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.
Apols - I buggered up the block quotes earlier there - now sorted I hope.
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.
TBF, though I have no time for this lot, an election in Dec 19 is pre covid, pre Ukraine, pre energy crisis and (of course) pre Brexit.
it is impossible both to elect for 5 years and expect government not to adjust to radical changes of circumstance, which these are.
That does not mean I agree with either Boris or LT.
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 .
And do you ever wonder why @Farooq and nobody else is?
And do you ever wonder why lots of others here comment on your posts in the same way as I do from posters ranging from the left to the right?
You only have to look at your obnoxious reply to what was a reasonably positive post to you.
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.
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.
I had mine a fortnight ago. Felt slightly fragile for a day, but vaccination is supposed to provoke an immune response. It is the whole point!
Sure, post vaccine myocarditis and other side effects exist, but myocarditis etc is an even more frequent complication of the virus itself.
The infectivity is such that about 50% will now get it every year, and like flu the antigenic shift means that immunity fades. I reckon on annual boosters from now on. Anti-vaxxers can make their choice. It's their funeral.
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.
Give him a break, @squareroot2's world order is disintegrating before his eyes as Truss is being mad enough to give that neoliberal bollocks a try - with the inevitable disastrous consequences.
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 .
And do you ever wonder why @Farooq and nobody else is?
And do you ever wonder why lots of others here comment on your posts in the same way as I do from posters ranging from the left to the right?
You only have to look at your obnoxious reply to what was a reasonably positive post to you.
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.
That's very arguable (on Germany, that is).
Germany always had a strong militaristic tradition and although clearly delineated, its civil institutions were actually very weak compared to the army. For example, the Reichstag under the Empire had no power over the government, and during the Weimar era the Presidency ruled without the Reichstag altogether under Article 48 on many occasions long before Hitler came to power. And the President was elected because he was an ex military commander.
Germany also always had a highly expansionist outlook, including annexing large chunks of territory from its neighbours. They launched WWI (yes, they did, that's been an argument pretty much done and dusted for 60 years ever since Fischer published his book on the subject and Ritter was caught forging and destroying documents to rebut it) very largely in the hope of annexing more territory in Poland, Belgium and France.
Without wishing to be all AJP Taylor about this, one of the more troubling features of Nazism is how many of its policies followed quite naturally from those of earlier generations of German rulers.
I was just thinking about how things may evolve. The tories seem hell bent on doubling down. The possible outcome seems to be to shore up their base of wealthy southern and rural constituencies. (although even if this is the case, they are going in to an unwise battle with them over planning reform - which makes you wonder, is there any political strategy at all?). But I wondered... looking at the regional polling that came out yesterday, what is the likelihood of an 'independent group' of red wall tory MPs forming? Could this be the end game for the current 'growth plans'?
The southern base is far, far from safe and not just due to planning but demographics - many seats' populations of young professionals priced out of London are growing in formerly solid commuter towns - and spending most of the time since the referendum taking liberal Conservatives (which many in the south are) for granted and insulting them. There maybe a similar parallel with Labour losing its northern heartlands after ignoring them for too long - they might shore it up, but these aren't the kind of policies that will help, as there are very few libertarians, and fewer still who'll put that ahead of their kids' school, NHS wait times, or a rocketing mortgage. Rather they might precipitate a far swifter collapse than Labour managed until Corbyn was fully let rip.
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.
It’s fascinating how quickly Jurassic Park became out of date. Not all dinosaurs were feathered, but a significant number were. I used to have dinosaur books which pictured T-Rex standing upright, rather than the more modern horizontal positioning.
On that score Jurassic Park was out of date before it was even made - in spite of leaning heavily on the new theories that were circulating at the time about warm blooded dinosaurs. They made great use of the ideas of Bob Bakker who was one of the original proponents of the warm blooded dinosaur hypothesis and which included feathered dinosaurs. They seem to have made a conscious decision not to push things too far away from the traditional view of dinosaurs and so limited the use of feathers and fur.
They pay a direct homage to Bakker in the second film by having one of the experts who returns to the island based on him including his distinictive looks.
Just checked my memory and the film did indeed come out in 1993 by when feathers in at least some theropods (and obviously Archaeopteryx) were very much accepted. So a timelag of maybe a decade or so after Bakker's book (1975?) and the ensuing debates. Though it was also about that time (early 1990s) that the first Liaoning fossils were being discovered to reinforce the point re feathers in dinos, and in due course to extend it considerably. Very nice online talk here by Prof Mike Benton btw.
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.
The chances of nuclear annihilation depend on our evaluation of three things.
1. Is Putin mad enough to do it?
2. Will anyone in the chain of command refuse the order, or do we believe if the order is given, it will be followed?
3. Does Russia actually have the operational capability to fire its nukes?
With regard to 1, Putin is clearly behaving irrationally and has been since the start of the war. He's clearly capable of issuing the order. There is also the good kamil galeev thread on Twitter about how a tactical nuke would provoke such a response from the west, it would allow Putin to de-escalate the war, thus saving face.
As far as 2 goes, we don't know. There's a rather high chance if Putin ordered a full first strike of strategic nukes it would be refused. But battlefield nukes? We know from the M388 US Davy Crockett that these things are man portable. It's not the same process as tactical nukes. Could Putin order his generals to deploy tactical nukes on the battlefield and is there a reasonable possibility he will be obeyed? Yes, absolutely. If NATO then responds with a devastating conventional attack, e.g. sinking the Black Sea Fleet, cruise missile strikes on military targets, etc, it is very possible that leads to an escalation that sees people within the chain of command more willing to follow orders to use strategic nukes, or an accident - e.g. a cruise missile being mistaken for a nuclear first strike, leading to a response.
3. The big unknown. Having seen the state of most Russian materiel can we assume their nuclear arsenal is in a similar, poorly-maintained state? Probably. But do we want to find out?
"WORKERS in essential services will be downgraded from heroes to low-skilled by Easter if vaccinations continue at their current rate, it has been confirmed."
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.
That is better than four months ago when they accidentally decided to close 100% of them through administrative incompetence.
Do they honestly think
I cut it to that because 'no' is such a simple answer.
I was talking to a friend last night, also a retired teacher. We were trying to decide whether the DfE's actions on education showed malice or mind-bending stupidity.
We came to the conclusion (a) it's impossible to say and (b) it doesn't matter an awful lot given the effect is much the same.
(For what it's worth, I suspect it's genuine ignorance coupled with intellectual laziness, typical Whitehall arrogance and complacency. Which doesn't necessarily equal stupidity but in practical terms is indistinguishable from it.)
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.
Boris was brought down by his own party because he was a lying, lazy arse and his ratings had headed south and was taking the party down with him.
Truss has the zeal of the converted and is nothing more than a puppet of ERG. To repeat myself, let's see how it plays out when voters finally see the face behind the Brexit mask.
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.
Part of the problem is that there has been no moral recovery from Stalin, who really was just as evil as Hitler.
Instead of atoning for the crimes of Stalinism and Communism, Putin has mostly repeated those crimes. This is why I use the word "moral" crisis. There has been no truth and reconciliation, but instead a glorification of the KGB and other criminals. Unless this is ended, Russia can never recover. I have many Russophone friends who now refuse to engage with any Russian culture because whatever the glories of Bulgakov, Tshaikovsky etc, everything is overlaid with the continuing brutality of thugs like Stalin, Beria and indeed Putin. As one said, who cares about the ballet when they are rebuilding the GULAG? The collapse of Russian soft power is just as remarkable as any other part of this Russian disaster.
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 .
And do you ever wonder why @Farooq and nobody else is?
And do you ever wonder why lots of others here comment on your posts in the same way as I do from posters ranging from the left to the right?
You only have to look at your obnoxious reply to what was a reasonably positive post to you.
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.
That's very arguable (on Germany, that is).
Germany always had a strong militaristic tradition and although clearly delineated, its civil institutions were actually very weak compared to the army. For example, the Reichstag under the Empire had no power over the government, and during the Weimar era the Presidency ruled without the Reichstag altogether under Article 48 on many occasions long before Hitler came to power. And the President was elected because he was an ex military commander.
Germany also always had a highly expansionist outlook, including annexing large chunks of territory from its neighbours. They launched WWI (yes, they did, that's been an argument pretty much done and dusted for 60 years ever since Fischer published his book on the subject and Ritter was caught forging and destroying documents to rebut it) very largely in the hope of annexing more territory in Poland, Belgium and France.
Without wishing to be all AJP Taylor about this, one of the more troubling features of Nazism is how many of its policies followed quite naturally from those of earlier generations of German rulers.
But Germany's expansionist impulses were much more in line with the Zeitgeist. How does Russia's behaviour today stack up against what is expected of states in the third decade of this century? Context matters somewhat.
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.
That's very arguable (on Germany, that is).
Germany always had a strong militaristic tradition and although clearly delineated, its civil institutions were actually very weak compared to the army. For example, the Reichstag under the Empire had no power over the government, and during the Weimar era the Presidency ruled without the Reichstag altogether under Article 48 on many occasions long before Hitler came to power. And the President was elected because he was an ex military commander.
Germany also always had a highly expansionist outlook, including annexing large chunks of territory from its neighbours. They launched WWI (yes, they did, that's been an argument pretty much done and dusted for 60 years ever since Fischer published his book on the subject and Ritter was caught forging and destroying documents to rebut it) very largely in the hope of annexing more territory in Poland, Belgium and France.
Without wishing to be all AJP Taylor about this, one of the more troubling features of Nazism is how many of its policies followed quite naturally from those of earlier generations of German rulers.
But Germany's expansionist impulses were much more in line with the Zeitgeist. How does Russia's behaviour today stack up against what is expected of states in the third decade of this century? Context matters somewhat.
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?
More importantly, Tritium has a short half-life of about 12 years. I wonder how good the replenishment schedules are?
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.
Boris was brought down by his own party because he was a lying, lazy arse and his ratings had headed south and was taking the party down with him.
