Starmer saying he didn't break the covid regulations is being challenged by Richard Holden, MP, the mail and others including 2 students who want the police to review the video they took
There is nothing unreasonable about questioning the veracity of those events
I don’t know why Labour continues with this line that it doesn’t matter and there is nothing to see here. If there was truly nothing, you think they would have a better argument. It’s clear from yours - who is not a Tory-at-any-cost voter - plus arguably the Best PM polling that the voters are sceptical of Labour’s stance. Blaming it on the machinations of the Daily Mail is a lazy argument.
Mudslinging. Dirty tricks. Negative campaigning.
It’s a fact in absence of any new significant evidence since last investigated, The Tories merely doing a throw spaghetti at the wall see what sticks. What significant new evidence has emerged that warrants a new or reopened investigation? The Tories and mail have brought nothing forward, they merely hoping the police could find some, but that is not how the process works, not how justice works.
The killer fact, unlike when the Tories partied during lockdown in Westminster, at this particular time of Starmer’s working meal, the rules were you could do a working meal in office. Unless Tories or friends in media, or anyone in public such as caterer who delivered a feast, comes forward with evidence it was different than the first investigation concluded, then it quite rightly remains closed. Simples.
With most workplaces, if you have alcohol during work time - especially during work time - it’s a sackable offence.
Anyway, take it you believe the “it was a honest mistake we forgot about Rayner” line. Given that, I’m sure you will be generous if BJ trots out the same line.
Here's your problem. The police have established this to be a legal campaign event. So Rayner being forgotten about is about as big as crime as me forgetting that I bought a sandwich last week.
TBH, I don’t really care who did what. A lot of people broke lockdown rules. And SKS having a beer is not a capital offence.
What he should do though is, if he criticising someone’s else’s behaviour, is be whiter than white. His attempts to explain it all don’t seem that great either. Same for his supporters as well. If you are going to demand BJ resigns and in the same breath say “it’s all overblown with Starmer” you’re backing your side not playing the facts.
In any event, what we think doesn’t matter, it’s what the wider public thanks and there seems a fair bit of anecdotal evidence that people are not really buying the excuses of SKS.
His attempts to explain it all don’t seem that great either. It being the legal campaign event. He doesn't have to explain legal things.
you’re backing your side They are not my side. I am a member of a different party.
not playing the facts. the facts that the event was a legal campaign event?
These students made a complaint and submitted their video as evidence. The police review the evidence, confirm the law at the time and say "no evidence of an offence". These are the facts. The rest is desperate political smear by the guilty.
As I keep saying, if you want a society where I can compel the police to keep investigating your legal activities by making baseless complaints without any evidence, then keep going the way you are.
I have seen pictures of SKS with a beer with apparently some party workers (no idea when, or what the rules were at that time).
But if the rules were the same as they were for cakegate then a reasonable person would think that if Boris was in the wrong so was SKS.
Entirely off-topic but I have just jumped out of my chair at a massive bang as a door is slammed somewhere outside my office. Go out and have a look and yes the store room door is shut. Was open earlier when I went in. No windows or doors open and nobody else in the building...
This was the last post Dale ever posted…
Aliens! Suggested Leon.
Its my ghost called Jim Shives. Died here at work in 1895 and appears not to have left. Have seen him. Heard him. He leaves us objects. Its fine - as long as he isn't slamming the sodding door shut.
Cool. I'd ask him nicely not to slam doors! What did you see by the way? Fascinated by things like this.
Entirely off-topic but I have just jumped out of my chair at a massive bang as a door is slammed somewhere outside my office. Go out and have a look and yes the store room door is shut. Was open earlier when I went in. No windows or doors open and nobody else in the building...
This was the last post Dale ever posted…
Aliens! Suggested Leon.
Its my ghost called Jim Shives. Died here at work in 1895 and appears not to have left. Have seen him. Heard him. He leaves us objects. Its fine - as long as he isn't slamming the sodding door shut.
Since it’s your manor, any skinny on the mysterious murder of the bank manager in Nairn in 2004? At the time various theories were punted from drug dealers to international financial skulduggery, but it appears now to be down to a planning dispute over decking at a local hotel. There’s something terrifically NE of Scotland about that..
You can get 2/1 on the LibDems winning control of Woking Council. 10 of the 30 seats are up for grabs and, knowing the area as I do, I think this is a value bet. They have made steady gains in recent times and they are already the largest party. It's clear that the party machine is up and running hard for this.
