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Memo to the Tories: Look stupid, it’s the economy – politicalbetting.com

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  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 43,378
    edited October 2022
    ...
  • WillGWillG Posts: 2,366

    Leon said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    DavidL said:

    On the way to Skye for a site visit. Up through the great glen and down to the sea lochs of the west. Sun glinting on the lochs and the waterfalls as the rain clouds dash through. Snow capping the highest peaks. Absolutely glorious. And now the rather brilliant Skye bridge.

    I am coming over all @SeanT : someone is paying me for this?

    Excellent. Maybe just change it thus:


    “On the way to Skye for a site visit. Up through the great glen and down to the sea lochs of the west. Sun glinting on the rough waters, and the cataracts, as the rain clouds dash through. Snow capping the highest peaks.”

    Avoiding the repetition of “loch” and “water” etc but adding a “ca” echo

    Thanks. But you must forgive mere lawyers some repetition; it is innate.

    Sometimes, when I don’t get here for a while you forget that this is truly one of the most beautiful countries in the world.

    Driving around Colorado these last days has reminded me how beautiful and fascinating the UK is - and in such a tiny space (despite our often horrible new houses)

    Parts of the Rockies are fab and I love the frontier feel here. But there are 100 mile stretches of Colorado where nothing happens. At all. Strip malls and inane residential development. That’s it. And it is quite bleak even in the dazzling sun

    The beer tho. American beer is maybe the best in the world now. Such incredible variety
    The British landscape genius, with the exception I guess of the Highlands etc, is the largely domesticated geography of church steeple and smoke issuing from chimneys in the “next village on”.

    It’s the feeling evoked by the that Adlestrop poem.

    Britain should do more of that.

    There is a urban genius too, of garden squares and pepperpot chimneys, think Mary Poppins.

    Britain should do more of that too.

    https://twitter.com/kelhamcooke/status/1581641036090454016?s=46&t=sdg6s_ZXBLFwMhGBbudIvA

    Britain's natural landscape is wonderful. Not just the majesty of the Highlands, Snowdonia etc. but just the Constable-style landscapes of little fields, rock walls and hedgerows. Far more beautiful than much of France and Germany even.

    What ruins Britain's look is all the 1960s brutalism. It blights the views of our wonderful Georgian architecture in our big cities, and makes a lot of small towns just look uniformly shit.
  • HYUFD said:

    I've heard the line 'Party X will lose the next general election, but that will just amount to a four-year holiday, and they'll be back when party Y royally screws up' many times before without it coming to pass.

    You obviously weren't around in the 1960s and 1970s then when we changed government 4 times in 15 years
    Though if you listen to May, Johnson and Truss, we've had three changes of government in the last six and a bit years, with a fourth quite possibly incoming.

    (Those with knowledge... was it like this during the '50s and '60s? Was Churchill - Eden - Macmillan - Home seen as four governments or one evolving government?)
  • HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Unlike 1997 however Labour would not be left with a largely balanced budget, low inflation and low taxes.

    Instead post Covid and Ukraine they too would have to reckon with the need to balance the books, increase taxes or cut spending or both

    Both, but the public would accept it on the wholly reasonable grounds that it wasn't their fault and they couldn't do much else.
    In theory, in reality the Labour left is not going to accept PM Starmer's government pursuing austerity and the average voter is not going to be too patient if their tax bill keeps going up either!
    That's certainly the usual problem. The question is how long they can hold off and deal with such pressures.

    I've a feeling we'll be finding out in due course.

    Congrats on the Council win in Epping Forest btw. It may not be especially significant but always nice to get 'one against the head'.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 42,679
    Leon said:

    DavidL said:

    On the way to Skye for a site visit. Up through the great glen and down to the sea lochs of the west. Sun glinting on the lochs and the waterfalls as the rain clouds dash through. Snow capping the highest peaks. Absolutely glorious. And now the rather brilliant Skye bridge.

    I am coming over all @SeanT : someone is paying me for this?

    Excellent. Maybe just change it thus:

    “On the way to Skye for a site visit. Up through the great glen and down to the sea lochs of the west. Sun glinting on the rough waters, and the cataracts, as the rain clouds dash through. Snow capping the highest peaks.”

    Avoiding the repetition of “loch” and “water” etc but adding a “ca” echo.

    And a full stop at the end. (now done)
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 43,504
    Leon said:

    TimS said:

    Leon said:

    It begins to look like the attempt to seize Kyiv, by invading from Belarus, will be renewed. I was confident that it wouldn't, but, well, wrong again most likely.

    OSINTdefender
    @sentdefender
    Massive Amounts of Russian Armor and Personnel have reportedly been observed arriving by Aircraft/Trains across Belarus over the last several days, while Russian Combat Aircraft have been spotted over multiple Cities in Country for the first time in months.


    https://twitter.com/sentdefender/status/1581628973401853952

    If the first time was a tragedy for the people of Bucha and Borodyanka, this will surely turn into a farce for the Russian and Belarusian armies. They lost last time, and this time they have stacked against them additional factors:

    1. The Ukrainians are mobilised and not caught by surprise.
    2. The Ukrainians have a heap of additional equipment from the West.
    3. The Russians have lost their best troops and gear.

    I really can't make any sense of it. I thought the Russian's best hope was to reinforce their lines in the south, and hope that the winter is cold enough to force Europe to come to terms. They actually seem to think they can still win the war.

    You’ll know of course that I have been predicting a Russian/Belarus invasion - speeding towards kyiv from the Belarus border - for some time

    It’s the obvious move for Putin. And it could snatch victory from defeat etc etc

    But given the track record of his army he will struggle again. And he has failed to permanently destroy Ukraine’s energy supplies with his bombardment
    Many of us have, because it’s what the ultra nationalist bloggers have been calling for for weeks.

    It’s a big risk. Belarus (the people thereof, not the President) is not going to be a supine Putin puppet.
    Funny. I swear there were multiple PBers telling me that “the Russians are simply going in to police Belarus” (!!!) and “Belarus is sending kit to Russia this means nothing” etc etc

    In fact I remember a PB-er saying “the Russians are sending their troops to Belarus just so they can be more conveniently fed and housed there”
    They will get an absolute doing, the Belarusians will be running pronto along with the poor Russian conscripts.
  • ...

    stjohn said:

    Why not a government of all the Chancellors?

    Sunak
    Hunt
    Javid
    Zahawi

    Reminds me of an Alec Guiness line from Star Wars, about the bar they go to? 'Scum and villainy' were part of it I think.
    Genuine question: did you support the Tory party before last month, or is it only Liz who does it for you? I'm curious as to whether there's a genuine Truss following out there that is totally detached from Toryism and, if so, how widespread it is.
  • WillGWillG Posts: 2,366

    WillG said:

    Leon said:

    It begins to look like the attempt to seize Kyiv, by invading from Belarus, will be renewed. I was confident that it wouldn't, but, well, wrong again most likely.

    OSINTdefender
    @sentdefender
    Massive Amounts of Russian Armor and Personnel have reportedly been observed arriving by Aircraft/Trains across Belarus over the last several days, while Russian Combat Aircraft have been spotted over multiple Cities in Country for the first time in months.


    https://twitter.com/sentdefender/status/1581628973401853952

    If the first time was a tragedy for the people of Bucha and Borodyanka, this will surely turn into a farce for the Russian and Belarusian armies. They lost last time, and this time they have stacked against them additional factors:

    1. The Ukrainians are mobilised and not caught by surprise.
    2. The Ukrainians have a heap of additional equipment from the West.
    3. The Russians have lost their best troops and gear.

    I really can't make any sense of it. I thought the Russian's best hope was to reinforce their lines in the south, and hope that the winter is cold enough to force Europe to come to terms. They actually seem to think they can still win the war.

    You’ll know of course that I have been predicting a Russian/Belarus invasion - speeding towards kyiv from the Belarus border - for some time

    It’s the obvious move for Putin. And it could snatch victory from defeat etc etc

    But given the track record of his army he will struggle again. And he has failed to permanently destroy Ukraine’s energy supplies with his bombardment
    While some people have zig zagged back and forth on this, some of us have pointed out Ukraine would inevitably win from the start. It is a matter of when not if. Best case scenario for Putin is the next leader allows him to live out a life of luxury in some Siberian estate. Worst case scenario is he is handed over to the Hague.
    In the process Putin would lose Belarus as a client state. His last bordering on Europe. The loss of it as a means to attack Ukraine would be painful, but nowhere near as bad as a fully democratic Belarus asking to join NATO. On top of Sweden and Finland, that would be a massive line of contact, coming as a direct result of the SMO. It would surely signal his end.
    If Ukraine and Belarus achieve 50% of the success of Czechia, Poland and the Baltics, they will quickly surpass Russia in living standards. Some of the other Russian regions might start looking West in envy. Particularly places that have a history of semi-independence, like the region of the Don and Kuban cossacks.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,865

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    In macroeconomic terms, the massive interest rate hikes of the Fed, not to mention the Russian oil and gas situation, are driving global instability, not little ole' Britain's budget statement of things that won't even happen until April. As ever, we're a convenient scapegoat, and perhaps a braver person than yourself might have attempted some gentle counter-arguments.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 42,679
    edited October 2022

    ...

    stjohn said:

    Why not a government of all the Chancellors?

