The YouGov numbers are far from desperate for the Conservatives.
The 2019 Conservative vote is splitting 45% Conservative, 21% Don't Know ,11% Labour and 9% Reform. That 21% DK represents 9% of the total electorate so get most of those back and the Conservative VI is back into the low 30s. That's a big IF as @MoonRabbit might say.
Among the 65+ age group (excluding the DKs), the Conservatives lead 50-23 with Reform on 12. In 2019, this age group split 64-17 so that's only a 10% swing to Labour in the largest Conservative-voting group.
In England, the split is 45-26-12 with Reform on 8 and Green on 7. That equates to a 16% swing in England from Conservative to Labour. That would mean over 200 Conservative MPs losing their seats before we even consider tactical voting.
The hope for the Conservatives must be to try to claw the DKs back into the loyal camp but the gap (especially in England) remains large for all the older voters seem to be moving back slowly into the Conservative camp but among the largest age group (the 25-49 year olds), Labour enjoys a massive lead.
Interesting article in the FT on why Tories are so miserable, having jettisoned Thatcherism for a mess of Brexit pottage.
Key to the miscalculation was Brexit’s impact on their party. Since Thatcher, there have been three legs to the Tory stool — the free-marketers, the traditionalist social conservatives and the metropolitan Tories — exemplified by the leadership of David Cameron and George Osborne.
Though this last group was more culturally liberal, economically they were still Thatcherites. They believed in free trade, globalisation, lower taxes to encourage investment and reduced public spending. Before the referendum, the social and economic liberals were broadly aligned.
Brexit smashed this coalition. But Leave liberals were slow to recognise that Brexit was also a revolt against their ideology, delivered by the populist arguments of those who were hardline on immigration, suspicious of big business, keen on culture wars and comfortable with a more interventionist state and better-funded public services. The famous Brexit pledge was, after all, more money for the NHS.
During the referendum itself, the alliance made sense. But once it was over, instead of allying with the globalists and Remainers turned soft-Brexiters, many free-market Leavers made common cause with populists who never shared their economic vision. They believed that maximising “Brexit freedoms” would secure the smaller state.
Key UK service industries — and prosperous southern voters — were sacrificed to a bad trade deal as they built a new Tory electoral coalition. This delivered victory but handed their party to populists and weakened those who shared their economic values. The clues were always there, not least in the openly interventionist Boris Johnson’s “fuck business” outburst. The pandemic destroyed their room for manoeuvre by wrecking the public finances but the pass had already been sold.
Their desperate attempt to regain the initiative was to abandon a core belief in fiscal prudence for the chaos of the Liz Truss government: it shredded the Tory reputation for economic competence and the free-market cause.
But even when Truss used her only party conference speech as leader to rail against the “anti-growth coalition”, she failed to notice it was sitting in front of her, in the rows of Nimbys, immigration hawks and urbanite-hating culture warriors. The party is locked into a low growth economic model and a belief in spending cuts which struggles to be specific.
BREAKING: Boris Johnson’s spokesperson says all of the former PM’s WhatsApps and notebooks requested by Covid Inquiry have been handed to Cabinet Office in full.
Now up to Cabinet Office to hand them over to Inquiry or not. Johnson urges them to do so. Deadline 4pm tomorrow.
From a political betting view point, Primeminister Wallace or Mourdant might be close now.
Sunak might be toast. He is already in a very weak position. With Tories on 28% and slaughtered in the locals - Sunak’s WhatsAppGate could be about to finish him. The second Tory PM this parliament brought down by covid.
A worry for Labour as they clearly have Sunak beaten, sub 200 Tory seats even. But PM Penny might trump Labour appeals for a fresh change.
Penny will come across as more centre ground to voters than the increasingly right wing Starmer front bench.
Sunak actually polls better than his party, especially with under 50s and urban professionals.
Mordaunt is too woke for the party membership as leader.
I doubt the whatsapp messages will make the slightest difference to Sunak's position, indeed Tory and RefUK voters think we locked down too early and too long if anything
With the benefit of hindsight, which I fully accept was not available at the time and the risks were very difficult to calculate, I think it is far from clear that we should ever have locked down at all. Protected vulnerable groups, certainly. Ensured proper protection for medical and care staff beyond doubt. But closing schools, factories, pubs, restaurants, etc. I think it was a mistake now.
The problem is, of course, that we didn't have the benefit of hindsight. We had terrible scenes coming out of Northern Italy and New York. We had stories of ambulances running through the night.
And we knew very little of successful treatment methods, and had little idea when - or even if - a vaccine would be forthcoming.
I don't blame the government for the initial lockdown.
I do blame them for the severity of the restrictions, and the length of time they went on for, despite all the evidence that we were getting on top of the disease. It is an absolute disgrace that, even though we had a fantastic headstart with the vaccine roll out, that we lagged so many of our European peers for the removal of restrictions.
Yes, I accept that this is with hindsight. We never got near a collapse of the hospital system, we never used the nightingale hospitals, the projections the government were being given were alarming but entirely wrong. I accept given what was not known, the first lockdown was probably inevitable but I would still want the inquiry to look at whether it was in fact a good idea and whether we should ever do the like again faced with anything similar. The subsequent lockdowns were increasingly bizarre.
There was no subtlety in the UK government's response; no assessment of what measures added little value, while imposing enormous restrictions on personal freedoms.
In retrospect, you could probably have achieved 50% of the reductions in R by closing nightclubs/karaoke bars/live music venues and requiring masks on public transport, while letting people otherwise go about their business.
The limitations on people visiting each other in their homes, or on going outside for a walk, were absolutely indefensible.
(And in between those two there were restrictions of varying degrees of sense.)
That FT article has the best opening to an article all year.
To borrow Oscar Wilde’s quip about the death of Little Nell, it would take a heart of stone not to hear the wails of free-market Brexiters without laughing.
I’ve got this feeling, all those promises to Ukraine to fast track their NATO and EU membership are going to sound horriblyhollow in 10-15 years time ☹️
It's certainly not in a position to meet the accession criteria. I'm in favour of the EU offering the prospect. Hopefully when this war is over Ukraine can work on its institutions and build a more robust state, with the carrot of EU membership as the reward.
Ukraine needs to stop being a Turkey, EU-wise?
Is Ukraine joining the EU?
It's fairly easy to imagine a twist of rhetoric that could have had a 'Breaking Point' poster about Ukraine rather than Turkey. Not quite so 'obviously foreign' of course (in billboard terms) - but not beyond imagining.
Off-topic but many here are interested in the implications of AI, so here goes...
Stack Exchange, by far and away the most influential "expert" question and answer site on the internet - and an instructive window on internet society including in its dynamic aspects - is in the process of getting AI-whacked.
Sadly it seems that most of those who until now have been working for the company for free, in some cases for many years, seem to fail to understand what's going on, believing it to come from stupidity.
AI - the LLM models at least - are parasitic on Stack Overflow. ChatGPT is trained on Stack Overflow and Reddit text. It has no knowledge of Linux filesystems, except that which it has extracted from those very experts.
If you take away the text for it to parse, then ChatGPT can't function. As from whence would it get its knowledge?
BREAKING: Boris Johnson’s spokesperson says all of the former PM’s WhatsApps and notebooks requested by Covid Inquiry have been handed to Cabinet Office in full.
Now up to Cabinet Office to hand them over to Inquiry or not. Johnson urges them to do so. Deadline 4pm tomorrow.
From a political betting view point, Primeminister Wallace or Mourdant might be close now.
Sunak might be toast. He is already in a very weak position. With Tories on 28% and slaughtered in the locals - Sunak’s WhatsAppGate could be about to finish him. The second Tory PM this parliament brought down by covid.
A worry for Labour as they clearly have Sunak beaten, sub 200 Tory seats even. But PM Penny might trump Labour appeals for a fresh change.
Penny will come across as more centre ground to voters than the increasingly right wing Starmer front bench.
Sunak actually polls better than his party, especially with under 50s and urban professionals.
Mordaunt is too woke for the party membership as leader.