Truss has the zeal of the converted and is nothing more than a puppet of ERG. To repeat myself, let's see how it plays out when voters finally see the face behind the Brexit mask.
I think it very likely this government will take down Brexit with it. Certainly the "Singapore on Thames" version, but also the Red Wall Autarky version too. Over the next 10 years we will move ever closer to the Single Market, to the point where Rejoin to have a say in the rules becomes the obvious next step.
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.
That is surely true. On my one and only visit so far to a PB social I met a few posters I had sparred with several times, not always politely. They all turned out to be terribly nice people, somewhat disappointingly.
Regarding indicators of when to drop everything and bug out, other possibilities as well as those already mentioned include
- a provocation against (or ascribed to) Russian speakers in NATO countries (especially where geographically concentrated, such as in Ida-Viru in Estonia, which adjoins the Russian border, but also in Latvia), or in non-NATO countries such as Moldova (Transnistria), or
- a provocation in territories annexed by Russia in 1945 such as Vyborg (formerly in Finland) or Kaliningrad (surrounded on land by NATO members).
A terrorist attack in any of these places could have horrendous knock-on effects. Or not even a terrorist attack. In Estonia see a couple of incidents involving statues.
Lyman and the rest of the front line are scary enough, but what's also scary is the volatility all over the place, with several possible trigger points across Europe.
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.
Give him a break, @squareroot2's world order is disintegrating before his eyes as Truss is being mad enough to give that neoliberal bollocks a try - with the inevitable disastrous consequences.
That's not the case either. The Tories have been in power for too long. This is the inevitable consequence of being in power and running outbof ideas . The tax cuts are meaningless and will do sfa. The 50 billion cost which probably isn't true spooked the markets. The media, post lying Boris have been waiting to bring the Tories down. Frankly it makes no odds to me whether it's Labour or Tories in power, I am In the same boat as many people. The Tories are talking about screwing pensioners. Frankly I am likely to be better off under Labour ...
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.
That's very arguable (on Germany, that is).
Germany always had a strong militaristic tradition and although clearly delineated, its civil institutions were actually very weak compared to the army. For example, the Reichstag under the Empire had no power over the government, and during the Weimar era the Presidency ruled without the Reichstag altogether under Article 48 on many occasions long before Hitler came to power. And the President was elected because he was an ex military commander.
Germany also always had a highly expansionist outlook, including annexing large chunks of territory from its neighbours. They launched WWI (yes, they did, that's been an argument pretty much done and dusted for 60 years ever since Fischer published his book on the subject and Ritter was caught forging and destroying documents to rebut it) very largely in the hope of annexing more territory in Poland, Belgium and France.
Without wishing to be all AJP Taylor about this, one of the more troubling features of Nazism is how many of its policies followed quite naturally from those of earlier generations of German rulers.
But Germany's expansionist impulses were much more in line with the Zeitgeist. How does Russia's behaviour today stack up against what is expected of states in the third decade of this century? Context matters somewhat.
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.
Also we're back to a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma, at least as far as the Russian people goes. While lots of Russians are undertandably reluctant to meet a sordid death in a Ukrainian sunflower field and there are pockets of protest, I can't (admittedly from a great and poorly informed distance) really discern any strong distaste for Putin or the nationalist project.
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.
Part of the problem is that there has been no moral recovery from Stalin, who really was just as evil as Hitler.
Instead of atoning for the crimes of Stalinism and Communism, Putin has mostly repeated those crimes. This is why I use the word "moral" crisis. There has been no truth and reconciliation, but instead a glorification of the KGB and other criminals. Unless this is ended, Russia can never recover. I have many Russophone friends who now refuse to engage with any Russian culture because whatever the glories of Bulgakov, Tshaikovsky etc, everything is overlaid with the continuing brutality of thugs like Stalin, Beria and indeed Putin. As one said, who cares about the ballet when they are rebuilding the GULAG? The collapse of Russian soft power is just as remarkable as any other part of this Russian disaster.
Today's Russia - and its actions - are yet another warning of the dangers of Communism. I am not claiming that the current Russian government is Communist - far from - but the leaders and apparatchiks were all born and raised in the Communist system. A failed system that routinely lied to its citizens.
Putin's Russia takes all those ideas and runs with them. As Soviet Russia lied and mistreated its citizens, so does Putin's Russia. As the leaders and politburo members were relatively rich (and well fed!) in the Communist era, so are Putin and his cronies. The people don't matter; what matters is power.
Communism is very little different to fascism. It is fascism with a 'friendly' face; a system that has failed every time it has been tried, to the cost of millions of lives.
I despise fascists. I despise Communists in exactly the same manner. There's no difference between the end results of both systems: chaos, misery and death.
I was just thinking about how things may evolve. The tories seem hell bent on doubling down. The possible outcome seems to be to shore up their base of wealthy southern and rural constituencies. (although even if this is the case, they are going in to an unwise battle with them over planning reform - which makes you wonder, is there any political strategy at all?). But I wondered... looking at the regional polling that came out yesterday, what is the likelihood of an 'independent group' of red wall tory MPs forming? Could this be the end game for the current 'growth plans'?
The southern base is far, far from safe and not just due to planning but demographics - many seats' populations of young professionals priced out of London are growing in formerly solid commuter towns - and spending most of the time since the referendum taking liberal Conservatives (which many in the south are) for granted and insulting them. There maybe a similar parallel with Labour losing its northern heartlands after ignoring them for too long - they might shore it up, but these aren't the kind of policies that will help, as there are very few libertarians, and fewer still who'll put that ahead of their kids' school, NHS wait times, or a rocketing mortgage. Rather they might precipitate a far swifter collapse than Labour managed until Corbyn was fully let rip.
I don't really understand the Tories' strategy. Most people I know who are benefiting from the tax cut think it's stupid and don't want the money. How they can justify it when public services are falling apart and so many people are struggling is mystifying. The only explanation is that they are actually utter psychopaths. I think they have fundamentally misread the British character.
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. I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
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.
Also we're back to a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma, at least as far as the Russian people goes. While lots of Russians are undertandably reluctant to meet a sordid death in a Ukrainian sunflower field and there are pockets of protest, I can't (admittedly from a great and poorly informed distance) really discern any strong distaste for Putin or the nationalist project.
" I can't (admittedly from a great and poorly informed distance) really discern any strong distaste for Putin or the nationalist project."
I'd argue you wouldn't have detected any strong distaste against the Romanian regime before 1989 - the media was controlled too strongly for 'distaste' to leak out - and especially with the knowledge that showing distaste might prove detrimental to your wellbeing.
Yet Ceaușescu fell in a ridiculously short period in late 1989.
The Internet 'helps' information get out, but we only see a tiny proportion of the feeling - and that's mostly those Russians who speak in English, and therefore somewhat western-leaning. I'd like to think (though cannot be sure) that if I was a Russian today, I'd be furious with Putin, but also very quiescent.
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
So?
You might like to try the diet you might feel better
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. I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Mrs C and I had our flu vaccinations and autumn Covid 10 days ago. I was talking to the senior partner at our practice about my current problems and she remarked that they had some Corvid vaccine in and "would I like it it ". So we had it done. I'm fine, as usual with these things, but my wife has developed a cold. I don't think that's related to the Covid vaccination!
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.
He wasn't referring to the UN charter.
Nor am I sure about the interpretation of the solemn faces as indicating a shared belief that Putin is screwing everything up. They were consistent with a shared expectation that the war will get a lot worse. No cause for jubilation there.
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.
Part of the problem is that there has been no moral recovery from Stalin, who really was just as evil as Hitler.
Instead of atoning for the crimes of Stalinism and Communism, Putin has mostly repeated those crimes. This is why I use the word "moral" crisis. There has been no truth and reconciliation, but instead a glorification of the KGB and other criminals. Unless this is ended, Russia can never recover. I have many Russophone friends who now refuse to engage with any Russian culture because whatever the glories of Bulgakov, Tshaikovsky etc, everything is overlaid with the continuing brutality of thugs like Stalin, Beria and indeed Putin. As one said, who cares about the ballet when they are rebuilding the GULAG? The collapse of Russian soft power is just as remarkable as any other part of this Russian disaster.
Today's Russia - and its actions - are yet another warning of the dangers of Communism. I am not claiming that the current Russian government is Communist - far from - but the leaders and apparatchiks were all born and raised in the Communist system. A failed system that routinely lied to its citizens.
Putin's Russia takes all those ideas and runs with them. As Soviet Russia lied and mistreated its citizens, so does Putin's Russia. As the leaders and politburo members were relatively rich (and well fed!) in the Communist era, so are Putin and his cronies. The people don't matter; what matters is power.
Communism is very little different to fascism. It is fascism with a 'friendly' face; a system that has failed every time it has been tried, to the cost of millions of lives.
I despise fascists. I despise Communists in exactly the same manner. There's no difference between the end results of both systems: chaos, misery and death.
I agree with a lot of what you say but a corollary of your equating fascism and communism is that we shouldn't have sided with the USSR to defeat the Nazis and I think that is incorrect. Naziism was on a different plane of evil. All totalitarian systems become evil through implementation but the Nazis' ideas about racial supiority made them evil in intent.
Thank you @POTUSfor signing into law $12.35 bln in supplemental support for 🇺🇦. The day before, the bill was backed by both houses of 🇺🇸 Congress. We appreciate this powerful act of solidarity of the 🇺🇸 people with 🇺🇦. And the bicameral and bipartisan support of our state. 1/2 https://mobile.twitter.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/1576118391387357184
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.
Part of the problem is that there has been no moral recovery from Stalin, who really was just as evil as Hitler.