    Sunak
    Hunt
    Javid
    Zahawi

    Reminds me of an Alec Guiness line from Star Wars, about the bar they go to? 'Scum and villainy' were part of it I think.
    "You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy."

    I think it's a bit harsh.
    I've seen that image - the Star Wars bar scene - used for Trump's White House. Aptly, I think.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 13,215
    Having seen Russian nationalist blogs and tweets on Ukraine over the last few months I think we face a category error, and on their terms Ukraine is indeed full of Nazis.

    To an average Westerner the Nazis are the people who did the holocaust. The defining feature is racism, anti-semitism and genocide. To Russia, I’m increasingly convinced “Nazi” simply means someone from Europe who hates Russia. On that measure Ukrainian nationalists are Nazis.

    Hence why a Russian nationalist can decry homosexuals and woke cuck Dems on the one hand and Ukrainian “Nazis” on the other.
  • NickPalmerNickPalmer Posts: 21,568

    It begins to look like the attempt to seize Kyiv, by invading from Belarus, will be renewed. I was confident that it wouldn't, but, well, wrong again most likely.

    OSINTdefender
    @sentdefender
    Massive Amounts of Russian Armor and Personnel have reportedly been observed arriving by Aircraft/Trains across Belarus over the last several days, while Russian Combat Aircraft have been spotted over multiple Cities in Country for the first time in months.


    https://twitter.com/sentdefender/status/1581628973401853952

    If the first time was a tragedy for the people of Bucha and Borodyanka, this will surely turn into a farce for the Russian and Belarusian armies. They lost last time, and this time they have stacked against them additional factors:

    1. The Ukrainians are mobilised and not caught by surprise.
    2. The Ukrainians have a heap of additional equipment from the West.
    3. The Russians have lost their best troops and gear.

    I really can't make any sense of it. I thought the Russian's best hope was to reinforce their lines in the south, and hope that the winter is cold enough to force Europe to come to terms. They actually seem to think they can still win the war.

    A quireky detail is that if Pokerstars is anything to go by, Belarus is being used in a big way to avoid sanctions - the number of supposedly Belarus players has increased massively since Russian players were banned. If that's a loophole being used in all the other sectors, then Putin's oligarichic mates may not be keen on dragging Belarus directly into the war.
  • Scott_xP said:

    “Depressed” @trussliz has changed her mobile number so many times that as of today, some cabinet ministers can no longer contact her, I’m told.
    https://twitter.com/IsabelOakeshott/status/1581624402911047681

    There is a human point here. Everyone fails at being Prime Minister eventually (maybe we have loaded too much into the role) even if Truss's failure is more spectacular and much faster than most.

    I hope she is getting a decent slab of unconditional love from someone.
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 21,318

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    I think some of this is a temporary embarrassment, but by no measure all.

    Britain has forfeited much of its economic influence (exercised within Brussels), it’s development influence (via cuts to the overseas aid), and the soft power associated with its reputation for seriousness and sobriety.

    Johnson was of course a global joke, and Truss something worse.

    We are playing an outsized role in Ukraine of course, which is not nothing.
  • OnlyLivingBoyOnlyLivingBoy Posts: 15,899

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    In macroeconomic terms, the massive interest rate hikes of the Fed, not to mention the Russian oil and gas situation, are driving global instability, not little ole' Britain's budget statement of things that won't even happen until April. As ever, we're a convenient scapegoat, and perhaps a braver person than yourself might have attempted some gentle counter-arguments.
    Some truth in that for sure but even the fact that we have become the go to scapegoat is revealing.
    I wasn't here to make the case for the UK but to gather market intelligence for my firm. I'm not a UK government official. Hopefully they were doing their best to play the hand the government had dealt them.
  • WillGWillG Posts: 2,366

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    In macroeconomic terms, the massive interest rate hikes of the Fed, not to mention the Russian oil and gas situation, are driving global instability, not little ole' Britain's budget statement of things that won't even happen until April. As ever, we're a convenient scapegoat, and perhaps a braver person than yourself might have attempted some gentle counter-arguments.
    That's a bit like making a household decision to throw all your sandbags away during a flood and then blaming the flood for when your house gets submerged.
  • OnlyLivingBoyOnlyLivingBoy Posts: 15,899

    Scott_xP said:

    “Depressed” @trussliz has changed her mobile number so many times that as of today, some cabinet ministers can no longer contact her, I’m told.
    https://twitter.com/IsabelOakeshott/status/1581624402911047681

    There is a human point here. Everyone fails at being Prime Minister eventually (maybe we have loaded too much into the role) even if Truss's failure is more spectacular and much faster than most.

    I hope she is getting a decent slab of unconditional love from someone.
    Indeed. I expect it won't be from Kwarteng though.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,865
    Ishmael_Z said:

    kle4 said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Former Conservative Minister @CrispinBlunt tells @AFNeil that Liz Truss needs to be replaced immediately by a ‘combination’ of @RishiSunak , @PennyMordaunt and @Jeremy_Hunt

    Triumvirates never go badly, everyone knows that.
    If Crispin Hunt is the best that the 'group of senior Tories who are going to come out and call for Truss to go' can come up with - a man with no political prospects or capital to sacrifice, it's disappointing to say the least.
    So most Tories think Liz is wonderful and are desperate for her to stay in place?
    I think the plotters don't have the nuts; I think Jeremy Hunt's appointment has bought Truss some time; I think it's borrowed time at the moment but politics can turn on a hair. I'd like the plotters to go for it, or Starmer to VONC, because those two things would be good for Truss.
    Hunt is her parole officer, not her bodyguard.
    He is both, and she is his. Nobody else will touch him with a bargepole, nobody else will touch her with one.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,865

    ...

    stjohn said:

    Why not a government of all the Chancellors?

    Sunak
    Hunt
    Javid
    Zahawi

    Reminds me of an Alec Guiness line from Star Wars, about the bar they go to? 'Scum and villainy' were part of it I think.
    "You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy."

    I think it's a bit harsh.
    I agree, it's a little unfair - the bar in Star Wars wasn't that bad.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,865

    ...

    stjohn said:

    Why not a government of all the Chancellors?

    Sunak
    Hunt
    Javid
    Zahawi

    Reminds me of an Alec Guiness line from Star Wars, about the bar they go to? 'Scum and villainy' were part of it I think.
    Genuine question: did you support the Tory party before last month, or is it only Liz who does it for you? I'm curious as to whether there's a genuine Truss following out there that is totally detached from Toryism and, if so, how widespread it is.
    I support the Tory party as far as it serves the interests of the country.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,105
    Another must read from @PaulGoodmanCH "It’s all over for Trussonomics". "The hostage you see waving at the window is Truss...The day will come on which to pin down why she played a hand of 2s and 3s as though all of them were aces".

    https://conservativehome.com/2022/10/16/its-all-over-for-truss/ via @conhome
  • darkagedarkage Posts: 5,398

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    I think some of this is a temporary embarrassment, but by no measure all.

    Britain has forfeited much of its economic influence (exercised within Brussels), it’s development influence (via cuts to the overseas aid), and the soft power associated with its reputation for seriousness and sobriety.

    Johnson was of course a global joke, and Truss something worse.

    We are playing an outsized role in Ukraine of course, which is not nothing.
    The British experience - after Johnson arrived on the scene as PM - is evidence of the ancient wisdom that it is a lot harder to build something up than it is to tear it all down. Still, we are a democracy and people voted for it, and things would probably be just as bad (albeit in different ways) if we had Corbyn as PM.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,910
    WillG said:

    Having been thinking about things, I think the Tories should replace the current leadership with this big four:

    PM: Penny Mordaunt
    Chancellor: Rishi Sunak
    Foreign Secretary: Jeremy Hunt
    Home Secretary: Kemi Badenoch

    A charismatic person at the top who could reset the Tory brand. A finance minister to reassure the markets. A foreign minister who would be well liked in foreign capitals. A home secretary who gets it on immigration and could put Labour on the defensive in the red wall. And a diverse team that looks like modern Britain.

    I love that the main function of a reset on PB this afternoon is for the Conservatives to win an election against the head, and another, and another, whether they deserve to or not?

    The national interest doesn't come into it. Keep that gravy train rolling.
  • ChameleonChameleon Posts: 4,264

    It begins to look like the attempt to seize Kyiv, by invading from Belarus, will be renewed. I was confident that it wouldn't, but, well, wrong again most likely.