I've only seen LibDem posters up and there is a lot of anger directed towards the Conservatives. In addition the tory run minority council has squandered huge amounts of money and the council is now the third most most debt-ridden in the country.
Woking is only 26th on the LD target list for the next general election, no surprise they are targeting it
Although it might be a target in the GE, it is not being especially done so in these local elections. There are no calls for help even from boroughs without election (eg where I am and I am only 5 miles from Woking). It is and has been for many years a very tight and actively fought borough by both the Tories an LDs and with a Tory run borough who are in a minority and with financial issues it is prime territory for LD gains to take overall control. Just a tough set of circumstances for the Tories here really.
I expect the heaviest Tory losses on Thursday to be in anti Brexit areas which most dislike Boris.
Woking was 56% Remain, similar councils in Remain areas of the Home Counties like Guildford and South Oxfordshire have already gone LD so I would not be surprised to see the LDs take it.
The Tories are also likely to lose Tunbridge Wells on Thursday too partly for the same reasons as well as local factors
I agree generally, but sometimes local factors are a bigger aspect as you point out re Tunbridge Wells. That is certainly the case with Guildford. Guildford is not LD controlled. It is in coalition with Indies and the Indies made the bigger wins (some wards by huge margins eg mine). This was because of Tory scandals and the local plan. You only have to speak to Mole Valley Tories to find out about what happened to the Guildford Tories. No love lost at the time.
Re Tunbridge Wells - I have no knowledge although I used to live in Crowborough but lost contact now. A lovely area in which I believe you used to live also.
Remind me, what went down in Guildford? In Woking, the attitude of the council has been "it's either tower blocks or building houses on green spaces and golf courses."
But I don't see any tower blocks in Guildford, so I guess they went for new housing estates like this one:
Hi @tlg86 I wondered if you would post as I know you are in Woking. I lived in the Borough from being 9 until my early 30s and can tell lots of stories, some quite funny.
Guildford Tories implosion is a long story and pre dates the local plan. There was infighting, a councillor sent down for corruption related to this stuff, an attempted coup to try and impose an elected mayor, corruption in getting the signatures for the referendum which was eventually lost by 90%. 20,000 written objections (yes really 20,000) against the local plan, which was an utter shambles, but passed on the eve of the local election that they knew they were going to lose. Fell out with the Mole Valley Tories over all this.
Needless to say a significant number of Tories defected to the newly formed Indies. The LDs picked up what would have been their typical targets. The Indies stood in the safe Tory wards and slaughtered them with huge margins.
I live in a rock solid safe Tory ward. It now has 3 Indy borough councillors and a Indy county councillor.
That really is a brief summary. What happened really isn't a fair reflection on proper Tories and I'm sure they will be back, but they have been thrown out by their own supporters.
That doesn't sound rock solid to me.
@dixiedean So here are some numbers for the Horsley ward. I am comparing 2011 to 2019 because 2015 was mid scandal so resentment building up but not peaked yet:
2011 3 Tory candidates win with between 2700 and 3000 votes each 2 Lab/ 1 LD candidates each muster between 400 and 650 votes each
Pretty safe? 80+% of the vote for the Cons
2019 3 Indies win with between 2666 and 2907 votes each 3 Tories get between 532 and 947 votes each
If that is not a slaughter from a dominant position I don't know what is.
Indeed. That is pretty remarkable by any standards. My remark was that it doesn't seem rock solid anymore. Which would appear to be untrue. Seems firmly Indy now.
Mr. Pioneers, some say it's Jacob Rees Mogg, haunting empty buildings looking for employees and leaving passive aggressive notes for people who know how to use the internet.
Entirely off-topic but I have just jumped out of my chair at a massive bang as a door is slammed somewhere outside my office. Go out and have a look and yes the store room door is shut. Was open earlier when I went in. No windows or doors open and nobody else in the building...
This was the last post Dale ever posted…
Aliens! Suggested Leon.
Its my ghost called Jim Shives. Died here at work in 1895 and appears not to have left. Have seen him. Heard him. He leaves us objects. Its fine - as long as he isn't slamming the sodding door shut.
Since it’s your manor, any skinny on the mysterious murder of the bank manager in Nairn in 2004? At the time various theories were punted from drug dealers to international financial skulduggery, but it appears now to be down to a planning dispute over decking at a local hotel. There’s something terrifically NE of Scotland about that..
