Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
That’s an interesting analysis.
I think (particularly given the characters you’ve mentioned) elitist snobbery played a big part.
They simply wanted to play at the table with their fellows, and didn’t really think it was the business of the electorate to worry their pretty little heads about it.
I can see why @algarkirk is going to vote Red Tory. The two parties have morphed into the same perverse beast. The FAV for next Lab Leader Burnham was visiting the Jock colony this week, behaving in exactly the disdainful, patrician, elitist, snobby fashion so personified by Hurd & Co.
Gordon thinks he’s being clever. It’s the same self-delusion that lead his henchman Jim Murphy sell consultancy services on “how to win elections”. Very drôle.
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
This is an interesting take. I think that the moderate pragmatic euro-realist tradition in the old one nation Tory party had negotiated what they thought was a decent compromise - no Schengen or the euro, acting as a brake on federalist tendencies in Brussels etc. The problem was that there was a large minority in the country, rapidly becoming a majority in the party, who simply were not reconciled to EU membership in any form. Add to that a population tired of austerity and wanting to give Cameron a kicking, and a rubbish Remain campaign, and voila, Brexit. In other words, I think they did their best, but it wasn't good enough. What now, though?
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
This is an interesting take. I think that the moderate pragmatic euro-realist tradition in the old one nation Tory party had negotiated what they thought was a decent compromise - no Schengen or the euro, acting as a brake on federalist tendencies in Brussels etc. The problem was that there was a large minority in the country, rapidly becoming a majority in the party, who simply were not reconciled to EU membership in any form. Add to that a population tired of austerity and wanting to give Cameron a kicking, and a rubbish Remain campaign, and voila, Brexit. In other words, I think they did their best, but it wasn't good enough. What now, though?
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
Wow, there’s already a Truss Derangement Syndrome, a week before she’s even been confirmed in the job.
I think TDS - if it exists outside your fevered imagination - is what Tory MPs are feeling.
The last time a PM was imposed over the wishes of the ruling party MPs was...?
Do we have another "Derangement Syndrome" to add to the list
Will "Derangement Syndrome" replace "gate" in future.
I expect TDSgate...
I've seen the phrase Truss Derangement Syndrome used in at least three completely unconnected areas online in, what, the past 48 hours. If I didn't know better, I'd start thinking that someone was seeding this to get ahead of the impending criticism
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
Wow, there’s already a Truss Derangement Syndrome, a week before she’s even been confirmed in the job.
I think TDS - if it exists outside your fevered imagination - is what Tory MPs are feeling.
The last time a PM was imposed over the wishes of the ruling party MPs was...?
Do we have another "Derangement Syndrome" to add to the list
Will "Derangement Syndrome" replace "gate" in future.
I expect TDSgate...
I've seen the phrase Truss Derangement Syndrome used in at least three completely unconnected areas online in, what, the past 48 hours. If I didn't know better, I'd start thinking that someone was seeding this to get ahead of the impending criticism
Glad we've parked the NT discussion (apparently). So, anyone want to join me in a discussion on the veracity of the Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster?
Well......
Keir Starmer may come to miss Boris Johnson. Some historians believe that each prime minister is the antithesis of their predecessor, as we always replace overly charismatic leaders with boring ones. The historian David Starkey says all PMs are either bookies or bishops, and that the righteous Starmer has just lost his useful sinner. “Boris is the archetypal cheating bookie,” Starkey tells All Talk.
“Starmer is worse than a bishop: he’s a moderator of the Church of Scotland.” The theory might fall down if Liz Truss wins. It’s hard to see how she could be viewed as a bishop, though she might be more of a nun-entity.
Truss does not easily fall into the category of either charismatic or dull. She is no Brown or Major or Callaghan. But then again, she clearly isn't a Wilson, Thatcher, Blair or Cameron.
If I had to choose an analog for Ms Truss, it would not be a British politician.
I've just cracked up laughing watching Harold Wilson in the Crown, having to repeat to the Queen, the obscene limericks shared by Princess Margaret and Lyndon Johnson.
Nervously, Wilson begins "There once was a woman from Dallas, who enjoyed a dynamite phallus"
Queen, poker-faced, " You've come this far"
"She left her vagina, in North Carolina, and her arsehole in Buckingham Palace."
Queen Mother interrupts: "We'll have to send that one to Wallis."
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
Wow, there’s already a Truss Derangement Syndrome, a week before she’s even been confirmed in the job.
I think TDS - if it exists outside your fevered imagination - is what Tory MPs are feeling.
The last time a PM was imposed over the wishes of the ruling party MPs was...?
Do we have another "Derangement Syndrome" to add to the list
Will "Derangement Syndrome" replace "gate" in future.
I expect TDSgate...
I've seen the phrase Truss Derangement Syndrome used in at least three completely unconnected areas online in, what, the past 48 hours. If I didn't know better, I'd start thinking that someone was seeding this to get ahead of the impending criticism
Surely TDS better describes her fans?
I just assumed it was to describe her own personality and delusions...
Mr. Boy, a majority might have been reconciled to EU membership either if the Remain campaign had been remotely adequate, or if the political class (primarily Labour) had not reneged upon a promised referendum on Lisbon.
That would have been a golden opportunity to acknowledge the scepticism, go without that treaty, and take heed of the electorate without having to leave the EU.
Instead the political class decided it was fine to just go without a promised vote, which helped lead to the rise of UKIP and the unusual confluence of circumstances that gave us a referendum.
Glad we've parked the NT discussion (apparently). So, anyone want to join me in a discussion on the veracity of the Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster?
Well......
Keir Starmer may come to miss Boris Johnson. Some historians believe that each prime minister is the antithesis of their predecessor, as we always replace overly charismatic leaders with boring ones. The historian David Starkey says all PMs are either bookies or bishops, and that the righteous Starmer has just lost his useful sinner. “Boris is the archetypal cheating bookie,” Starkey tells All Talk.
“Starmer is worse than a bishop: he’s a moderator of the Church of Scotland.” The theory might fall down if Liz Truss wins. It’s hard to see how she could be viewed as a bishop, though she might be more of a nun-entity.
Truss does not easily fall into the category of either charismatic or dull. She is no Brown or Major or Callaghan. But then again, she clearly isn't a Wilson, Thatcher, Blair or Cameron.
If I had to choose an analog for Ms Truss, it would not be a British politician.
I've just cracked up laughing watching Harold Wilson in the Crown, having to repeat to the Queen, the obscene limericks shared by Princess Margaret and Lyndon Johnson.
Nervously, Wilson begins "There once was a woman from Dallas, who enjoyed a dynamite phallus"
Queen, poker-faced, " You've come this f
"She left her vagina, in North Carolina, and her arsehole in Buckingham Palace."
I sort of went off the Crown. Olivia Coleman played it as Olivia Coleman with an accent - perhaps she couldn’t help herself - and I thought the producers wouldn’t be able to help themselves with the Thatcher years and, low and behold, I was right.
It was best done as a period piece in the 50s and 60s and left at that.
Yesterday, at a train station newsagent the "top shelf" consisted of those Heat/Hello type of magazines. Every one of them featured a picture of Harry & Meghan.
The appetite of the British public for all things royal is insatiable.
Yes, but when it’s about the present day it’s contemporary documentary which is different to a historical drama.
I think the trouble with The Crown is that it confuses the two the closer it gets.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
Wow, there’s already a Truss Derangement Syndrome, a week before she’s even been confirmed in the job.
What, there are folk saying she's going to be great ?
There is Barty, I suppose.
Given most people's expectations of her are so low she may positively surprise many people.
My expectation is she will be a disaster.
If she is not quite as bad a disaster as I expect, she will not have exceeded my expectations because she will still be a disaster.
KLM Flight Engineer Schreuder: "Is he not clear, that Pan American?" KLM Captain Veldhuyzen van Zanten: "Oh, yes!"
It's very early days, but if Truss were to follow the advice of the right-wing press, and some of her less-sensible MPs, the Tories would fight the next election on a three-pronged platform of:
Let's save Brexit! Let's defeat Woke! Let's cut taxes!
I suspect such a platform would lead to ignominious defeat as voters contemplated the fall in their living standards and the poor quality of public services. But who knows.
Mr. Al, given what's coming it would be astonishing if the Conservatives had nothing on the cost of living.
Even if this high inflation is brief and then dies back it'll still affect things significantly, especially if rampant energy prices drive large numbers of businesses under.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
Wow, there’s already a Truss Derangement Syndrome, a week before she’s even been confirmed in the job.
Ah, is that the name given to whatever she has? I think she's had it for more than two weeks though, judging from the pork markets and cheese speeches.
Mr. Boy, a majority might have been reconciled to EU membership either if the Remain campaign had been remotely adequate, or if the political class (primarily Labour) had not reneged upon a promised referendum on Lisbon.
Another lame attempt to shift the blame for Brexit to those who didn't want it, campaign for it, or vote for it.