    OSINTdefender
    @sentdefender
    Massive Amounts of Russian Armor and Personnel have reportedly been observed arriving by Aircraft/Trains across Belarus over the last several days, while Russian Combat Aircraft have been spotted over multiple Cities in Country for the first time in months.


    https://twitter.com/sentdefender/status/1581628973401853952

    If the first time was a tragedy for the people of Bucha and Borodyanka, this will surely turn into a farce for the Russian and Belarusian armies. They lost last time, and this time they have stacked against them additional factors:

    1. The Ukrainians are mobilised and not caught by surprise.
    2. The Ukrainians have a heap of additional equipment from the West.
    3. The Russians have lost their best troops and gear.

    I really can't make any sense of it. I thought the Russian's best hope was to reinforce their lines in the south, and hope that the winter is cold enough to force Europe to come to terms. They actually seem to think they can still win the war.

    Who says they'd go for Kyiv again (outside of a small feint meant to fix the sizeable Kyiv defence)?

    It would make far more sense to make a lunge towards Rivne then Ternopil (both about 200k population) to cut off Ukraine from Western support like weapons supplies and maintenance depots in Poland. Both West to east railway connections would be severed (or severely limited if within Russian artillery's range. In addition there's a railway line straight south from Belarus to Rivne that they can use to supply themselves, which the Kyiv attack did not have in the spring.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,105

    WillG said:

    Having been thinking about things, I think the Tories should replace the current leadership with this big four:

    PM: Penny Mordaunt
    Chancellor: Rishi Sunak
    Foreign Secretary: Jeremy Hunt
    Home Secretary: Kemi Badenoch

    A charismatic person at the top who could reset the Tory brand. A finance minister to reassure the markets. A foreign minister who would be well liked in foreign capitals. A home secretary who gets it on immigration and could put Labour on the defensive in the red wall. And a diverse team that looks like modern Britain.

    I love that the main function of a reset on PB this afternoon is for the Conservatives to win an election against the head, and another, and another, whether they deserve to or not?

    The national interest doesn't come into it. Keep that gravy train rolling.
    If you had to pick a team from the current Tory MPs, that list is not the worst I have seen, but your point stands.

    How about we let the voters have a go?

    Can they really fuck it up worse than the Tory members did?
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 43,378

    WillG said:

    Having been thinking about things, I think the Tories should replace the current leadership with this big four:

    PM: Penny Mordaunt
    Chancellor: Rishi Sunak
    Foreign Secretary: Jeremy Hunt
    Home Secretary: Kemi Badenoch

    A charismatic person at the top who could reset the Tory brand. A finance minister to reassure the markets. A foreign minister who would be well liked in foreign capitals. A home secretary who gets it on immigration and could put Labour on the defensive in the red wall. And a diverse team that looks like modern Britain.

    I love that the main function of a reset on PB this afternoon is for the Conservatives to win an election against the head, and another, and another, whether they deserve to or not?

    The national interest doesn't come into it. Keep that gravy train rolling.
    The role of the Tory Party is not to support the UK. The UK, on the other hand, is the host whose role it is to support the Tory Party.

    https://www.facebook.com/mackenziekwakparasitologist/videos/check-out-this-crab-infected-by-the-parasitic-sacculina-barnacle-which-manipulat/285670149038306/
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,865

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    I think some of this is a temporary embarrassment, but by no measure all.

    Britain has forfeited much of its economic influence (exercised within Brussels), it’s development influence (via cuts to the overseas aid), and the soft power associated with its reputation for seriousness and sobriety.

    Johnson was of course a global joke, and Truss something worse.

    We are playing an outsized role in Ukraine of course, which is not nothing.
    Stop giving your dinner money to the bullies, expect similar short to medium term disaprobation. Doesn't mean it isn't necessary.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,956
    Crispin Blunt was the first Tory MP to call for IDS to resign in 2003, and today he's the first Tory MP to call for Liz Truss to go.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 13,215
    Chameleon said:

    It begins to look like the attempt to seize Kyiv, by invading from Belarus, will be renewed. I was confident that it wouldn't, but, well, wrong again most likely.

    OSINTdefender
    @sentdefender
    Massive Amounts of Russian Armor and Personnel have reportedly been observed arriving by Aircraft/Trains across Belarus over the last several days, while Russian Combat Aircraft have been spotted over multiple Cities in Country for the first time in months.


    https://twitter.com/sentdefender/status/1581628973401853952

    If the first time was a tragedy for the people of Bucha and Borodyanka, this will surely turn into a farce for the Russian and Belarusian armies. They lost last time, and this time they have stacked against them additional factors:

    1. The Ukrainians are mobilised and not caught by surprise.
    2. The Ukrainians have a heap of additional equipment from the West.
    3. The Russians have lost their best troops and gear.

    I really can't make any sense of it. I thought the Russian's best hope was to reinforce their lines in the south, and hope that the winter is cold enough to force Europe to come to terms. They actually seem to think they can still win the war.

    Who says they'd go for Kyiv again (outside of a small feint meant to fix the sizeable Kyiv defence)?

    It would make far more sense to make a lunge towards Rivne then Ternopil (both about 200k population) to cut off Ukraine from Western support like weapons supplies and maintenance depots in Poland. Both West to east railway connections would be severed (or severely limited if within Russian artillery's range. In addition there's a railway line straight south from Belarus to Rivne that they can use to supply themselves, which the Kyiv attack did not have in the spring.
    My resident Ukrainian is from Ternopil. Going back there at Christmas. I think that ara would be extremely difficult for Russia. Much further from the frontier than Kiev, through wooded and rolling country. Ukraine can easily blow a railway.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 123,967
    edited October 2022

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump.

    Indeed one thing Sanders and Trump supporters and the hard left and nationalist right share is they despise the IMF and the neoliberal globalist order
  • Leon said:

    FPT, re: Leon's visit/invasion/infestation at The Broadmoor Hotel in Colorado Springs -

    Yours truly has a commemorative ceramic whiskey bottle (Jim Beam) in the shape of The Broadmoor.

    Which also is the place where in 1940, Republican "dark horse" (sorta) presidential nominee Wendell Willkie came, after winning the nomination at RNC, to prepare for his Fall campaign against Franklin Roosevelt.

    Hope it works out better for our wandering PBer than it did for WW!


    I LOVE this hotel. The history is fabulous, it’s basically unknown outside the USA


    Also: the food is superb. I had maybe the best ceviche of my life last night, then some wonderful Alaskan halibut

    And the dry martinis in the “Prohibition” bar

    👍
    Here is link showing the Jim Beam bottle issued for 50th anniversary of The Broadmoor.

    https://www.ebay.com/itm/274902467406

    Why the misspelling, no clue!
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    edited October 2022
    WillG said:

    Leon said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    DavidL said:

    On the way to Skye for a site visit. Up through the great glen and down to the sea lochs of the west. Sun glinting on the lochs and the waterfalls as the rain clouds dash through. Snow capping the highest peaks. Absolutely glorious. And now the rather brilliant Skye bridge.

    I am coming over all @SeanT : someone is paying me for this?

    Excellent. Maybe just change it thus:


    “On the way to Skye for a site visit. Up through the great glen and down to the sea lochs of the west. Sun glinting on the rough waters, and the cataracts, as the rain clouds dash through. Snow capping the highest peaks.”

    Avoiding the repetition of “loch” and “water” etc but adding a “ca” echo

    Thanks. But you must forgive mere lawyers some repetition; it is innate.

    Sometimes, when I don’t get here for a while you forget that this is truly one of the most beautiful countries in the world.

    Driving around Colorado these last days has reminded me how beautiful and fascinating the UK is - and in such a tiny space (despite our often horrible new houses)

    Parts of the Rockies are fab and I love the frontier feel here. But there are 100 mile stretches of Colorado where nothing happens. At all. Strip malls and inane residential development. That’s it. And it is quite bleak even in the dazzling sun

    The beer tho. American beer is maybe the best in the world now. Such incredible variety
    The British landscape genius, with the exception I guess of the Highlands etc, is the largely domesticated geography of church steeple and smoke issuing from chimneys in the “next village on”.

    It’s the feeling evoked by the that Adlestrop poem.

    Britain should do more of that.

    There is a urban genius too, of garden squares and pepperpot chimneys, think Mary Poppins.

    Britain should do more of that too.

    https://twitter.com/kelhamcooke/status/1581641036090454016?s=46&t=sdg6s_ZXBLFwMhGBbudIvA

    It blights the views of our wonderful Georgian architecture in our big cities, and makes a lot of small towns just look uniformly shit.
    It's not difficult to tell where Brighton ends and Hove begins:



    The original plan was to demolish all the Georgian architecture and extend the 1930s Art Deco Embassy Court (right) replacing all of the (now Grade I listed) Brunswick Town (left).

    Fortunately Mr Hitler and sanity intervened.

