“The BBC has now ‘disappeared’ women as a sex class and instead monitors ‘gender identity’. It’s redefined a word which we all understand, without any public debate… following ‘Stonewall law’ in failing to respect sex as as a protected characteristic”
The headline quoted in the tweet gives more context: BBC ‘disappearing women’ as gender quota filled by trans guests who self-identify Corporation’s 50:50 equality project fails to ‘monitor whether a contributor’s gender differs from their sex registered at birth’
What is the alternative? Either you take guests' word for whether they sit down to pee or you make them give a blood sample for DNA testing.
You can ask for people's biological sex and gender identity separately and trust them to be honest, and then you have better data to do your equality monitoring with.
You get to monitor that you have any trans guests at all for starters.
No harm in doing both. Which is why if the Scottish Census wasn’t already a complete car crash because of abysmal return rates it would be anyway because they decided that people could decide what sex they were whatever their birth certificate said.
Actually there is harm in doing both. For a start, if you introduce new classes, you will need to incorporate them into the target, and that in itself will be controversial.
But the biggest problem is asking guests at all. It is intrusive. As a thought experiment, imagine Tesco introduces a 50/50 male/female customer target. It can just ask till staff to press the blue or pink button according to their impression, and that will be good enough with a massive sample size hiding random errors. But now imagine someone outside Tesco with a clipboard asking questions about your sex and gender before letting you inside. You'd be off to Morrison's like a shot.
The Duke of Rothesay making an absolute arse of himself. Again. His minders must be ripping their hair out.
What is the mechanism for skipping straight from Elisabeth to William? Can the Daftie be forced out?
There's no mechanism to skip a generation. If you don't want Charles the only way to avoid it is if we make Dame Judi Dench the next monarch by general acclamation. No need to be weird about it or anything, everybody has to just act like it's the normal thing that Queen Elizabeth is dead so now the new Queen is Queen Judi.
It's happened before. Complete with automatic transfer of Divine Right. Come to think of it, 'divine' is an appropriate term especially for Dame Judi!
Liverpool Labour sources tell me West Derby MP Ian Bryne lost last night’s final branch trigger vote. Means Bryne has now lost every single branch vote in the CLP, despite a PR campaign backed by John McDonnell and others. Source says of last night’s vote :”He lost badly.”
Yet more evidence that Corbynism is dead and the Labour Party and membership has moved firmly to the centre.
Numbers have been going up somewhat slowly, but according to Oryx's figures, Russia has lost 910 tanks and 4,997 vehicles in total.
Real numbers are probably much higher, as many of the losses are now occurring deep behind Russian lines and photographic evidence is probably harder to come by.
Assuming the actual number is somewhere in the middle, that’s around 40% of the entire Russian army’s tanks, lost in only five months of war. We also know that most of what’s left are relics of the 1960s, that have been in what’s euphamisttically termed ‘storage’ for decades. It’s quite likely that, by the end of the summer, they’re going to be struggling to find any serviceable tanks to get to the front lines.
It now looks like the Russians in Kherson have lost all their supply routes apart from the river itself. They’re quickly going to have to either retreat without their equipment, or be starved out with nightly bombardments on their undefended positions.
The Duke of Rothesay making an absolute arse of himself. Again. His minders must be ripping their hair out.
What is the mechanism for skipping straight from Elisabeth to William? Can the Daftie be forced out?
There's no mechanism to skip a generation. If you don't want Charles the only way to avoid it is if we make Dame Judi Dench the next monarch by general acclamation. No need to be weird about it or anything, everybody has to just act like it's the normal thing that Queen Elizabeth is dead so now the new Queen is Queen Judi.
It's happened before. Complete with automatic transfer of Divine Right. Come to think of it, 'divine' is an appropriate term especially for Dame Judi!
Because Brexit meant no bands came to Glastonbury this year..... uh-huh....
Brexit does not mean no bands will turn up, but the carnet issue is devastating and something that was obviously going to be an issue. I was banging on about it here pre brexit as it was an area I had some experience. A friend of mine who had an exhibition business was effectively put out of business overnight because he could no longer compete in Europe for any large event. If you are moving large trailers of equipment back and forth eg exhibitions, bands, F1 the impact is devastating. F1 will survive because it is so dominant here but it's still impacted and I'm sure they will warehouse a lot more in Europe.
Just because bands still turn up does not mean it is devastating. Lots won't and the UK may stop being the kick off or central location for European tours
Obviously I meant 'does not mean it isn't devastating' In answer to @tres I don't think there will be any big US bands who don't turn up. They still will. The main issue will be bands travelling to and from Europe from the UK. Smaller bands might stop, but the Rolling Stones won't, but it will cost them a lot more. Not sure what impact it will have on a US based band as they will have carnet issues anyway. I expect more to base their tours from Europe and not the UK.
Numbers have been going up somewhat slowly, but according to Oryx's figures, Russia has lost 910 tanks and 4,997 vehicles in total.
Real numbers are probably much higher, as many of the losses are now occurring deep behind Russian lines and photographic evidence is probably harder to come by.
Assuming the actual number is somewhere in the middle, that’s around 40% of the entire Russian army’s tanks, lost in only five months of war. We also know that most of what’s left are relics of the 1960s, that have been in what’s euphamisttically termed ‘storage’ for decades. It’s quite likely that, by the end of the summer, they’re going to be struggling to find any serviceable tanks to get to the front lines.
It now looks like the Russians in Kherson have lost all their supply routes apart from the river itself. They’re quickly going to have to either retreat without their equipment, or be starved out with nightly bombardments on their undefended positions.
I wonder what the breakdown is by tank type. Using figures from Wikipedia and Oryx (though note that 195 of the 910 are of unidentified type, so you might be able to scale these by +25% for the total identified as lost by Oryx, and more - maybe an additional +50% - for an estimate of the true numbers lost).
T-90 417 active and 200 reserve of which 22 confirmed lost, 5.3% of the active force.
T-80 480 active and 3000 reserve of which 170 confirmed lost, 35% of the active force.
T-72 2030 active and 7000 reserve of which 487 confirmed lost, 24% of the active force.
Oryx also has Russia losing 35 T-64s which will either have been previously captured from the Ukrainians, or be part of the LNR/DNR forces.
Oryx has only 1 T-62 confirmed destroyed, though I think none of these were previously active and the number in reserve was unknown.
It's interesting to see the higher proportion of lost T-80s. This suggests that most of the T-90s have been held back for the elite Putin-guard forces around Moscow, and otherwise Russia sent and lost its next best tier of units.
It's quite likely that Russia has lost around two-thirds of its active T-80s and nearly half of its active T-72s.
We have no idea how well stored the large numbers of reserve T-80s and T-72s have been, though the appearance of T-62s is suggestive that it's at least taking time to return these to service.
There is still a large civilian population in Kherson City. Starving the Russian troops out would mean starving the civilians too. I don't think that's a viable strategy for the Ukrainian government.
Why does every Tory leadership contest require the same weak-ass policy ideas to be trotted out, like fines for missing GP appointments? I’ve been hearing proposals like this for at least a decade. The fact they never actually happen suggests maybe they’re not that good an idea?
There was a poll yesterday that said Truss would lead Labour by 1 point
The question isn't if she has a honeymoon, but for how long will the honeymoon last?
That wasn't my point Pete. My point was that she ties Labour within MoE, not exactly the kind of bounce Johnson, May, or even Brown saw.
A fair point, my gut feeling is she will get such a media boost that the Conservative Party will move to five or six points ahead. That's how it works.
Will that lead last? I suspect it will take two or three months before crossover and small Labour leads. Winter could be economically horrific for a significant percentage of the population. Will speeches castigating Europe, Putin, transgender people and ethnic taxi drivers keep the bounce up? I doubt it, and the Labour lead could be back to circling the double figure mark in some polls in the New Year/ Spring. The huge plus mark against her name is Ukraine. Putin (doesn't know this) is her friend. If Ukraine sees a Russian collapse she has positioned herself as the architect of that defeat. Total bollocks, but that's incumbency for you
There was a poll yesterday that said Truss would lead Labour by 1 point
The question isn't if she has a honeymoon, but for how long will the honeymoon last?
Until peoples energy bills nearly double in October.
Of course the counter is that she gets no boost at all and the Tories stay where they are. She doesn't have to get a boost, we just assume she will because historically that is what has happened.
Even if inflation reverses costs of things are going to remain high for a long time. And unless there is something done about that - and Truss has not yet announced anything to my knowledge - the economy is going to be blamed squarely on the Tories.
Longer term you'd hope earnings will go up as inflation goes down but we've had a decade of stagnant wages and I can't see Liz offering short term solutions for that either.
They don't have enough time to do anything, that's the real problem for her. These are deep-routed issues.
The Duke of Rothesay making an absolute arse of himself. Again. His minders must be ripping their hair out.
What is the mechanism for skipping straight from Elisabeth to William? Can the Daftie be forced out?
There's no mechanism to skip a generation. If you don't want Charles the only way to avoid it is if we make Dame Judi Dench the next monarch by general acclamation. No need to be weird about it or anything, everybody has to just act like it's the normal thing that Queen Elizabeth is dead so now the new Queen is Queen Judi.
It's happened before. Complete with automatic transfer of Divine Right. Come to think of it, 'divine' is an appropriate term especially for Dame Judi!
Why not Claire Foy?
Excellent idea!
Even republicans like me generally admit Queen Elizabeth II has been ok for a monarch. So if we have to remain a monarchy (and it seems the public are determined to support it) let's just keep having Queen Elizabeths forever.
