TLDR; the things you think are beyond the pale morally, are to another person the only moral answer.
The usual conclusion from the book is that we should be more understanding of others’ political positions - more often than we think our opponents genuinely believe in the moral purpose of what they are doing.
In the case of the extremists in government, I feel there is also another conclusion to draw. If you are weird enough, you can find almost any outcome the ‘moral’ one (cf gulags under communism). So one should be deeply suspicious of one’s own moral certainties.
Given what others have posted about Truss in the last few hours, I’m not sure she will be open to that conclusion though.
I've not read it (although will now add it to the pile), but I did write this a few months ago on Facebook:
What a lot of bollocks.
This sanctimonious arsehole (bet he's a Dem) needs to mind his own business.
Exactly. At least on PB.com we do engage with the 'other' view.
Apple has withdrawn a number of Russian-based social media apps from the App Store, including the app for the VK social network. With Apple operating in the UK, sanctions put in place by the government mean that Apple can no longer do business with the developers of the app, leading to the cancellation of the developer accounts and subsequent delistings:
"Russia's communications regulator on Wednesday demanded an explanation from Apple after applications operated by the Russian state-controlled tech firm VK were removed from the U.S. firm's App Store… Apple said it follows laws in the jurisdictions where the company operates. Apple said the apps in question were being distributed by developers majority-owned or majority-controlled by one or more parties sanctioned by the UK government."
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
If it was windy, rather sunny, and rained all night, that would be perfect from my point of view. The conservatory is heating up nicely and the solar panels are already running all my extant gadgets.
But given a choice between sun and wind/rain, the latter's better for everyone else so I'll take it.
TLDR; the things you think are beyond the pale morally, are to another person the only moral answer.
The usual conclusion from the book is that we should be more understanding of others’ political positions - more often than we think our opponents genuinely believe in the moral purpose of what they are doing.
In the case of the extremists in government, I feel there is also another conclusion to draw. If you are weird enough, you can find almost any outcome the ‘moral’ one (cf gulags under communism). So one should be deeply suspicious of one’s own moral certainties.
Given what others have posted about Truss in the last few hours, I’m not sure she will be open to that conclusion though.
I've not read it (although will now add it to the pile), but I did write this a few months ago on Facebook:
The sentiment is noble, but it's unintentionally funny in one particular way: saying "we all" when you are only talking about a subset of people. Trust me when I say that you can walk from one end of my constituency to the other and not run into a Lib Dem voter. My folks are all Labour but I've never voted for them. Everyone else seems to be Conservative or SNP. I'm surrounded by people who have pretty fixed opinions one was or the other about independence but I'm open to either option.
Not all of us are in a political echo chamber. I'm sure there are quite a few of us on here who recognise the feeling of being a lone voice of sanity among others who just don't get it, and who fear that others regard us as a lone voice of insanity because our ideas don't fit.
Bubbles are real, but the idea that everyone is in one is just your bubble talking.
Yes. This use of the term 'We' (the Guardian does it all the time) is dishonest, evasive, patronising and guilt trippy.
'We' should always be used with precision, identifying oneself and identifiable others. It is lazy writing.
(It has an obscure but more harmless parallel in what I term the 'Times Lit Supp "everyone" '
As in "Everyone knows that 14th century Mongolian terracotta chimneys are predominantly the work of Nestorian camel owners")
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
I still remember going to bed in late October 1962, thinking that I might not quite reach my teens, my thirteenth birthday not being until January.
As always, we muddled through and since then, I've treated doom-sayers with a little contempt. If it's being foreseen, it probably won't happen. It's the unforseen you need to worry about.
Global warning? A piece of piss. Nuckear war? It won't happen. A large asteroid? We can probably knock it off-course.
A complete f*ck-up? Always possible, but no point worrying about. As for a financial misadventure? Put it into context. What is this life if full of care ...
To be fair I also thought I wouldn’t reach my teens because I was convinced a T-Rex was going to eat me after watching Jurassic Park
Why would a t-rex watch Jurassic Park?
Anyway, it would make more sense to eat him first and watch the film after?
Where is the electoral mandate for this low tax and smaller state economy . Truss and Kwarteng are determined to change the UKs economic model with absolutely no democratic consent .
Nonsense.
It's not nonsense because if the Tories had gone in to the last election spelling out what they have done since Truss became PM they would have lost by the sort of margins the polls are now indicating.
TLDR; the things you think are beyond the pale morally, are to another person the only moral answer.
The usual conclusion from the book is that we should be more understanding of others’ political positions - more often than we think our opponents genuinely believe in the moral purpose of what they are doing.
In the case of the extremists in government, I feel there is also another conclusion to draw. If you are weird enough, you can find almost any outcome the ‘moral’ one (cf gulags under communism). So one should be deeply suspicious of one’s own moral certainties.
Given what others have posted about Truss in the last few hours, I’m not sure she will be open to that conclusion though.
I've not read it (although will now add it to the pile), but I did write this a few months ago on Facebook:
The sentiment is noble, but it's unintentionally funny in one particular way: saying "we all" when you are only talking about a subset of people. Trust me when I say that you can walk from one end of my constituency to the other and not run into a Lib Dem voter. My folks are all Labour but I've never voted for them. Everyone else seems to be Conservative or SNP. I'm surrounded by people who have pretty fixed opinions one was or the other about independence but I'm open to either option.
Not all of us are in a political echo chamber. I'm sure there are quite a few of us on here who recognise the feeling of being a lone voice of sanity among others who just don't get it, and who fear that others regard us as a lone voice of insanity because our ideas don't fit.
Bubbles are real, but the idea that everyone is in one is just your bubble talking.
Yes. This use of the term 'We' (the Guardian does it all the time) is dishonest, evasive, patronising and guilt trippy.
'We' should always be used with precision, identifying oneself and identifiable others. It is lazy writing.
(It has an obscure but more harmless parallel in what I term the 'Times Lit Supp "everyone" '
As in "Everyone knows that 14th century Mongolian terracotta chimneys are predominantly the work of Nestorian camel owners")
You and your Nestorian camel bubble. I'm tired of people like you airbrushing migratory Gansu artisans out of the history of terracotta chimney-making throughout Mongol and Chinese history. A lot of these people had never seen a camel but their fluted pottery was as robust and popular as any other small scale manufacturer of the time.
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Asking why Delingpole is acting like a prat, is rather like asking why water is wet.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
Cyclefree is on the ball as always. However as so often more than one strand of the many problems can get confused.
In terms of presentation obviously this is a disaster. In one bound Truss and co manage both to spook the people who actually have some say over trillions and to devastate the lives and opinions of ordinary middle ground punters. This takes skill. And there is a special advanced skill in giving away hundreds of billions of free money and getting no credit for it.
Books will be written about this.