I doubt the whatsapp messages will make the slightest difference to Sunak's position, indeed Tory and RefUK voters think we locked down too early and too long if anything
With the benefit of hindsight, which I fully accept was not available at the time and the risks were very difficult to calculate, I think it is far from clear that we should ever have locked down at all. Protected vulnerable groups, certainly. Ensured proper protection for medical and care staff beyond doubt. But closing schools, factories, pubs, restaurants, etc. I think it was a mistake now.
The problem is, of course, that we didn't have the benefit of hindsight. We had terrible scenes coming out of Northern Italy and New York. We had stories of ambulances running through the night.
And we knew very little of successful treatment methods, and had little idea when - or even if - a vaccine would be forthcoming.
I don't blame the government for the initial lockdown.
I do blame them for the severity of the restrictions, and the length of time they went on for, despite all the evidence that we were getting on top of the disease. It is an absolute disgrace that, even though we had a fantastic headstart with the vaccine roll out, that we lagged so many of our European peers for the removal of restrictions.
I think we do need to remember the severity of the strain on hospitals in Jan 2021. We had a peak of 4000 deaths per day from covid, and an immunisation programme just kicking off.
Sure, some aspects of restrictions could be better targeted, but the idea that we could have carried on living normally while this was going on was delusional.
BREAKING: Boris Johnson’s spokesperson says all of the former PM’s WhatsApps and notebooks requested by Covid Inquiry have been handed to Cabinet Office in full.
Now up to Cabinet Office to hand them over to Inquiry or not. Johnson urges them to do so. Deadline 4pm tomorrow.
From a political betting view point, Primeminister Wallace or Mourdant might be close now.
Sunak might be toast. He is already in a very weak position. With Tories on 28% and slaughtered in the locals - Sunak’s WhatsAppGate could be about to finish him. The second Tory PM this parliament brought down by covid.
A worry for Labour as they clearly have Sunak beaten, sub 200 Tory seats even. But PM Penny might trump Labour appeals for a fresh change.
Penny will come across as more centre ground to voters than the increasingly right wing Starmer front bench.
Sunak actually polls better than his party, especially with under 50s and urban professionals.
Mordaunt is too woke for the party membership as leader.
I doubt the whatsapp messages will make the slightest difference to Sunak's position, indeed Tory and RefUK voters think we locked down too early and too long if anything
With the benefit of hindsight, which I fully accept was not available at the time and the risks were very difficult to calculate, I think it is far from clear that we should ever have locked down at all. Protected vulnerable groups, certainly. Ensured proper protection for medical and care staff beyond doubt. But closing schools, factories, pubs, restaurants, etc. I think it was a mistake now.
The problem is, of course, that we didn't have the benefit of hindsight. We had terrible scenes coming out of Northern Italy and New York. We had stories of ambulances running through the night.
And we knew very little of successful treatment methods, and had little idea when - or even if - a vaccine would be forthcoming.
I don't blame the government for the initial lockdown.
I do blame them for the severity of the restrictions, and the length of time they went on for, despite all the evidence that we were getting on top of the disease. It is an absolute disgrace that, even though we had a fantastic headstart with the vaccine roll out, that we lagged so many of our European peers for the removal of restrictions.
I think we do need to remember the severity of the strain on hospitals in Jan 2021. We had a peak of 4000 deaths per day from covid, and an immunisation programme just kicking off.
Sure, some aspects of restrictions could be better targeted, but
Okay, this is a bit of a PR puff piece, but it's still interesting. Who'd have thought a 23-mile long tunnel with its own railway was the *least* innovative part of a project? Because it also includes Europe's deepest mine, and buried winding gear. Oh, and it's named after two geologists - will we see a @Richard_Tyndall mine?
Oh, and it's in Britain.
The only downside is that it's in the inferior county of Yorkshire...
Starmer looks positively refreshing compared to absolutely bugger all from the Tories at the moment. I still can’t understand what the Tories are “for”.
BREAKING: Boris Johnson’s spokesperson says all of the former PM’s WhatsApps and notebooks requested by Covid Inquiry have been handed to Cabinet Office in full.
Now up to Cabinet Office to hand them over to Inquiry or not. Johnson urges them to do so. Deadline 4pm tomorrow.
From a political betting view point, Primeminister Wallace or Mourdant might be close now.
Sunak might be toast. He is already in a very weak position. With Tories on 28% and slaughtered in the locals - Sunak’s WhatsAppGate could be about to finish him. The second Tory PM this parliament brought down by covid.
A worry for Labour as they clearly have Sunak beaten, sub 200 Tory seats even. But PM Penny might trump Labour appeals for a fresh change.
Penny will come across as more centre ground to voters than the increasingly right wing Starmer front bench.
Sunak actually polls better than his party, especially with under 50s and urban professionals.
Mordaunt is too woke for the party membership as leader.
I doubt the whatsapp messages will make the slightest difference to Sunak's position, indeed Tory and RefUK voters think we locked down too early and too long if anything
With the benefit of hindsight, which I fully accept was not available at the time and the risks were very difficult to calculate, I think it is far from clear that we should ever have locked down at all. Protected vulnerable groups, certainly. Ensured proper protection for medical and care staff beyond doubt. But closing schools, factories, pubs, restaurants, etc. I think it was a mistake now.
The problem is, of course, that we didn't have the benefit of hindsight. We had terrible scenes coming out of Northern Italy and New York. We had stories of ambulances running through the night.
And we knew very little of successful treatment methods, and had little idea when - or even if - a vaccine would be forthcoming.
I don't blame the government for the initial lockdown.
I do blame them for the severity of the restrictions, and the length of time they went on for, despite all the evidence that we were getting on top of the disease. It is an absolute disgrace that, even though we had a fantastic headstart with the vaccine roll out, that we lagged so many of our European peers for the removal of restrictions.
Yes, I accept that this is with hindsight. We never got near a collapse of the hospital system, we never used the nightingale hospitals, the projections the government were being given were alarming but entirely wrong. I accept given what was not known, the first lockdown was probably inevitable but I would still want the inquiry to look at whether it was in fact a good idea and whether we should ever do the like again faced with anything similar. The subsequent lockdowns were increasingly bizarre.
There was no subtlety in the UK government's response; no assessment of what measures added little value, while imposing enormous restrictions on personal freedoms.
In retrospect, you could probably have achieved 50% of the reductions in R by closing nightclubs/karaoke bars/live music venues and requiring masks on public transport, while letting people otherwise go about their business.
The limitations on people visiting each other in their homes, or on going outside for a walk, were absolutely indefensible.
(And in between those two there were restrictions of varying degrees of sense.)
Will the inquiry make international comparisons? Some friends were marooned at their place in Spain for two months unable to venture more than 100m from their front door, heavily policed. They were allowed access once a day to the nearest food shop, which happened to be a dump. Compared to some countries the UK had it easy but there were plenty who pined for more vigorous restrictions.
BREAKING: Boris Johnson’s spokesperson says all of the former PM’s WhatsApps and notebooks requested by Covid Inquiry have been handed to Cabinet Office in full.
Now up to Cabinet Office to hand them over to Inquiry or not. Johnson urges them to do so. Deadline 4pm tomorrow.
From a political betting view point, Primeminister Wallace or Mourdant might be close now.
Sunak might be toast. He is already in a very weak position. With Tories on 28% and slaughtered in the locals - Sunak’s WhatsAppGate could be about to finish him. The second Tory PM this parliament brought down by covid.
A worry for Labour as they clearly have Sunak beaten, sub 200 Tory seats even. But PM Penny might trump Labour appeals for a fresh change.
Penny will come across as more centre ground to voters than the increasingly right wing Starmer front bench.
Sunak actually polls better than his party, especially with under 50s and urban professionals.
Mordaunt is too woke for the party membership as leader.
I doubt the whatsapp messages will make the slightest difference to Sunak's position, indeed Tory and RefUK voters think we locked down too early and too long if anything
With the benefit of hindsight, which I fully accept was not available at the time and the risks were very difficult to calculate, I think it is far from clear that we should ever have locked down at all. Protected vulnerable groups, certainly. Ensured proper protection for medical and care staff beyond doubt. But closing schools, factories, pubs, restaurants, etc. I think it was a mistake now.