When the current one reaches her well-deserved eternal rest, just select a pretty young actress to take the role for the next 60 or 70 years. Claire Foy would be perfect.
Numbers have been going up somewhat slowly, but according to Oryx's figures, Russia has lost 910 tanks and 4,997 vehicles in total.
Real numbers are probably much higher, as many of the losses are now occurring deep behind Russian lines and photographic evidence is probably harder to come by.
Assuming the actual number is somewhere in the middle, that’s around 40% of the entire Russian army’s tanks, lost in only five months of war. We also know that most of what’s left are relics of the 1960s, that have been in what’s euphamisttically termed ‘storage’ for decades. It’s quite likely that, by the end of the summer, they’re going to be struggling to find any serviceable tanks to get to the front lines.
It now looks like the Russians in Kherson have lost all their supply routes apart from the river itself. They’re quickly going to have to either retreat without their equipment, or be starved out with nightly bombardments on their undefended positions.
Liverpool Labour sources tell me West Derby MP Ian Bryne lost last night’s final branch trigger vote. Means Bryne has now lost every single branch vote in the CLP, despite a PR campaign backed by John McDonnell and others. Source says of last night’s vote :”He lost badly.”
Yet more evidence that Corbynism is dead and the Labour Party and membership has moved firmly to the centre.
Why does every Tory leadership contest require the same weak-ass policy ideas to be trotted out, like fines for missing GP appointments? I’ve been hearing proposals like this for at least a decade. The fact they never actually happen suggests maybe they’re not that good an idea?
Bring back the rod and / or Matron for criticising the contest.
“The BBC has now ‘disappeared’ women as a sex class and instead monitors ‘gender identity’. It’s redefined a word which we all understand, without any public debate… following ‘Stonewall law’ in failing to respect sex as as a protected characteristic”
The headline quoted in the tweet gives more context: BBC ‘disappearing women’ as gender quota filled by trans guests who self-identify Corporation’s 50:50 equality project fails to ‘monitor whether a contributor’s gender differs from their sex registered at birth’
What is the alternative? Either you take guests' word for whether they sit down to pee or you make them give a blood sample for DNA testing.
You can ask for people's biological sex and gender identity separately and trust them to be honest, and then you have better data to do your equality monitoring with.
You get to monitor that you have any trans guests at all for starters.
No harm in doing both. Which is why if the Scottish Census wasn’t already a complete car crash because of abysmal return rates it would be anyway because they decided that people could decide what sex they were whatever their birth certificate said.
Actually there is harm in doing both. For a start, if you introduce new classes, you will need to incorporate them into the target, and that in itself will be controversial.
But the biggest problem is asking guests at all. It is intrusive. As a thought experiment, imagine Tesco introduces a 50/50 male/female customer target. It can just ask till staff to press the blue or pink button according to their impression, and that will be good enough with a massive sample size hiding random errors. But now imagine someone outside Tesco with a clipboard asking questions about your sex and gender before letting you inside. You'd be off to Morrison's like a shot.
No, you'd claim to be a Vogon Fifth Sex and then just get on with the shopping. Not as if they could disprove it, is it?
Liverpool Labour sources tell me West Derby MP Ian Bryne lost last night’s final branch trigger vote. Means Bryne has now lost every single branch vote in the CLP, despite a PR campaign backed by John McDonnell and others. Source says of last night’s vote :”He lost badly.”
Yet more evidence that Corbynism is dead and the Labour Party and membership has moved firmly to the centre.
Does that mean he is deselected?
No - it means he’s not automatically reselected - so he can put his name forward for selection - if he’s feeling (very) lucky….
Liverpool Labour sources tell me West Derby MP Ian Bryne lost last night’s final branch trigger vote. Means Bryne has now lost every single branch vote in the CLP, despite a PR campaign backed by John McDonnell and others. Source says of last night’s vote :”He lost badly.”
Yet more evidence that Corbynism is dead and the Labour Party and membership has moved firmly to the centre.
The problem is that the spectre of Corbyn still looms large in the minds of voters. Class warfare strikes (of which I have some sympathy at present) do not help the new New Labour cause. Halfwits like Owen Jones and John McDonnell are wheeled out to remind voters why they felt it necessary to vote for an arse like Johnson over the Labour Party.
The Duke of Rothesay making an absolute arse of himself. Again. His minders must be ripping their hair out.
What is the mechanism for skipping straight from Elisabeth to William? Can the Daftie be forced out?
There's no mechanism to skip a generation. If you don't want Charles the only way to avoid it is if we make Dame Judi Dench the next monarch by general acclamation. No need to be weird about it or anything, everybody has to just act like it's the normal thing that Queen Elizabeth is dead so now the new Queen is Queen Judi.
It's happened before. Complete with automatic transfer of Divine Right. Come to think of it, 'divine' is an appropriate term especially for Dame Judi!
We’ve published an important letter in today’s Observer from Labour MPs & peers expressing dismay at @Keir_Starmer’s party blocking @LabWomenDec from having a stand at this year’s conference. Good to [see] them speaking out about attempts to quash women’s voices in Labour 👏
Numbers have been going up somewhat slowly, but according to Oryx's figures, Russia has lost 910 tanks and 4,997 vehicles in total.
Real numbers are probably much higher, as many of the losses are now occurring deep behind Russian lines and photographic evidence is probably harder to come by.
Assuming the actual number is somewhere in the middle, that’s around 40% of the entire Russian army’s tanks, lost in only five months of war. We also know that most of what’s left are relics of the 1960s, that have been in what’s euphamisttically termed ‘storage’ for decades. It’s quite likely that, by the end of the summer, they’re going to be struggling to find any serviceable tanks to get to the front lines.
It now looks like the Russians in Kherson have lost all their supply routes apart from the river itself. They’re quickly going to have to either retreat without their equipment, or be starved out with nightly bombardments on their undefended positions.
I wonder what the breakdown is by tank type. Using figures from Wikipedia and Oryx (though note that 195 of the 910 are of unidentified type, so you might be able to scale these by +25% for the total identified as lost by Oryx, and more - maybe an additional +50% - for an estimate of the true numbers lost).
T-90 417 active and 200 reserve of which 22 confirmed lost, 5.3% of the active force.
T-80 480 active and 3000 reserve of which 170 confirmed lost, 35% of the active force.
T-72 2030 active and 7000 reserve of which 487 confirmed lost, 24% of the active force.
Oryx also has Russia losing 35 T-64s which will either have been previously captured from the Ukrainians, or be part of the LNR/DNR forces.
Oryx has only 1 T-62 confirmed destroyed, though I think none of these were previously active and the number in reserve was unknown.
It's interesting to see the higher proportion of lost T-80s. This suggests that most of the T-90s have been held back for the elite Putin-guard forces around Moscow, and otherwise Russia sent and lost its next best tier of units.
It's quite likely that Russia has lost around two-thirds of its active T-80s and nearly half of its active T-72s.
We have no idea how well stored the large numbers of reserve T-80s and T-72s have been, though the appearance of T-62s is suggestive that it's at least taking time to return these to service.
There is still a large civilian population in Kherson City. Starving the Russian troops out would mean starving the civilians too. I don't think that's a viable strategy for the Ukrainian government.
The Wiki numbers for each model of tank, seems to have benefited somewhat from Russian editing. Moscow may have signed a cheque for 617 T-90 tanks, but there’s little evidence of the existence of anything close to that number. Western estimates from the start of the war, suggest around 3,500 Russian tanks in total, rather than the 14,000 suggested by Wiki.
The Russians in Kherson will be starved of ammunition and military supplies, rather than starved of food. Unarmed invaders won’t last long, against an armed civilian population and a defending military just outside the city, firing on their positions every night.
The Duke of Rothesay making an absolute arse of himself. Again. His minders must be ripping their hair out.
What is the mechanism for skipping straight from Elisabeth to William? Can the Daftie be forced out?
There's no mechanism to skip a generation. If you don't want Charles the only way to avoid it is if we make Dame Judi Dench the next monarch by general acclamation. No need to be weird about it or anything, everybody has to just act like it's the normal thing that Queen Elizabeth is dead so now the new Queen is Queen Judi.
It's happened before. Complete with automatic transfer of Divine Right. Come to think of it, 'divine' is an appropriate term especially for Dame Judi!
We could be really progressive and follow her with Queen Eddie
BTW Eddie has already played Queen Judi's heir as Edward VII
Numbers have been going up somewhat slowly, but according to Oryx's figures, Russia has lost 910 tanks and 4,997 vehicles in total.
Real numbers are probably much higher, as many of the losses are now occurring deep behind Russian lines and photographic evidence is probably harder to come by.
Assuming the actual number is somewhere in the middle, that’s around 40% of the entire Russian army’s tanks, lost in only five months of war. We also know that most of what’s left are relics of the 1960s, that have been in what’s euphamisttically termed ‘storage’ for decades. It’s quite likely that, by the end of the summer, they’re going to be struggling to find any serviceable tanks to get to the front lines.
It now looks like the Russians in Kherson have lost all their supply routes apart from the river itself. They’re quickly going to have to either retreat without their equipment, or be starved out with nightly bombardments on their undefended positions.
I wonder what the breakdown is by tank type. Using figures from Wikipedia and Oryx (though note that 195 of the 910 are of unidentified type, so you might be able to scale these by +25% for the total identified as lost by Oryx, and more - maybe an additional +50% - for an estimate of the true numbers lost).
T-90 417 active and 200 reserve of which 22 confirmed lost, 5.3% of the active force.
