Howdy, Stranger!

It looks like you're new here. Sign in or register to get started.

Happy 80th birthday Joe Biden – politicalbetting.com

1246

Comments

  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,073

    Scott_xP said:

    kyf_100 said:

    A greater understanding of why people have different beliefs to your own would go a long way to helping you understand why you lost the vote.

    I know exactly why Leave won last time.

    The people who voted for it seem less sure...
    The analogy is with America, where the Civil War was apparently fought for “State Rights”.
    They did.
    States’ rights to keep black people enslaved.

    As those states very clearly declared as a causus belli when they seceded.
  • WillGWillG Posts: 2,366
    rcs1000 said:

    WillG said:

    WillG said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Exactly. As I've covered a million times, why don't Germany or France have low-wage and low-skill economies ? They're also in the EU.

    It's not that the EU has not changed some of these things, it's that some of them *were consciously encouraged by Thatcherism*. And then many of Thatcher's same acolytes then proposed Brexit. It's as clear as day, but will always be difficult for many on the right to accept , partly because of Thatcher's totemic status.
    France and Germany don't have the issues with housing unaffordability we do. France has twice the land area and Germany has both more land and more regional cities for historic reasons.
    What’s the Dutch excuse then?
    A far lower level of immigration than us, and much, much lower from the developing world.
    https://data.oecd.org/migration/foreign-born-population.htm

    Basically the snake as the UK
    That data is clearly incorrect as it does not align with ONS data. We are at 17% and rapidly climbing.
  • ohnotnowohnotnow Posts: 3,792

    IanB2 said:

    WillG said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Exactly. As I've covered a million times, why don't Germany or France have low-wage and low-skill economies ? They're also in the EU.

    It's not that the EU has not changed some of these things, it's that some of them *were consciously encouraged by Thatcherism*. And then many of Thatcher's same acolytes then proposed Brexit. It's as clear as day, but will always be difficult for many on the right to accept , partly because of Thatcher's totemic status.
    France and Germany don't have the issues with housing unaffordability we do. France has twice the land area and Germany has both more land and more regional cities for historic reasons.
    How much is the UK housing problem lack of land, and how much is it that, collectively, we have sort of decided not to build enough homes?

    OK, most people haven't put it as explicitly as that, but it is the net effect of other decisions society has taken.

    But the chain from "don't build on that field near me" or "don't develop those old houses to four stories" to Britain being poorer, meaner and angrier than is ideal is too long to fit into a three word slogan.
    We come back to a dysfunctional planning system which is a bizarre mixture of stalinism (you can’t build that), corporatism (you can only build if you are one of a small set of mass developers) and laissez faire (the government refuses to do anything about obvious market failure).

    When it comes to the geo-spatial reality, the Low Countries, the Paris Basin, and the Greater New York Metro area are all denser than SE England.

    Its really not the planning system that is the problem. Go research the huge number of unimplemented permissions, and the land banking that the major developers are doing.
    The land banking is in response to the “planning and development” anti-system.
    As is the grip of large corporations on development. When something is slow, expensive and has a long legal process, you have given a massive advantage to big companies.
    Absolutely.

    The system has created an effective oligopoly, because only large developers have the capital to manage the risk and timescales.

    The downstream effect is lots of Barratt hutches that people rightly object to, and no self-build sector worth the name.
    New builds are shit.

    No storage, no-room-to-swing-a-cat bedrooms, postage stamp gardens, full of snags and hugely overpriced.

    We bought a 1982 build, which needed a bit of work, sure, but much better.

    We have space.
    I was just looking at some new-build rental flats after someone asked about them. Look nice and glossy, but I kept thinking 'that's going to fall off. oh, and the damp will get in I'm sure. bet that window handle will snap.'

    https://www.solastariverside.com/apartments

    Still, only a grand a month for pokey flat.
  • ThomasNasheThomasNashe Posts: 5,331
    Alex Scott really good taking Infantino apart.
  • TresTres Posts: 2,700
    MaxPB said:

    Andy_JS said:
    Only fools will bet on matches involving Qatar, they are said to be attempting to pay off individual footballers in the Ecuador and Senegal national teams to the matches so they can advance to the knock out stages.
    that's fake news from dubious sources like the Hindustan Times.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 57,160
    WillG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    WillG said:

    WillG said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Exactly. As I've covered a million times, why don't Germany or France have low-wage and low-skill economies ? They're also in the EU.

    It's not that the EU has not changed some of these things, it's that some of them *were consciously encouraged by Thatcherism*. And then many of Thatcher's same acolytes then proposed Brexit. It's as clear as day, but will always be difficult for many on the right to accept , partly because of Thatcher's totemic status.
    France and Germany don't have the issues with housing unaffordability we do. France has twice the land area and Germany has both more land and more regional cities for historic reasons.
    What’s the Dutch excuse then?
    A far lower level of immigration than us, and much, much lower from the developing world.
    https://data.oecd.org/migration/foreign-born-population.htm

    Basically the snake as the UK
    That data is clearly incorrect as it does not align with ONS data. We are at 17% and rapidly climbing.
    It is worth noting, though, that Britain's house prices reached a peak relative to Europe's I'm the mid 2000s. So before the big wave of post EU expansion immigration.
  • WillG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    WillG said:

    WillG said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Exactly. As I've covered a million times, why don't Germany or France have low-wage and low-skill economies ? They're also in the EU.

    It's not that the EU has not changed some of these things, it's that some of them *were consciously encouraged by Thatcherism*. And then many of Thatcher's same acolytes then proposed Brexit. It's as clear as day, but will always be difficult for many on the right to accept , partly because of Thatcher's totemic status.
    France and Germany don't have the issues with housing unaffordability we do. France has twice the land area and Germany has both more land and more regional cities for historic reasons.
    What’s the Dutch excuse then?
    A far lower level of immigration than us, and much, much lower from the developing world.
    https://data.oecd.org/migration/foreign-born-population.htm

    Basically the snake as the UK
    That data is clearly incorrect as it does not align with ONS data. We are at 17% and rapidly climbing.
    WillG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    WillG said:

    WillG said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Exactly. As I've covered a million times, why don't Germany or France have low-wage and low-skill economies ? They're also in the EU.

