Speaking of dodgy dealings and criminal activity, glad to see FTX has now officially fallen into bankruptcy and hopefully a few more "Coin exchanges" follow it.
My sympathies for all the victims of the fraudsters and shysters behind the crypto scam. The sooner the entire so-called crypto market is wiped out entirely, the better, stop future victims from falling prey to these predators.
Unfortunately I doubt we'll see many of the people behind this pyramid scam end up behind bars where they deserve.
“Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.” My response to everything you post, Barty. It would never remotely occur to me to invest in bitcoin (as opposed to holding retail sized bits of it to buy acid on Tor), but it is a bit more complicated than you think it is. FTX going bust says nothing about bitcoin being a scam.
The technology behind Bitcoin is not a scam.
The market behind Bitcoin, and exchanges like FTX, Ether etc absolutely are scams.
Technology can be used for good or bad. The same technology behind emails, which are often legitimate and can be useful for correspondences, is the same technology behind Nigerian scams.
Unfortunately the entire crypto "scene" is one big Nigerian scam at the minute. Its been taken over by timeshare sellers, fraudsters, thieves and useful idiots.
After Bitcoin dies, the technology it leaves behind may be useful, put to better and smarter uses than "stonks go up!" scamware.
Even had we voted Remain in due course we would have ended up on the outer edge with non Eurozone Sweden, Denmark and Poland and Hungary while the rest moved full steam ahead to federal union.
Yes, exactly (except fuller union of the core won't be anything like at 'full steam ahead', more like a snail's pace with long periods of stasis, if it ever happens at all). We'd have had the best of all possible positions: all the advantages of full EU membership, without the excessive bits. It is such an extraordinary tragedy that we, of our own volition, threw it away. As I predicted at the time, we'll spend at least a decade, perhaps longer, painfully trying to claw back some of the lost ground, but we'll never get back to such a favourable position as we had.
And all of it easily avoided if the arrogant clueless europhiles had only given the British people a vote on earlier moments of integration - as they so often promised, yet failed to do
This constant fraudulence led inexorably to the fatal rupture of total Brexit. Consider this
Yes, the EU as it was circa 2005 almost everybody could have lived with*. A halfway house, fine. Had Cameron tried that little bit harder to achieve such a thing, and to sell it he would have carried the day. Sadly, he thought all he had to was reject the Eurosceptics. Inasmuch as he thought about Euroscepticism, he thought it was confined to a fringe of his own party and an even smaller fringe of the far left. He thought that the country thought like Witney. But given Lisbon we had no way to trust that we wouldn't be dragged in further. Blair wanted to be at the heart of Europe, remember, and wanted to join the Euro. Why would we trust our political classes on Europe? So in a forced choice of wholly in or wholly out, out wins.
*Not me. I was a leaver long before it was unfashionable. But even I was a soft Brexiteer.
Cameron worked very hard and was a good executive chair but was never a deep thinker.
I think he was just a committed europhile. A more neutral PM on the issue could have combined a robust negotiation with some meaningful domestic changes to benefits etc., and come up with a respectable package that would have romped home in the referendum. He didn't want that - he thought the threat of leave would mean that he could force the UK population to swallow the whole hog. Every Euro thing they pushed through after that he'd have reminded anyone who opposed of the 'ringing British endorsement of the EU' etc. Silly and destructive.
Exactly.
The idea that a Remain vote would have seen us a member of an "outer" group is risible - we would have been sucked into the inner core, with the Remain vote used as justification.
The history of British engagement in the EU since the turn of the millennium says otherwise. Staying out of the Euro, exercising the veto, securing carve outs. The history of the EU itself isn’t much different either.
At most we might have had to give up a bit more rebate and agreed to QM voting. The federal superstate thing was always more of a figment of the imagination. Even after the Euro crisis and bailouts the EU is no more integrated now than it was in 2010.
A very rose-tinted view of the situation. Not falsifiable - but also doesn't take into consideration the principle of the ratchet.
But there’s no evidence as far as I can see for any of that before or since. Countries like Denmark for instance are broadly as integrated as they were 15 years ago.
No country ever tried to leave. If you think the raging federalists that run the EU would have risked us having a second try, you're beyond optimistic.
If we’d voted remain we wouldn’t have “tried to leave” any more than Scotland tried to leave in 2015. HYUFD may fantasise about tanks up the A1 but Scotland’s constitutional status is pretty much the same now as before the Indy ref. Likewise Britain’s status in the EU would be the same as before 2016.
The people who “run the EU” - evident to anyone who looks at things like Ukraine or tax policy - are the leaders of the member states.
This is beyond naive. It is astonishing that apparently clever people can still trot out this gibberish
The EU is intent on Ever Closer Union. That has been its explicit aim since its inception, denied less on the continent than in the UK
As a small part of this it has created a super elite of very-well-paid and undertaxed eurocrats and politicians who are, notwithstanding their general mediocrity, completely dedicated to the EU Federal ideal - not least because it provides them with a career and a creed
It's like being a Catholic cleric - which also explains why the reactions to Brexit were so emotionally hostile. Brexit isn't just an error, it is a heresy, to these people. It can never be right, no more than a blasphemer can be "right"
This commitment to the EU is, by the way, written into the Lisbon Treaty. All the Commissioners have to display a "European vocation" - ie be totally convinced of the Ever Closer Union and emotionally invested in the EU as the future. Meaning no eurosceptic can ever be a senior member of the EU's "government" - just one reason we had to leave, in the end
The EU is a nascent Federal superstate. The honest ones do not deny it, and I respect them more than the snivelling liars or the pootling idiots
And yet hundreds of millions of people in apparently pretty sophisticated countries across Europe are pretty content with the status quo and make little disguise of their disinterest in integrating further. Denmark, Sweden, Poland, much of the rest of Eastern Europe. They know it’s in their power to choose their own future.
The British Eurosceptics always seemed so much more frightened of the power of the central institutions than other countries: the commission in particular. Perhaps that was a vestigial island mentality and resistance to continental empires, but the Danes are pretty independent minded and seem a lot less in awe of Brussels. Yet despite the fear the same people believed we could negotiate the best of both worlds and could bend the EU to our will in the way out.
Again, it’s this odd mixture of under- and overestimating Britain’s agency and power that I don’t get.
Feelings of inferiority and superiority often co-exist. But I agree it's an interesting paradox.
Or is it? Sometimes I hear all the tortuous reasons advanced for leaving as simply retrospective justification for an act of self-harm.
One of the reasons EFTA (or similar) was not entertained was simply that Brexiters were so high on their own supply they could not concede that there was any merit at all in doing so.
After all, there were no downsides to Brexit, only considerable upsides; Minford predicted Brexit would deliver falling prices and economic *growth*; a US trade deal was in the wings, and of course the EU was a sclerotic hellhole anyway.
Once Brexiters return to reality-based thinking, and there are signs that this has started, EFTA (or similar) starts to look viable.
Freedom of movement remains a problem... it's pretty much the main reason Labour won't consider EEA at the moment. But there is scope for an emergency brake within Article 112.
Even had we voted Remain in due course we would have ended up on the outer edge with non Eurozone Sweden, Denmark and Poland and Hungary while the rest moved full steam ahead to federal union.
Yes, exactly (except fuller union of the core won't be anything like at 'full steam ahead', more like a snail's pace with long periods of stasis, if it ever happens at all). We'd have had the best of all possible positions: all the advantages of full EU membership, without the excessive bits. It is such an extraordinary tragedy that we, of our own volition, threw it away. As I predicted at the time, we'll spend at least a decade, perhaps longer, painfully trying to claw back some of the lost ground, but we'll never get back to such a favourable position as we had.
And all of it easily avoided if the arrogant clueless europhiles had only given the British people a vote on earlier moments of integration - as they so often promised, yet failed to do
This constant fraudulence led inexorably to the fatal rupture of total Brexit. Consider this
Yes, the EU as it was circa 2005 almost everybody could have lived with*. A halfway house, fine. Had Cameron tried that little bit harder to achieve such a thing, and to sell it he would have carried the day. Sadly, he thought all he had to was reject the Eurosceptics. Inasmuch as he thought about Euroscepticism, he thought it was confined to a fringe of his own party and an even smaller fringe of the far left. He thought that the country thought like Witney. But given Lisbon we had no way to trust that we wouldn't be dragged in further. Blair wanted to be at the heart of Europe, remember, and wanted to join the Euro. Why would we trust our political classes on Europe? So in a forced choice of wholly in or wholly out, out wins.
*Not me. I was a leaver long before it was unfashionable. But even I was a soft Brexiteer.
Cameron worked very hard and was a good executive chair but was never a deep thinker.
I think he was just a committed europhile. A more neutral PM on the issue could have combined a robust negotiation with some meaningful domestic changes to benefits etc., and come up with a respectable package that would have romped home in the referendum. He didn't want that - he thought the threat of leave would mean that he could force the UK population to swallow the whole hog. Every Euro thing they pushed through after that he'd have reminded anyone who opposed of the 'ringing British endorsement of the EU' etc. Silly and destructive.
Exactly.
The idea that a Remain vote would have seen us a member of an "outer" group is risible - we would have been sucked into the inner core, with the Remain vote used as justification.
The history of British engagement in the EU since the turn of the millennium says otherwise. Staying out of the Euro, exercising the veto, securing carve outs. The history of the EU itself isn’t much different either.
At most we might have had to give up a bit more rebate and agreed to QM voting. The federal superstate thing was always more of a figment of the imagination. Even after the Euro crisis and bailouts the EU is no more integrated now than it was in 2010.
A very rose-tinted view of the situation. Not falsifiable - but also doesn't take into consideration the principle of the ratchet.
But there’s no evidence as far as I can see for any of that before or since. Countries like Denmark for instance are broadly as integrated as they were 15 years ago.
No country ever tried to leave. If you think the raging federalists that run the EU would have risked us having a second try, you're beyond optimistic.
If we’d voted remain we wouldn’t have “tried to leave” any more than Scotland tried to leave in 2015. HYUFD may fantasise about tanks up the A1 but Scotland’s constitutional status is pretty much the same now as before the Indy ref. Likewise Britain’s status in the EU would be the same as before 2016.
The people who “run the EU” - evident to anyone who looks at things like Ukraine or tax policy - are the leaders of the member states.
This is beyond naive. It is astonishing that apparently clever people can still trot out this gibberish
The EU is intent on Ever Closer Union. That has been its explicit aim since its inception, denied less on the continent than in the UK
As a small part of this it has created a super elite of very-well-paid and undertaxed eurocrats and politicians who are, notwithstanding their general mediocrity, completely dedicated to the EU Federal ideal - not least because it provides them with a career and a creed
It's like being a Catholic cleric - which also explains why the reactions to Brexit were so emotionally hostile. Brexit isn't just an error, it is a heresy, to these people. It can never be right, no more than a blasphemer can be "right"
This commitment to the EU is, by the way, written into the Lisbon Treaty. All the Commissioners have to display a "European vocation" - ie be totally convinced of the Ever Closer Union and emotionally invested in the EU as the future. Meaning no eurosceptic can ever be a senior member of the EU's "government" - just one reason we had to leave, in the end
The EU is a nascent Federal superstate.
