Probably because it is either bloody awful or does not support what the government intends saying later this week.
Possibly they have not done one. That might be another reason.
According to the article the OBR have done one excluding the measures announced on Friday and have offered to do one including them but the government said no. So your first suggestions sound more likely.
Having one excluding the measures to be announced rather defeats the point of having one to go with the measures announced.
The reports are published every six months anyway, so it won't be long until one is eventually released and that ought to have the impact of Friday's measures included.
I assume the forecast excluded the measures because the government hasn't told the OBR what the measures are. The government could have had the OBR draw up a forecast including the measures to allow for an informed debate of their policy choices, but have decided not to. I think we can all draw our own conclusions from that decision.
Yes that the Government hasn't had the time to do so. The OBR needs time to draw up the Forecast.
The Government was only formed two weeks ago yesterday, in fact many of the appointments were made two weeks ago today, and it was effectively shut down and put into a period of mourning two weeks ago tomorrow. That mourning period only ended yesterday and now the announcement is happening on Friday.
If the Government were to give the OBR time to draw up a forecast that would mean no announcement and no support for another month. Be honest, you wouldn't praise them for being quiet for another month, would you?
As I understand it the OBR could have turned it around in days. The government is just afraid of scrutiny. It's a shame because the creation of the OBR is probably the only good idea that has come out of the 2010-22 period of Tory rule.
Truss' main effect seems to be shoring up the Labour vote while squeezing a bit of the LD vote to her. Hardly that surprising given she was once a LD
LD mindset is not an open book to me but I wouldn't have thought that sort of biographical consideration weighed much with them.
Truss is an ex LD and ex Remainer and the polling evidence is the main swing since Boris left office and Truss replaced him is from LD to Tory, there has been virtually no movement at all between Labour and the Tories.
The last YouGov before Boris announced he was resigning had Labour 11% ahead and the LDs on 15%.
The latest Yougov has Labour still 10% ahead of the Tories under Truss but the LDs have fallen back to 10%, even below their election 2019 level of 11%
See @tims post. His is a better analysis of the movement. It isn't LD minded that are moving from LD to Con. It is the floaters that gravitate to the LDs when not happy with the other two or gravitate to anything new.
LDs aren't influenced that she used to be a LD or Remainer. If anything that will turn them off as she has turned her back on this stuff.
Yes but given the LD core vote is only about 8% as 2015 and 2017 proved, the LDs cannot afford to lose those floaters who moved to them in and since 2019.
The fact Truss has failed to regain 2017 and 2019 redwall working class Tory voters who have gone back to Labour but has regained some upper middle class southern voters Boris lost to the LDs is also significant demographically. It suggests the Tory vote will be the poshest and richest it has been since Cameron in 2015. That would also reflect her policies of tax cuts for the rich.
Labour meanwhile look set to win average earners for the first time since Blair
Those who thought you would rapidly fall in love with Truss once she became Leader have been proved wrong thus far, haven't they? Your contempt is barely concealed.
I have never been a great fan of hers but she is the leader and I am just pointing out what the polling data shows us.
Truss has still lost the redwall voters Boris won in 2019 to Labour but has it seems regained a few probably Remain Tories who voted for Cameron and May but switched to the LDs when Boris was leader
[Translated] Former rector of the Moscow Aviation Institute (MAI) Anatoly Gerashchenko died in an accident, reports The Moscow Post correspondent .
It is reported that the tragic accident occurred on the afternoon of Tuesday, September 21. Gerashchenko was at the Moscow Aviation Institute and descended the stairs. At one point, something went wrong, the scientist fell and flew several flights. He received injuries incompatible with life. Arriving ambulance officers ascertained the death of Gerashchenko.
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Apart from the bitter complaints about the fact their kids will be price/princess but not HRH. And the repeated attempts to push the King over the last few days. Who the fuck does that when someone is in mourning?
Apart from the whining that Harry first couldn’t wear his uniform & then when that was permitted that he no longer had the ER sigil that he had when he was ADC to the Queen. Despite the fact that he resigned as an ADC two years ago
Apart from calling up the US media to say that the two of them were planning to do a walkabout to look at flowers and that the cameras should all turn up to film them i their grief
The reality is they have chosen to move overseas and live their own lives. Good luck to them and don’t let the door hit you on the way out
It was rather ironic that the only two Royals with active military service were the only two in civilian clothes.
Every attack by the Meghan haters in the tabloids and BTL shows the wisdom of them emigrating.
KCIII would be wise to heal the divisions or it will be a very divided reign. A few uniforms and baubles is a small price to pay.
It won't, the polls show Meghan and Harry are now almost as hated as Andrew.
Charles and William can be polite to them but otherwise should keep them at arms length and just focus on the core new royal family, them, the Queen Consort, Kate and William's children plus Anne and Edward
The difference between the grounds forthe claimed hatred, should suggest you that polls aren't everything. Perceived racism, and perceived unkindness to a child after unkindness to her mother, are not going to do the RF any favours at all.
I assume "perceived" here means "statements unsupported by evidence".
There are very few established facts about all these allegations. The few that are known do not tend to support the allegations of bad behaviour by the RF and some clearly contradict some of the things said.
If I were to review this as a professional investigator and list out all the allegations and statements and review the evidence, the facts would, I suspect, look somewhat different to the stories which people have in their heads, regardless of which "side" anyone is on.
But facts now seem irrelevant.
I will say that some of the press stories have been silly, ridiculous and spiteful. Ditto the gutters of social media. I can well see how upsetting they could be. Though really it is very easy indeed to avoid reading English tabloids and the loonier fringes of social media, even in the U.K. let alone thousands of miles away.
You may be or have been a "professional investigator" but unless you have access to first hand evidence the rest of us don't, which you don't, the relevance is hard to see. I said "perceived" for a reason.
@Richard_Nabavi - John Redwood's Diary has him listing some 'EU red tape' he wants to go. I'd be interested to read whether you think any of these is valid.
The Business Secretary could abolish the droit du suite and VAT impositions the EU used to divert part of the global art market from London to New York.Maybe they thought it would help Paris but it just made the whole EU less competitive.
He could lower costs of buying a home by removing anti money laundering checks from any U.K. citizen buying and selling their main home and using a U.K. regulated bank. He could make energy certificates for homes a matter of choice for buyers and sellers.
He could work with Defra to use farm grants to promote growing more food here and to foster investment in more glasshouses and new farming techniques instead of subsidising wilding policies, and relying on more imports from the EU.
He could simplify the expensive bureaucracy created by the EU data protection legislation.
He could repeal the EU Ports Regulation which was widely opposed by our ports when it was introduced. It gets in the way of port investment and expansion.
He could repeal the railway rules which require the separation of track ownership from train ownership.Integrated ownership of routes by private companies should be an option.
He with the Treasury should allow more people self employed tax status, removing the penal elements of IR 35.
Most of those I absolutely support. Though some would need to be in combination with other revisions. IR35 is a bloody nightmare for contractors but the best way to get rid of it is simply to merge tax and NI which removes the need for it.
The one I think I really disagree with is repealing the on line digital tax.
The "remove anti-money laundering checks from any U.K. citizen buying and selling their main home and using a U.K. regulated bank" point is interesting.
The checks currently required are "proof of funds" - typically a mortgage agreement in principal, or bank statements from an accredited bank; and "proof of id" - either passport or online ID verification.
Whereas to prove that you are a UK citizen, using a UK regulated bank, selling your primary residence you'd need some kind of proof of funds from the UK regulated bank, and some kind of proof of id such as a UK passport or online ID verification *plus* some kind of proof that the property you are selling is your primary residence.
[Translated] Former rector of the Moscow Aviation Institute (MAI) Anatoly Gerashchenko died in an accident, reports The Moscow Post correspondent .
It is reported that the tragic accident occurred on the afternoon of Tuesday, September 21. Gerashchenko was at the Moscow Aviation Institute and descended the stairs. At one point, something went wrong, the scientist fell and flew several flights. He received injuries incompatible with life. Arriving ambulance officers ascertained the death of Gerashchenko.
[Translated] Former rector of the Moscow Aviation Institute (MAI) Anatoly Gerashchenko died in an accident, reports The Moscow Post correspondent .
It is reported that the tragic accident occurred on the afternoon of Tuesday, September 21. Gerashchenko was at the Moscow Aviation Institute and descended the stairs. At one point, something went wrong, the scientist fell and flew several flights. He received injuries incompatible with life. Arriving ambulance officers ascertained the death of Gerashchenko.
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Apart from the bitter complaints about the fact their kids will be price/princess but not HRH. And the repeated attempts to push the King over the last few days. Who the fuck does that when someone is in mourning?
Apart from the whining that Harry first couldn’t wear his uniform & then when that was permitted that he no longer had the ER sigil that he had when he was ADC to the Queen. Despite the fact that he resigned as an ADC two years ago
Apart from calling up the US media to say that the two of them were planning to do a walkabout to look at flowers and that the cameras should all turn up to film them i their grief
The reality is they have chosen to move overseas and live their own lives. Good luck to them and don’t let the door hit you on the way out
It was rather ironic that the only two Royals with active military service were the only two in civilian clothes.
Every attack by the Meghan haters in the tabloids and BTL shows the wisdom of them emigrating.
KCIII would be wise to heal the divisions or it will be a very divided reign. A few uniforms and baubles is a small price to pay.
It won't, the polls show Meghan and Harry are now almost as hated as Andrew.
Charles and William can be polite to them but otherwise should keep them at arms length and just focus on the core new royal family, them, the Queen Consort, Kate and William's children plus Anne and Edward
The difference between the grounds forthe claimed hatred, should suggest you that polls aren't everything. Perceived racism, and perceived unkindness to a child after unkindness to her mother, are not going to do the RF any favours at all.