You can get 2/1 on the LibDems winning control of Woking Council. 10 of the 30 seats are up for grabs and, knowing the area as I do, I think this is a value bet. They have made steady gains in recent times and they are already the largest party. It's clear that the party machine is up and running hard for this.
I've only seen LibDem posters up and there is a lot of anger directed towards the Conservatives. In addition the tory run minority council has squandered huge amounts of money and the council is now the third most most debt-ridden in the country.
Woking is only 26th on the LD target list for the next general election, no surprise they are targeting it
Although it might be a target in the GE, it is not being especially done so in these local elections. There are no calls for help even from boroughs without election (eg where I am and I am only 5 miles from Woking). It is and has been for many years a very tight and actively fought borough by both the Tories an LDs and with a Tory run borough who are in a minority and with financial issues it is prime territory for LD gains to take overall control. Just a tough set of circumstances for the Tories here really.
I expect the heaviest Tory losses on Thursday to be in anti Brexit areas which most dislike Boris.
Woking was 56% Remain, similar councils in Remain areas of the Home Counties like Guildford and South Oxfordshire have already gone LD so I would not be surprised to see the LDs take it.
The Tories are also likely to lose Tunbridge Wells on Thursday too partly for the same reasons as well as local factors
I agree generally, but sometimes local factors are a bigger aspect as you point out re Tunbridge Wells. That is certainly the case with Guildford. Guildford is not LD controlled. It is in coalition with Indies and the Indies made the bigger wins (some wards by huge margins eg mine). This was because of Tory scandals and the local plan. You only have to speak to Mole Valley Tories to find out about what happened to the Guildford Tories. No love lost at the time.
Re Tunbridge Wells - I have no knowledge although I used to live in Crowborough but lost contact now. A lovely area in which I believe you used to live also.
Remind me, what went down in Guildford? In Woking, the attitude of the council has been "it's either tower blocks or building houses on green spaces and golf courses."
But I don't see any tower blocks in Guildford, so I guess they went for new housing estates like this one:
Hi @tlg86 I wondered if you would post as I know you are in Woking. I lived in the Borough from being 9 until my early 30s and can tell lots of stories, some quite funny.
Guildford Tories implosion is a long story and pre dates the local plan. There was infighting, a councillor sent down for corruption related to this stuff, an attempted coup to try and impose an elected mayor, corruption in getting the signatures for the referendum which was eventually lost by 90%. 20,000 written objections (yes really 20,000) against the local plan, which was an utter shambles, but passed on the eve of the local election that they knew they were going to lose. Fell out with the Mole Valley Tories over all this.
Needless to say a significant number of Tories defected to the newly formed Indies. The LDs picked up what would have been their typical targets. The Indies stood in the safe Tory wards and slaughtered them with huge margins.
I live in a rock solid safe Tory ward. It now has 3 Indy borough councillors and a Indy county councillor.
That really is a brief summary. What happened really isn't a fair reflection on proper Tories and I'm sure they will be back, but they have been thrown out by their own supporters.
But is it simply nimbyism that did for the Tories? That is, we don't want tower blocks and we don't want new housing estates either.
No I don't think so. That is going on all over the SE. This was far more extreme which is why a number of the Tories left and joined the Indies.
Also @tlg86 there were 2 indie groups one more nimby than the other. The less nimby one was more popular although they did cooperate.
I think it is also worth noting this was an example of what myself and @NickPalmer and others were talking about the other day. The Indie group was not made up of wet Tories but a cross section, some from the right of the party and also LDs joined as well as non aligned people. They weren't anti Tory, they were anti what the Tory group had done. As Nick mentioned most stuff isn't political and they get on and do it regardless of their political views 90% of the time.
The Tory losses were not because they were Tory, but because what they did, which had nothing to do with politics.
The SCOTUS decision will inflame US politics at a time when it’s already deeply polarized .
The choice is clear in November and this will impact many of the close races . Governors and state legislatures will be very much more at the forefront and it’s likely you’ll see a lot of up ballot effect .
Make no mistake behind the scenes the Dems will know this is a gift from the court which could help them save the senate.
Yup, that and letting Trump back on Twitter.
Still, it remains to be seen if the court will actually do this. If they're religious ideologues they will, but if they're political hacks they won't: What a political hack would do would be to leak that they were going to overturn, then do something that doesn't actually technically overturn but lets states almost completely ban abortion in practice. After the leak this will appear moderate and not really do much for Dem turnout.
