A reminder that "cultural Marxism" is an antisemitic conspiracy theory.
That’s an incredibly biased article. People like Adorno and Marcuse were very influential, not “impotent professors issuing scarcely comprehensible jeremiads”, and it is simply false that the term “cultural Marxism” originated on the far-right.
The right does have a long history of taking terms of art from the left & turning them into sticks to beat the left with.
Pace “political correctness” for instance, which was originally a leftist in-joke IIRC. It wouldn’t at all surprise me if the idea of “Cultural Marxism” was a term of art in a subset of the academic left that was turned into something else & then massively amplified by right-wing talking heads (talk radio in the 90s? purveyors of those insane right-wing mailshots in the US?) looking to create the next left-wing boogeyman.
If your goal is to keep your followers in a permanent state of perceived threat to their way of life, then you need to create the enemy in their heads. It doesn’t really matter whether it’s real or not, or how widespread the reality is. What’s important (from the right’s POV) is that it’s real in the heads of right-wing followers. Look at Leon & “wokeism”. “Woke” can be real, but Leon’s frothing reaction to it is out of all proportion with that reality because he’s not taking his cues from the actual left, but from the right-wing commentators creating narratives for their own purposes, sometimes out of whole cloth & sometimes by cherry picking bits and pieces from left discource & piecing them together into a monster to frighten & dismay.
If, at this stage in your life, you still think “Woke” is just a made-up scary monster, then there is no hope for you
There are 17 year old girls out there with double mastectomies because Woke believes gender is a “social construct” just like race
Gender and race *are* social constructs. Sex is biological. Cats and invertibrates have sexes, they don't have genders.
So you think skin colour is just a social construct? It has no actual reality?
The Woke tell us, simultaneously, that race is a biological fiction, a nullity, a construct in our heads, while absolutely obsessing about skin colour - a fact of human variation which, to my amateur eyes, looks decidedly real
So race exists yet doesn’t exist. Schrodinger says Hi
Hair and eye colour are “decidedly real”. As is height. However western societies have not historically erected significant legal and cultural barriers on participation based on eye colour, hair colour (ginger jokes notwithstanding) or height. They have on skin colour.
Take drama. A somewhat trivial, but easy to understand, example is the fact that people bitched and moaned about actors in the Soarse Ronan/Margot Robbie vehicle ‘Mary Queen of Scots’ being the “wrong” skin colour for that period of British history, while failing to care that Irish actress Ronan had the wrong accent for the French raised Scottish Queen she was playing, and Australian actress Robbie the wrong hair colour, height and practically everything else for the English Queen she was portraying, shows that certain “decidedly real” factors (accent, hair colour, eye colour, age, nationality) matter far less to our society than skin colour. You’re white, you get a pass on your appearance. If you’re black, you don’t. Skin colour matters.
A black English actor would get massive pushback in playing an English historical figure on the basis of “historical accuracy”. A white actor of any nationality, even if he or she had virtually no similarity to the personage portrayed (hair, eyes, accent, height - all ‘decidedly real’) would not. Imagine the outcry if, say, Thandiwe Newton had been cast as Elizabeth I instead of Robbie. It it that kind of difference in treatment of a superficial appearance that is the societal construct.
Drama is just the (relatively minor) example I have used here. The same difference in treatment throughout society is “decidedly real”. The people you patronisingly condemn as “woke” are, often clumsily trying to correct.
I think you know all this really but enjoy the drama.
That last drama is unfortunately ambiguous
There's black actors in The Great playing courtiers who were actually white and I have to say I was surprised to find how ok I was with that. They are actors not imposters.
A reminder that "cultural Marxism" is an antisemitic conspiracy theory.
That’s an incredibly biased article. People like Adorno and Marcuse were very influential, not “impotent professors issuing scarcely comprehensible jeremiads”, and it is simply false that the term “cultural Marxism” originated on the far-right.
The right does have a long history of taking terms of art from the left & turning them into sticks to beat the left with.
Pace “political correctness” for instance, which was originally a leftist in-joke IIRC. It wouldn’t at all surprise me if the idea of “Cultural Marxism” was a term of art in a subset of the academic left that was turned into something else & then massively amplified by right-wing talking heads (talk radio in the 90s? purveyors of those insane right-wing mailshots in the US?) looking to create the next left-wing boogeyman.
If your goal is to keep your followers in a permanent state of perceived threat to their way of life, then you need to create the enemy in their heads. It doesn’t really matter whether it’s real or not, or how widespread the reality is. What’s important (from the right’s POV) is that it’s real in the heads of right-wing followers. Look at Leon & “wokeism”. “Woke” can be real, but Leon’s frothing reaction to it is out of all proportion with that reality because he’s not taking his cues from the actual left, but from the right-wing commentators creating narratives for their own purposes, sometimes out of whole cloth & sometimes by cherry picking bits and pieces from left discource & piecing them together into a monster to frighten & dismay.
If, at this stage in your life, you still think “Woke” is just a made-up scary monster, then there is no hope for you
There are 17 year old girls out there with double mastectomies because Woke believes gender is a “social construct” just like race
Gender and race *are* social constructs. Sex is biological. Cats and invertibrates have sexes, they don't have genders.
So you think skin colour is just a social construct? It has no actual reality?
The Woke tell us, simultaneously, that race is a biological fiction, a nullity, a construct in our heads, while absolutely obsessing about skin colour - a fact of human variation which, to my amateur eyes, looks decidedly real
So race exists yet doesn’t exist. Schrodinger says Hi
Hair and eye colour are “decidedly real”. As is height. However western societies have not historically erected significant legal and cultural barriers on participation based on eye colour, hair colour (ginger jokes notwithstanding) or height. They have on skin colour.
Take drama. A somewhat trivial, but easy to understand, example is the fact that people bitched and moaned about actors in the Soarse Ronan/Margot Robbie vehicle ‘Mary Queen of Scots’ being the “wrong” skin colour for that period of British history, while failing to care that Irish actress Ronan had the wrong accent for the French raised Scottish Queen she was playing, and Australian actress Robbie the wrong hair colour, height and practically everything else for the English Queen she was portraying, shows that certain “decidedly real” factors (accent, hair colour, eye colour, age, nationality) matter far less to our society than skin colour. You’re white, you get a pass on your appearance. If you’re black, you don’t. Skin colour matters.
A black English actor would get massive pushback in playing an English historical figure on the basis of “historical accuracy”. A white actor of any nationality, even if he or she had virtually no similarity to the personage portrayed (hair, eyes, accent, height - all ‘decidedly real’) would not. Imagine the outcry if, say, Thandiwe Newton had been cast as Elizabeth I instead of Robbie. It it that kind of difference in treatment of a superficial appearance that is the societal construct.
Drama is just the (relatively minor) example I have used here. The same difference in treatment throughout society is “decidedly real”. The people you patronisingly condemn as “woke” are, often clumsily trying to correct.
I think you know all this really but enjoy the drama.
It isn't just relatively minor, it's ridiculous. If the actress playing Mary used (or just had) an accent that jarred with widely known fact, she deserves to be criticised. Margot Robbie afaik wore a wig and make up to make her colouring match Elizabeth's. Most are not familiar with the height of historical figures (unless from the recent past), so most would find that unimportant. If a thin actor played Henry VIII without padding, that would be an issue. Making Sir Walter Raleigh (or whoever) black is such a change, and would pull most of the viewers right out of the reality of the world portrayed in the film, assuming even a basic knowledge of British and world history. We don't cast white actors in black historical roles for the same reason.
We must have been very Woke at our school. In 1982, when I was aged 7 (and in my only acting credit to date!), I played one of the Three Kings in a nativity play, and the other two were played by a black boy and a white boy!
It is generally accepted that one of the Three Kings was Black.
Pretty remarkable, considering the only thing the source material says is that they came from the East!
The Bible doesn’t call them Kings and doesn’t even say how many there were. There are traditions, dating back to the middle to late first millennium perhaps, in western Christianity that there were 3 of them, that they were Kings, and that one is from Persia, one is from India and the last is from Arabia or Ethiopia (and is thus black). However, traditions vary. There is a Syriac Christian tradition that there were 12 of them.
There are very few Biblical traditions suggesting Jesus was blond, blue eyed and clean shaven. Indeed he wasn’t. Yet casting a blond, blue eyed actor to play him has never been an issue. Cast a black man, or even a Palestinian (who would likely fit the bill better than most) and watch the sparks fly. This idea of “historical realism” is BS. Our culture can suspend disbelief, apparently, when it comes to everything but skin colour.
Jonathan Roumie was cast in the role in "the Chosen". He's half Egyptian. This was an Evangelically crowd funded series. Despite that it's pretty good. Particularly in giving the Apostles rounded characters.
Is it just me, or do Scot Nats dislike Starmer way more than they did either Milliband or Magic Grandpa? I mean it's not just on PB. Wasn't Tommy Shephard saying some bollocks in the National about how Starmer was the worst Labour leader ever the other day? My guess is because unlike the previous two leaders, they fear Starmer is going to win and get Labour back in office, which they very much don't want.
If Scottish Labour were still in power, many of the people who have attached themselves to the SNP would still be Labour. If SLAB’s continuing irrational hatred of the SNP didn’t colour all their decisions, they could win back some nationalists. Fortunately for the SNP, SLAB are unable to change, ensuring their failure to progress.
Indeed.
I’ve never quite understood why SLab never learned the lesson of 2015. They are still ploughing the same barren furrows.
Successful political movements learn from defeat and change and bounce back. The inability of SLab to heal has really been quite sad to witness. They are tortured by their own hatred and hurt.
Is it just me, or do Scot Nats dislike Starmer way more than they did either Milliband or Magic Grandpa? I mean it's not just on PB. Wasn't Tommy Shephard saying some bollocks in the National about how Starmer was the worst Labour leader ever the other day? My guess is because unlike the previous two leaders, they fear Starmer is going to win and get Labour back in office, which they very much don't want.
I, like approx one third of Scots, would prefer a PM Starmer to a PM Truss. If we choose to stay in the Union.
Which of the following do you think would make the best Prime Minister? - Scotland
What makes Starmer so unpalatable, compared to previous Labour leaders, is his ‘Muscular Unionism’. Just another term for bullying.
If I was HY (I am not) I would be telling you that means a Yoon majority of 53%. Let's say accounting for rounding that's 52% plays 48%. Now where have I seen such a compelling case on those numbers?
1. You've said before that you supported lockdowns at the time. What changed your mind?
2. Can you envisage a situation where you would support public health advice to cut all possible social contract to an absolute minimum as justified? Would an IFR of 10% be sufficiently dangerous? Are there no circumstances at all?
I, likewise, have been examining that UFO photo again. As have many people on Twitter
Your “rock in a loch” hypothesis is still reasonable, but it has flaws. The location cited doesn’t fit. No bodies of water. The airplane is not a reflection? The rock isn’t credible in its angularity. And no ripples? At all?
To get to a rock in a loch you have to presume:
1 quite a lot of people conspiring over decades. Why?
2 an element of photographic manipulation. Which the one pro analysis we have - the photographic prof at Sheffield Hallam - says has not happened
I note that Debunker General Mick West is unusually hesitant to pronounce. It’s a tricky one
Oi, I came up with rock in loch. I've now seen the wider photo, so I agree that it's not as simple as that. It just kinda looks like a reflection, though?
I saw the kite analysis too and that seems quite compelling, but why anyone was flying a kite in that rather remote bit of Scotland is a mystery.
Apols if it was your thesis!
Yes it still looks rather like a reflection - but the debate is ongoing. There are many problems with that simple explanation
Aren’t you near there? It would be great if a highland dwelling pb-er could go over there and take some snaps of the real location. The absence of water in the cited place is a conundrum
I don’t buy the kite thesis. Nor does Twitter
My take is that it is ether
1 a reflection plus a quite elaborate hoax
2 genuinely weird tech: American or “other”
It's not far off the A9, and near a Corbett I need to bag. Perhaps.
(I imagine it's flooded with nutters at the mo though).
Every time I look at the Calvine photo I have one of two reactions
1. Oh FFS it’s just a rock in a loch. Get real
2. No. Omg. This is properly weird
As I do this I can feel two modules in my head, at work. But in opposition. The first is my Freakiness Bias. I enjoy freaky drama, I like the outlandish idea that America has super brilliant tech that ignores gravity, I like even more the idea that aliens are buzzing Pitlochry
The second is my Normalcy Bias. My brain is wired to filter out the bizarre and weird. The gorilla on the basketball court. So if I ever did see a properly inexplicable UFO photo my reflexive brain would try to explain it in a prosaic way: a rock in a loch
If nothing else, it’s a delicious psychological experiment
I stand by my Schiehallion experiment theory
Lol. Schiehallion is an excellent place for a conspiracy. It definitely has vibes, as well as being the subject of experiment.
I didn't see that you'd also proposed a rock in a loch - sorry. Funny that two 'baggers' saw the same thing though.
I'm not sure I'd be able to work up the enthusiasm for any of the Corbetts local to that area apart from Ben Vrackie. Beinn Dearg was dull enough!
Mind you, I do like a good conspiracy theory. They can be very attractive.
I think the problem is that the real scientific mysteries to be found these days are too hard for most of us.
My theory was that, like us, the Aliens have used the Schiehallion experiment to work out that Earth's core is largely main of iron. It's taken 30 odd years for them to get home and send over an enormous mining space ship, which the James Webb telescope (hat tip @moonshine) has spotted on the horizon.
The problem isn't the Tory party, its the voters. People want contradictory things but refuse to accept there is a contradiction. A series of events have empowered them to believe their genuine ignorance on a subject holds the same weight as actual knowledge and experience. They aren't wrong, the experts are wrong.
There is a way through though - find us a new Blair or Thatcher, someone who does know what they are talking about and has political umph. People said "that is Boris" but as all but the remaining holdouts now accept Boris stood for nothing, with no great policies delivered and settled in his time.
Ummm, BoZo was the politician more than any other in my lifetime that told voters they could have contradictory things. Denied the contradictions. That experts were to be derided.
He was the problem
The fact his opponents failed to make their case shows how poor they were
Not entirely.
If you are in a debate with someone shameless and dishonest enough, it can be really hard to persuade an audience.
It tends to go this;
BORIS-ALIKE Something involving cake and eat it
RORY-ALIKE (because he at least tried) That's not possible- once you have eaten your cake, it's gone...
BORIS-ALIKE There you go, with your doomy gloomy negativity. Remember we are Great Britain! We are being held back by your fears... (Continues ad nauseum.)
Boris style cakeism is a really attractive prospectus. It's awfully hard to argue against, because deep down we want it to be true, and want to believe that there's some meanie stopping it being true for us. That's been the case since the apple/snake/Eve fiasco in Genesis.
It would have been better for the UK had someone successfully argued us out of Borisism, but I'm not convinced that was possible.
It would have been better for the Conservatives and the UK to have not fallen for Borisism, but that required human nature to be something it isn't.
The culpability for (gestures round) all of this belongs with the clique who proposed it, who lied to the public about it, who smeared and deposed those who questioned it.
Not particularly with those who fell for it, and certainly not with those who did their best to argue against it.
Unless you had a better plan to argue against Boris, in which case I'm all ears.
And unless he didn't vote for the Conservatives when Mr Johnson was their leader.
I want to make this clear
I supported Johnson on brexit, covid and Ukraine but he lost me from Paterson onwards
Starmer would have had our economy in lockdown forever if he could, and it is to Johnson's credit he opened the economy when he did
That's a very silly thing to write. Starmer wanted us "in lockdown forever"?
Profoundly stupid read of the situation that isn't worthy of yours usual sage analysis.
Forever is a stretch, but Starmer was ALWAYS on the side of more and longer restrictions.
I accept forever was one of my rather exaggerated comments but there is no doubt Starmer favoured a much stricter and longer lockdown and it was Johnson who made the correct decision and it has been proven as the right thing to do
It is rather hot and I apologise for my exaggeration
Boris caused longer lockdowns by always being slow to initiate a lockdown. Had we acted promptly, we would have better controlled infection rates and could’ve come out of lockdown sooner. It’s yet more short term thinking.