It was Meghan and Harry who chose to abandon the royal family and royal duties for California. Both have now strongly negative approval ratings with the public.
Giving Harry back his officers uniform and medals and he and Meghan back their HRH without returning to do royal duties would be far more damaging to the royals, especially with their core supporters than keeping them at arms length still
Yes, obviously
as with the tories and the C of E you define the core as essentially the haters and place yourself in it. Anyone genuinely concerned for the family would be thinking there's nothing sadder than inter family rifts, and hoping they can be resolved.
Meghan has a -22% rating with YouGov, that is far more than just a few Tories. If they want to heal the rift they can stick to a quiet life in luxury in California and leave the royal family alone
Truss' main effect seems to be shoring up the Labour vote while squeezing a bit of the LD vote to her. Hardly that surprising given she was once a LD
LD mindset is not an open book to me but I wouldn't have thought that sort of biographical consideration weighed much with them.
I would say quite the opposite for actual Lib Dems - her prior life and later conversion are decidedly offputting.
A lot of potential LD voters aren't members or activists though, and they still benefit from being a parking space for disgruntled voters who are essentially undecideds. So I would hazard a guess that the small swing back from Lib Dem to Tory is part of the same trend as the swing back from undecided to Tory. Possibly even some of the moment from the Greens who are also lower than in recent months.
We're talking small movements though. If this is the Truss bounce - and LLG is still 57-58% - then it's not a particularly strong position for a new leader. Major, Brown, May and Johnson all saw much bigger bounces on taking over mid-term.
And this is very likely the top of the "bounce". This is the week of pain where they get to be unpopular and watch the markets, commentators and voters recoil backwards in displeasure...
I disagree on that. Over the next couple of days Truss is going to seize the domestic agenda for good or ill. If people like it, that is when we will see the bounce.
Personally, I am quite pleased that a lot of the gesture politics of the last government is being dropped, the withdrawal from the ECHR, the "privatisation" of C4 and the refusal to speak to the rail unions. If we have a more pragmatic government focused on things that actually matter rather than gestures that will be a good thing. I hope this includes a more constructive approach to relations with the EU too.
I like the willingness to take unpopular decisions and not to be a prisoner of focus groups. If we continue to only enact popular policies I think we will be up a street named sh*t
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Truss' main effect seems to be shoring up the Labour vote while squeezing a bit of the LD vote to her. Hardly that surprising given she was once a LD
LD mindset is not an open book to me but I wouldn't have thought that sort of biographical consideration weighed much with them.
Truss is an ex LD and ex Remainer and the polling evidence is the main swing since Boris left office and Truss replaced him is from LD to Tory, there has been virtually no movement at all between Labour and the Tories.
The last YouGov before Boris announced he was resigning had Labour 11% ahead and the LDs on 15%.
The latest Yougov has Labour still 10% ahead of the Tories under Truss but the LDs have fallen back to 10%, even below their election 2019 level of 11%
See @tims post. His is a better analysis of the movement. It isn't LD minded that are moving from LD to Con. It is the floaters that gravitate to the LDs when not happy with the other two or gravitate to anything new.
LDs aren't influenced that she used to be a LD or Remainer. If anything that will turn them off as she has turned her back on this stuff.
Yes but given the LD core vote is only about 8% as 2015 and 2017 proved, the LDs cannot afford to lose those floaters who moved to them in and since 2019.
The fact Truss has failed to regain 2017 and 2019 redwall working class Tory voters who have gone back to Labour but has regained some upper middle class southern voters Boris lost to the LDs is also significant demographically. It suggests the Tory vote will be the poshest and richest it has been since Cameron in 2015. That would also reflect her policies of tax cuts for the rich.
Labour meanwhile look set to win average earners for the first time since Blair
Well that is life. If we could stop people changing how they would vote we would never lose an election. It is natural for out and out floaters to move when something new comes along. If Truss cocks up they will move back. If not she keeps them.
I would actually put the true core LD vote below 8%.
There is probably a floor below 8% (LDs have been at 6% in the polls) but that's a little different from the "core vote" which I'd describe as people who would usually, all things being equal, tend to vote for the party. The Tory core vote is probably around 30-35%, so probably is Labour's, but that doesn't stop them falling below from time to time if their usual voters get disillusioned. The 2017 result when everything pointed to a 2 horse race and the party were still suffering from post-Clegg blues suggests it is pretty resilient at around that level.
Truss does have a chance to win back some Tory remainers if she shows enough evidence of a. fiscal responsibility (not much evidence so far), b. friendliness and a willingness to compromise with the EU on issues like the NIP.
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
Pussyfooting
Also they don't shoot first at Chicago, which is far away and protected by the world's best anti missile defences. they shoot at Camden.
Two B-52s having left from RAF Fairford this morning are currently flying up through the length of Norway. I'm sure intended to give Moscow pause for thought.
There’s been a few of those around Eastern Europe recently, last couple of weeks.
A step up from the usual NATO surveillance planes and drones hanging around the Ukraine borders, that have been a feature of this conflict, just to remind Putin who he’s up against.
The occasional airbourne USAF F-35 too, just in case something needs shooting down in a hurry. Can’t see that one up today though - but that doesn’t mean it’s not there!
The B-52s are flying circuits over northern Sweden now.
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
When Truss said she's willing to take unpopular decisions I'm not sure that's what she had in mind.
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
Pussyfooting
Also they don't shoot first at Chicago, which is far away and protected by the world's best anti missile defences. they shoot at Camden.
So post-strike we'd be able to link build a link between HS1 and HS2?
Two B-52s having left from RAF Fairford this morning are currently flying up through the length of Norway. I'm sure intended to give Moscow pause for thought.
There’s been a few of those around Eastern Europe recently, last couple of weeks.
A step up from the usual NATO surveillance planes and drones hanging around the Ukraine borders, that have been a feature of this conflict, just to remind Putin who he’s up against.
The occasional airbourne USAF F-35 too, just in case something needs shooting down in a hurry. Can’t see that one up today though - but that doesn’t mean it’s not there!
The B-52s are flying circuits over northern Sweden now.
Truss' main effect seems to be shoring up the Labour vote while squeezing a bit of the LD vote to her. Hardly that surprising given she was once a LD
LD mindset is not an open book to me but I wouldn't have thought that sort of biographical consideration weighed much with them.
Truss is an ex LD and ex Remainer and the polling evidence is the main swing since Boris left office and Truss replaced him is from LD to Tory, there has been virtually no movement at all between Labour and the Tories.
The last YouGov before Boris announced he was resigning had Labour 11% ahead and the LDs on 15%.
The latest Yougov has Labour still 10% ahead of the Tories under Truss but the LDs have fallen back to 10%, even below their election 2019 level of 11%
See @tims post. His is a better analysis of the movement. It isn't LD minded that are moving from LD to Con. It is the floaters that gravitate to the LDs when not happy with the other two or gravitate to anything new.
LDs aren't influenced that she used to be a LD or Remainer. If anything that will turn them off as she has turned her back on this stuff.
Yes but given the LD core vote is only about 8% as 2015 and 2017 proved, the LDs cannot afford to lose those floaters who moved to them in and since 2019.
The fact Truss has failed to regain 2017 and 2019 redwall working class Tory voters who have gone back to Labour but has regained some middle class southern voters Boris lost to the LDs is also significant demographically. It suggests the Tory vote will be the poshest and richest it has been since Cameron in 2015. That would also reflect her policies of tax cuts for the rich.
Labour meanwhile look set to win average earners for the first time since Blair
The Lib Dem vote is a coalition like all other parties' votes, even the Greens. My sense is it's made up of:
- A core liberal vote - The disillusioned former Tory Remain vote - Labour-inclined tactical voters - Green-inclined tactical voters - A few anti-SNP tactical voters - non-partisan voters who like the local MP - None of the above vote / undecideds
I'd put its national polling ceiling around 15% and local election ceiling closer to 20%.
I'm not sure there is a significant "core liberal vote" for the LDs these days - not in the pre 1980 sense. I think I would substitute that with "a core social democrat vote, and a smattering of (very) old Liberals who haven't given up the fight".
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Oh do fuck off you pathetic little man. Do you believe anything that you have posted here?
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
I think that I am glad @Leon is not Prime Minister.
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Oh do fuck off you pathetic little man. Do you believe anything that you have posted here?
Well, when he said Russian apologists are told they have smaller dicks than everyone else...
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
"
I've read the whole of your post and thought whether I should change my mind on anything and I haven't.
One thing I'll give them credit for is that they keep talking Britain up. Must be doing wonders for our global prestige.
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
"
I've read the whole of your post and thought whether I should change my mind on anything and I haven't.
One thing I'll give them credit for is that they keep talking Britain up. Must be doing wonders for our global prestige.
Ever since Sidney Reilly, the U.K. has lived, rent free, in the heads of the Bolsheviks and their successors.
The amount of time Frunze publications spent talking about British military capabilities, you’d think we were equal to the US.
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
Brilliant.
Even autocorrect buys into Leon's fear of the Woke!
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
Not keen. We'd lose the moral high ground.
Killing more civilians than Adolf Fucking Hitler involves losing the moral high ground?
What do we have to do to be actually a touch rude?
[Translated] Former rector of the Moscow Aviation Institute (MAI) Anatoly Gerashchenko died in an accident, reports The Moscow Post correspondent .
It is reported that the tragic accident occurred on the afternoon of Tuesday, September 21. Gerashchenko was at the Moscow Aviation Institute and descended the stairs. At one point, something went wrong, the scientist fell and flew several flights. He received injuries incompatible with life. Arriving ambulance officers ascertained the death of Gerashchenko.
Two B-52s having left from RAF Fairford this morning are currently flying up through the length of Norway. I'm sure intended to give Moscow pause for thought.
