The fact they are talking about this and saying what great condition they are in reveals a lot. I would not be surprised to see T-34s in Ukraine facing Leopard 2s, Challenger 2s and Abrams.
I don’t think Britain will Brejoin, although I concede it is likelier than I ever thought it might be.
As @Driver notes, nobody has really made the case for why the EU is better (apart from trade). There needs to be a hearts, not just minds, case.
You’re right. It’ll come.
I was speaking to my niece and her fella, both born in 2000, at Xmas when they came to visit from Bristol. They’re both fucking livid that they can’t afford a house and, a close second, livid at Brexit. Pissed off they were too young to vote. Feel they’ve been betrayed by the Boomers on both issues. The heart thing seems ingrained with them. They want to be able to afford a house and they want freedom of movement, to be part of something bigger, something better than this right-wing shithole we’ve descended to. They’re not rich, or ‘woke’, just normal kids who feel betrayed.
I hope they’re representative of their age group.
I'd say freedom of movement across Europe is somewhat inimical to being able to afford a house in the UK.
Other way round, in part. Try finding builders, roofers, plumbers to maintain existing stock let alone build new stock.
You're both right. Rapid population growth driven by immigration pushes up house prices. But hard to expand housing supply without enough labour. In the long run the second argument is more important, but of course in the long run we're all dead. It's worth pointing out that total immigration hasn't changed much post Brexit, but it has skewed away from workers in sectors like construction owing to the skill requirements for visas. The hope is that higher wages in the sector will lead to more indigenous tradespeople in the long run. But that's not very reassuring if your roof is leaking right now.
I don’t think Britain will Brejoin, although I concede it is likelier than I ever thought it might be.
As @Driver notes, nobody has really made the case for why the EU is better (apart from trade). There needs to be a hearts, not just minds, case.
No one really though the EU was a fantastic fault -free organisation. And the bits I really liked, such as FoM where the bits everyone else hated.
The EU's single USP was membership is less sub optimal, and by a country mile, than non membership.
Not that I advocate rejoin. That ship sailed when Boris Johnson " done Brexit".
And that, of course, isn't a USP. If one side is saying "this is bad but that's worse" and the other side is saying "this is good", there's only one winner.
Yes, and you were that winner. I've come to terms with it, we are out, and out for my lifetime, and it's an unmitigated disaster as I predicted.
Mrs BJ claims to have seen a parakeet fly over our house this morning.
I asked her how she knew it was a parakeet
She told me that at first she thought it could have been Donald Trump as they look the same have a similar IQ.
She realised it wasn't though as it was tweeting
This is why I married Mrs BJ
I see parakeets most days in suburban South Manchester. Five years ago, I saw my first one, and was astonished. In fact my then three year old saw it - 'parrot', she said. I didn't really believe her (although the noise it made was rather exotic) - but I looked, and yes, a parrot, or near enough. And now you see them most days. They nest in the Mersey Valley and flock in great numbers. The speed of their population growth is faintly alarming. Though we don't yet have as many here as I saw in Sefton Park in Liverpool. Bloody hundreds of them there.
Parrots in the Midlands = canaries in the coal mines re: global warming?
In Emerald City of Seattle, also seeing more birds from more southerly climes more often, such as hummingbirds.
How have the hummingbirds got there? The parakeets are descended from pets who have escaped/been released. It's probably an urban myth to suppose that it was all down to Jimi Hendrix, but it's fun nonetheless.
I occasionally seen the flock of parakeets that inhabits Hampstead Heath. They are definitely the descendants of escaped pets but I doubt JH was involved. They are quite spectacular in flight.
You can tell they are not indiginous but they seem to co-exist hppily enough with the locals.
They're one of the most common bird species in our neighbourhood. I like them, they add a bit of exotic colour and noise on a drab winter's day in South London.
The fact they are talking about this and saying what great condition they are in reveals a lot. I would not be surprised to see T-34s in Ukraine facing Leopard 2s, Challenger 2s and Abrams.
Mrs BJ claims to have seen a parakeet fly over our house this morning.
I asked her how she knew it was a parakeet
She told me that at first she thought it could have been Donald Trump as they look the same have a similar IQ.
She realised it wasn't though as it was tweeting
This is why I married Mrs BJ
I see parakeets most days in suburban South Manchester. Five years ago, I saw my first one, and was astonished. In fact my then three year old saw it - 'parrot', she said. I didn't really believe her (although the noise it made was rather exotic) - but I looked, and yes, a parrot, or near enough. And now you see them most days. They nest in the Mersey Valley and flock in great numbers. The speed of their population growth is faintly alarming. Though we don't yet have as many here as I saw in Sefton Park in Liverpool. Bloody hundreds of them there.
Parrots in the Midlands = canaries in the coal mines re: global warming?
In Emerald City of Seattle, also seeing more birds from more southerly climes more often, such as hummingbirds.
How have the hummingbirds got there? The parakeets are descended from pets who have escaped/been released. It's probably an urban myth to suppose that it was all down to Jimi Hendrix, but it's fun nonetheless.
I occasionally seen the flock of parakeets that inhabits Hampstead Heath. They are definitely the descendants of escaped pets but I doubt JH was involved. They are quite spectacular in flight.
You can tell they are not indiginous but they seem to co-exist hppily enough with the locals.
Not with the local birds PtP. They drive them away
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The EEC and the EU being rather different things, of course. If the one hadn't transformed into the other there never would have been a Leave campaign in the first place.
Off topic on the Hancock Bridgen barney - I struggle to see how this is anything other than vexatious. Mancock made a statement in parliament - legally bullet proof. He then tweets a video clip of his statement with a direct quote of his statement as he tweet.
Qualified privilege m'lud.
What is the legal status of tweeting what was your own privileged statement ? It's not reporting; doesn't it amount to repeating the statement outside of Parliament ?
It's debatable. He posted a complete and unedited video of his statement. Direct reporting of parliament is absolutely fine - its broadcast on live TV. So its the words he used in the tweet that is the debatable part. Having read the tweet and watched the video, he used all the same words he said in parliament, but not verbatim.
So, a debate about fair reporting of privileged matters. "Fair and contemporaneous" was the phrase drummed into my journalism student head, and this was. Bridgen will I assume go after "I am not an AS so its libel to say I am.
Which gets us to the basic libel defences. An honest opinion that could reasonably held, said without malice. And the fun bit where Bridgen appears to have joined the Reclaim Party...
I don’t think Britain will Brejoin, although I concede it is likelier than I ever thought it might be.
As @Driver notes, nobody has really made the case for why the EU is better (apart from trade). There needs to be a hearts, not just minds, case.
I am a convinced European; in 1975, I was pounding the streets for the Cause. I always felt Western Europe in particular had a considerable degree of shared history and culture and made sense as an economic and political union. I have to say I was less convinced by the addition of Eastern Europe and particularly South-eastern, but I was happy to go along with it. I didn’t work so hard in the referendum, due to old age, although I did contribute money and stand on street corners handing out leaflets. And I’d vote to Rejoin.
Of course I would vote to Rejoin.
I am not in love with the EU, but it’s not possible to wish it away, and Britain’s only opportunity to push it in the most convivial direction is from the inside.
But I confess I don’t have a three word slogan to that effect.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
I think that exchange is the crux of the whole debate. It doesn't matter whether the EU is perceived as left wing or right wing - or both simultaneously. What matters is that the political direction of the country should be dictated by the Government of the day, not by an external authority. If we want to elect a Government to pursue left wing policies, unhindered by external regulation then, as long as we don't break certain fundamental international rules and agreements, we should be free to do so - for better or worse. Neither the EU, the US or any other external power should have the explicit power to prevent that.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The EEC and the EU being rather different things, of course. If the one hadn't transformed into the other there never would have been a Leave campaign in the first place.
Not really. As you are probably aware, the preamble to the Treaty of Rome that established the EEC talks of laying "the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe". The EU can therefore be regarded as a natural evolution of the EEC. We knew what we were getting into, and Right of the time thought it was a good idea.
Off topic on the Hancock Bridgen barney - I struggle to see how this is anything other than vexatious. Mancock made a statement in parliament - legally bullet proof. He then tweets a video clip of his statement with a direct quote of his statement as he tweet.
Qualified privilege m'lud.
What is the legal status of tweeting what was your own privileged statement ? It's not reporting; doesn't it amount to repeating the statement outside of Parliament ?
It's debatable ...
Which is why I posed the question. I don't know what the answer is.
I don’t think Britain will Brejoin, although I concede it is likelier than I ever thought it might be.
As @Driver notes, nobody has really made the case for why the EU is better (apart from trade). There needs to be a hearts, not just minds, case.
You’re right. It’ll come.
I was speaking to my niece and her fella, both born in 2000, at Xmas when they came to visit from Bristol. They’re both fucking livid that they can’t afford a house and, a close second, livid at Brexit. Pissed off they were too young to vote. Feel they’ve been betrayed by the Boomers on both issues. The heart thing seems ingrained with them. They want to be able to afford a house and they want freedom of movement, to be part of something bigger, something better than this right-wing shithole we’ve descended to. They’re not rich, or ‘woke’, just normal kids who feel betrayed.
I hope they’re representative of their age group.
I'd say freedom of movement across Europe is somewhat inimical to being able to afford a house in the UK.
Other way round, in part. Try finding builders, roofers, plumbers to maintain existing stock let alone build new stock.