T-80 480 active and 3000 reserve of which 170 confirmed lost, 35% of the active force.
T-72 2030 active and 7000 reserve of which 487 confirmed lost, 24% of the active force.
Oryx also has Russia losing 35 T-64s which will either have been previously captured from the Ukrainians, or be part of the LNR/DNR forces.
Oryx has only 1 T-62 confirmed destroyed, though I think none of these were previously active and the number in reserve was unknown.
It's interesting to see the higher proportion of lost T-80s. This suggests that most of the T-90s have been held back for the elite Putin-guard forces around Moscow, and otherwise Russia sent and lost its next best tier of units.
It's quite likely that Russia has lost around two-thirds of its active T-80s and nearly half of its active T-72s.
We have no idea how well stored the large numbers of reserve T-80s and T-72s have been, though the appearance of T-62s is suggestive that it's at least taking time to return these to service.
There is still a large civilian population in Kherson City. Starving the Russian troops out would mean starving the civilians too. I don't think that's a viable strategy for the Ukrainian government.
The Wiki numbers for each model of tank, seems to have benefited somewhat from Russian editing. Moscow may have signed a cheque for 617 T-90 tanks, but there’s little evidence of the existence of anything close to that number. Western estimates from the start of the war, suggest around 3,500 Russian tanks in total, rather than the 14,000 suggested by Wiki.
The Russians in Kherson will be starved of ammunition and military supplies, rather than starved of food. Unarmed invaders won’t last long, against an armed civilian population and a defending military just outside the city, firing on their positions every night.
I do hope you're right and we're not all succumbing to wishful thinking.
I note that the T-90 wiki page says 8500+ have been built in the summary box but only 1300 to 1700 in the detail.
Johnson led Hunt by 61% to 39% amongst Conservative councillors in a 2019 poll, so for Truss to be only 2% ahead amongst the same group suggests it could still be close.
There is of course zero chance of Sunak or Hunt calling an immediate general election, voters elect the party not the leader and the party already has a majority. Major, Brown and Callaghan certainly didn't and nor did May immediately either
Numbers have been going up somewhat slowly, but according to Oryx's figures, Russia has lost 910 tanks and 4,997 vehicles in total.
Real numbers are probably much higher, as many of the losses are now occurring deep behind Russian lines and photographic evidence is probably harder to come by.
Assuming the actual number is somewhere in the middle, that’s around 40% of the entire Russian army’s tanks, lost in only five months of war. We also know that most of what’s left are relics of the 1960s, that have been in what’s euphamisttically termed ‘storage’ for decades. It’s quite likely that, by the end of the summer, they’re going to be struggling to find any serviceable tanks to get to the front lines.
It now looks like the Russians in Kherson have lost all their supply routes apart from the river itself. They’re quickly going to have to either retreat without their equipment, or be starved out with nightly bombardments on their undefended positions.
I wonder what the breakdown is by tank type. Using figures from Wikipedia and Oryx (though note that 195 of the 910 are of unidentified type, so you might be able to scale these by +25% for the total identified as lost by Oryx, and more - maybe an additional +50% - for an estimate of the true numbers lost).
T-90 417 active and 200 reserve of which 22 confirmed lost, 5.3% of the active force.
T-80 480 active and 3000 reserve of which 170 confirmed lost, 35% of the active force.
T-72 2030 active and 7000 reserve of which 487 confirmed lost, 24% of the active force.
Oryx also has Russia losing 35 T-64s which will either have been previously captured from the Ukrainians, or be part of the LNR/DNR forces.
Oryx has only 1 T-62 confirmed destroyed, though I think none of these were previously active and the number in reserve was unknown.
It's interesting to see the higher proportion of lost T-80s. This suggests that most of the T-90s have been held back for the elite Putin-guard forces around Moscow, and otherwise Russia sent and lost its next best tier of units.
It's quite likely that Russia has lost around two-thirds of its active T-80s and nearly half of its active T-72s.
We have no idea how well stored the large numbers of reserve T-80s and T-72s have been, though the appearance of T-62s is suggestive that it's at least taking time to return these to service.
There is still a large civilian population in Kherson City. Starving the Russian troops out would mean starving the civilians too. I don't think that's a viable strategy for the Ukrainian government.
The Wiki numbers for each model of tank, seems to have benefited somewhat from Russian editing. Moscow may have signed a cheque for 617 T-90 tanks, but there’s little evidence of the existence of anything close to that number. Western estimates from the start of the war, suggest around 3,500 Russian tanks in total, rather than the 14,000 suggested by Wiki.
The Russians in Kherson will be starved of ammunition and military supplies, rather than starved of food. Unarmed invaders won’t last long, against an armed civilian population and a defending military just outside the city, firing on their positions every night.
I do hope you're right and we're not all succumbing to wishful thinking.
I hope I’m right too! The only way to find out is to keep sending weapons to blow up tanks, and see how many more they can muster.
The Duke of Rothesay making an absolute arse of himself. Again. His minders must be ripping their hair out.
What is the mechanism for skipping straight from Elisabeth to William? Can the Daftie be forced out?
There's no mechanism to skip a generation. If you don't want Charles the only way to avoid it is if we make Dame Judi Dench the next monarch by general acclamation. No need to be weird about it or anything, everybody has to just act like it's the normal thing that Queen Elizabeth is dead so now the new Queen is Queen Judi.
It's happened before. Complete with automatic transfer of Divine Right. Come to think of it, 'divine' is an appropriate term especially for Dame Judi!
Scotland’s state-imposed price controls for alcohol have driven some people to turn to cheap street drugs linked to hundreds of deaths last year, health experts have warned.
Last week official statistics confirmed that Scotland remains the drug death capital of Europe, with a growing number of fatalities among women.
Because Brexit meant no bands came to Glastonbury this year..... uh-huh....
It won't be the big festivals that are affected by these extra frictions and costs. Glastonbury will be able to absorb them easily. It will be the smaller, grassroots events operating on a shoestring that will suffer. But cutting the British population off from Europe culturally is part of the Brexit project, very much a feature not a bug.
Er, bollocks. I run a smaller, grassroots event on a shoestring. We had no EU acts before Brexit. It makes no difference to us. We did, for example, have a fantastic contingent of six bands come down from Southend, and everyone concerned will be delighted for that to happen in 2023.
Festival with no EU acts unaffected by Brexit shocker.
When I saw the headline about GP fines I naturally assumed GPs were to be fined for failing to offer appointments. It's the only language they understand.
The well-intentioned scheme to enthrone Dame Judi Dench may not be to her advantage. They tried a similar stunt with Lady Jane Grey and it didn't end well.
There are going to be a lot of pissed off Conservative MPs who were sure that Truss had promised them an important job!
I’m trying to remember a quote - about medieval kingship being the art of deciding which supporters to let down by how much, while not losing the crown.
I'm glad 56% think there should be an election. Seeing Tory members interviewed on TV, at least half still support Boris. I don't think the people choosing the next PM should be people who don't think there should be a change anyway...it's a mad situation.
I think that Brexit has quite literally driven Tories mad. They have lost their senses. Support for The Oaf is simply a manifestation of their collective mental breakdown.
The interesting question is: what is the cure? All countries need a moderate centre-right, pro-business, pro-good governance party. Even England. How does the English nation regain such a party? Only one route is obvious: PR.
Over to you Mr Starmer: save the Conservative & Unionist Party, cos they ain’t gonna save themselves.
Brexit was a symptom, not a cause.
Economic globalisation has led to most people's living standards in the West stagnating, and they aren't happy about it. This has led to the collapse of the political centre in most countries, though this has been expressed in different ways. Brexit, and increased support for Scottish independence, were the particular manifestations in Britain.
This is seen in other European countries that use PR. The way to fix the issue is through the economic fundamentals. Improve people's living standards.
Improve people’s living standards by… reversing globalisation?!? Cos that seems to be what you are advocating.
Very “brave”.
Yes. The return of domestic manufacturing offshored to China, and the creation of more good working-class jobs.
The mess the economy is in right now, is a direct result of globalisation policies that have hollowed-out Western middle classes over the past few decades.
If your government is run for the top 10%, don’t be surprised if 90% don’t like it.
And instead vote in politicians funded by and introducing laws for the top 0.1%!
Which is a large part of why Richi Rich is floundering.
He's just not as good at disguising it as Truss is. They are two cheeks of the same plutocratic arse.
... and talking of plutocratic arses, Boris had his hooley at Bamford's gaff yesterday. Boris must be a very nice man with all these friends eager to lavish gifts on him in these difficult times.
He must be gutted though that Bamford didn't put him up at his Barbados place - that is properly amazing. I've spent many lazy afternoons on the fantastic beach that it faces onto.
Scotland’s state-imposed price controls for alcohol have driven some people to turn to cheap street drugs linked to hundreds of deaths last year, health experts have warned.
Last week official statistics confirmed that Scotland remains the drug death capital of Europe, with a growing number of fatalities among women.
There was a poll yesterday that said Truss would lead Labour by 1 point
The question isn't if she has a honeymoon, but for how long will the honeymoon last?
Until peoples energy bills nearly double in October.
There is a "Don't pay" movement that has popped up on my timeline a few times. People cancelling their direct debit from 01 October.
There was some discussion of this yesterday. It takes the energy companies months to get a court order to actually disconnect supplies. If a million or two stop paying in October, it likely takes until well into the spring before anything can be done about it. Such low-level civil disobedience is almost certainly going to happen, if the predictions for winter price rises are anything close to reality.
Because Brexit meant no bands came to Glastonbury this year..... uh-huh....