    It's not that the EU has not changed some of these things, it's that some of them *were consciously encouraged by Thatcherism*. And then many of Thatcher's same acolytes then proposed Brexit. It's as clear as day, but will always be difficult for many on the right to accept , partly because of Thatcher's totemic status.
    France and Germany don't have the issues with housing unaffordability we do. France has twice the land area and Germany has both more land and more regional cities for historic reasons.
    What’s the Dutch excuse then?
    A far lower level of immigration than us, and much, much lower from the developing world.
    https://data.oecd.org/migration/foreign-born-population.htm

    Basically the snake as the UK
    That data is clearly incorrect as it does not align with ONS data. We are at 17% and rapidly climbing.
    The OECD figures are for 2018. It is why you can compare these figures meaningfully. Perhaps you can tell us the Belgian or Greek figures for 2021. If not then this is the best we have to work with.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 50,270
    pillsbury said:

    ydoethur said:

    pillsbury said:

    DJ41 said:

    More shelling at the Zaporozhye nuclear plant.

    Rafael Grossi, head of the IAEA, is wagging his finger like nobody's business. Possibly he even means to tell the culprits' parents - assuming the moment comes when he decides he can declare he's found out who the culprits actually are.

    "Whoever is behind this," says Mr Grossi, "it must stop immediately. As I have said many times before, you’re playing with fire!" (Source.)

    The Kiev government...they're the guys who launched a missile that landed in Poland recently, killing two civilians, and they haven't admitted it, right? And NATO loony Jens Stoltenberg said sure but it's not their fault that they did it. (I wonder whose fault it is that they haven't admitted it? Father Christmas's maybe.) Just for some context. Logic suggests that it's possible for guys like Stoltenberg to say it's even possible to shell the f*** out of a nuclear power station with it being someone else's fault. They must have been great moral philosophy classes he attended at the Steiner school.

    Accidents will happen.

    The Zap plant provides electricity to Ukraine. There is one party which has set out to deprive Ukraine of electricity. Which party is that?
    It's Russia's core strategy.
    Give that man a cigar.
    Wrong.

    Give him a pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes. They are the premium brand in Russia these days.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,397

    IanB2 said:

    WillG said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Exactly. As I've covered a million times, why don't Germany or France have low-wage and low-skill economies ? They're also in the EU.

    It's not that the EU has not changed some of these things, it's that some of them *were consciously encouraged by Thatcherism*. And then many of Thatcher's same acolytes then proposed Brexit. It's as clear as day, but will always be difficult for many on the right to accept , partly because of Thatcher's totemic status.
    France and Germany don't have the issues with housing unaffordability we do. France has twice the land area and Germany has both more land and more regional cities for historic reasons.
    How much is the UK housing problem lack of land, and how much is it that, collectively, we have sort of decided not to build enough homes?

    OK, most people haven't put it as explicitly as that, but it is the net effect of other decisions society has taken.

    But the chain from "don't build on that field near me" or "don't develop those old houses to four stories" to Britain being poorer, meaner and angrier than is ideal is too long to fit into a three word slogan.
    We come back to a dysfunctional planning system which is a bizarre mixture of stalinism (you can’t build that), corporatism (you can only build if you are one of a small set of mass developers) and laissez faire (the government refuses to do anything about obvious market failure).

    When it comes to the geo-spatial reality, the Low Countries, the Paris Basin, and the Greater New York Metro area are all denser than SE England.

    Its really not the planning system that is the problem. Go research the huge number of unimplemented permissions, and the land banking that the major developers are doing.
    The land banking is in response to the “planning and development” anti-system.
    As is the grip of large corporations on development. When something is slow, expensive and has a long legal process, you have given a massive advantage to big companies.
    Absolutely.

    The system has created an effective oligopoly, because only large developers have the capital to manage the risk and timescales.

    The downstream effect is lots of Barratt hutches that people rightly object to, and no self-build sector worth the name.
    New builds are shit.

    No storage, no-room-to-swing-a-cat bedrooms, postage stamp gardens, full of snags and hugely overpriced.

    We bought a 1982 build, which needed a bit of work, sure, but much better.

    We have space.
    Not just new builds, though, is it? That's an issue with many houses built as long ago as the mid-90s.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,406
    OT. It's bloody cold already as the Sun goes down with a cloudless sky.
    Predicted 1°C overnight. Heating will be on. Price will be really felt for the first time for many.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 50,270
    Nigelb said:

    Scott_xP said:

    kyf_100 said:

    A greater understanding of why people have different beliefs to your own would go a long way to helping you understand why you lost the vote.

    I know exactly why Leave won last time.

    The people who voted for it seem less sure...
    The analogy is with America, where the Civil War was apparently fought for “State Rights”.
    They did.
    States’ rights to keep black people enslaved.

    As those states very clearly declared as a causus belli when they seceded.
    Slavery was The Cornerstone* of the Confederacy.

    *https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornerstone_Speech
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 57,160
    Andy_JS said:
    There are three LAFC players in the Ecuador squad: Mendes (starting), Cifuentes (bench) and Palacios (also bench).

    Cifuentes is rumoured to be off to Brighton.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,397
    dixiedean said:

    OT. It's bloody cold already as the Sun goes down with a cloudless sky.
    Predicted 1°C overnight. Heating will be on. Price will be really felt for the first time for many.

    Yet we're still lucky. 1°C in November round your parts is hardly unusual and we're 2/3 of the way through it.

    Doesn't mean it's going to be fun, of course.
  • Nigelb said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Foxy said:

    I agree though that there is a need for a more positive campaign to Rejoin, not just a desire to grind Brexiteers faces into the dust.

    The requirement to grind Brexiteers faces into the dust is a necessary but not sufficient condition if we want to avoid doing it all over again.
    A methodology that puts off any kind of improvement.

    Because grinding peoples faces into the dust doesn’t make them more stubborn. Not at all.

    What you actually want to do is to build a political movement of people in favour of Europe. When you have a nice big majority of those, you’ll get rejoin.

    You won’t get rejoin because Starmer does a whipped vote on day 1 for rejoin. He won’t commit political suicide for you.

    That's not the point.

    I want to get (back) to a point where a politician like Nigel Fucking Farage is laughed off the stage instead of being feted on every platform for spouting spurious bullshit.