However, the real problem is not the presentation disaster of giving away a few billion to the rich. These sums are accounting footnotes. The real problem is that we are in a cycle, and have been since 2008 at least of borrowing to live beyond our means and affording it by artificial zero/negative interest rates.
We are still in it. Bank crisis, Covid, Ukraine, and now Energy. Next it will be housing/mortgages to be met by oceans of free money.
On this matter solutions seem more distant.
Effectively, we are in a world where the major central banks - certainly the Fed, BoE, Bank of Japan and the Bank of China - are practicing Modern Monetary Theory to a nth degree. There is an argument for saying it worked for approaching 15 years. We are now about to see whether it works under these circumstances.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
BTW, one of the better Ukrainian war twitters is from Alexander Kamyshin, who I believe is head of the Ukrainian railways. It casts a little light away from the immediate frontlines, to show what the non-solders are doing to try to keep the country running.
I notice that renewables are on 62% at the moment. There must be at least one energy company that making a heap of money charging the gas rate for wind and solar.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Just had a look at his twitter feed. Completely lost down an anti-vax rabbit hole of paranoia.
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Just had a look at his twitter feed. Completely lost down an anti-vax rabbit hole of paranoia.
Was he ever taken seriously?
I believe a PBer (or several depending on how you interpret PB identities) was quite pally with him. Thankfully that PBer is not prone to going down conspiracy theory rabbit holes.
the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
IMO the big question facing Putin is the following: if he automagically 'wins' all of Ukraine today, how does he stop all the economic sanctions that are massively limiting his country's strength? The west won't just say: "Oh well, he's won, we'd better just lift everything!" as they well know Putin will do the same with your fair country and others.
Russia has spent decades getting vast amount of treasure from oil and gas. They will now be seen around the world as a massively unreliable supplier, untrustworthy. They will sell oil and gas, but at nowhere near the quantities they did before, or on the favourable conditions. Europe will find alternative supplies and move towards other, hopefully greener, forms of supply.
There is now no way that Russia ends this war stronger than it was before February this year. It will be a diminished country, in terms of its military, its world standing, and most importantly, the lives of its own citizens. A pariah.
The only way out of this is to withdraw from Ukraine - at the very least to its pre-February borders - and admit defeat. Then, slowly over time, sanctions can be withdrawn. But I doubt Germany et al will be taking long-term energy contracts out with them, and western companies will be very hesitant to invest in the country.
Continuing the escalation will only weaken Russia, as well as imperilling the world. And that's what worries me: as I've been saying for years, Putin is not interested in making Russia stronger. He is only interested in bringing us down to his level.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
Very good analysis @cicero mainly because I'm in total agreement with it but also because it is spot on.
The bed wetting from the types on here reliving their 1980s under the covers nightmares is a sight to behold. God knows what would happen if they had to face the night and fury of Liz Truss.
Liz Truss says the markets don't understand her plans.
Liz Truss thinks the energy cap caps your bill at £2500 a year - she doesn't understand her plans.
No, she doesn’t think that. That was a slip of the tongue and you know it.
Dianne Abbott didn't get any grace for a "slip of the tongue", so neither does Liz Truss. Liz Truss is a moron who doesn't know what she's doing.
Fair point. My question is this - do you think Truss thinks the bills are capped at £2500? I don’t, but sadly the way the cap has been reported has confused a lot of people.
As usual, Martin Lewis is the only main source who treats people like adults.
1. Economically, the post from @williamglenn quoting the Fox Business tweet suggesting the Fed is concerned about systemic risk from rising interest rates is the key economic issue. It suggests the Fed is going to scale back on interest rate increases and may even reverse some.
I've always taken the view the Fed's moves are essentially political to show US voters they are doing something on inflation (even though raising interest rates does little to cool a lot of the underlying causes). Given the midterms are next month, we may see a reverse ferret from the Fed using the excuse of market turmoil as a reason to change course.
2. Re nukes in Ukraine, bear in mind the last thing China wants is Russia using nukes as that will automatically make China's strategic positioning far worse as Japan at least and possibly S Korea and Taiwan go for nukes. This Xi will do everything to stop Putin using such weapons
Not just Asia. Every country with 20 year old fuel rods from their nuclear reactors is a chemistry class or 2 away from the bomb.
Thanks to bans and moratoria on transferring plutonium internationally, it just stacks up. Clinton had a plan to buy the world stocks up, IIRC, but the sticking point was the US purchasing the reprocessed plutonium.
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Just had a look at his twitter feed. Completely lost down an anti-vax rabbit hole of paranoia.
Was he ever taken seriously?
To be fair there are respected doctors like Dr Aseem Malhotra now coming out saying the vax is harmful
The absolute obscenity of making the poorest fund tax cuts for the richest is the end game of the Brexit chosen by the zealots and ideologues who now run this country. It will be accompanied by environmental degradation and significant further reductions in individual rights and freedoms. This is fundamentalism and like all fundamentalism it is profoundly harmful, so must be defeated.
It was always the end-game for the right wing Tory Brexit faction. They were also smart enough to know that their vision could never win on its own so they temporarily hitched their wagon to the Farage/UKIP anti-immigration faction to get over the first hurdle.
Once the vote was won all they had to do was manoeuvre themselves into control which they have managed to do courtesy of 80,000 aged clueless Tory members.
At least we will now witness this right-wing wet-dream in action and if the initial reaction is anything to go by it will shred its credibility for decades to come. With any luck it will eventually take Brexit down with it as the penny finally drops that these are the very same idiots that promised them the "sunlit uplands" and "levelling up".
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
Do Dynamo and his BA obsessed friends count?
I work for the people behind the Illuminati, who are behind the Zeta Reticulans, who in turn are in charge of the Lizard Men.
The Chief Lizard frequently apologises about WWI and 2.
It is a complicated story, involving a junior lizard, a time machine and a meeting a mad bloke eating oysters on his own at a second rate hotel. And a Moroccan black cab driver in London.
What is the largest actual majority we think Labour could achieve?
Let's look at the benchmarks.
1997: Labour 179 seat majority (659 MPs in Commons) 1992: Tories 14,093,007 votes 1983: Tory 14.8pp vote share lead 1959: Tory 49.4% vote share 1931: National 67.2% vote share, 36.6pp vote share lead and 493 seat majority (615 MPs in Commons)
Some of those records are safe, but one does start to wonder about a few of them.
1983 was a special circumstance. To think that there's any chance of that margin getting blown away without a major split shortly beforehand is remarkable. It probably won't happen, but it's not impossible.
Where is the electoral mandate for this low tax and smaller state economy . Truss and Kwarteng are determined to change the UKs economic model with absolutely no democratic consent .
Nonsense.
It's not nonsense because if the Tories had gone in to the last election spelling out what they have done since Truss became PM they would have lost by the sort of margins the polls are now indicating.
MPs are elected They chose a PM. After that the manifesto can be ignored as so often it is. Labour are as equally guilty as the Tories of doing things that they said they would not. Suck it up.