Your hidden premise seems to be that federal states (and a fortiori unions) are bad for some reason.
But wait...Britain is a union...
Indeed. Which is why some English Eurosceptics like myself are supportive of Scottish Independence and a united Ireland.
Me too.
Wales can tag along with us if they're too sheepish to go independent.
Wales voted for Brexit as did county Antrim
Only you would see a post talking about Wales being too sheepish, and respond seriously about how they voted.
One of the reasons EFTA (or similar) was not entertained was simply that Brexiters were so high on their own supply they could not concede that there was any merit at all in doing so.
After all, there were no downsides to Brexit, only considerable upsides; Minford predicted Brexit would deliver falling prices and economic *growth*; a US trade deal was in the wings, and of course the EU was a sclerotic hellhole anyway.
Once Brexiters return to reality-based thinking, and there are signs that this has started, EFTA (or similar) starts to look viable.
Freedom of movement remains a problem... it's pretty much the main reason Labour won't consider EEA at the moment. But there is scope for an emergency brake within Article 112.
If a Labour government were able to convince the electorate they can control immigration, they could possibly sell the EEA by emphasising Article 112.
Let’s see.
There is a reasonable case to be made that Britain has suffered “serious economic, societal or environmental difficulties of a sectorial or regional nature liable to persist” as a result of immigration, but I don’t think anyone has made that honest case yet, because it likely needs to be framed in a way that concedes that overall migration was a massive boon for the UK.
Monday OK. Tuesday student self-injured. Not as bad as first thought. Permanent injury though. Wednesday public urination. Thursday assault and threats to torture and kill. Friday was pretty chilled. How was your week?
Monday OK. Tuesday student self-insured. Not as bad as first thought. Wednesday public urination. Thursday assault and threats to torture and kill. Friday was pretty chilled. How was your week?
Is that a selection of news headlines or your own lived experience?
Monday OK. Tuesday student self-injured. Not as bad as first thought. Permanent injury though. Wednesday public urination. Thursday assault and threats to torture and kill. Friday was pretty chilled. How was your week?
Even had we voted Remain in due course we would have ended up on the outer edge with non Eurozone Sweden, Denmark and Poland and Hungary while the rest moved full steam ahead to federal union.
Yes, exactly (except fuller union of the core won't be anything like at 'full steam ahead', more like a snail's pace with long periods of stasis, if it ever happens at all). We'd have had the best of all possible positions: all the advantages of full EU membership, without the excessive bits. It is such an extraordinary tragedy that we, of our own volition, threw it away. As I predicted at the time, we'll spend at least a decade, perhaps longer, painfully trying to claw back some of the lost ground, but we'll never get back to such a favourable position as we had.
And all of it easily avoided if the arrogant clueless europhiles had only given the British people a vote on earlier moments of integration - as they so often promised, yet failed to do
This constant fraudulence led inexorably to the fatal rupture of total Brexit. Consider this
Yes, the EU as it was circa 2005 almost everybody could have lived with*. A halfway house, fine. Had Cameron tried that little bit harder to achieve such a thing, and to sell it he would have carried the day. Sadly, he thought all he had to was reject the Eurosceptics. Inasmuch as he thought about Euroscepticism, he thought it was confined to a fringe of his own party and an even smaller fringe of the far left. He thought that the country thought like Witney. But given Lisbon we had no way to trust that we wouldn't be dragged in further. Blair wanted to be at the heart of Europe, remember, and wanted to join the Euro. Why would we trust our political classes on Europe? So in a forced choice of wholly in or wholly out, out wins.
*Not me. I was a leaver long before it was unfashionable. But even I was a soft Brexiteer.
Cameron worked very hard and was a good executive chair but was never a deep thinker.
I think he was just a committed europhile. A more neutral PM on the issue could have combined a robust negotiation with some meaningful domestic changes to benefits etc., and come up with a respectable package that would have romped home in the referendum. He didn't want that - he thought the threat of leave would mean that he could force the UK population to swallow the whole hog. Every Euro thing they pushed through after that he'd have reminded anyone who opposed of the 'ringing British endorsement of the EU' etc. Silly and destructive.
Exactly.
The idea that a Remain vote would have seen us a member of an "outer" group is risible - we would have been sucked into the inner core, with the Remain vote used as justification.
The history of British engagement in the EU since the turn of the millennium says otherwise. Staying out of the Euro, exercising the veto, securing carve outs. The history of the EU itself isn’t much different either.
At most we might have had to give up a bit more rebate and agreed to QM voting. The federal superstate thing was always more of a figment of the imagination. Even after the Euro crisis and bailouts the EU is no more integrated now than it was in 2010.
A very rose-tinted view of the situation. Not falsifiable - but also doesn't take into consideration the principle of the ratchet.
But there’s no evidence as far as I can see for any of that before or since. Countries like Denmark for instance are broadly as integrated as they were 15 years ago.
No country ever tried to leave. If you think the raging federalists that run the EU would have risked us having a second try, you're beyond optimistic.
If we’d voted remain we wouldn’t have “tried to leave” any more than Scotland tried to leave in 2015. HYUFD may fantasise about tanks up the A1 but Scotland’s constitutional status is pretty much the same now as before the Indy ref. Likewise Britain’s status in the EU would be the same as before 2016.
The people who “run the EU” - evident to anyone who looks at things like Ukraine or tax policy - are the leaders of the member states.
This is beyond naive. It is astonishing that apparently clever people can still trot out this gibberish
The EU is intent on Ever Closer Union. That has been its explicit aim since its inception, denied less on the continent than in the UK
As a small part of this it has created a super elite of very-well-paid and undertaxed eurocrats and politicians who are, notwithstanding their general mediocrity, completely dedicated to the EU Federal ideal - not least because it provides them with a career and a creed
It's like being a Catholic cleric - which also explains why the reactions to Brexit were so emotionally hostile. Brexit isn't just an error, it is a heresy, to these people. It can never be right, no more than a blasphemer can be "right"
This commitment to the EU is, by the way, written into the Lisbon Treaty. All the Commissioners have to display a "European vocation" - ie be totally convinced of the Ever Closer Union and emotionally invested in the EU as the future. Meaning no eurosceptic can ever be a senior member of the EU's "government" - just one reason we had to leave, in the end
The EU is a nascent Federal superstate.
Your hidden premise seems to be that federal states (and a fortiori unions) are bad for some reason.
But wait...Britain is a union...
Indeed. Which is why some English Eurosceptics like myself are supportive of Scottish Independence and a united Ireland.
Scotland wouldn't be independent under Sturgeon, just leaving the UK to join a Federal EU superstate
New nation state created, the resulting sovereignty voluntarily pooled via EU membership in the perceived national interest. Like many other European countries. That's the reality. Call it what you like but I don't see much wrong with "independence".
Solar energy firm Toucan has fallen into administration after racking up more than half a billion pounds in debt to a local authority in Essex, England https://trib.al/1DDI7RZ
Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot.
Given what's happened in the Electricity market, solar farms ought to be making unprecedented windfall profits, not falling into bankruptcy.
Something very, very dodgy has surely happened there. Hope it gets a criminal investigation.
More to the point WTF was Essex County Council doing lending £665 million to a commercial entity?
Even had we voted Remain in due course we would have ended up on the outer edge with non Eurozone Sweden, Denmark and Poland and Hungary while the rest moved full steam ahead to federal union.
Yes, exactly (except fuller union of the core won't be anything like at 'full steam ahead', more like a snail's pace with long periods of stasis, if it ever happens at all). We'd have had the best of all possible positions: all the advantages of full EU membership, without the excessive bits. It is such an extraordinary tragedy that we, of our own volition, threw it away. As I predicted at the time, we'll spend at least a decade, perhaps longer, painfully trying to claw back some of the lost ground, but we'll never get back to such a favourable position as we had.
And all of it easily avoided if the arrogant clueless europhiles had only given the British people a vote on earlier moments of integration - as they so often promised, yet failed to do
This constant fraudulence led inexorably to the fatal rupture of total Brexit. Consider this
Yes, the EU as it was circa 2005 almost everybody could have lived with*. A halfway house, fine. Had Cameron tried that little bit harder to achieve such a thing, and to sell it he would have carried the day. Sadly, he thought all he had to was reject the Eurosceptics. Inasmuch as he thought about Euroscepticism, he thought it was confined to a fringe of his own party and an even smaller fringe of the far left. He thought that the country thought like Witney. But given Lisbon we had no way to trust that we wouldn't be dragged in further. Blair wanted to be at the heart of Europe, remember, and wanted to join the Euro. Why would we trust our political classes on Europe? So in a forced choice of wholly in or wholly out, out wins.
*Not me. I was a leaver long before it was unfashionable. But even I was a soft Brexiteer.
Cameron worked very hard and was a good executive chair but was never a deep thinker.
I think he was just a committed europhile. A more neutral PM on the issue could have combined a robust negotiation with some meaningful domestic changes to benefits etc., and come up with a respectable package that would have romped home in the referendum. He didn't want that - he thought the threat of leave would mean that he could force the UK population to swallow the whole hog. Every Euro thing they pushed through after that he'd have reminded anyone who opposed of the 'ringing British endorsement of the EU' etc. Silly and destructive.
Exactly.
The idea that a Remain vote would have seen us a member of an "outer" group is risible - we would have been sucked into the inner core, with the Remain vote used as justification.
The history of British engagement in the EU since the turn of the millennium says otherwise. Staying out of the Euro, exercising the veto, securing carve outs. The history of the EU itself isn’t much different either.
At most we might have had to give up a bit more rebate and agreed to QM voting. The federal superstate thing was always more of a figment of the imagination. Even after the Euro crisis and bailouts the EU is no more integrated now than it was in 2010.
A very rose-tinted view of the situation. Not falsifiable - but also doesn't take into consideration the principle of the ratchet.
But there’s no evidence as far as I can see for any of that before or since. Countries like Denmark for instance are broadly as integrated as they were 15 years ago.
No country ever tried to leave. If you think the raging federalists that run the EU would have risked us having a second try, you're beyond optimistic.
If we’d voted remain we wouldn’t have “tried to leave” any more than Scotland tried to leave in 2015. HYUFD may fantasise about tanks up the A1 but Scotland’s constitutional status is pretty much the same now as before the Indy ref. Likewise Britain’s status in the EU would be the same as before 2016.
The people who “run the EU” - evident to anyone who looks at things like Ukraine or tax policy - are the leaders of the member states.
This is beyond naive. It is astonishing that apparently clever people can still trot out this gibberish
The EU is intent on Ever Closer Union. That has been its explicit aim since its inception, denied less on the continent than in the UK
As a small part of this it has created a super elite of every-well-paid and undertaxed eurocrats and politicians who are, notwithstanding their general mediocrity, completely dedicated to the EU Federal ideal - not least because it provides them with a career and a creed
It's like being a Catholic cleric - which also explains why the reactions to Brexit were so emotionally hostile. Brexit isn't just an error, it is a heresy, to these people. It can never be right, no more than a blasphemer can be "right"
This commitment to the EU is, by the way, written into the Lisbon Treaty. All the Commissioners have to display a "European vocation" - ie be totally convinced of the Ever Closer Union and emotionally invested in the EU as the future. Meaning no eurosceptic can ever be a senior member of the EU's "government" - just one reason we had to leave, in the end
The EU is a nascent Federal superstate. The honest ones do not deny it, and I respect them more than the snivelling liars or the pootling idiots
IIRC, an EU employee's pension can in theory be revoked if they act in an un-european way after their retirement. Doubt it would ever happen, but still creepy as fuck.