You're both right. Rapid population growth driven by immigration pushes up house prices. But hard to expand housing supply without enough labour. In the long run the second argument is more important, but of course in the long run we're all dead. It's worth pointing out that total immigration hasn't changed much post Brexit, but it has skewed away from workers in sectors like construction owing to the skill requirements for visas. The hope is that higher wages in the sector will lead to more indigenous tradespeople in the long run. But that's not very reassuring if your roof is leaking right now.
I can see half a dozen builders on various projects from where I'm sitting. Smooth Radio blares out almost incessantly. "Show me Heaven" is playing for the third time today. You can barely move around here for builders.
But that is of course very local circumstances and I do concede you and Carnyx have a point about availability of labour.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The EEC and the EU being rather different things, of course. If the one hadn't transformed into the other there never would have been a Leave campaign in the first place.
Not really. As you are probably aware, the preamble to the Treaty of Rome that established the EEC talks of laying "the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe". The EU can therefore be regarded as a natural evolution of the EEC. We knew what we were getting into.
I don't think that counteracts my point: euroscepticism only became a thing of any significance after Maastricht. Certainly both the facts of Maastricht and the way the politicians forced it through without letting us have our say were factors in this.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The EEC and the EU being rather different things, of course. If the one hadn't transformed into the other there never would have been a Leave campaign in the first place.
Not really. As you are probably aware, the preamble to the Treaty of Rome that established the EEC talks of laying "the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe". The EU can therefore be regarded as a natural evolution of the EEC. We knew what we were getting into, and Right of the time thought it was a good idea.
And Thatcher was a key proponent of the EU single market, which was for many Leave voters the key problem they had with the EU because of the free movement that it involved.
Mrs BJ claims to have seen a parakeet fly over our house this morning.
I asked her how she knew it was a parakeet
She told me that at first she thought it could have been Donald Trump as they look the same have a similar IQ.
She realised it wasn't though as it was tweeting
This is why I married Mrs BJ
I see parakeets most days in suburban South Manchester. Five years ago, I saw my first one, and was astonished. In fact my then three year old saw it - 'parrot', she said. I didn't really believe her (although the noise it made was rather exotic) - but I looked, and yes, a parrot, or near enough. And now you see them most days. They nest in the Mersey Valley and flock in great numbers. The speed of their population growth is faintly alarming. Though we don't yet have as many here as I saw in Sefton Park in Liverpool. Bloody hundreds of them there.
Parrots in the Midlands = canaries in the coal mines re: global warming?
In Emerald City of Seattle, also seeing more birds from more southerly climes more often, such as hummingbirds.
How have the hummingbirds got there? The parakeets are descended from pets who have escaped/been released. It's probably an urban myth to suppose that it was all down to Jimi Hendrix, but it's fun nonetheless.
Hummingbirds are native to the Pacific northwest. You get a lot in British Columbia as well. They are migratory - mostly from Mexico
The fact they are talking about this and saying what great condition they are in reveals a lot. I would not be surprised to see T-34s in Ukraine facing Leopard 2s, Challenger 2s and Abrams.
Are they that naive/stupid?
You forget. If anyone in Russia questions this then they will be charged with bringing the military into disrepute.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The EEC and the EU being rather different things, of course. If the one hadn't transformed into the other there never would have been a Leave campaign in the first place.
Not really. As you are probably aware, the preamble to the Treaty of Rome that established the EEC talks of laying "the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe". The EU can therefore be regarded as a natural evolution of the EEC. We knew what we were getting into, and Right of the time thought it was a good idea.
And Thatcher was a key proponent of the EU single market, which was for many Leave voters the key problem they had with the EU because of the free movement that it involved.
Again, a single market of 12 western European countries mostly of similar economic levels is a very different creature to one of 28 that very much aren't.
Make no mistake. This is a comprehensive defeat and singular humiliation for Sturgeon. All that "criminals won't try to get into female spaces", all that "most marginalised people", all that "be kind and respect a self declared identity" That house of cards just utterly collapsed
Strange that such an able politician (though I don't agree with her desire to break up the union) should make two odd errors - both the trans thing where she seems to go to the stake for something few really support (Kate Forbes!!??!!); secondly the odd stuff about the next GE being a referendum - which combines the possibility of very obviously losing with the impossibility of very unambiguously winning.
The fact they are talking about this and saying what great condition they are in reveals a lot. I would not be surprised to see T-34s in Ukraine facing Leopard 2s, Challenger 2s and Abrams.
I guess that shipping them Laos, is marginally better than dragging them down from war memorials across Russia.
Watching them go up against modern NATO machinery, is not going to be very nice for the Russians.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The EEC and the EU being rather different things, of course. If the one hadn't transformed into the other there never would have been a Leave campaign in the first place.
Not really. As you are probably aware, the preamble to the Treaty of Rome that established the EEC talks of laying "the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe". The EU can therefore be regarded as a natural evolution of the EEC. We knew what we were getting into, and Right of the time thought it was a good idea.
And yet most Remain/Rejoin supporters go out of their way to claim that 'ever closer union' is a myth.
The fact they are talking about this and saying what great condition they are in reveals a lot. I would not be surprised to see T-34s in Ukraine facing Leopard 2s, Challenger 2s and Abrams.
But only briefly, I presume. Catch it while you can.
I don’t think Britain will Brejoin, although I concede it is likelier than I ever thought it might be.
As @Driver notes, nobody has really made the case for why the EU is better (apart from trade). There needs to be a hearts, not just minds, case.
You’re right. It’ll come.
I was speaking to my niece and her fella, both born in 2000, at Xmas when they came to visit from Bristol. They’re both fucking livid that they can’t afford a house and, a close second, livid at Brexit. Pissed off they were too young to vote. Feel they’ve been betrayed by the Boomers on both issues. The heart thing seems ingrained with them. They want to be able to afford a house and they want freedom of movement, to be part of something bigger, something better than this right-wing shithole we’ve descended to. They’re not rich, or ‘woke’, just normal kids who feel betrayed.
I hope they’re representative of their age group.
I'd say freedom of movement across Europe is somewhat inimical to being able to afford a house in the UK.
Other way round, in part. Try finding builders, roofers, plumbers to maintain existing stock let alone build new stock.
You're both right. Rapid population growth driven by immigration pushes up house prices. But hard to expand housing supply without enough labour. In the long run the second argument is more important, but of course in the long run we're all dead. It's worth pointing out that total immigration hasn't changed much post Brexit, but it has skewed away from workers in sectors like construction owing to the skill requirements for visas. The hope is that higher wages in the sector will lead to more indigenous tradespeople in the long run. But that's not very reassuring if your roof is leaking right now.
I can see half a dozen builders on various projects from where I'm sitting. Smooth Radio blares out almost incessantly. "Show me Heaven" is playing for the third time today. You can barely move around here for builders.
But that is of course very local circumstances and I do concede you and Carnyx have a point about availability of labour.
Show me Heaven is a great song, a popular choice on Magic too. There are still about 100k fewer people working in construction than pre Covid according to the ONS. But wages are up only 11% on three years ago compared to a 23% rise for finance and business services, so a brickie would still be better off becoming a banker.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
*Ditch HS2, or bring the current work to some sort of reasonable conclusion - perhaps build a garden city at the end of it that we were planning to build anyway.
What has HS2 got to do with the EU - it's core infrastructure that has been sold inappropriately since the very first announcement.
HS2 (in it's initial enterity) is core infrastructure to allow more trains to / from London and Birmingham while allowing increased capacity for slower local services on the old lines.
And given you started with a completely irrelevant hobbyhorse topic - I doubt you've given the other ideas any thought either.
Regarding the origins and the inexplicable ability of this project to radically increase its costs whilst never getting shitcanned, you may find the following blogpost from back in 2015 (when this was a slightly less expensive white elephant) interesting:
At the time the TENs were outlined in the Treaty of Rome, the original Trans-European Network Member States were not obliged to upgrade or complete existing infrastructure. But this changed when such obligations were included in the 1992 Maastricht Treaty.
In 2011 the European Commission put forward two more proposals which significantly overhauled the operation of TEN-T. The first moved the programme from a voluntary to a compulsory basis (i.e. Member States would be forced to introduce transport network changes specified in an EU Regulation). For this, the UK Government estimates it would cost between £64 and £137 billion. The second proposal was for a Connecting Europe Facility to put the budget for TEN-T on a multi-year footing and this would obviously see a significant increase to the budget.
As for the merits of the project itself, I'd be interested to read a single cost-benefit analysis where it returns more than its current projected cost.
It would appear to be you who needs to give these issues more thought, not me. Like most extreme remainers, you aren't prepared to contemplate the fact that the EU has always worked via national Governments implementing its agenda (and obliging the EU by helpfully absorbing any flak), because it doesn't fit with your narrative about complaining right wing Tories 'blaming the EU for everything', which along with 'The Sun' is your main way of dismissing the loss of the referendum. The truth is that whilst some complained, UK Governments of all colours have swiftly and quietly implemented EU directives and memoranda disguised as their own reforms.
What is now apparent is that the same people see the fact that we've actually left the EU as no impediment to continuing exactly the same practise.
Mrs BJ claims to have seen a parakeet fly over our house this morning.
I asked her how she knew it was a parakeet
She told me that at first she thought it could have been Donald Trump as they look the same have a similar IQ.
