Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
I don’t think you are fully grasping the concept of being an intellectual here, Mr HY?
I'd leave it well alone tbh otherwise we will end up arguing about the concept of IQs again.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
But he presented "non seriousness" as a virtue. The very antithesis of Brown in this respect, indeed in almost every respect come to think of it. Just about the only thing these 2 men have in common is a bulky frame on which considerable weight can be carried without looking too obese.
Driving to see my father a thought just popped in there…. Liz Truss Prime Minister.
Leaving all partisan aspects aside. Good grief what on Earth are people thinking!
Don't blame me!
But I do blame you, Mr Mark. If your lot had not gone mad in 2015 and targeted the Lib Dem seats, the result of that election could well have been a continuation of the coalition government, with the Tory leader still being that nice Mr Cameron.
Greed is one of the deadly sins that you have to pay for. The problem is that we are all having to pay the price of your sin.
Liz Truss is an ex LD activist and in her youth was more radical than Nick Clegg. What are you complaining about?
That she has been corrupted by a lust for power and, with it, an easy life where thousands of Tory minions work for her, spin for her and the wealthy ones pave her path with gold.
All she has to do in exchange for that is live with corruption and do as she is told.
Nick Clegg would be proud.
Yes, well, there is that. But when was the last person who made it into power who didn’t go a bit mad on it? Major, or Callaghan, I suppose, but them neither of them got that long a run at it.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
Dead wrong. You can coast through Oxford classics on the back of a trad prep/public school background because you are competing unhandicapped against players who are learning the bloody difficult languages for the first time
That implies that standards have suffered as a result of increasing admissions from state schools.
Driving to see my father a thought just popped in there…. Liz Truss Prime Minister.
Leaving all partisan aspects aside. Good grief what on Earth are people thinking!
Don't blame me!
But I do blame you, Mr Mark. If your lot had not gone mad in 2015 and targeted the Lib Dem seats, the result of that election could well have been a continuation of the coalition government, with the Tory leader still being that nice Mr Cameron.
Greed is one of the deadly sins that you have to pay for. The problem is that we are all having to pay the price of your sin.
Liz Truss is an ex LD activist and in her youth was more radical than Nick Clegg. What are you complaining about?
That she has been corrupted by a lust for power and, with it, an easy life where thousands of Tory minions work for her, spin for her and the wealthy ones pave her path with gold.
All she has to do in exchange for that is live with corruption and do as she is told.
Nick Clegg would be proud.
Nick Clegg had it too easy too. He would have been a better politician if he had had to struggle a bit more.
Indeed. Even in politics, and unusually for a LibDem, he didn’t work to win his seat from the opposition, but dropped into a held seat after the previous guy, who had done the hard yards, stood down.
Ashdown was so popular inside the party because he was a rare example of a leader who had worn the t-shirt.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
Dead wrong. You can coast through Oxford classics on the back of a trad prep/public school background because you are competing unhandicapped against players who are learning the bloody difficult languages for the first time
Absolutely - in my day about half the guys who went and did classics at Oxford were genuinely interested and the other half knew it was a sneaky back-door as they were more interested in going to Oxford than what they actually were going there to study.
And as you said it was a lot smaller pool of competition if you’ve been studying Latin and Greek from prep school and onwards when a lot of state schools didn’t or couldn’t offer it.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
The competition here is Cameron and May. So when you compare Johnson with them, you may well be right. The most intellectual.... Also the most devious, the most lazy, the most self-centred... and lots of other negative categories. In short, Johnson was the worst. And not only since Gordon Bown.
He was also more intellectual than Blair, Major and Thatcher, if not as hard working as Thatcher or probably not as logical. He is also likely more intellectual than Truss, Sunak and Starmer
Cameron got a first, which Johnson didn't.
And nobody who uses "girly swot" as a put-down gets to join the intellectuals club.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
Dead wrong. You can coast through Oxford classics on the back of a trad prep/public school background because you are competing unhandicapped against players who are learning the bloody difficult languages for the first time
Absolutely - in my day about half the guys who went and did classics at Oxford were genuinely interested and the other half knew it was a sneaky back-door as they were more interested in going to Oxford than what they actually were going there to study.
And as you said it was a lot smaller pool of competition if you’ve been studying Latin and Greek from prep school and onwards when a lot of state schools didn’t or couldn’t offer it.
You only have to look at the way Johnson does his jobs, and lives his life, to see that he is no intellectual.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
Dead wrong. You can coast through Oxford classics on the back of a trad prep/public school background because you are competing unhandicapped against players who are learning the bloody difficult languages for the first time
Absolutely - in my day about half the guys who went and did classics at Oxford were genuinely interested and the other half knew it was a sneaky back-door as they were more interested in going to Oxford than what they actually were going there to study.
And as you said it was a lot smaller pool of competition if you’ve been studying Latin and Greek from prep school and onwards when a lot of state schools didn’t or couldn’t offer it.
Guiltily allocating myself to one of those categories... shoulda switched to something else after mods.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
But he presented "non seriousness" as a virtue. The very antithesis of Brown in this respect, indeed in almost every respect come to think of it. Just about the only thing these 2 men have in common is a bulky frame on which considerable weight can be carried without looking too obese.
It could have been a virtue, and could have been deployed brilliantly to get us through covid, had there been someone sensible behind it to do the behind the scenes bits. That person was, sadly, Cummings.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
Dead wrong. You can coast through Oxford classics on the back of a trad prep/public school background because you are competing unhandicapped against players who are learning the bloody difficult languages for the first time
That implies that standards have suffered as a result of increasing admissions from state schools.
Well, yes, the better you know the languages the better. But there's arguably a counter balance in increased genuine enthusiasm for the subjects.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
The competition here is Cameron and May. So when you compare Johnson with them, you may well be right. The most intellectual.... Also the most devious, the most lazy, the most self-centred... and lots of other negative categories. In short, Johnson was the worst. And not only since Gordon Bown.
He was also more intellectual than Blair, Major and Thatcher, if not as hard working as Thatcher or probably not as logical. He is also likely more intellectual than Truss, Sunak and Starmer
Cameron got a first, which Johnson didn't.
And nobody who uses "girly swot" as a put-down gets to join the intellectuals club.
Brown and I think Thatcher read political philosophy and economics books “for fun”.
They both strike me as more intellectual than Boris, if less interested in the arts.
Boris strikes me as pretty gammony-middle-brow, which a smattering of Latin helps to obscure.
Driving to see my father a thought just popped in there…. Liz Truss Prime Minister.
Leaving all partisan aspects aside. Good grief what on Earth are people thinking!
Don't blame me!
But I do blame you, Mr Mark. If your lot had not gone mad in 2015 and targeted the Lib Dem seats, the result of that election could well have been a continuation of the coalition government, with the Tory leader still being that nice Mr Cameron.
Greed is one of the deadly sins that you have to pay for. The problem is that we are all having to pay the price of your sin.
Liz Truss is an ex LD activist and in her youth was more radical than Nick Clegg. What are you complaining about?
That she has been corrupted by a lust for power and, with it, an easy life where thousands of Tory minions work for her, spin for her and the wealthy ones pave her path with gold.
All she has to do in exchange for that is live with corruption and do as she is told.
Nick Clegg would be proud.
Nick Clegg had it too easy too. He would have been a better politician if he had had to struggle a bit more.
Indeed. Even in politics, and unusually for a LibDem, he didn’t work to win his seat from the opposition, but dropped into a held seat after the previous guy, who had done the hard yards, stood down.
Ashdown was so popular inside the party because he was a rare example of a leader who had worn the t-shirt.
Almost all of the Liberal/Lib Dem leaders won their seats from an opposition party - Swinson, Campbell, Kennedy, Ashdown, Steel, Thorpe. Grimond and Clement Davies may have inherited them, but that is going back a very long way.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
But he presented "non seriousness" as a virtue. The very antithesis of Brown in this respect, indeed in almost every respect come to think of it. Just about the only thing these 2 men have in common is a bulky frame on which considerable weight can be carried without looking too obese.
Boris is the fattest PM too, probably since Heath.
I don't find the attraction of Boris that difficult. Life is absurd. Boris is absurd. He points out the absurdity of himself and life to you. It's amusing. What more can you ask for from a politician? You don't really believe that they have any intention of actually helping you, do you? That would be ridiculous.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
But he presented "non seriousness" as a virtue. The very antithesis of Brown in this respect, indeed in almost every respect come to think of it. Just about the only thing these 2 men have in common is a bulky frame on which considerable weight can be carried without looking too obese.
It could have been a virtue, and could have been deployed brilliantly to get us through covid, had there been someone sensible behind it to do the behind the scenes bits. That person was, sadly, Cummings.