The problem is, of course, that we didn't have the benefit of hindsight. We had terrible scenes coming out of Northern Italy and New York. We had stories of ambulances running through the night.
And we knew very little of successful treatment methods, and had little idea when - or even if - a vaccine would be forthcoming.
I don't blame the government for the initial lockdown.
I do blame them for the severity of the restrictions, and the length of time they went on for, despite all the evidence that we were getting on top of the disease. It is an absolute disgrace that, even though we had a fantastic headstart with the vaccine roll out, that we lagged so many of our European peers for the removal of restrictions.
I think we do need to remember the severity of the strain on hospitals in Jan 2021. We had a peak of 4000 deaths per day from covid, and an immunisation programme just kicking off.
Sure, some aspects of restrictions could be better targeted, but the idea that we could have carried on living normally while this was going on was delusional.
The 'deaths' and 'hospitalistions' charts should always be kept in the back of mind for such discussions. They are (or at least, should be) sobering.
Off-topic but many here are interested in the implications of AI, so here goes...
Stack Exchange, by far and away the most influential "expert" question and answer site on the internet - and an instructive window on internet society including in its dynamic aspects - is in the process of getting AI-whacked.
Sadly it seems that most of those who until now have been working for the company for free, in some cases for many years, seem to fail to understand what's going on, believing it to come from stupidity.
AI - the LLM models at least - are parasitic on Stack Overflow. ChatGPT is trained on Stack Overflow and Reddit text. It has no knowledge of Linux filesystems, except that which it has extracted from those very experts.
If you take away the text for it to parse, then ChatGPT can't function. As from whence would it get its knowledge?
I'd be somewhat cautious on that specific line of attack. I asked it today about a quite obscure Kernel thing and it had clearly (to me at least as SO offered no results) read and 'understood' the kernel source itself.
The new Code Interpreter mode is also quite impressive.
Sarah Montague gave a very robust defence of Houchen on WATO. She demanded Andy Mc Donald repeat the accusations he made against Houchen under parliamentary privilege. He refused, and Sarah took the win on behalf of Ben.
I have to say selling millions of pounds worth of (even brownfield) real estate for less than a tenner raised my eyebrow.
The YouGov numbers are far from desperate for the Conservatives.
The 2019 Conservative vote is splitting 45% Conservative, 21% Don't Know ,11% Labour and 9% Reform. That 21% DK represents 9% of the total electorate so get most of those back and the Conservative VI is back into the low 30s. That's a big IF as @MoonRabbit might say.
Among the 65+ age group (excluding the DKs), the Conservatives lead 50-23 with Reform on 12. In 2019, this age group split 64-17 so that's only a 10% swing to Labour in the largest Conservative-voting group.
In England, the split is 45-26-12 with Reform on 8 and Green on 7. That equates to a 16% swing in England from Conservative to Labour. That would mean over 200 Conservative MPs losing their seats before we even consider tactical voting.
The hope for the Conservatives must be to try to claw the DKs back into the loyal camp but the gap (especially in England) remains large for all the older voters seem to be moving back slowly into the Conservative camp but among the largest age group (the 25-49 year olds), Labour enjoys a massive lead.
Interesting article in the FT on why Tories are so miserable, having jettisoned Thatcherism for a mess of Brexit pottage.
Key to the miscalculation was Brexit’s impact on their party. Since Thatcher, there have been three legs to the Tory stool — the free-marketers, the traditionalist social conservatives and the metropolitan Tories — exemplified by the leadership of David Cameron and George Osborne.
Though this last group was more culturally liberal, economically they were still Thatcherites. They believed in free trade, globalisation, lower taxes to encourage investment and reduced public spending. Before the referendum, the social and economic liberals were broadly aligned.
Brexit smashed this coalition. But Leave liberals were slow to recognise that Brexit was also a revolt against their ideology, delivered by the populist arguments of those who were hardline on immigration, suspicious of big business, keen on culture wars and comfortable with a more interventionist state and better-funded public services. The famous Brexit pledge was, after all, more money for the NHS.
During the referendum itself, the alliance made sense. But once it was over, instead of allying with the globalists and Remainers turned soft-Brexiters, many free-market Leavers made common cause with populists who never shared their economic vision. They believed that maximising “Brexit freedoms” would secure the smaller state.
Key UK service industries — and prosperous southern voters — were sacrificed to a bad trade deal as they built a new Tory electoral coalition. This delivered victory but handed their party to populists and weakened those who shared their economic values. The clues were always there, not least in the openly interventionist Boris Johnson’s “fuck business” outburst. The pandemic destroyed their room for manoeuvre by wrecking the public finances but the pass had already been sold.
Their desperate attempt to regain the initiative was to abandon a core belief in fiscal prudence for the chaos of the Liz Truss government: it shredded the Tory reputation for economic competence and the free-market cause.
But even when Truss used her only party conference speech as leader to rail against the “anti-growth coalition”, she failed to notice it was sitting in front of her, in the rows of Nimbys, immigration hawks and urbanite-hating culture warriors. The party is locked into a low growth economic model and a belief in spending cuts which struggles to be specific.
In the 19th century of course the protectionist Tories' main opponents were the free market Liberals. The Tories post Peel were the party of farmers, landowners and landed gentry, nationalists and the Church of England, the Liberals the party of merchants, industrialists and non conformists. It was only the rise of the Labour Party in the early 20th century as the franchise expanded to universal suffrage that brought Tories and middle class liberals together to form the 20th century Conservative Party to keep out Labour and socialism.
Brexit however has changed that coalition. Boris managed to win over working class voters on a ticket of regaining sovereignty and reducing immigration, fighting Woke and rebuilding British industry and more investment in public services on a scale no Tory leader had managed since Salisbury or Baldwin. Upper middle class voters who backed Remain however are now increasingly voting Liberal or even Starmer Labour
Just asking ... what percentage chance is there that all the polls are wrong.?
Wrong about what? If you think Labour have a greater chance than 80% of winning most seats, and you fancy placing a bet this far out from an election, it would make sense for you to bet on them because that's the implied probability of that outcome at Betfair at the moment:
Does Pence have a secondary reason for launching a bid? Because he almost certainly won't get very far in terms of actually winning the nomination.
He won't if Trump wins it, if Trump collapses due to legal problems however he would likely endorse Pence, his former VP, to ensure DeSantis doesn't get the nomination given he now despises the latter even more than Pence
BREAKING: Boris Johnson’s spokesperson says all of the former PM’s WhatsApps and notebooks requested by Covid Inquiry have been handed to Cabinet Office in full.
Now up to Cabinet Office to hand them over to Inquiry or not. Johnson urges them to do so. Deadline 4pm tomorrow.
From a political betting view point, Primeminister Wallace or Mourdant might be close now.
Sunak might be toast. He is already in a very weak position. With Tories on 28% and slaughtered in the locals - Sunak’s WhatsAppGate could be about to finish him. The second Tory PM this parliament brought down by covid.
A worry for Labour as they clearly have Sunak beaten, sub 200 Tory seats even. But PM Penny might trump Labour appeals for a fresh change.
Penny will come across as more centre ground to voters than the increasingly right wing Starmer front bench.
Sunak actually polls better than his party, especially with under 50s and urban professionals.
Mordaunt is too woke for the party membership as leader.
I doubt the whatsapp messages will make the slightest difference to Sunak's position, indeed Tory and RefUK voters think we locked down too early and too long if anything
With the benefit of hindsight, which I fully accept was not available at the time and the risks were very difficult to calculate, I think it is far from clear that we should ever have locked down at all. Protected vulnerable groups, certainly. Ensured proper protection for medical and care staff beyond doubt. But closing schools, factories, pubs, restaurants, etc. I think it was a mistake now.
The problem is, of course, that we didn't have the benefit of hindsight. We had terrible scenes coming out of Northern Italy and New York. We had stories of ambulances running through the night.