    I want a politician who says with a straight face "We have had enough of experts" expunged.

    I want journalists and broadcasters to once again presents facts, not presents opinions as equivalent.

    The requirement to grind Brexiteers faces into the dust is a necessary but not sufficient condition for that.

    I hope the same thing happens to the SNP in Scotland.
    You are wrong regarding the grinding of faces, but the rest is on the right track.
    Scott posts unsubstantiated Tweets that turn out to be factually incorrect very frequently. I find it hard to square that with this declared devotion to fact.
    Limiting people on here to the factually accurate would be a very dangerous precedent!
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 21,298
    edited November 2022
    We go round and round on these topics.

    Immigration caused runaway house price inflation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused wage stagnation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused companies to under-invest? No, it didn’t.

    These problems are largely independent of immigration. The core issues are elsewhere.

    The problem with blaming “immigration” is that you are just ignoring the actual issues. And therefore, you’ll never address them.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,397

    pillsbury said:

    ydoethur said:

    pillsbury said:

    DJ41 said:

    More shelling at the Zaporozhye nuclear plant.

    Rafael Grossi, head of the IAEA, is wagging his finger like nobody's business. Possibly he even means to tell the culprits' parents - assuming the moment comes when he decides he can declare he's found out who the culprits actually are.

    "Whoever is behind this," says Mr Grossi, "it must stop immediately. As I have said many times before, you’re playing with fire!" (Source.)

    The Kiev government...they're the guys who launched a missile that landed in Poland recently, killing two civilians, and they haven't admitted it, right? And NATO loony Jens Stoltenberg said sure but it's not their fault that they did it. (I wonder whose fault it is that they haven't admitted it? Father Christmas's maybe.) Just for some context. Logic suggests that it's possible for guys like Stoltenberg to say it's even possible to shell the f*** out of a nuclear power station with it being someone else's fault. They must have been great moral philosophy classes he attended at the Steiner school.

    Accidents will happen.

    The Zap plant provides electricity to Ukraine. There is one party which has set out to deprive Ukraine of electricity. Which party is that?
    It's Russia's core strategy.
    Give that man a cigar.
    Wrong.

    Give him a pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes. They are the premium brand in Russia these days.
    Don't be silly.

    That's their artillery strategy, not their smoke of choice.
  • WillGWillG Posts: 2,366

    WillG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    WillG said:

    WillG said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Exactly. As I've covered a million times, why don't Germany or France have low-wage and low-skill economies ? They're also in the EU.

    It's not that the EU has not changed some of these things, it's that some of them *were consciously encouraged by Thatcherism*. And then many of Thatcher's same acolytes then proposed Brexit. It's as clear as day, but will always be difficult for many on the right to accept , partly because of Thatcher's totemic status.
    France and Germany don't have the issues with housing unaffordability we do. France has twice the land area and Germany has both more land and more regional cities for historic reasons.
    What’s the Dutch excuse then?
    A far lower level of immigration than us, and much, much lower from the developing world.
    https://data.oecd.org/migration/foreign-born-population.htm

    Basically the snake as the UK
    That data is clearly incorrect as it does not align with ONS data. We are at 17% and rapidly climbing.
    WillG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    WillG said:

    WillG said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Sandpit said:

    Putting aside Brexit, Torsten Bell explains the uniquely British economic malaise very well on a recent episode of “News Agents”.

    Take five countries with which Britons might think they are broadly comparable: France, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia.

    Britain is much more unequal and quite a bit poorer. The wealthiest in Britain are doing the same (or better), but the middle and bottom are *much* poorer than their peers.

    If Britain was like these neighbours, the average family would be £8,800 better off per year.

    And now, that family faces increased energy costs which are priced globally…

    Adding five million unskilled and semi-skilled people to a population, in less than a decade, will have exactly that effect.
    Actually, the reverse.
    But you do you.

    Ah yes, making the minimum wage, the maximum wage for millions of people, makes them richer than when their labour is a scarce resource. Of course it does.
    As as been pointed out to you countless times, EU migration was better skilled than domestic labour, improved corporate productivity, and helped ease the demographic burden besides.

    I know anti-immigration sneering is pretty much all you have left, but it’s boring to see it trotted out over and over.
    Yes, you seem convinced that a native population where a huge number of people are reliant on minimum wage, unwaged ‘gig’ work, and state benefit top-ups, is a happy state of affairs.
    But EU migration didn’t cause those things.

    Minimum wage, gig economy (eg zero hours contracting) and in-work benefits are all deliberate cross-party policies of the last xx years.

    Exactly. As I've covered a million times, why don't Germany or France have low-wage and low-skill economies ? They're also in the EU.

    It's not that the EU has not changed some of these things, it's that some of them *were consciously encouraged by Thatcherism*. And then many of Thatcher's same acolytes then proposed Brexit. It's as clear as day, but will always be difficult for many on the right to accept , partly because of Thatcher's totemic status.
    France and Germany don't have the issues with housing unaffordability we do. France has twice the land area and Germany has both more land and more regional cities for historic reasons.
    What’s the Dutch excuse then?
    A far lower level of immigration than us, and much, much lower from the developing world.
    https://data.oecd.org/migration/foreign-born-population.htm

    Basically the snake as the UK
    That data is clearly incorrect as it does not align with ONS data. We are at 17% and rapidly climbing.
    The OECD figures are for 2018. It is why you can compare these figures meaningfully. Perhaps you can tell us the Belgian or Greek figures for 2021. If not then this is the best we have to work with.
    The comparison was the Netherlands, who are at 14% in 2021. 20% lower than the UK.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,664
    dixiedean said:

    OT. It's bloody cold already as the Sun goes down with a cloudless sky.
    Predicted 1°C overnight. Heating will be on. Price will be really felt for the first time for many.

    We've already had two air frosts here in Dorset, 11 October and yesterday.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 50,270
    kle4 said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    TimS said:

    glw said:


    Scott_xP said:

    Another Brexiteer lie that need to be put to the sword.

    Remainers don't "love the EU"

    I voted Remain not because I love the EU, I really don’t, but I wanted nurse for fear of something worse….and wasn’t I absolutely right
    https://twitter.com/HarryWorcester/status/1593957527011590147

    Obviously not every Remainer is a Europhile, but many of the most vocal are. They attribute things to the EU that have little to do with it, a perennial favourite of mine being European peace, somehow they forget the very existence of NATO.
    NATO and the EU are a very powerful combination. As close as we’ve been able to manage on this side of the Atlantic to the American dream.