I actually had no problem with how he "fronted" the pandemic response. Thought he was generally ok on that score and on occasion a bit more than ok.
From a purely pragmatic point of view the White (Haired) Walkers have to vote for Jizzy Lizzy now. They can't go into a GE with a PM who most of the MPs thought was a wanker and not up to it.
You put this in me So now what, so now what? Wanting, needing, waiting For you to Trusstify my love (my love) Hoping, praying For you to Trusstify my love
That remains one of the filthiest pop songs ever. The video too.
Thirty years on, still sublime.
(Especially the William Orbit remix.)
She had a pretty brilliant run. Tuned out of her now - seen a few shots in online tabloids and it looks like she's slipped into self parody and facial injection addiction nowadays.
Many years ago I read a story alleging that there was a make-up artist employed specifically to 'pin' her hair back so tightly that it made her face look smooth so she could claim 'no plastic surgery'.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
The competition here is Cameron and May. So when you compare Johnson with them, you may well be right. The most intellectual.... Also the most devious, the most lazy, the most self-centred... and lots of other negative categories. In short, Johnson was the worst. And not only since Gordon Bown.
He was also more intellectual than Blair, Major and Thatcher, if not as hard working as Thatcher or probably not as logical. He is also likely more intellectual than Truss, Sunak and Starmer
Cameron got a first, which Johnson didn't.
And nobody who uses "girly swot" as a put-down gets to join the intellectuals club.
In PPE and Johnson was a scholar at Eton unlike Cameron. I doubt Cameron is as well read as Boris certainly outside of politics texts
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
The competition here is Cameron and May. So when you compare Johnson with them, you may well be right. The most intellectual.... Also the most devious, the most lazy, the most self-centred... and lots of other negative categories. In short, Johnson was the worst. And not only since Gordon Bown.
He was also more intellectual than Blair, Major and Thatcher, if not as hard working as Thatcher or probably not as logical. He is also likely more intellectual than Truss, Sunak and Starmer
No he isn't. His intellect is all smoke and mirrors. He can't think on his feet and his speaking and writing verges on florid nonsense.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
I don’t think you are fully grasping the concept of being an intellectual here, Mr HY?
I'd leave it well alone tbh otherwise we will end up arguing about the concept of IQs again.
You can have a high IQ and not be an intellectual or have an average IQ but be very intellectual and well read
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
But he presented "non seriousness" as a virtue. The very antithesis of Brown in this respect, indeed in almost every respect come to think of it. Just about the only thing these 2 men have in common is a bulky frame on which considerable weight can be carried without looking too obese.
Boris is the fattest PM too, probably since Heath.
From a purely pragmatic point of view the White (Haired) Walkers have to vote for Jizzy Lizzy now. They can't go into a GE with a PM who most of the MPs thought was a wanker and not up to it.
You put this in me So now what, so now what? Wanting, needing, waiting For you to Trusstify my love (my love) Hoping, praying For you to Trusstify my love
That remains one of the filthiest pop songs ever. The video too.
Thirty years on, still sublime.
(Especially the William Orbit remix.)
She had a pretty brilliant run. Tuned out of her now - seen a few shots in online tabloids and it looks like she's slipped into self parody and facial injection addiction nowadays.
Many years ago I read a story alleging that there was a make-up artist employed specifically to 'pin' her hair back so tightly that it made her face look smooth so she could claim 'no plastic surgery'.
Didn't sound like a lot of fun, I must say.
My wife has been to Madonna’s house for reasons.
On one occasion some 18 yo boy was idling about and my wife said something polite about “your mother”.
From a purely pragmatic point of view the White (Haired) Walkers have to vote for Jizzy Lizzy now. They can't go into a GE with a PM who most of the MPs thought was a wanker and not up to it.
You put this in me So now what, so now what? Wanting, needing, waiting For you to Trusstify my love (my love) Hoping, praying For you to Trusstify my love
That remains one of the filthiest pop songs ever. The video too.
Thirty years on, still sublime.
(Especially the William Orbit remix.)
She had a pretty brilliant run. Tuned out of her now - seen a few shots in online tabloids and it looks like she's slipped into self parody and facial injection addiction nowadays.
Many years ago I read a story alleging that there was a make-up artist employed specifically to 'pin' her hair back so tightly that it made her face look smooth so she could claim 'no plastic surgery'.
Didn't sound like a lot of fun, I must say.
She was (and is fundamentally) a stunning woman. But so many celebrities these days have got 'Putinface' - gone for fillers to puff out the face, eliminate wrinkles, and exaggerate desired characteristics like cheekbones. It looks terrible, especially in motion.
Trivia: I heard Madonna was originally in line to sing Massive Attack's Teardrop. Which would have made it a very different song. 'Love, love, is a verb. Love is a doing word.'
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
The competition here is Cameron and May. So when you compare Johnson with them, you may well be right. The most intellectual.... Also the most devious, the most lazy, the most self-centred... and lots of other negative categories. In short, Johnson was the worst. And not only since Gordon Bown.
He was also more intellectual than Blair, Major and Thatcher, if not as hard working as Thatcher or probably not as logical. He is also likely more intellectual than Truss, Sunak and Starmer
Cameron got a first, which Johnson didn't.
And nobody who uses "girly swot" as a put-down gets to join the intellectuals club.
Brown and I think Thatcher read political philosophy and economics books “for fun”.
They both strike me as more intellectual than Boris, if less interested in the arts.
Boris strikes me as pretty gammony-middle-brow, which a smattering of Latin helps to obscure.
There is a delightful story about an actor I read once. They would swan into a room, loudly say hi to everyone, become the centre of attention, pour a stiff drink and sit at the piano and start playing until a pretty girl would drag them away from the piano.
It turned out the pretty girl was paid to do so and the actor only knew how to play the first few bars of that one tune.
Not sure why that sort of shallowness came to mind...
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
But he presented "non seriousness" as a virtue. The very antithesis of Brown in this respect, indeed in almost every respect come to think of it. Just about the only thing these 2 men have in common is a bulky frame on which considerable weight can be carried without looking too obese.
Boris is the fattest PM too, probably since Heath.
Half the population are fat
Yes. And the last very fat PM was Churchill. I’m just noting that it’s unusual in a PM.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
Is there any hint of a plan to replace, emergency-style, UK's lost gas storage space? In Jan/Feb when blithe Boris/ministers were waving away concerns it was said would take 2 years to build. If had started then would at least be underway. Now, anyone in either camp have a plan?
It is staggering. He knew war was coming, but refused to make the connection on energy. Monstrous abdication of duty. Having dad danced his way round Cop26 he would not engage properly. Any predecessor would have at least started on a storage plan.
Is there any hint of a plan to replace, emergency-style, UK's lost gas storage space? In Jan/Feb when blithe Boris/ministers were waving away concerns it was said would take 2 years to build. If had started then would at least be underway. Now, anyone in either camp have a plan?
It is staggering. He knew war was coming, but refused to make the connection on energy. Monstrous abdication of duty. Having dad danced his way round Cop26 he would not engage properly. Any predecessor would have at least started on a storage plan.
I'm just relieved that something, anything, is happening on this. Good news.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
The competition here is Cameron and May. So when you compare Johnson with them, you may well be right. The most intellectual.... Also the most devious, the most lazy, the most self-centred... and lots of other negative categories. In short, Johnson was the worst. And not only since Gordon Bown.
He was also more intellectual than Blair, Major and Thatcher, if not as hard working as Thatcher or probably not as logical. He is also likely more intellectual than Truss, Sunak and Starmer
Cameron got a first, which Johnson didn't.
And nobody who uses "girly swot" as a put-down gets to join the intellectuals club.
Brown and I think Thatcher read political philosophy and economics books “for fun”.
They both strike me as more intellectual than Boris, if less interested in the arts.
Boris strikes me as pretty gammony-middle-brow, which a smattering of Latin helps to obscure.
There is a delightful story about an actor I read once. They would swan into a room, loudly say hi to everyone, become the centre of attention, pour a stiff drink and sit at the piano and start playing until a pretty girl would drag them away from the piano.
It turned out the pretty girl was paid to do so and the actor only knew how to play the first few bars of that one tune.
Not sure why that sort of shallowness came to mind...
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
classics is basically a step up from art history for public school bluffers
You can't be a true intellectual and have no interest in the classics or the history of art
So the likes of Socrates, who were around before the history of art was invented, ditto most of the classics, weren't intellectual?
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
Is there any hint of a plan to replace, emergency-style, UK's lost gas storage space? In Jan/Feb when blithe Boris/ministers were waving away concerns it was said would take 2 years to build. If had started then would at least be underway. Now, anyone in either camp have a plan?