Instead of atoning for the crimes of Stalinism and Communism, Putin has mostly repeated those crimes. This is why I use the word "moral" crisis. There has been no truth and reconciliation, but instead a glorification of the KGB and other criminals. Unless this is ended, Russia can never recover. I have many Russophone friends who now refuse to engage with any Russian culture because whatever the glories of Bulgakov, Tshaikovsky etc, everything is overlaid with the continuing brutality of thugs like Stalin, Beria and indeed Putin. As one said, who cares about the ballet when they are rebuilding the GULAG? The collapse of Russian soft power is just as remarkable as any other part of this Russian disaster.
Today's Russia - and its actions - are yet another warning of the dangers of Communism. I am not claiming that the current Russian government is Communist - far from - but the leaders and apparatchiks were all born and raised in the Communist system. A failed system that routinely lied to its citizens.
Putin's Russia takes all those ideas and runs with them. As Soviet Russia lied and mistreated its citizens, so does Putin's Russia. As the leaders and politburo members were relatively rich (and well fed!) in the Communist era, so are Putin and his cronies. The people don't matter; what matters is power.
Communism is very little different to fascism. It is fascism with a 'friendly' face; a system that has failed every time it has been tried, to the cost of millions of lives.
I despise fascists. I despise Communists in exactly the same manner. There's no difference between the end results of both systems: chaos, misery and death.
You're right, of course, to despise both. But don't pretend that they are similar. Yes, you can find similarities but you can find similarities too with liberal democracies if that is your wont. In terms of human misery, of course you don't care whether you're being wiped out by fascists or communists, but the reason the distinction matters and matters profoundly is because they both need to be defeated and defeating them requires different stances. Fascism and communism have different models of legitimacy and it's by targeting these foundations that you bring them down.
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
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.
He wasn't referring to the UN charter.
Nor am I sure about the interpretation of the solemn faces as indicating a shared belief that Putin is screwing everything up. They were consistent with a shared expectation that the war will get a lot worse. No cause for jubilation there.
Putin may have told them to look miserable as part of his psychological warfare operation
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
Well, I am currently boosting my immunity the other way
I appear to be over it all now. Made chicken and chips for dinner last night but just to be safe I have also made a large amount of HYFUD broth in the slow cooker overnight, lunch will be Cockaleekie with bread and butter. Yummy!!
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
Had my moderna shot on Thursday afternoon. 24 hours later got hit by a dreadful feeling of just feeling shit and under the weather. Lasted through the night and only just starting to feel normal this late morning. Same thing happened with pfizer last autumn.
Not pleasant, but I keep telling myself it is better than long covid.
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.
Part of the problem is that there has been no moral recovery from Stalin, who really was just as evil as Hitler.
Instead of atoning for the crimes of Stalinism and Communism, Putin has mostly repeated those crimes. This is why I use the word "moral" crisis. There has been no truth and reconciliation, but instead a glorification of the KGB and other criminals. Unless this is ended, Russia can never recover. I have many Russophone friends who now refuse to engage with any Russian culture because whatever the glories of Bulgakov, Tshaikovsky etc, everything is overlaid with the continuing brutality of thugs like Stalin, Beria and indeed Putin. As one said, who cares about the ballet when they are rebuilding the GULAG? The collapse of Russian soft power is just as remarkable as any other part of this Russian disaster.
Today's Russia - and its actions - are yet another warning of the dangers of Communism. I am not claiming that the current Russian government is Communist - far from - but the leaders and apparatchiks were all born and raised in the Communist system. A failed system that routinely lied to its citizens.
Putin's Russia takes all those ideas and runs with them. As Soviet Russia lied and mistreated its citizens, so does Putin's Russia. As the leaders and politburo members were relatively rich (and well fed!) in the Communist era, so are Putin and his cronies. The people don't matter; what matters is power.
Communism is very little different to fascism. It is fascism with a 'friendly' face; a system that has failed every time it has been tried, to the cost of millions of lives.
I despise fascists. I despise Communists in exactly the same manner. There's no difference between the end results of both systems: chaos, misery and death.
I agree with a lot of what you say but a corollary of your equating fascism and communism is that we shouldn't have sided with the USSR to defeat the Nazis and I think that is incorrect. Naziism was on a different plane of evil. All totalitarian systems become evil through implementation but the Nazis' ideas about racial supiority made them evil in intent.
I'm not saying that. In 1939-1945 Germany was the expansionist threat. The sad thing is that after the war, we let millions of good people in eastern European countries come under Stalin's evil thumb. That might have been unavoidable, though.
I'm also far from sure that Putin's doggerel about Russian superiority and homelands isn't just about some weird idea of Slavic superiority - although quietly said, given Russia's diverse ethnic makeup. But it's odd how the Slavic parts of the country are the richest, whilst those from the provinces are cannon-fodder who think toilets and washing machines are novelties.
I'm unsure the victims of the purges and the Holodomor would agree that Nazism was a different plane of evil.
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
Good for you...no need to tell everyone though...my dad doesnt broadcast to the world every time he has his flu jab
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.
Give him a break, @squareroot2's world order is disintegrating before his eyes as Truss is being mad enough to give that neoliberal bollocks a try - with the inevitable disastrous consequences.
That's not the case either. The Tories have been in power for too long. This is the inevitable consequence of being in power and running outbof ideas . The tax cuts are meaningless and will do sfa. The 50 billion cost which probably isn't true spooked the markets. The media, post lying Boris have been waiting to bring the Tories down. Frankly it makes no odds to me whether it's Labour or Tories in power, I am In the same boat as many people. The Tories are talking about screwing pensioners. Frankly I am likely to be better off under Labour ...
Fair enough.
The only part I disagree with is "The media, post lying Boris have been waiting to bring the Tories down." Some parts do and always have done but the DM and Express, and to a lesser extent the Telegraph are still holding out for a Tory recovery.
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.
Part of the problem is that there has been no moral recovery from Stalin, who really was just as evil as Hitler.
Instead of atoning for the crimes of Stalinism and Communism, Putin has mostly repeated those crimes. This is why I use the word "moral" crisis. There has been no truth and reconciliation, but instead a glorification of the KGB and other criminals. Unless this is ended, Russia can never recover. I have many Russophone friends who now refuse to engage with any Russian culture because whatever the glories of Bulgakov, Tshaikovsky etc, everything is overlaid with the continuing brutality of thugs like Stalin, Beria and indeed Putin. As one said, who cares about the ballet when they are rebuilding the GULAG? The collapse of Russian soft power is just as remarkable as any other part of this Russian disaster.
Today's Russia - and its actions - are yet another warning of the dangers of Communism. I am not claiming that the current Russian government is Communist - far from - but the leaders and apparatchiks were all born and raised in the Communist system. A failed system that routinely lied to its citizens.
Putin's Russia takes all those ideas and runs with them. As Soviet Russia lied and mistreated its citizens, so does Putin's Russia. As the leaders and politburo members were relatively rich (and well fed!) in the Communist era, so are Putin and his cronies. The people don't matter; what matters is power.
Communism is very little different to fascism. It is fascism with a 'friendly' face; a system that has failed every time it has been tried, to the cost of millions of lives.
I despise fascists. I despise Communists in exactly the same manner. There's no difference between the end results of both systems: chaos, misery and death.
You're right, of course, to despise both. But don't pretend that they are similar. Yes, you can find similarities but you can find similarities too with liberal democracies if that is your wont. In terms of human misery, of course you don't care whether you're being wiped out by fascists or communists, but the reason the distinction matters and matters profoundly is because they both need to be defeated and defeating them requires different stances. Fascism and communism have different models of legitimacy and it's by targeting these foundations that you bring them down.
They are similar IMO, although your point that the differences matter when combatting them is correct.
My point was that the 'end results' of the system are the same. Yet for some reason Communism is seen as being 'acceptable' in many circles.
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
Well, I am currently boosting my immunity the other way
I appear to be over it all now. Made chicken and chips for dinner last night but just to be safe I have also made a large amount of HYFUD broth in the slow cooker overnight, lunch will be Cockaleekie with bread and butter. Yummy!!
HYUFD broth? Did you render PB's favourite protofascist councillor down to stock?
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.
In my last (of many) discussions with @HYUFD I started to get a bit tetchy (as I have done many times before) and realised I was out of order and immediately apologised (twice). The discussion was a lot better as a consequence even though we disagreed.
It is difficult sometimes though with some posters as you will see from my reaction to the negativity of a particular poster.
We can be polite. It will get heated, but we can pull back from that, or if we fail, apologise after.
I see we are at the dressing up in working people's clothes and making regional visits with closely controlled video snippets stage of the premiership.
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.
Give him a break, @squareroot2's world order is disintegrating before his eyes as Truss is being mad enough to give that neoliberal bollocks a try - with the inevitable disastrous consequences.
That's not the case either. The Tories have been in power for too long. This is the inevitable consequence of being in power and running outbof ideas . The tax cuts are meaningless and will do sfa. The 50 billion cost which probably isn't true spooked the markets. The media, post lying Boris have been waiting to bring the Tories down. Frankly it makes no odds to me whether it's Labour or Tories in power, I am In the same boat as many people. The Tories are talking about screwing pensioners. Frankly I am likely to be better off under Labour ...
Fair enough.
The only part I disagree with is "The media, post lying Boris have been waiting to bring the Tories down." Some parts do and always have done but the DM and Express, and to a lesser extent the Telegraph are still holding out for a Tory recovery.
The Daily Express is not a newspaper imho so should be ignored, its vintentbus for those if weajend brains. , not as I understand it The Mail is a hate filled rag nit fitvyo venon the stands . Abd the Telegraph is owned by the Barclay Unsurprising that its the three you mention. They can hold out but it won't come unless Truss's plan has a miraculous recovery linked yo it.
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.
Also we're back to a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma, at least as far as the Russian people goes. While lots of Russians are undertandably reluctant to meet a sordid death in a Ukrainian sunflower field and there are pockets of protest, I can't (admittedly from a great and poorly informed distance) really discern any strong distaste for Putin or the nationalist project.
" I can't (admittedly from a great and poorly informed distance) really discern any strong distaste for Putin or the nationalist project."