Truss' main effect seems to be shoring up the Labour vote while squeezing a bit of the LD vote to her. Hardly that surprising given she was once a LD
LD mindset is not an open book to me but I wouldn't have thought that sort of biographical consideration weighed much with them.
Truss is an ex LD and ex Remainer and the polling evidence is the main swing since Boris left office and Truss replaced him is from LD to Tory, there has been virtually no movement at all between Labour and the Tories.
The last YouGov before Boris announced he was resigning had Labour 11% ahead and the LDs on 15%.
The latest Yougov has Labour still 10% ahead of the Tories under Truss but the LDs have fallen back to 10%, even below their election 2019 level of 11%
See @tims post. His is a better analysis of the movement. It isn't LD minded that are moving from LD to Con. It is the floaters that gravitate to the LDs when not happy with the other two or gravitate to anything new.
LDs aren't influenced that she used to be a LD or Remainer. If anything that will turn them off as she has turned her back on this stuff.
Yes but given the LD core vote is only about 8% as 2015 and 2017 proved, the LDs cannot afford to lose those floaters who moved to them in and since 2019.
The fact Truss has failed to regain 2017 and 2019 redwall working class Tory voters who have gone back to Labour but has regained some middle class southern voters Boris lost to the LDs is also significant demographically. It suggests the Tory vote will be the poshest and richest it has been since Cameron in 2015. That would also reflect her policies of tax cuts for the rich.
Labour meanwhile look set to win average earners for the first time since Blair
The Lib Dem vote is a coalition like all other parties' votes, even the Greens. My sense is it's made up of:
- A core liberal vote - The disillusioned former Tory Remain vote - Labour-inclined tactical voters - Green-inclined tactical voters - A few anti-SNP tactical voters - non-partisan voters who like the local MP - None of the above vote / undecideds
I'd put its national polling ceiling around 15% and local election ceiling closer to 20%.
The party got 22% in 2010 and 1992, more or less. That suggests a higher ceiling than 15%.
Two B-52s having left from RAF Fairford this morning are currently flying up through the length of Norway. I'm sure intended to give Moscow pause for thought.
Apart from the bitter complaints about the fact their kids will be price/princess but not HRH. And the repeated attempts to push the King over the last few days. Who the fuck does that when someone is in mourning?
Apart from the whining that Harry first couldn’t wear his uniform & then when that was permitted that he no longer had the ER sigil that he had when he was ADC to the Queen. Despite the fact that he resigned as an ADC two years ago
Apart from calling up the US media to say that the two of them were planning to do a walkabout to look at flowers and that the cameras should all turn up to film them i their grief
The reality is they have chosen to move overseas and live their own lives. Good luck to them and don’t let the door hit you on the way out
It was rather ironic that the only two Royals with active military service were the only two in civilian clothes.
Every attack by the Meghan haters in the tabloids and BTL shows the wisdom of them emigrating.
KCIII would be wise to heal the divisions or it will be a very divided reign. A few uniforms and baubles is a small price to pay.
It won't, the polls show Meghan and Harry are now almost as hated as Andrew.
Charles and William can be polite to them but otherwise should keep them at arms length and just focus on the core new royal family, them, the Queen Consort, Kate and William's children plus Anne and Edward
A King disowning his son is not a good look.
As I hinted in my Sunday piece, Meghan should bite her tongue, and Charles reconcile with his son. Otherwise it will dog his reign throughout. Best do it soon, so all sorted by the Coronation.
How on earth do you know what's happening in the royal family.
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
I think I would check out my second best idea before giving the order.
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
The Russians would fire back before all that was done and the Russians still have more nuclear weapons than any other nation, even the US and China.
Our nuclear weapons are a weapon of last resort, not first strike. Only if Putin somehow managed to get an invasion force across Europe to the Channel would we even consider using them and by then NATO would already be at war with Russia anyway
Probably because it is either bloody awful or does not support what the government intends saying later this week.
Possibly they have not done one. That might be another reason.
Can't imagine the Treasury hasn't done a forecast - it's very much plug figures in see the output.
The more likely figure is that it both looks bloody awful AND it doesn't support the government intentions - anyone with a clue knows that reducing Corporation Tax is going to do nothing at all about productivity regardless of what Professor Minford believes....
Most companies operate on the basis of take money today because they may not be there tomorrow...
Here's the thing though.
The government can decide not to publish a forecast this week, and it's hard to imagine an alternative to the "things are bad and Trussonimics will make things worse" theory of non-publication.
But not publishing will make people suspicious (i.e. it comes at a government credibility cost that will become a money cost), and it doesn't stop events happening.
Unless we really are in a "only thing to fear is fear" scenario, which seems unlikely.
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Oh do fuck off you pathetic little man. Do you believe anything that you have posted here?
This is all a face saving measure by Putin. He wanted to deckare war and a full mobilization to bring Belarus into the war and call up the population of the big cities. But he was blocked last night so had to announce this "partial mobilization" with regional governors deciding who to call up. I.e. it is a deal so that the Westernized educated cities will be protected from mobilization. The elite blocked Putin from calling up their kids and their friends' kids. That in turn means Belarus cannot be forced in. He has ramped up the rhetoric to cover this up.
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
No, not the first strike, that would lead to WWIII MAD with no going back.
But as the public planned response to a Russian first nuclear strike, most definitely. Putin needs to know that a nuclear escalation from his side, results immediately in a major escalation from our side.
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
Not keen. We'd lose the moral high ground.
Only with the traitors and pansies. Red wall voters would love it. It would stimulate growth too. Ok, that growth would be of various cancers but still
@Richard_Nabavi - John Redwood's Diary has him listing some 'EU red tape' he wants to go. I'd be interested to read whether you think any of these is valid.
Good challenge, here goes:
The Business Secretary could abolish the droit du suite and VAT impositions the EU used to divert part of the global art market from London to New York.Maybe they thought it would help Paris but it just made the whole EU less competitive.
Yes, some merit to that.
He could lower costs of buying a home by removing anti money laundering checks from any U.K. citizen buying and selling their main home and using a U.K. regulated bank.
That one's raving bonkers. Quite apart from the fact that we're not exactly suffering from too little money laundering in the UK, has he not heard of the anti-money-laundering reach of the US?
He could make energy certificates for homes a matter of choice for buyers and sellers
Possibly some merit to this, although they really aren't very onerous (or useful, for that matter). But again, we're not exactly suffering from excessively good home insulation, are we?
He could work with Defra to use farm grants to promote growing more food here and to foster investment in more glasshouses and new farming techniques instead of subsidising wilding policies, and relying on more imports from the EU.
Already being done, but the lack of suitable labour from the EU is the biggest problem in farming.
He could simplify the expensive bureaucracy created by the EU data protection legislation.
No go on that one: GPDR is a global standard and conforming with it is indispensable for British businesses, who otherwise would get totally tangled up in complexity because of cross-border data transfers. The last thing business wants is yet another variation of standards.
He could repeal the EU Ports Regulation which was widely opposed by our ports when it was introduced. It gets in the way of port investment and expansion.
I don't know too much about the subject, but I think there might be some minor merit in this.
He could repeal the railway rules which require the separation of track ownership from train ownership. Integrated ownership of routes by private companies should be an option.
A rule introduced by the UK! I don;t see any appetite for this.
He with the Treasury should allow more people self employed tax status, removing the penal elements of IR 35.
Nothing to do with the EU, of course, but, yes, IR35 could and should be reformed. It needs to be done as part of a wider reform of tax so that there is not such a huge incentive to divert income away from PAYE.
He should repeal the on line digital tax.
On the contrary, this is a good Tory measure of levelling the playing field (a bit).
Overall, though, the list is small beer, isn't it?
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
Not keen. We'd lose the moral high ground.
Plus Putin's ghost would be saying "told you so, told you so."
Truss' main effect seems to be shoring up the Labour vote while squeezing a bit of the LD vote to her. Hardly that surprising given she was once a LD
LD mindset is not an open book to me but I wouldn't have thought that sort of biographical consideration weighed much with them.
Truss is an ex LD and ex Remainer and the polling evidence is the main swing since Boris left office and Truss replaced him is from LD to Tory, there has been virtually no movement at all between Labour and the Tories.
The last YouGov before Boris announced he was resigning had Labour 11% ahead and the LDs on 15%.
The latest Yougov has Labour still 10% ahead of the Tories under Truss but the LDs have fallen back to 10%, even below their election 2019 level of 11%
See @tims post. His is a better analysis of the movement. It isn't LD minded that are moving from LD to Con. It is the floaters that gravitate to the LDs when not happy with the other two or gravitate to anything new.
LDs aren't influenced that she used to be a LD or Remainer. If anything that will turn them off as she has turned her back on this stuff.
Yes but given the LD core vote is only about 8% as 2015 and 2017 proved, the LDs cannot afford to lose those floaters who moved to them in and since 2019.
The fact Truss has failed to regain 2017 and 2019 redwall working class Tory voters who have gone back to Labour but has regained some upper middle class southern voters Boris lost to the LDs is also significant demographically. It suggests the Tory vote will be the poshest and richest it has been since Cameron in 2015. That would also reflect her policies of tax cuts for the rich.
Labour meanwhile look set to win average earners for the first time since Blair
Those who thought you would rapidly fall in love with Truss once she became Leader have been proved wrong thus far, haven't they? Your contempt is barely concealed.
I have never been a great fan of hers but she is the leader and I am just pointing out what the polling data shows us.
Truss has still lost the redwall voters Boris won in 2019 to Labour but has it seems regained a few probably Remain Tories who voted for Cameron and May but switched to the LDs when Boris was leader
I suspect the proper Europhiles are lost, but the "shame Boris turned out to be a wrongun because he got the big calls right" wavering Conservatives (no names, no packdrill) look like they're back onboard.