  • TresTres Posts: 2,724
    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    they don't despise us, they are laughing at us.
  • FrankBoothFrankBooth Posts: 9,928
    Ukraine has refrained from attacking Belarussian territory. Presumably that would change if they invaded?
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 21,318
    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 123,967

    HYUFD said:

    I've heard the line 'Party X will lose the next general election, but that will just amount to a four-year holiday, and they'll be back when party Y royally screws up' many times before without it coming to pass.

    You obviously weren't around in the 1960s and 1970s then when we changed government 4 times in 15 years
    Though if you listen to May, Johnson and Truss, we've had three changes of government in the last six and a bit years, with a fourth quite possibly incoming.

    (Those with knowledge... was it like this during the '50s and '60s? Was Churchill - Eden - Macmillan - Home seen as four governments or one evolving government?)
    One evolving government, the 1960s and 1970s saw 4 changes of the party leading the government
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    For any Tory MPs pondering what to do today a reminder that the difference between losing by 25pt and 15pts is 150 seats.

    https://twitter.com/Samfr/status/1581640379278905344?s=20&t=Ev3qLbiNVkIIQesbNve_mQ
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 123,967
    edited October 2022

    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

    Italy is in the G7 and has a nationalist right government, Trump leads some 2024 polls again, Le Pen and Melenchon and the various other left parties combined now have more seats than the neoliberal Macron in the French Parliament. In the UK we voted for Brexit and Boris and very nearly voted for Corbyn in 2017.

    If the globalist neoliberal order thinks the populations of western democracies are just going to take ever higher taxes, ever deeper austerity and uncontrolled immigration, then the ballot box will increasingly prove otherwise!
  • RazedabodeRazedabode Posts: 3,033
    Wallace now asking the plotting to stop - I don’t see how he thinks people can unite around Truss.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,910
    Scott_xP said:

    WillG said:

    Having been thinking about things, I think the Tories should replace the current leadership with this big four:

    PM: Penny Mordaunt
    Chancellor: Rishi Sunak
    Foreign Secretary: Jeremy Hunt
    Home Secretary: Kemi Badenoch

    A charismatic person at the top who could reset the Tory brand. A finance minister to reassure the markets. A foreign minister who would be well liked in foreign capitals. A home secretary who gets it on immigration and could put Labour on the defensive in the red wall. And a diverse team that looks like modern Britain.

    I love that the main function of a reset on PB this afternoon is for the Conservatives to win an election against the head, and another, and another, whether they deserve to or not?

    The national interest doesn't come into it. Keep that gravy train rolling.
    If you had to pick a team from the current Tory MPs, that list is not the worst I have seen, but your point stands.

    How about we let the voters have a go?

    Can they really fuck it up worse than the Tory members did?
    I am of an age where it matters not a jot in fiscal terms who wins the next election. Nonetheless the one party state that we have become cannot be healthy. " We are losing the argument, quick let's throw some red meat to The RedWall".

    In terms of just desserts and karma the Conservatives deserve to be out of office for a considerable time, not least because Johnson sold the notion of Brexit simply to become Prime Minister. Most Conservative MPs and Ministers, like Hunt, like Truss, knew it would be a fiasco, but after the event they went along for the ride anyway.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,956
    If Farage returns as leader of Reform UK the party will probably go from 5% to 10% in the polls and then the Tories are really in trouble.
  • DougSealDougSeal Posts: 12,541
    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

    Italy is in the G7 and has a nationalist right government, Trump leads some 2024 polls again, Le Pen and Melenchon combined now have more seats than the neoliberal Macron and Les Republicains in the French Parliament. In the UK we voted for Brexit and very nearly voted for Corbyn in 2017.

    If the globalist neoliberal order thinks the populations of western democracies are just going to take ever high taxes, ever deeper austerity and uncontrolled immigration, then
    the ballot box will increasingly prove otherwise!
    U okay, Hun?
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    Too true to be good - the Truss government (sic) as the Muppet Show:

    https://twitter.com/Exiled_Sinners/status/1581592168644296704
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 43,378
    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

    Italy is in the G7 and has a nationalist right government, Trump leads some 2024 polls again, Le Pen and Melenchon combined now have more seats than the neoliberal Macron in the French Parliament. In the UK we voted for Brexit and Boris and very nearly voted for Corbyn in 2017.

    If the globalist neoliberal order thinks the populations of western democracies are just going to take ever high taxes, ever deeper austerity and uncontrolled immigration, then the ballot box will increasingly prove otherwise!
    Ooh, are you going to start talking along these lines? Here's a nice video:

    https://nationalzoo.si.edu/animals/komodo-dragon
  • HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant
    aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of
    a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump.

    Indeed one thing Sanders and Trump supporters and the hard left and
    nationalist right share is they despise
    the IMF and the neoliberal globalist order
    There is a lot of short-term memoryism on Pb.com. The Truss plans that everyone on here are locking now we're essentially the same ones that they were praising when the Biden Administration was pushing through - or trying to - its huge spending bills.

    Now, it's true the U.K. isn't the US and gilts are not the default safe asset for global investors. But other central banks - noticeably China and Japan - have also decided to loosen their monetary policy.

    @HYFUD is right - much of the pain going on is because the US is racking up its interest rates to catch up with past mistakes (and you know the Administration knows it has screwed up because it's blaming Trump's spending packages for causing inflation while blithely ignoring its own).

    One final point - Biden may be mocking now but if - and it's a big if - he loses Congress and Truss hangs on, he might be finding some of the favour returned. It wouldn't take a few well aimed comments about his own policies, including his initial wobbling on Ukraine and the mixed messages he was sending, to cause him problems.

  • ChameleonChameleon Posts: 4,264
    TimS said:

    Chameleon said:

    It begins to look like the attempt to seize Kyiv, by invading from Belarus, will be renewed. I was confident that it wouldn't, but, well, wrong again most likely.

    OSINTdefender
    @sentdefender
    Massive Amounts of Russian Armor and Personnel have reportedly been observed arriving by Aircraft/Trains across Belarus over the last several days, while Russian Combat Aircraft have been spotted over multiple Cities in Country for the first time in months.


    https://twitter.com/sentdefender/status/1581628973401853952

    If the first time was a tragedy for the people of Bucha and Borodyanka, this will surely turn into a farce for the Russian and Belarusian armies. They lost last time, and this time they have stacked against them additional factors:

    1. The Ukrainians are mobilised and not caught by surprise.
    2. The Ukrainians have a heap of additional equipment from the West.
    3. The Russians have lost their best troops and gear.

    I really can't make any sense of it. I thought the Russian's best hope was to reinforce their lines in the south, and hope that the winter is cold enough to force Europe to come to terms. They actually seem to think they can still win the war.

    Who says they'd go for Kyiv again (outside of a small feint meant to fix the sizeable Kyiv defence)?

    It would make far more sense to make a lunge towards Rivne then Ternopil (both about 200k population) to cut off Ukraine from Western support like weapons supplies and maintenance depots in Poland. Both West to east railway connections would be severed (or severely limited if within Russian artillery's range. In addition there's a railway line straight south from Belarus to Rivne that they can use to supply themselves, which the Kyiv attack did not have in the spring.
    My resident Ukrainian is from Ternopil. Going back there at Christmas. I think that ara would be extremely difficult for Russia. Much further from the frontier than Kiev, through wooded and rolling country. Ukraine can easily blow a railway.
    Yeah there's definitely issues, but if I were a Russian general and had to pick something it's definitely the one I'd go for.

    As long as Russian troops can push on the other three fronts, and keep a fixing force over the border from Kyiv Ukraine's defences will be very stretched in the West. In addition to get the Ternopil railway into Russian artillery range they'd only need to advance 20 miles south of Rivne, which is close enough they should be able to consistently supply the effort.

    From a Ukrainian PoV I'd be reassured by the large front lines Russia would have the defend, the extremely low quality of the Russian mobiks and Belarusian regulars, and the complete inability of Russia to provide adequate training and winter wear for the months ahead.

    It's Russia's best option for a game changer, but given they'd have to maintain the effort for a long while for it to cause collapse in the East I still don't think it is a good option.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 123,967
    Andy_JS said:

    If Farage returns as leader of Reform UK the party will probably go from 5% to 10% in the polls and then the Tories are really in trouble.

    He has now said he would if May returns '@Nigel_Farage
    ·
    1h
    The Mail on Sunday speculating on a comeback for Mrs May. You really couldn't make it up.

    I got rid of her once and would be very tempted to go for a second time.'

    https://twitter.com/Nigel_Farage/status/1581646846539182081?s=20&t=qKoGjGPUsSV9WciI3udIeg
  • NickPalmerNickPalmer Posts: 21,568
    TimS said:

    Having seen Russian nationalist blogs and tweets on Ukraine over the last few months I think we face a category error, and on their terms Ukraine is indeed full of Nazis.

    To an average Westerner the Nazis are the people who did the holocaust. The defining feature is racism, anti-semitism and genocide. To Russia, I’m increasingly convinced “Nazi” simply means someone from Europe who hates Russia. On that measure Ukrainian nationalists are Nazis.