And we knew very little of successful treatment methods, and had little idea when - or even if - a vaccine would be forthcoming.
I don't blame the government for the initial lockdown.
I do blame them for the severity of the restrictions, and the length of time they went on for, despite all the evidence that we were getting on top of the disease. It is an absolute disgrace that, even though we had a fantastic headstart with the vaccine roll out, that we lagged so many of our European peers for the removal of restrictions.
Yes, I accept that this is with hindsight. We never got near a collapse of the hospital system, we never used the nightingale hospitals, the projections the government were being given were alarming but entirely wrong. I accept given what was not known, the first lockdown was probably inevitable but I would still want the inquiry to look at whether it was in fact a good idea and whether we should ever do the like again faced with anything similar. The subsequent lockdowns were increasingly bizarre.
There was no subtlety in the UK government's response; no assessment of what measures added little value, while imposing enormous restrictions on personal freedoms.
In retrospect, you could probably have achieved 50% of the reductions in R by closing nightclubs/karaoke bars/live music venues and requiring masks on public transport, while letting people otherwise go about their business.
The limitations on people visiting each other in their homes, or on going outside for a walk, were absolutely indefensible.
(And in between those two there were restrictions of varying degrees of sense.)
Will the inquiry make international comparisons? Some friends were marooned at their place in Spain for two months unable to venture more than 100m from their front door, heavily policed. They were allowed access once a day to the nearest food shop, which happened to be a dump. Compared to some countries the UK had it easy but there were plenty who pined for more vigorous restrictions.
I hope it doesn't make international comparisons except insofar as what went on in other countries will have been a factor in decision making here.
It'll be one less if a friend of mine's brother manages to get rid of his mother in law. She came over for a quick visit from China in early 2020, and still hasn't been able to leave for some reason...
BREAKING: Boris Johnson’s spokesperson says all of the former PM’s WhatsApps and notebooks requested by Covid Inquiry have been handed to Cabinet Office in full.
Now up to Cabinet Office to hand them over to Inquiry or not. Johnson urges them to do so. Deadline 4pm tomorrow.
From a political betting view point, Primeminister Wallace or Mourdant might be close now.
Sunak might be toast. He is already in a very weak position. With Tories on 28% and slaughtered in the locals - Sunak’s WhatsAppGate could be about to finish him. The second Tory PM this parliament brought down by covid.
A worry for Labour as they clearly have Sunak beaten, sub 200 Tory seats even. But PM Penny might trump Labour appeals for a fresh change.
Penny will come across as more centre ground to voters than the increasingly right wing Starmer front bench.
Sunak actually polls better than his party, especially with under 50s and urban professionals.
Mordaunt is too woke for the party membership as leader.
I doubt the whatsapp messages will make the slightest difference to Sunak's position, indeed Tory and RefUK voters think we locked down too early and too long if anything
With the benefit of hindsight, which I fully accept was not available at the time and the risks were very difficult to calculate, I think it is far from clear that we should ever have locked down at all. Protected vulnerable groups, certainly. Ensured proper protection for medical and care staff beyond doubt. But closing schools, factories, pubs, restaurants, etc. I think it was a mistake now.
The problem is, of course, that we didn't have the benefit of hindsight. We had terrible scenes coming out of Northern Italy and New York. We had stories of ambulances running through the night.
And we knew very little of successful treatment methods, and had little idea when - or even if - a vaccine would be forthcoming.
I don't blame the government for the initial lockdown.
I do blame them for the severity of the restrictions, and the length of time they went on for, despite all the evidence that we were getting on top of the disease. It is an absolute disgrace that, even though we had a fantastic headstart with the vaccine roll out, that we lagged so many of our European peers for the removal of restrictions.
Yes, I accept that this is with hindsight. We never got near a collapse of the hospital system, we never used the nightingale hospitals, the projections the government were being given were alarming but entirely wrong. I accept given what was not known, the first lockdown was probably inevitable but I would still want the inquiry to look at whether it was in fact a good idea and whether we should ever do the like again faced with anything similar. The subsequent lockdowns were increasingly bizarre.
There was no subtlety in the UK government's response; no assessment of what measures added little value, while imposing enormous restrictions on personal freedoms.
In retrospect, you could probably have achieved 50% of the reductions in R by closing nightclubs/karaoke bars/live music venues and requiring masks on public transport, while letting people otherwise go about their business.
The limitations on people visiting each other in their homes, or on going outside for a walk, were absolutely indefensible.
(And in between those two there were restrictions of varying degrees of sense.)
I remember at way towards the end of the peak of covid we had a local restriction of 'groups of upto 20 people can meet outdoors - but they must stay one meter apart'. It was things like that which made me really think "urrr - wut?". Especially as the week before it would be different, and a week after different again. The specificity combined with the changeability was really noticeable.
I wonder how many other pb'ers regularly use buses? I was on a couple today, and they're great for litmus tests of public mood.
The die is cast. People have made up their minds and the polls will change very little right up until next year's General Election.
Have a nice evening.
xx
Is the mood anger.
Are the people mutinous ?
Is it a (drumroll) shellacking.
I am not on buses often but I have never heard anyone on one even mentioning politics.
I use the tube every day, buses quite often - it’s the quick way to get about in central London.
Striking up a conversation with a stranger would be considered evidence of being a sociopath or drunk. Or both.
I take a bus from time to time and can confirm that no-one speaks. They sit staring wistfully, hunched over their shopping bags, caressing the sausages they bought from Lidl, calculating how many days they might stretch to. If conversation did break out I'd have to confess I was en route to the station to go to London for lunch, so silence is probably the better option.
Does Pence have a secondary reason for launching a bid? Because he almost certainly won't get very far in terms of actually winning the nomination.
He won't if Trump wins it, if Trump collapses due to legal problems however he would likely endorse Pence, his former VP, to ensure DeSantis doesn't get the nomination given he now despises the latter even more than Pence
Are you sure Trump thinks like that? Is there a precedent for him going "I don't like HIM, and I don't like HIM, but I dislike the first guy more, so I'll endorse the second guy"?
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
On thread: Just asking ... what percentage chance is there that all the polls are wrong.?
I know the direction to which you are looking, and Labour themselves were suggesting a ten point lead when the polls were averaging 17. Now the polls are what? Circling 12/13. That suggests down to 5/6, which with MoE gives us level pegging, and Con most seats.
Equally if they are wrong in the other direction your team is f*****!
"So that gives fair gap for LAB in the latest round of polling but, of course, the five-week general election campaign could change all of that. Just remember what happened to TMay at GE2017"
Can easily see SKS being as bad as TM when under scrutiny. Fortunately for him RS is no Jeremy Corbyn and wont gain ground as quick as Jezza did
Hung Parliament nailed on as by GE 2024 inflation will be less than 3% and the Tories will get credit for solving the cost of living crisis (undeserved) so will start with a small deficit of no less than 10% and will pull a few points back as Sunak outperforms SKS and the Right wing press do their thing
Sarah Montague gave a very robust defence of Houchen on WATO. She demanded Andy Mc Donald repeat the accusations he made against Houchen under parliamentary privilege. He refused, and Sarah took the win on behalf of Ben.
I have to say selling millions of pounds worth of (even brownfield) real estate for less than a tenner raised my eyebrow.
I don't know anything about this situation. However in my experience it is common for these brownfield sites to have a zero value, for instance where the clean up costs exceed the land value even with planning permission in place.
Starmer looks positively refreshing compared to absolutely bugger all from the Tories at the moment. I still can’t understand what the Tories are “for”.
They are "for" a great multitude of things. Unfortunately, many of them are mutually exclusive.
"So that gives fair gap for LAB in the latest round of polling but, of course, the five-week general election campaign could change all of that. Just remember what happened to TMay at GE2017"
Can easily see SKS being as bad as TM when under scrutiny. Fortunately for him RS is no Jeremy Corbyn and wont gain ground as quick as Jezza did
Hung Parliament nailed on as by GE 2024 inflation will be less than 3% and the Tories will get credit for solving the cost of living crisis (undeserved) so will start with a small deficit of no less than 10% and will pull a few points back as Sunak outperforms SKS and the Right wing press do their thing
If you were a non-partisan commentator that would be a compelling analysis. You aren't, so it isn't.