I'd argue you wouldn't have detected any strong distaste against the Romanian regime before 1989 - the media was controlled too strongly for 'distaste' to leak out - and especially with the knowledge that showing distaste might prove detrimental to your wellbeing.
Yet Ceaușescu fell in a ridiculously short period in late 1989.
The Internet 'helps' information get out, but we only see a tiny proportion of the feeling - and that's mostly those Russians who speak in English, and therefore somewhat western-leaning. I'd like to think (though cannot be sure) that if I was a Russian today, I'd be furious with Putin, but also very quiescent.
Then again, if I was Russian, I wouldn't be me.
All we're both doing is drawing conclusions from a similarly poorly informed distance. Romania was just one crumbling foundation of the Soviet bloc, 2022 Russia is a special case. The whole rotten structure may come crashing down with one kick of the door as a famous person once incorrectly said, but authoritarian Russia has a strong track record of recovering and reasserting itself.
The Internet 'helps' information get out, but we only see a tiny proportion of the feeling - and that's mostly those Russians who speak in English, and therefore somewhat western-leaning. I'd like to think (though cannot be sure) that if I was a Russian today, I'd be furious with Putin, but also very quiescent.
Then again, if I was Russian, I wouldn't be me.
Based on what I see on my VK feed... there is a sullen and not very vocal anti-Putin group. However, at least 50% of this sentiment comes from the Nationalist Right who think shoeing the k*******s is a terrific idea but that it's just being executed incompetently with insufficient brutality.
There are also a significant group of reluctant Putinists who generally detest the Thieving Dwarf of German extraction but will rally behind him because they've been told the SMO is an existential struggle of Russia vs NATO. Which, in a sense, it now is.
I see we are at the dressing up in working people's clothes and making regional visits with closely controlled video snippets stage of the premiership.
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. I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
How long until the effect of a booster wanes? I would like mine to be giving a good strong resistance in December January. When is the ideal time to be boosted? I've had 2 AZ and 0.5 Moderna booster, not to mention Covid in December '21
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
Well, I am currently boosting my immunity the other way
I appear to be over it all now. Made chicken and chips for dinner last night but just to be safe I have also made a large amount of HYFUD broth in the slow cooker overnight, lunch will be Cockaleekie with bread and butter. Yummy!!
HYUFD broth? Did you render PB's favourite protofascist councillor down to stock?
At least the aspiring-to-posh HYUFD can say if he doesn't come from good stock he at least makes good stock.
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.
Is that a genuine account for James Delingpole? Never heard of a Knight Commander of the Garter before. If it is genuine, why does he call himself that? Some kind of Spectator joke?
The Internet 'helps' information get out, but we only see a tiny proportion of the feeling - and that's mostly those Russians who speak in English, and therefore somewhat western-leaning. I'd like to think (though cannot be sure) that if I was a Russian today, I'd be furious with Putin, but also very quiescent.
Then again, if I was Russian, I wouldn't be me.
Based on what I see on my VK feed... there is a sullen and not very vocal anti-Putin group. However, at least 50% of this sentiment comes from the Nationalist Right who think shoeing the k*******s is a terrific idea but that it's just being executed incompetently with insufficient brutality.
There are also a significant group of reluctant Putinists who generally detest the Thieving Dwarf of German extraction but will rally behind him because they've been told the SMO is an existential struggle of Russia vs NATO. Which, in a sense, it now is.
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
Well, I am currently boosting my immunity the other way
I appear to be over it all now. Made chicken and chips for dinner last night but just to be safe I have also made a large amount of HYFUD broth in the slow cooker overnight, lunch will be Cockaleekie with bread and butter. Yummy!!
HYUFD broth? Did you render PB's favourite protofascist councillor down to stock?
Back before the vaccines, a certain poster assured PB of the efficacy of broth as a roboratrive against the plague
I was just thinking about how things may evolve. The tories seem hell bent on doubling down. The possible outcome seems to be to shore up their base of wealthy southern and rural constituencies. (although even if this is the case, they are going in to an unwise battle with them over planning reform - which makes you wonder, is there any political strategy at all?). But I wondered... looking at the regional polling that came out yesterday, what is the likelihood of an 'independent group' of red wall tory MPs forming? Could this be the end game for the current 'growth plans'?
The southern base is far, far from safe and not just due to planning but demographics - many seats' populations of young professionals priced out of London are growing in formerly solid commuter towns - and spending most of the time since the referendum taking liberal Conservatives (which many in the south are) for granted and insulting them. There maybe a similar parallel with Labour losing its northern heartlands after ignoring them for too long - they might shore it up, but these aren't the kind of policies that will help, as there are very few libertarians, and fewer still who'll put that ahead of their kids' school, NHS wait times, or a rocketing mortgage. Rather they might precipitate a far swifter collapse than Labour managed until Corbyn was fully let rip.
I don't really understand the Tories' strategy. Most people I know who are benefiting from the tax cut think it's stupid and don't want the money. How they can justify it when public services are falling apart and so many people are struggling is mystifying. The only explanation is that they are actually utter psychopaths. I think they have fundamentally misread the British character.
And I don't understand why you don't understand it. Giving tax cuts to the already wealthy. Giving benefit cuts to scroungers. Cutting the public sector to the bone until it's ripe for privatisation. Lining further the pockets of the rich by cutting corporation tax. Encouraging greed. Increasing inequality of wealth and income. Levelling up my arse.
That's what Tories do, isn't it? That's why I'm not one.
The Internet 'helps' information get out, but we only see a tiny proportion of the feeling - and that's mostly those Russians who speak in English, and therefore somewhat western-leaning. I'd like to think (though cannot be sure) that if I was a Russian today, I'd be furious with Putin, but also very quiescent.
Then again, if I was Russian, I wouldn't be me.
Based on what I see on my VK feed... there is a sullen and not very vocal anti-Putin group. However, at least 50% of this sentiment comes from the Nationalist Right who think shoeing the k*******s is a terrific idea but that it's just being executed incompetently with insufficient brutality.
There are also a significant group of reluctant Putinists who generally detest the Thieving Dwarf of German extraction but will rally behind him because they've been told the SMO is an existential struggle of Russia vs NATO. Which, in a sense, it now is.
The problem is that even nowadays, perhaps less than 10% are actually 'vocal'. It's like trying to discern political sentiment off PB - and we see how often we've got it wrong. To make matters worse, we're pretty much free to sat what we want on here, and the biggest threat is the ban hammer (unless we go totally off-reservation and call **** ******* an utter ****** who ***** ***** and *****. Russians do not feel that freedom.
Most Americans say that former President Trump should not be allowed to serve another term in the White House in the near future, according to a new Yahoo News-YouGov poll.
With several investigations into Trump’s conduct ramping up, 51 percent of registered voters say that the allegations of wrongdoing are enough to preclude the former president from launching another campaign.
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
Well, I am currently boosting my immunity the other way
I appear to be over it all now. Made chicken and chips for dinner last night but just to be safe I have also made a large amount of HYFUD broth in the slow cooker overnight, lunch will be Cockaleekie with bread and butter. Yummy!!
HYUFD broth? Did you render PB's favourite protofascist councillor down to stock?
Back before the vaccines, a certain poster assured PB of the efficacy of broth as a roboratrive against the plague
I sincerely hope it works for you, although it's a disappointingly boring explanation given the possibilities.
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
Had my moderna shot on Thursday afternoon. 24 hours later got hit by a dreadful feeling of just feeling shit and under the weather. Lasted through the night and only just starting to feel normal this late morning. Same thing happened with pfizer last autumn.
Not pleasant, but I keep telling myself it is better than long covid.
Well vaccines are supposed to prompt an immune response. The latter is what makes you feel shit.
The Internet 'helps' information get out, but we only see a tiny proportion of the feeling - and that's mostly those Russians who speak in English, and therefore somewhat western-leaning. I'd like to think (though cannot be sure) that if I was a Russian today, I'd be furious with Putin, but also very quiescent.
Then again, if I was Russian, I wouldn't be me.
Based on what I see on my VK feed... there is a sullen and not very vocal anti-Putin group. However, at least 50% of this sentiment comes from the Nationalist Right who think shoeing the k*******s is a terrific idea but that it's just being executed incompetently with insufficient brutality.
There are also a significant group of reluctant Putinists who generally detest the Thieving Dwarf of German extraction but will rally behind him because they've been told the SMO is an existential struggle of Russia vs NATO. Which, in a sense, it now is.
The problem is that even nowadays, perhaps less than 10% are actually 'vocal'. It's like trying to discern political sentiment off PB - and we see how often we've got it wrong. To make matters worse, we're pretty much free to sat what we want on here, and the biggest threat is the ban hammer (unless we go totally off-reservation and call **** ******* an utter ****** who ***** ***** and *****. Russians do not feel that freedom.
You can say what the fuck you want on VK and Telegram without OMON coming round to kick the door of your khrushchoba in. If you share something from VoA, BBC, etc. it'll get taken down pretty quickly. Telegram don't give a toss and you can do what you want on that. Even though they have a no violence rule, it's not really enforced.
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
Had my moderna shot on Thursday afternoon. 24 hours later got hit by a dreadful feeling of just feeling shit and under the weather. Lasted through the night and only just starting to feel normal this late morning. Same thing happened with pfizer last autumn.
Not pleasant, but I keep telling myself it is better than long covid.
Well vaccines are supposed to prompt an immune response. The latter is what makes you feel shit.
Yeh, it's a good sign I suppose. Shows something happened when it went in.
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.
Part of the problem is that there has been no moral recovery from Stalin, who really was just as evil as Hitler.
Instead of atoning for the crimes of Stalinism and Communism, Putin has mostly repeated those crimes. This is why I use the word "moral" crisis. There has been no truth and reconciliation, but instead a glorification of the KGB and other criminals. Unless this is ended, Russia can never recover. I have many Russophone friends who now refuse to engage with any Russian culture because whatever the glories of Bulgakov, Tshaikovsky etc, everything is overlaid with the continuing brutality of thugs like Stalin, Beria and indeed Putin. As one said, who cares about the ballet when they are rebuilding the GULAG? The collapse of Russian soft power is just as remarkable as any other part of this Russian disaster.