Oh what nonsense. Claimed by people who want to justify lockdowns. Taking away civil liberties as a precautionary measure is unacceptable and the virus would still be prevalent on our continent after any lockdown it wasn't a magic pill that would get rid of it.
What country in Europe successfully had a short, sharp lockdown that was rapidly ended and not repeated?
I can in hindsight point at a country and say we should have done that, Sweden. Can you name any country that had a rapid premature lockdown that worked, fixed things and meant coming out of lockdown sooner?
Following the Swedish model would have been utterly catastrophic. Look at their death rates compared to their immediate neighbours. Thousands of additional people died in Sweden who did not need to because of the route they chose. And that is in spite of the fact that far more people in Sweden work from home anyway so the effects of a lockdown would have been considerably less on their economy.
Many - if not all - European countries got their policies wrong in the pandemic in one way or another. Sweden is certainly no exception.
Thousands extra dying, almost all of whom would have died soon anyway, is better than stripping tens of millions of two years of civil liberties, trashing education and development for years that will have consequences for generations to come, spending hundreds of billions and creating NHS waiting lists for years to come.
The price we paid to keep people alive was not a price worth paying. There's more to life than a mortuary league table.
If the vulnerable wishes to shield that should be there prerogative but not at the price of trashing children's education etc
Bolded: incorrect, and pointed out to you repeatedly before.
Half of those in ICUs were under 60. A quarter were under 50.
Using averages of deaths is as irrelevant as using the average age of people locked down (which was over 40, so why are we worrying about childrens education when none of them are anywhere near 40. Which would be an absurd argument, but is just as true).
Over 13,000 children lost a parent to covid. Under your plan, that number would be several times higher. And we'd still have had a large (if not larger) economic impact.
In ICU doesn't mean dead.
Some extra casualties is still better than the alternative. Life is for living, even if some people die, we all die eventually.
Shutting down life in fear of death was not a price worth paying. Simply saying "more would die" isn't an argument winner against someone saying death is acceptable.
People go to ICU when there's a very significant chance that they could die without the assistance. Should there be no more capacity in ICU, no-one else could go to ICU. Those who would have survived with ICU assistance would therefore be dead.
Even "lesser" hospitalisation would see far more dead without hospital assistance. It's a key reason we have hospitals and healthcare in the first place.
Both ICUs and hospitals were maxed out and beyond maxed out. It was the hospital loadings and ICU loadings that governed the call for lockdowns.
Yes, it's true that everyone dies. We do consider it civilized to minimize avoidable deaths. We could close the deficit and cut taxes hugely at a stroke by abolishing all healthcare spending and pension spending, for example, on the grounds that yes, loads of people would die due to lack of healthcare and/or starve to death in old age, but hey - people die, right?
That is, to me, an absurd case to make, but not far off of your argument.
You're right its not far off the argument and make it less ridiculous and its not unreasonable either.
A budget should be available to the NHS for healthcare and the best available treatment based upon what is affordable - the NHS should not have a blank cheque.
If the NHS not having a blank cheque means more die and fewer receive pensions, then so be it. We can't afford to keep everyone alive forever, nor should we.
No one ever answered the question as to whether they would visit an immunocompronised friend if they (not the friend) were not symptomatic but did have a positive Covid test result.
Is it just me, or do Scot Nats dislike Starmer way more than they did either Milliband or Magic Grandpa? I mean it's not just on PB. Wasn't Tommy Shephard saying some bollocks in the National about how Starmer was the worst Labour leader ever the other day? My guess is because unlike the previous two leaders, they fear Starmer is going to win and get Labour back in office, which they very much don't want.
I, like approx one third of Scots, would prefer a PM Starmer to a PM Truss. If we choose to stay in the Union.
Which of the following do you think would make the best Prime Minister? - Scotland
What makes Starmer so unpalatable, compared to previous Labour leaders, is his ‘Muscular Unionism’. Just another term for bullying.
If I was HY (I am not) I would be telling you that means a Yoon majority of 53%. Let's say accounting for rounding that's 52% plays 48%. Now where have I seen such a compelling case on those numbers?
Hate to tell you, but here’s the VI findings from the same poll 😉
Oh what nonsense. Claimed by people who want to justify lockdowns. Taking away civil liberties as a precautionary measure is unacceptable and the virus would still be prevalent on our continent after any lockdown it wasn't a magic pill that would get rid of it.
What country in Europe successfully had a short, sharp lockdown that was rapidly ended and not repeated?
I can in hindsight point at a country and say we should have done that, Sweden. Can you name any country that had a rapid premature lockdown that worked, fixed things and meant coming out of lockdown sooner?
As you say and then there's hindsight.
In March 2020, Governments took action which you may say now was excessive but was to limit the spread of the original virus in turn to reduce the pressure on medical and hospital services which were buckling under the strain of patients needing ventilation. The best way to limit the virus spread was to reduce contact between human beings - hardly original, the villagers of Eyam had the same thought.
Even then, it was known the elderly were the most vulnerable so I suppose there's a school of thought we should have only confined the over-70s plus the immuno-compromised - how practical that would have been I don't know but we might have avoided the shutdown of, for example, construction and some other parts of retail.
Asking those who could to work from home seemed perfectly sensible though whether anyone envisaged it as a semi-permanent change of working culture for hundreds of thousands of admin staff I don't know.
The worst aspect, however, if proven, was knowingly sending elderly people likely to have the virus (no testing then of course) back to care homes with the significant and certainly non-negligible chance of infecting other residents and staff but with bed spaces critically short and patients needing ventilation, what else could be done?
The other issue was or were the borders - decisions were taken not to close the borders and there will be many who will question the viability of that decision. There's plenty of evidence it wouldn't have made any difference - the favoured culprits seem to be the school half-term holidays in mid-February but I suspect time will tell the virus was in the country long before that.
The borders issue could have been excused if it had only happened in spring 2020.
But the virus was largely let in again in late summer after foreign holidays were allowed to resume.
Followed by the Delta variant being allowed to enter in spring 2021 because travel with India hadn't been restricted - IMO because Boris wanted to have his own India visit.
The Ukrainian view - and Zelensky's spokesman does a daily broadcast - is that Russia desperately wants a ceasefire because they know they're in big trouble - make of that what you will. I'd be astonished if the Ukrainians agreed to it. I wouldn't even bet on it if the west withdrew all military support and unaffected by Russia's gas stoppage the US will carry on regardless.
I believe the Russians currently occupy 20% of the Ukraine (including presumably Crimea). What we are probably looking at (short of any surprise escalation which you can never rule out) is a point whether neither side can lose and neither side can win and that's probably where we are now.
It may well be the conflict will drag on for months at a lower level (still plenty of death and destruction) without significant progress on either side. Zelenskyy's perfectly reasonable demand is the complete and unconditional withdrawal of all Russian forces from Ukrainian territory - that seems pretty unambiguous to me.
Except we have Crimea which we all think of as part of the Ukraine but Russia sees differently. That is the stumbling block - I suspect Putin could throw Donetsk and Lubansk under the bus (possibly continuing to tacitly support post-war guerrilla activity?) but to give up Sebastopol would be too much of a personal political humiliation.
The problem is without a resolution to the Crimea issue the rest of it remains unresolved.
The Russians and Ukrainians have both ruled out a ceasefire or even resumption of negotiations, and I suspect that the Kherson counter-offensive needs to either succeed or fail by autumn before anyone's willing to talk. Not much seems to be happening at present except for artillery barrages and isolated spectacular hits, but Ukraine is clearly going to try to take Kherson by end-September.
A deadlock is a good thing in most wars unless one wants to hang on for total victory for one or the other side with unlimited human suffering along the way - failing that, there needs to come a point where both sides acknowledge that they're getting nowhere at huge cost. It's up to Ukraine as the injured party, but we should not be seeking to prolong the conflict.
An arrangement where Ukraine has sovereignty but Russia has a 99-year lease on Crimea and the pre-2014 Donbas area could probably be reached without anyone being overthrown - the invasion would have failed to gain any ground, giving Putin an obvious lesson that invasions don't work, but nobody would have won outright, avoiding seeding the ground for revanchism into future decades.
Successful political movements learn from defeat and change and bounce back.
Like the SNP
Having been gubbed in 2014, their cunning plan is to do it again...
You’re a rare brave Unionist. Most of your colleagues are too scared to even pose the question.
Not sure I’d call 45% “gubbed”. I’d say that it is a tremendous base to build on.
Agree with that. And they made made remarkable progress during the campaign.
I think, back then, the idea of independence was actually quite new to a lot of people, and we saw a growth in support as a result (I think the same with Brexit). I don't think you'll get the same swell in support again - just enough to get over the magic 50%.
The problem isn't the Tory party, its the voters. People want contradictory things but refuse to accept there is a contradiction. A series of events have empowered them to believe their genuine ignorance on a subject holds the same weight as actual knowledge and experience. They aren't wrong, the experts are wrong.
There is a way through though - find us a new Blair or Thatcher, someone who does know what they are talking about and has political umph. People said "that is Boris" but as all but the remaining holdouts now accept Boris stood for nothing, with no great policies delivered and settled in his time.
Ummm, BoZo was the politician more than any other in my lifetime that told voters they could have contradictory things. Denied the contradictions. That experts were to be derided.
He was the problem
The fact his opponents failed to make their case shows how poor they were
Not entirely.
If you are in a debate with someone shameless and dishonest enough, it can be really hard to persuade an audience.
It tends to go this;
BORIS-ALIKE Something involving cake and eat it
RORY-ALIKE (because he at least tried) That's not possible- once you have eaten your cake, it's gone...
BORIS-ALIKE There you go, with your doomy gloomy negativity. Remember we are Great Britain! We are being held back by your fears... (Continues ad nauseum.)
Boris style cakeism is a really attractive prospectus. It's awfully hard to argue against, because deep down we want it to be true, and want to believe that there's some meanie stopping it being true for us. That's been the case since the apple/snake/Eve fiasco in Genesis.
It would have been better for the UK had someone successfully argued us out of Borisism, but I'm not convinced that was possible.
It would have been better for the Conservatives and the UK to have not fallen for Borisism, but that required human nature to be something it isn't.
The culpability for (gestures round) all of this belongs with the clique who proposed it, who lied to the public about it, who smeared and deposed those who questioned it.
Not particularly with those who fell for it, and certainly not with those who did their best to argue against it.
Unless you had a better plan to argue against Boris, in which case I'm all ears.
And unless he didn't vote for the Conservatives when Mr Johnson was their leader.
I want to make this clear
I supported Johnson on brexit, covid and Ukraine but he lost me from Paterson onwards
Starmer would have had our economy in lockdown forever if he could, and it is to Johnson's credit he opened the economy when he did
That's a very silly thing to write. Starmer wanted us "in lockdown forever"?
Profoundly stupid read of the situation that isn't worthy of yours usual sage analysis.
Forever is a stretch, but Starmer was ALWAYS on the side of more and longer restrictions.
I accept forever was one of my rather exaggerated comments but there is no doubt Starmer favoured a much stricter and longer lockdown and it was Johnson who made the correct decision and it has been proven as the right thing to do
It is rather hot and I apologise for my exaggeration
Boris caused longer lockdowns by always being slow to initiate a lockdown. Had we acted promptly, we would have better controlled infection rates and could’ve come out of lockdown sooner. It’s yet more short term thinking.
Oh what nonsense. Claimed by people who want to justify lockdowns. Taking away civil liberties as a precautionary measure is unacceptable and the virus would still be prevalent on our continent after any lockdown it wasn't a magic pill that would get rid of it.
What country in Europe successfully had a short, sharp lockdown that was rapidly ended and not repeated?
I can in hindsight point at a country and say we should have done that, Sweden. Can you name any country that had a rapid premature lockdown that worked, fixed things and meant coming out of lockdown sooner?
Following the Swedish model would have been utterly catastrophic. Look at their death rates compared to their immediate neighbours. Thousands of additional people died in Sweden who did not need to because of the route they chose. And that is in spite of the fact that far more people in Sweden work from home anyway so the effects of a lockdown would have been considerably less on their economy.
Many - if not all - European countries got their policies wrong in the pandemic in one way or another. Sweden is certainly no exception.
Thousands extra dying, almost all of whom would have died soon anyway, is better than stripping tens of millions of two years of civil liberties, trashing education and development for years that will have consequences for generations to come, spending hundreds of billions and creating NHS waiting lists for years to come.
The price we paid to keep people alive was not a price worth paying. There's more to life than a mortuary league table.
If the vulnerable wishes to shield that should be there prerogative but not at the price of trashing children's education etc
Bolded: incorrect, and pointed out to you repeatedly before.
Half of those in ICUs were under 60. A quarter were under 50.
Using averages of deaths is as irrelevant as using the average age of people locked down (which was over 40, so why are we worrying about childrens education when none of them are anywhere near 40. Which would be an absurd argument, but is just as true).
Over 13,000 children lost a parent to covid. Under your plan, that number would be several times higher. And we'd still have had a large (if not larger) economic impact.
In ICU doesn't mean dead.
Some extra casualties is still better than the alternative. Life is for living, even if some people die, we all die eventually.
Shutting down life in fear of death was not a price worth paying. Simply saying "more would die" isn't an argument winner against someone saying death is acceptable.
People go to ICU when there's a very significant chance that they could die without the assistance. Should there be no more capacity in ICU, no-one else could go to ICU. Those who would have survived with ICU assistance would therefore be dead.
Even "lesser" hospitalisation would see far more dead without hospital assistance. It's a key reason we have hospitals and healthcare in the first place.
Both ICUs and hospitals were maxed out and beyond maxed out. It was the hospital loadings and ICU loadings that governed the call for lockdowns.
Yes, it's true that everyone dies. We do consider it civilized to minimize avoidable deaths. We could close the deficit and cut taxes hugely at a stroke by abolishing all healthcare spending and pension spending, for example, on the grounds that yes, loads of people would die due to lack of healthcare and/or starve to death in old age, but hey - people die, right?
That is, to me, an absurd case to make, but not far off of your argument.
You're right its not far off the argument and make it less ridiculous and its not unreasonable either.
A budget should be available to the NHS for healthcare and the best available treatment based upon what is affordable - the NHS should not have a blank cheque.
If the NHS not having a blank cheque means more die and fewer receive pensions, then so be it. We can't afford to keep everyone alive forever, nor should we.
A bold defence of Let the Devil Take the Hindmost capitalism.
"C'est magnifique, mais ce n'est pas la politique"
No one ever answered the question as to whether they would visit an immunocompronised friend if they (not the friend) were not symptomatic but did have a positive Covid test result.
I, likewise, have been examining that UFO photo again. As have many people on Twitter
Your “rock in a loch” hypothesis is still reasonable, but it has flaws. The location cited doesn’t fit. No bodies of water. The airplane is not a reflection? The rock isn’t credible in its angularity. And no ripples? At all?
To get to a rock in a loch you have to presume:
1 quite a lot of people conspiring over decades. Why?
2 an element of photographic manipulation. Which the one pro analysis we have - the photographic prof at Sheffield Hallam - says has not happened
I note that Debunker General Mick West is unusually hesitant to pronounce. It’s a tricky one
It takes four years at light speed to get to Earth from Alpha Centauri.
No, it doesnt. Time experienced by those doing the travelling is much less as you approach light speed. Time dilation. If you even travel by such prosaic means.
The spaceship will take four years, same with the light from the stars of the Centauri system.
In relativity there are only points of view. A spaceship at the speed of light takes 4 years to get from AC to us from our point of view. But from the point of view of the spaceship so travelling it doesn't take that time (or indeed any time at all).
1. You've said before that you supported lockdowns at the time. What changed your mind?
2. Can you envisage a situation where you would support public health advice to cut all possible social contract to an absolute minimum as justified? Would an IFR of 10% be sufficiently dangerous? Are there no circumstances at all?
1a. I thought the restrictions would be for a few weeks, not years. A few weeks disruption to 'flatten the curve' as claimed would have been one thing, but once the restrictions were accepted that's not what it became.
1b. The impact of prolonged lockdown was worse on children, mental health etc was far worse than I expected.