That's what I expect to happen. Some of the intended legislation in deep Red States, if Roe is overturned, is pretty grim, and would surely impact upon the Republicans' chances.
Not in deep Red states as most voters there are anti abortion, though it might drive up Democrat turnout in blue and purple states which are more pro choice
But they were voting Republican anyway. It will motivate Democrats and Independents and maybe some Republicans who think 'For the grace of God that could be me'.
Not sure about that and I think it’s lazy to make that assumption.
Sure, it will motivate white, middle class educated liberals to vote and get out their Handmaiden Tale’s outfits. But the Democrats have them anyway and they are concentrated in already heavily Blue areas.
However, there is a fair chunk of the Democrat base - particularly Black but also a good chunk of the Hispanic vote - which is socially conservative but votes Democrat.
Turn this into a supercharger electoral issue and you might find a good chunk of those voters decide to exit the Democrat base.
Then there is @SeaShantyIrish2’s point. People in the States are used to flying large distances for regular routine visits to see family etc given air travel is so connected. It actually takes nearly twice as long to get from Belfast to Liverpool by ferry than from Mobile Alabama to Boston MA. So saying people having to travel to get abortions is not going to be seen as necessarily an unreasonable point @BartholomewRoberts thinks to many people.
In any event, I think what happens is that you get springing up a whole organisational network (and funding the cost) helping women who want abortions from banned states to those where it is not.
About two thirds of American voters don't want Roe vs Wade overturned, according to the polls. So if there are Democratic voters who are anti-abortion, there must be even more Republicans who are pro-abortion. I suspect this move will backfire on the Republicans, who will have to go on the airwaves to defend this policy every time a thirteen year old gets raped by her uncle then dies in childbirth. Abortion will still happen anyway, just like it always did; the rich will find a friendly doctor willing to do it for the right price, while the poor will find some pills on the Internet or risk sepsis with a coat hanger. All brought to you by Donald Trump, a man who probably kept half on NYC's abortionists in business during the 1980s.
Even if Roe v Wade was repealed it would NOT end abortion in most US States, for starters as most do not have the Republican governor AND Republican controlled state legislatures needed to pass abortion bans.
However currently states like Alabama and Mississippi and Tennessee and Utah cannot impose abortion restrictions despite the fact most voters there want them and they have Republican governors and Republican state legislatures due to the Supreme Court mandate of US wide legal abortion via Roe v Wade
As always it's a question of democracy vs liberty. If Alabama passed a law saying that people called Peter were not allowed access to life saving medical procedures would that be okay? And if not why is it okay for those laws to be passed with respect to pregnant women? What about when pro life states block pregnant women from travelling to pro choice states in case they have a termination? This Scotus ruling will prove to be the Dredd Scott of the abortion debate, a reactionary over-reach by activist judges that forces the issue to be resolved at a federal level. If it takes a civil war to settle it I wouldn't be entirely surprised.
That's one take. Another take is that the SC is stopping being activist and returning the US to a situation similar to the UK in which difficulty issues are dealt with by a democratic process and legislation. By 'federal level' you mean 'by a democratic process'.
It seems to me that neither extreme wants to accept that the democratic process has a legitimacy that the SC doesn't have, and that both sides only approve of the SC when it does what it wants.
The lack of open mindedness is staggering.
A democratic process subject to the veto of 40 senators.
Entirely off-topic but I have just jumped out of my chair at a massive bang as a door is slammed somewhere outside my office. Go out and have a look and yes the store room door is shut. Was open earlier when I went in. No windows or doors open and nobody else in the building...
This was the last post Dale ever posted…
Aliens! Suggested Leon.
Its my ghost called Jim Shives. Died here at work in 1895 and appears not to have left. Have seen him. Heard him. He leaves us objects. Its fine - as long as he isn't slamming the sodding door shut.
Since it’s your manor, any skinny on the mysterious murder of the bank manager in Nairn in 2004? At the time various theories were punted from drug dealers to international financial skulduggery, but it appears now to be down to a planning dispute over decking at a local hotel. There’s something terrifically NE of Scotland about that..
Is that the one they made a TV series out of?
Dunno, missed it if they did. This the event and aftermath..
The SCOTUS decision will inflame US politics at a time when it’s already deeply polarized .