It won't be the big festivals that are affected by these extra frictions and costs. Glastonbury will be able to absorb them easily. It will be the smaller, grassroots events operating on a shoestring that will suffer. But cutting the British population off from Europe culturally is part of the Brexit project, very much a feature not a bug.
Er, bollocks. I run a smaller, grassroots event on a shoestring. We had no EU acts before Brexit. It makes no difference to us. We did, for example, have a fantastic contingent of six bands come down from Southend, and everyone concerned will be delighted for that to happen in 2023.
Festival with no EU acts unaffected by Brexit shocker.
We’ve just had WOMAD in Wilts. Did they have trouble getting acts in?
There was a poll yesterday that said Truss would lead Labour by 1 point
The question isn't if she has a honeymoon, but for how long will the honeymoon last?
Until peoples energy bills nearly double in October.
There is a "Don't pay" movement that has popped up on my timeline a few times. People cancelling their direct debit from 01 October.
I’ve seen this on Twitter. I just can’t see what good this will do if people do this. I’m sure there is some profiteering going on but a lot of the price increase is driven by wholesale gas prices rising and there will be a fair amount of speculation in that price currently.
Because Brexit meant no bands came to Glastonbury this year..... uh-huh....
It won't be the big festivals that are affected by these extra frictions and costs. Glastonbury will be able to absorb them easily. It will be the smaller, grassroots events operating on a shoestring that will suffer. But cutting the British population off from Europe culturally is part of the Brexit project, very much a feature not a bug.
Er, bollocks. I run a smaller, grassroots event on a shoestring. We had no EU acts before Brexit. It makes no difference to us. We did, for example, have a fantastic contingent of six bands come down from Southend, and everyone concerned will be delighted for that to happen in 2023.
Festival with no EU acts unaffected by Brexit shocker.
We’ve just had WOMAD in Wilts. Did they have trouble getting acts in?
The Trussites are becoming so confident that some of them are risking sounding complacent and arrogant by suggesting that Mr Sunak ought to quit now before he falls even further behind. He is showing signs of being rattled, such as his abrupt conversion to suspending VAT on energy bills, an idea he previously dismissed on the correct grounds that this is not the way to direct help to those who most need it because a VAT cut will be of greatest benefit to affluent households.
It is too early to definitively write off his bid for the leadership – an extraordinary event or revelation could still upend things – but we can draft a preliminary postmortem of why the golden boy lost his lustre.
One big mistake was to think that it would be enough to present himself as the safe pair of hands who protected the economy during the pandemic and can be relied on to see Britain safely through an inflation-fuelled tempest. Being the “grownup” candidate has not been an asset but a handicap because the Tory party has had its synapses scrambled during its three years in thrall to the puerile antics of Mr Johnson.
A preposterous but potent betrayal narrative is being propagated by the Johnsonites and in rightwing media, which is consumed by Tory members. The right riposte to this is that the architect of Boris Johnson’s downfall was Boris Johnson. He debased and disgraced the premiership with his rule-breaking, his lies and his sleaze.
The former chancellor has been the more fluent performer, and has demonstrated the better command of detail, in all the leadership debates. His foes have flipped that against him by saying he is too polished and packaged. Among a Tory membership that is concentrated in provincial England, it hasn’t been difficult for Team Truss to encourage mistrust of her rival as a metropolitan smoothie.
He is fighting not just for the premiership, but for his political career. If the foreign secretary wins, she is not going to bring him back as chancellor after all the contempt she has hurled at him as a “bean counter”. So venomous have been the exchanges between them, it is a struggle to see Mr Sunak in a cabinet led by Ms Truss or vice-versa. It is all or nothing for both of them. Unless Mr Sunak can change the trajectory of this contest and fast, he is going to become extremely well-acquainted with failure.
There was a poll yesterday that said Truss would lead Labour by 1 point
The question isn't if she has a honeymoon, but for how long will the honeymoon last?
Until peoples energy bills nearly double in October.
There is a "Don't pay" movement that has popped up on my timeline a few times. People cancelling their direct debit from 01 October.
There was some discussion of this yesterday. It takes the energy companies months to get a court order to actually disconnect supplies. If a million or two stop paying in October, it likely takes until well into the spring before anything can be done about it. Such low-level civil disobedience is almost certainly going to happen, if the predictions for winter price rises are anything close to reality.
I've decided not to fix my energy on that basis (see my detailed post on this yesterday). Slept on it and:
- Political reality; there is no way these insane hikes will be allowed to pass by government - And/Or they do come to pass, people don't pay, my energy company goes under. Having paid more than I needed to in the opening few months of the contract, I get dumped onto the variable rate just before I get to enjoy the lower (relative to the new variable) rate.
Scotland’s state-imposed price controls for alcohol have driven some people to turn to cheap street drugs linked to hundreds of deaths last year, health experts have warned.
Last week official statistics confirmed that Scotland remains the drug death capital of Europe, with a growing number of fatalities among women.
Johnson led Hunt by 61% to 39% amongst Conservative councillors in a 2019 poll, so for Truss to be only 2% ahead amongst the same group suggests it could still be close.
There is of course zero chance of Sunak or Hunt calling an immediate general election, voters elect the party not the leader and the party already has a majority. Major, Brown and Callaghan certainly didn't and nor did May immediately either
I assume you mean Truss, not Hunt, in your penultimate sentence. Unless you know something that we don't?
Because Brexit meant no bands came to Glastonbury this year..... uh-huh....
Brexit does not mean no bands will turn up, but the carnet issue is devastating and something that was obviously going to be an issue. I was banging on about it here pre brexit as it was an area I had some experience. A friend of mine who had an exhibition business was effectively put out of business overnight because he could no longer compete in Europe for any large event. If you are moving large trailers of equipment back and forth eg exhibitions, bands, F1 the impact is devastating. F1 will survive because it is so dominant here but it's still impacted and I'm sure they will warehouse a lot more in Europe.
Just because bands still turn up does not mean it is devastating. Lots won't and the UK may stop being the kick off or central location for European tours
Obviously I meant 'does not mean it isn't devastating' In answer to @tres I don't think there will be any big US bands who don't turn up. They still will. The main issue will be bands travelling to and from Europe from the UK. Smaller bands might stop, but the Rolling Stones won't, but it will cost them a lot more. Not sure what impact it will have on a US based band as they will have carnet issues anyway. I expect more to base their tours from Europe and not the UK.
"I know a guy who knows a guy.."
There is a big market for stories about trivial Brexit frustrations at the margins.
Any band that wants to play to its UK fan base (which is likely to be their biggest in Europe, and from which they will earn tens of millions in royalties, publicity and sales) isn't going to be put off by a £600 carnet fee, or even paying someone £1,000 to organise it for them, just as they wouldn't be by hotel bills or a tour management team and publicist.
You'd have to be a very modest band on a shoestring tour for this to be the deciding factor, and, if it were, you'd have bigger problems.
At the risk of sounding like a broken record, axing the green levy, or at least suspending it, appears a rather obvious thing.
It's a pretty small proportion of the bill. 8% on the current price cap, so significantly lower than that from October as the huge hike in wholesale costs comes in.
If they are going to support people with their bills they should reduce standard charges, imo. Helps incentivise using less energy, reducing demand, reducing prices.
Because Brexit meant no bands came to Glastonbury this year..... uh-huh....
Brexit does not mean no bands will turn up, but the carnet issue is devastating and something that was obviously going to be an issue. I was banging on about it here pre brexit as it was an area I had some experience. A friend of mine who had an exhibition business was effectively put out of business overnight because he could no longer compete in Europe for any large event. If you are moving large trailers of equipment back and forth eg exhibitions, bands, F1 the impact is devastating. F1 will survive because it is so dominant here but it's still impacted and I'm sure they will warehouse a lot more in Europe.
Just because bands still turn up does not mean it is devastating. Lots won't and the UK may stop being the kick off or central location for European tours
Obviously I meant 'does not mean it isn't devastating' In answer to @tres I don't think there will be any big US bands who don't turn up. They still will. The main issue will be bands travelling to and from Europe from the UK. Smaller bands might stop, but the Rolling Stones won't, but it will cost them a lot more. Not sure what impact it will have on a US based band as they will have carnet issues anyway. I expect more to base their tours from Europe and not the UK.
"I know a guy who knows a guy.."
There is a big market for stories about trivial Brexit frustrations at the margins.
Any band that wants to play to its UK fan base (which is likely to be their biggest in Europe, and from which they will earn tens of millions in royalties, publicity and sales) isn't going to be put off by a £600 carnet fee, or even paying someone £1,000 to organise it for them, just as they wouldn't be by hotel bills or a tour management team and publicist.
You'd have to be a very modest band on a shoestring tour for this to be the deciding factor, and, if it were, you'd have bigger problems.
Scotland’s state-imposed price controls for alcohol have driven some people to turn to cheap street drugs linked to hundreds of deaths last year, health experts have warned.
Last week official statistics confirmed that Scotland remains the drug death capital of Europe, with a growing number of fatalities among women.
As was pointed out to the anti alcohol crusaders at the time.
The history of prohibition (drugs of all kinds) is that the biggest effect, always, is to move people from one drug source to another or another type of drug.
The later is a particular disaster, since the substitutes are always worse.
I'm glad 56% think there should be an election. Seeing Tory members interviewed on TV, at least half still support Boris. I don't think the people choosing the next PM should be people who don't think there should be a change anyway...it's a mad situation.
I think that Brexit has quite literally driven Tories mad. They have lost their senses. Support for The Oaf is simply a manifestation of their collective mental breakdown.