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
This is an interesting take. I think that the moderate pragmatic euro-realist tradition in the old one nation Tory party had negotiated what they thought was a decent compromise - no Schengen or the euro, acting as a brake on federalist tendencies in Brussels etc. The problem was that there was a large minority in the country, rapidly becoming a majority in the party, who simply were not reconciled to EU membership in any form. Add to that a population tired of austerity and wanting to give Cameron a kicking, and a rubbish Remain campaign, and voila, Brexit. In other words, I think they did their best, but it wasn't good enough. What now, though?
Agree. But there were vast mistakes:
Agreement to and implementation of FOM with no brake and no possibility of derogation. This only led a problem once it involved states at very different stages of development from us.
Which led to the obvious nature of the democratic deficit, which has ramifications all over the enterprise. (To the question: For whom do I vote to change the FOM rules in the EU? There was and is no answer).
Which led to the understanding that (a) other states had referendums, including some which were effectively overruled (b) we hadn't.
Both moderate Labour and One Nation Tories should have seen all this coming.
Mr. Boy, a majority might have been reconciled to EU membership either if the Remain campaign had been remotely adequate, or if the political class (primarily Labour) had not reneged upon a promised referendum on Lisbon.
That would have been a golden opportunity to acknowledge the scepticism, go without that treaty, and take heed of the electorate without having to leave the EU.
Instead the political class decided it was fine to just go without a promised vote, which helped lead to the rise of UKIP and the unusual confluence of circumstances that gave us a referendum.
Yes, there could have been a comfortable majority for 'this far and no further' back in 2007. By the time Cameron offered that in 2016 'this far' was already too far for most and no-one believed 'and no further'.
It's very early days, but if Truss were to follow the advice of the right-wing press, and some of her less-sensible MPs, the Tories would fight the next election on a three-pronged platform of:
Let's save Brexit! Let's defeat Woke! Let's cut taxes!
I suspect such a platform would lead to ignominious defeat as voters contemplated the fall in their living standards and the poor quality of public services. But who knows.
"Brexit is in peril" worked as a slogan in 2019. Not universally, but sufficiently.
The medium-term risk for the Conservatives is if the dominant response to "Brexit is in peril" becomes "good". That hasn't happened yet.
Mr. Al, given what's coming it would be astonishing if the Conservatives had nothing on the cost of living.
Even if this high inflation is brief and then dies back it'll still affect things significantly, especially if rampant energy prices drive large numbers of businesses under.
Of course, they will do something on the cost of living, and we won't be short of government largesse. But they won't like doing it, ideologically, because it's corrupting the free market.
So by the time of the next GE, they'll be back on Brexit, culture wars, and cutting taxes. Probably.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
That’s an interesting analysis.
I think (particularly given the characters you’ve mentioned) elitist snobbery played a big part.
They simply wanted to play at the table with their fellows, and didn’t really think it was the business of the electorate to worry their pretty little heads about it.
I can see why @algarkirk is going to vote Red Tory. The two parties have morphed into the same perverse beast. The FAV for next Lab Leader Burnham was visiting the Jock colony this week, behaving in exactly the disdainful, patrician, elitist, snobby fashion so personified by Hurd & Co.
Gordon thinks he’s being clever. It’s the same self-delusion that lead his henchman Jim Murphy sell consultancy services on “how to win elections”. Very drôle.
If you so strongly dislike Starmer now because of his anti-independence stance, why did you initially hold out any hope for him as a leader whatsoever? He didn't exactly hide the fact he was a unionist.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
This is an interesting take. I think that the moderate pragmatic euro-realist tradition in the old one nation Tory party had negotiated what they thought was a decent compromise - no Schengen or the euro, acting as a brake on federalist tendencies in Brussels etc. The problem was that there was a large minority in the country, rapidly becoming a majority in the party, who simply were not reconciled to EU membership in any form. Add to that a population tired of austerity and wanting to give Cameron a kicking, and a rubbish Remain campaign, and voila, Brexit. In other words, I think they did their best, but it wasn't good enough. What now, though?
Vote Red Tory. He just explicitly said so.
That's a slightly slang version of 'Vote for Buttskellism' but you correctly identify that the Overton window is in fact very narrow once two things are accepted: the continuation of the Union with Scotland, England and Wales, and the non reversal of Brexit.
It is only an intuition - opposition never proves anything, but it seems to me that SKS may well be more honest, more competent and less in hock to absurd and corrupt people than the Tories at this moment.
Let's hope that the EFTA EEA compromise will emerge in time. SKS clearly thinks he can't win on such a platform at the moment.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Glad we've parked the NT discussion (apparently). So, anyone want to join me in a discussion on the veracity of the Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster?
Well......
Keir Starmer may come to miss Boris Johnson. Some historians believe that each prime minister is the antithesis of their predecessor, as we always replace overly charismatic leaders with boring ones. The historian David Starkey says all PMs are either bookies or bishops, and that the righteous Starmer has just lost his useful sinner. “Boris is the archetypal cheating bookie,” Starkey tells All Talk.
“Starmer is worse than a bishop: he’s a moderator of the Church of Scotland.” The theory might fall down if Liz Truss wins. It’s hard to see how she could be viewed as a bishop, though she might be more of a nun-entity.
Truss does not easily fall into the category of either charismatic or dull. She is no Brown or Major or Callaghan. But then again, she clearly isn't a Wilson, Thatcher, Blair or Cameron.
If I had to choose an analog for Ms Truss, it would not be a British politician.
I've just cracked up laughing watching Harold Wilson in the Crown, having to repeat to the Queen, the obscene limericks shared by Princess Margaret and Lyndon Johnson.
Nervously, Wilson begins "There once was a woman from Dallas, who enjoyed a dynamite phallus"
Queen, poker-faced, " You've come this f
"She left her vagina, in North Carolina, and her arsehole in Buckingham Palace."
I sort of went off the Crown. Olivia Coleman played it as Olivia Coleman with an accent - perhaps she couldn’t help herself - and I thought the producers wouldn’t be able to help themselves with the Thatcher years and, low and behold, I was right.
It was best done as a period piece in the 50s and 60s and left at that.
Yesterday, at a train station newsagent the "top shelf" consisted of those Heat/Hello type of magazines. Every one of them featured a picture of Harry & Meghan.
The appetite of the British public for all things royal is insatiable.
Yes, but when it’s about the present day it’s contemporary documentary which is different to a historical drama.
I think the trouble with The Crown is that it confuses the two the closer it gets.
No it doesn't. It always and at every stage makes it clear that it is fiction based upon real people.
The trouble is that people get confused and think the makers of the Crown are making some statement/comment on the royal family.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Europeans still have a chance. As Tony said (but didn’t do): Education, Education, Education.
My theory is that bi-and tri-lingualism helping juvenile brains develop is a huge advantage for many Europeans. Monoglot English-speakers’ brains are just made for atrophy.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Some of them can’t name a single country outside the US. 😮
The questioner asked them to name three countries besides the US, but given so many named Canada and/or Mexico, I think they understood the word "besides" differently from the questioner, who was himself too dumb to notice.
As with the AI art, these answers are no doubt curated so we are not shown correct responses. But still,...
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Silly question, because without defining the type of road and what is meant by 'how far' the answer is unknowable.
If (for example) you do 60mph for one hour round a mile long circuit, the correct answer is 'no distance.'
Is your last sentence correct? As you say, it depends on how you define 'far': if you define it as the distance between start and end points, then you are correct. But if you define 'far' as in distance driven, then 60 miles would be correct.
I'd argue the latter is the common usage: when we discuss how 'far' it is to drive between two places, we use the road distance, not the direct as-the-crow-flies distance. Or when I did my coastwalk, I walked about 6,200 miles, not 0 miles because I ended at the place I started.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
That’s an interesting analysis.
I think (particularly given the characters you’ve mentioned) elitist snobbery played a big part.
They simply wanted to play at the table with their fellows, and didn’t really think it was the business of the electorate to worry their pretty little heads about it.
I can see why @algarkirk is going to vote Red Tory. The two parties have morphed into the same perverse beast. The FAV for next Lab Leader Burnham was visiting the Jock colony this week, behaving in exactly the disdainful, patrician, elitist, snobby fashion so personified by Hurd & Co.
Gordon thinks he’s being clever. It’s the same self-delusion that lead his henchman Jim Murphy sell consultancy services on “how to win elections”. Very drôle.
If you so strongly dislike Starmer now because of his anti-independence stance, why did you initially hold out any hope for him as a leader whatsoever? He didn't exactly hide the fact he was a unionist.
One can be a Unionist and be fair, considerate, reasonable, realistic and democratic.
I thought initially that Starmer might be one of those. I was wrong.
Mr. Boy, a majority might have been reconciled to EU membership either if the Remain campaign had been remotely adequate, or if the political class (primarily Labour) had not reneged upon a promised referendum on Lisbon.
That would have been a golden opportunity to acknowledge the scepticism, go without that treaty, and take heed of the electorate without having to leave the EU.
Instead the political class decided it was fine to just go without a promised vote, which helped lead to the rise of UKIP and the unusual confluence of circumstances that gave us a referendum.