Two B-52s having left from RAF Fairford this morning are currently flying up through the length of Norway. I'm sure intended to give Moscow pause for thought.
There’s been a few of those around Eastern Europe recently, last couple of weeks.
A step up from the usual NATO surveillance planes and drones hanging around the Ukraine borders, that have been a feature of this conflict, just to remind Putin who he’s up against.
The occasional airbourne USAF F-35 too, just in case something needs shooting down in a hurry. Can’t see that one up today though - but that doesn’t mean it’s not there!
The B-52s are flying circuits over northern Sweden now.
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Oh do fuck off you pathetic little man. Do you believe anything that you have posted here?
This is all a face saving measure by Putin. He wanted to deckare war and a full mobilization to bring Belarus into the war and call up the population of the big cities. But he was blocked last night so had to announce this "partial mobilization" with regional governors deciding who to call up. I.e. it is a deal so that the Westernized educated cities will be protected from mobilization. The elite blocked Putin from calling up their kids and their friends' kids. That in turn means Belarus cannot be forced in. He has ramped up the rhetoric to cover this up.
I think that makes the most sense of the available facts.
All dictatorships are based on controlling a coalitions of forces. It’s rare to non-existent to simply have one man doing whatever he wants without consultation with other powers in the system.
Two B-52s having left from RAF Fairford this morning are currently flying up through the length of Norway. I'm sure intended to give Moscow pause for thought.
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke...
Shit like that makes you sound almost as sad as Dynamo.
Two B-52s having left from RAF Fairford this morning are currently flying up through the length of Norway. I'm sure intended to give Moscow pause for thought.
There’s been a few of those around Eastern Europe recently, last couple of weeks.
A step up from the usual NATO surveillance planes and drones hanging around the Ukraine borders, that have been a feature of this conflict, just to remind Putin who he’s up against.
The occasional airbourne USAF F-35 too, just in case something needs shooting down in a hurry. Can’t see that one up today though - but that doesn’t mean it’s not there!
The B-52s are flying circuits over northern Sweden now.
Quadruple dose of Imodium all round! If you have to crap on a Buff, you have to bag it and take it with you like a dog.
He could simplify the expensive bureaucracy created by the EU data protection legislation.
No go on that one: GPDR is a global standard and conforming with it is indispensable for British businesses, who otherwise would get totally tangled up in complexity because of cross-border data transfers. The last thing business wants is yet another variation of standards.
No it isn't. Why do you think we should help Brussels in its attempts to become a global regulator?
He could simplify the expensive bureaucracy created by the EU data protection legislation.
No go on that one: GPDR is a global standard and conforming with it is indispensable for British businesses, who otherwise would get totally tangled up in complexity because of cross-border data transfers. The last thing business wants is yet another variation of standards.
No it isn't. Why do you think we should help Brussels in its attempts to become a global regulator?
They are a global regulator, with or without our help. Virtually no-one in business wants the UK to set up its own rules.
He could simplify the expensive bureaucracy created by the EU data protection legislation.
No go on that one: GPDR is a global standard and conforming with it is indispensable for British businesses, who otherwise would get totally tangled up in complexity because of cross-border data transfers. The last thing business wants is yet another variation of standards.
No it isn't. Why do you think we should help Brussels in its attempts to become a global regulator?
Plenty of American and other firms don't engage in GDPR.
If some firms choose to do so, that is their prerogative. But there's no reason for it to be mandatory for all.
So, whatever was the power struggle inside the Kremlin last night we can assume that Putin won it or at least won it enough to give a slightly watered down version of his plan. As I said yesterday it is not obvious where the kit to equip these 300k soldiers is going to come from. It is an empty threat militarily.
As for the nuclear war threat, well no rational man would be serious about that. But the flaw in that line of reasoning is obvious.
We now know that a Putin order can be blocked if the rest of the regime is against it. That certainly applies to use of nuclear weapons.
Two B-52s having left from RAF Fairford this morning are currently flying up through the length of Norway. I'm sure intended to give Moscow pause for thought.
Given the necessary bureaucracy around nuclear weapons - not least to avoid dangerous incorrect assumptions by adversaries - it's not something that would be changed without announcement.
So, whatever was the power struggle inside the Kremlin last night we can assume that Putin won it or at least won it enough to give a slightly watered down version of his plan. As I said yesterday it is not obvious where the kit to equip these 300k soldiers is going to come from. It is an empty threat militarily.
As for the nuclear war threat, well no rational man would be serious about that. But the flaw in that line of reasoning is obvious.
We now know that a Putin order can be blocked if the rest of the regime is against it. That certainly applies to use of nuclear weapons.
Well, he can be blocked for 12 hours. Which is a start I suppose. Providing those doing the blocking stay away from windows.
So, whatever was the power struggle inside the Kremlin last night we can assume that Putin won it or at least won it enough to give a slightly watered down version of his plan. As I said yesterday it is not obvious where the kit to equip these 300k soldiers is going to come from. It is an empty threat militarily.
As for the nuclear war threat, well no rational man would be serious about that. But the flaw in that line of reasoning is obvious.
We now know that a Putin order can be blocked if the rest of the regime is against it. That certainly applies to use of nuclear weapons.
Indeed, if Putin can't even get a full mobilisation approved, he certainly won't be engaging in global thermonuclear war.
He could simplify the expensive bureaucracy created by the EU data protection legislation.
No go on that one: GPDR is a global standard and conforming with it is indispensable for British businesses, who otherwise would get totally tangled up in complexity because of cross-border data transfers. The last thing business wants is yet another variation of standards.
No it isn't. Why do you think we should help Brussels in its attempts to become a global regulator?
They are a global regulator, with or without our help. Virtually no-one in business wants the UK to set up its own rules.
You don't think that the "Brussels effect" is in any way diminished by the UK no longer being subject to regulations from Brussels?
So, whatever was the power struggle inside the Kremlin last night we can assume that Putin won it or at least won it enough to give a slightly watered down version of his plan. As I said yesterday it is not obvious where the kit to equip these 300k soldiers is going to come from. It is an empty threat militarily.
As for the nuclear war threat, well no rational man would be serious about that. But the flaw in that line of reasoning is obvious.
We now know that a Putin order can be blocked if the rest of the regime is against it. That certainly applies to use of nuclear weapons.
Well, he can be blocked for 12 hours. Which is a start I suppose. Providing those doing the blocking stay away from windows.
He could simplify the expensive bureaucracy created by the EU data protection legislation.
No go on that one: GPDR is a global standard and conforming with it is indispensable for British businesses, who otherwise would get totally tangled up in complexity because of cross-border data transfers. The last thing business wants is yet another variation of standards.
No it isn't. Why do you think we should help Brussels in its attempts to become a global regulator?
They are a global regulator, with or without our help. Virtually no-one in business wants the UK to set up its own rules.
Quite. It's like building stuff to imperial measures and imperial Whitworth threads. Who would buy it overseas?
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Oh do fuck off you pathetic little man. Do you believe anything that you have posted here?
This is all a face saving measure by Putin. He wanted to deckare war and a full mobilization to bring Belarus into the war and call up the population of the big cities. But he was blocked last night so had to announce this "partial mobilization" with regional governors deciding who to call up. I.e. it is a deal so that the Westernized educated cities will be protected from mobilization. The elite blocked Putin from calling up their kids and their friends' kids. That in turn means Belarus cannot be forced in. He has ramped up the rhetoric to cover this up.
"The Government of the Russian Federation shall define the categories of citizens of the Russian Federation who have the right to draft exemptions and the manner in which these exemptions shall be provided."
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
OK. Lets play the scenario. We're not concerned by the slaughter of missions we're about to do for "peace", we're only interested in making this first strike work. Some options:
1. Strategic strike using ICBMs. Whilst this will absolutely destroy the targets, it will almost certainly provoke a reaction from Russia, especially as their computers show the strike to be largely counter-value (population centres). Result: You destroy Moscow and St Petersburg. And Washington, London, LA etc 2. Sneak attack using depressed trajectory SLBMs. This reduces the reaction time in Russia, but likely still allows them to order their own massive strike against us.
In summary, we would be as uninhabitable for 3,000 years as them. Do you dislike Camden that much that you want it melted?
Plenty of American and other firms don't engage in GDPR.
Really? Not any international ones, I think you'll find.
Yes, really. Besides which not all firms are international.
And it wouldn't surprise me if some engaging in bilateral trade eg US to China or US to Aus or similar only don't engage either.
Many firms will choose to meet all international standards. Same reason my Laptop has both FCC and CE and other stamps despite my buying it in a country not subject to FCC regulations. But that's their choice.
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Oh do fuck off you pathetic little man. Do you believe anything that you have posted here?
This is all a face saving measure by Putin. He wanted to deckare war and a full mobilization to bring Belarus into the war and call up the population of the big cities. But he was blocked last night so had to announce this "partial mobilization" with regional governors deciding who to call up. I.e. it is a deal so that the Westernized educated cities will be protected from mobilization. The elite blocked Putin from calling up their kids and their friends' kids. That in turn means Belarus cannot be forced in. He has ramped up the rhetoric to cover this up.
"The Government of the Russian Federation shall define the categories of citizens of the Russian Federation who have the right to draft exemptions and the manner in which these exemptions shall be provided."
"Looking at Vladimir Putin’s actual order for a partial mobilisation, Russian commentators have begun casting serious doubts on the promises of the president and his defence minister that the call-up will be limited.
They point out that the actual decree signed is very vague. It says nothing about any cap on numbers or about any exceptions, like not recruiting students or conscripts.
It's left to regional heads to decide who to call, to meet quotas."