    One guarantees freedom from (largely Russian) imperialistic tyranny; the other promises economic development and the opportunity to travel freely for work and
    leisure. The post Soviet era without both would have been much less successful for Eastern Europe. Look at Poland and the Baltics, and now even the troubled Balkans, to see the dynamic in action.

    Security independence outside NATO is a dead end for Europe as the current war has shown. Economic independence outside the EU is a drag on prosperity for integrated European economies like Britain as our trade stats have shown.
    Europe has no security independence inside NATO as that organisation is dominated by the US. Poland had to check with Biden if they could give Fulcrums to Ukraine and the answer was 'no'.
    And so its not worth having at all?
    It’s the Golden Rule. The Man who provides the Gold makes all the rules.

    If Europe wants to be an equal partner in NATO, then they would need to put in 50% of the resources. They don’t. So they aren’t.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 122,969

    We go round and round on these topics.

    Immigration caused runaway house price inflation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused wage stagnation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused companies to under-invest? No, it didn’t.

    These problems are largely independent of immigration. The core issues are elsewhere.

    The problem with blaming “immigration” is that you are just ignoring the actual issues. And therefore, you’ll never address them.

    Higher immigration did push up demand for housing though and put pressure on the wages of the lower skilled
  • WillGWillG Posts: 2,366

    We go round and round on these topics.

    Immigration caused runaway house price inflation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused wage stagnation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused companies to under-invest? No, it didn’t.

    These problems are largely independent of immigration. The core issues are elsewhere.

    The problem with blaming “immigration” is that you are just ignoring the actual issues. And therefore, you’ll never address them.

    Yes, we go round and round, where other people bring specific arguments for the role of immigration in these things and you just make blanket statements or misrepresent people.
  • DrkB said:

    DJ41 said:

    More shelling at the Zaporozhye nuclear plant.

    Rafael Grossi, head of the IAEA, is wagging his finger like nobody's business. Possibly he even means to tell the culprits' parents - assuming the moment comes when he decides he can declare he's found out who the culprits actually are.

    "Whoever is behind this," says Mr Grossi, "it must stop immediately. As I have said many times before, you’re playing with fire!" (Source.)

    The Kiev government...they're the guys who launched a missile that landed in Poland recently, killing two civilians, and they haven't admitted it, right? And NATO loony Jens Stoltenberg said sure but it's not their fault that they did it. (I wonder whose fault it is that they haven't admitted it? Father Christmas's maybe.) Just for some context. Logic suggests that it's possible for guys like Stoltenberg to say it's even possible to shell the f*** out of a nuclear power station and it be someone else's fault. They must have been great moral philosophy classes he attended at the Steiner school.

    This is a worrying tweet for Ukraine

    If Russia continues to destroy critical infrastructure in Ukraine, an inflexion point will be reached, whereby Ukraine as a nation will collapse, due to chronic food, water, communication and energy shortages. It would also no longer be able to continue to fight the war.

    8:11 AM · Nov 20, 2022·Twitter for Android

    https://twitter.com/thesiriusreport/status/1594241992107884544?s=20&t=FICCWtx2ho8YgssRuQ47-w

    I think I could write that particular report. Blatantly obvious - but the biggest and most important word there is 'if'.
  • pingping Posts: 3,805
    edited November 2022
    After listening to the excellent Athletic podcast on the morality of Qatar 2022, I’ve come off the fence.

    https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/tifo-football-podcast/id1227699368

    I’m not boycotting it, or ambivalent to it.

    I’m actively hostile.

    I’ll be cheering on Ecuador and hoping Qatar get utterly humiliated.

    This has nothing to do with the substantial free bet on Ecuador that a certain bookie has just randomly credited to me. Nor the offer for a free bet for every goal scored in that particular game.

    No, sir.

    I’ve got morals, me.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,437

    We go round and round on these topics.

    Immigration caused runaway house price inflation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused wage stagnation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused companies to under-invest? No, it didn’t.

    These problems are largely independent of immigration. The core issues are elsewhere.

    The problem with blaming “immigration” is that you are just ignoring the actual issues. And therefore, you’ll never address them.

    It also misses the underlying cause, which even the French are starting to pick us up on - if you say you want less migration, why do you make yourself such an attractive destination? Even within the EU, we could have evolved the benefits system to avoid paying child benefit for Polish kids in Poland, to avoid the NHS being a global free for all. For whatever reason, successive Governments, mostly Tory, have declined to alter a system which was designed for a post war world with barely a fraction of the mobility of population we see today.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 50,270
    ydoethur said:

    pillsbury said:

    ydoethur said:

    pillsbury said:

    DJ41 said:

    More shelling at the Zaporozhye nuclear plant.

    Rafael Grossi, head of the IAEA, is wagging his finger like nobody's business. Possibly he even means to tell the culprits' parents - assuming the moment comes when he decides he can declare he's found out who the culprits actually are.

    "Whoever is behind this," says Mr Grossi, "it must stop immediately. As I have said many times before, you’re playing with fire!" (Source.)

    The Kiev government...they're the guys who launched a missile that landed in Poland recently, killing two civilians, and they haven't admitted it, right? And NATO loony Jens Stoltenberg said sure but it's not their fault that they did it. (I wonder whose fault it is that they haven't admitted it? Father Christmas's maybe.) Just for some context. Logic suggests that it's possible for guys like Stoltenberg to say it's even possible to shell the f*** out of a nuclear power station with it being someone else's fault. They must have been great moral philosophy classes he attended at the Steiner school.

    Accidents will happen.

    The Zap plant provides electricity to Ukraine. There is one party which has set out to deprive Ukraine of electricity. Which party is that?
    It's Russia's core strategy.
    Give that man a cigar.
    Wrong.

    Give him a pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes. They are the premium brand in Russia these days.
    Don't be silly.

    That's their artillery strategy, not their smoke of choice.
    No no. The explosions all over Russia are smoking accidents. That’s the Official Policy. And Official policy is always right? Eh Komrade? Can you check that window latch behind you, please?
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,437

    Nigelb said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Foxy said:

    I agree though that there is a need for a more positive campaign to Rejoin, not just a desire to grind Brexiteers faces into the dust.