Yep. And "creepy as fuck" is an apt description of the inner philosophies of the EU, once you begin to dig. It is "building a superstate by stealth", in essence
Anyway we are now out of this stupid pile of lying wank, and Remoaners like @Scott_xP can spend the rest of their futile lives lamenting it. Perhaps if they'd been honest earlier they might not have ended up on the wrong side of history. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Oh no, Leon's off on Brexit again. I think the only way to stop him will be to rejoin.
they might not have ended up on the wrong side of history.
We remain on the right side of history (see what I did there?)
Leaving was a bad mistake.
One day even you will figure it out.
There is zero sign of Switzerland, Norway or Iceland trying to join - quite the opposite. Polls show intense allergic reactions to the idea
The EEA countries all seem very happy with their statuses - much more so than most EU members.
There are a couple of differences, though.
First is that the EEA countries are pretty small- they're not giving up that much by withdrawing from the political/democratic discussions.
Second, the EEA states have made fairly clear calculations- accept that they are going to follow the herd in most areas in order to carve out more autonomy in a few things that really matter to them.
Mapping that onto the UK is tricky. Partly because the country is bigger. But also, we haven't really worked out what bits of autonomy we really want and what (if anything) we are prepared to give up to achieve that. Maybe we could, but it's not happened yet.
Put those together, and it kinda makes sense that the UK hasn't neatly settled in EEA. (Me? I'd be chill with it. But I don't see how you get there from "Take Back Control", or think it's a stable answer for the UK.)
For the problem you have to go into the past. As of right now the UK as a whole does not accept FoM, ie a migration system not in our power to legislate for.
This only became live as an issue when states at very different stages of development had FoM with us.
To allow this was a UK (New Labour) failure of statecraft.
Once done it can't be undone (theological principle of the EU). Ask Cameron.
We allowed the SM to be linked irrevocably to FoM. Unless that is undone there can be no optimal solution.
We have no power to undo it.
Ergo there is no optimal solution.
This has been the central problem since June 2016, and it still is.
NB Labour has no coherent policy on the matter, for very good reasons.
The question is how much poorer are people willing to be to stop Polish people moving here. I guess we're going to find out.
The answer for most families will be "no poorer at all".
The only ones who stand be poorer are those making good money who had gotten addicted to getting everyone else to be minimum wage serfs to look after them. Tarquin might need a more expensive Nanny until he becomes old enough to start climbing on M25 gantries going forwards.
Solar energy firm Toucan has fallen into administration after racking up more than half a billion pounds in debt to a local authority in Essex, England https://trib.al/1DDI7RZ
Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot.
Given what's happened in the Electricity market, solar farms ought to be making unprecedented windfall profits, not falling into bankruptcy.
Something very, very dodgy has surely happened there. Hope it gets a criminal investigation.
More to the point WTF was Essex County Council doing lending £665 million to a commercial entity?
Monday OK. Tuesday student self-injured. Not as bad as first thought. Permanent injury though. Wednesday public urination. Thursday assault and threats to torture and kill. Friday was pretty chilled. How was your week?
Solar energy firm Toucan has fallen into administration after racking up more than half a billion pounds in debt to a local authority in Essex, England https://trib.al/1DDI7RZ
Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot.
Given what's happened in the Electricity market, solar farms ought to be making unprecedented windfall profits, not falling into bankruptcy.
Something very, very dodgy has surely happened there. Hope it gets a criminal investigation.
More to the point WTF was Essex County Council doing lending £665 million to a commercial entity?
The Councillors had gone on trips to El Salvador for financial advice?
Monday OK. Tuesday student self-injured. Not as bad as first thought. Permanent injury though. Wednesday public urination. Thursday assault and threats to torture and kill. Friday was pretty chilled. How was your week?
Why did you do all those things?
Threat of OFSTED. It's only fair.
So you had OFSTED in on Thursday?
I would say if you'd dropped me a message I'd have come and helped. But I've been a bit tied up this week so I probably couldn't have done.
I started lurking on this site in 2016. I remember vividly thread after thread. comment after comment, about Brexit; and then, towards the end of the year, Trump was thrown into the mix.
Roll forward six years, and it's astonishing how little has changed. Still Brexit. Still Trump. There was a big dash of Covid in the middle, I guess.
Monday OK. Tuesday student self-injured. Not as bad as first thought. Permanent injury though. Wednesday public urination. Thursday assault and threats to torture and kill. Friday was pretty chilled. How was your week?
Why did you do all those things?
Threat of OFSTED. It's only fair.
So you had OFSTED in on Thursday?
I would say if you'd dropped me a message I'd have come and helped. But I've been a bit tied up this week so I probably couldn't have done.
Even had we voted Remain in due course we would have ended up on the outer edge with non Eurozone Sweden, Denmark and Poland and Hungary while the rest moved full steam ahead to federal union.
Yes, exactly (except fuller union of the core won't be anything like at 'full steam ahead', more like a snail's pace with long periods of stasis, if it ever happens at all). We'd have had the best of all possible positions: all the advantages of full EU membership, without the excessive bits. It is such an extraordinary tragedy that we, of our own volition, threw it away. As I predicted at the time, we'll spend at least a decade, perhaps longer, painfully trying to claw back some of the lost ground, but we'll never get back to such a favourable position as we had.
And all of it easily avoided if the arrogant clueless europhiles had only given the British people a vote on earlier moments of integration - as they so often promised, yet failed to do
This constant fraudulence led inexorably to the fatal rupture of total Brexit. Consider this
Yes, the EU as it was circa 2005 almost everybody could have lived with*. A halfway house, fine. Had Cameron tried that little bit harder to achieve such a thing, and to sell it he would have carried the day. Sadly, he thought all he had to was reject the Eurosceptics. Inasmuch as he thought about Euroscepticism, he thought it was confined to a fringe of his own party and an even smaller fringe of the far left. He thought that the country thought like Witney. But given Lisbon we had no way to trust that we wouldn't be dragged in further. Blair wanted to be at the heart of Europe, remember, and wanted to join the Euro. Why would we trust our political classes on Europe? So in a forced choice of wholly in or wholly out, out wins.
*Not me. I was a leaver long before it was unfashionable. But even I was a soft Brexiteer.
Cameron worked very hard and was a good executive chair but was never a deep thinker.
I think he was just a committed europhile. A more neutral PM on the issue could have combined a robust negotiation with some meaningful domestic changes to benefits etc., and come up with a respectable package that would have romped home in the referendum. He didn't want that - he thought the threat of leave would mean that he could force the UK population to swallow the whole hog. Every Euro thing they pushed through after that he'd have reminded anyone who opposed of the 'ringing British endorsement of the EU' etc. Silly and destructive.
Exactly.
The idea that a Remain vote would have seen us a member of an "outer" group is risible - we would have been sucked into the inner core, with the Remain vote used as justification.
The history of British engagement in the EU since the turn of the millennium says otherwise. Staying out of the Euro, exercising the veto, securing carve outs. The history of the EU itself isn’t much different either.
At most we might have had to give up a bit more rebate and agreed to QM voting. The federal superstate thing was always more of a figment of the imagination. Even after the Euro crisis and bailouts the EU is no more integrated now than it was in 2010.
A very rose-tinted view of the situation. Not falsifiable - but also doesn't take into consideration the principle of the ratchet.
But there’s no evidence as far as I can see for any of that before or since. Countries like Denmark for instance are broadly as integrated as they were 15 years ago.
No country ever tried to leave. If you think the raging federalists that run the EU would have risked us having a second try, you're beyond optimistic.
If we’d voted remain we wouldn’t have “tried to leave” any more than Scotland tried to leave in 2015. HYUFD may fantasise about tanks up the A1 but Scotland’s constitutional status is pretty much the same now as before the Indy ref. Likewise Britain’s status in the EU would be the same as before 2016.
The people who “run the EU” - evident to anyone who looks at things like Ukraine or tax policy - are the leaders of the member states.
This is beyond naive. It is astonishing that apparently clever people can still trot out this gibberish
The EU is intent on Ever Closer Union. That has been its explicit aim since its inception, denied less on the continent than in the UK
As a small part of this it has created a super elite of very-well-paid and undertaxed eurocrats and politicians who are, notwithstanding their general mediocrity, completely dedicated to the EU Federal ideal - not least because it provides them with a career and a creed
It's like being a Catholic cleric - which also explains why the reactions to Brexit were so emotionally hostile. Brexit isn't just an error, it is a heresy, to these people. It can never be right, no more than a blasphemer can be "right"
This commitment to the EU is, by the way, written into the Lisbon Treaty. All the Commissioners have to display a "European vocation" - ie be totally convinced of the Ever Closer Union and emotionally invested in the EU as the future. Meaning no eurosceptic can ever be a senior member of the EU's "government" - just one reason we had to leave, in the end
The EU is a nascent Federal superstate.
Your hidden premise seems to be that federal states (and a fortiori unions) are bad for some reason.
But wait...Britain is a union...
Indeed. Which is why some English Eurosceptics like myself are supportive of Scottish Independence and a united Ireland.
Me too.
Wales can tag along with us if they're tosheepish to go independent.
Wales voted for Brexit as did county Antrim
Only you would see a post talking about Wales being too sheepish, and respond seriously about how they voted.
Monday OK. Tuesday student self-injured. Not as bad as first thought. Permanent injury though. Wednesday public urination. Thursday assault and threats to torture and kill. Friday was pretty chilled. How was your week?
Why did you do all those things?
Threat of OFSTED. It's only fair.
So you had OFSTED in on Thursday?
I would say if you'd dropped me a message I'd have come and helped. But I've been a bit tied up this week so I probably couldn't have done.
You've been seeing Liz Truss?
No, I haven't had enough sleep to have any nightmares.
But I'm hoping to get some tonight, so I suppose that might change.
Even had we voted Remain in due course we would have ended up on the outer edge with non Eurozone Sweden, Denmark and Poland and Hungary while the rest moved full steam ahead to federal union.
Yes, exactly (except fuller union of the core won't be anything like at 'full steam ahead', more like a snail's pace with long periods of stasis, if it ever happens at all). We'd have had the best of all possible positions: all the advantages of full EU membership, without the excessive bits. It is such an extraordinary tragedy that we, of our own volition, threw it away. As I predicted at the time, we'll spend at least a decade, perhaps longer, painfully trying to claw back some of the lost ground, but we'll never get back to such a favourable position as we had.