    Hence why a Russian nationalist can decry homosexuals and woke cuck Dems on the one hand and Ukrainian “Nazis” on the other.

    Nazism for Russians is inextricably linked to the Nazi attempt to wipe Russia out by mass genocide. FWIW my Russian-born mother did regard Ukrainian nationalism as inextricably tainted by Nazism, because of Bandera's collaboration with the Germans during the war. She died 20 years ago but I've little doubt she'd have been cheering Putin on.

    Conversely the atrocities committed by Stalin against Ukraine did make some Ukrainian nationalist leaders pro-Nazi as "the lesser evil who will free us", and that attitude has persisted among some to the present day (cf. Azov). It's all a long time ago, but these prejudices linger, especially outside the cosmopolitan cities.

    There's no reason why a rational ex-Soviet Russian shouldn't regret Ukraine wanting to be separate, without supporting a war to prevent it, in the same way that we in England might regret a Scottish decision to go independent without wanting (pace HYUFD) to send tanks to Edinburgh. But if Scottish leaders had supported Hitler during the war it would complicate attitudes here too. The war is an atrocity, but both populations are haunted by the sins of past generations, and it's possible to oppose the war, support Ukraine's defence, and still not entirely accept the ultra-nationalists on either side.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 72,245

    Nigelb said:

    Should, not will...

    Tesco boss John Allan describing Labour as “the only team on the field”will horrify Tory MPs.
    https://mobile.twitter.com/euanmccolm/status/1581576119756939265

    It’s precisely on topic. “It’s the economy stupid” and Tesco is a big fucking chunk of the economy.

    Big business turning to Labour was a brick in the arch of New Labour.
    I don't let the fat... fingers bother me. :smile:
  • HYUFD said:

    Andy_JS said:

    If Farage returns as leader of Reform UK the party will probably go from 5% to 10% in the polls and then the Tories are really in trouble.

    He has now said he would if May returns '@Nigel_Farage
    ·
    1h
    The Mail on Sunday speculating on a comeback for Mrs May. You really couldn't make it up.

    I got rid of her once and would be very tempted to go for a second time.'

    https://twitter.com/Nigel_Farage/status/1581646846539182081?s=20&t=qKoGjGPUsSV9WciI3udIeg
    'I got rid of her once'? How does he work that out? I'd have said Corbyn and Boris played a far bigger hand in her destruction. Is there a megalomania thing going on here?
  • RogerRoger Posts: 19,981
    OT. Man U fans might enjoy this (or not) Very funny

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Aiy9FVRU8s
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 43,378

    WillG said:

    Leon said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    DavidL said:

    On the way to Skye for a site visit. Up through the great glen and down to the sea lochs of the west. Sun glinting on the lochs and the waterfalls as the rain clouds dash through. Snow capping the highest peaks. Absolutely glorious. And now the rather brilliant Skye bridge.

    I am coming over all @SeanT : someone is paying me for this?

    Excellent. Maybe just change it thus:


    “On the way to Skye for a site visit. Up through the great glen and down to the sea lochs of the west. Sun glinting on the rough waters, and the cataracts, as the rain clouds dash through. Snow capping the highest peaks.”

    Avoiding the repetition of “loch” and “water” etc but adding a “ca” echo

    Thanks. But you must forgive mere lawyers some repetition; it is innate.

    Sometimes, when I don’t get here for a while you forget that this is truly one of the most beautiful countries in the world.

    Driving around Colorado these last days has reminded me how beautiful and fascinating the UK is - and in such a tiny space (despite our often horrible new houses)

    Parts of the Rockies are fab and I love the frontier feel here. But there are 100 mile stretches of Colorado where nothing happens. At all. Strip malls and inane residential development. That’s it. And it is quite bleak even in the dazzling sun

    The beer tho. American beer is maybe the best in the world now. Such incredible variety
    The British landscape genius, with the exception I guess of the Highlands etc, is the largely domesticated geography of church steeple and smoke issuing from chimneys in the “next village on”.

    It’s the feeling evoked by the that Adlestrop poem.

    Britain should do more of that.

    There is a urban genius too, of garden squares and pepperpot chimneys, think Mary Poppins.

    Britain should do more of that too.

    https://twitter.com/kelhamcooke/status/1581641036090454016?s=46&t=sdg6s_ZXBLFwMhGBbudIvA

    It blights the views of our wonderful Georgian architecture in our big cities, and makes a lot of small towns just look uniformly shit.
    It's not difficult to tell where Brighton ends and Hove begins:



    The original plan was to demolish all the Georgian architecture and extend the 1930s Art Deco Embassy Court (right) replacing all of the (now Grade I listed) Brunswick Town (left).

    Fortunately Mr Hitler and sanity intervened.

    Slightly disappointing in one way - I do like art deco. But then I think, all they need to do is to put a gilded turd on the big one and that's Brighton's rep for architecture screwed.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,591

    ...

    stjohn said:

    Why not a government of all the Chancellors?

    Sunak
    Hunt
    Javid
    Zahawi

    Reminds me of an Alec Guiness line from Star Wars, about the bar they go to? 'Scum and villainy' were part of it I think.
    "You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy."

    I think it's a bit harsh.
    I agree, it's a little unfair - the bar in Star Wars wasn't that bad.
    Swift service, live music, good ambience, a place of work and play, what's not to love?
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 43,378
    kle4 said:

    ...

    stjohn said:

    Why not a government of all the Chancellors?

    Sunak
    Hunt
    Javid
    Zahawi

    Reminds me of an Alec Guiness line from Star Wars, about the bar they go to? 'Scum and villainy' were part of it I think.
    "You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy."

    I think it's a bit harsh.
    I agree, it's a little unfair - the bar in Star Wars wasn't that bad.
    Swift service, live music, good ambience, a place of work and play, what's not to love?
    And interestingly mixed company. Above all.
  • HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant
    aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of
    a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump.

    Indeed one thing Sanders and Trump supporters and the hard left and
    nationalist right share is they despise
    the IMF and the neoliberal globalist order
    There is a lot of short-term memoryism on Pb.com. The Truss plans that everyone on here are locking now we're essentially the same ones that they were praising when the Biden Administration was pushing through - or trying to - its huge spending bills.

    Now, it's true the U.K. isn't the US and gilts are not the default safe asset for global investors. But other central banks - noticeably China and Japan - have also decided to loosen their monetary policy.

    @HYFUD is right - much of the pain going on is because the US is racking up its interest rates to catch up with past mistakes (and you know the Administration knows it has screwed up because it's blaming Trump's spending packages for causing inflation while blithely ignoring its own).

    One final point - Biden may be mocking now but if - and it's a big if - he loses Congress and Truss hangs on, he might be finding some of the favour returned. It wouldn't take a few well aimed comments about his own policies, including his initial wobbling on Ukraine and the mixed messages he was sending, to cause him problems.

    Liz could bring down Biden. Wow.
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 21,318

    Too true to be good - the Truss government (sic) as the Muppet Show:

    https://twitter.com/Exiled_Sinners/status/1581592168644296704

    Very good.

    I lack the technical skills, but someone needs to do a recut of the “You Have Been Watching” end credits of Hi-De-Hi, with Jeremy Hunt as Mr Fairbrother, Liz Truss as Peggy, and Therese Coffey as Ted Bovis.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,956

    For any Tory MPs pondering what to do today a reminder that the difference between losing by 25pt and 15pts is 150 seats.

    https://twitter.com/Samfr/status/1581640379278905344?s=20&t=Ev3qLbiNVkIIQesbNve_mQ

    Does anyone think the Tories could lose by 25% in a real election?
  • WillG said:

    Leon said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    DavidL said:

    On the way to Skye for a site visit. Up through the great glen and down to the sea lochs of the west. Sun glinting on the lochs and the waterfalls as the rain clouds dash through. Snow capping the highest peaks. Absolutely glorious. And now the rather brilliant Skye bridge.

    I am coming over all @SeanT : someone is paying me for this?

    Excellent. Maybe just change it thus:


    “On the way to Skye for a site visit. Up through the great glen and down to the sea lochs of the west. Sun glinting on the rough waters, and the cataracts, as the rain clouds dash through. Snow capping the highest peaks.”

    Avoiding the repetition of “loch” and “water” etc but adding a “ca” echo

    Thanks. But you must forgive mere lawyers some repetition; it is innate.

    Sometimes, when I don’t get here for a while you forget that this is truly one of the most beautiful countries in the world.

    Driving around Colorado these last days has reminded me how beautiful and fascinating the UK is - and in such a tiny space (despite our often horrible new houses)

    Parts of the Rockies are fab and I love the frontier feel here. But there are 100 mile stretches of Colorado where nothing happens. At all. Strip malls and inane residential development. That’s it. And it is quite bleak even in the dazzling sun

    The beer tho. American beer is maybe the best in the world now. Such incredible variety
    The British landscape genius, with the exception I guess of the Highlands etc, is the largely domesticated geography of church steeple and smoke issuing from chimneys in the “next village on”.