2. Advice not law is definitely better. Legal restrictions I doubt I'd ever support again under any circumstances.
The Ukrainian view - and Zelensky's spokesman does a daily broadcast - is that Russia desperately wants a ceasefire because they know they're in big trouble - make of that what you will. I'd be astonished if the Ukrainians agreed to it. I wouldn't even bet on it if the west withdrew all military support and unaffected by Russia's gas stoppage the US will carry on regardless.
I believe the Russians currently occupy 20% of the Ukraine (including presumably Crimea). What we are probably looking at (short of any surprise escalation which you can never rule out) is a point whether neither side can lose and neither side can win and that's probably where we are now.
It may well be the conflict will drag on for months at a lower level (still plenty of death and destruction) without significant progress on either side. Zelenskyy's perfectly reasonable demand is the complete and unconditional withdrawal of all Russian forces from Ukrainian territory - that seems pretty unambiguous to me.
Except we have Crimea which we all think of as part of the Ukraine but Russia sees differently. That is the stumbling block - I suspect Putin could throw Donetsk and Lubansk under the bus (possibly continuing to tacitly support post-war guerrilla activity?) but to give up Sebastopol would be too much of a personal political humiliation.
The problem is without a resolution to the Crimea issue the rest of it remains unresolved.
The Russians and Ukrainians have both ruled out a ceasefire or even resumption of negotiations, and I suspect that the Kherson counter-offensive needs to either succeed or fail by autumn before anyone's willing to talk. Not much seems to be happening at present except for artillery barrages and isolated spectacular hits, but Ukraine is clearly going to try to take Kherson by end-September.
A deadlock is a good thing in most wars unless one wants to hang on for total victory for one or the other side with unlimited human suffering along the way - failing that, there needs to come a point where both sides acknowledge that they're getting nowhere at huge cost. It's up to Ukraine as the injured party, but we should not be seeking to prolong the conflict.
An arrangement where Ukraine has sovereignty but Russia has a 99-year lease on Crimea and the pre-2014 Donbas area could probably be reached without anyone being overthrown - the invasion would have failed to gain any ground, giving Putin an obvious lesson that invasions don't work, but nobody would have won outright, avoiding seeding the ground for revanchism into future decades.
The Donbass and Crimea were not Russian. Giving them a lease (*) just allows them to undertake more of the ethnic cleansing they have been doing in Crimea and the Donbass - and in the parts of Ukraine they have controlled since February. It allows them to build up more troops and weapons in those areas.
Your 'answer' rewards Russian aggression, because they gain from it. As someone who is supposedly interested in peace, how does your 'answer' prevent or deter Russia, or other states, starting such adventures?
Besides, have you not noticed Russia's grand plans for the entire region? Their talk of taking over almost the entirety of eastern Europe? How does your 'answer' deter them from that?
That graph is shocking: the poorest 20% in England & her satellite states are going to get absolutely hammered compared to the richest 20%.
While the poor suffer more than the rich nearly everywhere, they are better protected in France, Italy, Germany etc
Isn't the greatest per capita consumption of energy in Scandinavia? I am sure someone will find a graph that shows this. Clearing the roads of snow (for hundreds and hundreds of kilometres) and heating 200-300 sqm houses favoured by the most people through minus 30 degree winters is bound to use up vast amounts of energy, mainly oil and gas. It seems to me like, if you go through Sweden or Finland - which I have done a lot; much of it is actually also suburban sprawl. They have never built to any density because of the unlimited supply of land. This sprawl just goes on for miles. House after house (200-300 sqm) with 3-4 cars. Also... limited use of public transport. So the trains are empty and cost little or nothing to use. And lots are actually diesel. Even busses - massively subsidised and good, but not used all that much .. not on anything like the density in the UK. Because of the disparate suburban planning over the past decades , things like shopping centres and swimming pools are located out of centre. So to get from A to B by bus, even though its possible, it takes an hour to to a journey that takes 15 minutes by car. Outside the progressive cities with new apartment blocks and townhouse style developments, it seems like people are driving everywhere and aspiring to live to these timber framed modernist mansions. I don't see how that can all be improved particularly.
So even if you have redistributive policies in Sweden, it won't correct a more fundamental problem which will take a lot longer to resolve. By contrast, countries like the UK could adopt redistributive policies a lot more quickly and painlessly.
Stuart and co fear Starmer because he'd run a good Government which would blunt the need for independence.
Perhaps the SNP should propose some policies and we can look at them. Their record in Government is a dismal failure.
Propose policies? Ho ho. There speaks someone firmly locked in Opposition Mode. FYI the SNP have been in government for fifteen years, and have now won eleven elections in a row. Lots of policies implemented and approved at the ballot box.
Welsh Labour, the only one in power, is closer to the SNP than Scottish or English Labour. Anas Sarwar would recoil in horror at some of the things Mark Drakeford says and does. Drakeford is riding high in the polls. Sarwar isn’t.
The second is my Normalcy Bias. My brain is wired to filter out the bizarre and weird. The gorilla on the basketball court.
That's the wrong experiment.
The gorilla on the basketball is not seen. You don't see it and explain it away, you just don't see it.
Inattentional blindness.
Yes, the oddity is filtered out before you can notice it. That's my point (albeit slightly inexact, I admit)
When I stare at the Calvine photo and see a rock in a loch, is my brain pre-filtering the fucking great UFO in the middle of the photo?
I cannot know
The difference between my experience and the gorilla thing, is that I am able to switch between perceptions - rock in a loch, and UFO. It's also like one of those optical illusions where you can either see two faces, or a vase, but not really both together
The Russians and Ukrainians have both ruled out a ceasefire or even resumption of negotiations, and I suspect that the Kherson counter-offensive needs to either succeed or fail by autumn before anyone's willing to talk. Not much seems to be happening at present except for artillery barrages and isolated spectacular hits, but Ukraine is clearly going to try to take Kherson by end-September.
A deadlock is a good thing in most wars unless one wants to hang on for total victory for one or the other side with unlimited human suffering along the way - failing that, there needs to come a point where both sides acknowledge that they're getting nowhere at huge cost. It's up to Ukraine as the injured party, but we should not be seeking to prolong the conflict.
An arrangement where Ukraine has sovereignty but Russia has a 99-year lease on Crimea and the pre-2014 Donbas area could probably be reached without anyone being overthrown - the invasion would have failed to gain any ground, giving Putin an obvious lesson that invasions don't work, but nobody would have won outright, avoiding seeding the ground for revanchism into future decades.
The Donbass and Crimea were not Russian. Giving them a lease (*) just allows them to undertake more of the ethnic cleansing they have been doing in Crimea and the Donbass - and in the parts of Ukraine they have controlled since February. It allows them to build up more troops and weapons in those areas.
Your 'answer' rewards Russian aggression, because they gain from it. As someone who is supposedly interested in peace, how does your 'answer' prevent or deter Russia, or other states, starting such adventures?
Besides, have you not noticed Russia's grand plans for the entire region? Their talk of taking over almost the entirety of eastern Europe? How does your 'answer' deter them from that?
It is extremely naive.
(*) Crimea was leased to Russia...
No, that's why I said the pre-2014 Donbas, not the parts they have controlled since Frbruary. They will have taken huge costs for precisely zero territorial gain - hardly encouragement to try agian either in the same place or somewhere else.
We agree about defeating the invasion. But we have different preferred endpoints. I want it to be seen to fail and then the war to stop. The objective of defeating aggression is vital; the objective of reversing the 2014 situation less so, and not worth extending the war. You want it to be seen to fail and the war to continue until Ukraine controls the whole of pre-2014 Ukraine plus Crimea. It's a view that I think most Ukrainians would agree with at the the moment, but potentially will simply lead to years of horrors with the same inconclusive result.
Just going out for the rest of the day, so will have to leave it there for now.
That graph is shocking: the poorest 20% in England & her satellite states are going to get absolutely hammered compared to the richest 20%.
While the poor suffer more than the rich nearly everywhere, they are better protected in France, Italy, Germany etc
Isn't the greatest per capita consumption of energy in Scandinavia? I am sure someone will find a graph that shows this. Clearing the roads of snow (for hundreds and hundreds of kilometres) and heating 200-300 sqm houses favoured by the most people through minus 30 degree winters is bound to use up vast amounts of energy, mainly oil and gas. It seems to me like, if you go through Sweden or Finland - which I have done a lot; much of it is actually also suburban sprawl. They have never built to any density because of the unlimited supply of land. This sprawl just goes on for miles. House after house (200-300 sqm) with 3-4 cars. Also... limited use of public transport. So the trains are empty and cost little or nothing to use. And lots are actually diesel. Even busses - massively subsidised and good, but not used all that much .. not on anything like the density in the UK. Because of the disparate suburban planning over the past decades , things like shopping centres and swimming pools are located out of centre. So to get from A to B by bus, even though its possible, it takes an hour to to a journey that takes 15 minutes by car. Outside the progressive cities with new apartment blocks and townhouse style developments, it seems like people are driving everywhere and aspiring to live to these timber framed modernist mansions. I don't see how that can all be improved particularly.
So even if you have redistributive policies in Sweden, it won't correct a more fundamental problem which will take a lot longer to resolve. By contrast, countries like the UK could adopt redistributive policies a lot more quickly and painlessly.
We have PB Scotch Experts. Now we have a PB Swedish Expert telling someone who lives in Sweden what living in Sweden is like. PB, there’s nothing like it!
That graph is shocking: the poorest 20% in England & her satellite states are going to get absolutely hammered compared to the richest 20%.
While the poor suffer more than the rich nearly everywhere, they are better protected in France, Italy, Germany etc
Isn't the greatest per capita consumption of energy in Scandinavia? I am sure someone will find a graph that shows this. Clearing the roads of snow (for hundreds and hundreds of kilometres) and heating 200-300 sqm houses favoured by the most people through minus 30 degree winters is bound to use up vast amounts of energy, mainly oil and gas. It seems to me like, if you go through Sweden or Finland - which I have done a lot; much of it is actually also suburban sprawl. They have never built to any density because of the unlimited supply of land. This sprawl just goes on for miles. House after house (200-300 sqm) with 3-4 cars. Also... limited use of public transport. So the trains are empty and cost little or nothing to use. And lots are actually diesel. Even busses - massively subsidised and good, but not used all that much .. not on anything like the density in the UK. Because of the disparate suburban planning over the past decades , things like shopping centres and swimming pools are located out of centre. So to get from A to B by bus, even though its possible, it takes an hour to to a journey that takes 15 minutes by car. Outside the progressive cities with new apartment blocks and townhouse style developments, it seems like people are driving everywhere and aspiring to live to these timber framed modernist mansions. I don't see how that can all be improved particularly.
So even if you have redistributive policies in Sweden, it won't correct a more fundamental problem which will take a lot longer to resolve. By contrast, countries like the UK could adopt redistributive policies a lot more quickly and painlessly.
We have PB Scotch Experts. Now we have a PB Swedish Expert telling someone who lives in Sweden what living in Sweden is like. PB, there’s nothing like it!
Stuart and co fear Starmer because he'd run a good Government which would blunt the need for independence.
Perhaps the SNP should propose some policies and we can look at them. Their record in Government is a dismal failure.
Propose policies? Ho ho. There speaks someone firmly locked in Opposition Mode. FYI the SNP have been in government for fifteen years, and have now won eleven elections in a row. Lots of policies implemented and approved at the ballot box.
Welsh Labour, the only one in power, is closer to the SNP than Scottish or English Labour. Anas Sarwar would recoil in horror at some of the things Mark Drakeford says and does. Drakeford is riding high in the polls. Sarwar isn’t.
Do Scottish Labour have anyone of the quality of Mark Drakeford? No wonder Welsh Labour do well and Scottish Labour don’t.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Stuart and co fear Starmer because he'd run a good Government which would blunt the need for independence.
Perhaps the SNP should propose some policies and we can look at them. Their record in Government is a dismal failure.
Propose policies? Ho ho. There speaks someone firmly locked in Opposition Mode. FYI the SNP have been in government for fifteen years, and have now won eleven elections in a row. Lots of policies implemented and approved at the ballot box.
Welsh Labour, the only one in power, is closer to the SNP than Scottish or English Labour. Anas Sarwar would recoil in horror at some of the things Mark Drakeford says and does. Drakeford is riding high in the polls. Sarwar isn’t.
SNP have done sod all, if they had done anything you'd be able to point out achievements
1. You've said before that you supported lockdowns at the time. What changed your mind?
2. Can you envisage a situation where you would support public health advice to cut all possible social contract to an absolute minimum as justified? Would an IFR of 10% be sufficiently dangerous? Are there no circumstances at all?
1a. I thought the restrictions would be for a few weeks, not years. A few weeks disruption to 'flatten the curve' as claimed would have been one thing, but once the restrictions were accepted that's not what it became.
1b. The impact of prolonged lockdown was worse on children, mental health etc was far worse than I expected.
2. Advice not law is definitely better. Legal restrictions I doubt I'd ever support again under any circumstances.
I do wonder whether my opinion would have been different if q my daughter had been younger. I didn't have the direct experience of dealing with a young child cut off from their social group for an extended period.
I never liked the law interfering with who was allowed into my home, but since I intended to comply with the advice, because I understood the necessity for it, I felt more strongly that the arguments against were crap, rather than worried that my liberties were curtailed.
Perhaps that was naive, and yet, despite warnings to the contrary that the legal restrictions would never be lifted, none now remain. We actually could trust our government to give up the power it had taken over us, when it was no longer required.
I know a lot of people, including myself, were angry at the government for various things it did, and did not do, but it's worth noting that a lot of the wild accusations thrown around were unwarranted.
Stuart and co fear Starmer because he'd run a good Government which would blunt the need for independence.
Perhaps the SNP should propose some policies and we can look at them. Their record in Government is a dismal failure.
Propose policies? Ho ho. There speaks someone firmly locked in Opposition Mode. FYI the SNP have been in government for fifteen years, and have now won eleven elections in a row. Lots of policies implemented and approved at the ballot box.
Welsh Labour, the only one in power, is closer to the SNP than Scottish or English Labour. Anas Sarwar would recoil in horror at some of the things Mark Drakeford says and does. Drakeford is riding high in the polls. Sarwar isn’t.
SNP have done sod all, if they had done anything you'd be able to point out achievements
That graph is shocking: the poorest 20% in England & her satellite states are going to get absolutely hammered compared to the richest 20%.
While the poor suffer more than the rich nearly everywhere, they are better protected in France, Italy, Germany etc
Isn't the greatest per capita consumption of energy in Scandinavia? I am sure someone will find a graph that shows this. Clearing the roads of snow (for hundreds and hundreds of kilometres) and heating 200-300 sqm houses favoured by the most people through minus 30 degree winters is bound to use up vast amounts of energy, mainly oil and gas. It seems to me like, if you go through Sweden or Finland - which I have done a lot; much of it is actually also suburban sprawl. They have never built to any density because of the unlimited supply of land. This sprawl just goes on for miles. House after house (200-300 sqm) with 3-4 cars. Also... limited use of public transport. So the trains are empty and cost little or nothing to use. And lots are actually diesel. Even busses - massively subsidised and good, but not used all that much .. not on anything like the density in the UK. Because of the disparate suburban planning over the past decades , things like shopping centres and swimming pools are located out of centre. So to get from A to B by bus, even though its possible, it takes an hour to to a journey that takes 15 minutes by car. Outside the progressive cities with new apartment blocks and townhouse style developments, it seems like people are driving everywhere and aspiring to live to these timber framed modernist mansions. I don't see how that can all be improved particularly.
So even if you have redistributive policies in Sweden, it won't correct a more fundamental problem which will take a lot longer to resolve. By contrast, countries like the UK could adopt redistributive policies a lot more quickly and painlessly.
We have PB Scotch Experts. Now we have a PB Swedish Expert telling someone who lives in Sweden what living in Sweden is like. PB, there’s nothing like it!
Yeah, well firstly, you don't know anything about me and what I may or not know about Sweden. Secondly the poster just suggested that the country with the second highest per capita consumption of energy in the EU (IE Sweden) was a good country to be a consumer, when raw energy prices are rising very significantly. It is perfectly reasonable to point out in response that Sweden has an objective problem with consumption, even if the impact may be masked by redistributive policies.
Stuart and co fear Starmer because he'd run a good Government which would blunt the need for independence.