She realised it wasn't though as it was tweeting
This is why I married Mrs BJ
I see parakeets most days in suburban South Manchester. Five years ago, I saw my first one, and was astonished. In fact my then three year old saw it - 'parrot', she said. I didn't really believe her (although the noise it made was rather exotic) - but I looked, and yes, a parrot, or near enough. And now you see them most days. They nest in the Mersey Valley and flock in great numbers. The speed of their population growth is faintly alarming. Though we don't yet have as many here as I saw in Sefton Park in Liverpool. Bloody hundreds of them there.
Parrots in the Midlands = canaries in the coal mines re: global warming?
In Emerald City of Seattle, also seeing more birds from more southerly climes more often, such as hummingbirds.
How have the hummingbirds got there? The parakeets are descended from pets who have escaped/been released. It's probably an urban myth to suppose that it was all down to Jimi Hendrix, but it's fun nonetheless.
I occasionally seen the flock of parakeets that inhabits Hampstead Heath. They are definitely the descendants of escaped pets but I doubt JH was involved. They are quite spectacular in flight.
You can tell they are not indiginous but they seem to co-exist hppily enough with the locals.
Not with the local birds PtP. They drive them away
I was thinking more of the local yoga groups and poetry reading sessions.
Yes, I can see the feathered birds might take offence and it would account for some of the anti-immigrant tensions in the area.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The EEC and the EU being rather different things, of course. If the one hadn't transformed into the other there never would have been a Leave campaign in the first place.
Not really. As you are probably aware, the preamble to the Treaty of Rome that established the EEC talks of laying "the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe". The EU can therefore be regarded as a natural evolution of the EEC. We knew what we were getting into, and Right of the time thought it was a good idea.
And yet most Remain/Rejoin supporters go out of their way to claim that 'ever closer union' is a myth.
I've certainly never claimed that, and I can't say I've heard others doing so. It would be rather daft to do so given that it's there in black and white. Of course, as members we were able to exert an influence on the speed of ever closer union.
Mrs BJ claims to have seen a parakeet fly over our house this morning.
I asked her how she knew it was a parakeet
She told me that at first she thought it could have been Donald Trump as they look the same have a similar IQ.
She realised it wasn't though as it was tweeting
This is why I married Mrs BJ
I see parakeets most days in suburban South Manchester. Five years ago, I saw my first one, and was astonished. In fact my then three year old saw it - 'parrot', she said. I didn't really believe her (although the noise it made was rather exotic) - but I looked, and yes, a parrot, or near enough. And now you see them most days. They nest in the Mersey Valley and flock in great numbers. The speed of their population growth is faintly alarming. Though we don't yet have as many here as I saw in Sefton Park in Liverpool. Bloody hundreds of them there.
There was a pirch invasion by parakeets at Leyton Orient recently.
Make no mistake. This is a comprehensive defeat and singular humiliation for Sturgeon. All that "criminals won't try to get into female spaces", all that "most marginalised people", all that "be kind and respect a self declared identity" That house of cards just utterly collapsed
Strange that such an able politician (though I don't agree with her desire to break up the union) should make two odd errors - both the trans thing where she seems to go to the stake for something few really support (Kate Forbes!!??!!); secondly the odd stuff about the next GE being a referendum - which combines the possibility of very obviously losing with the impossibility of very unambiguously winning.
I don't think she ever cared about the trans cause per se or, indeed, how many people support it on its own merits - it looks very much something she felt she could use as a tool to dirve a wedge between her and Glorious Scotland and EnglandWestminster to use as a justification for separation.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The EEC and the EU being rather different things, of course. If the one hadn't transformed into the other there never would have been a Leave campaign in the first place.
Not really. As you are probably aware, the preamble to the Treaty of Rome that established the EEC talks of laying "the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe". The EU can therefore be regarded as a natural evolution of the EEC. We knew what we were getting into, and Right of the time thought it was a good idea.
There were a number of reasons why a lot of people stopped thinking it was optimal. In the UK 'ever closer union' was something which we saw happening by two processes; one in which referenda elsewhere were rerun (or circumvented) if the wrong answer was given, and one in the UK in which referenda were either not held at all, or promised and then not held.
Ultimately this was going to be fatal. It was a terrible failure of statesmanship.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The EEC and the EU being rather different things, of course. If the one hadn't transformed into the other there never would have been a Leave campaign in the first place.
Not really. As you are probably aware, the preamble to the Treaty of Rome that established the EEC talks of laying "the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe". The EU can therefore be regarded as a natural evolution of the EEC. We knew what we were getting into, and Right of the time thought it was a good idea.
There were a number of reasons why a lot of people stopped thinking it was optimal. In the UK 'ever closer union' was something which we saw happening by two processes; one in which referenda elsewhere were rerun (or circumvented) if the wrong answer was given, and one in the UK in which referenda were either not held at all, or promised and then not held.
Ultimately this was going to be fatal. It was a terrible failure of statesmanship.
Blair running away from a referendum on the Euro because he would lose it might actually have been strategically the worst error of all.
Machine 4 is likely to be a very useful physics research facility, alongside its role in exploring practical fusion development.
Weirdly, I received an email this morning inviting me to apply for a computational plasma physics job with one of the current crop of fusion startups. They must have found an old copy of my CV somewhere. I don't think I'd be much help to them though, given that I haven't worked in the field since my PhD, many years ago.
I remain highly sceptical of most of the current hype around potential fusion devices, but I will watch the video you posted when I get a mo. Thanks for linking it.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The EEC and the EU being rather different things, of course. If the one hadn't transformed into the other there never would have been a Leave campaign in the first place.
Not really. As you are probably aware, the preamble to the Treaty of Rome that established the EEC talks of laying "the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe". The EU can therefore be regarded as a natural evolution of the EEC. We knew what we were getting into, and Right of the time thought it was a good idea.
And yet most Remain/Rejoin supporters go out of their way to claim that 'ever closer union' is a myth.
I've certainly never claimed that, and I can't say I've heard others doing so. It would be rather daft to do so given that it's there in black and white. Of course, as members we were able to exert an influence on the speed of ever closer union.
It was and is a common retort whenever it is raised on here - although I grant you I have never seen you say it.
The fact they are talking about this and saying what great condition they are in reveals a lot. I would not be surprised to see T-34s in Ukraine facing Leopard 2s, Challenger 2s and Abrams.
But only briefly, I presume. Catch it while you can.
Fun fact I just discovered on Wikipedia about the T-34. The suspension is based on a design that was rejected by the US Army for their tanks.... in 1928.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The EEC and the EU being rather different things, of course. If the one hadn't transformed into the other there never would have been a Leave campaign in the first place.
Not really. As you are probably aware, the preamble to the Treaty of Rome that established the EEC talks of laying "the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe". The EU can therefore be regarded as a natural evolution of the EEC. We knew what we were getting into, and Right of the time thought it was a good idea.
And yet most Remain/Rejoin supporters go out of their way to claim that 'ever closer union' is a myth.
I've certainly never claimed that, and I can't say I've heard others doing so. It would be rather daft to do so given that it's there in black and white. Of course, as members we were able to exert an influence on the speed of ever closer union.
Cameron, of course, won an “opt-out” on Ever Closer Union, thus:
”It is recognised that the United Kingdom, in the light of the specific situation it has under the Treaties, is not committed to further political integration into the European Union. The substance of this will be incorporated into the Treaties at the time of their next revision in accordance with the relevant provisions of the Treaties and the respective constitutional requirements of the Member States, so as to make it clear that the references to ever closer union do not apply to the United Kingdom”
Since “Ever Closer Union” was hardly ever used by the European Courts to inform interpretation, this was widely assumed to be a piece of verbiage with no real effect.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
*Ditch HS2, or bring the current work to some sort of reasonable conclusion - perhaps build a garden city at the end of it that we were planning to build anyway.
What has HS2 got to do with the EU - it's core infrastructure that has been sold inappropriately since the very first announcement.
HS2 (in it's initial enterity) is core infrastructure to allow more trains to / from London and Birmingham while allowing increased capacity for slower local services on the old lines.
And given you started with a completely irrelevant hobbyhorse topic - I doubt you've given the other ideas any thought either.
Regarding the origins and the inexplicable ability of this project to radically increase its costs whilst never getting shitcanned, you may find the following blogpost from back in 2015 (when this was a slightly less expensive white elephant) interesting:
At the time the TENs were outlined in the Treaty of Rome, the original Trans-European Network Member States were not obliged to upgrade or complete existing infrastructure. But this changed when such obligations were included in the 1992 Maastricht Treaty.
In 2011 the European Commission put forward two more proposals which significantly overhauled the operation of TEN-T. The first moved the programme from a voluntary to a compulsory basis (i.e. Member States would be forced to introduce transport network changes specified in an EU Regulation). For this, the UK Government estimates it would cost between £64 and £137 billion. The second proposal was for a Connecting Europe Facility to put the budget for TEN-T on a multi-year footing and this would obviously see a significant increase to the budget.
As for the merits of the project itself, I'd be interested to read a single cost-benefit analysis where it returns more than its current projected cost.
It would appear to be you who needs to give these issues more thought, not me. Like most extreme remainers, you aren't prepared to contemplate the fact that the EU has always worked via national Governments implementing its agenda (and obliging the EU by helpfully absorbing any flak), because it doesn't fit with your narrative about complaining right wing Tories 'blaming the EU for everything', which along with 'The Sun' is your main way of dismissing the loss of the referendum. The truth is that whilst some complained, UK Governments of all colours have swiftly and quietly implemented EU directives and memoranda disguised as their own reforms.
What is now apparent is that the same people see the fact that we've actually left the EU as no impediment to continuing exactly the same practise.