He could simplify the expensive bureaucracy created by the EU data protection legislation.
No go on that one: GPDR is a global standard and conforming with it is indispensable for British businesses, who otherwise would get totally tangled up in complexity because of cross-border data transfers. The last thing business wants is yet another variation of standards.
No it isn't. Why do you think we should help Brussels in its attempts to become a global regulator?
They are a global regulator, with or without our help. Virtually no-one in business wants the UK to set up its own rules.
You don't think that the "Brussels effect" is in any way diminished by the UK no longer being subject to regulations from Brussels?
Obviously a little bit, but given that the strength of the UK economy and our main international competitive advantages are in service industries, and given the size of the EU market, it would be madness to shackle our economy with a huge barrier to trade on data protection.
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Oh do fuck off you pathetic little man. Do you believe anything that you have posted here?
This is all a face saving measure by Putin. He wanted to deckare war and a full mobilization to bring Belarus into the war and call up the population of the big cities. But he was blocked last night so had to announce this "partial mobilization" with regional governors deciding who to call up. I.e. it is a deal so that the Westernized educated cities will be protected from mobilization. The elite blocked Putin from calling up their kids and their friends' kids. That in turn means Belarus cannot be forced in. He has ramped up the rhetoric to cover this up.
"The Government of the Russian Federation shall define the categories of citizens of the Russian Federation who have the right to draft exemptions and the manner in which these exemptions shall be provided."
Good news for the sons of the Politburo.
Not so good news for the average lad in the East though, he gets to spend winter dodging NLAWs and HIMARS, with little training and nothing more than an old AK-47 to defend himself.
Probably because it is either bloody awful or does not support what the government intends saying later this week.
Possibly they have not done one. That might be another reason.
Can't imagine the Treasury hasn't done a forecast - it's very much plug figures in see the output.
The more likely figure is that it both looks bloody awful AND it doesn't support the government intentions - anyone with a clue knows that reducing Corporation Tax is going to do nothing at all about productivity regardless of what Professor Minford believes....
Most companies operate on the basis of take money today because they may not be there tomorrow...
Here's the thing though.
The government can decide not to publish a forecast this week, and it's hard to imagine an alternative to the "things are bad and Trussonimics will make things worse" theory of non-publication.
But not publishing will make people suspicious (i.e. it comes at a government credibility cost that will become a money cost), and it doesn't stop events happening.
Unless we really are in a "only thing to fear is fear" scenario, which seems unlikely.
If they publish the forecast now, and it's not good news - ballooning deficit, slow growth, persistent inflation - then it overshadowed the good news story of the tax cuts.
If they release the forecast later, it will be much less noticed, and the positive news of the tax cuts will have had time to bed in.
It's a cynical piece of news management and Parliament shouldn't stand for it.
But, it does show that when Truss undermines Parliament she does so for political advantage, rather than in an ill-judged attempt to save a mate from embarrassment over a lobbying scandal. This sort of ruthlessness and focus might work to her advantage for the election, if Parliament let's her get away with it.
He could simplify the expensive bureaucracy created by the EU data protection legislation.
No go on that one: GPDR is a global standard and conforming with it is indispensable for British businesses, who otherwise would get totally tangled up in complexity because of cross-border data transfers. The last thing business wants is yet another variation of standards.
No it isn't. Why do you think we should help Brussels in its attempts to become a global regulator?
They are a global regulator, with or without our help. Virtually no-one in business wants the UK to set up its own rules.
Quite. It's like building stuff to imperial measures and imperial Whitworth threads. Who would buy it overseas?
Indeed. The reality if that the EU as a whole is a huge trading block and their regulations are going to be more significant internationally than ours. What about if there was some way for us to be part of the EU’s decision making, so we agreed to follow their regulations but in exchange for a seat at the table in writing those regulations?
Don't worry Russian conscripts the Russian Federation will be providing you with these top-of-the-range T-62 tanks.
A new batch of cold-war era T62-M tanks (MY1983) for newly mobilized Russian soldiers is on its way to Ukraine. Photo taken on Sep. 11 in Millerovo, Rostov region (source archive.ph/DFQ7c). https://twitter.com/kromark/status/1572547554675687428
Truss' main effect seems to be shoring up the Labour vote while squeezing a bit of the LD vote to her. Hardly that surprising given she was once a LD
LD mindset is not an open book to me but I wouldn't have thought that sort of biographical consideration weighed much with them.
Truss is an ex LD and ex Remainer and the polling evidence is the main swing since Boris left office and Truss replaced him is from LD to Tory, there has been virtually no movement at all between Labour and the Tories.
The last YouGov before Boris announced he was resigning had Labour 11% ahead and the LDs on 15%.
The latest Yougov has Labour still 10% ahead of the Tories under Truss but the LDs have fallen back to 10%, even below their election 2019 level of 11%
See @tims post. His is a better analysis of the movement. It isn't LD minded that are moving from LD to Con. It is the floaters that gravitate to the LDs when not happy with the other two or gravitate to anything new.
LDs aren't influenced that she used to be a LD or Remainer. If anything that will turn them off as she has turned her back on this stuff.
Yes but given the LD core vote is only about 8% as 2015 and 2017 proved, the LDs cannot afford to lose those floaters who moved to them in and since 2019.
The fact Truss has failed to regain 2017 and 2019 redwall working class Tory voters who have gone back to Labour but has regained some upper middle class southern voters Boris lost to the LDs is also significant demographically. It suggests the Tory vote will be the poshest and richest it has been since Cameron in 2015. That would also reflect her policies of tax cuts for the rich.
Labour meanwhile look set to win average earners for the first time since Blair
Those who thought you would rapidly fall in love with Truss once she became Leader have been proved wrong thus far, haven't they? Your contempt is barely concealed.
I have never been a great fan of hers but she is the leader and I am just pointing out what the polling data shows us.
Truss has still lost the redwall voters Boris won in 2019 to Labour but has it seems regained a few probably Remain Tories who voted for Cameron and May but switched to the LDs when Boris was leader
I suspect the proper Europhiles are lost, but the "shame Boris turned out to be a wrongun because he got the big calls right" wavering Conservatives (no names, no packdrill) look like they're back onboard.
Yes, though the proper Europhiles ie those who voted for Cameron in 2015 but Remain in 2016 and Labour or LD in 2017 and 2019 were lost anyway. The redwall Leave voters have now gone back to Labour after voting for Boris in 2019 too.
The voters Truss has won back are those Tory waverers who voted Remain in 2016 and for Cameron in 2015 and May in 2017 but went LD under Boris. They tend to be high earners, highly educated and live in West London or the Home counties. So if Truss has gained any bounce it is with them
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Oh do fuck off you pathetic little man. Do you believe anything that you have posted here?
Who is more pathetic, an internet 'tard with a small vocabulary who posts a one-liner insult more suitable for a toilet wall like Twitter and who thinks that posting what Putin said (rather than mentioning Frank Muir after noticing the word "bluff" in a newspaper headline) means a person must necessarily adore Putin, or a cretin who hits a "Like" button?
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
OK. Lets play the scenario. We're not concerned by the slaughter of missions we're about to do for "peace", we're only interested in making this first strike work. Some options:
1. Strategic strike using ICBMs. Whilst this will absolutely destroy the targets, it will almost certainly provoke a reaction from Russia, especially as their computers show the strike to be largely counter-value (population centres). Result: You destroy Moscow and St Petersburg. And Washington, London, LA etc 2. Sneak attack using depressed trajectory SLBMs. This reduces the reaction time in Russia, but likely still allows them to order their own massive strike against us.
In summary, we would be as uninhabitable for 3,000 years as them. Do you dislike Camden that much that you want it melted?
So, whatever was the power struggle inside the Kremlin last night we can assume that Putin won it or at least won it enough to give a slightly watered down version of his plan. As I said yesterday it is not obvious where the kit to equip these 300k soldiers is going to come from. It is an empty threat militarily.
As for the nuclear war threat, well no rational man would be serious about that. But the flaw in that line of reasoning is obvious.
We now know that a Putin order can be blocked if the rest of the regime is against it. That certainly applies to use of nuclear weapons.
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Oh do fuck off you pathetic little man. Do you believe anything that you have posted here?
This is all a face saving measure by Putin. He wanted to deckare war and a full mobilization to bring Belarus into the war and call up the population of the big cities. But he was blocked last night so had to announce this "partial mobilization" with regional governors deciding who to call up. I.e. it is a deal so that the Westernized educated cities will be protected from mobilization. The elite blocked Putin from calling up their kids and their friends' kids. That in turn means Belarus cannot be forced in. He has ramped up the rhetoric to cover this up.
"The Government of the Russian Federation shall define the categories of citizens of the Russian Federation who have the right to draft exemptions and the manner in which these exemptions shall be provided."
Good news for the sons of the Politburo.
Not so good news for the average lad in the East though, he gets to spend winter dodging NLAWs and HIMARS, with little training and nothing more than an old AK-47 to defend himself.
If you can cremate over 50,000 of your own troops lost in combat, but call it just 5,000 on TV then who cares if a tens of thousands more from the East don't make it home?
Just so long as Muscovites aren't killed, that's all Russia is bothered about.
Plenty of American and other firms don't engage in GDPR.
Really? Not any international ones, I think you'll find.
Yes, really. Besides which not all firms are international.
And it wouldn't surprise me if some engaging in bilateral trade eg US to China or US to Aus or similar only don't engage either.
Many firms will choose to meet all international standards. Same reason my Laptop has both FCC and CE and other stamps despite my buying it in a country not subject to FCC regulations. But that's their choice.