The interesting question is: what is the cure? All countries need a moderate centre-right, pro-business, pro-good governance party. Even England. How does the English nation regain such a party? Only one route is obvious: PR.
Over to you Mr Starmer: save the Conservative & Unionist Party, cos they ain’t gonna save themselves.
Brexit was a symptom, not a cause.
Economic globalisation has led to most people's living standards in the West stagnating, and they aren't happy about it. This has led to the collapse of the political centre in most countries, though this has been expressed in different ways. Brexit, and increased support for Scottish independence, were the particular manifestations in Britain.
This is seen in other European countries that use PR. The way to fix the issue is through the economic fundamentals. Improve people's living standards.
I think it may be beyond a governments control to improve economic living standards over the next decade from here. What we could improve in that timescale is their physical and mental health. Time for a health and well being party!
Good idea. A surefire vote magnet. Also focus on a more equal distribution of wealth. This will improve the living standards of most people (esp those in real need) and is a more realistic ambition for our politics than the fairytale notion of all problems solved and everything paid for by "growing the economy". What that phrase means, from either politician or pundit, is "Let's play pretend".
Because Brexit meant no bands came to Glastonbury this year..... uh-huh....
It won't be the big festivals that are affected by these extra frictions and costs. Glastonbury will be able to absorb them easily. It will be the smaller, grassroots events operating on a shoestring that will suffer. But cutting the British population off from Europe culturally is part of the Brexit project, very much a feature not a bug.
Er, bollocks. I run a smaller, grassroots event on a shoestring. We had no EU acts before Brexit. It makes no difference to us. We did, for example, have a fantastic contingent of six bands come down from Southend, and everyone concerned will be delighted for that to happen in 2023.
Festival with no EU acts unaffected by Brexit shocker.
Europe are headlining the Steelhouse festival in Ebbw Vale today.
There was a poll yesterday that said Truss would lead Labour by 1 point
The question isn't if she has a honeymoon, but for how long will the honeymoon last?
Until peoples energy bills nearly double in October.
There is a "Don't pay" movement that has popped up on my timeline a few times. People cancelling their direct debit from 01 October.
I’ve seen this on Twitter. I just can’t see what good this will do if people do this. I’m sure there is some profiteering going on but a lot of the price increase is driven by wholesale gas prices rising and there will be a fair amount of speculation in that price currently.
But people won't think like that. Not everyone understand demand/supply. The logic will be:
- The cost of extracting gas/oil hasn't increased. Why am I paying more for it? - Why don't we have nationalised energy companies? - Why don't we just extract our gas from our North Sea? Why do we have to buy it on the market?
Why does every Tory leadership contest require the same weak-ass policy ideas to be trotted out, like fines for missing GP appointments? I’ve been hearing proposals like this for at least a decade. The fact they never actually happen suggests maybe they’re not that good an idea?
Because Brexit meant no bands came to Glastonbury this year..... uh-huh....
Brexit does not mean no bands will turn up, but the carnet issue is devastating and something that was obviously going to be an issue. I was banging on about it here pre brexit as it was an area I had some experience. A friend of mine who had an exhibition business was effectively put out of business overnight because he could no longer compete in Europe for any large event. If you are moving large trailers of equipment back and forth eg exhibitions, bands, F1 the impact is devastating. F1 will survive because it is so dominant here but it's still impacted and I'm sure they will warehouse a lot more in Europe.
Just because bands still turn up does not mean it is devastating. Lots won't and the UK may stop being the kick off or central location for European tours
Obviously I meant 'does not mean it isn't devastating' In answer to @tres I don't think there will be any big US bands who don't turn up. They still will. The main issue will be bands travelling to and from Europe from the UK. Smaller bands might stop, but the Rolling Stones won't, but it will cost them a lot more. Not sure what impact it will have on a US based band as they will have carnet issues anyway. I expect more to base their tours from Europe and not the UK.
"I know a guy who knows a guy.."
There is a big market for stories about trivial Brexit frustrations at the margins.
Any band that wants to play to its UK fan base (which is likely to be their biggest in Europe, and from which they will earn tens of millions in royalties, publicity and sales) isn't going to be put off by a £600 carnet fee, or even paying someone £1,000 to organise it for them, just as they wouldn't be by hotel bills or a tour management team and publicist.
You'd have to be a very modest band on a shoestring tour for this to be the deciding factor, and, if it were, you'd have bigger problems.
Every big band starts life as a modest band.
And modest bands at the start of their lives don't tend to go on massive international tours.
Ticket sales and popularity are the deciding factor here and it's absurd to suggest it's anything else, no matter how irritating border bureaucracy might be.
I thought inflation has gone up so much since the £400 announcement that it's basically a stone in the ocean
The 400 is around energy bills. Much (most?) of the inflation cost Is direct or indirect fuel costs, which is coming down a lot now. It’s not going to be a great winter, but I don’t think the government have said the 400 quid is the end of it. Perhaps it’s just the polarising nature of internet discussions. I get frustrated by posters saying the government is doing nothing, or ignoring the cost of living.
Five young men who claim to have been groomed, harassed or assaulted by Jordan Linden have accused a youth charity boss of failing to protect them.
The men, who were all members of the Scottish Youth Parliament (SYP) or had links with the organisation’s projects, claim they were let down in 2016 when allegations emerged about his conduct while chairman.
One of the alleged victims was just 14 when he claims Linden sent him semi-nude images and sexual messages.
Another man, 17 at the time, claims to have been sexually assaulted while at an overnight SYP event after being booked into a room with Linden containing a double bed.
I'm glad 56% think there should be an election. Seeing Tory members interviewed on TV, at least half still support Boris. I don't think the people choosing the next PM should be people who don't think there should be a change anyway...it's a mad situation.
I think that Brexit has quite literally driven Tories mad. They have lost their senses. Support for The Oaf is simply a manifestation of their collective mental breakdown.
The interesting question is: what is the cure? All countries need a moderate centre-right, pro-business, pro-good governance party. Even England. How does the English nation regain such a party? Only one route is obvious: PR.
Over to you Mr Starmer: save the Conservative & Unionist Party, cos they ain’t gonna save themselves.
Brexit was a symptom, not a cause.
Economic globalisation has led to most people's living standards in the West stagnating, and they aren't happy about it. This has led to the collapse of the political centre in most countries, though this has been expressed in different ways. Brexit, and increased support for Scottish independence, were the particular manifestations in Britain.
This is seen in other European countries that use PR. The way to fix the issue is through the economic fundamentals. Improve people's living standards.
I think it may be beyond a governments control to improve economic living standards over the next decade from here. What we could improve in that timescale is their physical and mental health. Time for a health and well being party!
Good idea. A surefire vote magnet. Also focus on a more equal distribution of wealth. This will improve the living standards of most people (esp those in real need) and is a more realistic ambition for our politics than the fairytale notion of all problems solved and everything paid for by "growing the economy". What that phrase means, from either politician or pundit, is "Let's play pretend".
I don't think growth in the economy is impossible. If the left simply falls back on income/wealth distribution rather than a clear economic policy they are making a big mistake in my view. The model should be wealthy northern European countries, none of whom so far as I can tell have given up on growth.
There was a poll yesterday that said Truss would lead Labour by 1 point
The question isn't if she has a honeymoon, but for how long will the honeymoon last?
Until peoples energy bills nearly double in October.
There is a "Don't pay" movement that has popped up on my timeline a few times. People cancelling their direct debit from 01 October.
I’ve seen this on Twitter. I just can’t see what good this will do if people do this. I’m sure there is some profiteering going on but a lot of the price increase is driven by wholesale gas prices rising and there will be a fair amount of speculation in that price currently.
But people won't think like that. Not everyone understand demand/supply. The logic will be:
- The cost of extracting gas/oil hasn't increased. Why am I paying more for it? - Why don't we have nationalised energy companies? - Why don't we just extract our gas from our North Sea? Why do we have to buy it on the market?
The single biggest fear in the European energy markets at the moment, is the suggestion that Biden might ban O&G exports from the US in the autumn, in order to hold down winter bills for US consumers.
If that happens, prices in Europe go through the roof.
Shit, the All bands are at least as big as Guns n Roses fallacy is a whole new level of stupid
I will just throw out that professional musicians are in the main on very low pay, so that hon posters can come back with hur hur hur Elton John seems to be doing OK
Womad had serious problems with specific booked acts in 2018 and 2019 and said that other acts declined to book
Brexit folk need to relax and enjoy the stories about how Brexit impacted X,Y or Z. They are the exact same stories that Eurosceptics used to tell about how the EU used to impact X, Y, or Z.
Because Brexit meant no bands came to Glastonbury this year..... uh-huh....
Brexit does not mean no bands will turn up, but the carnet issue is devastating and something that was obviously going to be an issue. I was banging on about it here pre brexit as it was an area I had some experience. A friend of mine who had an exhibition business was effectively put out of business overnight because he could no longer compete in Europe for any large event. If you are moving large trailers of equipment back and forth eg exhibitions, bands, F1 the impact is devastating. F1 will survive because it is so dominant here but it's still impacted and I'm sure they will warehouse a lot more in Europe.
Just because bands still turn up does not mean it is devastating. Lots won't and the UK may stop being the kick off or central location for European tours
Obviously I meant 'does not mean it isn't devastating' In answer to @tres I don't think there will be any big US bands who don't turn up. They still will. The main issue will be bands travelling to and from Europe from the UK. Smaller bands might stop, but the Rolling Stones won't, but it will cost them a lot more. Not sure what impact it will have on a US based band as they will have carnet issues anyway. I expect more to base their tours from Europe and not the UK.