Perhaps the SNP should propose some policies and we can look at them. Their record in Government is a dismal failure.
Propose policies? Ho ho. There speaks someone firmly locked in Opposition Mode. FYI the SNP have been in government for fifteen years, and have now won eleven elections in a row. Lots of policies implemented and approved at the ballot box.
Welsh Labour, the only one in power, is closer to the SNP than Scottish or English Labour. Anas Sarwar would recoil in horror at some of the things Mark Drakeford says and does. Drakeford is riding high in the polls. Sarwar isn’t.
Do Scottish Labour have anyone of the quality of Mark Drakeford? No wonder Welsh Labour do well and Scottish Labour don’t.
They used to, at least at the top. But not since, I think, Donald Dewar and Wendy Alexander.
The Russians and Ukrainians have both ruled out a ceasefire or even resumption of negotiations, and I suspect that the Kherson counter-offensive needs to either succeed or fail by autumn before anyone's willing to talk. Not much seems to be happening at present except for artillery barrages and isolated spectacular hits, but Ukraine is clearly going to try to take Kherson by end-September.
A deadlock is a good thing in most wars unless one wants to hang on for total victory for one or the other side with unlimited human suffering along the way - failing that, there needs to come a point where both sides acknowledge that they're getting nowhere at huge cost. It's up to Ukraine as the injured party, but we should not be seeking to prolong the conflict.
An arrangement where Ukraine has sovereignty but Russia has a 99-year lease on Crimea and the pre-2014 Donbas area could probably be reached without anyone being overthrown - the invasion would have failed to gain any ground, giving Putin an obvious lesson that invasions don't work, but nobody would have won outright, avoiding seeding the ground for revanchism into future decades.
The Donbass and Crimea were not Russian. Giving them a lease (*) just allows them to undertake more of the ethnic cleansing they have been doing in Crimea and the Donbass - and in the parts of Ukraine they have controlled since February. It allows them to build up more troops and weapons in those areas.
Your 'answer' rewards Russian aggression, because they gain from it. As someone who is supposedly interested in peace, how does your 'answer' prevent or deter Russia, or other states, starting such adventures?
Besides, have you not noticed Russia's grand plans for the entire region? Their talk of taking over almost the entirety of eastern Europe? How does your 'answer' deter them from that?
It is extremely naive.
(*) Crimea was leased to Russia...
No, that's why I said the pre-2014 Donbas, not the parts they have controlled since Frbruary. They will have taken huge costs for precisely zero territorial gain - hardly encouragement to try agian either in the same place or somewhere else.
We agree about defeating the invasion. But we have different preferred endpoints. I want it to be seen to fail and then the war to stop. The objective of defeating aggression is vital; the objective of reversing the 2014 situation less so, and not worth extending the war. You want it to be seen to fail and the war to continue until Ukraine controls the whole of pre-2014 Ukraine plus Crimea. It's a view that I think most Ukrainians would agree with at the the moment, but potentially will simply lead to years of horrors with the same inconclusive result.
Just going out for the rest of the day, so will have to leave it there for now.
If they are leasing it, they have essentially gained territory! They will control that territory.
Look at the way they just took over the (rented) Crimea when they wanted to, then invaded from it.
You do not seem to consider that *your* view might lead to 'years of horrors', except over the rest of Ukraine and much of eastern Europe.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Hang on, the options are real or hoax, not real or optical illusion. So it doesn't matter if there's a loch there or not, ig it's a hoax it could be, loch somewhere else.
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
1. You've said before that you supported lockdowns at the time. What changed your mind?
2. Can you envisage a situation where you would support public health advice to cut all possible social contract to an absolute minimum as justified? Would an IFR of 10% be sufficiently dangerous? Are there no circumstances at all?
1a. I thought the restrictions would be for a few weeks, not years. A few weeks disruption to 'flatten the curve' as claimed would have been one thing, but once the restrictions were accepted that's not what it became.
1b. The impact of prolonged lockdown was worse on children, mental health etc was far worse than I expected.
2. Advice not law is definitely better. Legal restrictions I doubt I'd ever support again under any circumstances.
I do wonder whether my opinion would have been different if q my daughter had been younger. I didn't have the direct experience of dealing with a young child cut off from their social group for an extended period.
I never liked the law interfering with who was allowed into my home, but since I intended to comply with the advice, because I understood the necessity for it, I felt more strongly that the arguments against were crap, rather than worried that my liberties were curtailed.
Perhaps that was naive, and yet, despite warnings to the contrary that the legal restrictions would never be lifted, none now remain. We actually could trust our government to give up the power it had taken over us, when it was no longer required.
I know a lot of people, including myself, were angry at the government for various things it did, and did not do, but it's worth noting that a lot of the wild accusations thrown around were unwarranted.
Absolutely a lot of wild things were said, I argued clearly with Contrarian etc saying the restrictions wouldn't be lifted and I stand by that. But they were kept in place far longer than they should have been (and no putting them in place sooner wouldn't have seen them lifted sooner realistically).
Once you've made this restriction "acceptable" the threshold for doing it becomes sooner and sooner in the future and that's why it needs pushing back on that it wasn't acceptable after all.
The problem isn't the Tory party, its the voters. People want contradictory things but refuse to accept there is a contradiction. A series of events have empowered them to believe their genuine ignorance on a subject holds the same weight as actual knowledge and experience. They aren't wrong, the experts are wrong.
There is a way through though - find us a new Blair or Thatcher, someone who does know what they are talking about and has political umph. People said "that is Boris" but as all but the remaining holdouts now accept Boris stood for nothing, with no great policies delivered and settled in his time.
Ummm, BoZo was the politician more than any other in my lifetime that told voters they could have contradictory things. Denied the contradictions. That experts were to be derided.
He was the problem
The fact his opponents failed to make their case shows how poor they were
Not entirely.
If you are in a debate with someone shameless and dishonest enough, it can be really hard to persuade an audience.
It tends to go this;
BORIS-ALIKE Something involving cake and eat it
RORY-ALIKE (because he at least tried) That's not possible- once you have eaten your cake, it's gone...
BORIS-ALIKE There you go, with your doomy gloomy negativity. Remember we are Great Britain! We are being held back by your fears... (Continues ad nauseum.)
Boris style cakeism is a really attractive prospectus. It's awfully hard to argue against, because deep down we want it to be true, and want to believe that there's some meanie stopping it being true for us. That's been the case since the apple/snake/Eve fiasco in Genesis.
It would have been better for the UK had someone successfully argued us out of Borisism, but I'm not convinced that was possible.
It would have been better for the Conservatives and the UK to have not fallen for Borisism, but that required human nature to be something it isn't.
The culpability for (gestures round) all of this belongs with the clique who proposed it, who lied to the public about it, who smeared and deposed those who questioned it.
Not particularly with those who fell for it, and certainly not with those who did their best to argue against it.
Unless you had a better plan to argue against Boris, in which case I'm all ears.
And unless he didn't vote for the Conservatives when Mr Johnson was their leader.
I want to make this clear
I supported Johnson on brexit, covid and Ukraine but he lost me from Paterson onwards
Starmer would have had our economy in lockdown forever if he could, and it is to Johnson's credit he opened the economy when he did
That's a very silly thing to write. Starmer wanted us "in lockdown forever"?
Profoundly stupid read of the situation that isn't worthy of yours usual sage analysis.
Forever is a stretch, but Starmer was ALWAYS on the side of more and longer restrictions.
I accept forever was one of my rather exaggerated comments but there is no doubt Starmer favoured a much stricter and longer lockdown and it was Johnson who made the correct decision and it has been proven as the right thing to do
It is rather hot and I apologise for my exaggeration
Boris caused longer lockdowns by always being slow to initiate a lockdown. Had we acted promptly, we would have better controlled infection rates and could’ve come out of lockdown sooner. It’s yet more short term thinking.
Oh what nonsense. Claimed by people who want to justify lockdowns. Taking away civil liberties as a precautionary measure is unacceptable and the virus would still be prevalent on our continent after any lockdown it wasn't a magic pill that would get rid of it.
What country in Europe successfully had a short, sharp lockdown that was rapidly ended and not repeated?
I can in hindsight point at a country and say we should have done that, Sweden. Can you name any country that had a rapid premature lockdown that worked, fixed things and meant coming out of lockdown sooner?
Following the Swedish model would have been utterly catastrophic. Look at their death rates compared to their immediate neighbours. Thousands of additional people died in Sweden who did not need to because of the route they chose. And that is in spite of the fact that far more people in Sweden work from home anyway so the effects of a lockdown would have been considerably less on their economy.
Many - if not all - European countries got their policies wrong in the pandemic in one way or another. Sweden is certainly no exception.
Thousands extra dying, almost all of whom would have died soon anyway, is better than stripping tens of millions of two years of civil liberties, trashing education and development for years that will have consequences for generations to come, spending hundreds of billions and creating NHS waiting lists for years to come.
The price we paid to keep people alive was not a price worth paying. There's more to life than a mortuary league table.
If the vulnerable wishes to shield that should be there prerogative but not at the price of trashing children's education etc
Bolded: incorrect, and pointed out to you repeatedly before.
Half of those in ICUs were under 60. A quarter were under 50.
Using averages of deaths is as irrelevant as using the average age of people locked down (which was over 40, so why are we worrying about childrens education when none of them are anywhere near 40. Which would be an absurd argument, but is just as true).
Over 13,000 children lost a parent to covid. Under your plan, that number would be several times higher. And we'd still have had a large (if not larger) economic impact.
In ICU doesn't mean dead.
Some extra casualties is still better than the alternative. Life is for living, even if some people die, we all die eventually.
Shutting down life in fear of death was not a price worth paying. Simply saying "more would die" isn't an argument winner against someone saying death is acceptable.
People go to ICU when there's a very significant chance that they could die without the assistance. Should there be no more capacity in ICU, no-one else could go to ICU. Those who would have survived with ICU assistance would therefore be dead.
Even "lesser" hospitalisation would see far more dead without hospital assistance. It's a key reason we have hospitals and healthcare in the first place.
Both ICUs and hospitals were maxed out and beyond maxed out. It was the hospital loadings and ICU loadings that governed the call for lockdowns.
Yes, it's true that everyone dies. We do consider it civilized to minimize avoidable deaths. We could close the deficit and cut taxes hugely at a stroke by abolishing all healthcare spending and pension spending, for example, on the grounds that yes, loads of people would die due to lack of healthcare and/or starve to death in old age, but hey - people die, right?
That is, to me, an absurd case to make, but not far off of your argument.
You're right its not far off the argument and make it less ridiculous and its not unreasonable either.
A budget should be available to the NHS for healthcare and the best available treatment based upon what is affordable - the NHS should not have a blank cheque.
If the NHS not having a blank cheque means more die and fewer receive pensions, then so be it. We can't afford to keep everyone alive forever, nor should we.
The NHS has never had a blank cheque and is never going to, so why this straw man argument?
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Hang on, the options are real or hoax, not real or optical illusion. So it doesn't matter if there's a loch there or not, ig it's a hoax it could be, loch somewhere else.
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
True, but I'm going by what the pro photo dude said (the guy at Sheffield Hallam uni). He insists this is a real photo of a real object, not a hoax in terms of altered imagery after-the-event (tho we cannot know for sure, natch)
The eye witnesses are curious. Their identity has been disguised for decades, and will remain hidden. There was - without doubt - some kind of MoD kerfuffle, whatever the ultimate reason
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Hang on, the options are real or hoax, not real or optical illusion. So it doesn't matter if there's a loch there or not, ig it's a hoax it could be, loch somewhere else.
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
Depending on when the photo was published, for one thing, they could claim copyright fees. AIUI the image was not *published* till 2022, so it is still in copyright for pretty much the full period from now (life of photographer plus 25 or whatever years). So I am [edit] doubtful about the copyright claim plastered on it. I cannot see how it can be copyright of Sheffield University etc unless they had a formal written transfer from the photographer via the MoD. https://www.uapmedia.uk/articles/calvinerevealed
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
By definition it is a UFO, because it hasn't been definitively identified. What it isn't is an extraterrestrial spacecraft.
And, again, you can't know that. You can say "To my mind it is extremely unlikely to be ET in a weird kite shaped jet" (I'd probably agree). But no one can absolutely rule that out
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
You cannot know for certain. We've been through this. Do keep up
I stick by my previous comments. From what we know at the moment, it isn't a UFO/UAP. People are fapping themselves off desperately wanting to believe; the same sorts who 'believed' the X-Files series as paralleling the truth (I knew one such loon at uni...)
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Hang on, the options are real or hoax, not real or optical illusion. So it doesn't matter if there's a loch there or not, ig it's a hoax it could be, loch somewhere else.
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
True, but I'm going by what the pro photo dude said (the guy at Sheffield Hallam uni). He insists this is a real photo of a real object, not a hoax in terms of altered imagery after-the-event (tho we cannot know for sure, natch)
The eye witnesses are curious. Their identity has been disguised for decades, and will remain hidden. There was - without doubt - some kind of MoD kerfuffle, whatever the ultimate reason
The Sheffield work is not about alien tech but about folklore and myth -
1. You've said before that you supported lockdowns at the time. What changed your mind?
2. Can you envisage a situation where you would support public health advice to cut all possible social contract to an absolute minimum as justified? Would an IFR of 10% be sufficiently dangerous? Are there no circumstances at all?
1a. I thought the restrictions would be for a few weeks, not years. A few weeks disruption to 'flatten the curve' as claimed would have been one thing, but once the restrictions were accepted that's not what it became.
1b. The impact of prolonged lockdown was worse on children, mental health etc was far worse than I expected.
2. Advice not law is definitely better. Legal restrictions I doubt I'd ever support again under any circumstances.
I do wonder whether my opinion would have been different if q my daughter had been younger. I didn't have the direct experience of dealing with a young child cut off from their social group for an extended period.
I never liked the law interfering with who was allowed into my home, but since I intended to comply with the advice, because I understood the necessity for it, I felt more strongly that the arguments against were crap, rather than worried that my liberties were curtailed.
Perhaps that was naive, and yet, despite warnings to the contrary that the legal restrictions would never be lifted, none now remain. We actually could trust our government to give up the power it had taken over us, when it was no longer required.
I know a lot of people, including myself, were angry at the government for various things it did, and did not do, but it's worth noting that a lot of the wild accusations thrown around were unwarranted.
Absolutely a lot of wild things were said, I argued clearly with Contrarian etc saying the restrictions wouldn't be lifted and I stand by that. But they were kept in place far longer than they should have been (and no putting them in place sooner wouldn't have seen them lifted sooner realistically).
Once you've made this restriction "acceptable" the threshold for doing it becomes sooner and sooner in the future and that's why it needs pushing back on that it wasn't acceptable after all.
I think if we're going to encourage the use of public health advice in place of public health law, then we have to be prepared to follow sensible public health advice - such as staying at home when you know you are infectious. But you've pushed back against such standard public health advice, so your change of mind seems a bit more than just pushing against the idea of public health law.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Hang on, the options are real or hoax, not real or optical illusion. So it doesn't matter if there's a loch there or not, ig it's a hoax it could be, loch somewhere else.
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
Depending on when the photo was published, for one thing, they could claim copyright fees. AIUI the image was not *published* till 2022, so it is still in copyright for pretty much the full period from now (life of photographer plus 25 or whatever years). So I am [edit] doubtful about the copyright claim plastered on it. I cannot see how it can be copyright of Sheffield University etc unless they had a formal written transfer from the photographer via the MoD. https://www.uapmedia.uk/articles/calvinerevealed
Good point. Copyright
"What is being withheld until 2072 is simply the name and address of the informant, e.g., the photographer – that is covered by black ink. The reason is that MOD and TNA regard this as ‘personal information’ that should be protected for an extended period of time.”"
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Is it just me, or do Scot Nats dislike Starmer way more than they did either Milliband or Magic Grandpa? I mean it's not just on PB. Wasn't Tommy Shephard saying some bollocks in the National about how Starmer was the worst Labour leader ever the other day? My guess is because unlike the previous two leaders, they fear Starmer is going to win and get Labour back in office, which they very much don't want.