Importantly, though, it should be noted that the benefits captured by the SOBC are pretty limited. Little attempt is made to monetise the two most important benefits, i.e. increased capacity on the existing railway (which you can either use to run more trains or you can capture as increased reliability), and almost no attempt made to quantify land value uplifts via LUTI models (since treasury, and therefore DfT, don't accept them).
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
*Ditch HS2, or bring the current work to some sort of reasonable conclusion - perhaps build a garden city at the end of it that we were planning to build anyway.
What has HS2 got to do with the EU - it's core infrastructure that has been sold inappropriately since the very first announcement.
HS2 (in it's initial enterity) is core infrastructure to allow more trains to / from London and Birmingham while allowing increased capacity for slower local services on the old lines.
And given you started with a completely irrelevant hobbyhorse topic - I doubt you've given the other ideas any thought either.
Regarding the origins and the inexplicable ability of this project to radically increase its costs whilst never getting shitcanned, you may find the following blogpost from back in 2015 (when this was a slightly less expensive white elephant) interesting:
At the time the TENs were outlined in the Treaty of Rome, the original Trans-European Network Member States were not obliged to upgrade or complete existing infrastructure. But this changed when such obligations were included in the 1992 Maastricht Treaty.
In 2011 the European Commission put forward two more proposals which significantly overhauled the operation of TEN-T. The first moved the programme from a voluntary to a compulsory basis (i.e. Member States would be forced to introduce transport network changes specified in an EU Regulation). For this, the UK Government estimates it would cost between £64 and £137 billion. The second proposal was for a Connecting Europe Facility to put the budget for TEN-T on a multi-year footing and this would obviously see a significant increase to the budget.
As for the merits of the project itself, I'd be interested to read a single cost-benefit analysis where it returns more than its current projected cost.
It would appear to be you who needs to give these issues more thought, not me. Like most extreme remainers, you aren't prepared to contemplate the fact that the EU has always worked via national Governments implementing its agenda (and obliging the EU by helpfully absorbing any flak), because it doesn't fit with your narrative about complaining right wing Tories 'blaming the EU for everything', which along with 'The Sun' is your main way of dismissing the loss of the referendum. The truth is that whilst some complained, UK Governments of all colours have swiftly and quietly implemented EU directives and memoranda disguised as their own reforms.
What is now apparent is that the same people see the fact that we've actually left the EU as no impediment to continuing exactly the same practise.
Importantly, though, it should be noted that the benefits captured by the SOBC are pretty limited. Little attempt is made to monetise the two most important benefits, i.e. increased capacity on the existing railway (which you can either use to run more trains or you can capture as increased reliability), and almost no attempt made to quantify land value uplifts via LUTI models (since treasury, and therefore DfT, don't accept them).
My challenge wasn't snark - I'm genuinely interested, so thanks, though as you suggest, I reserve the right to think it's flawed.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
*Ditch HS2, or bring the current work to some sort of reasonable conclusion - perhaps build a garden city at the end of it that we were planning to build anyway.
What has HS2 got to do with the EU - it's core infrastructure that has been sold inappropriately since the very first announcement.
HS2 (in it's initial enterity) is core infrastructure to allow more trains to / from London and Birmingham while allowing increased capacity for slower local services on the old lines.
And given you started with a completely irrelevant hobbyhorse topic - I doubt you've given the other ideas any thought either.
Regarding the origins and the inexplicable ability of this project to radically increase its costs whilst never getting shitcanned, you may find the following blogpost from back in 2015 (when this was a slightly less expensive white elephant) interesting:
At the time the TENs were outlined in the Treaty of Rome, the original Trans-European Network Member States were not obliged to upgrade or complete existing infrastructure. But this changed when such obligations were included in the 1992 Maastricht Treaty.
In 2011 the European Commission put forward two more proposals which significantly overhauled the operation of TEN-T. The first moved the programme from a voluntary to a compulsory basis (i.e. Member States would be forced to introduce transport network changes specified in an EU Regulation). For this, the UK Government estimates it would cost between £64 and £137 billion. The second proposal was for a Connecting Europe Facility to put the budget for TEN-T on a multi-year footing and this would obviously see a significant increase to the budget.
As for the merits of the project itself, I'd be interested to read a single cost-benefit analysis where it returns more than its current projected cost.
It would appear to be you who needs to give these issues more thought, not me. Like most extreme remainers, you aren't prepared to contemplate the fact that the EU has always worked via national Governments implementing its agenda (and obliging the EU by helpfully absorbing any flak), because it doesn't fit with your narrative about complaining right wing Tories 'blaming the EU for everything', which along with 'The Sun' is your main way of dismissing the loss of the referendum. The truth is that whilst some complained, UK Governments of all colours have swiftly and quietly implemented EU directives and memoranda disguised as their own reforms.
What is now apparent is that the same people see the fact that we've actually left the EU as no impediment to continuing exactly the same practise.
Importantly, though, it should be noted that the benefits captured by the SOBC are pretty limited. Little attempt is made to monetise the two most important benefits, i.e. increased capacity on the existing railway (which you can either use to run more trains or you can capture as increased reliability), and almost no attempt made to quantify land value uplifts via LUTI models (since treasury, and therefore DfT, don't accept them).
Funnily enough, combining the two topics of the EU and High Speed Rail, one of the arguments against HSR comes from a study commissioned by the EU itself back in the early 2000s looking at High Speed rail in France. It found that, contrary to the claims, although there was a very slight increase in GDP which could be attributed to the new rail network, it had exactly the reverse effect that had been touted for it - namely that rather than increasing investment in the regions, it actually sucked investment out of the regions and into Paris.
"There are people dying because they cannot get scans." Singer @rodstewart offers to fund scans for a number of patients stuck on long NHS waiting lists, after recently attending a private clinic which was "empty". #NHSinCrisis: trib.al/a6zLoxt 📺 Sky 501 and YouTube
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
*Ditch HS2, or bring the current work to some sort of reasonable conclusion - perhaps build a garden city at the end of it that we were planning to build anyway.
What has HS2 got to do with the EU - it's core infrastructure that has been sold inappropriately since the very first announcement.
HS2 (in it's initial enterity) is core infrastructure to allow more trains to / from London and Birmingham while allowing increased capacity for slower local services on the old lines.
And given you started with a completely irrelevant hobbyhorse topic - I doubt you've given the other ideas any thought either.
Regarding the origins and the inexplicable ability of this project to radically increase its costs whilst never getting shitcanned, you may find the following blogpost from back in 2015 (when this was a slightly less expensive white elephant) interesting:
At the time the TENs were outlined in the Treaty of Rome, the original Trans-European Network Member States were not obliged to upgrade or complete existing infrastructure. But this changed when such obligations were included in the 1992 Maastricht Treaty.
In 2011 the European Commission put forward two more proposals which significantly overhauled the operation of TEN-T. The first moved the programme from a voluntary to a compulsory basis (i.e. Member States would be forced to introduce transport network changes specified in an EU Regulation). For this, the UK Government estimates it would cost between £64 and £137 billion. The second proposal was for a Connecting Europe Facility to put the budget for TEN-T on a multi-year footing and this would obviously see a significant increase to the budget.
As for the merits of the project itself, I'd be interested to read a single cost-benefit analysis where it returns more than its current projected cost.
It would appear to be you who needs to give these issues more thought, not me. Like most extreme remainers, you aren't prepared to contemplate the fact that the EU has always worked via national Governments implementing its agenda (and obliging the EU by helpfully absorbing any flak), because it doesn't fit with your narrative about complaining right wing Tories 'blaming the EU for everything', which along with 'The Sun' is your main way of dismissing the loss of the referendum. The truth is that whilst some complained, UK Governments of all colours have swiftly and quietly implemented EU directives and memoranda disguised as their own reforms.
What is now apparent is that the same people see the fact that we've actually left the EU as no impediment to continuing exactly the same practise.
Importantly, though, it should be noted that the benefits captured by the SOBC are pretty limited. Little attempt is made to monetise the two most important benefits, i.e. increased capacity on the existing railway (which you can either use to run more trains or you can capture as increased reliability), and almost no attempt made to quantify land value uplifts via LUTI models (since treasury, and therefore DfT, don't accept them).
Funnily enough, combining the two topics of the EU and High Speed Rail, one of the arguments against HSR comes from a study commissioned by the EU itself back in the early 2000s looking at High Speed rail in France. It found that, contrary to the claims, although there was a very slight increase in GDP which could be attributed to the new rail network, it had exactly the reverse effect that had been touted for it - namely that rather than increasing investment in the regions, it actually sucked investment out of the regions and into Paris.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
*Ditch HS2, or bring the current work to some sort of reasonable conclusion - perhaps build a garden city at the end of it that we were planning to build anyway.
What has HS2 got to do with the EU - it's core infrastructure that has been sold inappropriately since the very first announcement.
HS2 (in it's initial enterity) is core infrastructure to allow more trains to / from London and Birmingham while allowing increased capacity for slower local services on the old lines.
And given you started with a completely irrelevant hobbyhorse topic - I doubt you've given the other ideas any thought either.
Regarding the origins and the inexplicable ability of this project to radically increase its costs whilst never getting shitcanned, you may find the following blogpost from back in 2015 (when this was a slightly less expensive white elephant) interesting:
At the time the TENs were outlined in the Treaty of Rome, the original Trans-European Network Member States were not obliged to upgrade or complete existing infrastructure. But this changed when such obligations were included in the 1992 Maastricht Treaty.