It is staggering. He knew war was coming, but refused to make the connection on energy. Monstrous abdication of duty. Having dad danced his way round Cop26 he would not engage properly. Any predecessor would have at least started on a storage plan.
Why would it take take two years? Centrica have said they could reopen the storage under N Sea that was closed but Treasury were blocking the money to support this iirc.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
But he presented "non seriousness" as a virtue. The very antithesis of Brown in this respect, indeed in almost every respect come to think of it. Just about the only thing these 2 men have in common is a bulky frame on which considerable weight can be carried without looking too obese.
It could have been a virtue, and could have been deployed brilliantly to get us through covid, had there been someone sensible behind it to do the behind the scenes bits. That person was, sadly, Cummings.
I actually had no problem with how he "fronted" the pandemic response. Thought he was generally ok on that score and on occasion a bit more than ok.
It’s just that the actual substance of what he was selling wasn't good most of the time. He was polishing a turd. If he'd been selling great policies, he'd have been amazing.
'In contrast, Seldon said, Johnson’s final weeks have been “lackadaisical” since he announced he was resigning. “What happens is that prime ministers are either blown away by a general election, like John Major or Gordon Brown, or by a collapsing leadership election, as was the case with Cameron,” Seldon said. “He wanted to do all sorts of things with his last six weeks.[...]
“Whereas this is all lackadaisical. It’s odd because the story of the Johnson premiership is of incomplete work. The things he cared about – levelling up, getting the Brexit dividend, creating the strong economy, creating a strong position for Britain in the world, being the most decisive prime minister on the environment – these things are not complete."'
There is, of course, an argument that a senior manager shouldn't make too many policy initiatives in the end days, which are best left to the successor. But that does not cover urgent stuff such as the gas storage issue.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
classics is basically a step up from art history for public school bluffers
You can't be a true intellectual and have no interest in the classics or the history of art
So the likes of Socrates, who were around before the history of art was invented, ditto most of the classics, weren't intellectual?
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
Tbh the queue to be considered intellectual by HY’s standards would make trying to leave the country from Dover look like a walk in the park.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
classics is basically a step up from art history for public school bluffers
You can't be a true intellectual and have no interest in the classics or the history of art
So the likes of Socrates, who were around before the history of art was invented, ditto most of the classics, weren't intellectual?
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
Uncharacteristically iffy point. Here is S doing art history in Hippias Major:
Socrates This reply, my most excellent friend, he not only will certainly not accept, but he will even jeer at me grossly and will say: “You lunatic, do you think Pheidias is a bad craftsman?” And I shall say, “Not in the least.”
Hippias And you will be right, Socrates.
Socrates Yes, to be sure. Consequently when I agree that Pheidias is a good craftsman, [290b] “Well, then,” he will say, “do you imagine that Pheidias did not know this beautiful that you speak of?” “Why do you ask that?” I shall say. “Because,” he will say, “he did not make the eyes of his Athena of gold, nor the rest of her face, nor her hands and feet, if, that is, they were sure to appear most beautiful provided only they were made of gold, but he made them of ivory; evidently he made this mistake through ignorance, not knowing that it is gold which makes everything beautiful to which it is added.” When he says that, what reply shall we make to him, Hippias? [290c]
Hippias That is easy; for we shall say that Pheidias did right; for ivory, I think, is beautiful.
Socrates “Why, then,” he will say, “did he not make the middle parts of the eyes also of ivory, but of stone, procuring stone as similar as possible to the ivory? Or is beautiful stone also beautiful?” Shall we say that it is, Hippias?
And he had stacks more of the classics available to him than we do, because so much has not survived. Homer plus a lot of other epic plus several thousand plays performed during his lifetime. Not much Plato, of course, and no Latin.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
O level Latin and Greek for me - the latter much more rudimentary, but (apart from other reasons) giving me a clear sense of scientific terminology. Though I never did become a formal botanist. Botanical Latin still is required in plant classification and description: the last living use of Latin, now the RCs have abandoned it.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
classics is basically a step up from art history for public school bluffers
You can't be a true intellectual and have no interest in the classics or the history of art
So the likes of Socrates, who were around before the history of art was invented, ditto most of the classics, weren't intellectual?
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
There was plenty of art around in Ancient Greece, indeed plenty of the greatest statues on earth and many built well before his time. Classical languages were the languages of the time and the stories if the classics were living history.
What a ridiculous comment. If you have no interest in art history then no, you are not a true intellectual even if intelligent
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
classics is basically a step up from art history for public school bluffers
You can't be a true intellectual and have no interest in the classics or the history of art
So the likes of Socrates, who were around before the history of art was invented, ditto most of the classics, weren't intellectual?
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
Uncharacteristically iffy point. Here is S doing art history in Hippias Major:
Socrates This reply, my most excellent friend, he not only will certainly not accept, but he will even jeer at me grossly and will say: “You lunatic, do you think Pheidias is a bad craftsman?” And I shall say, “Not in the least.”
Hippias And you will be right, Socrates.
Socrates Yes, to be sure. Consequently when I agree that Pheidias is a good craftsman, [290b] “Well, then,” he will say, “do you imagine that Pheidias did not know this beautiful that you speak of?” “Why do you ask that?” I shall say. “Because,” he will say, “he did not make the eyes of his Athena of gold, nor the rest of her face, nor her hands and feet, if, that is, they were sure to appear most beautiful provided only they were made of gold, but he made them of ivory; evidently he made this mistake through ignorance, not knowing that it is gold which makes everything beautiful to which it is added.” When he says that, what reply shall we make to him, Hippias? [290c]
Hippias That is easy; for we shall say that Pheidias did right; for ivory, I think, is beautiful.
Socrates “Why, then,” he will say, “did he not make the middle parts of the eyes also of ivory, but of stone, procuring stone as similar as possible to the ivory? Or is beautiful stone also beautiful?” Shall we say that it is, Hippias?
And he had stacks more of the classics available to him than we do, because so much has not survived. Homer plus a lot of other epic plus several thousand plays performed during his lifetime. Not much Plato, of course, and no Latin.
Fair enough! But some at least would count as modern lit/art for him? The equivalent of Koon's bricks in the V&A.
'In contrast, Seldon said, Johnson’s final weeks have been “lackadaisical” since he announced he was resigning. “What happens is that prime ministers are either blown away by a general election, like John Major or Gordon Brown, or by a collapsing leadership election, as was the case with Cameron,” Seldon said. “He wanted to do all sorts of things with his last six weeks.[...]
“Whereas this is all lackadaisical. It’s odd because the story of the Johnson premiership is of incomplete work. The things he cared about – levelling up, getting the Brexit dividend, creating the strong economy, creating a strong position for Britain in the world, being the most decisive prime minister on the environment – these things are not complete."'
There is, of course, an argument that a senior manager shouldn't make too many policy initiatives in the end days, which are best left to the successor. But that does not cover urgent stuff such as the gas storage issue.
The clown never wanted to achieve any of those things; merely to announce them.
'In contrast, Seldon said, Johnson’s final weeks have been “lackadaisical” since he announced he was resigning. “What happens is that prime ministers are either blown away by a general election, like John Major or Gordon Brown, or by a collapsing leadership election, as was the case with Cameron,” Seldon said. “He wanted to do all sorts of things with his last six weeks.[...]
“Whereas this is all lackadaisical. It’s odd because the story of the Johnson premiership is of incomplete work. The things he cared about – levelling up, getting the Brexit dividend, creating the strong economy, creating a strong position for Britain in the world, being the most decisive prime minister on the environment – these things are not complete."'
There is, of course, an argument that a senior manager shouldn't make too many policy initiatives in the end days, which are best left to the successor. But that does not cover urgent stuff such as the gas storage issue.
Simple answer is that being in the last weeks of a Premiership reveals character like few other things- a very public version of the line about an imminent execution.
And since he announced his resignation, Boris has appointed the most idiotic of his loyalists to ministerial jobs, tried to have a party at Chequers, had a photo op flying a plane and gone on holiday.
Perhaps Boris is doing the things he really wants with his last few weeks in power.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
classics is basically a step up from art history for public school bluffers
You can't be a true intellectual and have no interest in the classics or the history of art
So the likes of Socrates, who were around before the history of art was invented, ditto most of the classics, weren't intellectual?
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
In fairness the history of art must have been a somewhat shorter course in Socrates time.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
classics is basically a step up from art history for public school bluffers
You can't be a true intellectual and have no interest in the classics or the history of art
So the likes of Socrates, who were around before the history of art was invented, ditto most of the classics, weren't intellectual?