Yes, there could have been a comfortable majority for 'this far and no further' back in 2007. By the time Cameron offered that in 2016 'this far' was already too far for most and no-one believed 'and no further'.
There was also the highly-publicised punishment beatings meted out to the Greeks in 2009-10. It confirmed the impression that you can't have a sovereign economic policy when you use a common currency. That Cameron's deal specifically precluded Euro membership did not avert suspicion but rather enhanced it. "They would say that, wouldn't they?"
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
This is an interesting take. I think that the moderate pragmatic euro-realist tradition in the old one nation Tory party had negotiated what they thought was a decent compromise - no Schengen or the euro, acting as a brake on federalist tendencies in Brussels etc. The problem was that there was a large minority in the country, rapidly becoming a majority in the party, who simply were not reconciled to EU membership in any form. Add to that a population tired of austerity and wanting to give Cameron a kicking, and a rubbish Remain campaign, and voila, Brexit. In other words, I think they did their best, but it wasn't good enough. What now, though?
Agree. But there were vast mistakes:
Agreement to and implementation of FOM with no brake and no possibility of derogation. This only led a problem once it involved states at very different stages of development from us.
Which led to the obvious nature of the democratic deficit, which has ramifications all over the enterprise. (To the question: For whom do I vote to change the FOM rules in the EU? There was and is no answer).
Which led to the understanding that (a) other states had referendums, including some which were effectively overruled (b) we hadn't.
Both moderate Labour and One Nation Tories should have seen all this coming.
Whilst I don't disagree with you, I think you are underestimating how difficult it is to change an organisation like the EU in such a very fundamental manner.
"Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept."
But, of course, the EU was not designed for the UK. That was not a bug, it was a feature.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Europeans still have a chance. As Tony said (but didn’t do): Education, Education, Education.
My theory is that bi-and tri-lingualism helping juvenile brains develop is a huge advantage for many Europeans. Monoglot English-speakers’ brains are just made for atrophy.
Which continent has the most actively spoken languages?
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
This is an interesting take. I think that the moderate pragmatic euro-realist tradition in the old one nation Tory party had negotiated what they thought was a decent compromise - no Schengen or the euro, acting as a brake on federalist tendencies in Brussels etc. The problem was that there was a large minority in the country, rapidly becoming a majority in the party, who simply were not reconciled to EU membership in any form. Add to that a population tired of austerity and wanting to give Cameron a kicking, and a rubbish Remain campaign, and voila, Brexit. In other words, I think they did their best, but it wasn't good enough. What now, though?
Vote Red Tory. He just explicitly said so.
That's a slightly slang version of 'Vote for Buttskellism' but you correctly identify that the Overton window is in fact very narrow once two things are accepted: the continuation of the Union with Scotland, England and Wales, and the non reversal of Brexit.
It is only an intuition - opposition never proves anything, but it seems to me that SKS may well be more honest, more competent and less in hock to absurd and corrupt people than the Tories at this moment.
Let's hope that the EFTA EEA compromise will emerge in time. SKS clearly thinks he can't win on such a platform at the moment.
It's taken this leadership campaign to make the leap. I was a member of the Conservative Party from 18 to 45ish, my first wife ran for Parliament twice and I was a Conservative Council Leader in my 20s.
I want Labour to win next time.
And my self justification is that the Labour Party is a relatively conservative party that will enact sensible measured social democratic reform; I won't really agree with any of it, but it will be less damaging than the confused, ideological, incompetent, corrupt, revolutionary brand of Conservativism on offer.
Glad we've parked the NT discussion (apparently). So, anyone want to join me in a discussion on the veracity of the Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster?
Well......
Keir Starmer may come to miss Boris Johnson. Some historians believe that each prime minister is the antithesis of their predecessor, as we always replace overly charismatic leaders with boring ones. The historian David Starkey says all PMs are either bookies or bishops, and that the righteous Starmer has just lost his useful sinner. “Boris is the archetypal cheating bookie,” Starkey tells All Talk.
“Starmer is worse than a bishop: he’s a moderator of the Church of Scotland.” The theory might fall down if Liz Truss wins. It’s hard to see how she could be viewed as a bishop, though she might be more of a nun-entity.
Truss does not easily fall into the category of either charismatic or dull. She is no Brown or Major or Callaghan. But then again, she clearly isn't a Wilson, Thatcher, Blair or Cameron.
If I had to choose an analog for Ms Truss, it would not be a British politician.
I've just cracked up laughing watching Harold Wilson in the Crown, having to repeat to the Queen, the obscene limericks shared by Princess Margaret and Lyndon Johnson.
Nervously, Wilson begins "There once was a woman from Dallas, who enjoyed a dynamite phallus"
Queen, poker-faced, " You've come this f
"She left her vagina, in North Carolina, and her arsehole in Buckingham Palace."
I sort of went off the Crown. Olivia Coleman played it as Olivia Coleman with an accent - perhaps she couldn’t help herself - and I thought the producers wouldn’t be able to help themselves with the Thatcher years and, low and behold, I was right.
It was best done as a period piece in the 50s and 60s and left at that.
Yesterday, at a train station newsagent the "top shelf" consisted of those Heat/Hello type of magazines. Every one of them featured a picture of Harry & Meghan.
The appetite of the British public for all things royal is insatiable.
Yes, but when it’s about the present day it’s contemporary documentary which is different to a historical drama.
I think the trouble with The Crown is that it confuses the two the closer it gets.
No it doesn't. It always and at every stage makes it clear that it is fiction based upon real people.
The trouble is that people get confused and think the makers of the Crown are making some statement/comment on the royal family.
It is fiction.
The mutual misunderstanding between the Royal Family and the Thatchers was well known at the time, as was the (perhaps grudging) admiration that developed over time. The Crown showed both, and probably any complaints are due to viewers' strong prior opinions. The same might be true of the Charles vs Diana story, and in future series with Meghan vs the Royals.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
I thought it was some Star Wars nerdy thing.
Reminiscent of the (real life) confusion between fans of the metal band Slipknot, and the slipknot website, which was for knitters.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim ...
Are they too falling for conspiracy theories ?
They're falling for Leon, if some of his stories are to be believed...
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
I thought it was some Star Wars nerdy thing.
I was thinking community website on one of the more northerly Shetland islands.
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
This is an interesting take. I think that the moderate pragmatic euro-realist tradition in the old one nation Tory party had negotiated what they thought was a decent compromise - no Schengen or the euro, acting as a brake on federalist tendencies in Brussels etc. The problem was that there was a large minority in the country, rapidly becoming a majority in the party, who simply were not reconciled to EU membership in any form. Add to that a population tired of austerity and wanting to give Cameron a kicking, and a rubbish Remain campaign, and voila, Brexit. In other words, I think they did their best, but it wasn't good enough. What now, though?
Vote Red Tory. He just explicitly said so.
That's a slightly slang version of 'Vote for Buttskellism' but you correctly identify that the Overton window is in fact very narrow once two things are accepted: the continuation of the Union with Scotland, England and Wales, and the non reversal of Brexit.
It is only an intuition - opposition never proves anything, but it seems to me that SKS may well be more honest, more competent and less in hock to absurd and corrupt people than the Tories at this moment.
Let's hope that the EFTA EEA compromise will emerge in time. SKS clearly thinks he can't win on such a platform at the moment.
It's taken this leadership campaign to make the leap. I was a member of the Conservative Party from 18 to 45ish, my first wife ran for Parliament twice and I was a Conservative Council Leader in my 20s.
I want Labour to win next time.
And my self justification is that the Labour Party is a relatively conservative party that will enact sensible measured social democratic reform; I won't really agree with any of it, but it will be less damaging than the confused, ideological, incompetent, corrupt, revolutionary brand of Conservativism on offer.
Liked not becasue of partisanism but because of the interest of the statement.
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
This is an interesting take. I think that the moderate pragmatic euro-realist tradition in the old one nation Tory party had negotiated what they thought was a decent compromise - no Schengen or the euro, acting as a brake on federalist tendencies in Brussels etc. The problem was that there was a large minority in the country, rapidly becoming a majority in the party, who simply were not reconciled to EU membership in any form. Add to that a population tired of austerity and wanting to give Cameron a kicking, and a rubbish Remain campaign, and voila, Brexit. In other words, I think they did their best, but it wasn't good enough. What now, though?
Agree. But there were vast mistakes:
Agreement to and implementation of FOM with no brake and no possibility of derogation. This only led a problem once it involved states at very different stages of development from us.
Which led to the obvious nature of the democratic deficit, which has ramifications all over the enterprise. (To the question: For whom do I vote to change the FOM rules in the EU? There was and is no answer).
Which led to the understanding that (a) other states had referendums, including some which were effectively overruled (b) we hadn't.
Both moderate Labour and One Nation Tories should have seen all this coming.
Whilst I don't disagree with you, I think you are underestimating how difficult it is to change an organisation like the EU in such a very fundamental manner.
"Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept."
But, of course, the EU was not designed for the UK. That was not a bug, it was a feature.
The big error was not being a founding member. Then the French kept vetoing membership. By the time England and her satellite states were allowed to join, it was far too late. The die had been cast.
England will never fit in. Scotland and Wales will be perfect fits.
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them? The first year of Geography should be “learn all the countries, their capitals, the main rivers, the mountain ranges, the deserts, the oceans and seas, the historic roads and trade routes”. The BASICS
Thus equipping them with a mental map of the world that will last for a lifetime. Like basic arithmetic. How come we STILL aren’t doing this?
Do the same for cooking, adding up, shopping, banking, travelling, voting. BASIC LIFE SKILLS
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
This is an interesting take. I think that the moderate pragmatic euro-realist tradition in the old one nation Tory party had negotiated what they thought was a decent compromise - no Schengen or the euro, acting as a brake on federalist tendencies in Brussels etc. The problem was that there was a large minority in the country, rapidly becoming a majority in the party, who simply were not reconciled to EU membership in any form. Add to that a population tired of austerity and wanting to give Cameron a kicking, and a rubbish Remain campaign, and voila, Brexit. In other words, I think they did their best, but it wasn't good enough. What now, though?
Vote Red Tory. He just explicitly said so.
That's a slightly slang version of 'Vote for Buttskellism' but you correctly identify that the Overton window is in fact very narrow once two things are accepted: the continuation of the Union with Scotland, England and Wales, and the non reversal of Brexit.
It is only an intuition - opposition never proves anything, but it seems to me that SKS may well be more honest, more competent and less in hock to absurd and corrupt people than the Tories at this moment.
Let's hope that the EFTA EEA compromise will emerge in time. SKS clearly thinks he can't win on such a platform at the moment.
It's taken this leadership campaign to make the leap. I was a member of the Conservative Party from 18 to 45ish, my first wife ran for Parliament twice and I was a Conservative Council Leader in my 20s.
I want Labour to win next time.
And my self justification is that the Labour Party is a relatively conservative party that will enact sensible measured social democratic reform; I won't really agree with any of it, but it will be less damaging than the confused, ideological, incompetent, corrupt, revolutionary brand of Conservativism on offer.
That's an interesting comment: but have you considered the Lib Dems? (Although that might depend on which constituency you are in...)
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
This is an interesting take. I think that the moderate pragmatic euro-realist tradition in the old one nation Tory party had negotiated what they thought was a decent compromise - no Schengen or the euro, acting as a brake on federalist tendencies in Brussels etc. The problem was that there was a large minority in the country, rapidly becoming a majority in the party, who simply were not reconciled to EU membership in any form. Add to that a population tired of austerity and wanting to give Cameron a kicking, and a rubbish Remain campaign, and voila, Brexit. In other words, I think they did their best, but it wasn't good enough. What now, though?
Agree. But there were vast mistakes:
Agreement to and implementation of FOM with no brake and no possibility of derogation. This only led a problem once it involved states at very different stages of development from us.
Which led to the obvious nature of the democratic deficit, which has ramifications all over the enterprise. (To the question: For whom do I vote to change the FOM rules in the EU? There was and is no answer).
Which led to the understanding that (a) other states had referendums, including some which were effectively overruled (b) we hadn't.
Both moderate Labour and One Nation Tories should have seen all this coming.
Whilst I don't disagree with you, I think you are underestimating how difficult it is to change an organisation like the EU in such a very fundamental manner.
"Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept."
But, of course, the EU was not designed for the UK. That was not a bug, it was a feature.
The trouble was neither Remainers nor Brexiteers knew anything about the EU and believed the conspiracy theories about Germany running the show. Hence Cameron trying to negotiate with Angela Merkel who told him to try Brussels instead, and the Leavers expecting trade to be saved by German car manufacturers.
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
This is an interesting take. I think that the moderate pragmatic euro-realist tradition in the old one nation Tory party had negotiated what they thought was a decent compromise - no Schengen or the euro, acting as a brake on federalist tendencies in Brussels etc. The problem was that there was a large minority in the country, rapidly becoming a majority in the party, who simply were not reconciled to EU membership in any form. Add to that a population tired of austerity and wanting to give Cameron a kicking, and a rubbish Remain campaign, and voila, Brexit. In other words, I think they did their best, but it wasn't good enough. What now, though?
Agree. But there were vast mistakes:
Agreement to and implementation of FOM with no brake and no possibility of derogation. This only led a problem once it involved states at very different stages of development from us.
Which led to the obvious nature of the democratic deficit, which has ramifications all over the enterprise. (To the question: For whom do I vote to change the FOM rules in the EU? There was and is no answer).
Which led to the understanding that (a) other states had referendums, including some which were effectively overruled (b) we hadn't.
Both moderate Labour and One Nation Tories should have seen all this coming.
Whilst I don't disagree with you, I think you are underestimating how difficult it is to change an organisation like the EU in such a very fundamental manner.
"Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept."
But, of course, the EU was not designed for the UK. That was not a bug, it was a feature.
Yes. That is why long term statecraft matters.
If the way things are, as you suggest, were necessarily unavoidable (democratic deficit, ignoring referendums, FOM without derogation) then Brexit was inevitable at some point. The only question was: When?
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
That’s an interesting analysis.
I think (particularly given the characters you’ve mentioned) elitist snobbery played a big part.
They simply wanted to play at the table with their fellows, and didn’t really think it was the business of the electorate to worry their pretty little heads about it.
I can see why @algarkirk is going to vote Red Tory. The two parties have morphed into the same perverse beast. The FAV for next Lab Leader Burnham was visiting the Jock colony this week, behaving in exactly the disdainful, patrician, elitist, snobby fashion so personified by Hurd & Co.
Gordon thinks he’s being clever. It’s the same self-delusion that lead his henchman Jim Murphy sell consultancy services on “how to win elections”. Very drôle.
Even HYUFD might go Lab if SKS carries on with the khaki malarkey.
Glad we've parked the NT discussion (apparently). So, anyone want to join me in a discussion on the veracity of the Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster?
Well......
Keir Starmer may come to miss Boris Johnson. Some historians believe that each prime minister is the antithesis of their predecessor, as we always replace overly charismatic leaders with boring ones. The historian David Starkey says all PMs are either bookies or bishops, and that the righteous Starmer has just lost his useful sinner. “Boris is the archetypal cheating bookie,” Starkey tells All Talk.
“Starmer is worse than a bishop: he’s a moderator of the Church of Scotland.” The theory might fall down if Liz Truss wins. It’s hard to see how she could be viewed as a bishop, though she might be more of a nun-entity.
Truss does not easily fall into the category of either charismatic or dull. She is no Brown or Major or Callaghan. But then again, she clearly isn't a Wilson, Thatcher, Blair or Cameron.
If I had to choose an analog for Ms Truss, it would not be a British politician.
I've just cracked up laughing watching Harold Wilson in the Crown, having to repeat to the Queen, the obscene limericks shared by Princess Margaret and Lyndon Johnson.
Nervously, Wilson begins "There once was a woman from Dallas, who enjoyed a dynamite phallus"
Queen, poker-faced, " You've come this f
"She left her vagina, in North Carolina, and her arsehole in Buckingham Palace."
I sort of went off the Crown. Olivia Coleman played it as Olivia Coleman with an accent - perhaps she couldn’t help herself - and I thought the producers wouldn’t be able to help themselves with the Thatcher years and, low and behold, I was right.
It was best done as a period piece in the 50s and 60s and left at that.
Yesterday, at a train station newsagent the "top shelf" consisted of those Heat/Hello type of magazines. Every one of them featured a picture of Harry & Meghan.
The appetite of the British public for all things royal is insatiable.
Yes, but when it’s about the present day it’s contemporary documentary which is different to a historical drama.
I think the trouble with The Crown is that it confuses the two the closer it gets.
No it doesn't. It always and at every stage makes it clear that it is fiction based upon real people.
The trouble is that people get confused and think the makers of the Crown are making some statement/comment on the royal family.
It is fiction.
Yes. It's really tempting to think that the makers have some special access and are able to lift the lid on what really happened, but most of it is made up. It's just that we can more easily blur the boundaries with the more historical bits because we have no experience to compare it with.
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them?
I blame the parents.
Perhaps
But she is now getting a brisk, cogent and concise education in all things practical, historical, geographical, artistical. I am making it my duty
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Silly question, because without defining the type of road and what is meant by 'how far' the answer is unknowable.
If (for example) you do 60mph for one hour round a mile long circuit, the correct answer is 'no distance.'
I did one of those motorway awareness courses just recently, and one of the questions they ask you to guess is, if someone who normally drives at 80mph and their journey takes them an hour, how much longer will it take it they drive at 70mph? The group all guessed various numbers of minutes but the official course answer is apparently 86 seconds. How they arrived at that answer, I do not know.
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
That’s an interesting analysis.
I think (particularly given the characters you’ve mentioned) elitist snobbery played a big part.