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Just had a look at his twitter feed. Completely lost down an anti-vax rabbit hole of paranoia.
Was he ever taken seriously?
To be fair there are respected doctors like Dr Aseem Malhotra now coming out saying the vax is harmful
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
Very good analysis @cicero mainly because I'm in total agreement with it but also because it is spot on.
The bed wetting from the types on here reliving their 1980s under the covers nightmares is a sight to behold. God knows what would happen if they had to face the night and fury of Liz Truss.
Well, these films packed a punch.
I'm not very worried about nuclear war today. I suspect that Russia's nukes are more of a danger to Russia than to us.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
An excellent post and I find it difficult to disagree with most of it. My only concern is the collapse of the Russian regime and what replaces it. Whilst I hope for a Russian spring, a democratic revival and a welcome return to being an important partner, I fear if done wrong we get a regime even more reactionary than Putin’s.
Speaking of education budgets, one third of teacher training providers are going to be closed. Not because they are bad, but because the government doesn't like them.
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Just had a look at his twitter feed. Completely lost down an anti-vax rabbit hole of paranoia.
Was he ever taken seriously?
To be fair there are respected doctors like Dr Aseem Malhotra now coming out saying the vax is harmful
"Malhotra's views on diet and health have been criticized by the British Heart Foundation as "misleading and wrong", and his public questioning of the need ever to use statins has been condemned as a danger to public health."
"During the COVID-19 pandemic Malhotra published a book called The 21-Day Immunity Plan[11] making claims that following the diet could quickly help people reduce their risk from the virus; such claims are not backed by medical research evidence."
Where is the electoral mandate for this low tax and smaller state economy . Truss and Kwarteng are determined to change the UKs economic model with absolutely no democratic consent .
Nonsense.
It's not nonsense because if the Tories had gone in to the last election spelling out what they have done since Truss became PM they would have lost by the sort of margins the polls are now indicating.
MPs are elected They chose a PM. After that the manifesto can be ignored as so often it is. Labour are as equally guilty as the Tories of doing things that they said they would not. Suck it up.
Labour bankrupted the economy... there is no money left.... that wasnt in the manifesto...
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
An excellent post and I find it difficult to disagree with most of it. My only concern is the collapse of the Russian regime and what replaces it. Whilst I hope for a Russian spring, a democratic revival and a welcome return to being an important partner, I fear if done wrong we get a regime even more reactionary than Putin’s.
Look to 1905 as well as 1945. A humiliating defeat does not mean the guy at the top getting ousted.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
An excellent post and I find it difficult to disagree with most of it. My only concern is the collapse of the Russian regime and what replaces it. Whilst I hope for a Russian spring, a democratic revival and a welcome return to being an important partner, I fear if done wrong we get a regime even more reactionary than Putin’s.
Does anyone know if Putin truly is sick as said a few months ago or is that just a rumour
Where is the electoral mandate for this low tax and smaller state economy . Truss and Kwarteng are determined to change the UKs economic model with absolutely no democratic consent .
Nonsense.
Care to elaborate? Genuinely interested
Democratic consent was given at the GE.
Not for this. None of it. They said completely different stuff at that GE, hence there isn't a mandate. Clearly governments have to be flexible so a manifesto can not be sacrosanct , but to do the complete opposite of what you say under these circumstances is beyond the pale.
PS I don't know whether you noticed but the other day I responded to one of your posts positively. I agreed with what you said, primarily I was able to do so because you actually said something rather than just bitching.
Can you see the difference between a post that says 'nonsense' and one that says 'Democratic consent was given at the GE'
The first is just a negative waste of time, the second had content. Why didn't you say the 2nd in the first place. We might not agree with it, but it has value. The former didn't have any value whatsoever.
The absolute obscenity of making the poorest fund tax cuts for the richest is the end game of the Brexit chosen by the zealots and ideologues who now run this country. It will be accompanied by environmental degradation and significant further reductions in individual rights and freedoms. This is fundamentalism and like all fundamentalism it is profoundly harmful, so must be defeated.
It was always the end-game for the right wing Tory Brexit faction. They were also smart enough to know that their vision could never win on its own so they temporarily hitched their wagon to the Farage/UKIP anti-immigration faction to get over the first hurdle.
Once the vote was won all they had to do was manoeuvre themselves into control which they have managed to do courtesy of 80,000 aged clueless Tory members.
At least we will now witness this right-wing wet-dream in action and if the initial reaction is anything to go by it will shred its credibility for decades to come. With any luck it will eventually take Brexit down with it as the penny finally drops that these are the very same idiots that promised them the "sunlit uplands" and "levelling up".
The problem with this theory is that Liz Truss was a Remainer, and she's only in power because Boris Johnson was brought down in large part because of hysteria orchestrated by opponents of Brexit as well as the miscalculation of Rishi Sunak and his supporters.
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Just had a look at his twitter feed. Completely lost down an anti-vax rabbit hole of paranoia.
Was he ever taken seriously?
To be fair there are respected doctors like Dr Aseem Malhotra now coming out saying the vax is harmful
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.l
IMO the big question facing Putin is the following: if he automagically 'wins' all of Ukraine today, how does he stop all the economic sanctions that are massively limiting his country's strength? The west won't just say: "Oh well, he's won, we'd better just lift everything!" as they well know Putin will do the same with your fair country and others.
Russia has spent decades getting vast amount of treasure from oil and gas. They will now be seen around the world as a massively unreliable supplier, untrustworthy. They will sell oil and gas, but at nowhere near the quantities they did before, or on the favourable conditions. Europe will find alternative supplies and move towards other, hopefully greener, forms of supply.
There is now no way that Russia ends this war stronger than it was before February this year. It will be a diminished country, in terms of its military, its world standing, and most importantly, the lives of its own citizens. A pariah.
The only way out of this is to withdraw from Ukraine - at the very least to its pre-February borders - and admit defeat. Then, slowly over time, sanctions can be withdrawn. But I doubt Germany et al will be taking long-term energy contracts out with them, and western companies will be very hesitant to invest in the country.
Continuing the escalation will only weaken Russia, as well as imperilling the world. And that's what worries me: as I've been saying for years, Putin is not interested in making Russia stronger. He is only interested in bringing us down to his level.
Putin might but there's plenty in his cohort who won't. If the West has been smart, it's been making it clear to some of the cohorts that getting rid of Putin would be seen as a big plus in their favour.
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Just had a look at his twitter feed. Completely lost down an anti-vax rabbit hole of paranoia.
Was he ever taken seriously?
To be fair there are respected doctors like Dr Aseem Malhotra now coming out saying the vax is harmful
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
IMO the big question facing Putin is the following: if he automagically 'wins' all of Ukraine today, how does he stop all the economic sanctions that are massively limiting his country's strength? The west won't just say: "Oh well, he's won, we'd better just lift everything!" as they well know Putin will do the same with your fair country and others.