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
There was plenty of art around in Ancient Greece, indeed plenty of the greatest statues on earth and many built well before his time. Classical languages were the languages of the time and the stories if the classics were living history.
What a ridiculous comment. If you have no interest in art history then no, you are not a true intellectual even if intelligent
What an attitude to intellectual endeavour you have - it only counts if it is the traditional upper class style c. 1930:
posh - tick public school - tick history of art - tick Balliol College - double tick Latin and Greek - tick, double tick if it's Greats at Oxford ...
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
O level Latin and Greek for me - the latter much more rudimentary, but (apart from other reasons) giving me a clear sense of scientific terminology. Though I never did become a formal botanist. Botanical Latin still is required in plant classification and description: the last living use of Latin, now the RCs have abandoned it.
I did Latin to GCSE and Classical Greek to A Level at one of the few state schools to teach them. Very glad to have done both.
The argument that children shouldn't learn ancient languages because they'll 'never use them in real life' strikes me as odd and calls into question much else of the curriculum. I can't remember the last time I saw a Bunsen burner.
It seems the Rwanda plan might have made the Channel People Smugglers drop their prices
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/aug/06/channel-smugglers-drop-prices-and-cram-more-people-on-to-boats " One Syrian asylum seeker told the Guardian that the smugglers had dropped their prices dramatically. “Before it was £3,000 or £4,000 to cross. Now the top price is £1,200 and some asylum seekers are negotiating a price of as little as £500 to cross. Everyone can afford to cross these days. Some asylum seekers are saying to smugglers, ‘Why should I pay you £4,000 to go to the UK when I might end up in Rwanda? I will pay you £500’. Then a deal is struck.”"
Which, presumably, means more people crossing, depending on how many of the smugglers remain in the trade?
Eh?
The market will clear, and all things being equal lower prices mean that there will be less supply of boats by people smugglers.
'In contrast, Seldon said, Johnson’s final weeks have been “lackadaisical” since he announced he was resigning. “What happens is that prime ministers are either blown away by a general election, like John Major or Gordon Brown, or by a collapsing leadership election, as was the case with Cameron,” Seldon said. “He wanted to do all sorts of things with his last six weeks.[...]
“Whereas this is all lackadaisical. It’s odd because the story of the Johnson premiership is of incomplete work. The things he cared about – levelling up, getting the Brexit dividend, creating the strong economy, creating a strong position for Britain in the world, being the most decisive prime minister on the environment – these things are not complete."'
There is, of course, an argument that a senior manager shouldn't make too many policy initiatives in the end days, which are best left to the successor. But that does not cover urgent stuff such as the gas storage issue.
Simple answer is that being in the last weeks of a Premiership reveals character like few other things- a very public version of the line about an imminent execution.
And since he announced his resignation, Boris has appointed the most idiotic of his loyalists to ministerial jobs, tried to have a party at Chequers, had a photo op flying a plane and gone on holiday.
Perhaps Boris is doing the things he really wants with his last few weeks in power.
I think there’s a lot in this.
Boris is said to prefer Truss because she is most trusted to protect his policies, but one can’t help thinking he has other motives - including pure shits and giggles.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
classics is basically a step up from art history for public school bluffers
You can't be a true intellectual and have no interest in the classics or the history of art
So the likes of Socrates, who were around before the history of art was invented, ditto most of the classics, weren't intellectual?
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
Uncharacteristically iffy point. Here is S doing art history in Hippias Major:
Socrates This reply, my most excellent friend, he not only will certainly not accept, but he will even jeer at me grossly and will say: “You lunatic, do you think Pheidias is a bad craftsman?” And I shall say, “Not in the least.”
Hippias And you will be right, Socrates.
Socrates Yes, to be sure. Consequently when I agree that Pheidias is a good craftsman, [290b] “Well, then,” he will say, “do you imagine that Pheidias did not know this beautiful that you speak of?” “Why do you ask that?” I shall say. “Because,” he will say, “he did not make the eyes of his Athena of gold, nor the rest of her face, nor her hands and feet, if, that is, they were sure to appear most beautiful provided only they were made of gold, but he made them of ivory; evidently he made this mistake through ignorance, not knowing that it is gold which makes everything beautiful to which it is added.” When he says that, what reply shall we make to him, Hippias? [290c]
Hippias That is easy; for we shall say that Pheidias did right; for ivory, I think, is beautiful.
Socrates “Why, then,” he will say, “did he not make the middle parts of the eyes also of ivory, but of stone, procuring stone as similar as possible to the ivory? Or is beautiful stone also beautiful?” Shall we say that it is, Hippias?
And he had stacks more of the classics available to him than we do, because so much has not survived. Homer plus a lot of other epic plus several thousand plays performed during his lifetime. Not much Plato, of course, and no Latin.
Nevertheless, the very first intellectual had nothing worthwhile to read.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
Classics teachers are usually really good I think, because otherwise the classics department probably dies, at least in state schools. Really that was the main reason I did Latin, plus I liked the other people in the class. Agree on the grammar stuff too. But leaving school able to speak to actual living people in a language other than English might have been more useful.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
classics is basically a step up from art history for public school bluffers
You can't be a true intellectual and have no interest in the classics or the history of art
So the likes of Socrates, who were around before the history of art was invented, ditto most of the classics, weren't intellectual?
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
Uncharacteristically iffy point. Here is S doing art history in Hippias Major:
Socrates This reply, my most excellent friend, he not only will certainly not accept, but he will even jeer at me grossly and will say: “You lunatic, do you think Pheidias is a bad craftsman?” And I shall say, “Not in the least.”
Hippias And you will be right, Socrates.
Socrates Yes, to be sure. Consequently when I agree that Pheidias is a good craftsman, [290b] “Well, then,” he will say, “do you imagine that Pheidias did not know this beautiful that you speak of?” “Why do you ask that?” I shall say. “Because,” he will say, “he did not make the eyes of his Athena of gold, nor the rest of her face, nor her hands and feet, if, that is, they were sure to appear most beautiful provided only they were made of gold, but he made them of ivory; evidently he made this mistake through ignorance, not knowing that it is gold which makes everything beautiful to which it is added.” When he says that, what reply shall we make to him, Hippias? [290c]
Hippias That is easy; for we shall say that Pheidias did right; for ivory, I think, is beautiful.
Socrates “Why, then,” he will say, “did he not make the middle parts of the eyes also of ivory, but of stone, procuring stone as similar as possible to the ivory? Or is beautiful stone also beautiful?” Shall we say that it is, Hippias?
And he had stacks more of the classics available to him than we do, because so much has not survived. Homer plus a lot of other epic plus several thousand plays performed during his lifetime. Not much Plato, of course, and no Latin.
Nevertheless, the very first intellectual had nothing worthwhile to read.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
O level Latin and Greek for me - the latter much more rudimentary, but (apart from other reasons) giving me a clear sense of scientific terminology. Though I never did become a formal botanist. Botanical Latin still is required in plant classification and description: the last living use of Latin, now the RCs have abandoned it.
I did ancient Greek for a couple of weeks. The only word I really remember was thalappa, which meant sea. Not yet found a concrete use for this sadly, not even in Greece. latin was useful up to a point when studying law, especially in the days before google translate.
It seems the Rwanda plan might have made the Channel People Smugglers drop their prices
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/aug/06/channel-smugglers-drop-prices-and-cram-more-people-on-to-boats " One Syrian asylum seeker told the Guardian that the smugglers had dropped their prices dramatically. “Before it was £3,000 or £4,000 to cross. Now the top price is £1,200 and some asylum seekers are negotiating a price of as little as £500 to cross. Everyone can afford to cross these days. Some asylum seekers are saying to smugglers, ‘Why should I pay you £4,000 to go to the UK when I might end up in Rwanda? I will pay you £500’. Then a deal is struck.”"
Which, presumably, means more people crossing, depending on how many of the smugglers remain in the trade?
Eh?
The market will clear, and all things being equal lower prices mean that there will be less supply of boats by people smugglers.
Unless the previous prices were so gougey that the trade remains insanely profitable even at 500 a pop, which it probably is.
If petrol prices halve from here I do not expect there to be only half as many petrol stations as there are now.
'In contrast, Seldon said, Johnson’s final weeks have been “lackadaisical” since he announced he was resigning. “What happens is that prime ministers are either blown away by a general election, like John Major or Gordon Brown, or by a collapsing leadership election, as was the case with Cameron,” Seldon said. “He wanted to do all sorts of things with his last six weeks.[...]