In 2011 the European Commission put forward two more proposals which significantly overhauled the operation of TEN-T. The first moved the programme from a voluntary to a compulsory basis (i.e. Member States would be forced to introduce transport network changes specified in an EU Regulation). For this, the UK Government estimates it would cost between £64 and £137 billion. The second proposal was for a Connecting Europe Facility to put the budget for TEN-T on a multi-year footing and this would obviously see a significant increase to the budget.
As for the merits of the project itself, I'd be interested to read a single cost-benefit analysis where it returns more than its current projected cost.
It would appear to be you who needs to give these issues more thought, not me. Like most extreme remainers, you aren't prepared to contemplate the fact that the EU has always worked via national Governments implementing its agenda (and obliging the EU by helpfully absorbing any flak), because it doesn't fit with your narrative about complaining right wing Tories 'blaming the EU for everything', which along with 'The Sun' is your main way of dismissing the loss of the referendum. The truth is that whilst some complained, UK Governments of all colours have swiftly and quietly implemented EU directives and memoranda disguised as their own reforms.
What is now apparent is that the same people see the fact that we've actually left the EU as no impediment to continuing exactly the same practise.
Importantly, though, it should be noted that the benefits captured by the SOBC are pretty limited. Little attempt is made to monetise the two most important benefits, i.e. increased capacity on the existing railway (which you can either use to run more trains or you can capture as increased reliability), and almost no attempt made to quantify land value uplifts via LUTI models (since treasury, and therefore DfT, don't accept them).
My challenge wasn't snark - I'm genuinely interested, so thanks, though as you suggest, I reserve the right to think it's flawed.
Interesting to note also that while it does not form a full business case in itself, the government published an update following the (temporary?) removal of the Golborne Link from the scheme last June, which shows that without the Golborne Link (and therefore with a much reduced service from London to Scotland) the costs of the scheme exceed benefits. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/hs2-crewe-to-manchester-impacts-of-removing-the-golborne-link
Pressing on anyway was justified on the grounds that something will probably be found to replace Golborne.
"There are people dying because they cannot get scans." Singer @rodstewart offers to fund scans for a number of patients stuck on long NHS waiting lists, after recently attending a private clinic which was "empty". #NHSinCrisis: trib.al/a6zLoxt 📺 Sky 501 and YouTube
What a gent
As I mentioned a few days ago, though not life threatening, my mother spent an extra 3 days occupying a bed in hospital last week because they couldn't get an MRI scan for her. What is particularly galling, and does come back in this instance to the question of funding, is that within the same trust there are MRI scanners which were bought with money raised by local communities but they can't be used effectively because of the lack of trained staff.
Sir @rodstewart calls in to the @SkyNews NHS phone-in and says: "I personally have been a Tory for a very long time, but I think this government should stand down now and give the Labour Party a go at it."
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
*Ditch HS2, or bring the current work to some sort of reasonable conclusion - perhaps build a garden city at the end of it that we were planning to build anyway.
What has HS2 got to do with the EU - it's core infrastructure that has been sold inappropriately since the very first announcement.
HS2 (in it's initial enterity) is core infrastructure to allow more trains to / from London and Birmingham while allowing increased capacity for slower local services on the old lines.
And given you started with a completely irrelevant hobbyhorse topic - I doubt you've given the other ideas any thought either.
Regarding the origins and the inexplicable ability of this project to radically increase its costs whilst never getting shitcanned, you may find the following blogpost from back in 2015 (when this was a slightly less expensive white elephant) interesting:
At the time the TENs were outlined in the Treaty of Rome, the original Trans-European Network Member States were not obliged to upgrade or complete existing infrastructure. But this changed when such obligations were included in the 1992 Maastricht Treaty.
In 2011 the European Commission put forward two more proposals which significantly overhauled the operation of TEN-T. The first moved the programme from a voluntary to a compulsory basis (i.e. Member States would be forced to introduce transport network changes specified in an EU Regulation). For this, the UK Government estimates it would cost between £64 and £137 billion. The second proposal was for a Connecting Europe Facility to put the budget for TEN-T on a multi-year footing and this would obviously see a significant increase to the budget.
As for the merits of the project itself, I'd be interested to read a single cost-benefit analysis where it returns more than its current projected cost.
It would appear to be you who needs to give these issues more thought, not me. Like most extreme remainers, you aren't prepared to contemplate the fact that the EU has always worked via national Governments implementing its agenda (and obliging the EU by helpfully absorbing any flak), because it doesn't fit with your narrative about complaining right wing Tories 'blaming the EU for everything', which along with 'The Sun' is your main way of dismissing the loss of the referendum. The truth is that whilst some complained, UK Governments of all colours have swiftly and quietly implemented EU directives and memoranda disguised as their own reforms.
What is now apparent is that the same people see the fact that we've actually left the EU as no impediment to continuing exactly the same practise.
Importantly, though, it should be noted that the benefits captured by the SOBC are pretty limited. Little attempt is made to monetise the two most important benefits, i.e. increased capacity on the existing railway (which you can either use to run more trains or you can capture as increased reliability), and almost no attempt made to quantify land value uplifts via LUTI models (since treasury, and therefore DfT, don't accept them).
Funnily enough, combining the two topics of the EU and High Speed Rail, one of the arguments against HSR comes from a study commissioned by the EU itself back in the early 2000s looking at High Speed rail in France. It found that, contrary to the claims, although there was a very slight increase in GDP which could be attributed to the new rail network, it had exactly the reverse effect that had been touted for it - namely that rather than increasing investment in the regions, it actually sucked investment out of the regions and into Paris.
Which is precisely the argument of those who advocated a new Liverpool-Hull line instead.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The EEC and the EU being rather different things, of course. If the one hadn't transformed into the other there never would have been a Leave campaign in the first place.
Not really. As you are probably aware, the preamble to the Treaty of Rome that established the EEC talks of laying "the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe". The EU can therefore be regarded as a natural evolution of the EEC. We knew what we were getting into, and Right of the time thought it was a good idea.
There were a number of reasons why a lot of people stopped thinking it was optimal. In the UK 'ever closer union' was something which we saw happening by two processes; one in which referenda elsewhere were rerun (or circumvented) if the wrong answer was given, and one in the UK in which referenda were either not held at all, or promised and then not held.
Ultimately this was going to be fatal. It was a terrible failure of statesmanship.
As someone who voted remain - I lost count over the years of the time that some Brexiter type was told that “ever closer Union” was “just an aspiration”.
The reality was that after 89, the EEC/EU hit fast forward on integration. The Euro went from a day dream of a few to reality in a few short years.
"There are people dying because they cannot get scans." Singer @rodstewart offers to fund scans for a number of patients stuck on long NHS waiting lists, after recently attending a private clinic which was "empty". #NHSinCrisis: trib.al/a6zLoxt 📺 Sky 501 and YouTube
What a gent
As I mentioned a few days ago, though not life threatening, my mother spent an extra 3 days occupying a bed in hospital last week because they couldn't get an MRI scan for her. What is particularly galling, and does come back in this instance to the question of funding, is that within the same trust there are MRI scanners which were bought with money raised by local communities but they can't be used effectively because of the lack of trained staff.
Interesting that Rod is suggesting Keir Starmer's plan.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
*Ditch HS2, or bring the current work to some sort of reasonable conclusion - perhaps build a garden city at the end of it that we were planning to build anyway.
What has HS2 got to do with the EU - it's core infrastructure that has been sold inappropriately since the very first announcement.
HS2 (in it's initial enterity) is core infrastructure to allow more trains to / from London and Birmingham while allowing increased capacity for slower local services on the old lines.
And given you started with a completely irrelevant hobbyhorse topic - I doubt you've given the other ideas any thought either.
Regarding the origins and the inexplicable ability of this project to radically increase its costs whilst never getting shitcanned, you may find the following blogpost from back in 2015 (when this was a slightly less expensive white elephant) interesting:
At the time the TENs were outlined in the Treaty of Rome, the original Trans-European Network Member States were not obliged to upgrade or complete existing infrastructure. But this changed when such obligations were included in the 1992 Maastricht Treaty.
In 2011 the European Commission put forward two more proposals which significantly overhauled the operation of TEN-T. The first moved the programme from a voluntary to a compulsory basis (i.e. Member States would be forced to introduce transport network changes specified in an EU Regulation). For this, the UK Government estimates it would cost between £64 and £137 billion. The second proposal was for a Connecting Europe Facility to put the budget for TEN-T on a multi-year footing and this would obviously see a significant increase to the budget.
As for the merits of the project itself, I'd be interested to read a single cost-benefit analysis where it returns more than its current projected cost.
It would appear to be you who needs to give these issues more thought, not me. Like most extreme remainers, you aren't prepared to contemplate the fact that the EU has always worked via national Governments implementing its agenda (and obliging the EU by helpfully absorbing any flak), because it doesn't fit with your narrative about complaining right wing Tories 'blaming the EU for everything', which along with 'The Sun' is your main way of dismissing the loss of the referendum. The truth is that whilst some complained, UK Governments of all colours have swiftly and quietly implemented EU directives and memoranda disguised as their own reforms.
What is now apparent is that the same people see the fact that we've actually left the EU as no impediment to continuing exactly the same practise.
Importantly, though, it should be noted that the benefits captured by the SOBC are pretty limited. Little attempt is made to monetise the two most important benefits, i.e. increased capacity on the existing railway (which you can either use to run more trains or you can capture as increased reliability), and almost no attempt made to quantify land value uplifts via LUTI models (since treasury, and therefore DfT, don't accept them).