"I know a guy who knows a guy.."
There is a big market for stories about trivial Brexit frustrations at the margins.
Any band that wants to play to its UK fan base (which is likely to be their biggest in Europe, and from which they will earn tens of millions in royalties, publicity and sales) isn't going to be put off by a £600 carnet fee, or even paying someone £1,000 to organise it for them, just as they wouldn't be by hotel bills or a tour management team and publicist.
You'd have to be a very modest band on a shoestring tour for this to be the deciding factor, and, if it were, you'd have bigger problems.
@Casino_Royale please don't misquote me. I never said I knew a guy who knows a guy. I am talking about a close friend whose very successful exhibition business stopped dead. It is impossible for someone who produces large stands based in the UK to now compete in Europe because of the carnet issue. He is completely priced out of the big exhibition market, which is largely European because of the carnet issue. Please retract.
I also have expertise in the area myself (carnets not exhibitions).
I also specifically said it would not stop big bands. I specifically gave the issue of the Rolling Stones who will be significantly impacted but won't stop because it will still be profitable (and no different to say touring the US) and also said it will probably have no impact on US bands touring here because they have the carnet issue anyway. So again misquoting me.
The issue is medium sized bands may stop travelling between the UK and Europe (not the US) because the cost is such a large percentage of their revenue (£1000, honestly! Do you really think it costs £1000?), but more likely it will have the impact of bands (and others) moving their base from the UK to Europe. So for instance a US band whose larger number of major venues may be in the UK would base their tour here normally. Now they will base themselves in Europe. F1 teams will not move from the UK because of the expertise here but will open up warehouses now in Europe and that is the start of the drip drip effect that sees some expertise move over and then the growing pressure to move operations there. So warehousing now and then a slow move over the next 10 years.
And if you think it costs £1000 to organise a carnet for a band like the Rolling Stones or Mercedes F1 team you are in a world of your own. Actually for the very small guy it is mainly an inconvenience. If I were still doing it, it would not stop me, but I can't even fathom how Mercedes or the Rolling Stones manage it. I can't see how this is not in the hundreds of thousand of pounds if not a million or more. £1000 honestly!
Why does every Tory leadership contest require the same weak-ass policy ideas to be trotted out, like fines for missing GP appointments? I’ve been hearing proposals like this for at least a decade. The fact they never actually happen suggests maybe they’re not that good an idea?
That's an interesting one. The longer it goes on, the more fake it looks - particularly the eclipse bit
But: photography can be weird, and I've been caught out suspecting things as being false when they are not: a classic case being airliners in front of the Moon, which can look very unreal. Or the 'spirals in the sky' caused by rockets: https://www.space.com/spacex-rocket-launch-blue-spiral-photo
It's a problem with the Internet: it is a great source of knowledge and information, and it pays to be cynical about what you read and see. But because a massively flukey occurrence can be photographed and seen by millions, things that look flukey and/or impossible *can* be real.
Sugar's problem wasn't 'believing' the video; it was tweeting about it.
Shit, the All bands are at least as big as Guns n Roses fallacy is a whole new level of stupid
I will just throw out that professional musicians are in the main on very low pay, so that hon posters can come back with hur hur hur Elton John seems to be doing OK
Womad had serious problems with specific booked acts in 2018 and 2019 and said that other acts declined to book
Tom Tugendhat has admitted foreign secretary "would be a fantastic job to do" - but insisted Tory leadership frontrunner Liz Truss has made him no promises.
Mr Tugendhat, who also stood as a candidate to take over from Boris Johnson, is the latest senior Tory MP to back Ms Truss over Rishi Sunak.
Mr Tugendhat and Ms Truss shared a warm embrace at a campaign event at Biggin Hill Airport in south London on Saturday, during which he said the current foreign secretary's promises of tax cuts are based on "true Conservative principles" and that she can unite the party.
Brexit folk need to relax and enjoy the stories about how Brexit impacted X,Y or Z. They are the exact same stories that Eurosceptics used to tell about how the EU used to impact X, Y, or Z.
The idea that the EU used to be blamed for everything is largely a myth. The archetypal tabloid Eurosceptic story was about minor annoyances.
Brexit folk need to relax and enjoy the stories about how Brexit impacted X,Y or Z. They are the exact same stories that Eurosceptics used to tell about how the EU used to impact X, Y, or Z.
The idea that the EU used to be blamed for everything is largely a myth. The archetypal tabloid Eurosceptic story was about minor annoyances.
The opposite is true - Governments of all hues piloted EU law through the commons disguised as domestic legislation and there were no references made by them (or the opposition) to the origins of it.
There are some interesting details in the sombre drugs deaths report for Scotland. 65% of drug deaths are now in the age range 35-54 and the average age of death has increased from 32 to 44 over the last 21 years.
The Trainspotting generation got hooked on drugs like no generation before it or indeed since and they are still dying from them 25 years later. Drug treatment services in Scotland are beyond useless but what there is seems to be focused on a much younger demographic. This may be realistic: those who have destroyed their bodies and their brains for 20 years plus may simply be beyond help, but it still seems to me to be strange.
What is crystal clear is that if real progress is to be made (and, by the way 1% of 1339 is not 9) is that that generation in particular needs to be medicated and their addictions managed rather than prosecuted or isolated from society. An investment in mental health is also urgently required. By far the largest cause of deaths is benzodiazepines. In 2015 there were 191 of these deaths and in 2021 there were 918; almost five times as many. This increase has mostly been driven by street benzodiazepines rather than those which are prescribed. Its very likely that they will overtake opiates in the next few years as the primary cause of death (the reason that they have not done so already is the combination of the two is most lethal of all). The element of self medication here must be huge.
Dundee City, sadly, retains its crown with the highest death rate in Scotland which, of course, has the highest death rate in Europe. At 45.2 per 100k people someone dies of a drugs overdose in Dundee every single day.
Shit, the All bands are at least as big as Guns n Roses fallacy is a whole new level of stupid
I will just throw out that professional musicians are in the main on very low pay, so that hon posters can come back with hur hur hur Elton John seems to be doing OK
Womad had serious problems with specific booked acts in 2018 and 2019 and said that other acts declined to book
There was a poll yesterday that said Truss would lead Labour by 1 point
The question isn't if she has a honeymoon, but for how long will the honeymoon last?
Until peoples energy bills nearly double in October.
There is a "Don't pay" movement that has popped up on my timeline a few times. People cancelling their direct debit from 01 October.
For many people it really will be "Can't pay, won't pay".
This is an approaching shitstorm the government is studiously ignoring.
I don’t think that’s totally true. What about the 400 pound each that’s coming? Now it may not be enough, but it’s not true to say it’s being ignored.
Claims the govt is ignoring it are clearly wrong. They are just not doing enough. They need to do more, especially for the poorest in society.
It's that that is the point at issue. Not only is it going to billionaires, and to second homes, it is also going to the likes of me. £400 over six months will probably put me in credit, even with the ludicrous rises. I'm possibly going to make a profit on it. What was more administratively difficult about say 25% off everyone's bill?
Shit, the All bands are at least as big as Guns n Roses fallacy is a whole new level of stupid
I will just throw out that professional musicians are in the main on very low pay, so that hon posters can come back with hur hur hur Elton John seems to be doing OK
Womad had serious problems with specific booked acts in 2018 and 2019 and said that other acts declined to book
Surprised to see the Liberal Democrat voting intention so low. I expected them to get a boost after their strong by-election performances and reasonably good local election performances (19%, +2).
Here’s their VI in the last 10 polls (reverse chronological order):
11% 12% 11% 12% 10% 12% 13% 12% 9% 9%
If they really are going to do well in the Home Counties and the south west, should they not be polling in the high teens?
No. They only need to be doing well in their 30-40 target seats. Remember they lost their deposit in Wakefield on the same day they gained from 3rd place Tiverton & Honiton
Why does every Tory leadership contest require the same weak-ass policy ideas to be trotted out, like fines for missing GP appointments? I’ve been hearing proposals like this for at least a decade. The fact they never actually happen suggests maybe they’re not that good an idea?
Save the highstreet is particularly laughable. The Tories are completely out of ideas. And before anyone thinks "it's Labour's turn now" they are just as bad. Keir's guff about productivity the other day wasn't much better.
What we need is a complete rebuilding of the political classes, none of them are fit for purpose.
Why does every Tory leadership contest require the same weak-ass policy ideas to be trotted out, like fines for missing GP appointments? I’ve been hearing proposals like this for at least a decade. The fact they never actually happen suggests maybe they’re not that good an idea?
Save the highstreet is particularly laughable. The Tories are completely out of ideas. And before anyone thinks "it's Labour's turn now" they are just as bad. Keir's guff about productivity the other day wasn't much better.
What we need is a complete rebuilding of the political classes, none of them are fit for purpose.
Brexit folk need to relax and enjoy the stories about how Brexit impacted X,Y or Z. They are the exact same stories that Eurosceptics used to tell about how the EU used to impact X, Y, or Z.
The idea that the EU used to be blamed for everything is largely a myth. The archetypal tabloid Eurosceptic story was about minor annoyances.
Just like this story about bands and festivals. The key thing about the Eurosceptic tabloid stories was the sheer relentless volume of them, not that any single story was especially important. It all created an anti-EU background noise. We may now get a bit of that process in reverse, although not as much because the main conduits last time (the right wing billionaire owned tabloids) support Brexit.