“Whereas this is all lackadaisical. It’s odd because the story of the Johnson premiership is of incomplete work. The things he cared about – levelling up, getting the Brexit dividend, creating the strong economy, creating a strong position for Britain in the world, being the most decisive prime minister on the environment – these things are not complete."'
There is, of course, an argument that a senior manager shouldn't make too many policy initiatives in the end days, which are best left to the successor. But that does not cover urgent stuff such as the gas storage issue.
Simple answer is that being in the last weeks of a Premiership reveals character like few other things- a very public version of the line about an imminent execution.
And since he announced his resignation, Boris has appointed the most idiotic of his loyalists to ministerial jobs, tried to have a party at Chequers, had a photo op flying a plane and gone on holiday.
Perhaps Boris is doing the things he really wants with his last few weeks in power.
I think there’s a lot in this.
Boris is said to prefer Truss because she is most trusted to protect his policies, but one can’t help thinking he has other motives - including pure shits and giggles.
Most likely to make him look good in retrospect and potentially open the way to a triumphant return, I think.
It seems the Rwanda plan might have made the Channel People Smugglers drop their prices
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/aug/06/channel-smugglers-drop-prices-and-cram-more-people-on-to-boats " One Syrian asylum seeker told the Guardian that the smugglers had dropped their prices dramatically. “Before it was £3,000 or £4,000 to cross. Now the top price is £1,200 and some asylum seekers are negotiating a price of as little as £500 to cross. Everyone can afford to cross these days. Some asylum seekers are saying to smugglers, ‘Why should I pay you £4,000 to go to the UK when I might end up in Rwanda? I will pay you £500’. Then a deal is struck.”"
Which, presumably, means more people crossing, depending on how many of the smugglers remain in the trade?
Eh?
The market will clear, and all things being equal lower prices mean that there will be less supply of boats by people smugglers.
ATM it seems to be more people in each boat - the Amstrad hi-fi solution.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
O level Latin and Greek for me - the latter much more rudimentary, but (apart from other reasons) giving me a clear sense of scientific terminology. Though I never did become a formal botanist. Botanical Latin still is required in plant classification and description: the last living use of Latin, now the RCs have abandoned it.
I did ancient Greek for a couple of weeks. The only word I really remember was thalappa, which meant sea. Not yet found a concrete use for this sadly, not even in Greece. latin was useful up to a point when studying law, especially in the days before google translate.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
O level Latin and Greek for me - the latter much more rudimentary, but (apart from other reasons) giving me a clear sense of scientific terminology. Though I never did become a formal botanist. Botanical Latin still is required in plant classification and description: the last living use of Latin, now the RCs have abandoned it.
I did ancient Greek for a couple of weeks. The only word I really remember was thalappa, which meant sea. Not yet found a concrete use for this sadly, not even in Greece. latin was useful up to a point when studying law, especially in the days before google translate.
Are you saying you’ve never found an opportunity to employ the word thalassocracy?
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
Classics teachers are usually really good I think, because otherwise the classics department probably dies, at least in state schools. Really that was the main reason I did Latin, plus I liked the other people in the class. Agree on the grammar stuff too. But leaving school able to speak to actual living people in a language other than English might have been more useful.
You must be joking (on the first bit). My grammar school Latin teacher used to give extra marks if our Latin homework was handed in done in different coloured pens; “beauty marks”, he used to call them. I dropped that subject as soon as I could, and have yet to find a country where what little I can remember from those classes helps me order a beer.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
Classics teachers are usually really good I think, because otherwise the classics department probably dies, at least in state schools. Really that was the main reason I did Latin, plus I liked the other people in the class. Agree on the grammar stuff too. But leaving school able to speak to actual living people in a language other than English might have been more useful.
I suppose that depends whether you like people or not.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
classics is basically a step up from art history for public school bluffers
You can't be a true intellectual and have no interest in the classics or the history of art
So the likes of Socrates, who were around before the history of art was invented, ditto most of the classics, weren't intellectual?
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
Uncharacteristically iffy point. Here is S doing art history in Hippias Major:
Socrates This reply, my most excellent friend, he not only will certainly not accept, but he will even jeer at me grossly and will say: “You lunatic, do you think Pheidias is a bad craftsman?” And I shall say, “Not in the least.”
Hippias And you will be right, Socrates.
Socrates Yes, to be sure. Consequently when I agree that Pheidias is a good craftsman, [290b] “Well, then,” he will say, “do you imagine that Pheidias did not know this beautiful that you speak of?” “Why do you ask that?” I shall say. “Because,” he will say, “he did not make the eyes of his Athena of gold, nor the rest of her face, nor her hands and feet, if, that is, they were sure to appear most beautiful provided only they were made of gold, but he made them of ivory; evidently he made this mistake through ignorance, not knowing that it is gold which makes everything beautiful to which it is added.” When he says that, what reply shall we make to him, Hippias? [290c]
Hippias That is easy; for we shall say that Pheidias did right; for ivory, I think, is beautiful.
Socrates “Why, then,” he will say, “did he not make the middle parts of the eyes also of ivory, but of stone, procuring stone as similar as possible to the ivory? Or is beautiful stone also beautiful?” Shall we say that it is, Hippias?
And he had stacks more of the classics available to him than we do, because so much has not survived. Homer plus a lot of other epic plus several thousand plays performed during his lifetime. Not much Plato, of course, and no Latin.
Nevertheless, the very first intellectual had nothing worthwhile to read.
Plenty more time to write the first intellectual book though. About that strange bloke drawing round his hand and making squiggles that look like buffalo, no doubt.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
O level Latin and Greek for me - the latter much more rudimentary, but (apart from other reasons) giving me a clear sense of scientific terminology. Though I never did become a formal botanist. Botanical Latin still is required in plant classification and description: the last living use of Latin, now the RCs have abandoned it.
I did ancient Greek for a couple of weeks. The only word I really remember was thalappa, which meant sea. Not yet found a concrete use for this sadly, not even in Greece. latin was useful up to a point when studying law, especially in the days before google translate.
Are you saying you’ve never found an opportunity to employ the word thalassocracy?
Just wow.
Panthalassa = world ocean when there was only one continent Pangaea, in the early Mesozoic.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
Classics teachers are usually really good I think, because otherwise the classics department probably dies, at least in state schools. Really that was the main reason I did Latin, plus I liked the other people in the class. Agree on the grammar stuff too. But leaving school able to speak to actual living people in a language other than English might have been more useful.
You must be joking (on the first bit). My grammar school Latin teacher used to give extra marks if our Latin homework was handed in done in different coloured pens; “beauty marks”, he used to call them. I dropped that subject as soon as I could, and have yet to find a country where what little I can remember from those classes helps me order a beer.
Are you trying for some kind of Philistinism award?
From a purely pragmatic point of view the White (Haired) Walkers have to vote for Jizzy Lizzy now. They can't go into a GE with a PM who most of the MPs thought was a wanker and not up to it.
You put this in me So now what, so now what? Wanting, needing, waiting For you to Trusstify my love (my love) Hoping, praying For you to Trusstify my love
That remains one of the filthiest pop songs ever. The video too.
Thirty years on, still sublime.
(Especially the William Orbit remix.)
She had a pretty brilliant run. Tuned out of her now - seen a few shots in online tabloids and it looks like she's slipped into self parody and facial injection addiction nowadays.
Many years ago I read a story alleging that there was a make-up artist employed specifically to 'pin' her hair back so tightly that it made her face look smooth so she could claim 'no plastic surgery'.
Didn't sound like a lot of fun, I must say.
My wife has been to Madonna’s house for reasons.
On one occasion some 18 yo boy was idling about and my wife said something polite about “your mother”.
But the boy was not Madonna’s son…
My sister went to a school's parents' meeting, chatting off and on with the woman seated next to her only to find out afterwards that it was Madonna.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
Latin had been abolished in comprehensives by the time I was at one.
'In contrast, Seldon said, Johnson’s final weeks have been “lackadaisical” since he announced he was resigning. “What happens is that prime ministers are either blown away by a general election, like John Major or Gordon Brown, or by a collapsing leadership election, as was the case with Cameron,” Seldon said. “He wanted to do all sorts of things with his last six weeks.[...]
“Whereas this is all lackadaisical. It’s odd because the story of the Johnson premiership is of incomplete work. The things he cared about – levelling up, getting the Brexit dividend, creating the strong economy, creating a strong position for Britain in the world, being the most decisive prime minister on the environment – these things are not complete."'
There is, of course, an argument that a senior manager shouldn't make too many policy initiatives in the end days, which are best left to the successor. But that does not cover urgent stuff such as the gas storage issue.
Simple answer is that being in the last weeks of a Premiership reveals character like few other things- a very public version of the line about an imminent execution.