I, like approx one third of Scots, would prefer a PM Starmer to a PM Truss. If we choose to stay in the Union.
Which of the following do you think would make the best Prime Minister? - Scotland
What makes Starmer so unpalatable, compared to previous Labour leaders, is his ‘Muscular Unionism’. Just another term for bullying.
If I was HY (I am not) I would be telling you that means a Yoon majority of 53%. Let's say accounting for rounding that's 52% plays 48%. Now where have I seen such a compelling case on those numbers?
Hate to tell you, but here’s the VI findings from the same poll 😉
SNP 51% Con 22% Lab 16% LD 5% Grn 4% Ref 1%
Pro-independence parties 55% Unionist parties 44%
You know that your posted figure is as spurious as mine, and all SNP/ Green backers are not necessarily nationalists.
You also pick and choose polls to suit your agenda. Has anyone ever seen you and HYUFD in the same room?
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
You cannot know for certain. We've been through this. Do keep up
I stick by my previous comments. From what we know at the moment, it isn't a UFO/UAP. People are fapping themselves off desperately wanting to believe; the same sorts who 'believed' the X-Files series as paralleling the truth (I knew one such loon at uni...)
As others have said, it is the very definition of a UAP
There are eye witness reports of an unidentified aerial phenomenon, evidence in the MoD files to back it up, and also a photo (or six)
Now, they might show a rock in a loch, but a lot of credible people are saying this jobby is in the air. So: UAP until we know more
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
By definition it is a UFO, because it hasn't been definitively identified. What it isn't is an extraterrestrial spacecraft.
And, again, you can't know that. You can say "To my mind it is extremely unlikely to be ET in a weird kite shaped jet" (I'd probably agree). But no one can absolutely rule that out
I probably missed a word out in my sentence. What I meant to say was that a UFO is not evidence of alien life, because we don't know what it is.
But there *could* be aliens visiting us with Star Trek style cloaking technology, keeping an eye on us, but without evidence of this it does not make any sense to believe that they are.
The UFO = aliens equivalence gets my goat. Unidentified != Identified as an alien spacecraft.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Hang on, the options are real or hoax, not real or optical illusion. So it doesn't matter if there's a loch there or not, ig it's a hoax it could be, loch somewhere else.
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
Depending on when the photo was published, for one thing, they could claim copyright fees. AIUI the image was not *published* till 2022, so it is still in copyright for pretty much the full period from now (life of photographer plus 25 or whatever years). So I am [edit] doubtful about the copyright claim plastered on it. I cannot see how it can be copyright of Sheffield University etc unless they had a formal written transfer from the photographer via the MoD. https://www.uapmedia.uk/articles/calvinerevealed
Good point. Copyright
"What is being withheld until 2072 is simply the name and address of the informant, e.g., the photographer – that is covered by black ink. The reason is that MOD and TNA regard this as ‘personal information’ that should be protected for an extended period of time.”"
The logic being that Mr X is effectively certain to be dead by then. Like the 2021 census was only released last year. Rather than it being anything to do with UFOs.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
I have a photo taken at Strumbe Head one March evening, with the lighthouse's beam sweeping around, and a beam of pink light going from the horizon into the sky. I have only ever seen such a beam since, despite often being up at sparrow's fart.
Is it just me, or do Scot Nats dislike Starmer way more than they did either Milliband or Magic Grandpa? I mean it's not just on PB. Wasn't Tommy Shephard saying some bollocks in the National about how Starmer was the worst Labour leader ever the other day? My guess is because unlike the previous two leaders, they fear Starmer is going to win and get Labour back in office, which they very much don't want.
I, like approx one third of Scots, would prefer a PM Starmer to a PM Truss. If we choose to stay in the Union.
Which of the following do you think would make the best Prime Minister? - Scotland
What makes Starmer so unpalatable, compared to previous Labour leaders, is his ‘Muscular Unionism’. Just another term for bullying.
If I was HY (I am not) I would be telling you that means a Yoon majority of 53%. Let's say accounting for rounding that's 52% plays 48%. Now where have I seen such a compelling case on those numbers?
Hate to tell you, but here’s the VI findings from the same poll 😉
SNP 51% Con 22% Lab 16% LD 5% Grn 4% Ref 1%
Pro-independence parties 55% Unionist parties 44%
You know that your posted figure is as spurious as mine, and all SNP/ Green backers are not necessarily nationalists.
You also pick and choose polls to suit your agenda. Has anyone ever seen you and HYUFD in the same room?
Works both ways - a fair chuink of Labour voters are pro indy, though not a majority.
Stuart and co fear Starmer because he'd run a good Government which would blunt the need for independence.
Perhaps the SNP should propose some policies and we can look at them. Their record in Government is a dismal failure.
Propose policies? Ho ho. There speaks someone firmly locked in Opposition Mode. FYI the SNP have been in government for fifteen years, and have now won eleven elections in a row. Lots of policies implemented and approved at the ballot box.
Welsh Labour, the only one in power, is closer to the SNP than Scottish or English Labour. Anas Sarwar would recoil in horror at some of the things Mark Drakeford says and does. Drakeford is riding high in the polls. Sarwar isn’t.
Do Scottish Labour have anyone of the quality of Mark Drakeford? No wonder Welsh Labour do well and Scottish Labour don’t.
Mark Drakeford and quality seldom find themselves in the same sentence, certainly not without a negative before "quality".
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Hang on, the options are real or hoax, not real or optical illusion. So it doesn't matter if there's a loch there or not, ig it's a hoax it could be, loch somewhere else.
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
True, but I'm going by what the pro photo dude said (the guy at Sheffield Hallam uni). He insists this is a real photo of a real object, not a hoax in terms of altered imagery after-the-event (tho we cannot know for sure, natch)
The eye witnesses are curious. Their identity has been disguised for decades, and will remain hidden. There was - without doubt - some kind of MoD kerfuffle, whatever the ultimate reason
The Sheffield work is not about alien tech but about folklore and myth -
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
I have a photo taken at Strumbe Head one March evening, with the lighthouse's beam sweeping around, and a beam of pink light going from the horizon into the sky. I have only ever seen such a beam since, despite often being up at sparrow's fart.
Once saw the green flash at sunset - from a hillfort in West Dorset with the sea on the horizon.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Hang on, the options are real or hoax, not real or optical illusion. So it doesn't matter if there's a loch there or not, ig it's a hoax it could be, loch somewhere else.
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
Depending on when the photo was published, for one thing, they could claim copyright fees. AIUI the image was not *published* till 2022, so it is still in copyright for pretty much the full period from now (life of photographer plus 25 or whatever years). So I am [edit] doubtful about the copyright claim plastered on it. I cannot see how it can be copyright of Sheffield University etc unless they had a formal written transfer from the photographer via the MoD. https://www.uapmedia.uk/articles/calvinerevealed
Good point. Copyright
"What is being withheld until 2072 is simply the name and address of the informant, e.g., the photographer – that is covered by black ink. The reason is that MOD and TNA regard this as ‘personal information’ that should be protected for an extended period of time.”"
The logic being that Mr X is effectively certain to be dead by then. Like the 2021 census was only released last year. Rather than it being anything to do with UFOs.
Nonetheless one might usefully ask why his identity is protected even unto his death. Especially if it just a "rock in a loch". To save his blushes?
And how has the copyright - as you say - passed from him to this guy Craig Lindsay?
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Hang on, the options are real or hoax, not real or optical illusion. So it doesn't matter if there's a loch there or not, ig it's a hoax it could be, loch somewhere else.
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
True, but I'm going by what the pro photo dude said (the guy at Sheffield Hallam uni). He insists this is a real photo of a real object, not a hoax in terms of altered imagery after-the-event (tho we cannot know for sure, natch)
The eye witnesses are curious. Their identity has been disguised for decades, and will remain hidden. There was - without doubt - some kind of MoD kerfuffle, whatever the ultimate reason
The Sheffield work is not about alien tech but about folklore and myth -
The problem isn't the Tory party, its the voters. People want contradictory things but refuse to accept there is a contradiction. A series of events have empowered them to believe their genuine ignorance on a subject holds the same weight as actual knowledge and experience. They aren't wrong, the experts are wrong.
There is a way through though - find us a new Blair or Thatcher, someone who does know what they are talking about and has political umph. People said "that is Boris" but as all but the remaining holdouts now accept Boris stood for nothing, with no great policies delivered and settled in his time.
Ummm, BoZo was the politician more than any other in my lifetime that told voters they could have contradictory things. Denied the contradictions. That experts were to be derided.
He was the problem
The fact his opponents failed to make their case shows how poor they were
Not entirely.
If you are in a debate with someone shameless and dishonest enough, it can be really hard to persuade an audience.
It tends to go this;
BORIS-ALIKE Something involving cake and eat it
RORY-ALIKE (because he at least tried) That's not possible- once you have eaten your cake, it's gone...
BORIS-ALIKE There you go, with your doomy gloomy negativity. Remember we are Great Britain! We are being held back by your fears... (Continues ad nauseum.)
Boris style cakeism is a really attractive prospectus. It's awfully hard to argue against, because deep down we want it to be true, and want to believe that there's some meanie stopping it being true for us. That's been the case since the apple/snake/Eve fiasco in Genesis.
It would have been better for the UK had someone successfully argued us out of Borisism, but I'm not convinced that was possible.
It would have been better for the Conservatives and the UK to have not fallen for Borisism, but that required human nature to be something it isn't.
The culpability for (gestures round) all of this belongs with the clique who proposed it, who lied to the public about it, who smeared and deposed those who questioned it.
Not particularly with those who fell for it, and certainly not with those who did their best to argue against it.
Unless you had a better plan to argue against Boris, in which case I'm all ears.
And unless he didn't vote for the Conservatives when Mr Johnson was their leader.
I want to make this clear
I supported Johnson on brexit, covid and Ukraine but he lost me from Paterson onwards
Starmer would have had our economy in lockdown forever if he could, and it is to Johnson's credit he opened the economy when he did
That's a very silly thing to write. Starmer wanted us "in lockdown forever"?
Profoundly stupid read of the situation that isn't worthy of yours usual sage analysis.
Forever is a stretch, but Starmer was ALWAYS on the side of more and longer restrictions.
I accept forever was one of my rather exaggerated comments but there is no doubt Starmer favoured a much stricter and longer lockdown and it was Johnson who made the correct decision and it has been proven as the right thing to do
It is rather hot and I apologise for my exaggeration
Boris caused longer lockdowns by always being slow to initiate a lockdown. Had we acted promptly, we would have better controlled infection rates and could’ve come out of lockdown sooner. It’s yet more short term thinking.
Oh what nonsense. Claimed by people who want to justify lockdowns. Taking away civil liberties as a precautionary measure is unacceptable and the virus would still be prevalent on our continent after any lockdown it wasn't a magic pill that would get rid of it.
What country in Europe successfully had a short, sharp lockdown that was rapidly ended and not repeated?
I can in hindsight point at a country and say we should have done that, Sweden. Can you name any country that had a rapid premature lockdown that worked, fixed things and meant coming out of lockdown sooner?
Following the Swedish model would have been utterly catastrophic. Look at their death rates compared to their immediate neighbours. Thousands of additional people died in Sweden who did not need to because of the route they chose. And that is in spite of the fact that far more people in Sweden work from home anyway so the effects of a lockdown would have been considerably less on their economy.
Many - if not all - European countries got their policies wrong in the pandemic in one way or another. Sweden is certainly no exception.
Thousands extra dying, almost all of whom would have died soon anyway, is better than stripping tens of millions of two years of civil liberties, trashing education and development for years that will have consequences for generations to come, spending hundreds of billions and creating NHS waiting lists for years to come.
The price we paid to keep people alive was not a price worth paying. There's more to life than a mortuary league table.
If the vulnerable wishes to shield that should be there prerogative but not at the price of trashing children's education etc
Bolded: incorrect, and pointed out to you repeatedly before.
Half of those in ICUs were under 60. A quarter were under 50.
Using averages of deaths is as irrelevant as using the average age of people locked down (which was over 40, so why are we worrying about childrens education when none of them are anywhere near 40. Which would be an absurd argument, but is just as true).
Over 13,000 children lost a parent to covid. Under your plan, that number would be several times higher. And we'd still have had a large (if not larger) economic impact.
In ICU doesn't mean dead.
Some extra casualties is still better than the alternative. Life is for living, even if some people die, we all die eventually.
Shutting down life in fear of death was not a price worth paying. Simply saying "more would die" isn't an argument winner against someone saying death is acceptable.
People go to ICU when there's a very significant chance that they could die without the assistance. Should there be no more capacity in ICU, no-one else could go to ICU. Those who would have survived with ICU assistance would therefore be dead.
Even "lesser" hospitalisation would see far more dead without hospital assistance. It's a key reason we have hospitals and healthcare in the first place.
Both ICUs and hospitals were maxed out and beyond maxed out. It was the hospital loadings and ICU loadings that governed the call for lockdowns.
Yes, it's true that everyone dies. We do consider it civilized to minimize avoidable deaths. We could close the deficit and cut taxes hugely at a stroke by abolishing all healthcare spending and pension spending, for example, on the grounds that yes, loads of people would die due to lack of healthcare and/or starve to death in old age, but hey - people die, right?
That is, to me, an absurd case to make, but not far off of your argument.
You're right its not far off the argument and make it less ridiculous and its not unreasonable either.
A budget should be available to the NHS for healthcare and the best available treatment based upon what is affordable - the NHS should not have a blank cheque.
If the NHS not having a blank cheque means more die and fewer receive pensions, then so be it. We can't afford to keep everyone alive forever, nor should we.
The NHS has never had a blank cheque and is never going to, so why this straw man argument?
Because Andy made the extreme argument of abolishing the budget entirely, so I retorted with the opposite extreme.
So is it fair to say we both agree that a budget is acceptable and we both agree that it is acceptable for avoidable deaths to occur if they're not viably avoidable within the budget.
Well if so, I consider the lockdown an unacceptable price to pay and if that means extra deaths then so be it, that's the price you pay for not having a blank cheque.
The Russians and Ukrainians have both ruled out a ceasefire or even resumption of negotiations, and I suspect that the Kherson counter-offensive needs to either succeed or fail by autumn before anyone's willing to talk. Not much seems to be happening at present except for artillery barrages and isolated spectacular hits, but Ukraine is clearly going to try to take Kherson by end-September.
A deadlock is a good thing in most wars unless one wants to hang on for total victory for one or the other side with unlimited human suffering along the way - failing that, there needs to come a point where both sides acknowledge that they're getting nowhere at huge cost. It's up to Ukraine as the injured party, but we should not be seeking to prolong the conflict.
An arrangement where Ukraine has sovereignty but Russia has a 99-year lease on Crimea and the pre-2014 Donbas area could probably be reached without anyone being overthrown - the invasion would have failed to gain any ground, giving Putin an obvious lesson that invasions don't work, but nobody would have won outright, avoiding seeding the ground for revanchism into future decades.
The Donbass and Crimea were not Russian. Giving them a lease (*) just allows them to undertake more of the ethnic cleansing they have been doing in Crimea and the Donbass - and in the parts of Ukraine they have controlled since February. It allows them to build up more troops and weapons in those areas.
Your 'answer' rewards Russian aggression, because they gain from it. As someone who is supposedly interested in peace, how does your 'answer' prevent or deter Russia, or other states, starting such adventures?
Besides, have you not noticed Russia's grand plans for the entire region? Their talk of taking over almost the entirety of eastern Europe? How does your 'answer' deter them from that?
It is extremely naive.
(*) Crimea was leased to Russia...
No, that's why I said the pre-2014 Donbas, not the parts they have controlled since Frbruary. They will have taken huge costs for precisely zero territorial gain - hardly encouragement to try agian either in the same place or somewhere else.
We agree about defeating the invasion. But we have different preferred endpoints. I want it to be seen to fail and then the war to stop. The objective of defeating aggression is vital; the objective of reversing the 2014 situation less so, and not worth extending the war. You want it to be seen to fail and the war to continue until Ukraine controls the whole of pre-2014 Ukraine plus Crimea. It's a view that I think most Ukrainians would agree with at the the moment, but potentially will simply lead to years of horrors with the same inconclusive result.