And all of it easily avoided if the arrogant clueless europhiles had only given the British people a vote on earlier moments of integration - as they so often promised, yet failed to do
This constant fraudulence led inexorably to the fatal rupture of total Brexit. Consider this
Yes, the EU as it was circa 2005 almost everybody could have lived with*. A halfway house, fine. Had Cameron tried that little bit harder to achieve such a thing, and to sell it he would have carried the day. Sadly, he thought all he had to was reject the Eurosceptics. Inasmuch as he thought about Euroscepticism, he thought it was confined to a fringe of his own party and an even smaller fringe of the far left. He thought that the country thought like Witney. But given Lisbon we had no way to trust that we wouldn't be dragged in further. Blair wanted to be at the heart of Europe, remember, and wanted to join the Euro. Why would we trust our political classes on Europe? So in a forced choice of wholly in or wholly out, out wins.
*Not me. I was a leaver long before it was unfashionable. But even I was a soft Brexiteer.
Cameron worked very hard and was a good executive chair but was never a deep thinker.
I think he was just a committed europhile. A more neutral PM on the issue could have combined a robust negotiation with some meaningful domestic changes to benefits etc., and come up with a respectable package that would have romped home in the referendum. He didn't want that - he thought the threat of leave would mean that he could force the UK population to swallow the whole hog. Every Euro thing they pushed through after that he'd have reminded anyone who opposed of the 'ringing British endorsement of the EU' etc. Silly and destructive.
Exactly.
The idea that a Remain vote would have seen us a member of an "outer" group is risible - we would have been sucked into the inner core, with the Remain vote used as justification.
The history of British engagement in the EU since the turn of the millennium says otherwise. Staying out of the Euro, exercising the veto, securing carve outs. The history of the EU itself isn’t much different either.
At most we might have had to give up a bit more rebate and agreed to QM voting. The federal superstate thing was always more of a figment of the imagination. Even after the Euro crisis and bailouts the EU is no more integrated now than it was in 2010.
A very rose-tinted view of the situation. Not falsifiable - but also doesn't take into consideration the principle of the ratchet.
But there’s no evidence as far as I can see for any of that before or since. Countries like Denmark for instance are broadly as integrated as they were 15 years ago.
No country ever tried to leave. If you think the raging federalists that run the EU would have risked us having a second try, you're beyond optimistic.
If we’d voted remain we wouldn’t have “tried to leave” any more than Scotland tried to leave in 2015. HYUFD may fantasise about tanks up the A1 but Scotland’s constitutional status is pretty much the same now as before the Indy ref. Likewise Britain’s status in the EU would be the same as before 2016.
The people who “run the EU” - evident to anyone who looks at things like Ukraine or tax policy - are the leaders of the member states.
This is beyond naive. It is astonishing that apparently clever people can still trot out this gibberish
The EU is intent on Ever Closer Union. That has been its explicit aim since its inception, denied less on the continent than in the UK
As a small part of this it has created a super elite of very-well-paid and undertaxed eurocrats and politicians who are, notwithstanding their general mediocrity, completely dedicated to the EU Federal ideal - not least because it provides them with a career and a creed
It's like being a Catholic cleric - which also explains why the reactions to Brexit were so emotionally hostile. Brexit isn't just an error, it is a heresy, to these people. It can never be right, no more than a blasphemer can be "right"
This commitment to the EU is, by the way, written into the Lisbon Treaty. All the Commissioners have to display a "European vocation" - ie be totally convinced of the Ever Closer Union and emotionally invested in the EU as the future. Meaning no eurosceptic can ever be a senior member of the EU's "government" - just one reason we had to leave, in the end
The EU is a nascent Federal superstate.
Your hidden premise seems to be that federal states (and a fortiori unions) are bad for some reason.
But wait...Britain is a union...
Indeed. Which is why some English Eurosceptics like myself are supportive of Scottish Independence and a united Ireland.
Me too.
Wales can tag along with us if they're tosheepish to go independent.
Wales voted for Brexit as did county Antrim
Only you would see a post talking about Wales being too sheepish, and respond seriously about how they voted.
Never change, HYUFD, never change.
He’s a woolly thinker
He Kerries on in the same fashion, although sometimes it gets a bit Clun-ky.
Yay I’ve been shopping all day. Have I missed anything?
Brexit is still a bad idea that's being poorly executed. The pb.com Sonderkommando have liberated Kherson with high precision memes. Mixed views on the Captain Tom cake. Quite a few inmates in an advanced state of intoxication. Trussonomics is dead forever. That's about it.
Thanks for the reply. I have a serious question. As we went into this war the opinion was Russia would have control over the sky’s, and that should make a difference. Should we have though at the start Russia would have control of airspace, and why hasn’t it made much difference? Are the days of manned fighters, bombers, attack helicopters and para troopers going the way of the tank?
… hence all these videos of hooning round at 100' AGL as if it were a good idea.
Thought you’d be the last person to disapprove of such behaviour.
Robert Costa @costareports Dark time in Trump's inner circle. Spoke to several longtime friends, donors, and aides in the past 24 hours. Many say he's listening to very few people, isolated, and meanspirited about his potential rivals. Several of them say they're tired of his rants and are avoiding him.
If counting ended now the House is Rep 221, Dem 214.
There are five districts in CA where Rep is leading with between 50% and 55% of the vote - in four of these less than 50% of the vote has been counted and in the other 55% has been counted.
Could the Dems win several of these? I don't know.
Monday OK. Tuesday student self-injured. Not as bad as first thought. Permanent injury though. Wednesday public urination. Thursday assault and threats to torture and kill. Friday was pretty chilled. How was your week?
Why did you do all those things?
Threat of OFSTED. It's only fair.
So you had OFSTED in on Thursday?
I would say if you'd dropped me a message I'd have come and helped. But I've been a bit tied up this week so I probably couldn't have done.
You've been seeing Liz Truss?
No, I haven't had enough sleep to have any nightmares.
But I'm hoping to get some tonight, so I suppose that might change.
You're hoping to get some tonight, so not seeing Liz Truss might change?
Even had we voted Remain in due course we would have ended up on the outer edge with non Eurozone Sweden, Denmark and Poland and Hungary while the rest moved full steam ahead to federal union.
Yes, exactly (except fuller union of the core won't be anything like at 'full steam ahead', more like a snail's pace with long periods of stasis, if it ever happens at all). We'd have had the best of all possible positions: all the advantages of full EU membership, without the excessive bits. It is such an extraordinary tragedy that we, of our own volition, threw it away. As I predicted at the time, we'll spend at least a decade, perhaps longer, painfully trying to claw back some of the lost ground, but we'll never get back to such a favourable position as we had.
And all of it easily avoided if the arrogant clueless europhiles had only given the British people a vote on earlier moments of integration - as they so often promised, yet failed to do
This constant fraudulence led inexorably to the fatal rupture of total Brexit. Consider this
Yes, the EU as it was circa 2005 almost everybody could have lived with*. A halfway house, fine. Had Cameron tried that little bit harder to achieve such a thing, and to sell it he would have carried the day. Sadly, he thought all he had to was reject the Eurosceptics. Inasmuch as he thought about Euroscepticism, he thought it was confined to a fringe of his own party and an even smaller fringe of the far left. He thought that the country thought like Witney. But given Lisbon we had no way to trust that we wouldn't be dragged in further. Blair wanted to be at the heart of Europe, remember, and wanted to join the Euro. Why would we trust our political classes on Europe? So in a forced choice of wholly in or wholly out, out wins.
*Not me. I was a leaver long before it was unfashionable. But even I was a soft Brexiteer.
Cameron worked very hard and was a good executive chair but was never a deep thinker.
I think he was just a committed europhile. A more neutral PM on the issue could have combined a robust negotiation with some meaningful domestic changes to benefits etc., and come up with a respectable package that would have romped home in the referendum. He didn't want that - he thought the threat of leave would mean that he could force the UK population to swallow the whole hog. Every Euro thing they pushed through after that he'd have reminded anyone who opposed of the 'ringing British endorsement of the EU' etc. Silly and destructive.
Exactly.
The idea that a Remain vote would have seen us a member of an "outer" group is risible - we would have been sucked into the inner core, with the Remain vote used as justification.
The history of British engagement in the EU since the turn of the millennium says otherwise. Staying out of the Euro, exercising the veto, securing carve outs. The history of the EU itself isn’t much different either.
At most we might have had to give up a bit more rebate and agreed to QM voting. The federal superstate thing was always more of a figment of the imagination. Even after the Euro crisis and bailouts the EU is no more integrated now than it was in 2010.
A very rose-tinted view of the situation. Not falsifiable - but also doesn't take into consideration the principle of the ratchet.
But there’s no evidence as far as I can see for any of that before or since. Countries like Denmark for instance are broadly as integrated as they were 15 years ago.
No country ever tried to leave. If you think the raging federalists that run the EU would have risked us having a second try, you're beyond optimistic.
If we’d voted remain we wouldn’t have “tried to leave” any more than Scotland tried to leave in 2015. HYUFD may fantasise about tanks up the A1 but Scotland’s constitutional status is pretty much the same now as before the Indy ref. Likewise Britain’s status in the EU would be the same as before 2016.
The people who “run the EU” - evident to anyone who looks at things like Ukraine or tax policy - are the leaders of the member states.
This is beyond naive. It is astonishing that apparently clever people can still trot out this gibberish
The EU is intent on Ever Closer Union. That has been its explicit aim since its inception, denied less on the continent than in the UK
As a small part of this it has created a super elite of very-well-paid and undertaxed eurocrats and politicians who are, notwithstanding their general mediocrity, completely dedicated to the EU Federal ideal - not least because it provides them with a career and a creed
It's like being a Catholic cleric - which also explains why the reactions to Brexit were so emotionally hostile. Brexit isn't just an error, it is a heresy, to these people. It can never be right, no more than a blasphemer can be "right"
This commitment to the EU is, by the way, written into the Lisbon Treaty. All the Commissioners have to display a "European vocation" - ie be totally convinced of the Ever Closer Union and emotionally invested in the EU as the future. Meaning no eurosceptic can ever be a senior member of the EU's "government" - just one reason we had to leave, in the end
The EU is a nascent Federal superstate.
Your hidden premise seems to be that federal states (and a fortiori unions) are bad for some reason.
But wait...Britain is a union...
Indeed. Which is why some English Eurosceptics like myself are supportive of Scottish Independence and a united Ireland.
Me too.
Wales can tag along with us if they're tosheepish to go independent.
Wales voted for Brexit as did county Antrim
Only you would see a post talking about Wales being too sheepish, and respond seriously about how they voted.
Never change, HYUFD, never change.
He’s a woolly thinker
He Kerries on in the same fashion, although sometimes it gets a bit Clun-ky.
they might not have ended up on the wrong side of history.
We remain on the right side of history (see what I did there?)
Leaving was a bad mistake.
One day even you will figure it out.
There is zero sign of Switzerland, Norway or Iceland trying to join - quite the opposite. Polls show intense allergic reactions to the idea
The EEA countries all seem very happy with their statuses - much more so than most EU members.
There are a couple of differences, though.
First is that the EEA countries are pretty small- they're not giving up that much by withdrawing from the political/democratic discussions.
Second, the EEA states have made fairly clear calculations- accept that they are going to follow the herd in most areas in order to carve out more autonomy in a few things that really matter to them.