And since he announced his resignation, Boris has appointed the most idiotic of his loyalists to ministerial jobs, tried to have a party at Chequers, had a photo op flying a plane and gone on holiday.
Perhaps Boris is doing the things he really wants with his last few weeks in power.
I think there’s a lot in this.
Boris is said to prefer Truss because she is most trusted to protect his policies, but one can’t help thinking he has other motives - including pure shits and giggles.
Most likely to make him look good in retrospect and potentially open the way to a triumphant return, I think.
And Rishi betrayed him, whereas Liz (after an early wobble... what was the Boris question in the Channel 4 debate where they all said no?) remained loyal.
The Privileges Committee thing due in the autumn is going to be an interesting test for Truss. Once she's safely in No 10, the sensible, ruthless bastard thing to do will be to allow them to shoot Boris in the back of the head, and use that as an excuse to kick him out. With regret that it has come to this, of course.
What will she do? And what will her madder backers make of it?
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
Probably more useful. I was good at Latin but deeply average at modern languages. The mysteries of the brain.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
Classics teachers are usually really good I think, because otherwise the classics department probably dies, at least in state schools. Really that was the main reason I did Latin, plus I liked the other people in the class. Agree on the grammar stuff too. But leaving school able to speak to actual living people in a language other than English might have been more useful.
You must be joking (on the first bit). My grammar school Latin teacher used to give extra marks if our Latin homework was handed in done in different coloured pens; “beauty marks”, he used to call them. I dropped that subject as soon as I could, and have yet to find a country where what little I can remember from those classes helps me order a beer.
Are you trying for some kind of Philistinism award?
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
O level Latin and Greek for me - the latter much more rudimentary, but (apart from other reasons) giving me a clear sense of scientific terminology. Though I never did become a formal botanist. Botanical Latin still is required in plant classification and description: the last living use of Latin, now the RCs have abandoned it.
I did ancient Greek for a couple of weeks. The only word I really remember was thalappa, which meant sea. Not yet found a concrete use for this sadly, not even in Greece. latin was useful up to a point when studying law, especially in the days before google translate.
Are you saying you’ve never found an opportunity to employ the word thalassocracy?
Just wow.
No, and that is despite studying the British Empire from 1854 to 1914 where it might have actually been useful to describe how we could rule a third of the world with a smaller standing army than Belgium.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
Classics teachers are usually really good I think, because otherwise the classics department probably dies, at least in state schools. Really that was the main reason I did Latin, plus I liked the other people in the class. Agree on the grammar stuff too. But leaving school able to speak to actual living people in a language other than English might have been more useful.
You must be joking (on the first bit). My grammar school Latin teacher used to give extra marks if our Latin homework was handed in done in different coloured pens; “beauty marks”, he used to call them. I dropped that subject as soon as I could, and have yet to find a country where what little I can remember from those classes helps me order a beer.
Cervesia will get you there in Spain, Portugal and most of South America.
With a teacher like that, I'd be asking whether he liked to ask boys round for 1 on 1 tutorials.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
classics is basically a step up from art history for public school bluffers
You can't be a true intellectual and have no interest in the classics or the history of art
So the likes of Socrates, who were around before the history of art was invented, ditto most of the classics, weren't intellectual?
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
Uncharacteristically iffy point. Here is S doing art history in Hippias Major:
Socrates This reply, my most excellent friend, he not only will certainly not accept, but he will even jeer at me grossly and will say: “You lunatic, do you think Pheidias is a bad craftsman?” And I shall say, “Not in the least.”
Hippias And you will be right, Socrates.
Socrates Yes, to be sure. Consequently when I agree that Pheidias is a good craftsman, [290b] “Well, then,” he will say, “do you imagine that Pheidias did not know this beautiful that you speak of?” “Why do you ask that?” I shall say. “Because,” he will say, “he did not make the eyes of his Athena of gold, nor the rest of her face, nor her hands and feet, if, that is, they were sure to appear most beautiful provided only they were made of gold, but he made them of ivory; evidently he made this mistake through ignorance, not knowing that it is gold which makes everything beautiful to which it is added.” When he says that, what reply shall we make to him, Hippias? [290c]
Hippias That is easy; for we shall say that Pheidias did right; for ivory, I think, is beautiful.
Socrates “Why, then,” he will say, “did he not make the middle parts of the eyes also of ivory, but of stone, procuring stone as similar as possible to the ivory? Or is beautiful stone also beautiful?” Shall we say that it is, Hippias?
And he had stacks more of the classics available to him than we do, because so much has not survived. Homer plus a lot of other epic plus several thousand plays performed during his lifetime. Not much Plato, of course, and no Latin.
PS Did he include only Hellenic art as art? Or was barbarian art, by definition so to speak, beyond the pale?
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
Classics teachers are usually really good I think, because otherwise the classics department probably dies, at least in state schools. Really that was the main reason I did Latin, plus I liked the other people in the class. Agree on the grammar stuff too. But leaving school able to speak to actual living people in a language other than English might have been more useful.
You must be joking (on the first bit). My grammar school Latin teacher used to give extra marks if our Latin homework was handed in done in different coloured pens; “beauty marks”, he used to call them. I dropped that subject as soon as I could, and have yet to find a country where what little I can remember from those classes helps me order a beer.
Are you trying for some kind of Philistinism award?
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
O level Latin and Greek for me - the latter much more rudimentary, but (apart from other reasons) giving me a clear sense of scientific terminology. Though I never did become a formal botanist. Botanical Latin still is required in plant classification and description: the last living use of Latin, now the RCs have abandoned it.
I did ancient Greek for a couple of weeks. The only word I really remember was thalappa, which meant sea. Not yet found a concrete use for this sadly, not even in Greece. latin was useful up to a point when studying law, especially in the days before google translate.
thalatta or thalassa, not thalappa.
θάλασσα which I think is actually double rho isn't it?
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
Classics teachers are usually really good I think, because otherwise the classics department probably dies, at least in state schools. Really that was the main reason I did Latin, plus I liked the other people in the class. Agree on the grammar stuff too. But leaving school able to speak to actual living people in a language other than English might have been more useful.
You must be joking (on the first bit). My grammar school Latin teacher used to give extra marks if our Latin homework was handed in done in different coloured pens; “beauty marks”, he used to call them. I dropped that subject as soon as I could, and have yet to find a country where what little I can remember from those classes helps me order a beer.
Cervesia will get you there in Spain, Portugal and most of South America.
With a teacher like that, I'd be asking whether he liked to ask boys round for 1 on 1 tutorials.
The joys of education in the 1970s, untroubled by the greater awareness of modern times. I still wonder about my primary school; from a young age I was always someone who wouldn’t stand for any BS; predatory teachers from that era had the ability to identify those pupils who were more easily manipulated. All I remember, so many years later, is that pupils knew instinctively that there were some who were best avoided.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
classics is basically a step up from art history for public school bluffers
You can't be a true intellectual and have no interest in the classics or the history of art
So the likes of Socrates, who were around before the history of art was invented, ditto most of the classics, weren't intellectual?
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
Uncharacteristically iffy point. Here is S doing art history in Hippias Major:
Socrates This reply, my most excellent friend, he not only will certainly not accept, but he will even jeer at me grossly and will say: “You lunatic, do you think Pheidias is a bad craftsman?” And I shall say, “Not in the least.”
Hippias And you will be right, Socrates.
Socrates Yes, to be sure. Consequently when I agree that Pheidias is a good craftsman, [290b] “Well, then,” he will say, “do you imagine that Pheidias did not know this beautiful that you speak of?” “Why do you ask that?” I shall say. “Because,” he will say, “he did not make the eyes of his Athena of gold, nor the rest of her face, nor her hands and feet, if, that is, they were sure to appear most beautiful provided only they were made of gold, but he made them of ivory; evidently he made this mistake through ignorance, not knowing that it is gold which makes everything beautiful to which it is added.” When he says that, what reply shall we make to him, Hippias? [290c]
Hippias That is easy; for we shall say that Pheidias did right; for ivory, I think, is beautiful.
Socrates “Why, then,” he will say, “did he not make the middle parts of the eyes also of ivory, but of stone, procuring stone as similar as possible to the ivory? Or is beautiful stone also beautiful?” Shall we say that it is, Hippias?
And he had stacks more of the classics available to him than we do, because so much has not survived. Homer plus a lot of other epic plus several thousand plays performed during his lifetime. Not much Plato, of course, and no Latin.
PS Did he include only Hellenic art as art? Or was barbarian art, by definition so to speak, beyond the pale?
The Greeks were very, very clear on the worthlessness of everything not Greek. Except possibly Egypt (where I think Plato went but Socrates, not).