GDPR isn't like that, though. It's a whole-country thing. If the UK doesn't conform, it become an absolute nightmare for any companies wanting to do significant business with, and especially provide services to, the EU. I know Brexiteers think we can simply ignore an $18 trillion economy on our doorstep, but it would be lunacy of the highest order
Apart from the bitter complaints about the fact their kids will be price/princess but not HRH. And the repeated attempts to push the King over the last few days. Who the fuck does that when someone is in mourning?
Apart from the whining that Harry first couldn’t wear his uniform & then when that was permitted that he no longer had the ER sigil that he had when he was ADC to the Queen. Despite the fact that he resigned as an ADC two years ago
Apart from calling up the US media to say that the two of them were planning to do a walkabout to look at flowers and that the cameras should all turn up to film them i their grief
The reality is they have chosen to move overseas and live their own lives. Good luck to them and don’t let the door hit you on the way out
It was rather ironic that the only two Royals with active military service were the only two in civilian clothes.
Every attack by the Meghan haters in the tabloids and BTL shows the wisdom of them emigrating.
KCIII would be wise to heal the divisions or it will be a very divided reign. A few uniforms and baubles is a small price to pay.
It won't, the polls show Meghan and Harry are now almost as hated as Andrew.
Charles and William can be polite to them but otherwise should keep them at arms length and just focus on the core new royal family, them, the Queen Consort, Kate and William's children plus Anne and Edward
The difference between the grounds forthe claimed hatred, should suggest you that polls aren't everything. Perceived racism, and perceived unkindness to a child after unkindness to her mother, are not going to do the RF any favours at all.
I assume "perceived" here means "statements unsupported by evidence".
There are very few established facts about all these allegations. The few that are known do not tend to support the allegations of bad behaviour by the RF and some clearly contradict some of the things said.
If I were to review this as a professional investigator and list out all the allegations and statements and review the evidence, the facts would, I suspect, look somewhat different to the stories which people have in their heads, regardless of which "side" anyone is on.
But facts now seem irrelevant.
I will say that some of the press stories have been silly, ridiculous and spiteful. Ditto the gutters of social media. I can well see how upsetting they could be. Though really it is very easy indeed to avoid reading English tabloids and the loonier fringes of social media, even in the U.K. let alone thousands of miles away.
You may be or have been a "professional investigator" but unless you have access to first hand evidence the rest of us don't, which you don't, the relevance is hard to see. I said "perceived" for a reason.
There are some facts which we know which can be compared with statements. And there are plenty of others where we don't. I certainly don't I agree.
All I can say is that if one takes those facts we can establish with certainty we know that the "story" that some choose to believe is unsupported by those facts.
There may be other facts of course, which is why the endless speculation and stories are so pointless and why, as I've said before, a period of silence would be the best thing for everyone.
What interests me tbh is the difference between the perception and the reality and how, even when facts are against or with you, the "story" can be stronger. You see it with the Royals but of more interest you see it a lot in politics too. And its consequences for our public discourse and decision-making are I think very interesting and need more exploration.
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Oh do fuck off you pathetic little man. Do you believe anything that you have posted here?
This is all a face saving measure by Putin. He wanted to deckare war and a full mobilization to bring Belarus into the war and call up the population of the big cities. But he was blocked last night so had to announce this "partial mobilization" with regional governors deciding who to call up. I.e. it is a deal so that the Westernized educated cities will be protected from mobilization. The elite blocked Putin from calling up their kids and their friends' kids. That in turn means Belarus cannot be forced in. He has ramped up the rhetoric to cover this up.
"The Government of the Russian Federation shall define the categories of citizens of the Russian Federation who have the right to draft exemptions and the manner in which these exemptions shall be provided."
Good news for the sons of the Politburo.
Not so good news for the average lad in the East though, he gets to spend winter dodging NLAWs and HIMARS, with little training and nothing more than an old AK-47 to defend himself.
If you can cremate over 50,000 of your own troops lost in combat, but call it just 5,000 on TV then who cares if a tens of thousands more from the East don't make it home?
Just so long as Muscovites aren't killed, that's all Russia is bothered about.
Didn't they in the fairly early days of the war admit 4,000 had died? If so the Russian people must surely know that if they had lost "just" a couple of thousand more that they would not then be mobilising 300K new troops. When the sons of the Moscow elite start getting sent off to Ukraine with little training and T-62s for tanks (if they're lucky) when will they start to kick off?
Plenty of American and other firms don't engage in GDPR.
Really? Not any international ones, I think you'll find.
Yes, really. Besides which not all firms are international.
And it wouldn't surprise me if some engaging in bilateral trade eg US to China or US to Aus or similar only don't engage either.
Many firms will choose to meet all international standards. Same reason my Laptop has both FCC and CE and other stamps despite my buying it in a country not subject to FCC regulations. But that's their choice.
GDPR isn't like that, though. It's a whole-country thing. If the UK doesn't conform, it become an absolute nightmare for any companies wanting to do significant business with, and especially provide services to, the EU. I know Brexiteers think we can simply ignore an $18 trillion economy on our doorstep, but it would be lunacy of the highest order
And yet American firms absolutely can do significant business with Europe, and provides services too, despite categorically not conforming "country wide".
We don't need to ignore the economy on our doorstep, we just need firms to have the right to choose whether to engage with it, or not.
I think Labour will be satisfied with the polling. The main thing with a new PM is to avoid a substantial bounce and there isn't much sign of one at the moment. I'm a Truss sceptic but hubris is never wise in politics. A dash for growth might work in time for an election before the cards come crashing down.
On Putin's mobilisation:
1)Why the delay from the message that was supposed to go out yesterday? Seems like behind the scenes disagreements going on which could be the most significant revelation of all.
2)What sort of shape will these reservists be in? They've already been offering substantial money to go to the front lines and people haven't taken the bait so much so that Russia's resorted to recruiting prisoners.
3)What are they going to be equipped with and how will they be sufficiently supplied?
4)How is it going to be paid for? There's already talk about major spending cuts and the economic pain is only just beginning.
5)This is presumably a signal to the west of Putin's 'indomitable will' so it's time to negotiate. Frankly I think we should keep calling his bluff no least given the shenanigans over the broadcast. It's worth remembering that if Putin is at an 8 on the escalation scale Nato is at about 3. No elite fighter jets for Ukraine, no ATACMS and certainly not a no fly zone or boots on the ground or blockade of Russian ships. We have plenty to up the ante with.
I have been bullish on the outcome of the war since a few weeks in. That said it would be wrong not to be a little nervous about hundreds of thousands of men being mobilised. Could they make a difference at least in terms of holding the current lines? Yes but given the lack of kit and the fact they have no answer to American precision guided artillery a lot of them will surely die or be maimed in the process and they probably know it. I suspect this is an army that has more chance of marching on Moscow than Kyiv.
Any bounce will take a month or two to materialise. Just let the tax cuts and the free money bake in.
The potential defeat of Putin's Russia will help her too.
But the Conservatives are facing numerous significant problems. 1) They've been in for a long time, so time for a change becomes a powerful mantra. 2) Cost of living is a problem for many people. 3) The former clownish PM's antics lost the party a lot of support which has not returned.
Against that, they do have incumbency and the boundary changes should help, but I'd not be surprised if we see a lot of changes next time.
This is about where I am. Labour winning outright from so far back should be very hard, but 2019 was unusual and there are a lot of time and stored up problems for the Tories. I think itll be close - if the Truss gambles pay off its a 1992 result.
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Seeing as Russia is mainly relying on tanks made out of wood, drawn by lowing bullocks, I am now quite skeptical about all these "super secret brilliant super-miracle hyper-weapons" claimed by Moscow
Or maybe that is their description of a rifle that post-dates World War 1
Two B-52s having left from RAF Fairford this morning are currently flying up through the length of Norway. I'm sure intended to give Moscow pause for thought.
Mr. kle4, it's also worth remembering May turned a potential 200 seat majority, credibly, into a hung Parliament. A massive shift is eminently possible.
Don't worry Russian conscripts the Russian Federation will be providing you with these top-of-the-range T-62 tanks.
A new batch of cold-war era T62-M tanks (MY1983) for newly mobilized Russian soldiers is on its way to Ukraine. Photo taken on Sep. 11 in Millerovo, Rostov region (source archive.ph/DFQ7c). https://twitter.com/kromark/status/1572547554675687428
The West is sending Ukraine T-55s!
And Ukraine will still win, which is one demonstration of the importance of tanks on the modern battlefield I guess.
What do PB-ers think of a First Strike? Take out of all Russia’s main cities. Obliterate them. And all her main military and naval bases, power stations and industrial centres. Make sure Moscow and St Petersburg are uninhabitable for 3000 years. Aim to kill half the Russian population in the first 4/7 minutes. Ok 10 minutes. And melt the eyes of another 40 million.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
OK. Lets play the scenario. We're not concerned by the slaughter of missions we're about to do for "peace", we're only interested in making this first strike work. Some options:
1. Strategic strike using ICBMs. Whilst this will absolutely destroy the targets, it will almost certainly provoke a reaction from Russia, especially as their computers show the strike to be largely counter-value (population centres). Result: You destroy Moscow and St Petersburg. And Washington, London, LA etc 2. Sneak attack using depressed trajectory SLBMs. This reduces the reaction time in Russia, but likely still allows them to order their own massive strike against us.
In summary, we would be as uninhabitable for 3,000 years as them. Do you dislike Camden that much that you want it melted?
Hmm melting Islington….
A Blairite plot to deny the world of the Gift that is Jeremy Corbyn.
OK. Lets play the scenario. We're not concerned by the slaughter of missions we're about to do for "peace", we're only interested in making this first strike work. Some options:
1. Strategic strike using ICBMs. Whilst this will absolutely destroy the targets, it will almost certainly provoke a reaction from Russia, especially as their computers show the strike to be largely counter-value (population centres). Result: You destroy Moscow and St Petersburg. And Washington, London, LA etc 2. Sneak attack using depressed trajectory SLBMs. This reduces the reaction time in Russia, but likely still allows them to order their own massive strike against us.