Mapping that onto the UK is tricky. Partly because the country is bigger. But also, we haven't really worked out what bits of autonomy we really want and what (if anything) we are prepared to give up to achieve that. Maybe we could, but it's not happened yet.
Put those together, and it kinda makes sense that the UK hasn't neatly settled in EEA. (Me? I'd be chill with it. But I don't see how you get there from "Take Back Control", or think it's a stable answer for the UK.)
For the problem you have to go into the past. As of right now the UK as a whole does not accept FoM, ie a migration system not in our power to legislate for.
This only became live as an issue when states at very different stages of development had FoM with us.
To allow this was a UK (New Labour) failure of statecraft.
Once done it can't be undone (theological principle of the EU). Ask Cameron.
We allowed the SM to be linked irrevocably to FoM. Unless that is undone there can be no optimal solution.
We have no power to undo it.
Ergo there is no optimal solution.
This has been the central problem since June 2016, and it still is.
NB Labour has no coherent policy on the matter, for very good reasons.
The question is how much poorer are people willing to be to stop Polish people moving here. I guess we're going to find out.
The answer for most families will be "no poorer at all".
The only ones who stand be poorer are those making good money who had gotten addicted to getting everyone else to be minimum wage serfs to look after them. Tarquin might need a more expensive Nanny until he becomes old enough to start climbing on M25 gantries going forwards.
Tempted to give this a like for the sheer volume of clichés and right wing talking points on offer.
It's a tell, isn't it?
"Voted for Brexit because of the democratic deficit inherent in the EU".
Solar energy firm Toucan has fallen into administration after racking up more than half a billion pounds in debt to a local authority in Essex, England https://trib.al/1DDI7RZ
Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot.
Given what's happened in the Electricity market, solar farms ought to be making unprecedented windfall profits, not falling into bankruptcy.
Something very, very dodgy has surely happened there. Hope it gets a criminal investigation.
More to the point WTF was Essex County Council doing lending £665 million to a commercial entity?
As for why... I've not been following the scandal in detail, but there have been a few cases of councils doing questionable investments in the hope that the profits will prop up the council budget. After all, if your government grants are falling and you aren't allowed to raise Council Tax much and you need more money to fund social care, what are you meant to do?
Monday OK. Tuesday student self-injured. Not as bad as first thought. Permanent injury though. Wednesday public urination. Thursday assault and threats to torture and kill. Friday was pretty chilled. How was your week?
Why did you do all those things?
Threat of OFSTED. It's only fair.
So you had OFSTED in on Thursday?
I would say if you'd dropped me a message I'd have come and helped. But I've been a bit tied up this week so I probably couldn't have done.
You've been seeing Liz Truss?
No, I haven't had enough sleep to have any nightmares.
But I'm hoping to get some tonight, so I suppose that might change.
You're hoping to get some tonight, so not seeing Liz Truss might change?
Solar energy firm Toucan has fallen into administration after racking up more than half a billion pounds in debt to a local authority in Essex, England https://trib.al/1DDI7RZ
Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot.
Given what's happened in the Electricity market, solar farms ought to be making unprecedented windfall profits, not falling into bankruptcy.
Something very, very dodgy has surely happened there. Hope it gets a criminal investigation.
More to the point WTF was Essex County Council doing lending £665 million to a commercial entity?
As for why... I've not been following the scandal in detail, but there have been a few cases of councils doing questionable investments in the hope that the profits will prop up the council budget. After all, if your government grants are falling and you aren't allowed to raise Council Tax much and you need more money to fund social care, what are you meant to do?
How about using the money you have to fund social care rather than pissing it away in dodgy dealings?
Even had we voted Remain in due course we would have ended up on the outer edge with non Eurozone Sweden, Denmark and Poland and Hungary while the rest moved full steam ahead to federal union.
Yes, exactly (except fuller union of the core won't be anything like at 'full steam ahead', more like a snail's pace with long periods of stasis, if it ever happens at all). We'd have had the best of all possible positions: all the advantages of full EU membership, without the excessive bits. It is such an extraordinary tragedy that we, of our own volition, threw it away. As I predicted at the time, we'll spend at least a decade, perhaps longer, painfully trying to claw back some of the lost ground, but we'll never get back to such a favourable position as we had.
And all of it easily avoided if the arrogant clueless europhiles had only given the British people a vote on earlier moments of integration - as they so often promised, yet failed to do
This constant fraudulence led inexorably to the fatal rupture of total Brexit. Consider this
Yes, the EU as it was circa 2005 almost everybody could have lived with*. A halfway house, fine. Had Cameron tried that little bit harder to achieve such a thing, and to sell it he would have carried the day. Sadly, he thought all he had to was reject the Eurosceptics. Inasmuch as he thought about Euroscepticism, he thought it was confined to a fringe of his own party and an even smaller fringe of the far left. He thought that the country thought like Witney. But given Lisbon we had no way to trust that we wouldn't be dragged in further. Blair wanted to be at the heart of Europe, remember, and wanted to join the Euro. Why would we trust our political classes on Europe? So in a forced choice of wholly in or wholly out, out wins.
*Not me. I was a leaver long before it was unfashionable. But even I was a soft Brexiteer.
Cameron worked very hard and was a good executive chair but was never a deep thinker.
I think he was just a committed europhile. A more neutral PM on the issue could have combined a robust negotiation with some meaningful domestic changes to benefits etc., and come up with a respectable package that would have romped home in the referendum. He didn't want that - he thought the threat of leave would mean that he could force the UK population to swallow the whole hog. Every Euro thing they pushed through after that he'd have reminded anyone who opposed of the 'ringing British endorsement of the EU' etc. Silly and destructive.
Exactly.
The idea that a Remain vote would have seen us a member of an "outer" group is risible - we would have been sucked into the inner core, with the Remain vote used as justification.
The history of British engagement in the EU since the turn of the millennium says otherwise. Staying out of the Euro, exercising the veto, securing carve outs. The history of the EU itself isn’t much different either.
At most we might have had to give up a bit more rebate and agreed to QM voting. The federal superstate thing was always more of a figment of the imagination. Even after the Euro crisis and bailouts the EU is no more integrated now than it was in 2010.
A very rose-tinted view of the situation. Not falsifiable - but also doesn't take into consideration the principle of the ratchet.
But there’s no evidence as far as I can see for any of that before or since. Countries like Denmark for instance are broadly as integrated as they were 15 years ago.
No country ever tried to leave. If you think the raging federalists that run the EU would have risked us having a second try, you're beyond optimistic.
If we’d voted remain we wouldn’t have “tried to leave” any more than Scotland tried to leave in 2015. HYUFD may fantasise about tanks up the A1 but Scotland’s constitutional status is pretty much the same now as before the Indy ref. Likewise Britain’s status in the EU would be the same as before 2016.
The people who “run the EU” - evident to anyone who looks at things like Ukraine or tax policy - are the leaders of the member states.
This is beyond naive. It is astonishing that apparently clever people can still trot out this gibberish
The EU is intent on Ever Closer Union. That has been its explicit aim since its inception, denied less on the continent than in the UK
As a small part of this it has created a super elite of very-well-paid and undertaxed eurocrats and politicians who are, notwithstanding their general mediocrity, completely dedicated to the EU Federal ideal - not least because it provides them with a career and a creed
It's like being a Catholic cleric - which also explains why the reactions to Brexit were so emotionally hostile. Brexit isn't just an error, it is a heresy, to these people. It can never be right, no more than a blasphemer can be "right"
This commitment to the EU is, by the way, written into the Lisbon Treaty. All the Commissioners have to display a "European vocation" - ie be totally convinced of the Ever Closer Union and emotionally invested in the EU as the future. Meaning no eurosceptic can ever be a senior member of the EU's "government" - just one reason we had to leave, in the end
The EU is a nascent Federal superstate.
Your hidden premise seems to be that federal states (and a fortiori unions) are bad for some reason.
But wait...Britain is a union...
Indeed. Which is why some English Eurosceptics like myself are supportive of Scottish Independence and a united Ireland.
Me too.
Wales can tag along with us if they're tosheepish to go independent.
Wales voted for Brexit as did county Antrim
Only you would see a post talking about Wales being too sheepish, and respond seriously about how they voted.
Never change, HYUFD, never change.
He’s a woolly thinker
He Kerries on in the same fashion, although sometimes it gets a bit Clun-ky.
Ewe just had to ram it home didn’t you
Well, yes. But I'm not greedy. I know it Texel sorts to make a punning contest work.
Robert Costa @costareports Dark time in Trump's inner circle. Spoke to several longtime friends, donors, and aides in the past 24 hours. Many say he's listening to very few people, isolated, and meanspirited about his potential rivals. Several of them say they're tired of his rants and are avoiding him.
He's always come across as meanspirited and closeminded, plus vindictive and disloyal to boot. I don't understand why so many people decide to keep working for him - even trying to ride his coattails is going to be a chaotic, bitter time.
Robert Costa @costareports Dark time in Trump's inner circle. Spoke to several longtime friends, donors, and aides in the past 24 hours. Many say he's listening to very few people, isolated, and meanspirited about his potential rivals. Several of them say they're tired of his rants and are avoiding him.
He's always come across as meanspirited and closeminded, plus vindictive and disloyal to boot. I don't understand why so many people decide to keep working for him - even trying to ride his coattails is going to be a chaotic, bitter time.
I think we should consider the possibility that they are otherwise unemployable imbeciles.
Robert Costa @costareports Dark time in Trump's inner circle. Spoke to several longtime friends, donors, and aides in the past 24 hours. Many say he's listening to very few people, isolated, and meanspirited about his potential rivals. Several of them say they're tired of his rants and are avoiding him.
Solar energy firm Toucan has fallen into administration after racking up more than half a billion pounds in debt to a local authority in Essex, England https://trib.al/1DDI7RZ
Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot.
Given what's happened in the Electricity market, solar farms ought to be making unprecedented windfall profits, not falling into bankruptcy.
Something very, very dodgy has surely happened there. Hope it gets a criminal investigation.
More to the point WTF was Essex County Council doing lending £665 million to a commercial entity?
As for why... I've not been following the scandal in detail, but there have been a few cases of councils doing questionable investments in the hope that the profits will prop up the council budget. After all, if your government grants are falling and you aren't allowed to raise Council Tax much and you need more money to fund social care, what are you meant to do?
How about using the money you have to fund social care rather than pissing it away in dodgy dealings?
Councils are businesses too. If the money they have isn't sufficient, shouldn't they try to increase their income?
Unfortunately, they can't raise Council Tax because the Government won't let them - they can't dispose of assets because the funds raised can't be used to fund services and they can't borrow from the Public Works Loan Board to invest in Investment Property or other similar investments because the Government again won't let them.
it seems curious a Conservative Government won't allow Conservative-run councils to act in a more overtly business like way.
The next stage for struggling Councils is a Section 114 notice and the Government then sends in Commissioners to tell you how to run your council.
This is a must-read for those who want to understand the new campaign after the campaign in Nevada: Finding thousands of voters who need to fix, or cure, their mail ballots to get them counted. Could decide key NV races, including NV Senate. https://twitter.com/RalstonReports/status/1591188423351492608
Solar energy firm Toucan has fallen into administration after racking up more than half a billion pounds in debt to a local authority in Essex, England https://trib.al/1DDI7RZ
Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot.