Shit, the All bands are at least as big as Guns n Roses fallacy is a whole new level of stupid
I will just throw out that professional musicians are in the main on very low pay, so that hon posters can come back with hur hur hur Elton John seems to be doing OK
Womad had serious problems with specific booked acts in 2018 and 2019 and said that other acts declined to book
We may not produce much ourselves these days, but one thing that I don't think there's a domestic shortage of is bands.
and they all sound much the same. What is this World Music anyway?
Of course they don't all sound the same. We have a massive variety of bands and performers in a massive variety of genres. Barriers are always a nuisance, and should be eliminated over time if possible. But in this instance, the demand (festivals wanting to book acts) is here, and the domestic supply is plentiful.
By the way, what's the situation with bands from the US, Canada, Africa, the Middle East? Why haven't we been hearing about the dreadful restrictions on their tours for years?
Why does every Tory leadership contest require the same weak-ass policy ideas to be trotted out, like fines for missing GP appointments? I’ve been hearing proposals like this for at least a decade. The fact they never actually happen suggests maybe they’re not that good an idea?
Save the highstreet is particularly laughable. The Tories are completely out of ideas. And before anyone thinks "it's Labour's turn now" they are just as bad. Keir's guff about productivity the other day wasn't much better.
What we need is a complete rebuilding of the political classes, none of them are fit for purpose.
We need PR
That wouldn't help, we'd have the same fools stitching things up after the election itself.
Because Brexit meant no bands came to Glastonbury this year..... uh-huh....
It won't be the big festivals that are affected by these extra frictions and costs. Glastonbury will be able to absorb them easily. It will be the smaller, grassroots events operating on a shoestring that will suffer. But cutting the British population off from Europe culturally is part of the Brexit project, very much a feature not a bug.
Er, bollocks. I run a smaller, grassroots event on a shoestring. We had no EU acts before Brexit. It makes no difference to us. We did, for example, have a fantastic contingent of six bands come down from Southend, and everyone concerned will be delighted for that to happen in 2023.
Festival with no EU acts unaffected by Brexit shocker.
Does the EU produce pop music? I'm joking, but only just. The paucity of anything listenable coming out of mainland Europe over the past 60 years is baffling. I've just been looking through my iTunes library by most played - nothing from the EU in the top 100. A brief appearance by Stereolab and Jose Gonzalez in the next 100. Nothing in the 100 after that. Come on Europe, you can do better than this, surely?
Shit, the All bands are at least as big as Guns n Roses fallacy is a whole new level of stupid
I will just throw out that professional musicians are in the main on very low pay, so that hon posters can come back with hur hur hur Elton John seems to be doing OK
Womad had serious problems with specific booked acts in 2018 and 2019 and said that other acts declined to book
We may not produce much ourselves these days, but one thing that I don't think there's a domestic shortage of is bands.
and they all sound much the same. What is this World Music anyway?
Of course they don't all sound the same. We have a massive variety of bands and performers in a massive variety of genres. Barriers are always a nuisance, and should be eliminated over time if possible. But in this instance, the demand (festivals wanting to book acts) is here, and the domestic supply is plentiful.
By the way, what's the situation with bands from the US, Canada, Africa, the Middle East? Why haven't we been hearing about the dreadful restrictions on their tours for years?
Because it was worth their while to come to the UK at no extra administrative expense as part of an EU tour.
Why does every Tory leadership contest require the same weak-ass policy ideas to be trotted out, like fines for missing GP appointments? I’ve been hearing proposals like this for at least a decade. The fact they never actually happen suggests maybe they’re not that good an idea?
Save the highstreet is particularly laughable. The Tories are completely out of ideas. And before anyone thinks "it's Labour's turn now" they are just as bad. Keir's guff about productivity the other day wasn't much better.
What we need is a complete rebuilding of the political classes, none of them are fit for purpose.
We need PR
That wouldn't help, we'd have the same fools stitching things up after the election itself.
Actually saving the High Street would be great. It's whether we actually get policies to do that that's the question.
Because Brexit meant no bands came to Glastonbury this year..... uh-huh....
It won't be the big festivals that are affected by these extra frictions and costs. Glastonbury will be able to absorb them easily. It will be the smaller, grassroots events operating on a shoestring that will suffer. But cutting the British population off from Europe culturally is part of the Brexit project, very much a feature not a bug.
Er, bollocks. I run a smaller, grassroots event on a shoestring. We had no EU acts before Brexit. It makes no difference to us. We did, for example, have a fantastic contingent of six bands come down from Southend, and everyone concerned will be delighted for that to happen in 2023.
Festival with no EU acts unaffected by Brexit shocker.
Does the EU produce pop music? I'm joking, but only just. The paucity of anything listenable coming out of mainland Europe over the past 60 years is baffling. I've just been looking through my iTunes library by most played - nothing from the EU in the top 100. A brief appearance by Stereolab and Jose Gonzalez in the next 100. Nothing in the 100 after that. Come on Europe, you can do better than this, surely?
Because Brexit meant no bands came to Glastonbury this year..... uh-huh....
It won't be the big festivals that are affected by these extra frictions and costs. Glastonbury will be able to absorb them easily. It will be the smaller, grassroots events operating on a shoestring that will suffer. But cutting the British population off from Europe culturally is part of the Brexit project, very much a feature not a bug.
Er, bollocks. I run a smaller, grassroots event on a shoestring. We had no EU acts before Brexit. It makes no difference to us. We did, for example, have a fantastic contingent of six bands come down from Southend, and everyone concerned will be delighted for that to happen in 2023.
Festival with no EU acts unaffected by Brexit shocker.
Does the EU produce pop music? I'm joking, but only just. The paucity of anything listenable coming out of mainland Europe over the past 60 years is baffling. I've just been looking through my iTunes library by most played - nothing from the EU in the top 100. A brief appearance by Stereolab and Jose Gonzalez in the next 100. Nothing in the 100 after that. Come on Europe, you can do better than this, surely?
ABBA
Edit: bit of a giveaway that both answers are the same, mind.
Comments
But the biggest problem is asking guests at all. It is intrusive. As a thought experiment, imagine Tesco introduces a 50/50 male/female customer target. It can just ask till staff to press the blue or pink button according to their impression, and that will be good enough with a massive sample size hiding random errors. But now imagine someone outside Tesco with a clipboard asking questions about your sex and gender before letting you inside. You'd be off to Morrison's like a shot.
Liverpool Labour sources tell me West Derby MP Ian Bryne lost last night’s final branch trigger vote. Means Bryne has now lost every single branch vote in the CLP, despite a PR campaign backed by John McDonnell and others. Source says of last night’s vote :”He lost badly.”
Yet more evidence that Corbynism is dead and the Labour Party and membership has moved firmly to the centre.
T-90 417 active and 200 reserve of which 22 confirmed lost, 5.3% of the active force.
T-80 480 active and 3000 reserve of which 170 confirmed lost, 35% of the active force.
T-72 2030 active and 7000 reserve of which 487 confirmed lost, 24% of the active force.
Oryx also has Russia losing 35 T-64s which will either have been previously captured from the Ukrainians, or be part of the LNR/DNR forces.
Oryx has only 1 T-62 confirmed destroyed, though I think none of these were previously active and the number in reserve was unknown.
It's interesting to see the higher proportion of lost T-80s. This suggests that most of the T-90s have been held back for the elite Putin-guard forces around Moscow, and otherwise Russia sent and lost its next best tier of units.
It's quite likely that Russia has lost around two-thirds of its active T-80s and nearly half of its active T-72s.
We have no idea how well stored the large numbers of reserve T-80s and T-72s have been, though the appearance of T-62s is suggestive that it's at least taking time to return these to service.
There is still a large civilian population in Kherson City. Starving the Russian troops out would mean starving the civilians too. I don't think that's a viable strategy for the Ukrainian government.
Will that lead last? I suspect it will take two or three months before crossover and small Labour leads. Winter could be economically horrific for a significant percentage of the population. Will speeches castigating Europe, Putin, transgender people and ethnic taxi drivers keep the bounce up? I doubt it, and the Labour lead could be back to circling the double figure mark in some polls in the New Year/ Spring. The huge plus mark against her name is Ukraine. Putin (doesn't know this) is her friend. If Ukraine sees a Russian collapse she has positioned herself as the architect of that defeat. Total bollocks, but that's incumbency for you
Even if inflation reverses costs of things are going to remain high for a long time. And unless there is something done about that - and Truss has not yet announced anything to my knowledge - the economy is going to be blamed squarely on the Tories.
Longer term you'd hope earnings will go up as inflation goes down but we've had a decade of stagnant wages and I can't see Liz offering short term solutions for that either.
They don't have enough time to do anything, that's the real problem for her. These are deep-routed issues.
Liz Truss has pulled off Boris Johnson’s trick of appearing to offer a fresh start
Even republicans like me generally admit Queen Elizabeth II has been ok for a monarch. So if we have to remain a monarchy (and it seems the public are determined to support it) let's just keep having Queen Elizabeths forever.
When the current one reaches her well-deserved eternal rest, just select a pretty young actress to take the role for the next 60 or 70 years. Claire Foy would be perfect.
https://twitter.com/soniasodha/status/1553654729011601411
The Russians in Kherson will be starved of ammunition and military supplies, rather than starved of food. Unarmed invaders won’t last long, against an armed civilian population and a defending military just outside the city, firing on their positions every night.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_&_Abdul
But would she be Queen Edward IX or Queen Eddie I?