In summary, we would be as uninhabitable for 3,000 years as them. Do you dislike Camden that much that you want it melted?
Hmm melting Islington….
So long as these first strikers can guarantee the safety of both Lords and the Oval. Otherwise the potential price is too high.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
"
I've read the whole of your post and thought whether I should change my mind on anything and I haven't.
One thing I'll give them credit for is that they keep talking Britain up. Must be doing wonders for our global prestige.
Yes, I dont see what would change - it's still blame shifting and very shaky justifications when there's no getting around Putin chose all this.
The other thing it does, as is typical, is blame the response to his actions as if they caused his actions, which is not how time works. References to orders for Kyiv dont cut the mustard when inventing a cabal.
Probably because it is either bloody awful or does not support what the government intends saying later this week.
Possibly they have not done one. That might be another reason.
Can't imagine the Treasury hasn't done a forecast - it's very much plug figures in see the output.
The more likely figure is that it both looks bloody awful AND it doesn't support the government intentions - anyone with a clue knows that reducing Corporation Tax is going to do nothing at all about productivity regardless of what Professor Minford believes....
Most companies operate on the basis of take money today because they may not be there tomorrow...
Here's the thing though.
The government can decide not to publish a forecast this week, and it's hard to imagine an alternative to the "things are bad and Trussonimics will make things worse" theory of non-publication.
But not publishing will make people suspicious (i.e. it comes at a government credibility cost that will become a money cost), and it doesn't stop events happening.
Unless we really are in a "only thing to fear is fear" scenario, which seems unlikely.
If they publish the forecast now, and it's not good news - ballooning deficit, slow growth, persistent inflation - then it overshadowed the good news story of the tax cuts.
If they release the forecast later, it will be much less noticed, and the positive news of the tax cuts will have had time to bed in.
It's a cynical piece of news management and Parliament shouldn't stand for it.
But, it does show that when Truss undermines Parliament she does so for political advantage, rather than in an ill-judged attempt to save a mate from embarrassment over a lobbying scandal. This sort of ruthlessness and focus might work to her advantage for the election, if Parliament let's her get away with it.
Ballooning deficit, slow growth and persistent inflation is what we have now, after almost three years of Sunak's Brownism. And that's being generous to what we have now.
This truth is underlined by today's PSBR numbers, with borrowing yet again way ahead of what was forecast, yet another fail for Sunak's high tax policies.
Truss's go for growth isn't just driven by ideology, it's driven by necessity. Under Sunak, we would be manifestly headed for depression and bankruptcy. The numbers show it.
But the Conservatives are facing numerous significant problems. 1) They've been in for a long time, so time for a change becomes a powerful mantra. 2) Cost of living is a problem for many people. 3) The former clownish PM's antics lost the party a lot of support which has not returned.
Against that, they do have incumbency and the boundary changes should help, but I'd not be surprised if we see a lot of changes next time.
This is about where I am. Labour winning outright from so far back should be very hard, but 2019 was unusual and there are a lot of time and stored up problems for the Tories. I think itll be close - if the Truss gambles pay off its a 1992 result.
Most likely the result will be 2010 in reverse, a hung parliament but Starmer like Cameron wins most seats
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
Can I ask why Russia is razing large parts of Ukraine to the ground and feels it necessary to cut off the genitals of any male prisoners that they take whilst they are still alive?
But the Conservatives are facing numerous significant problems. 1) They've been in for a long time, so time for a change becomes a powerful mantra. 2) Cost of living is a problem for many people. 3) The former clownish PM's antics lost the party a lot of support which has not returned.
Against that, they do have incumbency and the boundary changes should help, but I'd not be surprised if we see a lot of changes next time.
I’m sure there will be a lot of changes next time too, but Starmer still needs to win about 130 seats for a majority of just one.
Even if he does the full Blair, he ends up with only the same majority Cameron got in 2015.
There’s a very large hung parliament landing zone, which is by far the most likely outcome of the next election.
Or, a Conservative majority..... I'm very pessimistic about people (voters) and changing their votes. Bootle gives you a viewpoint not many on here get. People DON'T change their votes, even when they say they do or will, anywhere near as often as we might all like to think.
A majority of voters (yep, based on no data whatsoever) don't think about their vote. They vote Labour because they vote Labour and they'll vote Labour unless the ballot paper doesn't say Labour on it. Then they'll have a nervous breakdown and ask the Labour Party who to vote for......
I'm quite sure there are Conservative voters who are the same.
The Conservatives need to lose 40 seats to lose their technical majority (and boundary changes will help them reduce that loss a bit); 44 seats to actually lose it (once Sinn Fein and the speaker weigh in) and probably 54 once the DUP (who won't support anyone but the Conservatives really) are thrown in.
54 seats is a BIG ask, let alone 140 or whatever. Sure, those are 54 loses to anyone (not just Labour) but to stake a claim, Labour needs to take at least most of those 54. If the Lib Dems take 47 and the SNP the 7 in Scotland, then whilst its a technical Lab-LD-SNP-Green-Plaid-SDLP-Alliance majority of 1, that'll last five minutes in the Commons before another GE.
The Conservatives need to lose 60 seats to put them out the game. And Labour need them (and the LD) to win enough to put more than a two party coalition out the window.
OK. Lets play the scenario. We're not concerned by the slaughter of missions we're about to do for "peace", we're only interested in making this first strike work. Some options:
1. Strategic strike using ICBMs. Whilst this will absolutely destroy the targets, it will almost certainly provoke a reaction from Russia, especially as their computers show the strike to be largely counter-value (population centres). Result: You destroy Moscow and St Petersburg. And Washington, London, LA etc 2. Sneak attack using depressed trajectory SLBMs. This reduces the reaction time in Russia, but likely still allows them to order their own massive strike against us.
In summary, we would be as uninhabitable for 3,000 years as them. Do you dislike Camden that much that you want it melted?
Hmm melting Islington….
So long as these first strikers can guarantee the safety of both Lords and the Oval. Otherwise the potential price is too high.
Let them take out Lords, we'll have better chance of having the Ashes then.
Headingley and Trent Bridge, now they need to be protected.
"The euro area is facing a deeper recession than previously forecast after Russia halted natural gas deliveries through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, according to Deutsche Bank economists.
Output will shrink 2.2% next year, compared with an earlier projection for a 0.3% contraction, the analysts said Wednesday in a report to clients. Gross domestic product in Germany, which is most exposed to lower energy shipments, will drop as much as 4%. "
Comments
Truss has still lost the redwall voters Boris won in 2019 to Labour but has it seems regained a few probably Remain Tories who voted for Cameron and May but switched to the LDs when Boris was leader
Those who don't know how to read will say that reading it was a waste of time and that all it does is show that everything they believed beforehand was so true. (That's how an idiot's mind works.) Perhaps they might then make a 1970s comedy reference.
I would have posted the whole thing but it's too long. Here are some extracts. I've put some bits in bold.
"Kiev representatives voiced quite a positive response to our proposals. (...) But a peaceful settlement obviously did not suit the West, which is why, after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements.
More weapons were pumped into Ukraine. The Kiev regime brought into play new groups of foreign mercenaries and nationalists, military units trained according to NATO standards and receiving orders from Western advisers.
At the same time, the regime of reprisals throughout Ukraine against their own citizens, established immediately after the armed coup in 2014, was harshly intensified (...)"
"The West has gone too far in its aggressive anti-Russia policy, making endless threats to our country and people. Some irresponsible Western politicians are doing more than just speak about their plans to organise the delivery of long-range offensive weapons to Ukraine, which could be used to deliver strikes at Crimea and other Russian regions.
Such terrorist attacks, including with the use of Western weapons, are being delivered at border areas in the Belgorod and Kursk regions. NATO is conducting reconnaissance through Russia’s southern regions in real time and with the use of modern systems, aircraft, vessels, satellites and strategic drones.
Washington, London and Brussels are openly encouraging Kiev to move the hostilities to our territory. They openly say that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield by any means, and subsequently deprived of political, economic, cultural and any other sovereignty and ransacked.
They have even resorted to the nuclear blackmail. I am referring not only to the Western-encouraged shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which poses a threat of a nuclear disaster, but also to the statements made by some high-ranking representatives of the leading NATO countries on the possibility and admissibility of using weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons – against Russia.
I would like to remind those who make such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have. In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems available to us. This is not a bluff.
The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our Motherland, our independence and freedom will be defended – I repeat – by all the systems available to us."
The checks currently required are "proof of funds" - typically a mortgage agreement in principal, or bank statements from an accredited bank; and "proof of id" - either passport or online ID verification.
Whereas to prove that you are a UK citizen, using a UK regulated bank, selling your primary residence you'd need some kind of proof of funds from the UK regulated bank, and some kind of proof of id such as a UK passport or online ID verification *plus* some kind of proof that the property you are selling is your primary residence.
Summat's up with that wheeze.
It’s risky, but I think it could woke. Unexpected. Then the Russians try to fire back and they realise everything is rusted and lacks parts. Nothing happens, one stray missile is sent and falls on Smolensk not Chicago
Job done
https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/explore/public_figure/Meghan_Duchess_of_Sussex
Truss does have a chance to win back some Tory remainers if she shows enough evidence of a. fiscal responsibility (not much evidence so far), b. friendliness and a willingness to compromise with the EU on issues like the NIP.
Also they don't shoot first at Chicago, which is far away and protected by the world's best anti missile defences. they shoot at Camden.
Maybe Leon has a point.