The Soviet Union came out of WWII with a huge amount of international goodwill, which completely obscured the crimes of the 1930's. The onset of the Cold War diminished, but certainly did not destroy, that goodwill, particularly as the Soviets could claim to be anti-colonialists, and the West really did throw its weight behind some ghastly leaders in the Third World.
Obviously, where you are based, and in Eastern Europe generally, people have never had warm feelings towards the Soviet Union, given the dreadful treatment they received at its hands. It's remarkable really, how little venegeance was taken against Soviet collaborators.
I was just thinking about how things may evolve. The tories seem hell bent on doubling down. The possible outcome seems to be to shore up their base of wealthy southern and rural constituencies. (although even if this is the case, they are going in to an unwise battle with them over planning reform - which makes you wonder, is there any political strategy at all?). But I wondered... looking at the regional polling that came out yesterday, what is the likelihood of an 'independent group' of red wall tory MPs forming? Could this be the end game for the current 'growth plans'?
The southern base is far, far from safe and not just due to planning but demographics - many seats' populations of young professionals priced out of London are growing in formerly solid commuter towns - and spending most of the time since the referendum taking liberal Conservatives (which many in the south are) for granted and insulting them. There maybe a similar parallel with Labour losing its northern heartlands after ignoring them for too long - they might shore it up, but these aren't the kind of policies that will help, as there are very few libertarians, and fewer still who'll put that ahead of their kids' school, NHS wait times, or a rocketing mortgage. Rather they might precipitate a far swifter collapse than Labour managed until Corbyn was fully let rip.
I don't really understand the Tories' strategy. Most people I know who are benefiting from the tax cut think it's stupid and don't want the money. How they can justify it when public services are falling apart and so many people are struggling is mystifying. The only explanation is that they are actually utter psychopaths. I think they have fundamentally misread the British character.
And I don't understand why you don't understand it. Giving tax cuts to the already wealthy. Giving benefit cuts to scroungers. Cutting the public sector to the bone until it's ripe for privatisation. Lining further the pockets of the rich by cutting corporation tax. Encouraging greed.
That's what Tories do, isn't it? That's why I'm not one.
Except... it didn't used to be that way. Even Thatcher didn't entirely believe it- for her, the point of the Good Samaritan was that he had the money to give away, but that was because the assumption that the wealthy should be generous was taken as read. Dave's Big Society, TMay's JAMs, Boris's Levelling Up... they weren't entirely cant. In part, yes, but not entirely. There was at least an ackowledgement that the pile had real people at the bottom of it.
Yes, Conservatives have always gone for spending and taxing less, and (let's be honest) sweating human and material resources more than is healthy in the long term.
Most Americans say that former President Trump should not be allowed to serve another term in the White House in the near future, according to a new Yahoo News-YouGov poll.
With several investigations into Trump’s conduct ramping up, 51 percent of registered voters say that the allegations of wrongdoing are enough to preclude the former president from launching another campaign.
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.
It’s fascinating how quickly Jurassic Park became out of date. Not all dinosaurs were feathered, but a significant number were. I used to have dinosaur books which pictured T-Rex standing upright, rather than the more modern horizontal positioning.
On that score Jurassic Park was out of date before it was even made - in spite of leaning heavily on the new theories that were circulating at the time about warm blooded dinosaurs. They made great use of the ideas of Bob Bakker who was one of the original proponents of the warm blooded dinosaur hypothesis and which included feathered dinosaurs. They seem to have made a conscious decision not to push things too far away from the traditional view of dinosaurs and so limited the use of feathers and fur.
They pay a direct homage to Bakker in the second film by having one of the experts who returns to the island based on him including his distinictive looks.
Just checked my memory and the film did indeed come out in 1993 by when feathers in at least some theropods (and obviously Archaeopteryx) were very much accepted. So a timelag of maybe a decade or so after Bakker's book (1975?) and the ensuing debates. Though it was also about that time (early 1990s) that the first Liaoning fossils were being discovered to reinforce the point re feathers in dinos, and in due course to extend it considerably. Very nice online talk here by Prof Mike Benton btw.
Bakker is one of my scientific heroes. Challenged conventional orthodoxy in such a way that it was very difficult to argue against him. Proper science.
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
Well, I am currently boosting my immunity the other way
I appear to be over it all now. Made chicken and chips for dinner last night but just to be safe I have also made a large amount of HYFUD broth in the slow cooker overnight, lunch will be Cockaleekie with bread and butter. Yummy!!
HYUFD broth? Did you render PB's favourite protofascist councillor down to stock?
Back before the vaccines, a certain poster assured PB of the efficacy of broth as a roboratrive against the plague
I sincerely hope it works for you, although it's a disappointingly boring explanation given the possibilities.
The vaccines and boosters worked. I thought I had a cold and continued doing various jobs (and commenting on PB as well) without realising what I had. It was only when I found an old test kit that was due to expire in Apr 2023 that I decided to test myself. I laughed out loud when it was positive because by then I was over my "cold"
The broth is just because it is autumn and I like the recipe
Where are the Russians? Surrounded in the centre of town?
Sounds like many died attempting to escape the encirclement to Kreminna during the night. If there were 5,000 surrounded in Lyman yesterday, there are fewer today.
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.
Is that a genuine account for James Delingpole? Never heard of a Knight Commander of the Garter before. If it is genuine, why does he call himself that? Some kind of Spectator joke?
Also what does "BA" stand for?
Yes, I think it is a genuine account. Whether it's deliberate irony or not, I don't know.
But, I think we can guess who this diabolically cunning race are, who were responsible for both world wars, along with the next one.
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.
Part of the problem is that there has been no moral recovery from Stalin, who really was just as evil as Hitler.
Instead of atoning for the crimes of Stalinism and Communism, Putin has mostly repeated those crimes. This is why I use the word "moral" crisis. There has been no truth and reconciliation, but instead a glorification of the KGB and other criminals. Unless this is ended, Russia can never recover. I have many Russophone friends who now refuse to engage with any Russian culture because whatever the glories of Bulgakov, Tshaikovsky etc, everything is overlaid with the continuing brutality of thugs like Stalin, Beria and indeed Putin. As one said, who cares about the ballet when they are rebuilding the GULAG? The collapse of Russian soft power is just as remarkable as any other part of this Russian disaster.
The Soviet Union came out of WWII with a huge amount of international goodwill, which completely obscured the crimes of the 1930's. The onset of the Cold War diminished, but certainly did not destroy, that goodwill, particularly as the Soviets could claim to be anti-colonialists, and the West really did throw its weight behind some ghastly leaders in the Third World.
Obviously, where you are based, and in Eastern Europe generally, people have never had warm feelings towards the Soviet Union, given the dreadful treatment they received at its hands. It's remarkable really, how little venegeance was taken against Soviet collaborators.
The first paragraph is quite right; and it wasn't only goodwill earned by the Soviet union, but a recognition that governments in the 30s had made some horrendous mistakes. At least that's what many of the then older generation said.
I'm not quite sure that the second paragraph is as correct as the first; there appears to be, or to have been, some amount of support among the older generation for the Communist regimes because they compared well, in many respects, with what had gone before.
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.
Is that a genuine account for James Delingpole? Never heard of a Knight Commander of the Garter before. If it is genuine, why does he call himself that? Some kind of Spectator joke?
Also what does "BA" stand for?
Yes, I think it is a genuine account. Whether it's deliberate irony or not, I don't know.
But, I think we can guess who this diabolically cunning race are, who were responsible for both world wars, along with the next one.
It is Delingpole. He called the vaccine the clot shot on gb news. He has some "interesting" views to say the least
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.
Part of the problem is that there has been no moral recovery from Stalin, who really was just as evil as Hitler.
Instead of atoning for the crimes of Stalinism and Communism, Putin has mostly repeated those crimes. This is why I use the word "moral" crisis. There has been no truth and reconciliation, but instead a glorification of the KGB and other criminals. Unless this is ended, Russia can never recover. I have many Russophone friends who now refuse to engage with any Russian culture because whatever the glories of Bulgakov, Tshaikovsky etc, everything is overlaid with the continuing brutality of thugs like Stalin, Beria and indeed Putin. As one said, who cares about the ballet when they are rebuilding the GULAG? The collapse of Russian soft power is just as remarkable as any other part of this Russian disaster.
The Soviet Union came out of WWII with a huge amount of international goodwill, which completely obscured the crimes of the 1930's. The onset of the Cold War diminished, but certainly did not destroy, that goodwill, particularly as the Soviets could claim to be anti-colonialists, and the West really did throw its weight behind some ghastly leaders in the Third World.
Obviously, where you are based, and in Eastern Europe generally, people have never had warm feelings towards the Soviet Union, given the dreadful treatment they received at its hands. It's remarkable really, how little venegeance was taken against Soviet collaborators.
The first paragraph is quite right; and it wasn't only goodwill earned by the Soviet union, but a recognition that governments in the 30s had made some horrendous mistakes. At least that's what many of the then older generation said.
I'm not quite sure that the second paragraph is as correct as the first; there appears to be, or to have been, some amount of support among the older generation for the Communist regimes because they compared well, in many respects, with what had gone before.
Nostalgia sometimes overpowers objective truth. People often want things to be like they were when they were 20, and it confuses them into thinking things must have been objectively better then.
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.
It’s fascinating how quickly Jurassic Park became out of date. Not all dinosaurs were feathered, but a significant number were. I used to have dinosaur books which pictured T-Rex standing upright, rather than the more modern horizontal positioning.
On that score Jurassic Park was out of date before it was even made - in spite of leaning heavily on the new theories that were circulating at the time about warm blooded dinosaurs. They made great use of the ideas of Bob Bakker who was one of the original proponents of the warm blooded dinosaur hypothesis and which included feathered dinosaurs. They seem to have made a conscious decision not to push things too far away from the traditional view of dinosaurs and so limited the use of feathers and fur.