The choice is clear in November and this will impact many of the close races . Governors and state legislatures will be very much more at the forefront and it’s likely you’ll see a lot of up ballot effect .
Make no mistake behind the scenes the Dems will know this is a gift from the court which could help them save the senate.
Yup, that and letting Trump back on Twitter.
Still, it remains to be seen if the court will actually do this. If they're religious ideologues they will, but if they're political hacks they won't: What a political hack would do would be to leak that they were going to overturn, then do something that doesn't actually technically overturn but lets states almost completely ban abortion in practice. After the leak this will appear moderate and not really do much for Dem turnout.
That's what I expect to happen. Some of the intended legislation in deep Red States, if Roe is overturned, is pretty grim, and would surely impact upon the Republicans' chances.
Not in deep Red states as most voters there are anti abortion, though it might drive up Democrat turnout in blue and purple states which are more pro choice
But they were voting Republican anyway. It will motivate Democrats and Independents and maybe some Republicans who think 'For the grace of God that could be me'.
Not sure about that and I think it’s lazy to make that assumption.
Sure, it will motivate white, middle class educated liberals to vote and get out their Handmaiden Tale’s outfits. But the Democrats have them anyway and they are concentrated in already heavily Blue areas.
However, there is a fair chunk of the Democrat base - particularly Black but also a good chunk of the Hispanic vote - which is socially conservative but votes Democrat.
Turn this into a supercharger electoral issue and you might find a good chunk of those voters decide to exit the Democrat base.
Then there is @SeaShantyIrish2’s point. People in the States are used to flying large distances for regular routine visits to see family etc given air travel is so connected. It actually takes nearly twice as long to get from Belfast to Liverpool by ferry than from Mobile Alabama to Boston MA. So saying people having to travel to get abortions is not going to be seen as necessarily an unreasonable point @BartholomewRoberts thinks to many people.
In any event, I think what happens is that you get springing up a whole organisational network (and funding the cost) helping women who want abortions from banned states to those where it is not.
About two thirds of American voters don't want Roe vs Wade overturned, according to the polls. So if there are Democratic voters who are anti-abortion, there must be even more Republicans who are pro-abortion. I suspect this move will backfire on the Republicans, who will have to go on the airwaves to defend this policy every time a thirteen year old gets raped by her uncle then dies in childbirth. Abortion will still happen anyway, just like it always did; the rich will find a friendly doctor willing to do it for the right price, while the poor will find some pills on the Internet or risk sepsis with a coat hanger. All brought to you by Donald Trump, a man who probably kept half on NYC's abortionists in business during the 1980s.
Even if Roe v Wade was repealed it would NOT end abortion in most US States, for starters as most do not have the Republican governor AND Republican controlled state legislatures needed to pass abortion bans.
However currently states like Alabama and Mississippi and Tennessee and Utah cannot impose abortion restrictions despite the fact most voters there want them and they have Republican governors and Republican state legislatures due to the Supreme Court mandate of US wide legal abortion via Roe v Wade
As always it's a question of democracy vs liberty. If Alabama passed a law saying that people called Peter were not allowed access to life saving medical procedures would that be okay? And if not why is it okay for those laws to be passed with respect to pregnant women? What about when pro life states block pregnant women from travelling to pro choice states in case they have a termination? This Scotus ruling will prove to be the Dredd Scott of the abortion debate, a reactionary over-reach by activist judges that forces the issue to be resolved at a federal level. If it takes a civil war to settle it I wouldn't be entirely surprised.
In a democracy in a Federal nation like the US built on states' rights the states are allowed to do anything they wish not prevented by the US constitution or Federal law.
The US constitution gives rights to free speech, to bear arms, abolition of slavery and against cruel and unusual punishment. It does not give an automatic right to healthcare nor does it give a right to abortion on demand despite what a more liberal SC decided in Roe v Wade.
Respect for a minority of mainly southern states' having the right to impose pro life legislation if they wish is not incompatible with the constituency and does not need to lead to another civil war
The constitutional ban on slavery only happened because the Northern States overthrew the governments of the Southern States, though. The South was challenged because the North could see that Southern slave states were intent on projecting their system extra-terratorially, through eg the Dredd Scott case and efforts to make slavery legal in the Louisiana purchase territories. Southern states will attempt to do the same on abortion by putting legal impediments on women travelling to pro abortion states for treatment or shipping in morning after pills from out of state. This will lead to an increasingly angry confrontation between the two sets of states, although obviously I would hope that it won't end in civil war. A constitutional amendment legalising abortion in all of the US would be the first best solution but is impossible to imagine given the way the population is distributed (ie sparsely populated states with an anti abortion majority would block it).