"So that gives fair gap for LAB in the latest round of polling but, of course, the five-week general election campaign could change all of that. Just remember what happened to TMay at GE2017"
Can easily see SKS being as bad as TM when under scrutiny. Fortunately for him RS is no Jeremy Corbyn and wont gain ground as quick as Jezza did
Hung Parliament nailed on as by GE 2024 inflation will be less than 3% and the Tories will get credit for solving the cost of living crisis (undeserved) so will start with a small deficit of no less than 10% and will pull a few points back as Sunak outperforms SKS and the Right wing press do their thing
The YouGov numbers are far from desperate for the Conservatives.
The 2019 Conservative vote is splitting 45% Conservative, 21% Don't Know ,11% Labour and 9% Reform. That 21% DK represents 9% of the total electorate so get most of those back and the Conservative VI is back into the low 30s. That's a big IF as @MoonRabbit might say.
Among the 65+ age group (excluding the DKs), the Conservatives lead 50-23 with Reform on 12. In 2019, this age group split 64-17 so that's only a 10% swing to Labour in the largest Conservative-voting group.
In England, the split is 45-26-12 with Reform on 8 and Green on 7. That equates to a 16% swing in England from Conservative to Labour. That would mean over 200 Conservative MPs losing their seats before we even consider tactical voting.
The hope for the Conservatives must be to try to claw the DKs back into the loyal camp but the gap (especially in England) remains large for all the older voters seem to be moving back slowly into the Conservative camp but among the largest age group (the 25-49 year olds), Labour enjoys a massive lead.
Interesting article in the FT on why Tories are so miserable, having jettisoned Thatcherism for a mess of Brexit pottage.
Key to the miscalculation was Brexit’s impact on their party. Since Thatcher, there have been three legs to the Tory stool — the free-marketers, the traditionalist social conservatives and the metropolitan Tories — exemplified by the leadership of David Cameron and George Osborne.
Though this last group was more culturally liberal, economically they were still Thatcherites. They believed in free trade, globalisation, lower taxes to encourage investment and reduced public spending. Before the referendum, the social and economic liberals were broadly aligned.
Brexit smashed this coalition. But Leave liberals were slow to recognise that Brexit was also a revolt against their ideology, delivered by the populist arguments of those who were hardline on immigration, suspicious of big business, keen on culture wars and comfortable with a more interventionist state and better-funded public services. The famous Brexit pledge was, after all, more money for the NHS.
During the referendum itself, the alliance made sense. But once it was over, instead of allying with the globalists and Remainers turned soft-Brexiters, many free-market Leavers made common cause with populists who never shared their economic vision. They believed that maximising “Brexit freedoms” would secure the smaller state.
Key UK service industries — and prosperous southern voters — were sacrificed to a bad trade deal as they built a new Tory electoral coalition. This delivered victory but handed their party to populists and weakened those who shared their economic values. The clues were always there, not least in the openly interventionist Boris Johnson’s “fuck business” outburst. The pandemic destroyed their room for manoeuvre by wrecking the public finances but the pass had already been sold.
Their desperate attempt to regain the initiative was to abandon a core belief in fiscal prudence for the chaos of the Liz Truss government: it shredded the Tory reputation for economic competence and the free-market cause.
But even when Truss used her only party conference speech as leader to rail against the “anti-growth coalition”, she failed to notice it was sitting in front of her, in the rows of Nimbys, immigration hawks and urbanite-hating culture warriors. The party is locked into a low growth economic model and a belief in spending cuts which struggles to be specific.
In the 19th century of course the protectionist Tories' main opponents were the free market Liberals. The Tories post Peel were the party of farmers, landowners and landed gentry, nationalists and the Church of England, the Liberals the party of merchants, industrialists and non conformists. It was only the rise of the Labour Party in the early 20th century as the franchise expanded to universal suffrage that brought Tories and middle class liberals together to form the 20th century Conservative Party to keep out Labour and socialism.
Brexit however has changed that coalition. Boris managed to win over working class voters on a ticket of regaining sovereignty and reducing immigration, fighting Woke and rebuilding British industry and more investment in public services on a scale no Tory leader had managed since Salisbury or Baldwin. Upper middle class voters who backed Remain however are now increasingly voting Liberal or even Starmer Labour
Sunakism doesn't seem to be going down well with the Redwall, so busy is he at sawing the other two legs off the Tory stool.
Sarah Montague gave a very robust defence of Houchen on WATO. She demanded Andy Mc Donald repeat the accusations he made against Houchen under parliamentary privilege. He refused, and Sarah took the win on behalf of Ben.
I have to say selling millions of pounds worth of (even brownfield) real estate for less than a tenner raised my eyebrow.
I don't know anything about this situation. However in my experience it is common for these brownfield sites to have a zero value, for instance where the clean up costs exceed the land value even with planning permission in place.
I believe the same site had been bought with public funds for a significant (£millions) fee a year or two earlier.
Sarah Montague gave a very robust defence of Houchen on WATO. She demanded Andy Mc Donald repeat the accusations he made against Houchen under parliamentary privilege. He refused, and Sarah took the win on behalf of Ben.
I have to say selling millions of pounds worth of (even brownfield) real estate for less than a tenner raised my eyebrow.
Yes. It seems bizarre. I’d not really noticed this until Rochdale started to mention it here. Questions clearly need to be answered. This is taxpayers money and taxpayers assets.
"So that gives fair gap for LAB in the latest round of polling but, of course, the five-week general election campaign could change all of that. Just remember what happened to TMay at GE2017"
Can easily see SKS being as bad as TM when under scrutiny. Fortunately for him RS is no Jeremy Corbyn and wont gain ground as quick as Jezza did
Hung Parliament nailed on as by GE 2024 inflation will be less than 3% and the Tories will get credit for solving the cost of living crisis (undeserved) so will start with a small deficit of no less than 10% and will pull a few points back as Sunak outperforms SKS and the Right wing press do their thing
Sarah Montague gave a very robust defence of Houchen on WATO. She demanded Andy Mc Donald repeat the accusations he made against Houchen under parliamentary privilege. He refused, and Sarah took the win on behalf of Ben.
I have to say selling millions of pounds worth of (even brownfield) real estate for less than a tenner raised my eyebrow.
I don't know anything about this situation. However in my experience it is common for these brownfield sites to have a zero value, for instance where the clean up costs exceed the land value even with planning permission in place.
Indeed. Back in the 1970s a Tory friend advocated a policy of simply giving council houses and flats to the tenants at zero cost on the grounds that their future maintenance was an open-ended liability to the public purse. Then Thatcher got in and sold them instead. Never underestimate the genius of that woman.
I wonder how many other pb'ers regularly use buses?
If not WFH, about three times a month. I don't listen to what the passengers say.
It’s rather rude to listen to other people’s conversations.
That's why I don't listen to them.
It is also because the b*****d on the phone diagonally opposite was effing and jeffing and being a dick, and vanishing into earphones and tablet is the best way of being inconspicuous and not be thumped.
It'll be one less if a friend of mine's brother manages to get rid of his mother in law. She came over for a quick visit from China in early 2020, and still hasn't been able to leave for some reason...
oh jesus ! eternally grateful for marrying into a family where the mother in law thought we lived in Northampton not Nottingham for 5 years
Sorry @dixiedean but I think this means Everton are fucked, even more so than if you were relegated.
The Treasury’s sanctions police have been reviewing the finances of the Everton Football Club owner, Farhad Moshiri, the Guardian understands.
Moshiri appears to have become a person of interest to the Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation (OFSI) because of his links to Alisher Usmanov, the Russian-Uzbek billionaire who was sanctioned by the UK, the EU and the US after last year’s invasion of Ukraine.
Usmanov has also been barred from entering the UK since September 2021 after his presence was “not deemed conducive to the public good”.