Russia has spent decades getting vast amount of treasure from oil and gas. They will now be seen around the world as a massively unreliable supplier, untrustworthy. They will sell oil and gas, but at nowhere near the quantities they did before, or on the favourable conditions. Europe will find alternative supplies and move towards other, hopefully greener, forms of supply.
There is now no way that Russia ends this war stronger than it was before February this year. It will be a diminished country, in terms of its military, its world standing, and most importantly, the lives of its own citizens. A pariah.
The only way out of this is to withdraw from Ukraine - at the very least to its pre-February borders - and admit defeat. Then, slowly over time, sanctions can be withdrawn. But I doubt Germany et al will be taking long-term energy contracts out with them, and western companies will be very hesitant to invest in the country.
Continuing the escalation will only weaken Russia, as well as imperilling the world. And that's what worries me: as I've been saying for years, Putin is not interested in making Russia stronger. He is only interested in bringing us down to his level.
In short: Yes to most of that. It will take a very long time for Russia´s neighbours not to fear and hate them, but with the scale of the economic and demographic collapse no beginning, the outlook is truly grim, even if they withdrew today. Even if sanctions were lifted, the de facto boycott will continue. Who wants anything to do with a bunch of murderers, torturers and rapists, who laugh when the threaten nuclear megadeath to the whole world?
Russia will have to face the same moral regeneration as Germany after 1945, and that is a process that takes generations.
TLDR; the things you think are beyond the pale morally, are to another person the only moral answer.
The usual conclusion from the book is that we should be more understanding of others’ political positions - more often than we think our opponents genuinely believe in the moral purpose of what they are doing.
In the case of the extremists in government, I feel there is also another conclusion to draw. If you are weird enough, you can find almost any outcome the ‘moral’ one (cf gulags under communism). So one should be deeply suspicious of one’s own moral certainties.
Given what others have posted about Truss in the last few hours, I’m not sure she will be open to that conclusion though.
I've not read it (although will now add it to the pile), but I did write this a few months ago on Facebook:
What a lot of bollocks.
This sanctimonious arsehole (bet he's a Dem) needs to mind his own business.
One techie friend of mine has always said that it's a feature, not a bug, of social media, that it generates hate.
One (and I have been guilty of this, and try to correct it) can end up saying things one would never dream of saying to another person in real life, and never dream of writing, if putting pen to paper.
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Just had a look at his twitter feed. Completely lost down an anti-vax rabbit hole of paranoia.
Was he ever taken seriously?
To be fair there are respected doctors like Dr Aseem Malhotra now coming out saying the vax is harmful
Calling Aseem Malhotra a 'respected doctor' would be like calling Richard Carrier a 'respected historian.' He is a crank who happens to have qualifications.
Where is the electoral mandate for this low tax and smaller state economy . Truss and Kwarteng are determined to change the UKs economic model with absolutely no democratic consent .
Nonsense.
Care to elaborate? Genuinely interested
Democratic consent was given at the GE.
Not for this. None of it. They said completely different stuff at that GE, hence there isn't a mandate. Clearly governments have to be flexible so a manifesto can not be sacrosanct , but to do the complete opposite of what you say under these circumstances is beyond the pale.
PS I don't know whether you noticed but the other day I responded to one of your posts positively. I agreed with what you said, primarily I was able to do so because you actually said something rather than just bitching.
Can you see the difference between a post that says 'nonsense' and one that says 'Democratic consent was given at the GE'
The first is just a negative waste of time, the second had content. Why didn't you say the 2nd in the first place. We might not agree with it, but it has value. The former didn't have any value whatsoever.
Why don't you just mind your own business. I write what I want. You are not my overseer. Nor are you there to mark my posts.Go away and stop stalking me.
Speaking of education budgets, one third of teacher training providers are going to be closed. Not because they are bad, but because the government doesn't like them.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
Very good analysis @cicero mainly because I'm in total agreement with it but also because it is spot on.
The bed wetting from the types on here reliving their 1980s under the covers nightmares is a sight to behold. God knows what would happen if they had to face the night and fury of Liz Truss.
Well, these films packed a punch.
I'm not very worried about nuclear war today. I suspect that Russia's nukes are more of a danger to Russia than to us.
Threads was a superb film.
However, if Russia was going to use a WMD, the time of most danger was post the retreat from Kyiv. Things are too far down the line
I still remember going to bed in late October 1962, thinking that I might not quite reach my teens, my thirteenth birthday not being until January.
As always, we muddled through and since then, I've treated doom-sayers with a little contempt. If it's being foreseen, it probably won't happen. It's the unforseen you need to worry about.
Global warning? A piece of piss. Nuckear war? It won't happen. A large asteroid? We can probably knock it off-course.
A complete f*ck-up? Always possible, but no point worrying about. As for a financial misadventure? Put it into context. What is this life if full of care ...
To be fair I also thought I wouldn’t reach my teens because I was convinced a T-Rex was going to eat me after watching Jurassic Park
Why would a t-rex watch Jurassic Park?
A T. rex would be horrified at Jurassic Park showing its peers without their usual feathery covering.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
An excellent post and I find it difficult to disagree with most of it. My only concern is the collapse of the Russian regime and what replaces it. Whilst I hope for a Russian spring, a democratic revival and a welcome return to being an important partner, I fear if done wrong we get a regime even more reactionary than Putin’s.
Russian nationalism is heavily invested in the mighty power of its military. With that discredited and comprehensively defeated in the field and the economy on the carpet it is difficult to see what it shifts into. A period of chaos, I suspect.
Where is the electoral mandate for this low tax and smaller state economy . Truss and Kwarteng are determined to change the UKs economic model with absolutely no democratic consent .
Nonsense.
It's not nonsense because if the Tories had gone in to the last election spelling out what they have done since Truss became PM they would have lost by the sort of margins the polls are now indicating.
MPs are elected They chose a PM. After that the manifesto can be ignored as so often it is. Labour are as equally guilty as the Tories of doing things that they said they would not. Suck it up.
Labour bankrupted the economy... there is no money left.... that wasnt in the manifesto...
You are mixing up the consequences of a manifesto and carrying out the manifesto.
You can't just ignore the manifesto (well you can but it has consequences) The Salisbury Convention has just a little say on that matter.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
IMO the big question facing Putin is the following: if he automagically 'wins' all of Ukraine today, how does he stop all the economic sanctions that are massively limiting his country's strength? The west won't just say: "Oh well, he's won, we'd better just lift everything!" as they well know Putin will do the same with your fair country and others.
Russia has spent decades getting vast amount of treasure from oil and gas. They will now be seen around the world as a massively unreliable supplier, untrustworthy. They will sell oil and gas, but at nowhere near the quantities they did before, or on the favourable conditions. Europe will find alternative supplies and move towards other, hopefully greener, forms of supply.