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
Latin had been abolished in comprehensives by the time I was at one.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
O level Latin and Greek for me - the latter much more rudimentary, but (apart from other reasons) giving me a clear sense of scientific terminology. Though I never did become a formal botanist. Botanical Latin still is required in plant classification and description: the last living use of Latin, now the RCs have abandoned it.
I did ancient Greek for a couple of weeks. The only word I really remember was thalappa, which meant sea. Not yet found a concrete use for this sadly, not even in Greece. latin was useful up to a point when studying law, especially in the days before google translate.
thalatta or thalassa, not thalappa.
θάλασσα which I think is actually double rho isn't it?
Those are sigmas. It's θάλαττα in some dialects including Attic (which is kinda mainstream cos it is what Athens spoke)
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
Classics teachers are usually really good I think, because otherwise the classics department probably dies, at least in state schools. Really that was the main reason I did Latin, plus I liked the other people in the class. Agree on the grammar stuff too. But leaving school able to speak to actual living people in a language other than English might have been more useful.
You must be joking (on the first bit). My grammar school Latin teacher used to give extra marks if our Latin homework was handed in done in different coloured pens; “beauty marks”, he used to call them. I dropped that subject as soon as I could, and have yet to find a country where what little I can remember from those classes helps me order a beer.
"At the other end of the fightback are the insurgent youths, ambushing Russians with their daggers. Ukraine's government does not want to admit this is happening, perhaps because it exposes how desperate the defence has become. But the Russians will not acknowledge it either, because they are ashamed by the damage these youngsters are inflicting.
"Groups with knives, sometimes a handful and sometimes a marauding gang, attack Russians wherever they can — slashing them, stabbing them, cutting their throats if they get the chance."
"On the pretence of rooting out resistance cells, the [Russian] soldiers break down doors and march into houses at any hour. They torture and rape the inhabitants, and kill them. Property is destroyed or looted.
These are not isolated incidents. It is going on all over Kherson — every day, every night. The anger this unleashes in all the inhabitants, including the very youngest, is palpable."
From a purely pragmatic point of view the White (Haired) Walkers have to vote for Jizzy Lizzy now. They can't go into a GE with a PM who most of the MPs thought was a wanker and not up to it.
You put this in me So now what, so now what? Wanting, needing, waiting For you to Trusstify my love (my love) Hoping, praying For you to Trusstify my love
That remains one of the filthiest pop songs ever. The video too.
Thirty years on, still sublime.
(Especially the William Orbit remix.)
The Orbit remix is indeed superb.
And Madonna's overall best album, unsurprisingly, is the one that was produced by William Orbit.
I've been thinking a bit about the complaints by Conservatives about the 'left blob' thing. A major contributory factor to the left blob is that people who work in public service are not really motivated by remuneration. The Civil service recruit at low levels of pay, and it is the same across much of the public sector. Also, when you join the civil service, you can't pursue other financial interests and this is normally a condition of your employment. So what you end up is with a certain kind of person that goes in to it, ie: not driven by money, modest expenditure, careful, churchgoer. They are more likely to be sympathetic to left wing ideas than right wing. People who are entrepeneurial don't go in to this type of job. Nor are people who have experienced any significant success in the commercial world. The tories have had 12 years to do something meaningful about this, but actually they have done very little, and freezing the pay of the civil service, which in my view exacerbates the fundamental problem.
I went to a very working class comp but Latin was probably my best and favourite subject. Think I only dropped it after O level because it seemed an arty farty hobby type thing rather than a 'proper' A level like Maths or Sciences. Not a great call, looking back, but it joins the queue of those and it's nowhere near the front.
I did Latin for standard grade and higher, and did standard grade Greek too. Looking back I wish I had studied French or German instead.
I did Higher Latin too. It improved my memory and knowledge of English grammar which English had long since given up teaching. Had I done 6th year I was going to do O level Greek too, mainly because I really liked the teachers in the classics department, but I left school instead.
O level Latin and Greek for me - the latter much more rudimentary, but (apart from other reasons) giving me a clear sense of scientific terminology. Though I never did become a formal botanist. Botanical Latin still is required in plant classification and description: the last living use of Latin, now the RCs have abandoned it.
I did ancient Greek for a couple of weeks. The only word I really remember was thalappa, which meant sea. Not yet found a concrete use for this sadly, not even in Greece. latin was useful up to a point when studying law, especially in the days before google translate.
thalatta or thalassa, not thalappa.
θάλασσα which I think is actually double rho isn't it?
Those are sigmas. It's θάλαττα in some dialects including Attic (which is kinda mainstream cos it is what Athens spoke)
I am starting to see that I didn't get as much out of those 4 or 5 classes in 1978 as I thought. Oh well. If ignorance is bliss I am a happy boy.
Bet Rishi is wishing he'd handed out 10 of his votes to Penny.
I still don't understand what happened between the 2nd and 3rd Ballot with Mourdaunt.
He'd have lost to Penny I expect too - but it'd have been closer than it will be.
He would have beaten The Hat and Hunt, maybe Zahawi. Lost to the rest, even bonkers Braverman.
Yep - it's a populist right party and so whichever populist right candidate made the run off was probably going to be fav to win. Although Mordaunt doesn't quite fit that. She was more a blank canvas.
I made money on her, having backed her on a hunch a while ago at 66, but I actually read things wrong. I thought being untainted by Johnson association, as she was, would have been a strength.
Well it was amongst MPs but not with the members where it's very much still "Boris" rather than Johnson. And I think this is the main reason why Sunak is losing to Truss. He's seen as the traitor who knifed the Beloved. I think this is a bigger factor than Truss's populism.
The Beloved Boris mentality is worthy of study.
It cannot be based much on either ideology or loyalty has Boris has little of either.
And the laziness, self-indulgence, immaturity and refusal to learn from mistakes of Boris cannot be denied.
Boris isn't even a means to and end anymore as he was in 2019.
It is - a curious mix of celeb worship, anti-intellectualism, class deference, escapism, and short attention spans plus shallow sensibilities in the age of social media and reality tv is my best shot at explaining it.
But I don't want to do the actual study. I'd rather try my level best to forget him.
Boris is a classics scholar, probably was our most intellectual PM since Gordon Brown
classics is basically a step up from art history for public school bluffers
You can't be a true intellectual and have no interest in the classics or the history of art
So the likes of Socrates, who were around before the history of art was invented, ditto most of the classics, weren't intellectual?
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
Uncharacteristically iffy point. Here is S doing art history in Hippias Major:
Socrates This reply, my most excellent friend, he not only will certainly not accept, but he will even jeer at me grossly and will say: “You lunatic, do you think Pheidias is a bad craftsman?” And I shall say, “Not in the least.”
Hippias And you will be right, Socrates.
Socrates Yes, to be sure. Consequently when I agree that Pheidias is a good craftsman, [290b] “Well, then,” he will say, “do you imagine that Pheidias did not know this beautiful that you speak of?” “Why do you ask that?” I shall say. “Because,” he will say, “he did not make the eyes of his Athena of gold, nor the rest of her face, nor her hands and feet, if, that is, they were sure to appear most beautiful provided only they were made of gold, but he made them of ivory; evidently he made this mistake through ignorance, not knowing that it is gold which makes everything beautiful to which it is added.” When he says that, what reply shall we make to him, Hippias? [290c]
Hippias That is easy; for we shall say that Pheidias did right; for ivory, I think, is beautiful.
Socrates “Why, then,” he will say, “did he not make the middle parts of the eyes also of ivory, but of stone, procuring stone as similar as possible to the ivory? Or is beautiful stone also beautiful?” Shall we say that it is, Hippias?
And he had stacks more of the classics available to him than we do, because so much has not survived. Homer plus a lot of other epic plus several thousand plays performed during his lifetime. Not much Plato, of course, and no Latin.
PS Did he include only Hellenic art as art? Or was barbarian art, by definition so to speak, beyond the pale?
The Greeks were very, very clear on the worthlessness of everything not Greek. Except possibly Egypt (where I think Plato went but Socrates, not).
What did the Greeks think about India? I know there was a decent amount of trade going on - and it's always struck me that when you look at Indian temples with the deities painted in bold colours how similar it may have been to the Greek look at the time.
Surely the unkindest cut of all. Zahawi and Braverman between them collected more MPs votes than Truss
Al Zahawi’s trajectory has been remarkable, promoted from obscurity to UK government chancellor, then knifes his boss a few days later, puts up for the leadership but is rejected by his colleagues, then slain by an American drone. Has there ever been a political career like it?