I mean, somebody has to be...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_S._Power
Hint - when Curtis Le May says you are a bit… hard core, that’s not a good sign
One thing I'll give them credit for is that they keep talking Britain up. Must be doing wonders for our global prestige.
But an FOI reveals Burnham was telling the truth. Scot Gov belatedly responded after he was already in Edinburgh, with just 24 hours notice.
https://twitter.com/staylorish/status/1572476804694437888
Burnham wrote to Sturgeon’s office on 26th July, they replied on the 23rd of August, suggesting a half hour meeting the following day.
The amount of time Frunze publications spent talking about British military capabilities, you’d think we were equal to the US.
What do we have to do to be actually a touch rude?
Because that is the sort of thing people say when they're still working alcohol through the system and not quite with it.
Pure speculation, but it would make sense of a number of things.
Our nuclear weapons are a weapon of last resort, not first strike. Only if Putin somehow managed to get an invasion force across Europe to the Channel would we even consider using them and by then NATO would already be at war with Russia anyway
The government can decide not to publish a forecast this week, and it's hard to imagine an alternative to the "things are bad and Trussonimics will make things worse" theory of non-publication.
But not publishing will make people suspicious (i.e. it comes at a government credibility cost that will become a money cost), and it doesn't stop events happening.
Unless we really are in a "only thing to fear is fear" scenario, which seems unlikely.
But as the public planned response to a Russian first nuclear strike, most definitely. Putin needs to know that a nuclear escalation from his side, results immediately in a major escalation from our side.
The Business Secretary could abolish the droit du suite and VAT impositions the EU used to divert part of the global art market from London to New York.Maybe they thought it would help Paris but it just made the whole EU less competitive.
Yes, some merit to that.
He could lower costs of buying a home by removing anti money laundering checks from any U.K. citizen buying and selling their main home and using a U.K. regulated bank.
That one's raving bonkers. Quite apart from the fact that we're not exactly suffering from too little money laundering in the UK, has he not heard of the anti-money-laundering reach of the US?
He could make energy certificates for homes a matter of choice for buyers and sellers
Possibly some merit to this, although they really aren't very onerous (or useful, for that matter). But again, we're not exactly suffering from excessively good home insulation, are we?
He could work with Defra to use farm grants to promote growing more food here and to foster investment in more glasshouses and new farming techniques instead of subsidising wilding policies, and relying on more imports from the EU.
Already being done, but the lack of suitable labour from the EU is the biggest problem in farming.
He could simplify the expensive bureaucracy created by the EU data protection legislation.
No go on that one: GPDR is a global standard and conforming with it is indispensable for British businesses, who otherwise would get totally tangled up in complexity because of cross-border data transfers. The last thing business wants is yet another variation of standards.
He could repeal the EU Ports Regulation which was widely opposed by our ports when it was introduced. It gets in the way of port investment and expansion.
I don't know too much about the subject, but I think there might be some minor merit in this.
He could repeal the railway rules which require the separation of track ownership from train ownership. Integrated ownership of routes by private companies should be an option.
A rule introduced by the UK! I don;t see any appetite for this.
He with the Treasury should allow more people self employed tax status, removing the penal elements of IR 35.
Nothing to do with the EU, of course, but, yes, IR35 could and should be reformed. It needs to be done as part of a wider reform of tax so that there is not such a huge incentive to divert income away from PAYE.
He should repeal the on line digital tax.
On the contrary, this is a good Tory measure of levelling the playing field (a bit).
Overall, though, the list is small beer, isn't it?
All dictatorships are based on controlling a coalitions of forces. It’s rare to non-existent to simply have one man doing whatever he wants without consultation with other powers in the system.
https://sgp.fas.org/crs/nuke/RL33640.pdf
If some firms choose to do so, that is their prerogative. But there's no reason for it to be mandatory for all.
They are no longer part of the B52 inventory.
https://www.military.com/daily-news/2020/01/18/b-52-will-no-longer-carry-certain-nuclear-weapons-heres-why.html/amp
Given the necessary bureaucracy around nuclear weapons - not least to avoid dangerous incorrect assumptions by adversaries - it's not something that would be
changed without announcement.
But we all knew that already.
Executive Order:
http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/69391
"The Government of the Russian Federation shall define the categories of citizens of the Russian Federation who have the right to draft exemptions and the manner in which these exemptions shall be provided."
1. Strategic strike using ICBMs. Whilst this will absolutely destroy the targets, it will almost certainly provoke a reaction from Russia, especially as their computers show the strike to be largely counter-value (population centres). Result: You destroy Moscow and St Petersburg. And Washington, London, LA etc
2. Sneak attack using depressed trajectory SLBMs. This reduces the reaction time in Russia, but likely still allows them to order their own massive strike against us.
In summary, we would be as uninhabitable for 3,000 years as them. Do you dislike Camden that much that you want it melted?
And it wouldn't surprise me if some engaging in bilateral trade eg US to China or US to Aus or similar only don't engage either.
Many firms will choose to meet all international standards. Same reason my Laptop has both FCC and CE and other stamps despite my buying it in a country not subject to FCC regulations. But that's their choice.
They point out that the actual decree signed is very vague. It says nothing about any cap on numbers or about any exceptions, like not recruiting students or conscripts.
It's left to regional heads to decide who to call, to meet quotas."
https://www.bbc.com/news/live/world-62970683
Not so good news for the average lad in the East though, he gets to spend winter dodging NLAWs and HIMARS, with little training and nothing more than an old AK-47 to defend himself.
If they release the forecast later, it will be much less noticed, and the positive news of the tax cuts will have had time to bed in.
It's a cynical piece of news management and Parliament shouldn't stand for it.
But, it does show that when Truss undermines Parliament she does so for political advantage, rather than in an ill-judged attempt to save a mate from embarrassment over a lobbying scandal. This sort of ruthlessness and focus might work to her advantage for the election, if Parliament let's her get away with it.
A new batch of cold-war era T62-M tanks (MY1983) for newly mobilized Russian soldiers is on its way to Ukraine. Photo taken on Sep. 11 in Millerovo, Rostov region (source archive.ph/DFQ7c).
https://twitter.com/kromark/status/1572547554675687428
The voters Truss has won back are those Tory waverers who voted Remain in 2016 and for Cameron in 2015 and May in 2017 but went LD under Boris. They tend to be high earners, highly educated and live in West London or the Home counties. So if Truss has gained any bounce it is with them
Just so long as Muscovites aren't killed, that's all Russia is bothered about.
All I can say is that if one takes those facts we can establish with certainty we know that the "story" that some choose to believe is unsupported by those facts.
There may be other facts of course, which is why the endless speculation and stories are so pointless and why, as I've said before, a period of silence would be the best thing for everyone.
What interests me tbh is the difference between the perception and the reality and how, even when facts are against or with you, the "story" can be stronger. You see it with the Royals but of more interest you see it a lot in politics too. And its consequences for our public discourse and decision-making are I think very interesting and need more exploration.
We don't need to ignore the economy on our doorstep, we just need firms to have the right to choose whether to engage with it, or not.
The potential defeat of Putin's Russia will help her too.
Don't worry she will be fine.
Or maybe that is their description of a rifle that post-dates World War 1
(Though those declared numbers don't quite tally with the listed currently deployed.)
Measures proposed include increasing the fee to register a company at Companies House from £12 to £50,
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-62972510
Yeah that will deter multi-million quid money laundering....
And Ukraine will still win, which is one demonstration of the importance of tanks on the modern battlefield I guess.
The other thing it does, as is typical, is blame the response to his actions as if they caused his actions, which is not how
time works. References to orders for Kyiv dont cut the mustard when inventing a cabal.
This truth is underlined by today's PSBR numbers, with borrowing yet again way ahead of what was forecast, yet another fail for Sunak's high tax policies.
Truss's go for growth isn't just driven by ideology, it's driven by necessity. Under Sunak, we would be manifestly headed for depression and bankruptcy. The numbers show it.
I'm very pessimistic about people (voters) and changing their votes. Bootle gives you a viewpoint not many on here get. People DON'T change their votes, even when they say they do or will, anywhere near as often as we might all like to think.
A majority of voters (yep, based on no data whatsoever) don't think about their vote. They vote Labour because they vote Labour and they'll vote Labour unless the ballot paper doesn't say Labour on it. Then they'll have a nervous breakdown and ask the Labour Party who to vote for......
I'm quite sure there are Conservative voters who are the same.
The Conservatives need to lose 40 seats to lose their technical majority (and boundary changes will help them reduce that loss a bit); 44 seats to actually lose it (once Sinn Fein and the speaker weigh in) and probably 54 once the DUP (who won't support anyone but the Conservatives really) are thrown in.
54 seats is a BIG ask, let alone 140 or whatever. Sure, those are 54 loses to anyone (not just Labour) but to stake a claim, Labour needs to take at least most of those 54. If the Lib Dems take 47 and the SNP the 7 in Scotland, then whilst its a technical Lab-LD-SNP-Green-Plaid-SDLP-Alliance majority of 1, that'll last five minutes in the Commons before another GE.
The Conservatives need to lose 60 seats to put them out the game. And Labour need them (and the LD) to win enough to put more than a two party coalition out the window.
Headingley and Trent Bridge, now they need to be protected.
"The euro area is facing a deeper recession than previously forecast after Russia halted natural gas deliveries through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, according to Deutsche Bank economists.
Output will shrink 2.2% next year, compared with an earlier projection for a 0.3% contraction, the analysts said Wednesday in a report to clients. Gross domestic product in Germany, which is most exposed to lower energy shipments, will drop as much as 4%. "
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-09-21/euro-zone-faces-deeper-recession-on-gas-cuts-deutsche-bank-says?cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_content=business&leadSource=uverify wall
A 4% drop of GDP for Germany. Ouch. And that's presuming the war does not get worse
Brace