    The requirement to grind Brexiteers faces into the dust is a necessary but not sufficient condition if we want to avoid doing it all over again.
    A methodology that puts off any kind of improvement.

    Because grinding peoples faces into the dust doesn’t make them more stubborn. Not at all.

    What you actually want to do is to build a political movement of people in favour of Europe. When you have a nice big majority of those, you’ll get rejoin.

    You won’t get rejoin because Starmer does a whipped vote on day 1 for rejoin. He won’t commit political suicide for you.

    That's not the point.

    I want to get (back) to a point where a politician like Nigel Fucking Farage is laughed off the stage instead of being feted on every platform for spouting spurious bullshit.

    I want a politician who says with a straight face "We have had enough of experts" expunged.

    I want journalists and broadcasters to once again presents facts, not presents opinions as equivalent.

    The requirement to grind Brexiteers faces into the dust is a necessary but not sufficient condition for that.

    I hope the same thing happens to the SNP in Scotland.
    You are wrong regarding the grinding of faces, but the rest is on the right track.
    Scott posts unsubstantiated Tweets that turn out to be factually incorrect very frequently. I find it hard to square that with this declared devotion to fact.
    Limiting people on here to the factually accurate would be a very dangerous precedent!
    It would be quite funny to have a PB comments section with footnotes and bibliography on each post.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,557
    edited November 2022
    A lot of people will be hoping Qatar get a bloody good hiding from Ecuador today.
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 21,298
    edited November 2022
    I was just playing with a nifty tool from Columbia that allows you to estimate 2015 population within circles or shapes you draw on a map.

    A 125km circumference around London, Antwerp (thereby taking in much of the Low Countries), Cologne (the Ruhr), the Peak District (which brings in both the Lancashire-Yorkshire metros and the main Midlands population centres), and New York City pretty much all give you the same population.

    Paris and the Po Valley provide smaller numbers.

    There’s no inherent geographical reason why these areas should have such disparity in productivity, incomes, and house prices.

  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 42,840
    https://www.theguardian.com/football/2022/nov/20/goalkeeper-sent-off-for-confronting-fan-who-allegedly-urinated-in-his-drink-tony-thompson-warrington

    Meanwhile, in the true art of coarse football, light-weeks away from IFA or Budweiser:

    'The non-league player Tony Thompson was “knocked sick” after a fan allegedly urinated in his drinks bottle during an FA Trophy tie. The Warrington Town goalkeeper was furious after being sent off for confronting the supporter behind his goal during the 1-0 defeat at home to Guiseley.'
  • pingping Posts: 3,805
    edited November 2022
    Oh btw, I’d like to take back all the bad things I’ve ever said about Vodafone.

    Their app has a little competition thingy, which is mostly a waste of time. Occasionally they just give you £5 to spend at Morrisons, though, which just about makes it worth checking once a week, or so.

    Well this week, I checked the app and clicked the various competitions, which takes about ten seconds, and one randomly said I’d won £1k of shopping vouchers.

    It’s not even a scam. I’ve just spent some of them buying a new mattress in John Lewis.

    I forgive you, Vodafone. Even your obscene CPI+3.9% contracts and your crap, inconsistent coverage.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 35,990

    Scott posts unsubstantiated Tweets that turn out to be factually incorrect very frequently. I find it hard to square that with this declared devotion to fact.

    It explicitly illustrates my point.

    I post something, and if it's wrong it gets refuted.

    That is what is supposed to happen.

    It didn't happen with Brexit.
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 51,648
    Scott_xP said:

    Scott posts unsubstantiated Tweets that turn out to be factually incorrect very frequently. I find it hard to square that with this declared devotion to fact.

    It explicitly illustrates my point.

    I post something, and if it's wrong it gets refuted.

    That is what is supposed to happen.

    It didn't happen with Brexit.
    The problem is that you think Brexit was wrong rather than simply a choice that you disagree with. You can't see that there are arguments on both sides.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 35,990

    The problem is that you think Brexit was wrong rather than simply a choice that you disagree with. You can't see that there are arguments on both sides.

    Then you haven't understood anything I have posted today
  • WillGWillG Posts: 2,366

    We go round and round on these topics.

    Immigration caused runaway house price inflation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused wage stagnation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused companies to under-invest? No, it didn’t.

    These problems are largely independent of immigration. The core issues are elsewhere.

    The problem with blaming “immigration” is that you are just ignoring the actual issues. And therefore, you’ll never address them.

    It also misses the underlying cause, which even the French are starting to pick us up on - if you say you want less migration, why do you make yourself such an attractive destination? Even within the EU, we could have evolved the benefits system to avoid paying child benefit for Polish kids in Poland, to avoid the NHS being a global free for all. For whatever reason, successive Governments, mostly Tory, have declined to alter a system which was designed for a post war world with barely a fraction of the mobility of population we see today.
    That's not true. The only way to avoid paying child benefit to kids in Poland would have been to stop paying child benefit to British kids.
  • F1: good race too.

    Edited in case spoilers unwanted.

    ICYMI BBC Sounds on F1 Spygate

    Excitement is in the air as the 2007 Formula 1 season gets underway. There’s a feeling that the World Championship is anyone’s for the taking. Michael Schumacher might have just retired, but Italian icon Ferrari is looking fierce and British powerhouse McLaren isn’t looking too shabby either. Under the guidance of legendary team boss Ron Dennis, the team looks like a strong contender once more with a fast car, driven by reigning world champion Fernando Alonso no less. But when their second driver - an unknown rookie called Lewis Hamilton - outperforms all expectations, it upsets the apple cart in ways that no-one can imagine. Meanwhile, in a photocopy shop in sleepy Surrey, a customer comes in to copy a package of documents that will change Formula 1 forever.
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0dgcsr4
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,397
    Scott_xP said:

    The problem is that you think Brexit was wrong rather than simply a choice that you disagree with. You can't see that there are arguments on both sides.

    Then you haven't understood anything I have posted today
    You didn't understand quite a lot of what you posted today (e.g. on Copernicus) why should he have more insight?
  • ThomasNasheThomasNashe Posts: 5,331
    Vamos Ecuador!
  • Andy_JS said:

    A lot of people will be hoping Qatar get a bloody good hiding from Ecuador today.