The apparent interest in Moshiri coincides with months of reporting by the Guardian, which has raised questions about the influence Usmanov has exerted over Moshiri and the Premier League club, including how the Russian tycoon came to attend job interviews with a series of prospective Everton managers before March 2022.
It also follows a Guardian report that revealed how the club’s auditor, BDO, stepped away from signing off the club’s accounts last year – a decision sources said was related to the ownership of the Premier League team.
The Guardian understands that BDO’s concerns led to OFSI being notified about Moshiri, who has hired an expert sanctions lawyer at Peters & Peters – one of the UK’s largest law firms – according to correspondence sent to the Guardian on Moshiri’s behalf.
The news of OFSI’s apparent interest in Moshiri’s finances has emerged as the football team narrowly avoided relegation from the Premier League and while Moshiri is attempting to find investment to bankroll the club and complete its new stadium.
It is understood that an investment offer on the table would result in Moshiri – who is estimated to have ploughed £750m into Everton – losing control of the club without being paid a penny, according to sources close to the negotiations.
Any lack of payment to Moshiri could raise questions about whether Everton is being treated in a similar manner to Chelsea FC when it was acquired from the sanctioned oligarch Roman Abramovich last year. Abramovich was prevented by the UK government from benefiting financially from the sale of the London club...
...However, the Guardian understands that Moshiri’s UK bank closed his account last year, seemingly because of his connections to Usmanov.
Moshiri declined to comment on OFSI’s apparent interest in his finances or the status of his UK bank account. The Treasury said that neither it nor OFSI commented on individual cases.
Sarah Montague gave a very robust defence of Houchen on WATO. She demanded Andy Mc Donald repeat the accusations he made against Houchen under parliamentary privilege. He refused, and Sarah took the win on behalf of Ben.
I have to say selling millions of pounds worth of (even brownfield) real estate for less than a tenner raised my eyebrow.
I don't know anything about this situation. However in my experience it is common for these brownfield sites to have a zero value, for instance where the clean up costs exceed the land value even with planning permission in place.
I believe the same site had been bought with public funds for a significant (£millions) fee a year or two earlier.
Who spent those public funds buying the site?
The cost of renovating some chemical brownfield sites is *massive* - enough to make them not worth the bother. Little items like mercury bearings in sewage works are far more problematic than the pollution from the sewage itself - especially if they've been buried.
"So that gives fair gap for LAB in the latest round of polling but, of course, the five-week general election campaign could change all of that. Just remember what happened to TMay at GE2017"
Can easily see SKS being as bad as TM when under scrutiny. Fortunately for him RS is no Jeremy Corbyn and wont gain ground as quick as Jezza did
Hung Parliament nailed on as by GE 2024 inflation will be less than 3% and the Tories will get credit for solving the cost of living crisis (undeserved) so will start with a small deficit of no less than 10% and will pull a few points back as Sunak outperforms SKS and the Right wing press do their thing
I love the way you still delude yourself that the thickest man ever to have been LoTO in this country was some kind of genius. It's hilarious.
Corbyn led Labour to their worst ever electoral defeat.
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
I’ve got this feeling, all those promises to Ukraine to fast track their NATO and EU membership are going to sound horriblyhollow in 10-15 years time ☹️
It's certainly not in a position to meet the accession criteria. I'm in favour of the EU offering the prospect. Hopefully when this war is over Ukraine can work on its institutions and build a more robust state, with the carrot of EU membership as the reward.
Ukraine needs to stop being a Turkey, EU-wise?
Is Ukraine joining the EU?
It's fairly easy to imagine a twist of rhetoric that could have had a 'Breaking Point' poster about Ukraine rather than Turkey. Not quite so 'obviously foreign' of course (in billboard terms) - but not beyond imagining.
I believe I saw an observation at the time on why the UK was more sympatico with Ukranians than (say) Syrians was that they use dishwashers 'just like us'. Of course the Turks just build them..
I wonder how many other pb'ers regularly use buses?
If not WFH, about three times a month. I don't listen to what the passengers say.
It’s rather rude to listen to other people’s conversations.
I generally think its fair game as I think its rather rude to have conversations in public that are loud enough for others to hear . However for most listened into conversations on public transport I rather wish I did have ear plugs or head phones as its mainly some moan about somebody who i dont know but end up feeling strangely in solidarity with by the end
I’ve got this feeling, all those promises to Ukraine to fast track their NATO and EU membership are going to sound horriblyhollow in 10-15 years time ☹️
It's certainly not in a position to meet the accession criteria. I'm in favour of the EU offering the prospect. Hopefully when this war is over Ukraine can work on its institutions and build a more robust state, with the carrot of EU membership as the reward.
The EU should assess other people's corruptness? Okayyy... And since when was a state's robustness antithetical to its corruptness?
Actually, I carefully avoided saying anything about corruptness. My post was a subtle change of subject onto firmer ground (for me). There are accession criteria. Ukraine doesn't qualify at the moment. I'll leave everything else to others.
Does Pence have a secondary reason for launching a bid? Because he almost certainly won't get very far in terms of actually winning the nomination.
He won't if Trump wins it, if Trump collapses due to legal problems however he would likely endorse Pence, his former VP, to ensure DeSantis doesn't get the nomination given he now despises the latter even more than Pence
Are you sure Trump thinks like that? Is there a precedent for him going "I don't like HIM, and I don't like HIM, but I dislike the first guy more, so I'll endorse the second guy"?
Otherwise Trump runs as an Independent of course, handing re election to Biden on a plate
"So that gives fair gap for LAB in the latest round of polling but, of course, the five-week general election campaign could change all of that. Just remember what happened to TMay at GE2017"
Can easily see SKS being as bad as TM when under scrutiny. Fortunately for him RS is no Jeremy Corbyn and wont gain ground as quick as Jezza did
Hung Parliament nailed on as by GE 2024 inflation will be less than 3% and the Tories will get credit for solving the cost of living crisis (undeserved) so will start with a small deficit of no less than 10% and will pull a few points back as Sunak outperforms SKS and the Right wing press do their thing
I love the way you still delude yourself that the thickest man ever to have been LoTO in this country was some kind of genius. It's hilarious.
Corbyn led Labour to their worst ever electoral defeat. AGAINST JOHNSON FFS!
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
Another equally gloomy article from Dan Hannan on whether we are seeing the end of the Liberalism which grew from the late 18th and early 19th century to peak at the end of the 20th and early 21st century. Instead we are facing a battle between leftist Woke identity based cancel culture and rightwing illiberal nationalist conservatism https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/05/06/blasphemy-codes-still-with-us-if-js-mill-were-alive-today/
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
Another equally gloomy article from Dan Hannan on whether we are seeing the end of the Liberalism which grew from the late 18th and early 19th century to peak at the end of the 20th and early 21st century. Instead we are facing a battle between leftist Woke cancel culture and rightwing illiberal nationalist conservatism https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/05/06/blasphemy-codes-still-with-us-if-js-mill-were-alive-today/
Okay, this is a bit of a PR puff piece, but it's still interesting. Who'd have thought a 23-mile long tunnel with its own railway was the *least* innovative part of a project? Because it also includes Europe's deepest mine, and buried winding gear. Oh, and it's named after two geologists - will we see a @Richard_Tyndall mine?
Oh, and it's in Britain.
The only downside is that it's in the inferior county of Yorkshire...
"So that gives fair gap for LAB in the latest round of polling but, of course, the five-week general election campaign could change all of that. Just remember what happened to TMay at GE2017"
Can easily see SKS being as bad as TM when under scrutiny. Fortunately for him RS is no Jeremy Corbyn and wont gain ground as quick as Jezza did
Hung Parliament nailed on as by GE 2024 inflation will be less than 3% and the Tories will get credit for solving the cost of living crisis (undeserved) so will start with a small deficit of no less than 10% and will pull a few points back as Sunak outperforms SKS and the Right wing press do their thing
The Sun always back the winner. Nobody aged under 70 has ever voted in a general election in which they didn't. (Although Rupe was narky in 2010 when the Tories only won most seats and failed to win a majority.)