They simply wanted to play at the table with their fellows, and didn’t really think it was the business of the electorate to worry their pretty little heads about it.
I can see why @algarkirk is going to vote Red Tory. The two parties have morphed into the same perverse beast. The FAV for next Lab Leader Burnham was visiting the Jock colony this week, behaving in exactly the disdainful, patrician, elitist, snobby fashion so personified by Hurd & Co.
Gordon thinks he’s being clever. It’s the same self-delusion that lead his henchman Jim Murphy sell consultancy services on “how to win elections”. Very drôle.
Even HYUFD might go Lab if SKS carries on with the khaki malarkey.
More Cosplay photo stunts. Does this stuff really work with voters?
"Thousands of you took to our comments section to air your thoughts on the matter and, while many readers expressed sympathy with the young, there was also outrage – outrage that having to endure food rationing, ballooning inflation, power shortages and myriad financial crashes in previous decades should be seen as “having it easy”. Not to mention the decades of fiscal responsibility, careful saving and hard graft that have translated into comfortable retirements. Advice was freely and generously given on how the young might face down economic hardship. Here is what you had to say... "
"When we were young, we paid for the pensions of the old and retired. Now it’s for the young to pay for us and shut up complaining.”
..."Modern generations, due to, no matter the cost, wanting everything now, have put themselves dangerously in debt and when an unexpected financial crisis happens, they are left all at sea, unable to pay the essential bills first. I am lucky to not be seriously affected by next year’s enormous fuel bills, but why should my savings be raided and my pension frozen to subsidise the fiscally incompetent?”
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
This is an interesting take. I think that the moderate pragmatic euro-realist tradition in the old one nation Tory party had negotiated what they thought was a decent compromise - no Schengen or the euro, acting as a brake on federalist tendencies in Brussels etc. The problem was that there was a large minority in the country, rapidly becoming a majority in the party, who simply were not reconciled to EU membership in any form. Add to that a population tired of austerity and wanting to give Cameron a kicking, and a rubbish Remain campaign, and voila, Brexit. In other words, I think they did their best, but it wasn't good enough. What now, though?
Vote Red Tory. He just explicitly said so.
That's a slightly slang version of 'Vote for Buttskellism' but you correctly identify that the Overton window is in fact very narrow once two things are accepted: the continuation of the Union with Scotland, England and Wales, and the non reversal of Brexit.
It is only an intuition - opposition never proves anything, but it seems to me that SKS may well be more honest, more competent and less in hock to absurd and corrupt people than the Tories at this moment.
Let's hope that the EFTA EEA compromise will emerge in time. SKS clearly thinks he can't win on such a platform at the moment.
It's taken this leadership campaign to make the leap. I was a member of the Conservative Party from 18 to 45ish, my first wife ran for Parliament twice and I was a Conservative Council Leader in my 20s.
I want Labour to win next time.
And my self justification is that the Labour Party is a relatively conservative party that will enact sensible measured social democratic reform; I won't really agree with any of it, but it will be less damaging than the confused, ideological, incompetent, corrupt, revolutionary brand of Conservativism on offer.
It's perfectly reasonable for a long time Conservative to want the party to get a good kicking at the next election and (hopefully) come to its senses. I imagine many long term Labour supporters had similar feelings in 2017 and 2019 - although dampened in 2019 by the nature of the alternative government.
As a long term LD sympathiser (although only a member for a few years in early-mid 2000s) I was quite happy with Clegg getting a kicking in 2015 over the tuition fees debacle. Although that looks pretty minor now compared to what came next for Lab and Con.
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them? The first year of Geography should be “learn all the countries, their capitals, the main rivers, the mountain ranges, the deserts, the oceans and seas, the historic roads and trade routes”. The BASICS
Thus equipping them with a mental map of the world that will last for a lifetime. Like basic arithmetic. How come we STILL aren’t doing this?
Do the same for cooking, adding up, shopping, banking, travelling, voting. BASIC LIFE SKILLS
My niece (a Scot) was studying comparative religion at university. I asked her for the date of the Scottish Reformation. Not only did she not provide a date, she didn’t have the faintest idea what the Scottish Reformation was. What on earth was Edinburgh University (an institution deeply involved in said events) teaching those young adults?
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them?
I blame the parents.
Perhaps
But she is now getting a brisk, cogent and concise education in all things practical, historical, geographical, artistical. I am making it my duty
Let us know how she responds to the alien visitation segment.
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
That’s an interesting analysis.
I think (particularly given the characters you’ve mentioned) elitist snobbery played a big part.
They simply wanted to play at the table with their fellows, and didn’t really think it was the business of the electorate to worry their pretty little heads about it.
I can see why @algarkirk is going to vote Red Tory. The two parties have morphed into the same perverse beast. The FAV for next Lab Leader Burnham was visiting the Jock colony this week, behaving in exactly the disdainful, patrician, elitist, snobby fashion so personified by Hurd & Co.
Gordon thinks he’s being clever. It’s the same self-delusion that lead his henchman Jim Murphy sell consultancy services on “how to win elections”. Very drôle.
Even HYUFD might go Lab if SKS carries on with the khaki malarkey.
More Cosplay photo stunts. Does this stuff really work with voters?
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them? The first year of Geography should be “learn all the countries, their capitals, the main rivers, the mountain ranges, the deserts, the oceans and seas, the historic roads and trade routes”. The BASICS
Thus equipping them with a mental map of the world that will last for a lifetime. Like basic arithmetic. How come we STILL aren’t doing this?
Do the same for cooking, adding up, shopping, banking, travelling, voting. BASIC LIFE SKILLS
My niece (a Scot) was studying comparative religion at university. I asked her for the date of the Scottish Reformation. Not only did she not provide a date, she didn’t have the faintest idea what the Scottish Reformation was. What on earth was Edinburgh University (an institution deeply involved in said events) teaching those young adults?
History was easier when you were at school because there wasn't so much of it.
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them? The first year of Geography should be “learn all the countries, their capitals, the main rivers, the mountain ranges, the deserts, the oceans and seas, the historic roads and trade routes”. The BASICS
Thus equipping them with a mental map of the world that will last for a lifetime. Like basic arithmetic. How come we STILL aren’t doing this?
Do the same for cooking, adding up, shopping, banking, travelling, voting. BASIC LIFE SKILLS
We are all dumb in some areas. Even you.
In the case of geography: my son is eight, and in first year he learnt all the continents. More recently, he has done the rain cycle. I'd say that's of more immediate use than learning ponderous lists without context. Knowing about how the main types of rock are formed (sedimentary, metamorphic and igneous) is of much ore use and interest to him at the moment than knowing the capital of Brazil is Brasília.
My favourite anecdote on this was from NASA. In about 2012, a guy was tasked with writing the official history of the Shuttle program. He got a team together and they wrote it. At a later stage, he got some interns to read through it and comment, the idea being to catch concepts and terms that had not been adequately explained in the text.
These interns were bright and knowledgeable. Yet one asked: "What is the Cold War' ?
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Silly question, because without defining the type of road and what is meant by 'how far' the answer is unknowable.
If (for example) you do 60mph for one hour round a mile long circuit, the correct answer is 'no distance.'
I did one of those motorway awareness courses just recently, and one of the questions they ask you to guess is, if someone who normally drives at 80mph and their journey takes them an hour, how much longer will it take it they drive at 70mph? The group all guessed various numbers of minutes but the official course answer is apparently 86 seconds. How they arrived at that answer, I do not know.
Hmm. Truss Interview level. 80 mph x 1 h = 80 miles. 80mi/70mph takes 8/7 hours, so the additional time is 1/7 x 60 minutes = 8 and 4/7 minutes. Which is almost exactly 8.57 mins, rounded up making 8.6 mins. Looks as if someome has lost a decimal point and then assumed it was seconds ...
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
That’s an interesting analysis.
I think (particularly given the characters you’ve mentioned) elitist snobbery played a big part.
They simply wanted to play at the table with their fellows, and didn’t really think it was the business of the electorate to worry their pretty little heads about it.
I can see why @algarkirk is going to vote Red Tory. The two parties have morphed into the same perverse beast. The FAV for next Lab Leader Burnham was visiting the Jock colony this week, behaving in exactly the disdainful, patrician, elitist, snobby fashion so personified by Hurd & Co.
Gordon thinks he’s being clever. It’s the same self-delusion that lead his henchman Jim Murphy sell consultancy services on “how to win elections”. Very drôle.
Even HYUFD might go Lab if SKS carries on with the khaki malarkey.
Not long now til Keir does the full Maggie cosplay too. It’ll end in tears.
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them? The first year of Geography should be “learn all the countries, their capitals, the main rivers, the mountain ranges, the deserts, the oceans and seas, the historic roads and trade routes”. The BASICS
Thus equipping them with a mental map of the world that will last for a lifetime. Like basic arithmetic. How come we STILL aren’t doing this?