They pay a direct homage to Bakker in the second film by having one of the experts who returns to the island based on him including his distinictive looks.
Just checked my memory and the film did indeed come out in 1993 by when feathers in at least some theropods (and obviously Archaeopteryx) were very much accepted. So a timelag of maybe a decade or so after Bakker's book (1975?) and the ensuing debates. Though it was also about that time (early 1990s) that the first Liaoning fossils were being discovered to reinforce the point re feathers in dinos, and in due course to extend it considerably. Very nice online talk here by Prof Mike Benton btw.
Where are the Russians? Surrounded in the centre of town?
Sounds like many died attempting to escape the encirclement to Kreminna during the night. If there were 5,000 surrounded in Lyman yesterday, there are fewer today.
S&P: “for now it is unclear whether the government plans to ultimately introduce fiscal consolidation measures to bring debt back on a downward path and we assume that the package will be funded by debt, as announced.”
You should get on the phone to them and tell them that she just doesn't give a fuck and really is going to slash the state's liabilities.
@williamglenn have you changed your mind* about the plan, then?
I ask because if you have I’m impressed - as I recall you were one of the few defenders a few days ago - an entrenched position that it is hard to row back from.
If you haven’t, and still support her plan, I find your quoted comment very surprising. Slashing the state’s liabilities is, I agree, the logical consequence of her actions so far. But it’s also morally bankrupt. Utterly so.
*if you never supported her plan in the first place, apologies. I think you did, but it’s been a busy few days, I might be mistaken.
In that particular comment I was just pointing out that Scott has a different view to the ratings agencies.
On the budget, I would still defend it in a devil's advocate way. It was obviously politically inept to do something that was seen as a giveaway to the rich at this time, but I think that returning to a simpler two-tier income tax system is a good thing.
@williamglenn just catching up, thanks for the reply
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.
Part of the problem is that there has been no moral recovery from Stalin, who really was just as evil as Hitler.
Instead of atoning for the crimes of Stalinism and Communism, Putin has mostly repeated those crimes. This is why I use the word "moral" crisis. There has been no truth and reconciliation, but instead a glorification of the KGB and other criminals. Unless this is ended, Russia can never recover. I have many Russophone friends who now refuse to engage with any Russian culture because whatever the glories of Bulgakov, Tshaikovsky etc, everything is overlaid with the continuing brutality of thugs like Stalin, Beria and indeed Putin. As one said, who cares about the ballet when they are rebuilding the GULAG? The collapse of Russian soft power is just as remarkable as any other part of this Russian disaster.
The Soviet Union came out of WWII with a huge amount of international goodwill, which completely obscured the crimes of the 1930's. The onset of the Cold War diminished, but certainly did not destroy, that goodwill, particularly as the Soviets could claim to be anti-colonialists, and the West really did throw its weight behind some ghastly leaders in the Third World.
Obviously, where you are based, and in Eastern Europe generally, people have never had warm feelings towards the Soviet Union, given the dreadful treatment they received at its hands. It's remarkable really, how little venegeance was taken against Soviet collaborators.
The first paragraph is quite right; and it wasn't only goodwill earned by the Soviet union, but a recognition that governments in the 30s had made some horrendous mistakes. At least that's what many of the then older generation said.
I'm not quite sure that the second paragraph is as correct as the first; there appears to be, or to have been, some amount of support among the older generation for the Communist regimes because they compared well, in many respects, with what had gone before.
Not in the Baltic States or Czechoslovkia. These were countries as prosperous as the United Kingdom, pre WWII. Breaking up great estates might have generated some initial goodwill in other parts of Eastern Europe.
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.
Is that a genuine account for James Delingpole? Never heard of a Knight Commander of the Garter before. If it is genuine, why does he call himself that? Some kind of Spectator joke?
Also what does "BA" stand for?
Yes, I think it is a genuine account. Whether it's deliberate irony or not, I don't know.
But, I think we can guess who this diabolically cunning race are, who were responsible for both world wars, along with the next one.
It is Delingpole. He called the vaccine the clot shot on gb news. He has some "interesting" views to say the least
A Spectator person prone to alarmist conspiracy theories? Has this ever happened before?
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?
More importantly, Tritium has a short half-life of about 12 years. I wonder how good the replenishment schedules are?
To get the tritium to fuse, the first stage in a thermonuclear weapon is a fission explosion. H-bombs work by having an A-bomb compress the tritium enough for it to fuse. Thus, even if the tritium is missing, you get an atom bomb going off.
For me I reckon an 100 seat Labour majority doesn't seem out of the question.
If the election were this week you are probably right. But you are getting way ahead of yourself. Truss could double down and the Tories have a 1997-style melt down. On the other hand they could change leader early next year, steady the ship, and we end up with NOM.
Given the Tories track record since 2019 they deserve a good kicking but that doesn't necessarily mean they will get it.
Most Americans say that former President Trump should not be allowed to serve another term in the White House in the near future, according to a new Yahoo News-YouGov poll.
With several investigations into Trump’s conduct ramping up, 51 percent of registered voters say that the allegations of wrongdoing are enough to preclude the former president from launching another campaign.
I see the odious Clarke has been shooting his mouth "the state's far too big and too much welfare, it makes it harder for us to give tax cuts to the rich". Who he? A long streak of piss risen without trace, the North East's answer to Mogg
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
So?
You might like to try the diet you might feel better
Or alternatively, rather than follow diets that actual scientists doing proper research can find no evidence of efficacy for, you could exercise more and eat a bit less? Then you might find there are other ways of staying healthy...and you might feel better.
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.
Part of the problem is that there has been no moral recovery from Stalin, who really was just as evil as Hitler.
Instead of atoning for the crimes of Stalinism and Communism, Putin has mostly repeated those crimes. This is why I use the word "moral" crisis. There has been no truth and reconciliation, but instead a glorification of the KGB and other criminals. Unless this is ended, Russia can never recover. I have many Russophone friends who now refuse to engage with any Russian culture because whatever the glories of Bulgakov, Tshaikovsky etc, everything is overlaid with the continuing brutality of thugs like Stalin, Beria and indeed Putin. As one said, who cares about the ballet when they are rebuilding the GULAG? The collapse of Russian soft power is just as remarkable as any other part of this Russian disaster.
The Soviet Union came out of WWII with a huge amount of international goodwill, which completely obscured the crimes of the 1930's. The onset of the Cold War diminished, but certainly did not destroy, that goodwill, particularly as the Soviets could claim to be anti-colonialists, and the West really did throw its weight behind some ghastly leaders in the Third World.
Obviously, where you are based, and in Eastern Europe generally, people have never had warm feelings towards the Soviet Union, given the dreadful treatment they received at its hands. It's remarkable really, how little venegeance was taken against Soviet collaborators.
The first paragraph is quite right; and it wasn't only goodwill earned by the Soviet union, but a recognition that governments in the 30s had made some horrendous mistakes. At least that's what many of the then older generation said.
I'm not quite sure that the second paragraph is as correct as the first; there appears to be, or to have been, some amount of support among the older generation for the Communist regimes because they compared well, in many respects, with what had gone before.
Not in the Baltic States or Czechoslovkia. These were countries as prosperous as the United Kingdom, pre WWII. Breaking up great estates might have generated some initial goodwill in other parts of Eastern Europe.
I can think of no country that welcomed Communism. Many, including the Baltic and Ukraine, fought guerilla wars for nearly a decade after the end of WWII, Romania and Bulgaria also had resistance movements, like the Bulgarian Goryani.
There were rebellions in Poland: 1956, 1970, 1980, Hungary: 1956, East Germany: 1953, Czechoslovakia: 1953 and 1968, there were resistance movements: Solidarnosc, KOR, the Petofi circles, Charter 77, Ekoglasnost.
There was no legitimacy to the "Peoples Republics" or the SSRs and as soon as the guns were put away, the system collapsed.
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.
But the manifesto (levelling up etc) was very much towards one extreme of conservatism, and this is very much towards another extreme.
In your view is that not a problem? Again, genuinely interested, not trolling.
Manifestos are not binding. We elect representatives to use their best judgement.
The only places where direct democratic consent is needed is where they want to change the rules of the game - voting systems, Scottish independence, Brexit etc
@squareroot2@StillWaters thanks for the considered replies ( just catching up, family stuff took up the morning)
What you say makes sense, is important, and in a technical/legal sense you’re right.
Added to that, I can see the argument that, post covid and in the midst of Ukraine, following a manifesto written pre- that is bonkers.
But I still think there was a spirit or an ethos to the Conservative party in 2019 (broadly, we are out to make the country more equal, we believe our way is better than Labour’s). Now, the message explicitly is, levelling up is not the thing, growth however achieved is the thing.
Plus the tweet Scott copied earlier:
Simon Clarke is flagging return to austerity in @thetimes interview. But where’s the mandate?
Boris Johnson pledged govt would "not go back to the austerity of 10 years ago" in June 2020.
Truss said in July 2022: “I’m very clear I’m not planning public spending reductions”.
So whilst I agree that our democratic system allows eg a change in leader and some policies between elections (and this is in fact essential), the extent of the change, and the fact that it directly contradicts what (some) people thought they were voting for, pushes this argument beyond breaking point. I don’t think we’re dealing in absolutes here.
Having said all of that, I do now see why you took issue with the ‘absolutely no democratic consent’ bit. There clearly is, in at least a technical sense, democratic consent. I reckon you’d be howling if it was Labour pivoting towards zealotry in this way, though (as, I hope, would I!)
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
Good for you...no need to tell everyone though...my dad doesnt broadcast to the world every time he has his flu jab
It’s a PB tradition for posters to tell everyone when they’ve had a COVID jab. It goes down well, largely because it annoys the anti-vaxxers.