Labour's @JonAshworth: "It's shameful that pensioners have no choice but to sit on the bus all day to avoid racking up heating bills. For Johnson to respond by boasting about the London bus pass reveals just how out of touch this narcissistic PM is.”
What would you suggest the Government do about pensioners heating bills, increase the state pension even more than it has been with the triple lock?
In any case, who has their heating on all day even in the winter? I was brought up to put on a jumper.
I have a great deal of sympathy with this point. Am surprised, however, that there hasn't been any attempt to make it from the government.
What's the point? They'd immediately get howled down as "out of touch" by people who think it's a human right to heat their houses to 22°C all winter.
Human right or not, sensible or not, the political angle is that some people can afford to heat their houses to 22°C all winter and some can't, hence a one rule for them attack line.
Which is why it needs a public information campaign. Needs to be pitched not primarily as a cost saving measure, but an energy security one. If you heat your home to 22°C, and do, you're doing Vlad's bidding. That kind of thing.
Btw. Not sure how anyone finds 22 inside comfortable. The population of Asia would think it stark bonkers.
We need to be careful about these kind of specifics. My grandmother definitely had the heating above 22C. People will vary in what they are comfortable with. It would be better instead to focus on wastage. Now you need to be careful because plenty of people worried about their bills will be economising anyway. So it needs to be targeted at the affluent who don't have financial insecurity. Urge them to be mindful about their energy usage.
Comments
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1997/05/abortion-in-american-history/376851/
...In one of the many curious twists that mark the history of abortion, the campaign to criminalize it was waged by the same professional group that, a century later, would play an important role in legalization: physicians. The American Medical Association's crusade against abortion was partly a professional move, to establish the supremacy of "regular" physicians over midwives and homeopaths. More broadly, anti-abortion sentiment was connected to nativism, anti-Catholicism, and, as it is today, anti-feminism. Immigration, especially by Catholics and nonwhites, was increasing, while birth rates among white native-born Protestants were declining. (Unlike the typical abortion patient of today, that of the nineteenth century was a middle- or upper-class white married woman.) Would the West "be filled by our own children or by those of aliens?" the physician and anti-abortion leader Horatio R. Storer asked in 1868. "This is a question our women must answer; upon their loins depends the future destiny of the nation." (It should be mentioned that the nineteenth-century women's movement also opposed abortion, having pinned its hopes on "voluntary motherhood"—the right of wives to control the frequency and timing of sex with their husbands.)
Nonetheless, having achieved their legal goal, many doctors—including prominent members of the AMA—went right on providing abortions. Some late-nineteenth-century observers estimated that two million were performed annually (which would mean that in Victorian America the number of abortions per capita was seven or eight times as high as it is today)....
But keep it up Lavrov, let’s see how many more neutral countries can be turned against Russia in the coming weeks!
NY Times blog
However currently states like Alabama and Mississippi and Tennessee and Utah cannot impose abortion restrictions despite the fact most voters there want them and they have Republican governors and Republican state legislatures due to the Supreme Court mandate of US wide legal abortion via Roe v Wade
https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/boris-johnson-free-bus-pass-cost-of-living_uk_6270e306e4b050c90f43d7f9
https://twitter.com/EuromaidanPress/status/1521423234805252096
Patron the Jack Russell Terrier continues assisting Ukraine's State Emergency Service in demining areas liberated from the Russian occupiers.
On Saturday alone, he helped demine 262 explosive objects in Chernihiv Oblast!
You therefore hope to see an end to Johnson's premiership while simultaneously avoiding the attention of the Conservative Party's Stasi, who would otherwise have binned you for disloyalty.
The net result is that over the past two weeks this country has seemingly had the highest death rate in the world!
I have had four jabs, weae a mask, even in the Gym, usually the only one, oh yes two regulars went down with it last week.
IT is everwhere but we are unaware.
Saddam had invaded two other sovereign states
Was supporting terrorism in Israel
Had used WMD on his own people
Had failed to comply with UN Inspectors for 10 years.