Do the same for cooking, adding up, shopping, banking, travelling, voting. BASIC LIFE SKILLS
This is a recurring (and timeless) complaint of the old about the young, that everything is in decline, they don't know anything, that the education system is failing, etc etc.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Silly question, because without defining the type of road and what is meant by 'how far' the answer is unknowable.
If (for example) you do 60mph for one hour round a mile long circuit, the correct answer is 'no distance.'
I did one of those motorway awareness courses just recently, and one of the questions they ask you to guess is, if someone who normally drives at 80mph and their journey takes them an hour, how much longer will it take it they drive at 70mph? The group all guessed various numbers of minutes but the official course answer is apparently 86 seconds. How they arrived at that answer, I do not know.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Europeans still have a chance. As Tony said (but didn’t do): Education, Education, Education.
My theory is that bi-and tri-lingualism helping juvenile brains develop is a huge advantage for many Europeans. Monoglot English-speakers’ brains are just made for atrophy.
Which continent has the most actively spoken languages?
Well, Georgian and Italian are quite actively spoken, so maybe Europe?
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them? The first year of Geography should be “learn all the countries, their capitals, the main rivers, the mountain ranges, the deserts, the oceans and seas, the historic roads and trade routes”. The BASICS
Thus equipping them with a mental map of the world that will last for a lifetime. Like basic arithmetic. How come we STILL aren’t doing this?
Do the same for cooking, adding up, shopping, banking, travelling, voting. BASIC LIFE SKILLS
We are all dumb in some areas. Even you.
In the case of geography: my son is eight, and in first year he learnt all the continents. More recently, he has done the rain cycle. I'd say that's of more immediate use than learning ponderous lists without context. Knowing about how the main types of rock are formed (sedimentary, metamorphic and igneous) is of much ore use and interest to him at the moment than knowing the capital of Brazil is Brasília.
My favourite anecdote on this was from NASA. In about 2012, a guy was tasked with writing the official history of the Shuttle program. He got a team together and they wrote it. At a later stage, he got some interns to read through it and comment, the idea being to catch concepts and terms that had not been adequately explained in the text.
These interns were bright and knowledgeable. Yet one asked: "What is the Cold War' ?
Mr. Jessop, for me, knowledge of the Soviet Union was a blind spot. Reading Stalin: the Court of the Red Tsar, by Simon Sebag Montefiore, was an eye opener.
Also, of course, the Eastern Roman Empire. But that's a blind spot for nearly everyone...
Hope all PBers with children or grandchildren sitting GCSEs got the results they were hoping for. Our daughter did well, a big relief after all the disruption of the last few years. Now the slog towards A levels begins!
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
This is an interesting take. I think that the moderate pragmatic euro-realist tradition in the old one nation Tory party had negotiated what they thought was a decent compromise - no Schengen or the euro, acting as a brake on federalist tendencies in Brussels etc. The problem was that there was a large minority in the country, rapidly becoming a majority in the party, who simply were not reconciled to EU membership in any form. Add to that a population tired of austerity and wanting to give Cameron a kicking, and a rubbish Remain campaign, and voila, Brexit. In other words, I think they did their best, but it wasn't good enough. What now, though?
Vote Red Tory. He just explicitly said so.
That's a slightly slang version of 'Vote for Buttskellism' but you correctly identify that the Overton window is in fact very narrow once two things are accepted: the continuation of the Union with Scotland, England and Wales, and the non reversal of Brexit.
It is only an intuition - opposition never proves anything, but it seems to me that SKS may well be more honest, more competent and less in hock to absurd and corrupt people than the Tories at this moment.
Let's hope that the EFTA EEA compromise will emerge in time. SKS clearly thinks he can't win on such a platform at the moment.
It's taken this leadership campaign to make the leap. I was a member of the Conservative Party from 18 to 45ish, my first wife ran for Parliament twice and I was a Conservative Council Leader in my 20s.
I want Labour to win next time.
And my self justification is that the Labour Party is a relatively conservative party that will enact sensible measured social democratic reform; I won't really agree with any of it, but it will be less damaging than the confused, ideological, incompetent, corrupt, revolutionary brand of Conservativism on offer.
That's an interesting comment: but have you considered the Lib Dems? (Although that might depend on which constituency you are in...)
Oh I'll vote Lib Dem. I live in a super safe Tory seat (Arundel and South Downs). But I know they won't be in government - so I want Labour to win.
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them? The first year of Geography should be “learn all the countries, their capitals, the main rivers, the mountain ranges, the deserts, the oceans and seas, the historic roads and trade routes”. The BASICS
Thus equipping them with a mental map of the world that will last for a lifetime. Like basic arithmetic. How come we STILL aren’t doing this?
Do the same for cooking, adding up, shopping, banking, travelling, voting. BASIC LIFE SKILLS
My niece (a Scot) was studying comparative religion at university. I asked her for the date of the Scottish Reformation. Not only did she not provide a date, she didn’t have the faintest idea what the Scottish Reformation was. What on earth was Edinburgh University (an institution deeply involved in said events) teaching those young adults?
I know. It’s shocking
And unless they are deeply personally curious - and read history, science and politics etc etc, as young adults - they will never learn this stuff. And thus they will never learn the CONTEXT of everything around them. Why the world, and human society, is the way it is. And that is so important for a human life. Otherwise the world is just something that randomly happened and something that is done to you
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them? The first year of Geography should be “learn all the countries, their capitals, the main rivers, the mountain ranges, the deserts, the oceans and seas, the historic roads and trade routes”. The BASICS
Thus equipping them with a mental map of the world that will last for a lifetime. Like basic arithmetic. How come we STILL aren’t doing this?
Do the same for cooking, adding up, shopping, banking, travelling, voting. BASIC LIFE SKILLS
My niece (a Scot) was studying comparative religion at university. I asked her for the date of the Scottish Reformation. Not only did she not provide a date, she didn’t have the faintest idea what the Scottish Reformation was. What on earth was Edinburgh University (an institution deeply involved in said events) teaching those young adults?
Hmm, looks as if she might simply be picking New Agery and Buddhism or whatever. A smörgåsbord type course (tho' not the sandwich with work kind). No obvious core.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
Wow, there’s already a Truss Derangement Syndrome, a week before she’s even been confirmed in the job.
I think TDS - if it exists outside your fevered imagination - is what Tory MPs are feeling.
The last time a PM was imposed over the wishes of the ruling party MPs was...?
As it stands Truss has more declared MP support than Sunak does.
In the final round of the MP voting Mordaunt was eliminated, but of course her votes were never redistributed. Mordaunt is very firmly on Team Truss not Team Sunak, as are more of her own supporters that have subsequently declared a side, so based on what MPs are saying they wish, if there were a final MP-only round of voting now, then Truss would win and Sunak would lose.
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
That’s an interesting analysis.
I think (particularly given the characters you’ve mentioned) elitist snobbery played a big part.
They simply wanted to play at the table with their fellows, and didn’t really think it was the business of the electorate to worry their pretty little heads about it.
I can see why @algarkirk is going to vote Red Tory. The two parties have morphed into the same perverse beast. The FAV for next Lab Leader Burnham was visiting the Jock colony this week, behaving in exactly the disdainful, patrician, elitist, snobby fashion so personified by Hurd & Co.
Gordon thinks he’s being clever. It’s the same self-delusion that lead his henchman Jim Murphy sell consultancy services on “how to win elections”. Very drôle.
Even HYUFD might go Lab if SKS carries on with the khaki malarkey.
Looking forward to seeing him at my next airsoft game.
Mr. Jessop, for me, knowledge of the Soviet Union was a blind spot. Reading Stalin: the Court of the Red Tsar, by Simon Sebag Montefiore, was an eye opener.
Also, of course, the Eastern Roman Empire. But that's a blind spot for nearly everyone...
For me too till I discovered Alfred Duggan novels as a student.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Silly question, because without defining the type of road and what is meant by 'how far' the answer is unknowable.
If (for example) you do 60mph for one hour round a mile long circuit, the correct answer is 'no distance.'
I did one of those motorway awareness courses just recently, and one of the questions they ask you to guess is, if someone who normally drives at 80mph and their journey takes them an hour, how much longer will it take it they drive at 70mph? The group all guessed various numbers of minutes but the official course answer is apparently 86 seconds. How they arrived at that answer, I do not know.
They normally drive at 80mph but half the journey is quite likely roadworks with 50 mph average speed cameras, and half of the rest has someone overtaking no-one but sitting in the outside lane at 65mph. 86 seconds sounds about right.
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them? The first year of Geography should be “learn all the countries, their capitals, the main rivers, the mountain ranges, the deserts, the oceans and seas, the historic roads and trade routes”. The BASICS
Thus equipping them with a mental map of the world that will last for a lifetime. Like basic arithmetic. How come we STILL aren’t doing this?
Do the same for cooking, adding up, shopping, banking, travelling, voting. BASIC LIFE SKILLS
I did geography GCE in the 1970s. We didn’t get taught the names of rivers, seas, cities etc. It was all ox bow rivers, population densities etc, if I remember correctly.