I note that the T-90 wiki page says 8500+ have been built in the summary box but only 1300 to 1700 in the detail.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-90
https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/1144078/Boris-Johnson-latest-Tory-leadership-hopeful-Brexit-Brexiteer-Conservative-Jeremy-Hunt
There is of course zero chance of Sunak or Hunt calling an immediate general election, voters elect the party not the leader and the party already has a majority. Major, Brown and Callaghan certainly didn't and nor did May immediately either
Scotland’s state-imposed price controls for alcohol have driven some people to turn to cheap street drugs linked to hundreds of deaths last year, health experts have warned.
Last week official statistics confirmed that Scotland remains the drug death capital of Europe, with a growing number of fatalities among women.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/minimum-alcohol-pricing-has-driven-people-to-street-drugs-say-experts-8t5z8tsf9
The well-intentioned scheme to enthrone Dame Judi Dench may not be to her advantage. They tried a similar stunt with Lady Jane Grey and it didn't end well.
This is an approaching shitstorm the government is studiously ignoring.
IDS was 2nd in the MP votes in 2001 too, not that that's a happy precedent.
https://twitter.com/lord_sugar/status/1553629910534594560?s=21&t=Nq_y62btEAC5SYOs6ICHjA
The Trussites are becoming so confident that some of them are risking sounding complacent and arrogant by suggesting that Mr Sunak ought to quit now before he falls even further behind. He is showing signs of being rattled, such as his abrupt conversion to suspending VAT on energy bills, an idea he previously dismissed on the correct grounds that this is not the way to direct help to those who most need it because a VAT cut will be of greatest benefit to affluent households.
It is too early to definitively write off his bid for the leadership – an extraordinary event or revelation could still upend things – but we can draft a preliminary postmortem of why the golden boy lost his lustre.
One big mistake was to think that it would be enough to present himself as the safe pair of hands who protected the economy during the pandemic and can be relied on to see Britain safely through an inflation-fuelled tempest. Being the “grownup” candidate has not been an asset but a handicap because the Tory party has had its synapses scrambled during its three years in thrall to the puerile antics of Mr Johnson.
A preposterous but potent betrayal narrative is being propagated by the Johnsonites and in rightwing media, which is consumed by Tory members. The right riposte to this is that the architect of Boris Johnson’s downfall was Boris Johnson. He debased and disgraced the premiership with his rule-breaking, his lies and his sleaze.
The former chancellor has been the more fluent performer, and has demonstrated the better command of detail, in all the leadership debates. His foes have flipped that against him by saying he is too polished and packaged. Among a Tory membership that is concentrated in provincial England, it hasn’t been difficult for Team Truss to encourage mistrust of her rival as a metropolitan smoothie.
He is fighting not just for the premiership, but for his political career. If the foreign secretary wins, she is not going to bring him back as chancellor after all the contempt she has hurled at him as a “bean counter”. So venomous have been the exchanges between them, it is a struggle to see Mr Sunak in a cabinet led by Ms Truss or vice-versa. It is all or nothing for both of them. Unless Mr Sunak can change the trajectory of this contest and fast, he is going to become extremely well-acquainted with failure.
- Political reality; there is no way these insane hikes will be allowed to pass by government
- And/Or they do come to pass, people don't pay, my energy company goes under. Having paid more than I needed to in the opening few months of the contract, I get dumped onto the variable rate just before I get to enjoy the lower (relative to the new variable) rate.
There is a big market for stories about trivial Brexit frustrations at the margins.
Any band that wants to play to its UK fan base (which is likely to be their biggest in Europe, and from which they will earn tens of millions in royalties, publicity and sales) isn't going to be put off by a £600 carnet fee, or even paying someone £1,000 to organise it for them, just as they wouldn't be by hotel bills or a tour management team and publicist.
You'd have to be a very modest band on a shoestring tour for this to be the deciding factor, and, if it were, you'd have bigger problems.
If they are going to support people with their bills they should reduce standard charges, imo. Helps incentivise using less energy, reducing demand, reducing prices.
The later is a particular disaster, since the substitutes are always worse.
Kraftwerk are playing in London next month.
- The cost of extracting gas/oil hasn't increased. Why am I paying more for it?
- Why don't we have nationalised energy companies?
- Why don't we just extract our gas from our North Sea? Why do we have to buy it on the market?
Ticket sales and popularity are the deciding factor here and it's absurd to suggest it's anything else, no matter how irritating border bureaucracy might be.
Perhaps it’s just the polarising nature of internet discussions. I get frustrated by posters saying the government is doing nothing, or ignoring the cost of living.
The men, who were all members of the Scottish Youth Parliament (SYP) or had links with the organisation’s projects, claim they were let down in 2016 when allegations emerged about his conduct while chairman.
One of the alleged victims was just 14 when he claims Linden sent him semi-nude images and sexual messages.
Another man, 17 at the time, claims to have been sexually assaulted while at an overnight SYP event after being booked into a room with Linden containing a double bed.
https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/five-alleged-victims-snp-council-27619397
If that happens, prices in Europe go through the roof.
I will just throw out that professional musicians are in the main on very low pay, so that hon posters can come back with hur hur hur Elton John seems to be doing OK
Womad had serious problems with specific booked acts in 2018 and 2019 and said that other acts declined to book
https://www.theguardian.com/global/2018/aug/02/womad-visa-fiasco-brexit-britain-live-music-festival
https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2019/feb/28/womad-uk-festival-artists-performers-brexit-visas
Gladsaxe, Denmark
I also have expertise in the area myself (carnets not exhibitions).
I also specifically said it would not stop big bands. I specifically gave the issue of the Rolling Stones who will be significantly impacted but won't stop because it will still be profitable (and no different to say touring the US) and also said it will probably have no impact on US bands touring here because they have the carnet issue anyway. So again misquoting me.
The issue is medium sized bands may stop travelling between the UK and Europe (not the US) because the cost is such a large percentage of their revenue (£1000, honestly! Do you really think it costs £1000?), but more likely it will have the impact of bands (and others) moving their base from the UK to Europe. So for instance a US band whose larger number of major venues may be in the UK would base their tour here normally. Now they will base themselves in Europe. F1 teams will not move from the UK because of the expertise here but will open up warehouses now in Europe and that is the start of the drip drip effect that sees some expertise move over and then the growing pressure to move operations there. So warehousing now and then a slow move over the next 10 years.
And if you think it costs £1000 to organise a carnet for a band like the Rolling Stones or Mercedes F1 team you are in a world of your own. Actually for the very small guy it is mainly an inconvenience. If I were still doing it, it would not stop me, but I can't even fathom how Mercedes or the Rolling Stones manage it. I can't see how this is not in the hundreds of thousand of pounds if not a million or more. £1000 honestly!
But: photography can be weird, and I've been caught out suspecting things as being false when they are not: a classic case being airliners in front of the Moon, which can look very unreal. Or the 'spirals in the sky' caused by rockets:
https://www.space.com/spacex-rocket-launch-blue-spiral-photo
It's a problem with the Internet: it is a great source of knowledge and information, and it pays to be cynical about what you read and see. But because a massively flukey occurrence can be photographed and seen by millions, things that look flukey and/or impossible *can* be real.
Sugar's problem wasn't 'believing' the video; it was tweeting about it.
Mr Tugendhat, who also stood as a candidate to take over from Boris Johnson, is the latest senior Tory MP to back Ms Truss over Rishi Sunak.
Mr Tugendhat and Ms Truss shared a warm embrace at a campaign event at Biggin Hill Airport in south London on Saturday, during which he said the current foreign secretary's promises of tax cuts are based on "true Conservative principles" and that she can unite the party.
https://news.sky.com/story/amp/tory-leadership-race-tugendhat-admits-foreign-secretary-would-be-a-fantastic-job-but-says-truss-has-promised-nothing-12662168
The Trainspotting generation got hooked on drugs like no generation before it or indeed since and they are still dying from them 25 years later. Drug treatment services in Scotland are beyond useless but what there is seems to be focused on a much younger demographic. This may be realistic: those who have destroyed their bodies and their brains for 20 years plus may simply be beyond help, but it still seems to me to be strange.
What is crystal clear is that if real progress is to be made (and, by the way 1% of 1339 is not 9) is that that generation in particular needs to be medicated and their addictions managed rather than prosecuted or isolated from society. An investment in mental health is also urgently required. By far the largest cause of deaths is benzodiazepines. In 2015 there were 191 of these deaths and in 2021 there were 918; almost five times as many. This increase has mostly been driven by street benzodiazepines rather than those which are prescribed. Its very likely that they will overtake opiates in the next few years as the primary cause of death (the reason that they have not done so already is the combination of the two is most lethal of all). The element of self medication here must be huge.
Dundee City, sadly, retains its crown with the highest death rate in Scotland which, of course, has the highest death rate in Europe. At 45.2 per 100k people someone dies of a drugs overdose in Dundee every single day.
£400 over six months will probably put me in credit, even with the ludicrous rises.
I'm possibly going to make a profit on it.
What was more administratively difficult about say 25% off everyone's bill?
What we need is a complete rebuilding of the political classes, none of them are fit for purpose.
By the way, what's the situation with bands from the US, Canada, Africa, the Middle East? Why haven't we been hearing about the dreadful restrictions on their tours for years?
I'm joking, but only just. The paucity of anything listenable coming out of mainland Europe over the past 60 years is baffling. I've just been looking through my iTunes library by most played - nothing from the EU in the top 100. A brief appearance by Stereolab and Jose Gonzalez in the next 100. Nothing in the 100 after that. Come on Europe, you can do better than this, surely?
Edit: bit of a giveaway that both answers are the same, mind.