Given what's happened in the Electricity market, solar farms ought to be making unprecedented windfall profits, not falling into bankruptcy.
Something very, very dodgy has surely happened there. Hope it gets a criminal investigation.
More to the point WTF was Essex County Council doing lending £665 million to a commercial entity?
As for why... I've not been following the scandal in detail, but there have been a few cases of councils doing questionable investments in the hope that the profits will prop up the council budget. After all, if your government grants are falling and you aren't allowed to raise Council Tax much and you need more money to fund social care, what are you meant to do?
How about using the money you have to fund social care rather than pissing it away in dodgy dealings?
At a guess, you really shouldn't use capital funding to pay for recurring spending. But you can use one-off funds to invest in things that are intended to throw off ongoing income. And if it works, you look like a really clever council leader.
But it looks like Thurrock really Thurrocked up this time.
Solar energy firm Toucan has fallen into administration after racking up more than half a billion pounds in debt to a local authority in Essex, England https://trib.al/1DDI7RZ
Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot.
Given what's happened in the Electricity market, solar farms ought to be making unprecedented windfall profits, not falling into bankruptcy.
Something very, very dodgy has surely happened there. Hope it gets a criminal investigation.
More to the point WTF was Essex County Council doing lending £665 million to a commercial entity?
As for why... I've not been following the scandal in detail, but there have been a few cases of councils doing questionable investments in the hope that the profits will prop up the council budget. After all, if your government grants are falling and you aren't allowed to raise Council Tax much and you need more money to fund social care, what are you meant to do?
How about using the money you have to fund social care rather than pissing it away in dodgy dealings?
Councils are businesses too. If the money they have isn't sufficient, shouldn't they try to increase their income?
Unfortunately, they can't raise Council Tax because the Government won't let them - they can't dispose of assets because the funds raised can't be used to fund services and they can't borrow from the Public Works Loan Board to invest in Investment Property or other similar investments because the Government again won't let them.
it seems curious a Conservative Government won't allow Conservative-run councils to act in a more overtly business like way.
The next stage for struggling Councils is a Section 114 notice and the Government then sends in Commissioners to tell you how to run your council.
The Council should have a fiduciary duty to use the taxes it has raised, for the purposes it is responsible to deal with, not to try and abuse that cash by pumping it into get rich quick scams.
Robert Costa @costareports Dark time in Trump's inner circle. Spoke to several longtime friends, donors, and aides in the past 24 hours. Many say he's listening to very few people, isolated, and meanspirited about his potential rivals. Several of them say they're tired of his rants and are avoiding him.
Robert Costa @costareports Dark time in Trump's inner circle. Spoke to several longtime friends, donors, and aides in the past 24 hours. Many say he's listening to very few people, isolated, and meanspirited about his potential rivals. Several of them say they're tired of his rants and are avoiding him.
Robert Costa @costareports Dark time in Trump's inner circle. Spoke to several longtime friends, donors, and aides in the past 24 hours. Many say he's listening to very few people, isolated, and meanspirited about his potential rivals. Several of them say they're tired of his rants and are avoiding him.
He's always come across as meanspirited and closeminded, plus vindictive and disloyal to boot. I don't understand why so many people decide to keep working for him - even trying to ride his coattails is going to be a chaotic, bitter time.
I think we should consider the possibility that they are otherwise unemployable imbeciles.
I have personally met one member of Trump's inner circle and he certainly matched that description.
Solar energy firm Toucan has fallen into administration after racking up more than half a billion pounds in debt to a local authority in Essex, England https://trib.al/1DDI7RZ
Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot.
Given what's happened in the Electricity market, solar farms ought to be making unprecedented windfall profits, not falling into bankruptcy.
Something very, very dodgy has surely happened there. Hope it gets a criminal investigation.
More to the point WTF was Essex County Council doing lending £665 million to a commercial entity?
As for why... I've not been following the scandal in detail, but there have been a few cases of councils doing questionable investments in the hope that the profits will prop up the council budget. After all, if your government grants are falling and you aren't allowed to raise Council Tax much and you need more money to fund social care, what are you meant to do?
How about using the money you have to fund social care rather than pissing it away in dodgy dealings?
Councils are businesses too. If the money they have isn't sufficient, shouldn't they try to increase their income?
Unfortunately, they can't raise Council Tax because the Government won't let them - they can't dispose of assets because the funds raised can't be used to fund services and they can't borrow from the Public Works Loan Board to invest in Investment Property or other similar investments because the Government again won't let them.
it seems curious a Conservative Government won't allow Conservative-run councils to act in a more overtly business like way.
The next stage for struggling Councils is a Section 114 notice and the Government then sends in Commissioners to tell you how to run your council.
It's not curious since I think even Conservatives think the consequences of a council acting like much more like a business and failing are rather too serious to risk. They might well act a bit more commercially, but there are limits. They're not businesses like any other.
Of course, many are going to fail anyway as you note, but by your professed logic they should also go to a casino and bet it all at the blackjack tables, since should't they try to increase their income? Obviously not by any means available.
Mail ballots submitted to county election officials that have signatures that do not match those on file require “cures,” a process by which county election workers verify the identity of the voter in question before having their ballot counted.
This cycle, challenged ballots must be cured by Monday, Nov. 14 — two days after the deadline to finish counting mail ballots.
As of Thursday morning, roughly 39 percent of the more than 11,755 ballots requiring cures thus far in Clark County had been cured, leaving 7,155 unresolved. The partisan breakdown of those cures was not made available through data posted online. …
Robert Costa @costareports Dark time in Trump's inner circle. Spoke to several longtime friends, donors, and aides in the past 24 hours. Many say he's listening to very few people, isolated, and meanspirited about his potential rivals. Several of them say they're tired of his rants and are avoiding him.
Yay I’ve been shopping all day. Have I missed anything?
NV has been called already, by me two guys ago …
You get through them quickly.
I meant days. It was a typo.
I’ve never had a guy, and I don’t intend to start.
Back to the point though, unlike Arizona the votes just aren’t there for Dems in Nevada this time are they? Possible reasons, they have maxxed out their Latino vote in previous good elections, couldn’t get them out this time. Or they got the Latino vote out again but the non Latino vote has swung against them.
Something about Team Biden or their policies puts Latino’s off.
I appreciate not all Latino’s are the same, in Florida Cuba is in their politics, in the West they may have come from Latin America.
Yay I’ve been shopping all day. Have I missed anything?
NV has been called already, by me two guys ago …
You get through them quickly.
I meant days. It was a typo.
I’ve never had a guy, and I don’t intend to start.
Back to the point though, unlike Arizona the votes just aren’t there for Dems in Nevada this time are they? Possible reasons, they have maxxed out their Latino vote in previous good elections, couldn’t get them out this time. Or they got the Latino vote out again but the non Latino vote has swung against them.
Something about Team Biden or their policies puts Latino’s off.
I appreciate not all Latino’s are the same, in Florida Cuba is in their politics, in the West they may have come from Latin America.
Modern Venezuelans are the most rightwing people I have ever met. They don't just dislike socialism/Marxism - they are violently opposed to it
They will cross a road just to beat up a lefty, while saying "We experienced this shit, it is absolute shit, now fuck off"
According to reports a lot of the migrants knocking on Trump's wall are Venezuelans. Republicans should maybe let them in, as they will be solid GOP voters for the next two generations
Yay I’ve been shopping all day. Have I missed anything?
NV has been called already, by me two guys ago …
You get through them quickly.
I meant days. It was a typo.
I’ve never had a guy, and I don’t intend to start.
Back to the point though, unlike Arizona the votes just aren’t there for Dems in Nevada this time are they? Possible reasons, they have maxxed out their Latino vote in previous good elections, couldn’t get them out this time. Or they got the Latino vote out again but the non Latino vote has swung against them.
Something about Team Biden or their policies puts Latino’s off.
I appreciate not all Latino’s are the same, in Florida Cuba is in their politics, in the West they may have come from Latin America.
One of the reason I prefer in-person voting to mailed ballots is the "curing" problem. I prefer a sysem where most mistakes can be fixed immediately after they are made. In the past that would have helped Democrats, who had (have?) more semi-literates than Republicans do.
Political scientists used to describe vote by education as a "J curve", with Democrats having the advantage at both ends, and Republicans having the advantage in the middle. You don't need a lot of education to follow voting instructions in most states, but you do need some.
(Trump may have changed that. As he said, at least once, he "loves" the poorly educated.)
Yay I’ve been shopping all day. Have I missed anything?
NV has been called already, by me two guys ago …
You get through them quickly.
I meant days. It was a typo.
I’ve never had a guy, and I don’t intend to start.
Back to the point though, unlike Arizona the votes just aren’t there for Dems in Nevada this time are they? Possible reasons, they have maxxed out their Latino vote in previous good elections, couldn’t get them out this time. Or they got the Latino vote out again but the non Latino vote has swung against them.
Something about Team Biden or their policies puts Latino’s off.
I appreciate not all Latino’s are the same, in Florida Cuba is in their politics, in the West they may have come from Latin America.
CNN think Masto wins in Nevada if she gets 60% of the remaining vote, which is what she got in votes counted yesterday
One of the reason I prefer in-person voting to mailed ballots is the "curing" problem. I prefer a sysem where most mistakes can be fixed immediately after they are made. In the past that would have helped Democrats, who had (have?) more semi-literates than Republicans do.
Political scientists used to describe vote by education as a "J curve", with Democrats having the advantage at both ends, and Republicans having the advantage in the middle. You don't need a lot of education to follow voting instructions in most states, but you do need some.
(Trump may have changed that. As he said, at least once, he "loves" the poorly educated.)
Interesting. Personally I think the decision we've made in the UK (and also the Netherlands) to only use paper ballots is the right one, because you can conduct a recount in the event of a very close election. With computer voting it's impossible to do a recount. You just get the same numbers returned by the computer system.
they might not have ended up on the wrong side of history.
We remain on the right side of history (see what I did there?)
Leaving was a bad mistake.
One day even you will figure it out.
There is zero sign of Switzerland, Norway or Iceland trying to join - quite the opposite. Polls show intense allergic reactions to the idea
The EEA countries all seem very happy with their statuses - much more so than most EU members.
By EEA countries, you mean Norway, I think. Switzerland is not in the EEA, nor is it happy with its relationship with the EU. The Norwegian government thinks its deal with the EU is formally bonkers, but it is a compromise that Norwegians have arrived at. Half the country want to be in the EU; half want to be out (sound familiar?) So they have come up with an arrangement everyone can live with.
Polling over EU membership in Norway has been remarkably consistent over many years with a solid 70% against. There was one poll recently that showed a 50:50 split but all the Norwegian commentators on both sides of the divide consider that to be an outlier and don't expect it to persist. From an observer's point of view the trouble is the polling is too rare. The view of the Norwegian Government changes depending on who is in power at the time but all sides know it would be electoral suicide to be the party that seriously advocated joining.
Even had we voted Remain in due course we would have ended up on the outer edge with non Eurozone Sweden, Denmark and Poland and Hungary while the rest moved full steam ahead to federal union.