    It’s the feeling evoked by the that Adlestrop poem.

    Britain should do more of that.

    There is a urban genius too, of garden squares and pepperpot chimneys, think Mary Poppins.

    Britain should do more of that too.

    https://twitter.com/kelhamcooke/status/1581641036090454016?s=46&t=sdg6s_ZXBLFwMhGBbudIvA

    It blights the views of our wonderful Georgian architecture in our big cities, and makes a lot of small towns just look uniformly shit.
    It's not difficult to tell where Brighton ends and Hove begins:



    The original plan was to demolish all the Georgian architecture and extend the 1930s Art Deco Embassy Court (right) replacing all of the (now Grade I listed) Brunswick Town (left).

    Fortunately Mr Hitler and sanity intervened.

    I thought Hove was the posh bit - hence the joke about sticks of rock with 'Hove Actually' through them.
  • ohnotnowohnotnow Posts: 4,014
    Really very off-topic, but I quite liked this : https://scotrail.datasette.io/scotrail/random_apology?

    "The background here is that someone did a FOI request for the announcement audio, crowdsourced transcriptions, and various things have been built on top of it."
  • Andy_JS said:

    For any Tory MPs pondering what to do today a reminder that the difference between losing by 25pt and 15pts is 150 seats.

    https://twitter.com/Samfr/status/1581640379278905344?s=20&t=Ev3qLbiNVkIIQesbNve_mQ

    Does anyone think the Tories could lose by 25% in a real election?
    Yes, absolutely
  • ThomasNasheThomasNashe Posts: 5,331
    Andy_JS said:

    For any Tory MPs pondering what to do today a reminder that the difference between losing by 25pt and 15pts is 150 seats.

    https://twitter.com/Samfr/status/1581640379278905344?s=20&t=Ev3qLbiNVkIIQesbNve_mQ

    Does anyone think the Tories could lose by 25% in a real election?
    If Liz is still leader, I'd say it's definitely possible.
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216

    WillG said:

    Leon said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    DavidL said:

    On the way to Skye for a site visit. Up through the great glen and down to the sea lochs of the west. Sun glinting on the lochs and the waterfalls as the rain clouds dash through. Snow capping the highest peaks. Absolutely glorious. And now the rather brilliant Skye bridge.

    I am coming over all @SeanT : someone is paying me for this?

    Excellent. Maybe just change it thus:


    “On the way to Skye for a site visit. Up through the great glen and down to the sea lochs of the west. Sun glinting on the rough waters, and the cataracts, as the rain clouds dash through. Snow capping the highest peaks.”

    Avoiding the repetition of “loch” and “water” etc but adding a “ca” echo

    Thanks. But you must forgive mere lawyers some repetition; it is innate.

    Sometimes, when I don’t get here for a while you forget that this is truly one of the most beautiful countries in the world.

    Driving around Colorado these last days has reminded me how beautiful and fascinating the UK is - and in such a tiny space (despite our often horrible new houses)

    Parts of the Rockies are fab and I love the frontier feel here. But there are 100 mile stretches of Colorado where nothing happens. At all. Strip malls and inane residential development. That’s it. And it is quite bleak even in the dazzling sun

    The beer tho. American beer is maybe the best in the world now. Such incredible variety
    The British landscape genius, with the exception I guess of the Highlands etc, is the largely domesticated geography of church steeple and smoke issuing from chimneys in the “next village on”.

    It’s the feeling evoked by the that Adlestrop poem.

    Britain should do more of that.

    There is a urban genius too, of garden squares and pepperpot chimneys, think Mary Poppins.

    Britain should do more of that too.

    https://twitter.com/kelhamcooke/status/1581641036090454016?s=46&t=sdg6s_ZXBLFwMhGBbudIvA

    It blights the views of our wonderful Georgian architecture in our big cities, and makes a lot of small towns just look uniformly shit.
    It's not difficult to tell where Brighton ends and Hove begins:



    The original plan was to demolish all the Georgian architecture and extend the 1930s Art Deco Embassy Court (right) replacing all of the (now Grade I listed) Brunswick Town (left).

    Fortunately Mr Hitler and sanity intervened.

    I thought Hove was the posh bit - hence the joke about sticks of rock with 'Hove Actually' through them.
    It is, although I doubt its visitors buy rock!

    Ironically 200 year old quickly flung up speculative Georgian architecture has proved easier to maintain than less than 85 year old Art Deco reinforced concrete......ah! Sea air!
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 42,679

    Scott_xP said:

    WillG said:

    Having been thinking about things, I think the Tories should replace the current leadership with this big four:

    PM: Penny Mordaunt
    Chancellor: Rishi Sunak
    Foreign Secretary: Jeremy Hunt
    Home Secretary: Kemi Badenoch

    A charismatic person at the top who could reset the Tory brand. A finance minister to reassure the markets. A foreign minister who would be well liked in foreign capitals. A home secretary who gets it on immigration and could put Labour on the defensive in the red wall. And a diverse team that looks like modern Britain.

    I love that the main function of a reset on PB this afternoon is for the Conservatives to win an election against the head, and another, and another, whether they deserve to or not?

    The national interest doesn't come into it. Keep that gravy train rolling.
    If you had to pick a team from the current Tory MPs, that list is not the worst I have seen, but your point stands.

    How about we let the voters have a go?

    Can they really fuck it up worse than the Tory members did?
    I am of an age where it matters not a jot in fiscal terms who wins the next election. Nonetheless the one party state that we have become cannot be healthy. " We are losing the argument, quick let's throw some red meat to The RedWall".

    In terms of just desserts and karma the Conservatives deserve to be out of office for a considerable time, not least because Johnson sold the notion of Brexit simply to become Prime Minister. Most Conservative MPs and Ministers, like Hunt, like Truss, knew it would be a fiasco, but after the event they went along for the ride anyway.
    Yes, if the Cons were to somehow shapeshift and win again Labour might as well disband.
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    One story that wont be in the NYT anytime soon - the sad spike in the murder rate in the US - and how it compares with other countries....

    https://youtu.be/rzx-eEXKqTk
  • HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

    Italy is in the G7 and has a nationalist right government, Trump leads some 2024 polls again, Le Pen and Melenchon and the various other left parties combined now have more seats than the neoliberal Macron in the French Parliament. In the UK we voted for Brexit and Boris and very nearly voted for Corbyn in 2017.

    If the globalist neoliberal order thinks the populations of western democracies are just going to take ever higher taxes, ever deeper austerity and uncontrolled immigration, then the ballot box will increasingly prove otherwise!
    Neoliberals want higher taxes? Are you sure about that?
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,947
    Andy_JS said:

    For any Tory MPs pondering what to do today a reminder that the difference between losing by 25pt and 15pts is 150 seats.

    https://twitter.com/Samfr/status/1581640379278905344?s=20&t=Ev3qLbiNVkIIQesbNve_mQ

    Does anyone think the Tories could lose by 25% in a real election?
    All that matters is that Tory MPs think they could.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,910
    kinabalu said:

    Scott_xP said:

    WillG said:

    Having been thinking about things, I think the Tories should replace the current leadership with this big four:

    PM: Penny Mordaunt
    Chancellor: Rishi Sunak
    Foreign Secretary: Jeremy Hunt
    Home Secretary: Kemi Badenoch

    A charismatic person at the top who could reset the Tory brand. A finance minister to reassure the markets. A foreign minister who would be well liked in foreign capitals. A home secretary who gets it on immigration and could put Labour on the defensive in the red wall. And a diverse team that looks like modern Britain.

    I love that the main function of a reset on PB this afternoon is for the Conservatives to win an election against the head, and another, and another, whether they deserve to or not?

    The national interest doesn't come into it. Keep that gravy train rolling.
    If you had to pick a team from the current Tory MPs, that list is not the worst I have seen, but your point stands.

    How about we let the voters have a go?

    Can they really fuck it up worse than the Tory members did?
    I am of an age where it matters not a jot in fiscal terms who wins the next election. Nonetheless the one party state that we have become cannot be healthy. " We are losing the argument, quick let's throw some red meat to The RedWall".

    In terms of just desserts and karma the Conservatives deserve to be out of office for a considerable time, not least because Johnson sold the notion of Brexit simply to become Prime Minister. Most Conservative MPs and Ministers, like Hunt, like Truss, knew it would be a fiasco, but after the event they went along for the ride anyway.
    Yes, if the Cons were to somehow shapeshift and win again Labour might as well disband.
    The thing is it's the same old shite dressed up as something else. I blame universal suffrage.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 123,967
    edited October 2022

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

    Italy is in the G7 and has a nationalist right government, Trump leads some 2024 polls again, Le Pen and Melenchon and the various other left parties combined now have more seats than the neoliberal Macron in the French Parliament. In the UK we voted for Brexit and Boris and very nearly voted for Corbyn in 2017.