Just going out for the rest of the day, so will have to leave it there for now.
What is important I think is not so much to liberate Ukraine (although it is for Ukrainians, obvs) but to deal a devastating military defeat to Russia, by the start of next summer. Any pause, and they will simply spend a couple of years building a better army, and more tanks and rocket launchers, and do it again. Don't forget the war has been going on since 2014 when Russia invaded Crimea and the Donbas, not February 2022. Offering Russia 2021 borders would be like offering Nazi Germany Austria and the Sudetenland in 1941. Their behaviour in the prosecution of this war has been barbaric in the extreme - we have seen nothing like it in Europe since Hitler and Stalin - and they need to be held account for that.
Is it just me, or do Scot Nats dislike Starmer way more than they did either Milliband or Magic Grandpa? I mean it's not just on PB. Wasn't Tommy Shephard saying some bollocks in the National about how Starmer was the worst Labour leader ever the other day? My guess is because unlike the previous two leaders, they fear Starmer is going to win and get Labour back in office, which they very much don't want.
I, like approx one third of Scots, would prefer a PM Starmer to a PM Truss. If we choose to stay in the Union.
Which of the following do you think would make the best Prime Minister? - Scotland
What makes Starmer so unpalatable, compared to previous Labour leaders, is his ‘Muscular Unionism’. Just another term for bullying.
If I was HY (I am not) I would be telling you that means a Yoon majority of 53%. Let's say accounting for rounding that's 52% plays 48%. Now where have I seen such a compelling case on those numbers?
Hate to tell you, but here’s the VI findings from the same poll 😉
SNP 51% Con 22% Lab 16% LD 5% Grn 4% Ref 1%
Pro-independence parties 55% Unionist parties 44%
So what. Both Truss and Starmer have made clear they will refuse indyref2 and sod all the SNP can do about it unless the Tories win most seats in a hung parliament but Labour and the SNP combined have a majority
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Hang on, the options are real or hoax, not real or optical illusion. So it doesn't matter if there's a loch there or not, ig it's a hoax it could be, loch somewhere else.
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
True, but I'm going by what the pro photo dude said (the guy at Sheffield Hallam uni). He insists this is a real photo of a real object, not a hoax in terms of altered imagery after-the-event (tho we cannot know for sure, natch)
The eye witnesses are curious. Their identity has been disguised for decades, and will remain hidden. There was - without doubt - some kind of MoD kerfuffle, whatever the ultimate reason
The Sheffield work is not about alien tech but about folklore and myth -
Thanks - hadn't seen that. But the emphasis on folklore and myth is still there.
What are you talking about? You just got confused and thought this was all about Clarke
I'm talking strictly about the photographic analysis. Which has been done by a pro photographer who lectures at Sheffield Hallam. He's done photographs and photo studies about folklore, but also farming, urinals, weather, motorway service stations, poverty, walks, northerly light and woods
You're trying to paint him as a kook, which does not seem to be the case
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Hang on, the options are real or hoax, not real or optical illusion. So it doesn't matter if there's a loch there or not, ig it's a hoax it could be, loch somewhere else.
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
Depending on when the photo was published, for one thing, they could claim copyright fees. AIUI the image was not *published* till 2022, so it is still in copyright for pretty much the full period from now (life of photographer plus 25 or whatever years). So I am [edit] doubtful about the copyright claim plastered on it. I cannot see how it can be copyright of Sheffield University etc unless they had a formal written transfer from the photographer via the MoD. https://www.uapmedia.uk/articles/calvinerevealed
Good point. Copyright
"What is being withheld until 2072 is simply the name and address of the informant, e.g., the photographer – that is covered by black ink. The reason is that MOD and TNA regard this as ‘personal information’ that should be protected for an extended period of time.”"
The logic being that Mr X is effectively certain to be dead by then. Like the 2021 census was only released last year. Rather than it being anything to do with UFOs.
Nonetheless one might usefully ask why his identity is protected even unto his death. Especially if it just a "rock in a loch". To save his blushes?
And how has the copyright - as you say - passed from him to this guy Craig Lindsay?
Protection of identity is absolutely standard practice for anything now in central and local government and agencies, unless there is explicit permission to publish name etc. or it is necessary for legal reasons. GDPR is the most recent incarnation AIUI. It is not connected to any UFOs or whatever.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
You cannot know for certain. We've been through this. Do keep up
I stick by my previous comments. From what we know at the moment, it isn't a UFO/UAP. People are fapping themselves off desperately wanting to believe; the same sorts who 'believed' the X-Files series as paralleling the truth (I knew one such loon at uni...)
As others have said, it is the very definition of a UAP
There are eye witness reports of an unidentified aerial phenomenon, evidence in the MoD files to back it up, and also a photo (or six)
Now, they might show a rock in a loch, but a lot of credible people are saying this jobby is in the air. So: UAP until we know more
That's a bullsh*t argument: UAP came into credence because UFO became so debased as a term, used as shorthand for 'aliens!'.
Stuart and co fear Starmer because he'd run a good Government which would blunt the need for independence.
Perhaps the SNP should propose some policies and we can look at them. Their record in Government is a dismal failure.
Propose policies? Ho ho. There speaks someone firmly locked in Opposition Mode. FYI the SNP have been in government for fifteen years, and have now won eleven elections in a row. Lots of policies implemented and approved at the ballot box.
Welsh Labour, the only one in power, is closer to the SNP than Scottish or English Labour. Anas Sarwar would recoil in horror at some of the things Mark Drakeford says and does. Drakeford is riding high in the polls. Sarwar isn’t.
Do Scottish Labour have anyone of the quality of Mark Drakeford? No wonder Welsh Labour do well and Scottish Labour don’t.
They used to, at least at the top. But not since, I think, Donald Dewar and Wendy Alexander.
I had high hopes for Wendy Alexander. But she didn't really make much of a mark in the role. I don't know enough about internal SLab politics to know if she was being undermined/let-down by rival factions or was just 'not that good'.
1. You've said before that you supported lockdowns at the time. What changed your mind?
2. Can you envisage a situation where you would support public health advice to cut all possible social contract to an absolute minimum as justified? Would an IFR of 10% be sufficiently dangerous? Are there no circumstances at all?
1a. I thought the restrictions would be for a few weeks, not years. A few weeks disruption to 'flatten the curve' as claimed would have been one thing, but once the restrictions were accepted that's not what it became.
1b. The impact of prolonged lockdown was worse on children, mental health etc was far worse than I expected.
2. Advice not law is definitely better. Legal restrictions I doubt I'd ever support again under any circumstances.
I do wonder whether my opinion would have been different if q my daughter had been younger. I didn't have the direct experience of dealing with a young child cut off from their social group for an extended period.
I never liked the law interfering with who was allowed into my home, but since I intended to comply with the advice, because I understood the necessity for it, I felt more strongly that the arguments against were crap, rather than worried that my liberties were curtailed.
Perhaps that was naive, and yet, despite warnings to the contrary that the legal restrictions would never be lifted, none now remain. We actually could trust our government to give up the power it had taken over us, when it was no longer required.
I know a lot of people, including myself, were angry at the government for various things it did, and did not do, but it's worth noting that a lot of the wild accusations thrown around were unwarranted.
Absolutely a lot of wild things were said, I argued clearly with Contrarian etc saying the restrictions wouldn't be lifted and I stand by that. But they were kept in place far longer than they should have been (and no putting them in place sooner wouldn't have seen them lifted sooner realistically).
Once you've made this restriction "acceptable" the threshold for doing it becomes sooner and sooner in the future and that's why it needs pushing back on that it wasn't acceptable after all.
I think if we're going to encourage the use of public health advice in place of public health law, then we have to be prepared to follow sensible public health advice - such as staying at home when you know you are infectious. But you've pushed back against such standard public health advice, so your change of mind seems a bit more than just pushing against the idea of public health law.
The vaccines are the other part of the change.
Pre vaccines I would absolutely have stayed at home even if healthy if I knew I was infectious. I regret in hindsight having a lockdown pre vaccines but not the advice.
Post vaccines though I think staying at home when healthy for a virus people are vaccinated against is an unacceptable burden. If people choose to do so, that's their choice, but I would not and that's my choice.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Hang on, the options are real or hoax, not real or optical illusion. So it doesn't matter if there's a loch there or not, ig it's a hoax it could be, loch somewhere else.
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
True, but I'm going by what the pro photo dude said (the guy at Sheffield Hallam uni). He insists this is a real photo of a real object, not a hoax in terms of altered imagery after-the-event (tho we cannot know for sure, natch)
The eye witnesses are curious. Their identity has been disguised for decades, and will remain hidden. There was - without doubt - some kind of MoD kerfuffle, whatever the ultimate reason
The Sheffield work is not about alien tech but about folklore and myth -
Thanks - hadn't seen that. But the emphasis on folklore and myth is still there.
What are you talking about? You just got confused and thought this was all about Clarke
I'm talking strictly about the photographic analysis. Which has been done by a pro photographer who lectures at Sheffield Hallam. He's done photographs and photo studies about folklore, but also farming, urinals, weather, motorway service stations, poverty, walks, northerly light and woods
You're trying to paint him as a kook, which does not seem to be the case
Sorry, just meant that the folklore and myth are still present, but in Clarke's work - but this is a very respectable approach. I've seen it done for the Loch Ness monster for instance, when I read up about it. Very illuminating.
The photographer chap has quite separately from this done a very interesting report. Answered a number of obvcious questions which had occurred to me.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
The U stands for Unidentified, so unless you know what it is, or can prove it isn't in the air, it is indeed a UFO/UAP
That is the proper meaning of the term. In the case of UFO, it became so connected with ALIENS! that it became debased: UFO *always* meant aliens. So the term UAP was invented instead, and the loons immediately debased that as well.
It'd be interesting to do a survey to see what the public think the terms mean. I would be unsurprised if both UFO and UAP meant ALIENS! for the majority.
The Ukrainian view - and Zelensky's spokesman does a daily broadcast - is that Russia desperately wants a ceasefire because they know they're in big trouble - make of that what you will. I'd be astonished if the Ukrainians agreed to it. I wouldn't even bet on it if the west withdrew all military support and unaffected by Russia's gas stoppage the US will carry on regardless.
Yes, the Ukranians are not planning on the war ending, until the enemy have withdrawn to the pre-2014 border. The momentum is with them, and there are serious suggestions that the enemy is close to collapsing in places, starved of supply lines and with frequent attacks on stores and supply infrastructure. The key battle in the coming weeks is that around Kherson, the only area West of the river Deniper held by the enemy.
The Russians were totally spooked by whatever went down at the Crimean airfield last week. The initial thought was that it was American-made ATACMS rockets (the big brother of the usual HIMARS MLRS missiles) that were rumoured to be on the way a few weeks ago, but the Americans have denied this. Other possibilities are the Ukranian-made Neptune anti-ship missile, adapted for land use, or more likely a Ukranian special forces operation deep behind enemy lines. Ukranian SF have been trained by the UK and US, so this sort of tactical operation is probably not past them.
Or a Hrim ballistic missile or three, but they will be in short supply. Better the Russians are spooked and don't know, they will have to try to defend against all the options. Was amusing seeing the traffic jams on the western approach to the Kerch bridge.
The problem isn't the Tory party, its the voters. People want contradictory things but refuse to accept there is a contradiction. A series of events have empowered them to believe their genuine ignorance on a subject holds the same weight as actual knowledge and experience. They aren't wrong, the experts are wrong.
There is a way through though - find us a new Blair or Thatcher, someone who does know what they are talking about and has political umph. People said "that is Boris" but as all but the remaining holdouts now accept Boris stood for nothing, with no great policies delivered and settled in his time.
Ummm, BoZo was the politician more than any other in my lifetime that told voters they could have contradictory things. Denied the contradictions. That experts were to be derided.
He was the problem
The fact his opponents failed to make their case shows how poor they were
Not entirely.
If you are in a debate with someone shameless and dishonest enough, it can be really hard to persuade an audience.
It tends to go this;
BORIS-ALIKE Something involving cake and eat it
RORY-ALIKE (because he at least tried) That's not possible- once you have eaten your cake, it's gone...
BORIS-ALIKE There you go, with your doomy gloomy negativity. Remember we are Great Britain! We are being held back by your fears... (Continues ad nauseum.)
Boris style cakeism is a really attractive prospectus. It's awfully hard to argue against, because deep down we want it to be true, and want to believe that there's some meanie stopping it being true for us. That's been the case since the apple/snake/Eve fiasco in Genesis.
It would have been better for the UK had someone successfully argued us out of Borisism, but I'm not convinced that was possible.
It would have been better for the Conservatives and the UK to have not fallen for Borisism, but that required human nature to be something it isn't.
The culpability for (gestures round) all of this belongs with the clique who proposed it, who lied to the public about it, who smeared and deposed those who questioned it.
Not particularly with those who fell for it, and certainly not with those who did their best to argue against it.
Unless you had a better plan to argue against Boris, in which case I'm all ears.
And unless he didn't vote for the Conservatives when Mr Johnson was their leader.
I want to make this clear
I supported Johnson on brexit, covid and Ukraine but he lost me from Paterson onwards
Starmer would have had our economy in lockdown forever if he could, and it is to Johnson's credit he opened the economy when he did
That's a very silly thing to write. Starmer wanted us "in lockdown forever"?
Profoundly stupid read of the situation that isn't worthy of yours usual sage analysis.
Forever is a stretch, but Starmer was ALWAYS on the side of more and longer restrictions.
I accept forever was one of my rather exaggerated comments but there is no doubt Starmer favoured a much stricter and longer lockdown and it was Johnson who made the correct decision and it has been proven as the right thing to do
It is rather hot and I apologise for my exaggeration
Boris caused longer lockdowns by always being slow to initiate a lockdown. Had we acted promptly, we would have better controlled infection rates and could’ve come out of lockdown sooner. It’s yet more short term thinking.
Oh what nonsense. Claimed by people who want to justify lockdowns. Taking away civil liberties as a precautionary measure is unacceptable and the virus would still be prevalent on our continent after any lockdown it wasn't a magic pill that would get rid of it.
What country in Europe successfully had a short, sharp lockdown that was rapidly ended and not repeated?
I can in hindsight point at a country and say we should have done that, Sweden. Can you name any country that had a rapid premature lockdown that worked, fixed things and meant coming out of lockdown sooner?
Following the Swedish model would have been utterly catastrophic. Look at their death rates compared to their immediate neighbours. Thousands of additional people died in Sweden who did not need to because of the route they chose. And that is in spite of the fact that far more people in Sweden work from home anyway so the effects of a lockdown would have been considerably less on their economy.
Many - if not all - European countries got their policies wrong in the pandemic in one way or another. Sweden is certainly no exception.
The thousands of lives saved are people in institutions. If anything like the rest of Europe, these are places where most people have dementia and nobody is coming out alive. To sacrifice everyone's wellbeing for two years is an excessive price to pay for nursing home safety.
A completely false statement. Most of those who died were not people living in nursing homes. Of course if you are advocating just killing off older people to save money then you are welcome to make that claim but you will be treated with the contempt you deserve.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
You cannot know for certain. We've been through this. Do keep up
I stick by my previous comments. From what we know at the moment, it isn't a UFO/UAP. People are fapping themselves off desperately wanting to believe; the same sorts who 'believed' the X-Files series as paralleling the truth (I knew one such loon at uni...)
As others have said, it is the very definition of a UAP
There are eye witness reports of an unidentified aerial phenomenon, evidence in the MoD files to back it up, and also a photo (or six)
Now, they might show a rock in a loch, but a lot of credible people are saying this jobby is in the air. So: UAP until we know more
That's a bullsh*t argument: UAP came into credence because UFO became so debased as a term, used as shorthand for 'aliens!'.
Stuart and co fear Starmer because he'd run a good Government which would blunt the need for independence.
Perhaps the SNP should propose some policies and we can look at them. Their record in Government is a dismal failure.
Propose policies? Ho ho. There speaks someone firmly locked in Opposition Mode. FYI the SNP have been in government for fifteen years, and have now won eleven elections in a row. Lots of policies implemented and approved at the ballot box.