Yes, exactly (except fuller union of the core won't be anything like at 'full steam ahead', more like a snail's pace with long periods of stasis, if it ever happens at all). We'd have had the best of all possible positions: all the advantages of full EU membership, without the excessive bits. It is such an extraordinary tragedy that we, of our own volition, threw it away. As I predicted at the time, we'll spend at least a decade, perhaps longer, painfully trying to claw back some of the lost ground, but we'll never get back to such a favourable position as we had.
And all of it easily avoided if the arrogant clueless europhiles had only given the British people a vote on earlier moments of integration - as they so often promised, yet failed to do
This constant fraudulence led inexorably to the fatal rupture of total Brexit. Consider this
Yes, the EU as it was circa 2005 almost everybody could have lived with*. A halfway house, fine. Had Cameron tried that little bit harder to achieve such a thing, and to sell it he would have carried the day. Sadly, he thought all he had to was reject the Eurosceptics. Inasmuch as he thought about Euroscepticism, he thought it was confined to a fringe of his own party and an even smaller fringe of the far left. He thought that the country thought like Witney. But given Lisbon we had no way to trust that we wouldn't be dragged in further. Blair wanted to be at the heart of Europe, remember, and wanted to join the Euro. Why would we trust our political classes on Europe? So in a forced choice of wholly in or wholly out, out wins.
*Not me. I was a leaver long before it was unfashionable. But even I was a soft Brexiteer.
Cameron worked very hard and was a good executive chair but was never a deep thinker.
I think he was just a committed europhile. A more neutral PM on the issue could have combined a robust negotiation with some meaningful domestic changes to benefits etc., and come up with a respectable package that would have romped home in the referendum. He didn't want that - he thought the threat of leave would mean that he could force the UK population to swallow the whole hog. Every Euro thing they pushed through after that he'd have reminded anyone who opposed of the 'ringing British endorsement of the EU' etc. Silly and destructive.
Exactly.
The idea that a Remain vote would have seen us a member of an "outer" group is risible - we would have been sucked into the inner core, with the Remain vote used as justification.
The history of British engagement in the EU since the turn of the millennium says otherwise. Staying out of the Euro, exercising the veto, securing carve outs. The history of the EU itself isn’t much different either.
At most we might have had to give up a bit more rebate and agreed to QM voting. The federal superstate thing was always more of a figment of the imagination. Even after the Euro crisis and bailouts the EU is no more integrated now than it was in 2010.
A very rose-tinted view of the situation. Not falsifiable - but also doesn't take into consideration the principle of the ratchet.
But there’s no evidence as far as I can see for any of that before or since. Countries like Denmark for instance are broadly as integrated as they were 15 years ago.
No country ever tried to leave. If you think the raging federalists that run the EU would have risked us having a second try, you're beyond optimistic.
If we’d voted remain we wouldn’t have “tried to leave” any more than Scotland tried to leave in 2015. HYUFD may fantasise about tanks up the A1 but Scotland’s constitutional status is pretty much the same now as before the Indy ref. Likewise Britain’s status in the EU would be the same as before 2016.
The people who “run the EU” - evident to anyone who looks at things like Ukraine or tax policy - are the leaders of the member states.
This is beyond naive. It is astonishing that apparently clever people can still trot out this gibberish
The EU is intent on Ever Closer Union. That has been its explicit aim since its inception, denied less on the continent than in the UK
As a small part of this it has created a super elite of very-well-paid and undertaxed eurocrats and politicians who are, notwithstanding their general mediocrity, completely dedicated to the EU Federal ideal - not least because it provides them with a career and a creed
It's like being a Catholic cleric - which also explains why the reactions to Brexit were so emotionally hostile. Brexit isn't just an error, it is a heresy, to these people. It can never be right, no more than a blasphemer can be "right"
This commitment to the EU is, by the way, written into the Lisbon Treaty. All the Commissioners have to display a "European vocation" - ie be totally convinced of the Ever Closer Union and emotionally invested in the EU as the future. Meaning no eurosceptic can ever be a senior member of the EU's "government" - just one reason we had to leave, in the end
The EU is a nascent Federal superstate.
Your hidden premise seems to be that federal states (and a fortiori unions) are bad for some reason.
But wait...Britain is a union...
Indeed. Which is why some English Eurosceptics like myself are supportive of Scottish Independence and a united Ireland.
Me too.
Wales can tag along with us if they're too sheepish to go independent.
Wales voted for Brexit as did county Antrim
Northern Ireland voted to Remain, something lost on the DUP.
Yay I’ve been shopping all day. Have I missed anything?
NV has been called already, by me two guys ago …
You get through them quickly.
I meant days. It was a typo.
I’ve never had a guy, and I don’t intend to start.
Back to the point though, unlike Arizona the votes just aren’t there for Dems in Nevada this time are they? Possible reasons, they have maxxed out their Latino vote in previous good elections, couldn’t get them out this time. Or they got the Latino vote out again but the non Latino vote has swung against them.
Something about Team Biden or their policies puts Latino’s off.
I appreciate not all Latino’s are the same, in Florida Cuba is in their politics, in the West they may have come from Latin America.
CNN think Masto wins in Nevada if she gets 60% of the remaining vote, which is what she got in votes counted yesterday
Nevada gap under 1000 now. Laxalt up about 9k and Cortez up about 17k since yesterday. Am sure she has this now but don't think the Douglas 6-7k has been added yet.
One of the reason I prefer in-person voting to mailed ballots is the "curing" problem. I prefer a sysem where most mistakes can be fixed immediately after they are made. In the past that would have helped Democrats, who had (have?) more semi-literates than Republicans do.
Political scientists used to describe vote by education as a "J curve", with Democrats having the advantage at both ends, and Republicans having the advantage in the middle. You don't need a lot of education to follow voting instructions in most states, but you do need some.
(Trump may have changed that. As he said, at least once, he "loves" the poorly educated.)
Interesting. Personally I think the decision we've made in the UK (and also the Netherlands) to only use paper ballots is the right one, because you can conduct a recount in the event of a very close election. With computer voting it's impossible to do a recount. You just get the same numbers returned by the computer system.
Mail ballots submitted to county election officials that have signatures that do not match those on file require “cures,” a process by which county election workers verify the identity of the voter in question before having their ballot counted.
This cycle, challenged ballots must be cured by Monday, Nov. 14 — two days after the deadline to finish counting mail ballots.
As of Thursday morning, roughly 39 percent of the more than 11,755 ballots requiring cures thus far in Clark County had been cured, leaving 7,155 unresolved. The partisan breakdown of those cures was not made available through data posted online. …
Starting gun has sounded for signature chasing. That is, identifying supporters (you hope) who did NOT sign their returned ballot envelope, or whose sigs on file do NOT match what's on envelope.
Note that election authorities notify (by mail & phone) voters with this situation.
Still scope for many of the remaining curable ballots to be cured by voters submitting required info.
However, for variety of reasons, many will never be cured. In some cases, the voter is traveling, can't be reached (or bothered).
In other cases, the sigs will never match, because person who returned the ballot was NOT the voter. Often because the signer was the voter's parent or spouse (they do check for "cross-signing" where wife signs for husband's ballot & visa versa).
As for political affiliation, with list of affected voters that includes voter ID number, you can match the list to the official (or unofficial party) voter file. That's what parties & candidates do, to ID voters that they want to contact . . . and also those they do NOT want to bother!
Andy_JS said: "Interesting. Personally I think the decision we've made in the UK (and also the Netherlands) to only use paper ballots is the right one, because you can conduct a recount in the event of a very close election. With computer voting it's impossible to do a recount. You just get the same numbers returned by the computer system."
I agree with you, and am happy that my state has chosen to use paper ballots that can be optically scanned by machines, or counted by hand.
(What I would like would be precincts with scanners that a voter could use to check their vote, after they had marked their ballot.)
England forward Beth Mead says her recent comments about diversity in the Lionesses squad were "not a true reflection" of her values.
Her crime? For daring to speak the truth.
Nice of Ian Wright to give her a call and bully her into changing her stance. Makes one feel all warm and fuzzy.
Is that the same stupid, ignorant, offensive prick who said England players should knock on the doors of grieving military death parents to explain their poor football results?
Yay I’ve been shopping all day. Have I missed anything?
NV has been called already, by me two guys ago …
You get through them quickly.
I meant days. It was a typo.
I’ve never had a guy, and I don’t intend to start.
Back to the point though, unlike Arizona the votes just aren’t there for Dems in Nevada this time are they? Possible reasons, they have maxxed out their Latino vote in previous good elections, couldn’t get them out this time. Or they got the Latino vote out again but the non Latino vote has swung against them.
Something about Team Biden or their policies puts Latino’s off.
I appreciate not all Latino’s are the same, in Florida Cuba is in their politics, in the West they may have come from Latin America.
CNN think Masto wins in Nevada if she gets 60% of the remaining vote, which is what she got in votes counted yesterday
Nevada gap under 1000 now. Laxalt up about 9k and Cortez up about 17k since yesterday. Am sure she has this now but don't think the Douglas 6-7k has been added yet.
“Am sure she has this now”
No no no no not happening. It will blow up my perfect 1 pick up each prediction, and I’ve spent the money already I got from the Laxhalt win on a beautiful slanket, perfume and big tub of double cream from swanky hideously expensive store.
If Cortez takes this it defies the bad election Dems have had in Nevada and defies pre election polling putting her too far behind.
Yay I’ve been shopping all day. Have I missed anything?
NV has been called already, by me two guys ago …
You get through them quickly.
I meant days. It was a typo.
I’ve never had a guy, and I don’t intend to start.
Back to the point though, unlike Arizona the votes just aren’t there for Dems in Nevada this time are they? Possible reasons, they have maxxed out their Latino vote in previous good elections, couldn’t get them out this time. Or they got the Latino vote out again but the non Latino vote has swung against them.
Something about Team Biden or their policies puts Latino’s off.
I appreciate not all Latino’s are the same, in Florida Cuba is in their politics, in the West they may have come from Latin America.
Modern Venezuelans are the most rightwing people I have ever met. They don't just dislike socialism/Marxism - they are violently opposed to it
They will cross a road just to beat up a lefty, while saying "We experienced this shit, it is absolute shit, now fuck off"
According to reports a lot of the migrants knocking on Trump's wall are Venezuelans. Republicans should maybe let them in, as they will be solid GOP voters for the next two generations
Apparently a batch of votes yet to be counted approx 114,000 will be very good for Lake according to the breakdown in party registration.
Also some developments regarding a police investigation into an apparent white powder sent in two envelopes to the Lake campaign HQ .
These envelopes were sent to the FBI at Quantico .
No substance was found inside . Not altogether clear whether that means nothing toxic or nothing at all was in them .
It does raise questions as to whether one of her campaign team fabricated this to elicit sympathy and get her some extra votes.
There was a break in at the Hobb HQ so perhaps Lake felt left out ! Going by the statement released after the alleged white powder incident it does look like they were milking the situation !
Pima drop in Arizona v good for Dems in Senate and Governor races.