Would in the view of the UN have re-started his WMD programme if sanctions had been removed
But our war was nevertheless "illegal" - in quotes because of course the concept is meaningless in such circumstances. Putin learnt well from the West in many regards.
"State rights today, state rights tomorrow ... state rights forever!"
And do we have the highest death rates currently? I know there was a reporting lag over Easter.
Here is one example from before the locals. A by election in Lovelace. Always Tory. The Indies haven't formed yet. It is in Guildford Borough but Mole Valley constituency so Mole Valley Tories pick their candidate. Guildford Borough Tories refuse to help for their own borough seat!
LDs not only win but take 70% of the vote.
LD winner and Tory candidate later defect to the Indies when they are formed.
Keep your mask if you want, but don't expect others to try futilely to "stop the spread" of something we are OK with spreading.
It’s a fact in absence of any new significant evidence since last investigated, The Tories merely doing a throw spaghetti at the wall see what sticks. What significant new evidence has emerged that warrants a new or reopened investigation? The Tories and mail have brought nothing forward, they merely hoping the police could find some, but that is not how the process works, not how justice works.
The killer fact, unlike when the Tories partied during lockdown in Westminster, at this particular time of Starmer’s working meal, the rules were you could do a working meal in office. Unless Tories or friends in media, or anyone in public such as caterer who delivered a feast, comes forward with evidence it was different than the first investigation concluded, then it quite rightly remains closed. Simples.
Now there is a Federal ban on abortion restrictions in every US state even if voters elect a pro
life governor and state legislature due to Roe v Wade
Any international rules based system is going to be imperfect, but it is far better than the absence of one.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BUHP3KDi-OQ
But If we don't start getting on with our life now, when will we? My brother, who's over seventy, has severe COPD, and has had his four jabs is well despite his wife testing positive a couple of weeks ago. She had one rough day but recovered quickly. Thanks to her vaccinations.
Old people have a tendency to die from viruses sometimes. "In the UK, RSV accounts for approximately 450,000 GP appointments, 29,000 hospitalisations and 83 deaths per year in children and adolescents, the majority in infants. It also has a major impact on elderly adults; 175,000 GP appointments, 14,000 hospitalisations and 8,000 deaths per year in the UK."
Yet how many people even know what RSV (respiratory syncytical virus) is?
If you wait for zero deaths, you might wait a long time.
BP says it will continue with its £18billion investment plans in UK *even if* the Government imposes a windfall tax
My colleague @emilygosden has the latest from BP chief executive Bernard Looney
https://twitter.com/emilygosden/status/1521431988695097345
We have now in the west (or UK at least) reached a situation where everyone has antibodies either from vaccination, disease or both. We are in a much better place than 2020. I went away at the weekend to North Devon. Eating out in pubs with no masks, attending an off road race with n covid rules. It was bliss.
Off course covid is still there. Some people are dying. At the moment we are on the reverse slope of the wave and pretty soon its likely we will have minimal covid and no restrictions. For the greater part that is entirely due to the disappointing vaccines.
If we knew Iraq had WMD we wouldn't have invaded because we'd have been scared of the WMD. That we went ahead with it shows we thought they *didn't* have WMD.
So we invaded Iraq because we thought they didn't have WMD and said we were doing it because we thought they did.
(I really must reread that Catch 22 novel one day)
Am surprised, however, that there hasn't been any attempt to make it from the government.
Anyway, take it you believe the “it was a honest mistake we forgot about Rayner” line. Given that, I’m sure you will be generous if BJ trots out the same line.
You should know this by now.
Please carry on wearing a mask if it makes you feel safer. We are living with covid and some people are dying from it. Sadly they are typically elderly and with other health issues. Covid will be on the death certificate as will heart problems, liver disease, etc.
Ukraine's Ambassador in Berlin
@MelnykAndrij to German Chancellor Olaf Scholz: "It doesn't sound very statesmanlike to behave like an offended liver sausage."
https://twitter.com/ChristopherJM/status/1521403653000732672
What about when pro life states block pregnant women from travelling to pro choice states in case they have a termination?
This Scotus ruling will prove to be the Dredd Scott of the abortion debate, a reactionary over-reach by activist judges that forces the issue to be resolved at a federal level. If it takes a civil war to settle it I wouldn't be entirely surprised.
And then people criticise the partisan nature of politics.
However, it is part of the job of a government (usually), to tell folk unpopular stuff they don't want to hear, but which is in the national interest. It could be tied to Ukraine as a patriotic thing to do.