    Indeed. I won’t be cheering on any bad guys.
  • pingping Posts: 3,805
    WillG said:

    We go round and round on these topics.

    Immigration caused runaway house price inflation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused wage stagnation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused companies to under-invest? No, it didn’t.

    These problems are largely independent of immigration. The core issues are elsewhere.

    The problem with blaming “immigration” is that you are just ignoring the actual issues. And therefore, you’ll never address them.

    It also misses the underlying cause, which even the French are starting to pick us up on - if you say you want less migration, why do you make yourself such an attractive destination? Even within the EU, we could have evolved the benefits system to avoid paying child benefit for Polish kids in Poland, to avoid the NHS being a global free for all. For whatever reason, successive Governments, mostly Tory, have declined to alter a system which was designed for a post war world with barely a fraction of the mobility of population we see today.
    That's not true. The only way to avoid paying child benefit to kids in Poland would have been to stop paying child benefit to British kids.
    Surely that isn’t true, though?

    Why couldn’t we have just made it an offence to claim for periods when the kids are outside the country?
  • Strange, that....

    Meanwhile, 50 per cent of trans prisoners in Scotland only discovered their new gender reality once they were held in custody. On the face of it, this seems remarkable. So much so, in fact, that anyone even marginally more inquisitive than the typical MSP might pause to wonder if this really is just coincidental. The official line, however, remains that such questions are irrelevant. There is nothing to see here and it is in some curious but undefined sense “transphobic” to even think about asking such questions.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/fc90146c-6813-11ed-bcd8-599592d95f22?shareToken=ce5a93cacf684cb8af27de9a2cc11565
  • Nigelb said:

    pillsbury said:

    On eternal life, I do wonder if the billionaire-cryogenic phenomenon isn't just a expression of the modern extreme fear of the - I would say incorrect - idea that eternal life isn't possible.

    Quite the opposite, I believe. Mainstream cryogenic theory says you are just freezing to bridge the awkward gap between now, and proper immortality treatment becoming available. When it does, you thaw and get the treatment. It's like the early Christians not being sure whether the second coming would be in their lifetimes or whether they would have to do the whole death and resurrection thing.
    If we have any biologists in, what are the precedents for any biological organism living forever ? For me the issue would be loss of faith in our cultural inheritance, in modern scientific terms yet to be proven that we have another essence ( possibly a quantum field ) that moves from one place to another. This is well outside current orthodoxy ofcourse, but a number of physicists around the edges are increasingly interested in the possibility. As mentioned earlier, one often finds the greatest openness to these ideas among physicists, at the moment, in line with Einstein's openness.
    Ah, a believer in Religion Without Sky Faeries.

    Penrose wants to be a hard core non-believer but can’t give up the idea that humans are special.

    There are plenty of organisms that live a lot longer than we do.
    Penrose is an interesting one, isn't he. He thinks that the brain may harbour quantum microtubules, and a number of physicists are interested too.
    It’s not looking good for Penrose’s quantum model.
    https://www.quantamagazine.org/physics-experiments-spell-doom-for-quantum-collapse-theory-20221020/
    You've got to feel sorry for Qijia Fu, the brainiac student who came up with the idea, and was soon after killed by lightning before he could start his PhD.
    https://www.hamilton.edu/scholarships-and-prizes/index?action=detail&id=F5259AC1-C6B5-1098-F0A320707CD64E74
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,406
    Ecuador!!
  • ThomasNasheThomasNashe Posts: 5,331
    Yes!
  • Thanks for coming Qatar 🏐
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 50,270
    WillG said:

    We go round and round on these topics.

    Immigration caused runaway house price inflation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused wage stagnation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused companies to under-invest? No, it didn’t.

    These problems are largely independent of immigration. The core issues are elsewhere.

    The problem with blaming “immigration” is that you are just ignoring the actual issues. And therefore, you’ll never address them.

    It also misses the underlying cause, which even the French are starting to pick us up on - if you say you want less migration, why do you make yourself such an attractive destination? Even within the EU, we could have evolved the benefits system to avoid paying child benefit for Polish kids in Poland, to avoid the NHS being a global free for all. For whatever reason, successive Governments, mostly Tory, have declined to alter a system which was designed for a post war world with barely a fraction of the mobility of population we see today.
    That's not true. The only way to avoid paying child benefit to kids in Poland would have been to stop paying child benefit to British kids.
    Plenty of countries don’t pay benefits in those circumstances. Quite a few in Europe.

    I’ve been told that a UBI was a nasty idea precisely because it wouldn’t be available to migrants.
  • pingping Posts: 3,805
    edited November 2022
    Go Ecuador!

    Well deserved humiliation for Qatar.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,557
    edited November 2022
    Goal ruled out.
  • LOL
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 63,063
    edited November 2022
    Offside !!!

    I just cannot see it
  • ThomasNasheThomasNashe Posts: 5,331
    Ridiculous!
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,406
    I see no offside there...
  • dixiedean said:

    I see no offside there...

    Shocking decision
  • WillGWillG Posts: 2,366
    I guess I am limited for libel reasons for saying what I think of that offside decision. This is an extremely corrupt World Cup.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 26,175
    To be fair, I think it was offside, but amusing start given the conspiracy theories.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,397
    WillG said:

    I guess I am limited for libel reasons for saying what I think of that offside decision. This is an extremely corrupt World Cup.

    There's snooker on BBC2 if you prefer that.
  • WillGWillG Posts: 2,366

    WillG said:

    We go round and round on these topics.

    Immigration caused runaway house price inflation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused wage stagnation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused companies to under-invest? No, it didn’t.

    These problems are largely independent of immigration. The core issues are elsewhere.

    The problem with blaming “immigration” is that you are just ignoring the actual issues. And therefore, you’ll never address them.

    It also misses the underlying cause, which even the French are starting to pick us up on - if you say you want less migration, why do you make yourself such an attractive destination? Even within the EU, we could have evolved the benefits system to avoid paying child benefit for Polish kids in Poland, to avoid the NHS being a global free for all. For whatever reason, successive Governments, mostly Tory, have declined to alter a system which was designed for a post war world with barely a fraction of the mobility of population we see today.
    That's not true. The only way to avoid paying child benefit to kids in Poland would have been to stop paying child benefit to British kids.
    Plenty of countries don’t pay benefits in those circumstances. Quite a few in Europe.