What you’re largely talking about is general knowledge. I got that by reading books of facts, dipping in and out of encyclopaedias etc. In other words, books at home and in libraries. I did that on rainy days when I couldn’t go out with my mates on our bikes or to play football etc. There were no mobile phones or computers back then.
That’s a long way of saying you can’t blame the education system. It’s a much wider issue - and one that parents absolutely need to be aware of and do something about if they believe it’s important for their kids to know this stuff (which it is).
I do agree on mental arithmetic, though. That should be part if the curriculum. We can’t leave it all to calculators.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Silly question, because without defining the type of road and what is meant by 'how far' the answer is unknowable.
If (for example) you do 60mph for one hour round a mile long circuit, the correct answer is 'no distance.'
I did one of those motorway awareness courses just recently, and one of the questions they ask you to guess is, if someone who normally drives at 80mph and their journey takes them an hour, how much longer will it take it they drive at 70mph? The group all guessed various numbers of minutes but the official course answer is apparently 86 seconds. How they arrived at that answer, I do not know.
Eh ? I make it 8 minutes 34 seconds.
This is mental maths I do every time I make a journey. I would imagine the reason is that if your journey of an hour - say, from suburban Stockport to somewhere on the Wirral - almost half the time will be spent getting to and from the motorway at either end. Which you can only do at the speed of the road, not at 80mph. Even when you think you are making good progress, your average speed will be surprisingly low, and whether you go at 70 or 80 on the motorway has surprisingly little impact on overall journey time. That said, I think you need to be making some particularly strong assumptions about the journey to get this all the way down to 86 seconds.
How many times do you need to be told the geology round here doesn't allow cheap fracking - so it's not going to solve anything.
Something else about Liz Truss that I think people are missing, which is that her support for their favoured policies in the hustings is strictly qualified. On fracking, although she does not rule it out, she says leave it to local communities. On grammar schools, Truss says that she has no objection to grammars but, hey, free schools are good and the real problems arise in primary not secondary education, with 11-year-olds not being able to read or do sums.
A lot of people may be disappointed in a fortnight's time, as many in Labour were when Starmer appeared not to do what they thought he'd said on the tin.
Truss has so many big problems I wonder if her team know which to deny first? Not supported by most Tory MPs Cost of Living catastrophe where the solutions are politically or economically untenable A coterie of the wort members of Johnson's government plus a choice of 2019 mince to promote
If they seriously try and market themselves as a "new" government I expect the response will get pretty brutal. No government would get through this winter without scars. None. But across Europe governments are showing voters they understand the crisis, they are prepared to do whatever it takes, and are putting lots of money into it.
The only money Trussteam are putting up is new debt to give themselves a tax cut, and opening a credit line in the Fetlife store.
*googles Fetlife* ... the things one learns on PB. "FetLife is the Social Network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky Community. Like Facebook, but run by kinksters like you and me. We think it is more fun that way."
And there was me thinking it was a harmless website for lovers of feta cheese...
Indeed. The expertise and knowledge of of PBers is impressive, from moths downward.
Intelligent people are often incredibly thick in the real world. Any truly clever person wouldn’t come near an obscure querulous blog.
And young people are a bit dim
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
Silly question, because without defining the type of road and what is meant by 'how far' the answer is unknowable.
If (for example) you do 60mph for one hour round a mile long circuit, the correct answer is 'no distance.'
I did one of those motorway awareness courses just recently, and one of the questions they ask you to guess is, if someone who normally drives at 80mph and their journey takes them an hour, how much longer will it take it they drive at 70mph? The group all guessed various numbers of minutes but the official course answer is apparently 86 seconds. How they arrived at that answer, I do not know.
Hmm. Truss Interview level. 80 mph x 1 h = 80 miles. 80mi/70mph takes 8/7 hours, so the additional time is 1/7 x 60 minutes = 8 and 4/7 minutes. Which is almost exactly 8.57 mins, rounded up making 8.6 mins. Looks as if someome has lost a decimal point and then assumed it was seconds ...
It is outside the nature of any PBer not to want to correct a dim official who makes a mistake. On speed awareness courses and especially anything to do with safeguarding training it is better practice to agree that they are right and you are wrong. It gets you home earlier and you pass.
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them? The first year of Geography should be “learn all the countries, their capitals, the main rivers, the mountain ranges, the deserts, the oceans and seas, the historic roads and trade routes”. The BASICS
Thus equipping them with a mental map of the world that will last for a lifetime. Like basic arithmetic. How come we STILL aren’t doing this?
Do the same for cooking, adding up, shopping, banking, travelling, voting. BASIC LIFE SKILLS
My niece (a Scot) was studying comparative religion at university. I asked her for the date of the Scottish Reformation. Not only did she not provide a date, she didn’t have the faintest idea what the Scottish Reformation was. What on earth was Edinburgh University (an institution deeply involved in said events) teaching those young adults?
I know. It’s shocking
And unless they are deeply personally curious - and read history, science and politics etc etc, as young adults - they will never learn this stuff. And thus they will never learn the CONTEXT of everything around them. Why the world, and human society, is the way it is. And that is so important for a human life. Otherwise the world is just something that randomly happened and something that is done to you
You become passive. You have no agency
All teaching is selective in the sense that not everything can be taught. So curriculums choose one thing over another.
My O Level Geography was based around the coal and steel industries in the UK, so largely made redundant by modern economic history.
Just read that Matthew Parris piece in The Times. Jeepers creepers.
- “She’s crackers. It isn’t going to work.”
Loving this blue on blue action.
Blue on blue action has been the norm for decades.
Isn't Parris a Lib Dem now?
I don't know if Parris is in a party, but it is salutary to think that not long ago he was the incarnation of thoughtful mainstream one nation Toryism.
I am by instinct a one nation Tory - Parris, Hurd, Heseltine and Clarke are our representatives.
Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept. This should have been a top exercise in moderate statecraft and democratic accountability.
This problem has driven Parris slightly deranged because of how much denial he has to engage in, and for now destroyed the heart of the Tory party.
SKS is the nearest there is to this tradition available, though not very near. He gets my vote.
That’s an interesting analysis.
I think (particularly given the characters you’ve mentioned) elitist snobbery played a big part.
They simply wanted to play at the table with their fellows, and didn’t really think it was the business of the electorate to worry their pretty little heads about it.
I can see why @algarkirk is going to vote Red Tory. The two parties have morphed into the same perverse beast. The FAV for next Lab Leader Burnham was visiting the Jock colony this week, behaving in exactly the disdainful, patrician, elitist, snobby fashion so personified by Hurd & Co.
Gordon thinks he’s being clever. It’s the same self-delusion that lead his henchman Jim Murphy sell consultancy services on “how to win elections”. Very drôle.
Even HYUFD might go Lab if SKS carries on with the khaki malarkey.
More Cosplay photo stunts. Does this stuff really work with voters?
It probably does work a bit. Voters will absorb the message - Labour, not soft on defence. It doesn't work if you look a prat in the process but SKS looks okay in this picture so job done.
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them? The first year of Geography should be “learn all the countries, their capitals, the main rivers, the mountain ranges, the deserts, the oceans and seas, the historic roads and trade routes”. The BASICS
Thus equipping them with a mental map of the world that will last for a lifetime. Like basic arithmetic. How come we STILL aren’t doing this?
Do the same for cooking, adding up, shopping, banking, travelling, voting. BASIC LIFE SKILLS
My niece (a Scot) was studying comparative religion at university. I asked her for the date of the Scottish Reformation. Not only did she not provide a date, she didn’t have the faintest idea what the Scottish Reformation was. What on earth was Edinburgh University (an institution deeply involved in said events) teaching those young adults?
I know. It’s shocking
And unless they are deeply personally curious - and read history, science and politics etc etc, as young adults - they will never learn this stuff. And thus they will never learn the CONTEXT of everything around them. Why the world, and human society, is the way it is. And that is so important for a human life. Otherwise the world is just something that randomly happened and something that is done to you
You become passive. You have no agency
All teaching is selective in the sense that not everything can be taught. So curriculums choose one thing over another.
My O Level Geography was based around the coal and steel industries in the UK, so largely made redundant by modern economic history.
Yeah, would be moved to the history curriculum now.
Comments
Gordon thinks he’s being clever. It’s the same self-delusion that lead his henchman Jim Murphy sell consultancy services on “how to win elections”. Very drôle.
Patterns are made for breaking.
That would have been a golden opportunity to acknowledge the scepticism, go without that treaty, and take heed of the electorate without having to leave the EU.
Instead the political class decided it was fine to just go without a promised vote, which helped lead to the rise of UKIP and the unusual confluence of circumstances that gave us a referendum.
I think the trouble with The Crown is that it confuses the two the closer it gets.
KLM Captain Veldhuyzen van Zanten: "Oh, yes!"
Let's save Brexit!
Let's defeat Woke!
Let's cut taxes!
I suspect such a platform would lead to ignominious defeat as voters contemplated the fall in their living standards and the poor quality of public services. But who knows.