There is now no way that Russia ends this war stronger than it was before February this year. It will be a diminished country, in terms of its military, its world standing, and most importantly, the lives of its own citizens. A pariah.
The only way out of this is to withdraw from Ukraine - at the very least to its pre-February borders - and admit defeat. Then, slowly over time, sanctions can be withdrawn. But I doubt Germany et al will be taking long-term energy contracts out with them, and western companies will be very hesitant to invest in the country.
Continuing the escalation will only weaken Russia, as well as imperilling the world. And that's what worries me: as I've been saying for years, Putin is not interested in making Russia stronger. He is only interested in bringing us down to his level.
In short: Yes to most of that. It will take a very long time for Russia´s neighbours not to fear and hate them, but with the scale of the economic and demographic collapse no beginning, the outlook is truly grim, even if they withdrew today. Even if sanctions were lifted, the de facto boycott will continue. Who wants anything to do with a bunch of murderers, torturers and rapists, who laugh when the threaten nuclear megadeath to the whole world?
Russia will have to face the same moral regeneration as Germany after 1945, and that is a process that takes generations.
I don't think Putin and his clique are in the same league of evil as Hitler and his clique.
They're still pretty evil.
It was very hard for Germany, simply because of how vile the Nazis were. But, it was also easier, because they were such an outlier. Germany, pre-Nazi, was a prosperous, law-abiding, civilised country, with strong civic institutions. Russia doesn't really have any of that. Russia has always been a kleptocracy, since the time of the Mongol invasions. Without the Mongols, Russia today would probably be Scandinavian.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
Very good analysis @cicero mainly because I'm in total agreement with it but also because it is spot on.
The bed wetting from the types on here reliving their 1980s under the covers nightmares is a sight to behold. God knows what would happen if they had to face the night and fury of Liz Truss.
Well, these films packed a punch.
I'm not very worried about nuclear war today. I suspect that Russia's nukes are more of a danger to Russia than to us.
I first watched Threads in the early 2010s, when there appeared to be little prospect of nuclear war, and it utterly disturbed me then.
So watching it now is not, I fear, particularly well advised.
It is however also worth noting that it, like most of its cold-war bedfellows, do go for pretty much the bleakest representation of the aftermath of an all out nuclear war that they can (understandably). On a similar note, back in the day the Soviet Union had thousands of missiles spare that it could hit the UK with, if the goal was obliteration they could manage it. Any strike nowadays would be significant but as a poster mentioned, yesterday necessarily limited because there’s likely much fewer operational missiles to go round, and you need a decent chunk to knock out the USA.
Not that I relish the chance of finding out mind, just treat Threads for what it is - fiction, and realise that there is still a reason, in 2022, why MAD hasn’t happened yet despite tens of thousands of nukes being pointed at every population centre in the world (pretty much) for most of the Cold War.
Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien · 25m First ukrainian official Ive seen putting a specific figure on the number of Russian troops trapped in Lyman. 5000.
With the front now 20 km further east from Lyman and supplies cut off, then the situation for the Russians is desperate. Fighting now in Kreminna shows a total collapse of the line, as was suggested last night. Peskov also announced the suspension of the mobilization "because the recruiting offices are over loaded" (translation from the weasel- the mobilization has been the greatest Russian military disaster in decades).
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
Very good analysis @cicero mainly because I'm in total agreement with it but also because it is spot on.
The bed wetting from the types on here reliving their 1980s under the covers nightmares is a sight to behold. God knows what would happen if they had to face the night and fury of Liz Truss.
Well, these films packed a punch.
I'm not very worried about nuclear war today. I suspect that Russia's nukes are more of a danger to Russia than to us.
Tritium is $30k a gram. 5 grams or so per warhead.
Think version of those tiny metal canisters of laughing gas the kids get high on in the park…. Fits in a small pocket, easily.
At 150k a pop, how many haven’t been stolen in Putins Russia?
Apropos of nothing, I ‘enjoyed’ my second covid booster on Thursday. I had a pretty intense reaction (flu like fever etc) to my fist booster (Pfizer, after 2x AZ). Had the new moderna mRNA this time and again nasty fever for 36 hours. Not fun. But harmful? Not a lot of evidence for that.
Where is the electoral mandate for this low tax and smaller state economy . Truss and Kwarteng are determined to change the UKs economic model with absolutely no democratic consent .
Nonsense.
Care to elaborate? Genuinely interested
Democratic consent was given at the GE.
Not for this. None of it. They said completely different stuff at that GE, hence there isn't a mandate. Clearly governments have to be flexible so a manifesto can not be sacrosanct , but to do the complete opposite of what you say under these circumstances is beyond the pale.
PS I don't know whether you noticed but the other day I responded to one of your posts positively. I agreed with what you said, primarily I was able to do so because you actually said something rather than just bitching.
Can you see the difference between a post that says 'nonsense' and one that says 'Democratic consent was given at the GE'
The first is just a negative waste of time, the second had content. Why didn't you say the 2nd in the first place. We might not agree with it, but it has value. The former didn't have any value whatsoever.
Why don't you just mind your own business. I write what I want. You are not my overseer. Nor are you there to mark my posts.Go away and stop stalking me.
1/10. Unnecessarily angry and pointless, but a point for being largely mistake-free.
Where is the electoral mandate for this low tax and smaller state economy . Truss and Kwarteng are determined to change the UKs economic model with absolutely no democratic consent .
Nonsense.
It's not nonsense because if the Tories had gone in to the last election spelling out what they have done since Truss became PM they would have lost by the sort of margins the polls are now indicating.
MPs are elected They chose a PM. After that the manifesto can be ignored as so often it is. Labour are as equally guilty as the Tories of doing things that they said they would not. Suck it up.
Labour bankrupted the economy... there is no money left.... that wasnt in the manifesto...
Labour bankrupted the economy due to external issues.
The tories are bankrupting the economy with their own internal games. If it was just the case of energy caps then no one would be complaining - it's utterly useless tax cuts that are the issue here....
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Just had a look at his twitter feed. Completely lost down an anti-vax rabbit hole of paranoia.
Was he ever taken seriously?
To be fair there are respected doctors like Dr Aseem Malhotra now coming out saying the vax is harmful
The absolute obscenity of making the poorest fund tax cuts for the richest is the end game of the Brexit chosen by the zealots and ideologues who now run this country. It will be accompanied by environmental degradation and significant further reductions in individual rights and freedoms. This is fundamentalism and like all fundamentalism it is profoundly harmful, so must be defeated.
It was always the end-game for the right wing Tory Brexit faction. They were also smart enough to know that their vision could never win on its own so they temporarily hitched their wagon to the Farage/UKIP anti-immigration faction to get over the first hurdle.
Once the vote was won all they had to do was manoeuvre themselves into control which they have managed to do courtesy of 80,000 aged clueless Tory members.