    I’ve been told that a UBI was a nasty idea precisely because it wouldn’t be available to migrants.
    This was one of the things Cameron tried to renegotiate and fail.
  • RobDRobD Posts: 59,930
    Tres said:

    MaxPB said:

    Andy_JS said:
    Only fools will bet on matches involving Qatar, they are said to be attempting to pay off individual footballers in the Ecuador and Senegal national teams to the matches so they can advance to the knock out stages.
    that's fake news from dubious sources like the Hindustan Times.
    This aged well. ;)
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,406
    No Ex-Evertonian to score the opener.
    A conspiracy.
  • StockyStocky Posts: 10,215
    I think it was offside - the pass after the goalie came out only had one defending player behind
  • WillGWillG Posts: 2,366
    ydoethur said:

    WillG said:

    I guess I am limited for libel reasons for saying what I think of that offside decision. This is an extremely corrupt World Cup.

    There's snooker on BBC2 if you prefer that.
    This my son's first World Cup and I promised to watch it with him.
  • tlg86 said:

    To be fair, I think it was offside, but amusing start given the conspiracy theories.

    Correct offside decision, the keeper's rashness ironically saved Qatar there because there was only one defender behind him.

    I'm so old I remember the scandalous decisions that benefited South Korea in 2022.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 35,990
    ydoethur said:

    why should he have more insight?

    I can only explain it to the wilfully ignorant.

    I can't understand it for you.
  • Stocky said:

    I think it was offside - the pass after the goalie came out only had one defending player behind

    Maybe but we are all Ecuador supporters now
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 17,405
    WillG said:

    ydoethur said:

    WillG said:

    I guess I am limited for libel reasons for saying what I think of that offside decision. This is an extremely corrupt World Cup.

    There's snooker on BBC2 if you prefer that.
    This my son's first World Cup and I promised to watch it with him.
    How old is he? Or do you mean first he’s aware of?
  • WillGWillG Posts: 2,366
    Stocky said:

    I think it was offside - the pass after the goalie came out only had one defending player behind

    You are allowed to be level and he clearly was.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 50,270
    WillG said:

    WillG said:

    We go round and round on these topics.

    Immigration caused runaway house price inflation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused wage stagnation? No, it didn’t.

    Immigration caused companies to under-invest? No, it didn’t.

    These problems are largely independent of immigration. The core issues are elsewhere.

    The problem with blaming “immigration” is that you are just ignoring the actual issues. And therefore, you’ll never address them.

    It also misses the underlying cause, which even the French are starting to pick us up on - if you say you want less migration, why do you make yourself such an attractive destination? Even within the EU, we could have evolved the benefits system to avoid paying child benefit for Polish kids in Poland, to avoid the NHS being a global free for all. For whatever reason, successive Governments, mostly Tory, have declined to alter a system which was designed for a post war world with barely a fraction of the mobility of population we see today.
    That's not true. The only way to avoid paying child benefit to kids in Poland would have been to stop paying child benefit to British kids.
    Plenty of countries don’t pay benefits in those circumstances. Quite a few in Europe.

    I’ve been told that a UBI was a nasty idea precisely because it wouldn’t be available to migrants.
    This was one of the things Cameron tried to renegotiate and fail.
    Benefit X is only available to those who have paid Y years of National Insurance contributions. Not paid your insurance? No benefits.

    Etc.
  • WillG said:

    Stocky said:

    I think it was offside - the pass after the goalie came out only had one defending player behind

    You are allowed to be level and he clearly was.
    Seems he was offside by a knee
  • NickPalmerNickPalmer Posts: 21,526
    ohnotnow said:



    I was just looking at some new-build rental flats after someone asked about them. Look nice and glossy, but I kept thinking 'that's going to fall off. oh, and the damp will get in I'm sure. bet that window handle will snap.'

    https://www.solastariverside.com/apartments

    Still, only a grand a month for pokey flat.

    Looks very nice to me. The great thing about renting is after all that you don't need to worry about window handles etc. - if they snap, it's the landlord's job to fix them, and if the landlord is consistently useless you can move somewhere else. For what it's worth, I've never had a problem with corporate landlords - they've always fixed problems faster than I could have done. Private landlords are more of a lottery, and at the bottom of the market they're still horrible.
  • TazTaz Posts: 14,405
    Penalty time
  • Jim_MillerJim_Miller Posts: 2,999
    FPT: It's a common mistake, even here in the US. The US Senate does not impeach; the House does that, by a majority vote. So the orange loser was impeached, twice. (As most of you will see immediately, an impeachment is similar to an indictment.)

    After a president is impeached by the House, the president is tried by the Senate, which can then remove him by a two-thirds vote. That's never happened, though, after the Civil War, Andrew Johnson survived by single vote.


  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,406
    This goalie is providing a tournament worth of entertainment.
  • pingping Posts: 3,805
    Are they going to find a reason to strike this one off, too?
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,397
    edited November 2022
    Scott_xP said:

    ydoethur said:

    why should he have more insight?

    I can only explain it to the wilfully ignorant.

    I can't understand it for you.
    I'm not sure what that rather incoherent post means. But the key point is, if you don't understand what you're talking about - as you demonstrated earlier, really quite spectacularly - how are the rest of us supposed to understand you?

    ('Wilfully ignorant' also strikes me as ironic, under the circumstances.)
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,557
    I thought the odds I posted earlier were a bit generous for Qatar.
  • Is this a good time to mention I backed Qatar to win the world cup this year at silly money?

    See it as a trading bet using the South Korea precedent.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,406
    dixiedean said:

    No Ex-Evertonian to score the opener.
    A conspiracy.

    Well.
    That aged well.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,397

    FPT: It's a common mistake, even here in the US. The US Senate does not impeach; the House does that, by a majority vote. So the orange loser was impeached, twice. (As most of you will see immediately, an impeachment is similar to an indictment.)

    After a president is impeached by the House, the president is tried by the Senate, which can then remove him by a two-thirds vote. That's never happened, though, after the Civil War, Andrew Johnson survived by single vote.