    If the globalist neoliberal order thinks the populations of western democracies are just going to take ever higher taxes, ever deeper austerity and uncontrolled immigration, then the ballot box will increasingly prove otherwise!
    Neoliberals want higher taxes? Are you sure about that?
    On ordinary voters, less so themselves
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 42,679

    kinabalu said:

    Scott_xP said:

    WillG said:

    Having been thinking about things, I think the Tories should replace the current leadership with this big four:

    PM: Penny Mordaunt
    Chancellor: Rishi Sunak
    Foreign Secretary: Jeremy Hunt
    Home Secretary: Kemi Badenoch

    A charismatic person at the top who could reset the Tory brand. A finance minister to reassure the markets. A foreign minister who would be well liked in foreign capitals. A home secretary who gets it on immigration and could put Labour on the defensive in the red wall. And a diverse team that looks like modern Britain.

    I love that the main function of a reset on PB this afternoon is for the Conservatives to win an election against the head, and another, and another, whether they deserve to or not?

    The national interest doesn't come into it. Keep that gravy train rolling.
    If you had to pick a team from the current Tory MPs, that list is not the worst I have seen, but your point stands.

    How about we let the voters have a go?

    Can they really fuck it up worse than the Tory members did?
    I am of an age where it matters not a jot in fiscal terms who wins the next election. Nonetheless the one party state that we have become cannot be healthy. " We are losing the argument, quick let's throw some red meat to The RedWall".

    In terms of just desserts and karma the Conservatives deserve to be out of office for a considerable time, not least because Johnson sold the notion of Brexit simply to become Prime Minister. Most Conservative MPs and Ministers, like Hunt, like Truss, knew it would be a fiasco, but after the event they went along for the ride anyway.
    Yes, if the Cons were to somehow shapeshift and win again Labour might as well disband.
    The thing is it's the same old shite dressed up as something else. I blame universal suffrage.
    Perhaps we need an aptitude test for wannabe voters.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,956
    "China's President Xi Jinping doubles down on zero-Covid as congress opens - BBC News"

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBU27IUaTb0
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,910
    edited October 2022
    HYUFD said:

    Andy_JS said:

    If Farage returns as leader of Reform UK the party will probably go from 5% to 10% in the polls and then the Tories are really in trouble.

    He has now said he would if May returns '@Nigel_Farage
    ·
    1h
    The Mail on Sunday speculating on a comeback for Mrs May. You really couldn't make it up.

    I got rid of her once and would be very tempted to go for a second time.'

    https://twitter.com/Nigel_Farage/status/1581646846539182081?s=20&t=qKoGjGPUsSV9WciI3udIeg
    HY, Farage is a moron, a one-trick Brexit show pony. Don't panic. If your party gets it's house in order and ditches the blue Corbynistas, life becomes a lot easier for you. One nation feudal Tories are your answer.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,956
    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

    Italy is in the G7 and has a nationalist right government, Trump leads some 2024 polls again, Le Pen and Melenchon and the various other left parties combined now have more seats than the neoliberal Macron in the French Parliament. In the UK we voted for Brexit and Boris and very nearly voted for Corbyn in 2017.

    If the globalist neoliberal order thinks the populations of western democracies are just going to take ever higher taxes, ever deeper austerity and uncontrolled immigration, then the ballot box will increasingly prove otherwise!
    Neoliberals want higher taxes? Are you sure about that?
    On ordinary voters, less so themselves
    The problem in this country is that a lot of voters want everyone wealthier than themselves to pay higher taxes so that they can have more money. But they want the level at which higher taxes are levied to conveniently stop just above themselves. One reason why Truss and Kwarteng were so unpopular is probably because they refused to go along with this way of thinking.
  • ihuntihunt Posts: 146

    HYUFD said:

    Andy_JS said:

    If Farage returns as leader of Reform UK the party will probably go from 5% to 10% in the polls and then the Tories are really in trouble.

    He has now said he would if May returns '@Nigel_Farage
    ·
    1h
    The Mail on Sunday speculating on a comeback for Mrs May. You really couldn't make it up.

    I got rid of her once and would be very tempted to go for a second time.'

    https://twitter.com/Nigel_Farage/status/1581646846539182081?s=20&t=qKoGjGPUsSV9WciI3udIeg
    HY, Farage is a moron, a one-trick Brexit show pony. Don't panic. If your party gets it's house in order and ditches the blue Corbynistas life becomes a lot easier for you. One nation feudal Tories are your answer.
    tories put Theresa May in again they really are finished...what a joke of a party
  • kjhkjh Posts: 11,945
    edited October 2022
    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

    Italy is in the G7 and has a nationalist right government, Trump leads some 2024 polls again, Le Pen and Melenchon and the various other left parties combined now have more seats than the neoliberal Macron in the French Parliament. In the UK we voted for Brexit and Boris and very nearly voted for Corbyn in 2017.

    If the globalist neoliberal order thinks the populations of western democracies are just going to take ever higher taxes, ever deeper austerity and uncontrolled immigration, then the ballot box will increasingly prove otherwise!
    Neoliberals want higher taxes? Are you sure about that?
    On ordinary voters, less so themselves
    Don't think so. I could be wrong. Can you show me any definition where neoliberals want higher taxes on ordinary voters. Would seem odd that advocates of a smaller state would want higher taxes on anyone. I mean what for?

    I would have thought tax reductions was the aim.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,910
    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

    Italy is in the G7 and has a nationalist right government, Trump leads some 2024 polls again, Le Pen and Melenchon and the various other left parties combined now have more seats than the neoliberal Macron in the French Parliament. In the UK we voted for Brexit and Boris and very nearly voted for Corbyn in 2017.

    If the globalist neoliberal order thinks the populations of western democracies are just going to take ever higher taxes, ever deeper austerity and uncontrolled immigration, then the ballot box will increasingly prove otherwise!
    Time to brush off that SS uniform?
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,947

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

    Italy is in the G7 and has a nationalist right government, Trump leads some 2024 polls again, Le Pen and Melenchon and the various other left parties combined now have more seats than the neoliberal Macron in the French Parliament. In the UK we voted for Brexit and Boris and very nearly voted for Corbyn in 2017.

    If the globalist neoliberal order thinks the populations of western democracies are just going to take ever higher taxes, ever deeper austerity and uncontrolled immigration, then the ballot box will increasingly prove otherwise!
    Time to brush off that SS uniform?
    You trying to lure Ed Balls back into politics?
  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 61,964
    Pretty abysmal performance from today's bets (one to come, late Spanish kickoff).

    Hmm. Truss down to 1.64 to go this year, out to 3.3 next. May go for another hedge of the 46 for her going this year.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 51,141
    TimS said:

    Having seen Russian nationalist blogs and tweets on Ukraine over the last few months I think we face a category error, and on their terms Ukraine is indeed full of Nazis.

    To an average Westerner the Nazis are the people who did the holocaust. The defining feature is racism, anti-semitism and genocide. To Russia, I’m increasingly convinced “Nazi” simply means someone from Europe who hates Russia. On that measure Ukrainian nationalists are Nazis.

    Hence why a Russian nationalist can decry homosexuals and woke cuck Dems on the one hand and Ukrainian “Nazis” on the other.

    "The defining feature is racism, anti-semitism and genocide" - bit more than that, otherwise Stalin was a Nazi...

    There was a rather good article the other day, by a chap who studied Russia academically, lived there, spoke the language etc.

    He wrote some interesting stuff on how "Nazi" has been suborned by various Russian nationalists - going back to Soviet times - in very much this way. They want it to mean - anyone who *Russia is against*.

    Which means that you can become a Nazi, even if you have no interest or concern with Russia. If they have a problem with you, that's all that is required.
  • ihuntihunt Posts: 146
    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

    Italy is in the G7 and has a nationalist right government, Trump leads some 2024 polls again, Le Pen and Melenchon and the various other left parties combined now have more seats than the neoliberal Macron in the French Parliament. In the UK we voted for Brexit and Boris and very nearly voted for Corbyn in 2017.

    If the globalist neoliberal order thinks the populations of western democracies are just going to take ever higher taxes, ever deeper austerity and uncontrolled immigration, then the ballot box will increasingly prove otherwise!
    article in the telegraph today says we are turning into Italy...i think that is true...the Uks future is as a chaotic country in decline with politics becoming increasingly crazy....
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,910
    Andy_JS said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

    Italy is in the G7 and has a nationalist right government, Trump leads some 2024 polls again, Le Pen and Melenchon and the various other left parties combined now have more seats than the neoliberal Macron in the French Parliament. In the UK we voted for Brexit and Boris and very nearly voted for Corbyn in 2017.