At least we will now witness this right-wing wet-dream in action and if the initial reaction is anything to go by it will shred its credibility for decades to come. With any luck it will eventually take Brexit down with it as the penny finally drops that these are the very same idiots that promised them the "sunlit uplands" and "levelling up".
The problem with this theory is that Liz Truss was a Remainer, and she's only in power because Boris Johnson was brought down in large part because of hysteria orchestrated by opponents of Brexit as well as the miscalculation of Rishi Sunak and his supporters.
No, Liz Truss is / was an opportunist. She jumped on the Remain bandwagon when she thought it was going to win and leapt off it when she realise supporting Leave would be better for her career progression. You might recall she used to be anti-monarchy yet as an MP she has spent years swearing loyalty to the monarch.
She says whatever works. I very much doubt she believes in anything.
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Just had a look at his twitter feed. Completely lost down an anti-vax rabbit hole of paranoia.
Was he ever taken seriously?
To be fair there are respected doctors like Dr Aseem Malhotra now coming out saying the vax is harmful
Calling Aseem Malhotra a 'respected doctor' would be like calling Richard Carrier a 'respected historian.' He is a crank who happens to have qualifications.
Malhotra urges a high fat low carb diet...many people agree with him on this i follow that diet myself
Where is the electoral mandate for this low tax and smaller state economy . Truss and Kwarteng are determined to change the UKs economic model with absolutely no democratic consent .
Nonsense.
Care to elaborate? Genuinely interested
Democratic consent was given at the GE.
Not for this. None of it. They said completely different stuff at that GE, hence there isn't a mandate. Clearly governments have to be flexible so a manifesto can not be sacrosanct , but to do the complete opposite of what you say under these circumstances is beyond the pale.
PS I don't know whether you noticed but the other day I responded to one of your posts positively. I agreed with what you said, primarily I was able to do so because you actually said something rather than just bitching.
Can you see the difference between a post that says 'nonsense' and one that says 'Democratic consent was given at the GE'
The first is just a negative waste of time, the second had content. Why didn't you say the 2nd in the first place. We might not agree with it, but it has value. The former didn't have any value whatsoever.
Why don't you just mind your own business. I write what I want. You are not my overseer. Nor are you there to mark my posts.Go away and stop stalking me.
Can't even react positively to a positive post eh?
It is my business as this is an open forum so I will comment as I see fit (unless I get banned). If I decide to comment on your bile I will. Shame as your last few posts have been more constructive, but I see you have gone back to the crap again.
Apropos of nothing, I ‘enjoyed’ my second covid booster on Thursday. I had a pretty intense reaction (flu like fever etc) to my fist booster (Pfizer, after 2x AZ). Had the new moderna mRNA this time and again nasty fever for 36 hours. Not fun. But harmful? Not a lot of evidence for that.
Looks like a load of bollocks to me. "...this vaccine is not completely safe." No vaccine is completely safe, surely?
Edit - from wiki:
"Malhotra's views on diet and health have been criticized by the British Heart Foundation as "misleading and wrong", and his public questioning of the need ever to use statins has been condemned as a danger to public health.[10] His "Pioppi diet" was named by the British Dietetic Association as one of the "top 5 worst celeb diets to avoid in 2018".[4] During the COVID-19 pandemic Malhotra published a book called The 21-Day Immunity Plan[11] making claims that following the diet could quickly help people reduce their risk from the virus; such claims are not backed by medical research evidence.[1]"
Speaking of education budgets, one third of teacher training providers are going to be closed. Not because they are bad, but because the government doesn't like them.
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Just had a look at his twitter feed. Completely lost down an anti-vax rabbit hole of paranoia.
Was he ever taken seriously?
To be fair there are respected doctors like Dr Aseem Malhotra now coming out saying the vax is harmful
Calling Aseem Malhotra a 'respected doctor' would be like calling Richard Carrier a 'respected historian.' He is a crank who happens to have qualifications.
Malhotra urges a high fat low carb diet...many people agree with him on this i follow that diet myself
Which ‘people’ would these be I wonder? The Sioux or Zoroastrians, or Rangers supporters perhaps?
What is with the KCMG bollocks? Is he allowed to advertise himself in that way?
Since if he were one the correct form of address would be 'Sir [Name] KG' I imagine he probably is. It would be like referring to yourself as the Supreme Duke and Earl Marshall of the Wash and Humber. It is a non-existent title so has no meaning.
I have edited that because of course KCMG is Michael and George, not the Garter.
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Is that the real Mr Delingpole or a satirical ripoff? I find it hard to tell, not being familiar with the gent.
Apropos of nothing, I ‘enjoyed’ my second covid booster on Thursday. I had a pretty intense reaction (flu like fever etc) to my fist booster (Pfizer, after 2x AZ). Had the new moderna mRNA this time and again nasty fever for 36 hours. Not fun. But harmful? Not a lot of evidence for that.
Looks like a load of bollocks to me. "...this vaccine is not completely safe." No vaccine is completely safe, surely?
No, nothing will be completely safe, hence the wrangles we’ve had over vaccinating kids in the U.K.
Where is the electoral mandate for this low tax and smaller state economy . Truss and Kwarteng are determined to change the UKs economic model with absolutely no democratic consent .
Nonsense.
It's not nonsense because if the Tories had gone in to the last election spelling out what they have done since Truss became PM they would have lost by the sort of margins the polls are now indicating.
MPs are elected They chose a PM. After that the manifesto can be ignored as so often it is. Labour are as equally guilty as the Tories of doing things that they said they would not. Suck it up.
Labour bankrupted the economy... there is no money left.... that wasnt in the manifesto...
And they have paid the price - 12 years (so far) in opposition.
The Tories will pay the price at the next election because they have stuffed the country in a far, far worse way than Labour ever did.
Where is the electoral mandate for this low tax and smaller state economy . Truss and Kwarteng are determined to change the UKs economic model with absolutely no democratic consent .
Nonsense.
Care to elaborate? Genuinely interested
Democratic consent was given at the GE.
Not for this. None of it. They said completely different stuff at that GE, hence there isn't a mandate. Clearly governments have to be flexible so a manifesto can not be sacrosanct , but to do the complete opposite of what you say under these circumstances is beyond the pale.
PS I don't know whether you noticed but the other day I responded to one of your posts positively. I agreed with what you said, primarily I was able to do so because you actually said something rather than just bitching.
Can you see the difference between a post that says 'nonsense' and one that says 'Democratic consent was given at the GE'
The first is just a negative waste of time, the second had content. Why didn't you say the 2nd in the first place. We might not agree with it, but it has value. The former didn't have any value whatsoever.
Why don't you just mind your own business. I write what I want. You are not my overseer. Nor are you there to mark my posts.Go away and stop stalking me.