    AIUI the general feeling is had the President Pro Tempore not been so blatantly angling for a conviction that would make him President, the verdict might have been 'guilty.'
  • ThomasNasheThomasNashe Posts: 5,331
    Qatar may be Asian champions, but they really are not very good. Ecuador have dominated this right from kick off.
  • Jim_MillerJim_Miller Posts: 2,999
    The last time a president replaced a vice president on the ticket was when FDR chose Harry S Truman to replace Henry Wallace in 1944. (Party leaders, knowing FDR was in poor health, pressured him to make that change.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_A._Wallace
  • Shall we agree not to talk about Brexit during the World Cup? 👍
  • dixiedean said:

    This goalie is providing a tournament worth of entertainment.

    Wait until you see England's first choice goalie.
  • TresTres Posts: 2,700
    RobD said:

    Tres said:

    MaxPB said:

    Andy_JS said:
    Only fools will bet on matches involving Qatar, they are said to be attempting to pay off individual footballers in the Ecuador and Senegal national teams to the matches so they can advance to the knock out stages.
    that's fake news from dubious sources like the Hindustan Times.
    This aged well. ;)
    looks like someone bribed the wrong goalkeeper
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,397

    The last time a president replaced a vice president on the ticket was when FDR chose Harry S Truman to replace Henry Wallace in 1944. (Party leaders, knowing FDR was in poor health, pressured him to make that change.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_A._Wallace

    Didn't Ford ditch his Vice President in 1976?
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 26,175

    Is this a good time to mention I backed Qatar to win the world cup this year at silly money?

    See it as a trading bet using the South Korea precedent.

    I’m surprised at how bad Qatar look.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,406

    Qatar may be Asian champions, but they really are not very good. Ecuador have dominated this right from kick off.

    Think Ecuador may be a little underrated too. You don't qualify from South America by not being half decent.
    Brazil's coach reckons they'll be the surprise team of the whole thing.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 57,160
    Is Ecuador very good, or is Qatar appallingly bad?
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 42,840
    edited November 2022

    WillG said:

    Stocky said:

    I think it was offside - the pass after the goalie came out only had one defending player behind

    You are allowed to be level and he clearly was.
    Seems he was offside by a knee
    Afternoon, BigG - hope you are well.

    This might interest you - obviously not just a Mr Drakeford thing (though, like him, more empowering local councils to make the decision). And supported by Conservatives.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11446827/Tourist-hotspots-England-preparing-double-council-tax-second-home-owners.html
  • TazTaz Posts: 14,405

    dixiedean said:

    This goalie is providing a tournament worth of entertainment.

    Wait until you see England's first choice goalie.
    Pope should get the nod.
  • Jim_MillerJim_Miller Posts: 2,999
    Since some of you are more than mildly interested in the EU, perhaps you can answer this question, which I have been wondering about, for years. Was joining the euro good for Greece?

    (My impression is that it was very bad, and that their economy has still not recovered completely, but, if I am wrong, feel free to tell me so.)
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,073

    The last time a president replaced a vice president on the ticket was when FDR chose Harry S Truman to replace Henry Wallace in 1944. (Party leaders, knowing FDR was in poor health, pressured him to make that change.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_A._Wallace

    Turned out OK.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,073
    rcs1000 said:

    Is Ecuador very good, or is Qatar appallingly bad?

    Yes.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 50,270
    edited November 2022
    WillG said:

    I guess I am limited for libel reasons for saying what I think of that offside decision. This is an extremely corrupt World Cup.

    I am starting a new venture. It involves cryptocurrency run from servers in Low Earth Orbit. Naturally, In addition to having our own custom currency, we will have our own launch system. Which uses New Physics.

    The name of the venture is RentAnOfficial.com

    The purpose is to improve the process of incentive enhanced official transactions, world wide.

    Would you like to invest?

    Forgot to mention that we will be using a new Fusion power source which uses New Physics as well.
  • EPGEPG Posts: 6,652
    Who the hell is betting Newsom into that 12%?
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 57,160

    Since some of you are more than mildly interested in the EU, perhaps you can answer this question, which I have been wondering about, for years. Was joining the euro good for Greece?

    (My impression is that it was very bad, and that their economy has still not recovered completely, but, if I am wrong, feel free to tell me so.)

    No.

    Joining the Euro was a stupid thing for Greece to do. (Ditto Italy.)

    The jury is still out on some of the other members of Club Med.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,557
    Ecuador really ought to score 4 or 5.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,397
    Taz said:

    dixiedean said:

    This goalie is providing a tournament worth of entertainment.

    Wait until you see England's first choice goalie.
    Pope should get the nod.
    Leave him alone. He's busy enough nailing down the no.3 spot in a much more important sport.
  • TazTaz Posts: 14,405
    Carnyx said:

    WillG said:

    Stocky said:

    I think it was offside - the pass after the goalie came out only had one defending player behind

    You are allowed to be level and he clearly was.
    Seems he was offside by a knee
    Afternoon, BigG - hope you are well.

    This might interest you - obviously not just a Mr Drakeford thing (though, like him, more empowering local councils to make the decision). And supported by Conservatives.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11446827/Tourist-hotspots-England-preparing-double-council-tax-second-home-owners.html
    Good. Councils need the money so why not.

    Hopefully this will also apply to Airbnb and the cottage rental sector too.
  • WillGWillG Posts: 2,366
    Estrada is not further forward than the goalkeeper, who is the second defender.
  • ClippPClippP Posts: 1,904
    edited November 2022

    IanB2 said:

    Breaking - mass shooting incident in a club in Colorado Springs; a number of deaths

    Five people have been killed and at least 18 injured in a shooting at a gay nightclub in Colorado Springs in the US.

    In a statement, the club - Club Q - called the shooting a "hate attack" and said customers overpowered the gunman.

    https://news.sky.com/story/five-killed-18-injured-in-us-gay-nightclub-hate-attack-12751571
    But these paragraphs from the story must be a classic...

    "Lt Castro said officers were able to immediately enter the venue, and located one individual they believed to be the suspect."
    "They are now in custody and being treated for injuries at a local hospital."

    The suspect was male and singular. The American use of pronouns makes the story a complete nonsense.
This discussion has been closed.