Welsh Labour, the only one in power, is closer to the SNP than Scottish or English Labour. Anas Sarwar would recoil in horror at some of the things Mark Drakeford says and does. Drakeford is riding high in the polls. Sarwar isn’t.
Do Scottish Labour have anyone of the quality of Mark Drakeford? No wonder Welsh Labour do well and Scottish Labour don’t.
They used to, at least at the top. But not since, I think, Donald Dewar and Wendy Alexander.
I had high hopes for Wendy Alexander. But she didn't really make much of a mark in the role. I don't know enough about internal SLab politics to know if she was being undermined/let-down by rival factions or was just 'not that good'.
That was a long time ago but from memory WA was widely regarded as being stabbed in the back by her friends*. Henry McLeish, her predecessor, was nominally forced out because of subletting his constituency office and forgetting to register it etc. This came out because the story emerged in a newspaper (can't recall which one). Howsoever that happened, as I recall Mr McLeish's leadership did not sit well with certain West Central Belt elements (he being from Fife).
*Edit: partly cos she wanted to take a pro-active approach and declare an indyref early, before the SNP had completely mobilised.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
You cannot know for certain. We've been through this. Do keep up
I stick by my previous comments. From what we know at the moment, it isn't a UFO/UAP. People are fapping themselves off desperately wanting to believe; the same sorts who 'believed' the X-Files series as paralleling the truth (I knew one such loon at uni...)
As others have said, it is the very definition of a UAP
There are eye witness reports of an unidentified aerial phenomenon, evidence in the MoD files to back it up, and also a photo (or six)
Now, they might show a rock in a loch, but a lot of credible people are saying this jobby is in the air. So: UAP until we know more
That's a bullsh*t argument: UAP came into credence because UFO became so debased as a term, used as shorthand for 'aliens!'.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
Hang on, the options are real or hoax, not real or optical illusion. So it doesn't matter if there's a loch there or not, ig it's a hoax it could be, loch somewhere else.
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
True, but I'm going by what the pro photo dude said (the guy at Sheffield Hallam uni). He insists this is a real photo of a real object, not a hoax in terms of altered imagery after-the-event (tho we cannot know for sure, natch)
The eye witnesses are curious. Their identity has been disguised for decades, and will remain hidden. There was - without doubt - some kind of MoD kerfuffle, whatever the ultimate reason
The Sheffield work is not about alien tech but about folklore and myth -
Thanks - hadn't seen that. But the emphasis on folklore and myth is still there.
What are you talking about? You just got confused and thought this was all about Clarke
I'm talking strictly about the photographic analysis. Which has been done by a pro photographer who lectures at Sheffield Hallam. He's done photographs and photo studies about folklore, but also farming, urinals, weather, motorway service stations, poverty, walks, northerly light and woods
You're trying to paint him as a kook, which does not seem to be the case
Sorry, just meant that the folklore and myth are still present, but in Clarke's work - but this is a very respectable approach. I've seen it done for the Loch Ness monster for instance, when I read up about it. Very illuminating.
The photographer chap has quite separately from this done a very interesting report. Answered a number of obvcious questions which had occurred to me.
Yes. I get a little irritated when stories about anomalous phenomena are dismissed because the person investigating/reporting is interested in anomalous phenomena, so they must be crazy
The kind of person who will dig up a photo like this is the kind of person who will spend years looking for photos like this. If you want to know about the weather, you go to a weather specialist
To be fair, I have done it myself. Dismissed ufologists as kooks just because. But I am trying to open my mind. We all should. Crazy shit actually happens, sometimes. As we all know, in 2022, to our cost
The problem isn't the Tory party, its the voters. People want contradictory things but refuse to accept there is a contradiction. A series of events have empowered them to believe their genuine ignorance on a subject holds the same weight as actual knowledge and experience. They aren't wrong, the experts are wrong.
There is a way through though - find us a new Blair or Thatcher, someone who does know what they are talking about and has political umph. People said "that is Boris" but as all but the remaining holdouts now accept Boris stood for nothing, with no great policies delivered and settled in his time.
Ummm, BoZo was the politician more than any other in my lifetime that told voters they could have contradictory things. Denied the contradictions. That experts were to be derided.
He was the problem
The fact his opponents failed to make their case shows how poor they were
Not entirely.
If you are in a debate with someone shameless and dishonest enough, it can be really hard to persuade an audience.
It tends to go this;
BORIS-ALIKE Something involving cake and eat it
RORY-ALIKE (because he at least tried) That's not possible- once you have eaten your cake, it's gone...
BORIS-ALIKE There you go, with your doomy gloomy negativity. Remember we are Great Britain! We are being held back by your fears... (Continues ad nauseum.)
Boris style cakeism is a really attractive prospectus. It's awfully hard to argue against, because deep down we want it to be true, and want to believe that there's some meanie stopping it being true for us. That's been the case since the apple/snake/Eve fiasco in Genesis.
It would have been better for the UK had someone successfully argued us out of Borisism, but I'm not convinced that was possible.
It would have been better for the Conservatives and the UK to have not fallen for Borisism, but that required human nature to be something it isn't.
The culpability for (gestures round) all of this belongs with the clique who proposed it, who lied to the public about it, who smeared and deposed those who questioned it.
Not particularly with those who fell for it, and certainly not with those who did their best to argue against it.
Unless you had a better plan to argue against Boris, in which case I'm all ears.
And unless he didn't vote for the Conservatives when Mr Johnson was their leader.
I want to make this clear
I supported Johnson on brexit, covid and Ukraine but he lost me from Paterson onwards
Starmer would have had our economy in lockdown forever if he could, and it is to Johnson's credit he opened the economy when he did
That's a very silly thing to write. Starmer wanted us "in lockdown forever"?
Profoundly stupid read of the situation that isn't worthy of yours usual sage analysis.
Forever is a stretch, but Starmer was ALWAYS on the side of more and longer restrictions.
I accept forever was one of my rather exaggerated comments but there is no doubt Starmer favoured a much stricter and longer lockdown and it was Johnson who made the correct decision and it has been proven as the right thing to do
It is rather hot and I apologise for my exaggeration
Boris caused longer lockdowns by always being slow to initiate a lockdown. Had we acted promptly, we would have better controlled infection rates and could’ve come out of lockdown sooner. It’s yet more short term thinking.
Oh what nonsense. Claimed by people who want to justify lockdowns. Taking away civil liberties as a precautionary measure is unacceptable and the virus would still be prevalent on our continent after any lockdown it wasn't a magic pill that would get rid of it.
What country in Europe successfully had a short, sharp lockdown that was rapidly ended and not repeated?
I can in hindsight point at a country and say we should have done that, Sweden. Can you name any country that had a rapid premature lockdown that worked, fixed things and meant coming out of lockdown sooner?
Following the Swedish model would have been utterly catastrophic. Look at their death rates compared to their immediate neighbours. Thousands of additional people died in Sweden who did not need to because of the route they chose. And that is in spite of the fact that far more people in Sweden work from home anyway so the effects of a lockdown would have been considerably less on their economy.
Many - if not all - European countries got their policies wrong in the pandemic in one way or another. Sweden is certainly no exception.
Thousands extra dying, almost all of whom would have died soon anyway, is better than stripping tens of millions of two years of civil liberties, trashing education and development for years that will have consequences for generations to come, spending hundreds of billions and creating NHS waiting lists for years to come.
The price we paid to keep people alive was not a price worth paying. There's more to life than a mortuary league table.
If the vulnerable wishes to shield that should be there prerogative but not at the price of trashing children's education etc
It is not for you to decide who has a right to live and die. I wonder if someone else were making that sort of decision but based on something other than simply age, whether you would be happy to be marked as uneconomic and unworthy of protection. I am sure we could work up a suitable argument as to why you should be sacrificed so we could all save a bit of money.
1. You've said before that you supported lockdowns at the time. What changed your mind?
2. Can you envisage a situation where you would support public health advice to cut all possible social contract to an absolute minimum as justified? Would an IFR of 10% be sufficiently dangerous? Are there no circumstances at all?
1a. I thought the restrictions would be for a few weeks, not years. A few weeks disruption to 'flatten the curve' as claimed would have been one thing, but once the restrictions were accepted that's not what it became.
1b. The impact of prolonged lockdown was worse on children, mental health etc was far worse than I expected.
2. Advice not law is definitely better. Legal restrictions I doubt I'd ever support again under any circumstances.
I do wonder whether my opinion would have been different if q my daughter had been younger. I didn't have the direct experience of dealing with a young child cut off from their social group for an extended period.
I never liked the law interfering with who was allowed into my home, but since I intended to comply with the advice, because I understood the necessity for it, I felt more strongly that the arguments against were crap, rather than worried that my liberties were curtailed.
Perhaps that was naive, and yet, despite warnings to the contrary that the legal restrictions would never be lifted, none now remain. We actually could trust our government to give up the power it had taken over us, when it was no longer required.
I know a lot of people, including myself, were angry at the government for various things it did, and did not do, but it's worth noting that a lot of the wild accusations thrown around were unwarranted.
Absolutely a lot of wild things were said, I argued clearly with Contrarian etc saying the restrictions wouldn't be lifted and I stand by that. But they were kept in place far longer than they should have been (and no putting them in place sooner wouldn't have seen them lifted sooner realistically).
Once you've made this restriction "acceptable" the threshold for doing it becomes sooner and sooner in the future and that's why it needs pushing back on that it wasn't acceptable after all.
Details aside – just big picture and on balance and all things considered - I’m impressed and pleasantly surprised by our response to Covid. Faced with this mortal threat to (mainly) elderly people we acted in a mature collective way rather than as a bunch of self-centred individuals. It’s something to be quite proud of imo.
Stuart and co fear Starmer because he'd run a good Government which would blunt the need for independence.
Perhaps the SNP should propose some policies and we can look at them. Their record in Government is a dismal failure.
Propose policies? Ho ho. There speaks someone firmly locked in Opposition Mode. FYI the SNP have been in government for fifteen years, and have now won eleven elections in a row. Lots of policies implemented and approved at the ballot box.
Welsh Labour, the only one in power, is closer to the SNP than Scottish or English Labour. Anas Sarwar would recoil in horror at some of the things Mark Drakeford says and does. Drakeford is riding high in the polls. Sarwar isn’t.
SNP have done sod all, if they had done anything you'd be able to point out achievements
Says the PB Scotch expert. You Labourites are just as bad as your Tory buddies.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
You cannot know for certain. We've been through this. Do keep up
I stick by my previous comments. From what we know at the moment, it isn't a UFO/UAP. People are fapping themselves off desperately wanting to believe; the same sorts who 'believed' the X-Files series as paralleling the truth (I knew one such loon at uni...)
As others have said, it is the very definition of a UAP
There are eye witness reports of an unidentified aerial phenomenon, evidence in the MoD files to back it up, and also a photo (or six)
Now, they might show a rock in a loch, but a lot of credible people are saying this jobby is in the air. So: UAP until we know more
That's a bullsh*t argument: UAP came into credence because UFO became so debased as a term, used as shorthand for 'aliens!'.
The problem isn't the Tory party, its the voters. People want contradictory things but refuse to accept there is a contradiction. A series of events have empowered them to believe their genuine ignorance on a subject holds the same weight as actual knowledge and experience. They aren't wrong, the experts are wrong.
There is a way through though - find us a new Blair or Thatcher, someone who does know what they are talking about and has political umph. People said "that is Boris" but as all but the remaining holdouts now accept Boris stood for nothing, with no great policies delivered and settled in his time.
Ummm, BoZo was the politician more than any other in my lifetime that told voters they could have contradictory things. Denied the contradictions. That experts were to be derided.
He was the problem
The fact his opponents failed to make their case shows how poor they were
Not entirely.
If you are in a debate with someone shameless and dishonest enough, it can be really hard to persuade an audience.
It tends to go this;
BORIS-ALIKE Something involving cake and eat it
RORY-ALIKE (because he at least tried) That's not possible- once you have eaten your cake, it's gone...
BORIS-ALIKE There you go, with your doomy gloomy negativity. Remember we are Great Britain! We are being held back by your fears... (Continues ad nauseum.)
Boris style cakeism is a really attractive prospectus. It's awfully hard to argue against, because deep down we want it to be true, and want to believe that there's some meanie stopping it being true for us. That's been the case since the apple/snake/Eve fiasco in Genesis.
It would have been better for the UK had someone successfully argued us out of Borisism, but I'm not convinced that was possible.
It would have been better for the Conservatives and the UK to have not fallen for Borisism, but that required human nature to be something it isn't.
The culpability for (gestures round) all of this belongs with the clique who proposed it, who lied to the public about it, who smeared and deposed those who questioned it.
Not particularly with those who fell for it, and certainly not with those who did their best to argue against it.
Unless you had a better plan to argue against Boris, in which case I'm all ears.
And unless he didn't vote for the Conservatives when Mr Johnson was their leader.
I want to make this clear
I supported Johnson on brexit, covid and Ukraine but he lost me from Paterson onwards
Starmer would have had our economy in lockdown forever if he could, and it is to Johnson's credit he opened the economy when he did
That's a very silly thing to write. Starmer wanted us "in lockdown forever"?
Profoundly stupid read of the situation that isn't worthy of yours usual sage analysis.
Forever is a stretch, but Starmer was ALWAYS on the side of more and longer restrictions.
I accept forever was one of my rather exaggerated comments but there is no doubt Starmer favoured a much stricter and longer lockdown and it was Johnson who made the correct decision and it has been proven as the right thing to do
It is rather hot and I apologise for my exaggeration
Boris caused longer lockdowns by always being slow to initiate a lockdown. Had we acted promptly, we would have better controlled infection rates and could’ve come out of lockdown sooner. It’s yet more short term thinking.
Oh what nonsense. Claimed by people who want to justify lockdowns. Taking away civil liberties as a precautionary measure is unacceptable and the virus would still be prevalent on our continent after any lockdown it wasn't a magic pill that would get rid of it.
What country in Europe successfully had a short, sharp lockdown that was rapidly ended and not repeated?
I can in hindsight point at a country and say we should have done that, Sweden. Can you name any country that had a rapid premature lockdown that worked, fixed things and meant coming out of lockdown sooner?
Following the Swedish model would have been utterly catastrophic. Look at their death rates compared to their immediate neighbours. Thousands of additional people died in Sweden who did not need to because of the route they chose. And that is in spite of the fact that far more people in Sweden work from home anyway so the effects of a lockdown would have been considerably less on their economy.
Many - if not all - European countries got their policies wrong in the pandemic in one way or another. Sweden is certainly no exception.
The thousands of lives saved are people in institutions. If anything like the rest of Europe, these are places where most people have dementia and nobody is coming out alive. To sacrifice everyone's wellbeing for two years is an excessive price to pay for nursing home safety.
A completely false statement. Most of those who died were not people living in nursing homes. Of course if you are advocating just killing off older people to save money then you are welcome to make that claim but you will be treated with the contempt you deserve.
Not simply to save money. And nobody is proposing euthanasia, anyone who dies from a virus is dying from natural causes.
The NHS has never had a blank cheque and nor should it, as even others agree already.
If the cost of keeping one elderly and vulnerable person from having a death from entirely natural causes is ten million pounds and taking a thousand children out of education for six months then is it worthy of "contempt" to question whether that is an acceptable price?
Stuart and co fear Starmer because he'd run a good Government which would blunt the need for independence.
Perhaps the SNP should propose some policies and we can look at them. Their record in Government is a dismal failure.
Propose policies? Ho ho. There speaks someone firmly locked in Opposition Mode. FYI the SNP have been in government for fifteen years, and have now won eleven elections in a row. Lots of policies implemented and approved at the ballot box.
Welsh Labour, the only one in power, is closer to the SNP than Scottish or English Labour. Anas Sarwar would recoil in horror at some of the things Mark Drakeford says and does. Drakeford is riding high in the polls. Sarwar isn’t.
SNP have done sod all, if they had done anything you'd be able to point out achievements
Says the PB Scotch expert. You Labourites are just as bad as your Tory buddies.
I'm getting to the point where I wish the bloody aliens just turn up and introduce themselves as transgender aliens who started COVID, just to shut Leon up.