I see the odious Clarke has been shooting his mouth "the state's far too big and too much welfare, it makes it harder for us to give tax cuts to the rich". Who he? A long streak of piss risen without trace, the North East's answer to Mogg
He was only promoted by Boris so he could stand next to Sunak and make Sunak look even smaller. How seriously this lot take governing the country.....
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
Good for you...no need to tell everyone though...my dad doesnt broadcast to the world every time he has his flu jab
It’s a PB tradition for posters to tell everyone when they’ve had a COVID jab. It goes down well, largely because it annoys the anti-vaxxers.
Think its origins were in seeing how quickly the age groups were getting called, in the early days of the vaccine. Not so interesting now.
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.
Part of the problem is that there has been no moral recovery from Stalin, who really was just as evil as Hitler.
Instead of atoning for the crimes of Stalinism and Communism, Putin has mostly repeated those crimes. This is why I use the word "moral" crisis. There has been no truth and reconciliation, but instead a glorification of the KGB and other criminals. Unless this is ended, Russia can never recover. I have many Russophone friends who now refuse to engage with any Russian culture because whatever the glories of Bulgakov, Tshaikovsky etc, everything is overlaid with the continuing brutality of thugs like Stalin, Beria and indeed Putin. As one said, who cares about the ballet when they are rebuilding the GULAG? The collapse of Russian soft power is just as remarkable as any other part of this Russian disaster.
The Soviet Union came out of WWII with a huge amount of international goodwill, which completely obscured the crimes of the 1930's. The onset of the Cold War diminished, but certainly did not destroy, that goodwill, particularly as the Soviets could claim to be anti-colonialists, and the West really did throw its weight behind some ghastly leaders in the Third World.
Obviously, where you are based, and in Eastern Europe generally, people have never had warm feelings towards the Soviet Union, given the dreadful treatment they received at its hands. It's remarkable really, how little venegeance was taken against Soviet collaborators.
The first paragraph is quite right; and it wasn't only goodwill earned by the Soviet union, but a recognition that governments in the 30s had made some horrendous mistakes. At least that's what many of the then older generation said.
I'm not quite sure that the second paragraph is as correct as the first; there appears to be, or to have been, some amount of support among the older generation for the Communist regimes because they compared well, in many respects, with what had gone before.
Not in the Baltic States or Czechoslovkia. These were countries as prosperous as the United Kingdom, pre WWII. Breaking up great estates might have generated some initial goodwill in other parts of Eastern Europe.
I can think of no country that welcomed Communism. Many, including the Baltic and Ukraine, fought guerilla wars for nearly a decade after the end of WWII, Romania and Bulgaria also had resistance movements, like the Bulgarian Goryani.
There were rebellions in Poland: 1956, 1970, 1980, Hungary: 1956, East Germany: 1953, Czechoslovakia: 1953 and 1968, there were resistance movements: Solidarnosc, KOR, the Petofi circles, Charter 77, Ekoglasnost.
There was no legitimacy to the "Peoples Republics" or the SSRs and as soon as the guns were put away, the system collapsed.
Chile and Yugoslavia both legally elected Communist governments, in 1970 and 1945 respectively.
Venezuela could perhaps be added to that list, although whether Chavez was a communist, socialist, or just a narcissist remains open to question.
Edit - also, Russia *would* have elected a Communist government in 1917, but for the fact Lenin and Trotsky decided the Socialist Revolutionaries were the wrong sort of Communists.
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Same here. I will probably end up having to call the surgery even though they say 'please don't call us'.
Good for you...no need to tell everyone though...my dad doesnt broadcast to the world every time he has his flu jab
It’s a PB tradition for posters to tell everyone when they’ve had a COVID jab. It goes down well, largely because it annoys the anti-vaxxers.
Think its origins were in seeing how quickly the age groups were getting called, in the early days of the vaccine. Not so interesting now.
Also, in the early days, the differing reactions, from almost non-existent to a couple of days floored, may have played a part in convincing some to get it done. I was certainly interested in knowing what I might expect.
I was just thinking about how things may evolve. The tories seem hell bent on doubling down. The possible outcome seems to be to shore up their base of wealthy southern and rural constituencies. (although even if this is the case, they are going in to an unwise battle with them over planning reform - which makes you wonder, is there any political strategy at all?). But I wondered... looking at the regional polling that came out yesterday, what is the likelihood of an 'independent group' of red wall tory MPs forming? Could this be the end game for the current 'growth plans'?
The southern base is far, far from safe and not just due to planning but demographics - many seats' populations of young professionals priced out of London are growing in formerly solid commuter towns - and spending most of the time since the referendum taking liberal Conservatives (which many in the south are) for granted and insulting them. There maybe a similar parallel with Labour losing its northern heartlands after ignoring them for too long - they might shore it up, but these aren't the kind of policies that will help, as there are very few libertarians, and fewer still who'll put that ahead of their kids' school, NHS wait times, or a rocketing mortgage. Rather they might precipitate a far swifter collapse than Labour managed until Corbyn was fully let rip.
I don't really understand the Tories' strategy. Most people I know who are benefiting from the tax cut think it's stupid and don't want the money. How they can justify it when public services are falling apart and so many people are struggling is mystifying. The only explanation is that they are actually utter psychopaths. I think they have fundamentally misread the British character.
And I don't understand why you don't understand it. Giving tax cuts to the already wealthy. Giving benefit cuts to scroungers. Cutting the public sector to the bone until it's ripe for privatisation. Lining further the pockets of the rich by cutting corporation tax. Encouraging greed.
That's what Tories do, isn't it? That's why I'm not one.
Except... it didn't used to be that way. Even Thatcher didn't entirely believe it- for her, the point of the Good Samaritan was that he had the money to give away, but that was because the assumption that the wealthy should be generous was taken as read. Dave's Big Society, TMay's JAMs, Boris's Levelling Up... they weren't entirely cant. In part, yes, but not entirely. There was at least an ackowledgement that the pile had real people at the bottom of it.
Yes, Conservatives have always gone for spending and taxing less, and (let's be honest) sweating human and material resources more than is healthy in the long term.
But not like this.
Deeply rooted in the mindset of Truss and co. is the idea that governmental influence over the individual - be it the welfare system giving them money they wouldn't otherwise have, or the NHS deciding what happens to their bodies - is in itself deeply immoral. Moreover, it will always be harmful as governments are inherently inefficient and incompetent. Eradicate the governmental stuff and, after some initial jolts, the individual will shine and prosper as never before.
Comments
it is impossible both to elect for 5 years and expect government not to adjust to radical changes of circumstance, which these are.
That does not mean I agree with either Boris or LT.
And do you ever wonder why lots of others here comment on your posts in the same way as I do from posters ranging from the left to the right?
You only have to look at your obnoxious reply to what was a reasonably positive post to you.
I suppose the top 0.1% will cheer when they are exempted from all taxes using the money saved by the closing of everything
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.
I had mine a fortnight ago. Felt slightly fragile for a day, but vaccination is supposed to provoke an immune response. It is the whole point!
Sure, post vaccine myocarditis and other side effects exist, but myocarditis etc is an even more frequent complication of the virus itself.
The infectivity is such that about 50% will now get it every year, and like flu the antigenic shift means that immunity fades. I reckon on annual boosters from now on. Anti-vaxxers can make their choice. It's their funeral.
Germany always had a strong militaristic tradition and although clearly delineated, its civil institutions were actually very weak compared to the army. For example, the Reichstag under the Empire had no power over the government, and during the Weimar era the Presidency ruled without the Reichstag altogether under Article 48 on many occasions long before Hitler came to power. And the President was elected because he was an ex military commander.
Germany also always had a highly expansionist outlook, including annexing large chunks of territory from its neighbours. They launched WWI (yes, they did, that's been an argument pretty much done and dusted for 60 years ever since Fischer published his book on the subject and Ritter was caught forging and destroying documents to rebut it) very largely in the hope of annexing more territory in Poland, Belgium and France.
Without wishing to be all AJP Taylor about this, one of the more troubling features of Nazism is how many of its policies followed quite naturally from those of earlier generations of German rulers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9NMQf_RfZw
1. Is Putin mad enough to do it?
2. Will anyone in the chain of command refuse the order, or do we believe if the order is given, it will be followed?
3. Does Russia actually have the operational capability to fire its nukes?
With regard to 1, Putin is clearly behaving irrationally and has been since the start of the war. He's clearly capable of issuing the order. There is also the good kamil galeev thread on Twitter about how a tactical nuke would provoke such a response from the west, it would allow Putin to de-escalate the war, thus saving face.
As far as 2 goes, we don't know. There's a rather high chance if Putin ordered a full first strike of strategic nukes it would be refused. But battlefield nukes? We know from the M388 US Davy Crockett that these things are man portable. It's not the same process as tactical nukes. Could Putin order his generals to deploy tactical nukes on the battlefield and is there a reasonable possibility he will be obeyed? Yes, absolutely. If NATO then responds with a devastating conventional attack, e.g. sinking the Black Sea Fleet, cruise missile strikes on military targets, etc, it is very possible that leads to an escalation that sees people within the chain of command more willing to follow orders to use strategic nukes, or an accident - e.g. a cruise missile being mistaken for a nuclear first strike, leading to a response.
3. The big unknown. Having seen the state of most Russian materiel can we assume their nuclear arsenal is in a similar, poorly-maintained state? Probably. But do we want to find out?
https://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/work/key-workers-to-be-called-low-skilled-workers-again-by-easter-20210126204660
"WORKERS in essential services will be downgraded from heroes to low-skilled by Easter if vaccinations continue at their current rate, it has been confirmed."
I was talking to a friend last night, also a retired teacher. We were trying to decide whether the DfE's actions on education showed malice or mind-bending stupidity.
We came to the conclusion (a) it's impossible to say and (b) it doesn't matter an awful lot given the effect is much the same.