This lot don't seem interested at all.
Her reason for leaving what was obviously a comfortable lifestyle was that foreigners had been advised to leave -I assumed by the British government-and she worried that if she didn't leave then it might be impossible. The ex pats left en masse apparently and her media job had gone by then.
Though she talked freely we were in danger of being at such cross purposes I listened more than I asked questions. She did mention the fascists in Mariupol which was how she explained the bombing and she did say that it wasn't a new war but a continuation of the previous one.
When I've been charity collecting I've knocked on thousands of doors over the years (in December). The number of really warm houses you encounter is astonishing. I recall one guy coming to the door in just shorts. The heat from the house was like getting off a plane a tropical country.
It paints a picture of what things might be like in US states that criminalise abortion, although the introduction of pharmacological methods for early abortion change the situation somewhat.
You seem supportive of this Tory attack. So I can make an allegation against you and make a complaint to the police. The examine my evidence, judge it not to provide evidence of a crime and end their investigation.
What you want then is that I get my friends to start a campaign for the police to investigate you anyway. That the police should interview you for the non-crime about the non-evidence and that you are the person who has to provide the evidence that your non-suspicious legal behaviour was above board.
That really what you want?
Tories who lose their seats this week will be mightily impressed the Tories fought a negative campaign, and wasted so much time and energy on the Partygate and currygate Westminster bubble twaddle, I suspect 🙄
What he should do though is, if he criticising someone’s else’s behaviour, is be whiter than white. His attempts to explain it all don’t seem that great either. Same for his supporters as well. If you are going to demand BJ resigns and in the same breath say “it’s all overblown with Starmer” you’re backing your side not playing the facts.
In any event, what we think doesn’t matter, it’s what the wider public thanks and there seems a fair bit of anecdotal evidence that people are not really buying the excuses of SKS.
If you heat your home to 22°C, and do, you're doing Vlad's bidding. That kind of thing.
Btw. Not sure how anyone finds 22 inside comfortable. The population of Asia would think it stark bonkers.
Blimey what a clusterfuck was mine.
The US constitution gives rights to free speech, to bear arms, abolition of slavery and against cruel and unusual punishment. It does not give an automatic right to healthcare nor does it give a right to abortion on demand despite what a more liberal SC decided in Roe v Wade.
Respect for a minority of mainly southern states' having the right to impose pro life legislation if they wish is not incompatible with the constitution and does not need to lead to another civil war
2011
3 Tory candidates win with between 2700 and 3000 votes each
2 Lab/ 1 LD candidates each muster between 400 and 650 votes each
Pretty safe? 80+% of the vote for the Cons
2019
3 Indies win with between 2666 and 2907 votes each
3 Tories get between 532 and 947 votes each
If that is not a slaughter from a dominant position I don't know what is.
Aliens! Suggested Leon.
Cameron and Thatcher made a virtue of saying things weren't great and you have to suffer to put it right.
you’re backing your side They are not my side. I am a member of a different party.
not playing the facts. the facts that the event was a legal campaign event?
These students made a complaint and submitted their video as evidence. The police review the evidence, confirm the law at the time and say "no evidence of an offence". These are the facts. The rest is desperate political smear by the guilty.
As I keep saying, if you want a society where I can compel the police to keep investigating your legal activities by making baseless complaints without any evidence, then keep going the way you are.
(Had to remove your link as it was doing horrid things to the HTML)
It seems to me that neither extreme wants to accept that the democratic process has a legitimacy that the SC doesn't have, and that both sides only approve of the SC when it does what it wants.
The lack of open mindedness is staggering.
(I'm not a believer, but exorcisms often work. Its a bit like doswing, which seems to work too)
But if the rules were the same as they were for cakegate then a reasonable person would think that if Boris was in the wrong so was SKS.
My remark was that it doesn't seem rock solid anymore. Which would appear to be untrue. Seems firmly Indy now.
I think it is also worth noting this was an example of what myself and @NickPalmer and others were talking about the other day. The Indie group was not made up of wet Tories but a cross section, some from the right of the party and also LDs joined as well as non aligned people. They weren't anti Tory, they were anti what the Tory group had done. As Nick mentioned most stuff isn't political and they get on and do it regardless of their political views 90% of the time.
The Tory losses were not because they were Tory, but because what they did, which had nothing to do with politics.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-61215644