Funnily enough, combining the two topics of the EU and High Speed Rail, one of the arguments against HSR comes from a study commissioned by the EU itself back in the early 2000s looking at High Speed rail in France. It found that, contrary to the claims, although there was a very slight increase in GDP which could be attributed to the new rail network, it had exactly the reverse effect that had been touted for it - namely that rather than increasing investment in the regions, it actually sucked investment out of the regions and into Paris.
Yes, that's recognised. The hope is that general uplift in economic activity cause by a) better long distance connectivity, and, in my view more importantly b) better local connectivity enabled by removing fast trains and therefore enabling more local trains to be run outweighs any drain to the capital.
The case for EU membership is that it ensures that the British government will pursue more left wing policies than would be the case outside the EU.
That’s why left-leaning groups tend to support membership.
But, that may not always be the case.
It certainly wasn't the case originally. I seem to remember one Mrs T being a great proponent of joining the EEC as it was then, while the left saw it as an evil capitalist project.
The EEC and the EU being rather different things, of course. If the one hadn't transformed into the other there never would have been a Leave campaign in the first place.
Not really. As you are probably aware, the preamble to the Treaty of Rome that established the EEC talks of laying "the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe". The EU can therefore be regarded as a natural evolution of the EEC. We knew what we were getting into, and Right of the time thought it was a good idea.
And yet most Remain/Rejoin supporters go out of their way to claim that 'ever closer union' is a myth.
I've certainly never claimed that, and I can't say I've heard others doing so. It would be rather daft to do so given that it's there in black and white. Of course, as members we were able to exert an influence on the speed of ever closer union.
Cameron, of course, won an “opt-out” on Ever Closer Union, thus:
”It is recognised that the United Kingdom, in the light of the specific situation it has under the Treaties, is not committed to further political integration into the European Union. The substance of this will be incorporated into the Treaties at the time of their next revision in accordance with the relevant provisions of the Treaties and the respective constitutional requirements of the Member States, so as to make it clear that the references to ever closer union do not apply to the United Kingdom”
Since “Ever Closer Union” was hardly ever used by the European Courts to inform interpretation, this was widely assumed to be a piece of verbiage with no real effect.
Of course as the recent Elysee statement shows it is perfectly possible to continue Ever Closer Union without actually calling it that. Moving to QMV for tax and foreign affairs/security issues and introducing EU wide constituencies for elections would clearly fall under that description.
"There are people dying because they cannot get scans." Singer @rodstewart offers to fund scans for a number of patients stuck on long NHS waiting lists, after recently attending a private clinic which was "empty". #NHSinCrisis: trib.al/a6zLoxt 📺 Sky 501 and YouTube
What a gent
As I mentioned a few days ago, though not life threatening, my mother spent an extra 3 days occupying a bed in hospital last week because they couldn't get an MRI scan for her. What is particularly galling, and does come back in this instance to the question of funding, is that within the same trust there are MRI scanners which were bought with money raised by local communities but they can't be used effectively because of the lack of trained staff.
That’s totally bonkers. Such expensive capital equipment should have two shifts a day of operators working it, from 6am until midnight seven days a week. Some of the best value for money in the entire NHS, would be training more people to use these machines.
It’s like an airline flying a plane once per day for want of pilots. They’d do everything possible to make sure they had enough trained crews.
"There are people dying because they cannot get scans." Singer @rodstewart offers to fund scans for a number of patients stuck on long NHS waiting lists, after recently attending a private clinic which was "empty". #NHSinCrisis: trib.al/a6zLoxt 📺 Sky 501 and YouTube
What a gent
As I mentioned a few days ago, though not life threatening, my mother spent an extra 3 days occupying a bed in hospital last week because they couldn't get an MRI scan for her. What is particularly galling, and does come back in this instance to the question of funding, is that within the same trust there are MRI scanners which were bought with money raised by local communities but they can't be used effectively because of the lack of trained staff.
Interesting that Rod is suggesting Keir Starmer's plan.
If it is a sensible plan then it doesn't matter where it originates. We need more cross fertilisation of ideas without the inevitable cries of 'selling out' or 'stealing clothes' that normally accompany them. Yet another failing of our current party system.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
*Ditch HS2, or bring the current work to some sort of reasonable conclusion - perhaps build a garden city at the end of it that we were planning to build anyway.
What has HS2 got to do with the EU - it's core infrastructure that has been sold inappropriately since the very first announcement.
HS2 (in it's initial enterity) is core infrastructure to allow more trains to / from London and Birmingham while allowing increased capacity for slower local services on the old lines.
And given you started with a completely irrelevant hobbyhorse topic - I doubt you've given the other ideas any thought either.
Regarding the origins and the inexplicable ability of this project to radically increase its costs whilst never getting shitcanned, you may find the following blogpost from back in 2015 (when this was a slightly less expensive white elephant) interesting:
At the time the TENs were outlined in the Treaty of Rome, the original Trans-European Network Member States were not obliged to upgrade or complete existing infrastructure. But this changed when such obligations were included in the 1992 Maastricht Treaty.
In 2011 the European Commission put forward two more proposals which significantly overhauled the operation of TEN-T. The first moved the programme from a voluntary to a compulsory basis (i.e. Member States would be forced to introduce transport network changes specified in an EU Regulation). For this, the UK Government estimates it would cost between £64 and £137 billion. The second proposal was for a Connecting Europe Facility to put the budget for TEN-T on a multi-year footing and this would obviously see a significant increase to the budget.
As for the merits of the project itself, I'd be interested to read a single cost-benefit analysis where it returns more than its current projected cost.
It would appear to be you who needs to give these issues more thought, not me. Like most extreme remainers, you aren't prepared to contemplate the fact that the EU has always worked via national Governments implementing its agenda (and obliging the EU by helpfully absorbing any flak), because it doesn't fit with your narrative about complaining right wing Tories 'blaming the EU for everything', which along with 'The Sun' is your main way of dismissing the loss of the referendum. The truth is that whilst some complained, UK Governments of all colours have swiftly and quietly implemented EU directives and memoranda disguised as their own reforms.
What is now apparent is that the same people see the fact that we've actually left the EU as no impediment to continuing exactly the same practise.
Importantly, though, it should be noted that the benefits captured by the SOBC are pretty limited. Little attempt is made to monetise the two most important benefits, i.e. increased capacity on the existing railway (which you can either use to run more trains or you can capture as increased reliability), and almost no attempt made to quantify land value uplifts via LUTI models (since treasury, and therefore DfT, don't accept them).
Funnily enough, combining the two topics of the EU and High Speed Rail, one of the arguments against HSR comes from a study commissioned by the EU itself back in the early 2000s looking at High Speed rail in France. It found that, contrary to the claims, although there was a very slight increase in GDP which could be attributed to the new rail network, it had exactly the reverse effect that had been touted for it - namely that rather than increasing investment in the regions, it actually sucked investment out of the regions and into Paris.
Which is precisely the argument of those who advocated a new Liverpool-Hull line instead.
Indeed. Cross country, intra region rail improvements/new projects would do far more good in my opinion.
If it is a sensible plan then it doesn't matter where it originates. We need more cross fertilisation of ideas without the inevitable cries of 'selling out' or 'stealing clothes' that normally accompany them. Yet another failing of our current party system.
Mrs BJ claims to have seen a parakeet fly over our house this morning.
I asked her how she knew it was a parakeet
She told me that at first she thought it could have been Donald Trump as they look the same have a similar IQ.
She realised it wasn't though as it was tweeting
This is why I married Mrs BJ
I see parakeets most days in suburban South Manchester. Five years ago, I saw my first one, and was astonished. In fact my then three year old saw it - 'parrot', she said. I didn't really believe her (although the noise it made was rather exotic) - but I looked, and yes, a parrot, or near enough. And now you see them most days. They nest in the Mersey Valley and flock in great numbers. The speed of their population growth is faintly alarming. Though we don't yet have as many here as I saw in Sefton Park in Liverpool. Bloody hundreds of them there.
There was a pirch invasion by parakeets at Leyton Orient recently.
If it is a sensible plan then it doesn't matter where it originates. We need more cross fertilisation of ideas without the inevitable cries of 'selling out' or 'stealing clothes' that normally accompany them. Yet another failing of our current party system.
Agree.
How are you Richard?
Good thanks. Gearing myself up to be out of work when my current contract ends at the end of next month which is daunting but having been on duty 365 days a year for the last 11 years with only a couple of short 3 week holidays in all that time I am ready for a couple of months off before I start to panic.
Almost a third of the people who organisers claimed had “engaged” with the Unboxed Brexit festival were the regular six million viewers of Countryfile on the BBC, it has emerged.
Organisers of the £120 million project, originally known as the Festival of Brexit and involving the funding of ten creative projects, said a total of 18.1 million people had “engaged” with the project. Of those, 2.8 million people had attended events last year, with another 13.6 million having “engaged” with broadcast and digital content.
It has now emerged that the 13.6 million figure included Countryfile viewers. In October the programme reported on one of the projects, Green Space Dark Skies.
Mrs BJ claims to have seen a parakeet fly over our house this morning.
I asked her how she knew it was a parakeet
She told me that at first she thought it could have been Donald Trump as they look the same have a similar IQ.