(For what it's worth, I suspect it's genuine ignorance coupled with intellectual laziness, typical Whitehall arrogance and complacency. Which doesn't necessarily equal stupidity but in practical terms is indistinguishable from it.)
Truss has the zeal of the converted and is nothing more than a puppet of ERG. To repeat myself, let's see how it plays out when voters finally see the face behind the Brexit mask.
Instead of atoning for the crimes of Stalinism and Communism, Putin has mostly repeated those crimes. This is why I use the word "moral" crisis. There has been no truth and reconciliation, but instead a glorification of the KGB and other criminals. Unless this is ended, Russia can never recover. I have many Russophone friends who now refuse to engage with any Russian culture because whatever the glories of Bulgakov, Tshaikovsky etc, everything is overlaid with the continuing brutality of thugs like Stalin, Beria and indeed Putin. As one said, who cares about the ballet when they are rebuilding the GULAG? The collapse of Russian soft power is just as remarkable as any other part of this Russian disaster.
Edited extra bit: bugger. Suspended market just as I was placing bets.
PS In fairness you have done some today.
That is surely true. On my one and only visit so far to a PB social I met a few posters I had sparred with several times, not always politely. They all turned out to be terribly nice people, somewhat disappointingly.
- a provocation against (or ascribed to) Russian speakers in NATO countries (especially where geographically concentrated, such as in Ida-Viru in Estonia, which adjoins the Russian border, but also in Latvia), or in non-NATO countries such as Moldova (Transnistria), or
- a provocation in territories annexed by Russia in 1945 such as Vyborg (formerly in Finland) or Kaliningrad (surrounded on land by NATO members).
A terrorist attack in any of these places could have horrendous knock-on effects. Or not even a terrorist attack. In Estonia see a couple of incidents involving statues.
Lyman and the rest of the front line are scary enough, but what's also scary is the volatility all over the place, with several possible trigger points across Europe.
Frankly it makes no odds to me whether it's Labour or Tories in power, I am In the same boat as many people. The Tories are talking about screwing pensioners. Frankly I am likely to be better off under Labour ...
Putin's Russia takes all those ideas and runs with them. As Soviet Russia lied and mistreated its citizens, so does Putin's Russia. As the leaders and politburo members were relatively rich (and well fed!) in the Communist era, so are Putin and his cronies. The people don't matter; what matters is power.
Communism is very little different to fascism. It is fascism with a 'friendly' face; a system that has failed every time it has been tried, to the cost of millions of lives.
I despise fascists. I despise Communists in exactly the same manner. There's no difference between the end results of both systems: chaos, misery and death.
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.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
I'd argue you wouldn't have detected any strong distaste against the Romanian regime before 1989 - the media was controlled too strongly for 'distaste' to leak out - and especially with the knowledge that showing distaste might prove detrimental to your wellbeing.
Yet Ceaușescu fell in a ridiculously short period in late 1989.
The Internet 'helps' information get out, but we only see a tiny proportion of the feeling - and that's mostly those Russians who speak in English, and therefore somewhat western-leaning. I'd like to think (though cannot be sure) that if I was a Russian today, I'd be furious with Putin, but also very quiescent.
Then again, if I was Russian, I wouldn't be me.
But harmful? Not a lot of evidence for that.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
Mrs C and I had our flu vaccinations and autumn Covid 10 days ago. I was talking to the senior partner at our practice about my current problems and she remarked that they had some Corvid vaccine in and "would I like it it ". So we had it done.
I'm fine, as usual with these things, but my wife has developed a cold. I don't think that's related to the Covid vaccination!
Nor am I sure about the interpretation of the solemn faces as indicating a shared belief that Putin is screwing everything up. They were consistent with a shared expectation that the war will get a lot worse. No cause for jubilation there.
https://mobile.twitter.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/1576118391387357184
In terms of human misery, of course you don't care whether you're being wiped out by fascists or communists, but the reason the distinction matters and matters profoundly is because they both need to be defeated and defeating them requires different stances. Fascism and communism have different models of legitimacy and it's by targeting these foundations that you bring them down.
I appear to be over it all now. Made chicken and chips for dinner last night but just to be safe I have also made a large amount of HYFUD broth in the slow cooker overnight, lunch will be Cockaleekie with bread and butter. Yummy!!
Not pleasant, but I keep telling myself it is better than long covid.
I'm also far from sure that Putin's doggerel about Russian superiority and homelands isn't just about some weird idea of Slavic superiority - although quietly said, given Russia's diverse ethnic makeup. But it's odd how the Slavic parts of the country are the richest, whilst those from the provinces are cannon-fodder who think toilets and washing machines are novelties.
I'm unsure the victims of the purges and the Holodomor would agree that Nazism was a different plane of evil.
The only part I disagree with is "The media, post lying Boris have been waiting to bring the Tories down." Some parts do and always have done but the DM and Express, and to a lesser extent the Telegraph are still holding out for a Tory recovery.
My point was that the 'end results' of the system are the same. Yet for some reason Communism is seen as being 'acceptable' in many circles.
It shouldn't be.
In my last (of many) discussions with @HYUFD I started to get a bit tetchy (as I have done many times before) and realised I was out of order and immediately apologised (twice). The discussion was a lot better as a consequence even though we disagreed.
It is difficult sometimes though with some posters as you will see from my reaction to the negativity of a particular poster.
We can be polite. It will get heated, but we can pull back from that, or if we fail, apologise after.
Unsurprising that its the three you mention.
They can hold out but it won't come unless Truss's plan has a miraculous recovery linked yo it.
Romania was just one crumbling foundation of the Soviet bloc, 2022 Russia is a special case. The whole rotten structure may come crashing down with one kick of the door as a famous person once incorrectly said, but authoritarian Russia has a strong track record of recovering and reasserting itself.
There are also a significant group of reluctant Putinists who generally detest the Thieving Dwarf of German extraction but will rally behind him because they've been told the SMO is an existential struggle of Russia vs NATO. Which, in a sense, it now is.
Ukraine at edge of Lyman confirmed
But harmful? Not a lot of evidence for that.
I’ll get mine too when offered. The NHS sent me a text saying “you’re due your Autumn booster” but the online form said I’m not….emailed the GP to see if they know.
How long until the effect of a booster wanes?
I would like mine to be giving a good strong resistance in December January. When is the ideal time to be boosted?
I've had 2 AZ and 0.5 Moderna booster, not to mention Covid in December '21
Also what does "BA" stand for?
That's what Tories do, isn't it? That's why I'm not one.
Most Americans say that former President Trump should not be allowed to serve another term in the White House in the near future, according to a new Yahoo News-YouGov poll.
With several investigations into Trump’s conduct ramping up, 51 percent of registered voters say that the allegations of wrongdoing are enough to preclude the former president from launching another campaign.
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/3669277-most-registered-voters-say-trump-shouldnt-be-allowed-to-serve-a-second-term-says-new-poll/
Obviously, where you are based, and in Eastern Europe generally, people have never had warm feelings towards the Soviet Union, given the dreadful treatment they received at its hands. It's remarkable really, how little venegeance was taken against Soviet collaborators.
Yes, Conservatives have always gone for spending and taxing less, and (let's be honest) sweating human and material resources more than is healthy in the long term.
But not like this.
I suspect the hardline Republicans would far rather have someone like De Santis, who is a clever, competent, version of Trump.
The broth is just because it is autumn and I like the recipe
But, I think we can guess who this diabolically cunning race are, who were responsible for both world wars, along with the next one.
At least that's what many of the then older generation said.
I'm not quite sure that the second paragraph is as correct as the first; there appears to be, or to have been, some amount of support among the older generation for the Communist regimes because they compared well, in many respects, with what had gone before.
Given the Tories track record since 2019 they deserve a good kicking but that doesn't necessarily mean they will get it.
You might even feel as healthy as I do...
There were rebellions in Poland: 1956, 1970, 1980, Hungary: 1956, East Germany: 1953, Czechoslovakia: 1953 and 1968, there were resistance movements: Solidarnosc, KOR, the Petofi circles, Charter 77, Ekoglasnost.
There was no legitimacy to the "Peoples Republics" or the SSRs and as soon as the guns were put away, the system collapsed.
What you say makes sense, is important, and in a technical/legal sense you’re right.
Added to that, I can see the argument that, post covid and in the midst of Ukraine, following a manifesto written pre- that is bonkers.
But I still think there was a spirit or an ethos to the Conservative party in 2019 (broadly, we are out to make the country more equal, we believe our way is better than Labour’s). Now, the message explicitly is, levelling up is not the thing, growth however achieved is the thing.
Plus the tweet Scott copied earlier:
Simon Clarke is flagging return to austerity in @thetimes interview. But where’s the mandate?
Boris Johnson pledged govt would "not go back to the austerity of 10 years ago" in June 2020.
Truss said in July 2022: “I’m very clear I’m not planning public spending reductions”.
https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1576120213069656065/photo/1
So whilst I agree that our democratic system allows eg a change in leader and some policies between elections (and this is in fact essential), the extent of the change, and the fact that it directly contradicts what (some) people thought they were voting for, pushes this argument beyond breaking point. I don’t think we’re dealing in absolutes here.
Having said all of that, I do now see why you took issue with the ‘absolutely no democratic consent’ bit. There clearly is, in at least a technical sense, democratic consent. I reckon you’d be howling if it was Labour pivoting towards zealotry in this way, though (as, I hope, would I!)
https://twitter.com/INTobservers/status/1576167196090245120
https://twitter.com/AlexKokcharov/status/1575980498450808832?s=20&t=fU97wMimAKa96DqaY0UnMA
Venezuela could perhaps be added to that list, although whether Chavez was a communist, socialist, or just a narcissist remains open to question.
Edit - also, Russia *would* have elected a Communist government in 1917, but for the fact Lenin and Trotsky decided the Socialist Revolutionaries were the wrong sort of Communists.
I was certainly interested in knowing what I might expect.
https://enormo-haddock.blogspot.com/2022/10/singapore-pre-qualifying-2022.html