I've been thinking a bit about the complaints by Conservatives about the 'left blob' thing. A major contributory factor to the left blob is that people who work in public service are not really motivated by remuneration. The Civil service recruit at low levels of pay, and it is the same across much of the public sector. Also, when you join the civil service, you can't pursue other financial interests and this is normally a condition of your employment. So what you end up is with a certain kind of person that goes in to it, ie: not driven by money, modest expenditure, careful, churchgoer. They are more likely to be sympathetic to left wing ideas than right wing. People who are entrepeneurial don't go in to this type of job. Nor are people who have experienced any significant success in the commercial world. The tories have had 12 years to do something meaningful about this, but actually they have done very little, and freezing the pay of the civil service, which in my view exacerbates the fundamental problem.
I guess in days gone by - the entrepreneurial types would have had a role advising the Treasury or the like in a 'Captains of Industry' position. Not sure when that kind of thing disappeared. 60s at a guess? Once in a while we see someone like 'Former head of Tesco' being brought in to do something with a 'taskforce' or whatever, but not really the same thing.
Comments
Ashdown was so popular inside the party because he was a rare example of a leader who had worn the t-shirt.
And as you said it was a lot smaller pool of competition if you’ve been studying Latin and Greek from prep school and onwards when a lot of state schools didn’t or couldn’t offer it.
And nobody who uses "girly swot" as a put-down gets to join the intellectuals club.
They both strike me as more intellectual than Boris, if less interested in the arts.
Boris strikes me as pretty gammony-middle-brow, which a smattering of Latin helps to obscure.
See also Jacob Rees Mogg and his essentially fake pronouncements on constitutional history.
Didn't sound like a lot of fun, I must say.
On one occasion some 18 yo boy was idling about and my wife said something polite about “your mother”.
But the boy was not Madonna’s son…
Trivia: I heard Madonna was originally in line to sing Massive Attack's Teardrop. Which would have made it a very different song. 'Love, love, is a verb. Love is a doing word.'
It turned out the pretty girl was paid to do so and the actor only knew how to play the first few bars of that one tune.
Not sure why that sort of shallowness came to mind...
I’m just noting that it’s unusual in a PM.
Is there any hint of a plan to replace, emergency-style, UK's lost gas storage space? In Jan/Feb when blithe Boris/ministers were waving away concerns it was said would take 2 years to build. If had started then would at least be underway. Now, anyone in either camp have a plan?
https://twitter.com/iainmartin1/status/1555840040143667200?s=21&t=aQQi4z2sSzK7BnF1bmyNNw
It is staggering. He knew war was coming, but refused to make the connection on energy. Monstrous abdication of duty. Having dad danced his way round Cop26 he would not engage properly. Any predecessor would have at least started on a storage plan.
Really sad case all round.
And I have no interest in the history of art, but would certainly count as an intellectual by your standards.
Critique of Mr J's approach to life and work:
'In contrast, Seldon said, Johnson’s final weeks have been “lackadaisical” since he announced he was resigning. “What happens is that prime ministers are either blown away by a general election, like John Major or Gordon Brown, or by a collapsing leadership election, as was the case with Cameron,” Seldon said. “He wanted to do all sorts of things with his last six weeks.[...]
“Whereas this is all lackadaisical. It’s odd because the story of the Johnson premiership is of incomplete work. The things he cared about – levelling up, getting the Brexit dividend, creating the strong economy, creating a strong position for Britain in the world, being the most decisive prime minister on the environment – these things are not complete."'
There is, of course, an argument that a senior manager shouldn't make too many policy initiatives in the end days, which are best left to the successor. But that does not cover urgent stuff such as the gas storage issue.
Socrates
This reply, my most excellent friend, he not only will certainly not accept, but he will even jeer at me grossly and will say: “You lunatic, do you think Pheidias is a bad craftsman?” And I shall say, “Not in the least.”
Hippias
And you will be right, Socrates.
Socrates
Yes, to be sure. Consequently when I agree that Pheidias is a good craftsman, [290b] “Well, then,” he will say, “do you imagine that Pheidias did not know this beautiful that you speak of?” “Why do you ask that?” I shall say. “Because,” he will say, “he did not make the eyes of his Athena of gold, nor the rest of her face, nor her hands and feet, if, that is, they were sure to appear most beautiful provided only they were made of gold, but he made them of ivory; evidently he made this mistake through ignorance, not knowing that it is gold which makes everything beautiful to which it is added.” When he says that, what reply shall we make to him, Hippias? [290c]
Hippias
That is easy; for we shall say that Pheidias did right; for ivory, I think, is beautiful.
Socrates
“Why, then,” he will say, “did he not make the middle parts of the eyes also of ivory, but of stone, procuring stone as similar as possible to the ivory? Or is beautiful stone also beautiful?” Shall we say that it is, Hippias?
And he had stacks more of the classics available to him than we do, because so much has not survived. Homer plus a lot of other epic plus several thousand plays performed during his lifetime. Not much Plato, of course, and no Latin.
What a ridiculous comment. If you have no interest in art history then no, you are not a true intellectual even if intelligent
Andrew Neil"
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-11085647/ANDREW-NEIL-Liz-Trusss-biggest-foe-wont-Starmer-vitrolic-campaign-Left-Blob.html
And since he announced his resignation, Boris has appointed the most idiotic of his loyalists to ministerial jobs, tried to have a party at Chequers, had a photo op flying a plane and gone on holiday.
Perhaps Boris is doing the things he really wants with his last few weeks in power.
posh - tick
public school - tick
history of art - tick
Balliol College - double tick
Latin and Greek - tick, double tick if it's Greats at Oxford ...
The argument that children shouldn't learn ancient languages because they'll 'never use them in real life' strikes me as odd and calls into question much else of the curriculum. I can't remember the last time I saw a Bunsen burner.
The market will clear, and all things being equal lower prices mean that there will be less supply of boats by people smugglers.
Boris is said to prefer Truss because she is most trusted to protect his policies, but one can’t help thinking he has other motives - including pure shits and giggles.
If petrol prices halve from here I do not expect there to be only half as many petrol stations as there are now.
Just wow.
But so paranoid about what he calls "the Left Blob" (aka what most people call "the Establishment") that he has no choice but to root for her.
About that strange bloke drawing round his hand and making squiggles that look like buffalo, no doubt.
The Privileges Committee thing due in the autumn is going to be an interesting test for Truss. Once she's safely in No 10, the sensible, ruthless bastard thing to do will be to allow them to shoot Boris in the back of the head, and use that as an excuse to kick him out. With regret that it has come to this, of course.
What will she do? And what will her madder backers make of it?
Right there in Botanical Latin, so 'da mihi cervisiam unam' at Kew Gardens upmarket cafe should do it.
With a teacher like that, I'd be asking whether he liked to ask boys round for 1 on 1 tutorials.
which I think is actually double rho isn't it?
"At the other end of the fightback are the insurgent youths, ambushing Russians with their daggers. Ukraine's government does not want to admit this is happening, perhaps because it exposes how desperate the defence has become. But the Russians will not acknowledge it either, because they are ashamed by the damage these youngsters are inflicting.
"Groups with knives, sometimes a handful and sometimes a marauding gang, attack Russians wherever they can — slashing them, stabbing them, cutting their throats if they get the chance."
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11086027/Insider-accounts-obtained-veteran-war-reporter-expose-unimaginable-evil-Kherson.html
"On the pretence of rooting out resistance cells, the [Russian] soldiers break down doors and march into houses at any hour. They torture and rape the inhabitants, and kill them. Property is destroyed or looted.
These are not isolated incidents. It is going on all over Kherson — every day, every night. The anger this unleashes in all the inhabitants, including the very youngest, is palpable."
This is WW2
And Madonna's overall best album, unsurprisingly, is the one that was produced by William Orbit.
A major contributory factor to the left blob is that people who work in public service are not really motivated by remuneration.
The Civil service recruit at low levels of pay, and it is the same across much of the public sector.
Also, when you join the civil service, you can't pursue other financial interests and this is normally a condition of your employment.
So what you end up is with a certain kind of person that goes in to it, ie: not driven by money, modest expenditure, careful, churchgoer.
They are more likely to be sympathetic to left wing ideas than right wing.
People who are entrepeneurial don't go in to this type of job. Nor are people who have experienced any significant success in the commercial world.
The tories have had 12 years to do something meaningful about this, but actually they have done very little, and freezing the pay of the civil service, which in my view exacerbates the fundamental problem.
"London's River Thames has shrunk as extreme heat and looming drought dries up its headwaters..."
https://edition.cnn.com/2022/08/05/uk/uk-london-thames-river-climate-gbr-intl/index.html
..