She realised it wasn't though as it was tweeting
This is why I married Mrs BJ
I see parakeets most days in suburban South Manchester. Five years ago, I saw my first one, and was astonished. In fact my then three year old saw it - 'parrot', she said. I didn't really believe her (although the noise it made was rather exotic) - but I looked, and yes, a parrot, or near enough. And now you see them most days. They nest in the Mersey Valley and flock in great numbers. The speed of their population growth is faintly alarming. Though we don't yet have as many here as I saw in Sefton Park in Liverpool. Bloody hundreds of them there.
Parrots in the Midlands = canaries in the coal mines re: global warming?
In Emerald City of Seattle, also seeing more birds from more southerly climes more often, such as hummingbirds.
How have the hummingbirds got there? The parakeets are descended from pets who have escaped/been released. It's probably an urban myth to suppose that it was all down to Jimi Hendrix, but it's fun nonetheless.
Re: hummers in Seattle, believe they are migrating northward from California or thereabouts.
They are larger than eastern US hummingbirds and also less colorful.
And less numerous? Back in the day, and back in mid-Ohio Valley, in summertime used to observe epic hummer battles around hummingbird feeders. Similar to WWI dogfights re: aerobatics, with added twist of hovering!
"There are people dying because they cannot get scans." Singer @rodstewart offers to fund scans for a number of patients stuck on long NHS waiting lists, after recently attending a private clinic which was "empty". #NHSinCrisis: trib.al/a6zLoxt 📺 Sky 501 and YouTube
What a gent
As I mentioned a few days ago, though not life threatening, my mother spent an extra 3 days occupying a bed in hospital last week because they couldn't get an MRI scan for her. What is particularly galling, and does come back in this instance to the question of funding, is that within the same trust there are MRI scanners which were bought with money raised by local communities but they can't be used effectively because of the lack of trained staff.
Interesting that Rod is suggesting Keir Starmer's plan.
If it is a sensible plan then it doesn't matter where it originates. We need more cross fertilisation of ideas without the inevitable cries of 'selling out' or 'stealing clothes' that normally accompany them. Yet another failing of our current party system.
Well yes. It's 'if it is a sensible plan that's the issue'. Labour's plan isn't sensible, although its far from their traditional nonsense. Reeves is very credible.
Nobody has a sensible plan, and the problem is spending. The nanny state will break. The idea that all needs should be tended to wasn't ever a policy - it's just creeped in.
The U.S. is planning to send Ukraine the Abrams main battle tank in its more advanced M1A2 configuration, rather than the older A1 version that the military has in storage, according to three people with knowledge of the deliberations - Politico https://twitter.com/Faytuks/status/1618656055353016322
Some of the best value for money in the entire NHS, would be training more people to use these machines.
Or allowing Foreign Nationals to do it...
Teach a man to fish…
But yes, in the short term, hire radiographers from anywhere you can find them!
There's that Pratchett quote about fire, isn't there...
Hire radiographers and people look forward to a scan for a week. Don't hire radiographers and people can look forward to a scan for the rest of their lives.
"There are people dying because they cannot get scans." Singer @rodstewart offers to fund scans for a number of patients stuck on long NHS waiting lists, after recently attending a private clinic which was "empty". #NHSinCrisis: trib.al/a6zLoxt 📺 Sky 501 and YouTube
What a gent
As I mentioned a few days ago, though not life threatening, my mother spent an extra 3 days occupying a bed in hospital last week because they couldn't get an MRI scan for her. What is particularly galling, and does come back in this instance to the question of funding, is that within the same trust there are MRI scanners which were bought with money raised by local communities but they can't be used effectively because of the lack of trained staff.
That’s totally bonkers. Such expensive capital equipment should have two shifts a day of operators working it, from 6am until midnight seven days a week. Some of the best value for money in the entire NHS, would be training more people to use these machines.
It’s like an airline flying a plane once per day for want of pilots. They’d do everything possible to make sure they had enough trained crews.
I’ve previously mentioned a friend who did analysis of MRI use in a trust - as a masters. The response to his suggested improvements was to try and do him over via academic back channels.
Make no mistake. This is a comprehensive defeat and singular humiliation for Sturgeon. All that "criminals won't try to get into female spaces", all that "most marginalised people", all that "be kind and respect a self declared identity" That house of cards just utterly collapsed
Is it though? I haven't followed this very closely, but hasn't someone (apparently) trying to abuse self-ID to get sent to a women's prison just been denied that opportunity?
(Happy to be corrected if I'm wrong, but it seems to show (i) that yes, some people will try to take the piss, but (ii) that won't be permitted)
The issues are:
1) The Scottish Prison Service - with help from activists - wrote a policy well in advance of the law in 2014. ScotGov ignored this. 2) Although the SPS is directly responsible to ScotGov they’ve denied responsibility - until today. 3) There are already trans identified rapists in the Scottish Prisons Women's Estate. 4) In the Holyrood debates Sturgeon dismissed such concerns as “not valid”. 5) Sturgeon said Blair will not be accommodated in Corton Vale. That a) doesn’t deny they are there now, b) deny that they will be accommodated in some other parts of the women’s estate.
"There are people dying because they cannot get scans." Singer @rodstewart offers to fund scans for a number of patients stuck on long NHS waiting lists, after recently attending a private clinic which was "empty". #NHSinCrisis: trib.al/a6zLoxt 📺 Sky 501 and YouTube
What a gent
As I mentioned a few days ago, though not life threatening, my mother spent an extra 3 days occupying a bed in hospital last week because they couldn't get an MRI scan for her. What is particularly galling, and does come back in this instance to the question of funding, is that within the same trust there are MRI scanners which were bought with money raised by local communities but they can't be used effectively because of the lack of trained staff.
Interesting that Rod is suggesting Keir Starmer's plan.
If it is a sensible plan then it doesn't matter where it originates. We need more cross fertilisation of ideas without the inevitable cries of 'selling out' or 'stealing clothes' that normally accompany them. Yet another failing of our current party system.
Well yes. It's 'if it is a sensible plan that's the issue'. Labour's plan isn't sensible, although its far from their traditional nonsense. Reeves is very credible.
Nobody has a sensible plan, and the problem is spending. The nanny state will break. The idea that all needs should be tended to wasn't ever a policy - it's just creeped in.
I don't disagree but there are certain basic things it is right to fund because they save us money as a society in the long run. Having trained staff to run scanners which can then save huge amounts of time, money and effort and free up bed space for other sick people seems eminently sensible to me.
The U.S. is planning to send Ukraine the Abrams main battle tank in its more advanced M1A2 configuration, rather than the older A1 version that the military has in storage, according to three people with knowledge of the deliberations - Politico https://twitter.com/Faytuks/status/1618656055353016322
They’ll have fun, against the WWII-era T-34s the enemy is proudly showing off today. 80-year-old tanks.
I think it’s fair to say, that the Russians are now struggling to field any more tanks, and that whatever the West can supply to Ukraine is going to make a massive difference in short order.
Trump Has Completely Lost His Grip on Reality https://www.nationalreview.com/2023/01/trump-has-completely-lost-his-grip-on-reality/ ...And then there’s Donald Trump, who, despite being the only candidate who has officially announced his bid, is . . . well, ranting like a deranged hobo in a dilapidated public park. No, don’t look at him — he might come over here with his sign.
There was a point in time at which Trump’s unusual verbal affect and singular nose for underutilized wedge issues gave him a competitive edge. Now? Now, he’s morphing into one of the three witches from Macbeth....
Best Twitter response: "... which is why we proudly support and endorse him to be President in 2024!!"
The U.S. is planning to send Ukraine the Abrams main battle tank in its more advanced M1A2 configuration, rather than the older A1 version that the military has in storage, according to three people with knowledge of the deliberations - Politico https://twitter.com/Faytuks/status/1618656055353016322
They’ll have fun, against the WWII-era T-34s the enemy is proudly showing off today. 80-year-old tanks.
I think it’s fair to say, that the Russians are now struggling to field any more tanks, and that whatever the West can supply to Ukraine is going to make a massive difference in short order.
That depends. The skills and resources on the critical path aren’t the crews that will be fighting in them, but the guys who’ll be servicing and maintaining and repairing them. Those modern tanks are mightily complicated, and very hungry for spare parts.
Mrs BJ claims to have seen a parakeet fly over our house this morning.
I asked her how she knew it was a parakeet
She told me that at first she thought it could have been Donald Trump as they look the same have a similar IQ.
She realised it wasn't though as it was tweeting
This is why I married Mrs BJ
I see parakeets most days in suburban South Manchester. Five years ago, I saw my first one, and was astonished. In fact my then three year old saw it - 'parrot', she said. I didn't really believe her (although the noise it made was rather exotic) - but I looked, and yes, a parrot, or near enough. And now you see them most days. They nest in the Mersey Valley and flock in great numbers. The speed of their population growth is faintly alarming. Though we don't yet have as many here as I saw in Sefton Park in Liverpool. Bloody hundreds of them there.
Parrots in the Midlands = canaries in the coal mines re: global warming?
In Emerald City of Seattle, also seeing more birds from more southerly climes more often, such as hummingbirds.
How have the hummingbirds got there? The parakeets are descended from pets who have escaped/been released. It's probably an urban myth to suppose that it was all down to Jimi Hendrix, but it's fun nonetheless.
Hummingbirds are native to the Pacific northwest. You get a lot in British Columbia as well. They are migratory - mostly from Mexico
Certainly way more hummers (the birds, not the garbagewagons) around Seattle anyway in recent years, than in previous three decades I've been infesting the place.