1/10. Unnecessarily angry and pointless, but a point for being largely mistake-free.
You haven't been stalked by KJH. Had you been so you would be as bored with it as I am .
Where is the electoral mandate for this low tax and smaller state economy . Truss and Kwarteng are determined to change the UKs economic model with absolutely no democratic consent .
Nonsense.
It's not nonsense because if the Tories had gone in to the last election spelling out what they have done since Truss became PM they would have lost by the sort of margins the polls are now indicating.
MPs are elected They chose a PM. After that the manifesto can be ignored as so often it is. Labour are as equally guilty as the Tories of doing things that they said they would not. Suck it up.
Labour bankrupted the economy... there is no money left.... that wasnt in the manifesto...
Labour bankrupted the economy due to external issues.
The tories are bankrupting the economy with their own internal games. If it was just the case of energy caps then no one would be complaining - it's utterly useless tax cuts that are the issue here....
Useless is a matter of opinion. I think they are pointless but that's another matter.
Where is the electoral mandate for this low tax and smaller state economy . Truss and Kwarteng are determined to change the UKs economic model with absolutely no democratic consent .
Nonsense.
Care to elaborate? Genuinely interested
Democratic consent was given at the GE.
Not for this. None of it. They said completely different stuff at that GE, hence there isn't a mandate. Clearly governments have to be flexible so a manifesto can not be sacrosanct , but to do the complete opposite of what you say under these circumstances is beyond the pale.
PS I don't know whether you noticed but the other day I responded to one of your posts positively. I agreed with what you said, primarily I was able to do so because you actually said something rather than just bitching.
Can you see the difference between a post that says 'nonsense' and one that says 'Democratic consent was given at the GE'
The first is just a negative waste of time, the second had content. Why didn't you say the 2nd in the first place. We might not agree with it, but it has value. The former didn't have any value whatsoever.
Why don't you just mind your own business. I write what I want. You are not my overseer. Nor are you there to mark my posts.Go away and stop stalking me.
1/10. Unnecessarily angry and pointless, but a point for being largely mistake-free.
Yes, that missing question mark is a self-inflicted fail. Could have been deux points.
Comments
Now, sod off you baby-eating Tory.
In plain speak what she wants is capitalism on steroids .
"Russia's communications regulator on Wednesday demanded an explanation from Apple after applications operated by the Russian state-controlled tech firm VK were removed from the U.S. firm's App Store… Apple said it follows laws in the jurisdictions where the company operates. Apple said the apps in question were being distributed by developers majority-owned or majority-controlled by one or more parties sanctioned by the UK government."
https://www.forbes.com/sites/ewanspence/2022/09/30/apple-headlines-apple-iphone-15-iphone-14-pro-mac-pro-launch-leaks-specs/?sh=2a32dab1a0d1
http://wxmaps.org/pix/temp4
Lots of rain for Norway’s hydro dams too, and a bit for France’s riverside nukes.
http://wxmaps.org/pix/prec4
But given a choice between sun and wind/rain, the latter's better for everyone else so I'll take it.
'We' should always be used with precision, identifying oneself and identifiable others. It is lazy writing.
(It has an obscure but more harmless parallel in what I term the 'Times Lit Supp "everyone" '
As in "Everyone knows that 14th century Mongolian terracotta chimneys are predominantly the work of Nestorian camel owners")
More to the point, a little research confirms there are no 'Knight Commanders' in the Garter. They are 'Knight Companions.' It's the other orders have Knight Commanders. So it's a totally made up title.
Why would he do it? I don't know, but I'm guessing because he's a tool. This would be in character with much of his career.
Isn't that what he's trying to get us to see?
But it is interesting to wonder who he means. Although also kinda obvious...
https://ukrainevolunteer297689472.wordpress.com/2022/09/30/its-a-slaughter/
The funereal faces in the Kremlin last night showed that the regime knows the game is up. The denouncing of the UN Charter (who signed up for these rules? asked Putin: all members of the UN, actually Vlad), was sinister, but in a pathetic, Dr. Evil, kind of way. The celebrations in Red Square were empty, and now many Russians are beginning to understand that the country is facing complete humiliation and utter disaster,
Though I would not want to test it, there is pretty good chance that even with better funding over the past decades, the Russian missile systems are in just as bad a state as the rest of the rabble of an army. Any nuclear use could lead to the rapid destruction of Russia´s entire armed forces, including its nuclear forces. The generals know this and while they are happy enough to rattle the nuclear sabre, there must be real concern that if they play that card, then rapid and total vengeance would follow. The western policy of maintaining conventional support for Ukraine makes complete sense. Russia has been warned to expect a "catastrophic" response to any first use of WMD.
So while our middle-agers here are enjoying the disaster porn of Threads and the like, the feeling here, close to the border, is that Russia is finished as a great power and that this war is the last nail in the coffin of a genuinely evil, criminal cabal. In their death throes they are very dangerous, but there is no real prospect of their long term survival. Could be weeks, or even months, but the direction of travel is close to irreversible. Then Russia will have to negotiate the scale of their moral depravity, in the same way as Germany did, after 1945.
https://twitter.com/AKamyshin
The Ukrainians are really winning the communications battle, at least from the west's viewpoint.
And she'd still waste at least two of them.....
I notice that renewables are on 62% at the moment. There must be at least one energy company that making a heap of money charging the gas rate for wind and solar.
Was he ever taken seriously?
https://images.app.goo.gl/Km2MTmxYDPc3Pv1y8
Looking at this map, it looks as though Kremina and Sverodonetsk will be taken back shortly.
Russia has spent decades getting vast amount of treasure from oil and gas. They will now be seen around the world as a massively unreliable supplier, untrustworthy. They will sell oil and gas, but at nowhere near the quantities they did before, or on the favourable conditions. Europe will find alternative supplies and move towards other, hopefully greener, forms of supply.
There is now no way that Russia ends this war stronger than it was before February this year. It will be a diminished country, in terms of its military, its world standing, and most importantly, the lives of its own citizens. A pariah.
The only way out of this is to withdraw from Ukraine - at the very least to its pre-February borders - and admit defeat. Then, slowly over time, sanctions can be withdrawn. But I doubt Germany et al will be taking long-term energy contracts out with them, and western companies will be very hesitant to invest in the country.
Continuing the escalation will only weaken Russia, as well as imperilling the world. And that's what worries me: as I've been saying for years, Putin is not interested in making Russia stronger. He is only interested in bringing us down to his level.
The bed wetting from the types on here reliving their 1980s under the covers nightmares is a sight to behold. God knows what would happen if they had to face the night and fury of Liz Truss.
Thanks to bans and moratoria on transferring plutonium internationally, it just stacks up. Clinton had a plan to buy the world stocks up, IIRC, but the sticking point was the US purchasing the reprocessed plutonium.