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
Another equally gloomy article from Dan Hannan on whether we are seeing the end of the Liberalism which grew from the late 18th and early 19th century to peak at the end of the 20th and early 21st century. Instead we are facing a battle between leftist Woke cancel culture and rightwing illiberal nationalist conservatism https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/05/06/blasphemy-codes-still-with-us-if-js-mill-were-alive-today/
Yes but Hannan is a twat and best ignored.
He is, but there is a belief, especially amongst those of us of a liberal mindview, that progress is always in one direction - towards liberalism.
It isn't - and the reverse can be slow and damaging. Trump was elected in 2016, but some of his decisions are causing reverses in some US states today.
"So that gives fair gap for LAB in the latest round of polling but, of course, the five-week general election campaign could change all of that. Just remember what happened to TMay at GE2017"
Can easily see SKS being as bad as TM when under scrutiny. Fortunately for him RS is no Jeremy Corbyn and wont gain ground as quick as Jezza did
Hung Parliament nailed on as by GE 2024 inflation will be less than 3% and the Tories will get credit for solving the cost of living crisis (undeserved) so will start with a small deficit of no less than 10% and will pull a few points back as Sunak outperforms SKS and the Right wing press do their thing
Quite a few assumptions there:
- Inflation looks stickier than hoped. It may well stay 5%+ for the rest of this year, which is hardly low enough to fly the 'mission accomplished' banner.
- If it does come down to 2%, that may be because we're entering a recession, which hardly bodes well for the incumbent.
I agree there's a path to a hung parliament, but it looks to me like there's risks in both directions for Sunak.
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
Not just 'net zero'... add other time consuming hobby horses like Brexit to the list.
It has been clear for many years that surveillance capitalism was advancing out of control and also that AI is an existential risk, poorly understood by policymakers and not taken seriously. Even now it seems to be naively underestimated, people try and find answers and settle on something like 'you can't stop human learning', or come up with false reassurances that 'the risk of existential collapse is low', or 'it is not very advanced'.
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
Not just 'net zero'... add other time consuming hobby horses like Brexit to the list.
It has been clear for many years that surveillance capitalism was advancing out of control and also that AI is an existential risk, poorly understood by policymakers and not taken seriously. Even now it seems to be naively underestimated, people try and find answers and settle on something like 'you can't stop human learning', or come up with false reassurances that 'the risk of existential collapse is low', or 'it is not very advanced'.
Ai is not a direct risk, as it stands at the moment or in the foreseeable future (unless there is another technological stepchange).
The direct risk comes from idiots believing AI's are actually intelligent, and trusting them more than their own common sense, because the computer must be correct.
"Yes, I should put this screwdriver into the mains electrical socket. The AI told me too..."
"So that gives fair gap for LAB in the latest round of polling but, of course, the five-week general election campaign could change all of that. Just remember what happened to TMay at GE2017"
Can easily see SKS being as bad as TM when under scrutiny. Fortunately for him RS is no Jeremy Corbyn and wont gain ground as quick as Jezza did
Hung Parliament nailed on as by GE 2024 inflation will be less than 3% and the Tories will get credit for solving the cost of living crisis (undeserved) so will start with a small deficit of no less than 10% and will pull a few points back as Sunak outperforms SKS and the Right wing press do their thing
I love the way you still delude yourself that the thickest man ever to have been LoTO in this country was some kind of genius. It's hilarious.
Corbyn led Labour to their worst ever electoral defeat.
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
Another equally gloomy article from Dan Hannan on whether we are seeing the end of the Liberalism which grew from the late 18th and early 19th century to peak at the end of the 20th and early 21st century. Instead we are facing a battle between leftist Woke cancel culture and rightwing illiberal nationalist conservatism https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/05/06/blasphemy-codes-still-with-us-if-js-mill-were-alive-today/
Yes but Hannan is a twat and best ignored.
He is, but there is a belief, especially amongst those of us of a liberal mindview, that progress is always in one direction - towards liberalism.
It isn't - and the reverse can be slow and damaging. Trump was elected in 2016, but some of his decisions are causing reverses in some US states today.
Also the brief that a cohesive, liberal democratic society just happens - and that we don't need to do anything to integrate people and help them find a shared worldview.
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
Not just 'net zero'... add other time consuming hobby horses like Brexit to the list.
It has been clear for many years that surveillance capitalism was advancing out of control and also that AI is an existential risk, poorly understood by policymakers and not taken seriously. Even now it seems to be naively underestimated, people try and find answers and settle on something like 'you can't stop human learning', or come up with false reassurances that 'the risk of existential collapse is low', or 'it is not very advanced'.
yes much more relaxed about climate change than I am about AI or (indeed) nuclear war- The recent AI moves have left me cold and depressed in many ways - it cannot be much of a step to go (if indeed not there already ) where a nation can unleash armies of robots against humans. Even if not end of the world , it will be a world without the need for human creativity or purpose. Just like nuclear weapons , climate change ,AI is also not stoppable in any meaningful sense and whilst humanity can live in with global warming , I am not sure it can (at least its very soul) with AI or indeed nuclear war. If the Church of England had some gumption it would focus on this rather than climate change or some secular woke stuff like gay marriages as a way to get people to God again
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
Another equally gloomy article from Dan Hannan on whether we are seeing the end of the Liberalism which grew from the late 18th and early 19th century to peak at the end of the 20th and early 21st century. Instead we are facing a battle between leftist Woke cancel culture and rightwing illiberal nationalist conservatism https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/05/06/blasphemy-codes-still-with-us-if-js-mill-were-alive-today/
Yes but Hannan is a twat and best ignored.
And we're back at the Robert Shrimsley piece in the FT (google "How the Thatcherites lost their Brexit dream and their party"). People like Hannan had a lovely theory of how Brexit should play out- and had Ireland, the Netherlands, Sweden et al only done the right thing and joined us, maybe it would have worked.
But having aligned themselves with rightwing illiberal nationalists to get the fact of Brexit they wanted, they were then trapped with a form of Brexit they really didn't. Heart of stone etc etc.
Except that their strategic screwup has taken the rest of us down as well.
The problem bro is that you claim to be Labour yet hate the man who is likely to deliver the first Labour Government since 2010. Why?
1 I dont claim to be Labour I stopped being Labour in 2020
2 I have explained many times why I will never vote Labour under SKS
3. He has gambled on winning over Tories and can afford to lose Socialists
I think it will backfire (we only have 18 months max to see if you with your massive Lab Majority or me with a hung Parliament is right
Do you not think that Labour being socialist will NEVER win as per 2017 and 2019?
No Labour being Socialist and offering something for the Many not the few produced the biggest swing to Lab since WW2 in 2017. 2019 was about an oven ready deal vs a 2nd Referendum nothing to do with Socialism
The problem bro is that you claim to be Labour yet hate the man who is likely to deliver the first Labour Government since 2010. Why?
1 I dont claim to be Labour I stopped being Labour in 2020
2 I have explained many times why I will never vote Labour under SKS
3. He has gambled on winning over Tories and can afford to lose Socialists
I think it will backfire (we only have 18 months max to see if you with your massive Lab Majority or me with a hung Parliament is right
I am no fan of Starmer, and am even more suspicious of Streeting, and won't be voting for them either.
I do accept though that even they are a better choice than the corrupt, mendacious incompetents of the current government. The Tories need to be chucked out for the good of democracy, even if little better.
There's so much to be said about this, from many angles. But I'll just say this: would the mocking soldiers have been so contemptuous if they'd required her services on the field? Or whether they'd have said the same to a male medic?
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
Not just 'net zero'... add other time consuming hobby horses like Brexit to the list.
It has been clear for many years that surveillance capitalism was advancing out of control and also that AI is an existential risk, poorly understood by policymakers and not taken seriously. Even now it seems to be naively underestimated, people try and find answers and settle on something like 'you can't stop human learning', or come up with false reassurances that 'the risk of existential collapse is low', or 'it is not very advanced'.