The U.S. is planning to send Ukraine the Abrams main battle tank in its more advanced M1A2 configuration, rather than the older A1 version that the military has in storage, according to three people with knowledge of the deliberations - Politico https://twitter.com/Faytuks/status/1618656055353016322
They’ll have fun, against the WWII-era T-34s the enemy is proudly showing off today. 80-year-old tanks.
I think it’s fair to say, that the Russians are now struggling to field any more tanks, and that whatever the West can supply to Ukraine is going to make a massive difference in short order.
That depends. The skills and resources on the critical path aren’t the crews that will be fighting in them, but the guys who’ll be servicing and maintaining and repairing them. Those modern tanks are mightily complicated, and very hungry for spare parts.
Definitely agree. Tank warfare, done properly, is a huge logistical operation.
Not done properly, like the Russians last February, it results in expensive pieces of equipment being abandoned because they have no fuel or ammo, or they can’t be repaired in the field.
Comments
It's worth pointing out that total immigration hasn't changed much post Brexit, but it has skewed away from workers in sectors like construction owing to the skill requirements for visas. The hope is that higher wages in the sector will lead to more indigenous tradespeople in the long run. But that's not very reassuring if your roof is leaking right now.
You won. Make it work.
But that would actually suit you, wouldn't it? You're really only happy when you have something to complain about.
So, a debate about fair reporting of privileged matters. "Fair and contemporaneous" was the phrase drummed into my journalism student head, and this was. Bridgen will I assume go after "I am not an AS so its libel to say I am.
Which gets us to the basic libel defences. An honest opinion that could reasonably held, said without malice. And the fun bit where Bridgen appears to have joined the Reclaim Party...
If not now, when ?
I'd like to think the EU encouraged more moderate policies, which is why centrists supported Remain and Corbynistas and Bridgenistas supported Leave.
I don't know what the answer is.
But that is of course very local circumstances and I do concede you and Carnyx have a point about availability of labour.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTj5HKiLKJY
Machine 4 is likely to be a very useful physics research facility, alongside its role in exploring practical fusion development.
Watching them go up against modern NATO machinery, is not going to be very nice for the Russians.
There are still about 100k fewer people working in construction than pre Covid according to the ONS. But wages are up only 11% on three years ago compared to a 23% rise for finance and business services, so a brickie would still be better off becoming a banker.
http://www.theeuroprobe.org/2015-088-hs2-controlled-by-eu-not-our-gov/
Excerpt:
Increase of Finance, Loss of Sovereignty
At the time the TENs were outlined in the Treaty of Rome, the original Trans-European Network Member States were not obliged to upgrade or complete existing infrastructure. But this changed when such obligations were included in the 1992 Maastricht Treaty.
In 2011 the European Commission put forward two more proposals which significantly overhauled the operation of TEN-T. The first moved the programme from a voluntary to a compulsory basis (i.e. Member States would be forced to introduce transport network changes specified in an EU Regulation). For this, the UK Government estimates it would cost between £64 and £137 billion. The second proposal was for a Connecting Europe Facility to put the budget for TEN-T on a multi-year footing and this would obviously see a significant increase to the budget.
As for the merits of the project itself, I'd be interested to read a single cost-benefit analysis where it returns more than its current projected cost.
It would appear to be you who needs to give these issues more thought, not me. Like most extreme remainers, you aren't prepared to contemplate the fact that the EU has always worked via national Governments implementing its agenda (and obliging the EU by helpfully absorbing any flak), because it doesn't fit with your narrative about complaining right wing Tories 'blaming the EU for everything', which along with 'The Sun' is your main way of dismissing the loss of the referendum. The truth is that whilst some complained, UK Governments of all colours have swiftly and quietly implemented EU directives and memoranda disguised as their own reforms.
What is now apparent is that the same people see the fact that we've actually left the EU as no impediment to continuing exactly the same practise.
Yes, I can see the feathered birds might take offence and it would account for some of the anti-immigrant tensions in the area.
EnglandWestminster to use as a justification for separation.Which would be utterly reprehensible, obviously.
Ultimately this was going to be fatal. It was a terrible failure of statesmanship.
The Ukrainian Army has captured 2 Germans fighting for the Wagner Group near Bakhmut.
https://twitter.com/visegrad24/status/1618560868115173378
Insert your own joke here about which 2 Germans it could be.
I remain highly sceptical of most of the current hype around potential fusion devices, but I will watch the video you posted when I get a mo. Thanks for linking it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-34
'Dick' is short for Richard.
If these mercenaries were officers, are they Dick's Heads?
Would be a slight improvement on Death's Heads...
”It is recognised that the United Kingdom, in the light of the specific situation it has under the Treaties, is not committed to further political integration into the European Union. The substance of this will be incorporated into the Treaties at the time of their next revision in accordance with the relevant provisions of the Treaties and the respective constitutional requirements of the Member States, so as to make it clear that the references to ever closer union do not apply to the United Kingdom”
Since “Ever Closer Union” was hardly ever used by the European Courts to inform interpretation, this was widely assumed to be a piece of verbiage with no real effect.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/hs2-crewe-to-manchester-update-on-the-strategic-outline-business-case
You may have your own views on whether you believe this. But these analyses do exist.
Importantly, though, it should be noted that the benefits captured by the SOBC are pretty limited. Little attempt is made to monetise the two most important benefits, i.e. increased capacity on the existing railway (which you can either use to run more trains or you can capture as increased reliability), and almost no attempt made to quantify land value uplifts via LUTI models (since treasury, and therefore DfT, don't accept them).
"There are people dying because they cannot get scans." Singer @rodstewart offers to fund scans for a number of patients stuck on long NHS waiting lists, after recently attending a private clinic which was "empty". #NHSinCrisis: trib.al/a6zLoxt 📺 Sky 501 and YouTube
What a gent
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/hs2-crewe-to-manchester-impacts-of-removing-the-golborne-link
Pressing on anyway was justified on the grounds that something will probably be found to replace Golborne.
The reality was that after 89, the EEC/EU hit fast forward on integration. The Euro went from a day dream of a few to reality in a few short years.
a) better long distance connectivity, and, in my view more importantly
b) better local connectivity enabled by removing fast trains and therefore enabling more local trains to be run outweighs any drain to the capital.
It’s like an airline flying a plane once per day for want of pilots. They’d do everything possible to make sure they had enough trained crews.
It'd be interesting to know what, if anything, the Brit could be charged with if/when he returns 'home'.
@mikeysmith: LONG-TIME TORY ROD STEWART CALLS ON GOVERNMENT TO 'STEP DOWN AND GIVE LABOUR A GO'
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/breaking-tory-sir-rod-stewart-29060268
How are you Richard?
https://welshfootballfans.com/eatsleepfootyrepeat/ynx2834nwd4ay2llcxhmkm482khh6r
But yes, in the short term, hire radiographers from anywhere you can find them!
Organisers of the £120 million project, originally known as the Festival of Brexit and involving the funding of ten creative projects, said a total of 18.1 million people had “engaged” with the project. Of those, 2.8 million people had attended events last year, with another 13.6 million having “engaged” with broadcast and digital content.
It has now emerged that the 13.6 million figure included Countryfile viewers. In October the programme reported on one of the projects, Green Space Dark Skies.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/third-of-brexit-festival-s-audience-had-seen-a-clip-on-countryfile-ltqtmx0pz
They are larger than eastern US hummingbirds and also less colorful.
And less numerous? Back in the day, and back in mid-Ohio Valley, in summertime used to observe epic hummer battles around hummingbird feeders. Similar to WWI dogfights re: aerobatics, with added twist of hovering!
Nobody has a sensible plan, and the problem is spending. The nanny state will break. The idea that all needs should be tended to wasn't ever a policy - it's just creeped in.
# Drain the Tory swamp !
https://twitter.com/Faytuks/status/1618656055353016322
Hire radiographers and people look forward to a scan for a week.
Don't hire radiographers and people can look forward to a scan for the rest of their lives.
Let's hope in a month or two I'll be able to run more than 5 minutes!
1) The Scottish Prison Service - with help from activists - wrote a policy well in advance of the law in 2014. ScotGov ignored this.
2) Although the SPS is directly responsible to ScotGov they’ve denied responsibility - until today.
3) There are already trans identified rapists in the Scottish Prisons Women's Estate.
4) In the Holyrood debates Sturgeon dismissed such concerns as “not valid”.
5) Sturgeon said Blair will not be accommodated in Corton Vale. That a) doesn’t deny they are there now, b) deny that they will be accommodated in some other parts of the women’s estate.
The Most Important City in the History of Music Isn't What You Think It Is
https://tedgioia.substack.com/p/the-most-important-city-in-the-history
I think it’s fair to say, that the Russians are now struggling to field any more tanks, and that whatever the West can supply to Ukraine is going to make a massive difference in short order.
Trump Has Completely Lost His Grip on Reality
https://www.nationalreview.com/2023/01/trump-has-completely-lost-his-grip-on-reality/
...And then there’s Donald Trump, who, despite being the only candidate who has officially announced his bid, is . . . well, ranting like a deranged hobo in a dilapidated public park. No, don’t look at him — he might come over here with his sign.
There was a point in time at which Trump’s unusual verbal affect and singular nose for underutilized wedge issues gave him a competitive edge. Now? Now, he’s morphing into one of the three witches from Macbeth....
Best Twitter response:
"... which is why we proudly support and endorse him to be President in 2024!!"
Not done properly, like the Russians last February, it results in expensive pieces of equipment being abandoned because they have no fuel or ammo, or they can’t be repaired in the field.