1997: Labour 179 seat majority (659 MPs in Commons)
1992: Tories 14,093,007 votes
1983: Tory 14.8pp vote share lead
1959: Tory 49.4% vote share
1931: National 67.2% vote share, 36.6pp vote share lead and 493 seat majority (615 MPs in Commons)
Some of those records are safe, but one does start to wonder about a few of them.
https://twitter.com/DrAseemMalhotra/status/1574986541302104065?s=20&t=HBbW0LFrvxGdVCWUzy4Tgw
He should be Field Marshal Dr. James Delingpole, KG, VC, DSO, President for Life, Lord of All the Beasts of the Earth and the Fishes of the Sea.
Once the vote was won all they had to do was manoeuvre themselves into control which they have managed to do courtesy of 80,000 aged clueless Tory members.
At least we will now witness this right-wing wet-dream in action and if the initial reaction is anything to go by it will shred its credibility for decades to come. With any luck it will eventually take Brexit down with it as the penny finally drops that these are the very same idiots that promised them the "sunlit uplands" and "levelling up".
That isn’t me…
@DailyMirror
https://twitter.com/KwasiKwarteng/status/1576133060411523072
Not a great start to “Black History Month”…
The Chief Lizard frequently apologises about WWI and 2.
It is a complicated story, involving a junior lizard, a time machine and a meeting a mad bloke eating oysters on his own at a second rate hotel. And a Moroccan black cab driver in London.
But can someone explain how you increase productivity by reducing investment
See
https://twitter.com/RichardALJones/status/1575730600111378432
Richard Jones
@RichardALJones
"spending on capital projects and research and development would be the early targets for savings"
From a government that claims to put the need to restore the economy to growth above all else, difficult to imagine anything more counterproductive.
And HS2 - which really isn't going to save her a penny in the 2 years she has to screw things up...
I'm not very worried about nuclear war today. I suspect that Russia's nukes are more of a danger to Russia than to us.
https://schoolsweek.co.uk/itt-review-5k-places-at-risk-as-third-of-scitts-left-out/
That is better than four months ago when they accidentally decided to close 100% of them through administrative incompetence.
"Malhotra's views on diet and health have been criticized by the British Heart Foundation as "misleading and wrong", and his public questioning of the need ever to use statins has been condemned as a danger to public health."
"During the COVID-19 pandemic Malhotra published a book called The 21-Day Immunity Plan[11] making claims that following the diet could quickly help people reduce their risk from the virus; such claims are not backed by medical research evidence."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aseem_Malhotra
PS I don't know whether you noticed but the other day I responded to one of your posts positively. I agreed with what you said, primarily I was able to do so because you actually said something rather than just bitching.
Can you see the difference between a post that says 'nonsense' and one that says 'Democratic consent was given at the GE'
The first is just a negative waste of time, the second had content. Why didn't you say the 2nd in the first place. We might not agree with it, but it has value. The former didn't have any value whatsoever.
Russia will have to face the same moral regeneration as Germany after 1945, and that is a process that takes generations.
One (and I have been guilty of this, and try to correct it) can end up saying things one would never dream of saying to another person in real life, and never dream of writing, if putting pen to paper.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2018/oct/30/butter-nonsense-the-rise-of-the-cholesterol-deniers
Calling Aseem Malhotra a 'respected doctor' would be like calling Richard Carrier a 'respected historian.' He is a crank who happens to have qualifications.
It's only outstanding and the the leader last year received a knighthood for services to education...
However, if Russia was going to use a WMD, the time of most danger was post the retreat from Kyiv. Things are too far down the line
You can't just ignore the manifesto (well you can but it has consequences) The Salisbury Convention has just a little say on that matter.
They're still pretty evil.
It was very hard for Germany, simply because of how vile the Nazis were. But, it was also easier, because they were such an outlier. Germany, pre-Nazi, was a prosperous, law-abiding, civilised country, with strong civic institutions. Russia doesn't really have any of that. Russia has always been a kleptocracy, since the time of the Mongol invasions. Without the Mongols, Russia today would probably be Scandinavian.
So watching it now is not, I fear, particularly well advised.
It is however also worth noting that it, like most of its cold-war bedfellows, do go for pretty much the bleakest representation of the aftermath of an all out nuclear war that they can (understandably). On a similar note, back in the day the Soviet Union had thousands of missiles spare that it could hit the UK with, if the goal was obliteration they could manage it. Any strike nowadays would be significant but as a poster mentioned, yesterday necessarily limited because there’s likely much fewer operational missiles to go round, and you need a decent chunk to knock out the USA.
Not that I relish the chance of finding out mind, just treat Threads for what it is - fiction, and realise that there is still a reason, in 2022, why MAD hasn’t happened yet despite tens of thousands of nukes being pointed at every population centre in the world (pretty much) for most of the Cold War.
Think version of those tiny metal canisters of laughing gas the kids get high on in the park…. Fits in a small pocket, easily.
At 150k a pop, how many haven’t been stolen in Putins Russia?
To be fair there are respected doctors like Dr Aseem Malhotra now coming out saying the vax is harmful
https://twitter.com/DrAseemMalhotra/status/1574986541302104065?s=20&t=HBbW0LFrvxGdVCWUzy4Tgw
The Pfizer mRNA to be precise.
Apropos of nothing, I ‘enjoyed’ my second covid booster on Thursday. I had a pretty intense reaction (flu like fever etc) to my fist booster (Pfizer, after 2x AZ). Had the new moderna mRNA this time and again nasty fever for 36 hours. Not fun.
But harmful? Not a lot of evidence for that.
The tories are bankrupting the economy with their own internal games. If it was just the case of energy caps then no one would be complaining - it's utterly useless tax cuts that are the issue here....
She says whatever works. I very much doubt she believes in anything.
It is my business as this is an open forum so I will comment as I see fit (unless I get banned). If I decide to comment on your bile I will. Shame as your last few posts have been more constructive, but I see you have gone back to the crap again.
Edit - from wiki:
"Malhotra's views on diet and health have been criticized by the British Heart Foundation as "misleading and wrong", and his public questioning of the need ever to use statins has been condemned as a danger to public health.[10] His "Pioppi diet" was named by the British Dietetic Association as one of the "top 5 worst celeb diets to avoid in 2018".[4] During the COVID-19 pandemic Malhotra published a book called The 21-Day Immunity Plan[11] making claims that following the diet could quickly help people reduce their risk from the virus; such claims are not backed by medical research evidence.[1]"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aseem_Malhotra
'Respected doctor', eh?
The DfE make the Russian Army's High Command look positively competent.
But harmful? Not a lot of evidence for that.
Looks like a load of bollocks to me. "...this vaccine is not completely safe." No vaccine is completely safe, surely?
No, nothing will be completely safe, hence the wrangles we’ve had over vaccinating kids in the U.K.
The Tories will pay the price at the next election because they have stuffed the country in a far, far worse way than Labour ever did.