Much like 1 picture from a dalle prompt I want to see the other 5 pictures
The retired RAF press officer, Craig Lindsay - who has kept this image for 30 years - says he has seen all six. He says they are all very similar, except the "object" is in a different place in some
Now, he could easily be a liar and he could easily be part of an elaborate hoax, but that's an odd thing to do at the end of a long career, in your 80s
To channel Mr @moonshine if this is part of Disclosure, it makes bizarre sense. The powers that be are softening us up for the final revelation, but doing it sloooooowly so we don't panic. It has now been happening for several years. Getting retired people to do it is logical, they do not have careers to damage. So maybe Craig Lindsay got a call from the RAF saying "go ahead, you can release it now"
Kristian Niemietz, Fossil Fuel Gammon @K_Niemietz · 4h If they re-ran the Corbo project, but with Mick Lynch as the new Corbo - it would work. He's the one who could build that Hipster-Gammon coalition.
That graph is shocking: the poorest 20% in England & her satellite states are going to get absolutely hammered compared to the richest 20%.
While the poor suffer more than the rich nearly everywhere, they are better protected in France, Italy, Germany etc
Isn't the greatest per capita consumption of energy in Scandinavia? I am sure someone will find a graph that shows this. Clearing the roads of snow (for hundreds and hundreds of kilometres) and heating 200-300 sqm houses favoured by the most people through minus 30 degree winters is bound to use up vast amounts of energy, mainly oil and gas. It seems to me like, if you go through Sweden or Finland - which I have done a lot; much of it is actually also suburban sprawl. They have never built to any density because of the unlimited supply of land. This sprawl just goes on for miles. House after house (200-300 sqm) with 3-4 cars. Also... limited use of public transport. So the trains are empty and cost little or nothing to use. And lots are actually diesel. Even busses - massively subsidised and good, but not used all that much .. not on anything like the density in the UK. Because of the disparate suburban planning over the past decades , things like shopping centres and swimming pools are located out of centre. So to get from A to B by bus, even though its possible, it takes an hour to to a journey that takes 15 minutes by car. Outside the progressive cities with new apartment blocks and townhouse style developments, it seems like people are driving everywhere and aspiring to live to these timber framed modernist mansions. I don't see how that can all be improved particularly.
So even if you have redistributive policies in Sweden, it won't correct a more fundamental problem which will take a lot longer to resolve. By contrast, countries like the UK could adopt redistributive policies a lot more quickly and painlessly.
We have PB Scotch Experts. Now we have a PB Swedish Expert telling someone who lives in Sweden what living in Sweden is like. PB, there’s nothing like it!
Yeah, well firstly, you don't know anything about me and what I may or not know about Sweden. Secondly the poster just suggested that the country with the second highest per capita consumption of energy in the EU (IE Sweden) was a good country to be a consumer, when raw energy prices are rising very significantly. It is perfectly reasonable to point out in response that Sweden has an objective problem with consumption, even if the impact may be masked by redistributive policies.
Huh? It wasn’t me who said that, it was The Economist. Hint: click the link.
Comments
Despite that it's pretty good. Particularly in giving the Apostles rounded characters.
I’ve never quite understood why SLab never learned the lesson of 2015. They are still ploughing the same barren furrows.
Successful political movements learn from defeat and change and bounce back. The inability of SLab to heal has really been quite sad to witness. They are tortured by their own hatred and hurt.
Having been gubbed in 2014, their cunning plan is to do it again...
1. You've said before that you supported lockdowns at the time. What changed your mind?
2. Can you envisage a situation where you would support public health advice to cut all possible social contract to an absolute minimum as justified? Would an IFR of 10% be sufficiently dangerous? Are there no circumstances at all?
Perhaps the SNP should propose some policies and we can look at them. Their record in Government is a dismal failure.
A budget should be available to the NHS for healthcare and the best available treatment based upon what is affordable - the NHS should not have a blank cheque.
If the NHS not having a blank cheque means more die and fewer receive pensions, then so be it. We can't afford to keep everyone alive forever, nor should we.
Not sure I’d call 45% “gubbed”. I’d say that it is a tremendous base to build on.
SNP 51%
Con 22%
Lab 16%
LD 5%
Grn 4%
Ref 1%
Pro-independence parties 55%
Unionist parties 44%
But the virus was largely let in again in late summer after foreign holidays were allowed to resume.
Followed by the Delta variant being allowed to enter in spring 2021 because travel with India hadn't been restricted - IMO because Boris wanted to have his own India visit.
A deadlock is a good thing in most wars unless one wants to hang on for total victory for one or the other side with unlimited human suffering along the way - failing that, there needs to come a point where both sides acknowledge that they're getting nowhere at huge cost. It's up to Ukraine as the injured party, but we should not be seeking to prolong the conflict.
An arrangement where Ukraine has sovereignty but Russia has a 99-year lease on Crimea and the pre-2014 Donbas area could probably be reached without anyone being overthrown - the invasion would have failed to gain any ground, giving Putin an obvious lesson that invasions don't work, but nobody would have won outright, avoiding seeding the ground for revanchism into future decades.
I think, back then, the idea of independence was actually quite new to a lot of people, and we saw a growth in support as a result (I think the same with Brexit). I don't think you'll get the same swell in support again - just enough to get over the magic 50%.
"C'est magnifique, mais ce n'est pas la politique"
1b. The impact of prolonged lockdown was worse on children, mental health etc was far worse than I expected.
2. Advice not law is definitely better. Legal restrictions I doubt I'd ever support again under any circumstances.
Your 'answer' rewards Russian aggression, because they gain from it. As someone who is supposedly interested in peace, how does your 'answer' prevent or deter Russia, or other states, starting such adventures?
Besides, have you not noticed Russia's grand plans for the entire region? Their talk of taking over almost the entirety of eastern Europe? How does your 'answer' deter them from that?
It is extremely naive.
(*) Crimea was leased to Russia...
I am sure someone will find a graph that shows this.
Clearing the roads of snow (for hundreds and hundreds of kilometres) and heating 200-300 sqm houses favoured by the most people through minus 30 degree winters is bound to use up vast amounts of energy, mainly oil and gas.
It seems to me like, if you go through Sweden or Finland - which I have done a lot; much of it is actually also suburban sprawl. They have never built to any density because of the unlimited supply of land.
This sprawl just goes on for miles. House after house (200-300 sqm) with 3-4 cars.
Also... limited use of public transport. So the trains are empty and cost little or nothing to use. And lots are actually diesel.
Even busses - massively subsidised and good, but not used all that much .. not on anything like the density in the UK.
Because of the disparate suburban planning over the past decades , things like shopping centres and swimming pools are located out of centre.
So to get from A to B by bus, even though its possible, it takes an hour to to a journey that takes 15 minutes by car.
Outside the progressive cities with new apartment blocks and townhouse style developments, it seems like people are driving everywhere and aspiring to live to these timber framed modernist mansions.
I don't see how that can all be improved particularly.
So even if you have redistributive policies in Sweden, it won't correct a more fundamental problem which will take a lot longer to resolve.
By contrast, countries like the UK could adopt redistributive policies a lot more quickly and painlessly.
Welsh Labour, the only one in power, is closer to the SNP than Scottish or English Labour. Anas Sarwar would recoil in horror at some of the things Mark Drakeford says and does. Drakeford is riding high in the polls. Sarwar isn’t.
When I stare at the Calvine photo and see a rock in a loch, is my brain pre-filtering the fucking great UFO in the middle of the photo?
I cannot know
The difference between my experience and the gorilla thing, is that I am able to switch between perceptions - rock in a loch, and UFO. It's also like one of those optical illusions where you can either see two faces, or a vase, but not really both together
We agree about defeating the invasion. But we have different preferred endpoints. I want it to be seen to fail and then the war to stop. The objective of defeating aggression is vital; the objective of reversing the 2014 situation less so, and not worth extending the war. You want it to be seen to fail and the war to continue until Ukraine controls the whole of pre-2014 Ukraine plus Crimea. It's a view that I think most Ukrainians would agree with at the the moment, but potentially will simply lead to years of horrors with the same inconclusive result.
Just going out for the rest of the day, so will have to leave it there for now.
The researchers are adamant the photo was NOT taken near a loch or wide river. Meaning that the rock in a loch is OUT
"One of our team, Giles Stevens, is local to the Calvine area and has spent a lot of time searching for the location where the images were taken. We’ll discuss on an upcoming livestream. Details soon."
Which leaves increasingly absurd explanations. I don't believe it is a kite
https://twitter.com/disclosureteam_/status/1558433518035795968?s=20&t=1r1qiU8XNLKnrGz6doxx1g
https://news.yahoo.com/supreme-court-hear-case-could-153057650.html
I never liked the law interfering with who was allowed into my home, but since I intended to comply with the advice, because I understood the necessity for it, I felt more strongly that the arguments against were crap, rather than worried that my liberties were curtailed.
Perhaps that was naive, and yet, despite warnings to the contrary that the legal restrictions would never be lifted, none now remain. We actually could trust our government to give up the power it had taken over us, when it was no longer required.
I know a lot of people, including myself, were angry at the government for various things it did, and did not do, but it's worth noting that a lot of the wild accusations thrown around were unwarranted.
Secondly the poster just suggested that the country with the second highest per capita consumption of energy in the EU (IE Sweden) was a good country to be a consumer, when raw energy prices are rising very significantly.
It is perfectly reasonable to point out in response that Sweden has an objective problem with consumption, even if the impact may be masked by redistributive policies.
Look at the way they just took over the (rented) Crimea when they wanted to, then invaded from it.
You do not seem to consider that *your* view might lead to 'years of horrors', except over the rest of Ukraine and much of eastern Europe.
Do you trust Russia?
1990 isn't that long ago (oddly enough I know what I was doing the day the photo was taken). Why has neither of the young-at-the-time photographers emerged from the woodwork?
Once you've made this restriction "acceptable" the threshold for doing it becomes sooner and sooner in the future and that's why it needs pushing back on that it wasn't acceptable after all.
The eye witnesses are curious. Their identity has been disguised for decades, and will remain hidden. There was - without doubt - some kind of MoD kerfuffle, whatever the ultimate reason
https://skybrary.aero/articles/fata-morgana#:~:text=A superior mirage occurs when,object, hence the name superior.
https://www.shu.ac.uk/about-us/our-people/staff-profiles/david-clarke#fourthSection
"What is being withheld until 2072 is simply the name and address of the informant, e.g., the photographer – that is covered by black ink. The reason is that MOD and TNA regard this as ‘personal information’ that should be protected for an extended period of time.”"
You also pick and choose polls to suit your agenda. Has anyone ever seen you and HYUFD in the same room?
There are eye witness reports of an unidentified aerial phenomenon, evidence in the MoD files to back it up, and also a photo (or six)
Now, they might show a rock in a loch, but a lot of credible people are saying this jobby is in the air. So: UAP until we know more
But there *could* be aliens visiting us with Star Trek style cloaking technology, keeping an eye on us, but without evidence of this it does not make any sense to believe that they are.
The UFO = aliens equivalence gets my goat. Unidentified != Identified as an alien spacecraft.
Atmospheric effects can be superb and weird.
I have a photo taken at Strumbe Head one March evening, with the lighthouse's beam sweeping around, and a beam of pink light going from the horizon into the sky. I have only ever seen such a beam since, despite often being up at sparrow's fart.
I'm talking about this analysis of the photo. By Andrew Robinson
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1tWMZ232qgDE6Tru7jwgG-nsqoeQZpIm3/view
He is a lecturer in photography at Sheffield Hallam (presumably a collague/friend of Clarke)
https://www.shu.ac.uk/about-us/our-people/staff-profiles/andrew-robinson
Betfair next prime minister
1.11 Liz Truss 90%
9.6 Rishi Sunak 10%
Next Conservative leader
1.11 Liz Truss 90%
9.6 Rishi Sunak 10%
Back to the garden….
And how has the copyright - as you say - passed from him to this guy Craig Lindsay?
So is it fair to say we both agree that a budget is acceptable and we both agree that it is acceptable for avoidable deaths to occur if they're not viably avoidable within the budget.
Well if so, I consider the lockdown an unacceptable price to pay and if that means extra deaths then so be it, that's the price you pay for not having a blank cheque.
I'm talking strictly about the photographic analysis. Which has been done by a pro photographer who lectures at Sheffield Hallam. He's done photographs and photo studies about folklore, but also farming, urinals, weather, motorway service stations, poverty, walks, northerly light and woods
You're trying to paint him as a kook, which does not seem to be the case
https://makeameme.org/meme/im-not-saying-hs2yuz
Pre vaccines I would absolutely have stayed at home even if healthy if I knew I was infectious. I regret in hindsight having a lockdown pre vaccines but not the advice.
Post vaccines though I think staying at home when healthy for a virus people are vaccinated against is an unacceptable burden. If people choose to do so, that's their choice, but I would not and that's my choice.
The photographer chap has quite separately from this done a very interesting report. Answered a number of obvcious questions which had occurred to me.
It'd be interesting to do a survey to see what the public think the terms mean. I would be unsurprised if both UFO and UAP meant ALIENS! for the majority.
*Edit: partly cos she wanted to take a pro-active approach and declare an indyref early, before the SNP had completely mobilised.
The kind of person who will dig up a photo like this is the kind of person who will spend years looking for photos like this. If you want to know about the weather, you go to a weather specialist
To be fair, I have done it myself. Dismissed ufologists as kooks just because. But I am trying to open my mind. We all should. Crazy shit actually happens, sometimes. As we all know, in 2022, to our cost
Queensferry Crossing
Child Payment Baby Box
Free bus travel for under 22s
Free period products
Dentistry charges scrapped
Music tuition fees scrapped
Best Performing NHS in the UK
Extended free personal care
Record high health funding
A dozen new Social Security benefits
Free school meals for P1-3s
Best performing A&E in the UK
Record high investment in education
Declared a climate emergency - 1st in world
Planting 22 million trees a year
Scottish National Investment Bank
Building more affordable homes
Small Business Bonus
Expanded MA scheme
Expanded EMAS
School Clothing Grant
Young Person's Guarantee
Investing more in life sciences
Free eye tests
Record support for college students
New progressive tax system
Carer's Allowance Supplement
Record low crime - lowest in over 40 years
Young Carer Grant
Violence Reduction Unit
Record investment in active travel
Best Start Grant
Aberdeen Bypass
Driving forward land reform
Lowering emissions
More investment in Climate Justice Fund
National Islands Plan
Community Empowerment Act
National Marine Plan
Helping deliver COP26
Outperforming UK on foreign investment
Continuing to outperform UK on productivity
Delivering Equally Safe Fund
First gender neutral cabinet in the UK
Keeping Scottish Water in public hands
Ferguson's shipyard jobs saved
BiFab saved
Prestwick Airport saved
Violent crime down
Weapon/knife crime significantly down
Handling the Covid crisis
I used another word that is common in Scotland, but maybe not in Sweden.
It means defeated. Beaten. For a generation...
Here is a picture of a man who got gubbed
The NHS has never had a blank cheque and nor should it, as even others agree already.
If the cost of keeping one elderly and vulnerable person from having a death from entirely natural causes is ten million pounds and taking a thousand children out of education for six months then is it worthy of "contempt" to question whether that is an acceptable price?
Now, he could easily be a liar and he could easily be part of an elaborate hoax, but that's an odd thing to do at the end of a long career, in your 80s
To channel Mr @moonshine if this is part of Disclosure, it makes bizarre sense. The powers that be are softening us up for the final revelation, but doing it sloooooowly so we don't panic. It has now been happening for several years. Getting retired people to do it is logical, they do not have careers to damage. So maybe Craig Lindsay got a call from the RAF saying "go ahead, you can release it now"
The timing is intriguing
The point of the experiment is not that you see the gorilla, and think it is a player, it's that you don't see the gorilla at all.
If the question was "count the players" you would spot the gorilla instantly. But it's not.
Count the passes. No gorilla catches a pass. No gorilla appears on the court (as far as you can tell)
Kristian Niemietz, Fossil Fuel Gammon
@K_Niemietz
·
4h
If they re-ran the Corbo project, but with Mick Lynch as the new Corbo - it would work.
He's the one who could build that Hipster-Gammon coalition.
https://twitter.com/K_Niemietz/status/1558398887471337473