Even if this high inflation is brief and then dies back it'll still affect things significantly, especially if rampant energy prices drive large numbers of businesses under.
Brexiteers won Brexit.
Suck it up...
Agreement to and implementation of FOM with no brake and no possibility of derogation. This only led a problem once it involved states at very different stages of development from us.
Which led to the obvious nature of the democratic deficit, which has ramifications all over the enterprise. (To the question: For whom do I vote to change the FOM rules in the EU? There was and is no answer).
Which led to the understanding that (a) other states had referendums, including some which were effectively overruled
(b) we hadn't.
Both moderate Labour and One Nation Tories should have seen all this coming.
By the time Cameron offered that in 2016 'this far' was already too far for most and no-one believed 'and no further'.
The medium-term risk for the Conservatives is if the dominant response to "Brexit is in peril" becomes "good". That hasn't happened yet.
So by the time of the next GE, they'll be back on Brexit, culture wars, and cutting taxes. Probably.
A groundswell of people rising up against the cost of living crisis which Boris said we all need to live with to support Ukraine.
The govt needs to act quick.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/news/this-isn-t-right-why-consumers-are-flocking-to-uk-enough-is-enough-fight/ar-AA113rPJ?ocid=entnewsntp&cvid=a0659a99488f4d90565aa6c4d1e49f31
I just watched this hilarious but terrifying video of American Gen Zs failing to answer the most basic questions
Perhaps the best is the girl who is asked “if you drive at 60mph for an hour, how far will you go?”
First she says “that’s fast” then she says “I don’t drive”
They exhibit mental retardation. Yet seem apparently normal. We are doomed (part 739)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2oMv93EUpY
If (for example) you do 60mph for one hour round a mile long circuit, the correct answer is 'no distance.'
It's a good thing there are no examples of older generations saying dumb things.
It is only an intuition - opposition never proves anything, but it seems to me that SKS may well be more honest, more competent and less in hock to absurd and corrupt people than the Tories at this moment.
Let's hope that the EFTA EEA compromise will emerge in time. SKS clearly thinks he can't win on such a platform at the moment.
The trouble is that people get confused and think the makers of the Crown are making some statement/comment on the royal family.
It is fiction.
https://www.thenationalnews.com/business/energy/2022/08/25/oil-to-rebound-to-125-in-coming-months-ubs-says/
Europeans still have a chance. As Tony said (but didn’t do): Education, Education, Education.
My theory is that bi-and tri-lingualism helping juvenile brains develop is a huge advantage for many Europeans. Monoglot English-speakers’ brains are just made for atrophy.
As with the AI art, these answers are no doubt curated so we are not shown correct responses. But still,...
I'd argue the latter is the common usage: when we discuss how 'far' it is to drive between two places, we use the road distance, not the direct as-the-crow-flies distance. Or when I did my coastwalk, I walked about 6,200 miles, not 0 miles because I ended at the place I started.
“Twelve?”
*dark despairing laughter*
However they can name all the Kardashians
I thought initially that Starmer might be one of those. I was wrong.
"Their epic failure is to fail over 40 years to understand how to shape the EU so that is was what the UK both needed and could accept."
But, of course, the EU was not designed for the UK. That was not a bug, it was a feature.
I want Labour to win next time.
And my self justification is that the Labour Party is a relatively conservative party that will enact sensible measured social democratic reform; I won't really agree with any of it, but it will be less damaging than the confused, ideological, incompetent, corrupt, revolutionary brand of Conservativism on offer.
England will never fit in. Scotland and Wales will be perfect fits.
Eg my older daughter with whom I have just been in Italy. She has just done Geography GCSE
We were sitting in the Piazza Navona in Rome looking at Bernini’s famous Fountain of the Four Rivers. I explained what it represents (turns out she likes all this art stuff) and I mentioned the Danube and she said “what’s the Danube?”
And this child is smart
Wtf are we teaching them? The first year of Geography should be “learn all the countries, their capitals, the main rivers, the mountain ranges, the deserts, the oceans and seas, the historic roads and trade routes”. The BASICS
Thus equipping them with a mental map of the world that will last for a lifetime. Like basic arithmetic. How come we STILL aren’t doing this?
Do the same for cooking, adding up, shopping, banking, travelling, voting. BASIC LIFE SKILLS
If the way things are, as you suggest, were necessarily unavoidable (democratic deficit, ignoring referendums, FOM without derogation) then Brexit was inevitable at some point. The only question was: When?
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/08/24/brexit-brink-ultra-remainers-mobilising-cancel/
But she is now getting a brisk, cogent and concise education in all things practical, historical, geographical, artistical. I am making it my duty
Comments from telegraph readers on the cost of living crisis.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/other/it-s-time-for-the-young-to-pay-for-us-and-stop-complaining/ar-AA113eUt?ocid=entnewsntp&cvid=a0659a99488f4d90565aa6c4d1e49f31
"Thousands of you took to our comments section to air your thoughts on the matter and, while many readers expressed sympathy with the young, there was also outrage – outrage that having to endure food rationing, ballooning inflation, power shortages and myriad financial crashes in previous decades should be seen as “having it easy”. Not to mention the decades of fiscal responsibility, careful saving and hard graft that have translated into comfortable retirements. Advice was freely and generously given on how the young might face down economic hardship. Here is what you had to say... "
"When we were young, we paid for the pensions of the old and retired. Now it’s for the young to pay for us and shut up complaining.”
..."Modern generations, due to, no matter the cost, wanting everything now, have put themselves dangerously in debt and when an unexpected financial crisis happens, they are left all at sea, unable to pay the essential bills first. I am lucky to not be seriously affected by next year’s enormous fuel bills, but why should my savings be raided and my pension frozen to subsidise the fiscally incompetent?”
As a long term LD sympathiser (although only a member for a few years in early-mid 2000s) I was quite happy with Clegg getting a kicking in 2015 over the tuition fees debacle. Although that looks pretty minor now compared to what came next for Lab and Con.
In the case of geography: my son is eight, and in first year he learnt all the continents. More recently, he has done the rain cycle. I'd say that's of more immediate use than learning ponderous lists without context. Knowing about how the main types of rock are formed (sedimentary, metamorphic and igneous) is of much ore use and interest to him at the moment than knowing the capital of Brazil is Brasília.
My favourite anecdote on this was from NASA. In about 2012, a guy was tasked with writing the official history of the Shuttle program. He got a team together and they wrote it. At a later stage, he got some interns to read through it and comment, the idea being to catch concepts and terms that had not been adequately explained in the text.
These interns were bright and knowledgeable. Yet one asked: "What is the Cold War' ?
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2022/08/24/fracking-could-ease-soaring-energy-bills-gets-immediate-green/
How many times do you need to be told the geology round here doesn't allow cheap fracking - so it's not going to solve anything.
This is a recurring (and timeless) complaint of the old about the young, that everything is in decline, they don't know anything, that the education system is failing, etc etc.
Also, of course, the Eastern Roman Empire. But that's a blind spot for nearly everyone...
And unless they are deeply personally curious - and read history, science and politics etc etc, as young adults - they will never learn this stuff. And thus they will never learn the CONTEXT of everything around them. Why the world, and human society, is the way it is. And that is so important for a human life. Otherwise the world is just something that randomly happened and something that is done to you
You become passive. You have no agency
https://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2022/08/25/with-truss-about-to-start-lab-becomes-the-most-seats-favourite/#vanilla-comments
Scottish History would be the best bet for Knox, Melville & Co.
In the final round of the MP voting Mordaunt was eliminated, but of course her votes were never redistributed. Mordaunt is very firmly on Team Truss not Team Sunak, as are more of her own supporters that have subsequently declared a side, so based on what MPs are saying they wish, if there were a final MP-only round of voting now, then Truss would win and Sunak would lose.
What you’re largely talking about is general knowledge. I got that by reading books of facts, dipping in and out of encyclopaedias etc. In other words, books at home and in libraries. I did that on rainy days when I couldn’t go out with my mates on our bikes or to play football etc. There were no mobile phones or computers back then.
That’s a long way of saying you can’t blame the education system. It’s a much wider issue - and one that parents absolutely need to be aware of and do something about if they believe it’s important for their kids to know this stuff (which it is).
I do agree on mental arithmetic, though. That should be part if the curriculum. We can’t leave it all to calculators.
I would imagine the reason is that if your journey of an hour - say, from suburban Stockport to somewhere on the Wirral - almost half the time will be spent getting to and from the motorway at either end. Which you can only do at the speed of the road, not at 80mph. Even when you think you are making good progress, your average speed will be surprisingly low, and whether you go at 70 or 80 on the motorway has surprisingly little impact on overall journey time.
That said, I think you need to be making some particularly strong assumptions about the journey to get this all the way down to 86 seconds.
A lot of people may be disappointed in a fortnight's time, as many in Labour were when Starmer appeared not to do what they thought he'd said on the tin.
My O Level Geography was based around the coal and steel industries in the UK, so largely made redundant by modern economic history.