There's a Maricopa drop coming at 8pm Arizona time. (3am UK)
Lake is very confident of winning on Twitter. She’s also stopped whining, which might be more indicative than any opinion she offers
We shall see
It's hard to see how Masters could gain the lead, but it's easy to see Lake overcoming Hobbs.
Of course, this won't be the only drop of ballots. Pima, which contains Tucson, is the real Democrat stronghold in the State, and that is the least counted county. We could well see Maricopa push Lake ahead tonight, and then Pima bring the two back level tomorrow.
Pima drop in Arizona v good for Dems in Senate and Governor races.
There's a Maricopa drop coming at 8pm Arizona time. (3am UK)
Lake is very confident of winning on Twitter. She’s also stopped whining, which might be more indicative than any opinion she offers
We shall see
It's hard to see how Masters could gain the lead, but it's easy to see Lake overcoming Hobbs.
Of course, this won't be the only drop of ballots. Pima, which contains Tucson, is the real Democrat stronghold in the State, and that is the least counted county. We could well see Maricopa push Lake ahead tonight, and then Pima bring the two back level tomorrow.
So, Lake is 22,000 votes behind Hobbs. There's 110,000 of Maricopa to come today, and if that goes 70k - 40k, that puts Lake 10k in front.
Pima drop in Arizona v good for Dems in Senate and Governor races.
There's a Maricopa drop coming at 8pm Arizona time. (3am UK)
Importantly, this batch are ballots dropped off ON ELECTION DAY.
Yes, we would expect this to break quite heavily Republican - but I'd be surprised if it was more than 2-1 in favour of Lake/Masters. Which is great for Lake, but not enough for Masters, who has a close to 120k lead.
Pima drop in Arizona v good for Dems in Senate and Governor races.
There's a Maricopa drop coming at 8pm Arizona time. (3am UK)
Importantly, this batch are ballots dropped off ON ELECTION DAY.
Yes, we would expect this to break quite heavily Republican - but I'd be surprised if it was more than 2-1 in favour of Lake/Masters. Which is great for Lake, but not enough for Masters, who has a close to 120k lead.
I think about 400k to 450k still to go in AZ so 2:1 could be enough for Masters - but of course a decent chunk are Pima.
Some more just dropped in AZ: must have been rural because barely moved the dial, but was slightly more positive for Kelly than Masters and the lead is back up to 5.5% from 5.4%.
Some more just dropped in AZ: must have been rural because barely moved the dial, but was slightly more positive for Kelly than Masters and the lead is back up to 5.5% from 5.4%.
And Hobbs' lead has also slightly ticked up - now 25k.
Comments
The market behind Bitcoin, and exchanges like FTX, Ether etc absolutely are scams.
Technology can be used for good or bad. The same technology behind emails, which are often legitimate and can be useful for correspondences, is the same technology behind Nigerian scams.
Unfortunately the entire crypto "scene" is one big Nigerian scam at the minute. Its been taken over by timeshare sellers, fraudsters, thieves and useful idiots.
After Bitcoin dies, the technology it leaves behind may be useful, put to better and smarter uses than "stonks go up!" scamware.
Or is it? Sometimes I hear all the tortuous reasons advanced for leaving as simply retrospective justification for an act of self-harm.
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/eut/eea-agreement/article/112
If a Labour government were able to convince the electorate they can control immigration, they could possibly sell the EEA by emphasising Article 112.
Never change, HYUFD, never change.
There is a reasonable case to be made that Britain has suffered “serious economic, societal or environmental difficulties of a sectorial or regional nature liable to persist” as a result of immigration, but I don’t think anyone has made that honest case yet, because it likely needs to be framed in a way that concedes that overall migration was a massive boon for the UK.
Tuesday student self-injured. Not as bad as first thought. Permanent injury though.
Wednesday public urination.
Thursday assault and threats to torture and kill.
Friday was pretty chilled.
How was your week?
at 35 years oldhe must have retired by now.https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-63599287
It's only fair.
I would say if you'd dropped me a message I'd have come and helped. But I've been a bit tied up this week so I probably couldn't have done.
Roll forward six years, and it's astonishing how little has changed. Still Brexit. Still Trump. There was a big dash of Covid in the middle, I guess.
But I'm hoping to get some tonight, so I suppose that might change.
Robert Costa
@costareports
Dark time in Trump's inner circle. Spoke to several longtime friends, donors, and aides in the past 24 hours. Many say he's listening to very few people, isolated, and meanspirited about his potential rivals. Several of them say they're tired of his rants and are avoiding him.
https://twitter.com/costareports/status/1591157532818800641
There are five districts in CA where Rep is leading with between 50% and 55% of the vote - in four of these less than 50% of the vote has been counted and in the other 55% has been counted.
Could the Dems win several of these? I don't know.
Betfair: Rep Maj 1.07, Dem Maj 14.
No wonder you were practicing being tied up.
Even Russian pundits wantr to call it the "liberation of Kherson"
https://twitter.com/Gigau_MEIOU/status/1591191360618782721
"Voted for Brexit because of the democratic deficit inherent in the EU".
Sure. Course. If you say so.
(checks, yes it was: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/nov/11/solar-farm-owner-toucan-energy-enters-administration-amid-thurrock-scandal).
As for why... I've not been following the scandal in detail, but there have been a few cases of councils doing questionable investments in the hope that the profits will prop up the council budget. After all, if your government grants are falling and you aren't allowed to raise Council Tax much and you need more money to fund social care, what are you meant to do?
Unfortunately, they can't raise Council Tax because the Government won't let them - they can't dispose of assets because the funds raised can't be used to fund services and they can't borrow from the Public Works Loan Board to invest in Investment Property or other similar investments because the Government again won't let them.
it seems curious a Conservative Government won't allow Conservative-run councils to act in a more overtly business like way.
The next stage for struggling Councils is a Section 114 notice and the Government then sends in Commissioners to tell you how to run your council.
This is a must-read for those who want to understand the new campaign after the campaign in Nevada: Finding thousands of voters who need to fix, or cure, their mail ballots to get them counted. Could decide key NV races, including NV Senate.
https://twitter.com/RalstonReports/status/1591188423351492608
But it looks like Thurrock really Thurrocked up this time.
Next step - send for Rudi!
Of course, many are going to fail anyway as you note, but by your professed logic they should also go to a casino and bet it all at the blackjack tables, since should't they try to increase their income? Obviously not by any means available.
https://thenevadaindependent.com/article/as-margins-tighten-in-nevada-elections-advocates-look-to-signature-curing-for-edge
With razor-thin margins separating candidates in Nevada’s top races, a growing number of advocacy groups are focusing on thousands of challenged ballots still requiring signature cures that could become the difference between victory and defeat for candidates across the state.
Mail ballots submitted to county election officials that have signatures that do not match those on file require “cures,” a process by which county election workers verify the identity of the voter in question before having their ballot counted.
This cycle, challenged ballots must be cured by Monday, Nov. 14 — two days after the deadline to finish counting mail ballots.
As of Thursday morning, roughly 39 percent of the more than 11,755 ballots requiring cures thus far in Clark County had been cured, leaving 7,155 unresolved. The partisan breakdown of those cures was not made available through data posted online. …
No one has less.
We are a fallen nation.
https://twitter.com/NoContextBrits/status/1591128896740917248
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/63604622
England forward Beth Mead says her recent comments about diversity in the Lionesses squad were "not a true reflection" of her values.
Her crime? For daring to speak the truth.
I’ve never had a guy, and I don’t intend to start.
Back to the point though, unlike Arizona the votes just aren’t there for Dems in Nevada this time are they? Possible reasons, they have maxxed out their Latino vote in previous good elections, couldn’t get them out this time. Or they got the Latino vote out again but the non Latino vote has swung against them.
Something about Team Biden or their policies puts Latino’s off.
I appreciate not all Latino’s are the same, in Florida Cuba is in their politics, in the West they may have come from Latin America.
They will cross a road just to beat up a lefty, while saying "We experienced this shit, it is absolute shit, now fuck off"
According to reports a lot of the migrants knocking on Trump's wall are Venezuelans. Republicans should maybe let them in, as they will be solid GOP voters for the next two generations
https://www.channel4.com/programmes/icc-t20-cricket-world-cup-final
Political scientists used to describe vote by education as a "J curve", with Democrats having the advantage at both ends, and Republicans having the advantage in the middle. You don't need a lot of education to follow voting instructions in most states, but you do need some.
(Trump may have changed that. As he said, at least once, he "loves" the poorly educated.)
10% left to count
Nothing yet today from Washoe or Douglas.
Note that election authorities notify (by mail & phone) voters with this situation.
Still scope for many of the remaining curable ballots to be cured by voters submitting required info.
However, for variety of reasons, many will never be cured. In some cases, the voter is traveling, can't be reached (or bothered).
In other cases, the sigs will never match, because person who returned the ballot was NOT the voter. Often because the signer was the voter's parent or spouse (they do check for "cross-signing" where wife signs for husband's ballot & visa versa).
As for political affiliation, with list of affected voters that includes voter ID number, you can match the list to the official (or unofficial party) voter file. That's what parties & candidates do, to ID voters that they want to contact . . . and also those they do NOT want to bother!
I agree with you, and am happy that my state has chosen to use paper ballots that can be optically scanned by machines, or counted by hand.
(What I would like would be precincts with scanners that a voter could use to check their vote, after they had marked their ballot.)
68,000 still to be counted in NV - highest number are in Clark but % unknown.
Cortez 17,150
Laxalt 8,960
No no no no not happening. It will blow up my perfect 1 pick up each prediction, and I’ve spent the money already I got from the Laxhalt win on a beautiful slanket, perfume and big tub of double cream from swanky hideously expensive store.
If Cortez takes this it defies the bad election Dems have had in Nevada and defies pre election polling putting her too far behind.
This ain’t happening guys.
"Care homes and hospitals told to stop shutting out visitors" (£)
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/care-homes-and-hospitals-told-to-stop-shutting-out-visitors-bh25sp5jw
We shall see
https://twitter.com/BryceElder/status/959770192107601920
Also some developments regarding a police investigation into an apparent white powder sent in two envelopes to the Lake campaign HQ .
These envelopes were sent to the FBI at Quantico .
No substance was found inside . Not altogether clear whether that means nothing toxic or nothing at all was in them .
It does raise questions as to whether one of her campaign team fabricated this to elicit sympathy and get her some extra votes.
There was a break in at the Hobb HQ so perhaps Lake felt left out ! Going by the statement released after the alleged white powder incident it does look like they were milking the situation !
Of course, this won't be the only drop of ballots. Pima, which contains Tucson, is the real Democrat stronghold in the State, and that is the least counted county. We could well see Maricopa push Lake ahead tonight, and then Pima bring the two back level tomorrow.
Laxalt 3,023 (60%)
Cortez 1,870 (37%)
Laxalt lead up 1,153 to 1,951.
Clark: 23k plus 15k provisional ballots (per CNN reporter)
Washoe: 5k (per Editor Nevada Independent)
Other rural: 5k to 6k (per Editor Nevada Independent)
Even if more rurals than expected looks like she has quite a substantial margin for error before she could lose.
Maybe a hint that Masters could outperform in the Maricopa 3am batch.