    If the globalist neoliberal order thinks the populations of western democracies are just going to take ever higher taxes, ever deeper austerity and uncontrolled immigration, then the ballot box will increasingly prove otherwise!
    Neoliberals want higher taxes? Are you sure about that?
    On ordinary voters, less so themselves
    The problem in this country is that a lot of voters want everyone wealthier than themselves to pay higher taxes so that they can have more money. But they want the level at which higher taxes are levied to conveniently stop just above themselves. One reason why Truss and Kwarteng were so unpopular is probably because they refused to go along with this way of thinking.
    You reckon?
  • OnlyLivingBoyOnlyLivingBoy Posts: 15,899
    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump.

    Indeed one thing Sanders and Trump supporters and the hard left and nationalist right share is they despise the IMF and the neoliberal globalist order
    Where do you and your party fit into this? It seems like Trussonomics has been buried. So are you for or against what conspiracy theorists would call the New World Order (and what non conspiracy theorists might call liberal capitalism tempered by varying degrees of social democracy)?
    I'm sure for all of us and for a variety of different reasons there is a gap between the world as it exists and as we would like it to be. The question is whether it is bad enough that blowing it up is going to be better (in my view no) and whether the solution on offer is rooted in reality (as far as the post Brexit Tory party is concerned, I don't think so).
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 51,141
    kle4 said:

    ...

    stjohn said:

    Why not a government of all the Chancellors?

    Sunak
    Hunt
    Javid
    Zahawi

    Reminds me of an Alec Guiness line from Star Wars, about the bar they go to? 'Scum and villainy' were part of it I think.
    "You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy."

    I think it's a bit harsh.
    I agree, it's a little unfair - the bar in Star Wars wasn't that bad.
    Swift service, live music, good ambience, a place of work and play, what's not to love?
    Bigotry against droids?
  • StillWatersStillWaters Posts: 8,473

    Scott_xP said:

    “Depressed” @trussliz has changed her mobile number so many times that as of today, some cabinet ministers can no longer contact her, I’m told.
    https://twitter.com/IsabelOakeshott/status/1581624402911047681

    There is a human point here. Everyone fails at being Prime Minister eventually (maybe we have loaded too much into the role) even if Truss's failure is more spectacular and much faster than most.

    I hope she is getting a decent slab of unconditional love from someone.
    I think she and her beau have had a falling out

  • kjhkjh Posts: 11,945

    Andy_JS said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

    Italy is in the G7 and has a nationalist right government, Trump leads some 2024 polls again, Le Pen and Melenchon and the various other left parties combined now have more seats than the neoliberal Macron in the French Parliament. In the UK we voted for Brexit and Boris and very nearly voted for Corbyn in 2017.

    If the globalist neoliberal order thinks the populations of western democracies are just going to take ever higher taxes, ever deeper austerity and uncontrolled immigration, then the ballot box will increasingly prove otherwise!
    Neoliberals want higher taxes? Are you sure about that?
    On ordinary voters, less so themselves
    The problem in this country is that a lot of voters want everyone wealthier than themselves to pay higher taxes so that they can have more money. But they want the level at which higher taxes are levied to conveniently stop just above themselves. One reason why Truss and Kwarteng were so unpopular is probably because they refused to go along with this way of thinking.
    You reckon?
    Two trains of thought for the selfish voter:

    1) Make people richer than me pay the taxes, but not me
    2) Don't put up taxes for people richer than me because I aspire to get there

    Toss up to which one is correct. Could be both as different voters think differently.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,910

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    I'm writing this from the Amtrak lounge at Union Station in Washington DC as I wait for my Acela train to New York. The following represents a few thoughts from the Annual Meetings of the IMF and associated fringe events organised by the major banks and bilateral meetings with officials and market participants. I'm going to focus on the bits relevant to the UK although of course this represents just a fraction of the discussions.
    First, when you have become the joke, you have a problem. I lost count of the number of times the British situation was remarked on wryly or was just openly mocked. It's nice to be able to put a smile on people's faces, but as a Brit I found it distinctly uncomfortable.
    Second, Britain needs friends. The US has been angered by the way that UK government incompetence has destabilised global markets, and has been very happy to air that frustration publicly. The Europeans have their own club, which we left. There wasn't much love in the room for the UK, anywhere.
    Third, there was open discussion of whether the UK might end up at the IMF. Mostly this was aired in an ironic tone, but I also heard quite serious players claim that it was likely.
    Last, when the UK wasn't being criticised or mocked it was entirely absent from the discussions. UK officials and policymakers aren't treated seriously. The UK's views and interests are absent in the big discussions. Global Britain is a distant aspiration.
    Feel free to dismiss as the ramblings of a bitter Remoaner member of the globalist blob if you like. But I am travelling on to New York in a rather depressed state at how low the stock of our country has fallen in global forums.

    Is it really surprising the globalist corporatist Biden administration and the EU and IMF despise post Brexit UK and anyone who thinks outside the neoliberal group think? However it is not just the UK which has seen revolts against what conspiracy theorists would call this New World Order agenda, see Italy with Meloni, Greece with Syriza, France with Le Pen and Melonchon and indeed the US with Trump?
    What a soft fascist dunce you are.

    Greece and Italy have never been seen as serious countries. Trump is (for now) in abeyance, and Le Pen has failed to win the Presidency on several occasions, despite your attempts to pretend otherwise.

    Italy is in the G7 and has a nationalist right government, Trump leads some 2024 polls again, Le Pen and Melenchon and the various other left parties combined now have more seats than the neoliberal Macron in the French Parliament. In the UK we voted for Brexit and Boris and very nearly voted for Corbyn in 2017.

    If the globalist neoliberal order thinks the populations of western democracies are just going to take ever higher taxes, ever deeper austerity and uncontrolled immigration, then the ballot box will increasingly prove otherwise!
    Time to brush off that SS uniform?
    You trying to lure Ed Balls back into politics?
    Hasn't George Osborne got something similar if Ed can't help HY out?
  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 61,964
    edited October 2022
    Truss is layable to go in 2022 at 1.51 on Smarkets.

    Put some down on that.

    Edited extra bit: on 24 September she was 46 to go this year.
  • solarflaresolarflare Posts: 3,750
    ohnotnow said:

    Really very off-topic, but I quite liked this : https://scotrail.datasette.io/scotrail/random_apology?

    "The background here is that someone did a FOI request for the announcement audio, crowdsourced transcriptions, and various things have been built on top of it."

    That is excellent.
  • nico679nico679 Posts: 6,277
    Andy_JS said:

    "China's President Xi Jinping doubles down on zero-Covid as congress opens - BBC News"

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBU27IUaTb0

    That should help lower oil prices even after the OPEC cuts.

  • Andy_JS said:

    For any Tory MPs pondering what to do today a reminder that the difference between losing by 25pt and 15pts is 150 seats.

    https://twitter.com/Samfr/status/1581640379278905344?s=20&t=Ev3qLbiNVkIIQesbNve_mQ

    Does anyone think the Tories could lose by 25% in a real election?
    If Liz is still leader, I'd say it's definitely possible.
    Yes, definitely. I should say even 15% is achievable if they carry on this way for a bit.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,910
    Andy_JS said:

    For any Tory MPs pondering what to do today a reminder that the difference between losing by 25pt and 15pts is 150 seats.

    https://twitter.com/Samfr/status/1581640379278905344?s=20&t=Ev3qLbiNVkIIQesbNve_mQ

    Does anyone think the Tories could lose by 25% in a real election?
    No you'll be fine. You might struggle past a 20 seat majority in January 2025 mind.
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    edited October 2022
    This week I have seen confusion amongst police forces about what constitutes a ‘hate crime’.

    The police need to enforce actual laws & fight actual crimes. Freedom of speech must be protected and a proportionate approach must be taken. 1/2




    The public need to have confidence in their police forces.

    This sort of thing undermines it.

    Senior police officers who allow this to happen can expect to have to explain to me why they’re spending vital resources on politically correct campaigns.
    2/2


    https://twitter.com/SuellaBraverman/status/1581618197585100800

    Possibly related:

    Chief Constable Simon Cole , said:“Leicestershire Police is thrilled to have made the Stonewall top 100 employer list .

    https://tinyurl.com/248njnpa
  • Ishmael_ZIshmael_Z Posts: 8,981

    Pretty abysmal performance from today's bets (one to come, late Spanish kickoff).

    Hmm. Truss down to 1.64 to go this year, out to 3.3 next. May go for another hedge of the 46 for her going this year.

    You on at 46? Respect.

    1.64 may be as short as it gets. This year is only 10 weeks now.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 56,606
    The Gathering Clouds


    “Well. This looks a bit ominous.
    Video of military equipment on the move in Belarus (via @JayinKyiv). Note white triangle tactical marking. Similar was seen on some Russian military vehicles before Russia's full-scale invasion. See examples in thread below.”

    https://twitter.com/euan_macdonald/status/1581639598291095552?s=46&t=Ur17zGIZtw45p1RkMrxyAw
  • Ishmael_ZIshmael_Z Posts: 8,981
    Who should replace her?
    Kemi Penny Rishi Hunt in that order. A good reason to keep the membership away from the decision.
This discussion has been closed.