Ai is not a direct risk, as it stands at the moment or in the foreseeable future (unless there is another technological stepchange).
The direct risk comes from idiots believing AI's are actually intelligent, and trusting them more than their own common sense, because the computer must be correct.
"Yes, I should put this screwdriver into the mains electrical socket. The AI told me too..."
From what I can see I would say the problem is with the rate it is advancing and the lack of control and oversight, which will lead to rapid 'paradigm shifts' - as we saw with the rapid advance of chatbots and image generation technology.
The problem bro is that you claim to be Labour yet hate the man who is likely to deliver the first Labour Government since 2010. Why?
1 I dont claim to be Labour I stopped being Labour in 2020
2 I have explained many times why I will never vote Labour under SKS
3. He has gambled on winning over Tories and can afford to lose Socialists
I think it will backfire (we only have 18 months max to see if you with your massive Lab Majority or me with a hung Parliament is right
Do you not think that Labour being socialist will NEVER win as per 2017 and 2019?
No Labour being Socialist and offering something for the Many not the few produced the biggest swing to Lab since WW2 in 2017. 2019 was about an oven ready deal vs a 2nd Referendum nothing to do with Socialism
Sarah Montague gave a very robust defence of Houchen on WATO. She demanded Andy Mc Donald repeat the accusations he made against Houchen under parliamentary privilege. He refused, and Sarah took the win on behalf of Ben.
I have to say selling millions of pounds worth of (even brownfield) real estate for less than a tenner raised my eyebrow.
I don't know anything about this situation. However in my experience it is common for these brownfield sites to have a zero value, for instance where the clean up costs exceed the land value even with planning permission in place.
I believe the same site had been bought with public funds for a significant (£millions) fee a year or two earlier.
I don't there's a benefit of the doubt entitlement involved in the free gift of public land.
The problem bro is that you claim to be Labour yet hate the man who is likely to deliver the first Labour Government since 2010. Why?
1 I dont claim to be Labour I stopped being Labour in 2020
2 I have explained many times why I will never vote Labour under SKS
3. He has gambled on winning over Tories and can afford to lose Socialists
I think it will backfire (we only have 18 months max to see if you with your massive Lab Majority or me with a hung Parliament is right
Do you not think that Labour being socialist will NEVER win as per 2017 and 2019?
No Labour being Socialist and offering something for the Many not the few produced the biggest swing to Lab since WW2 in 2017. 2019 was about an oven ready deal vs a 2nd Referendum nothing to do with Socialism
Why wasn't 2019 about socialism? If it was such a popular idea in 2017, why did so many people turn their back on it so quickly? Isn't it part of the skill of a good politician to keep people thinking and talking about the things YOU believe in?
You cannot assert that 2017 was something Corbyn did and 2019 was just something that happened. He was the leader for both elections. His skills and his weaknesses are there for all to see and you need to consider both elections to have anything sensible to say about him.
Okay, this is a bit of a PR puff piece, but it's still interesting. Who'd have thought a 23-mile long tunnel with its own railway was the *least* innovative part of a project? Because it also includes Europe's deepest mine, and buried winding gear. Oh, and it's named after two geologists - will we see a @Richard_Tyndall mine?
Oh, and it's in Britain.
The only downside is that it's in the inferior county of Yorkshire...
The problem bro is that you claim to be Labour yet hate the man who is likely to deliver the first Labour Government since 2010. Why?
1 I dont claim to be Labour I stopped being Labour in 2020
2 I have explained many times why I will never vote Labour under SKS
3. He has gambled on winning over Tories and can afford to lose Socialists
I think it will backfire (we only have 18 months max to see if you with your massive Lab Majority or me with a hung Parliament is right
Do you not think that Labour being socialist will NEVER win as per 2017 and 2019?
No Labour being Socialist and offering something for the Many not the few produced the biggest swing to Lab since WW2 in 2017. 2019 was about an oven ready deal vs a 2nd Referendum nothing to do with Socialism
2017 was actually about stopping a hard Brexit, as soon as it looked like Corbyn's socialism might win you got 2019.
The Tory vote actually only rose 1.2% from 2017 to 2019, the main swing from 2017 to 2019 was Labour to LD. The LD voteshare in 2019 was up 4.2% on 2017 and the Labour voteshare down 7.9%
There's so much to be said about this, from many angles. But I'll just say this: would the mocking soldiers have been so contemptuous if they'd required her services on the field? Or whether they'd have said the same to a male medic?
I think soldiers generally mock others who have medals - its a banter thing ? I certainly used to do with colleagues who had won employee of the month!
There may be genuine concerns about "true" AI. The problem for me seems to be the media have decided it's this week's boogeyman (despite decades of films, TV series and books writing about it in such existential terms) because of a few crappy chatbots. So I'm finding it a bit hard to take it all so po-faced serious as I supposedly ought to be doing.
"So that gives fair gap for LAB in the latest round of polling but, of course, the five-week general election campaign could change all of that. Just remember what happened to TMay at GE2017"
Can easily see SKS being as bad as TM when under scrutiny. Fortunately for him RS is no Jeremy Corbyn and wont gain ground as quick as Jezza did
Hung Parliament nailed on as by GE 2024 inflation will be less than 3% and the Tories will get credit for solving the cost of living crisis (undeserved) so will start with a small deficit of no less than 10% and will pull a few points back as Sunak outperforms SKS and the Right wing press do their thing
The Sun always back the winner. Nobody aged under 70 has ever voted in a general election in which they didn't. (Although Rupe was narky in 2010 when the Tories only won most seats and failed to win a majority.)
2017 Rupe nearly fooked it despite throwing everything at Jezza due to the threat to end the Billionaire gravy train
2024 will be Rupes last ever GE you would have thought
SKS has been bought by Rupe.
I predict SKS will get less votes for LAB in 2024 than the 12m Jezza got in 2017 but may well win most seats
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
Not just 'net zero'... add other time consuming hobby horses like Brexit to the list.
It has been clear for many years that surveillance capitalism was advancing out of control and also that AI is an existential risk, poorly understood by policymakers and not taken seriously. Even now it seems to be naively underestimated, people try and find answers and settle on something like 'you can't stop human learning', or come up with false reassurances that 'the risk of existential collapse is low', or 'it is not very advanced'.
Ai is not a direct risk, as it stands at the moment or in the foreseeable future (unless there is another technological stepchange).
The direct risk comes from idiots believing AI's are actually intelligent, and trusting them more than their own common sense, because the computer must be correct.
"Yes, I should put this screwdriver into the mains electrical socket. The AI told me too..."
From what I can see I would say the problem is with the rate it is advancing and the lack of control and oversight, which will lead to rapid 'paradigm shifts' - as we saw with the rapid advance of chatbots and image generation technology.
I'll say something controversial here: it's not advancing fast. elizabots would fool some people thirty years ago. There is no massively new innovative breakthrough; just more computer power and massively larger data sets.
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
Not just 'net zero'... add other time consuming hobby horses like Brexit to the list.
It has been clear for many years that surveillance capitalism was advancing out of control and also that AI is an existential risk, poorly understood by policymakers and not taken seriously. Even now it seems to be naively underestimated, people try and find answers and settle on something like 'you can't stop human learning', or come up with false reassurances that 'the risk of existential collapse is low', or 'it is not very advanced'.
Ai is not a direct risk, as it stands at the moment or in the foreseeable future (unless there is another technological stepchange).
The direct risk comes from idiots believing AI's are actually intelligent, and trusting them more than their own common sense, because the computer must be correct.
"Yes, I should put this screwdriver into the mains electrical socket. The AI told me too..."
From what I can see I would say the problem is with the rate it is advancing and the lack of control and oversight, which will lead to rapid 'paradigm shifts' - as we saw with the rapid advance of chatbots and image generation technology.
I'll say something controversial here: it's not advancing fast. elizabots would fool some people thirty years ago. There is no massively new innovative breakthrough; just more computer power and massively larger data sets.
(runs for cover)
You're absolutely right. The recent wave of enthusiasm is a classic hype bubble. We have not crossed an inflection point and nor are we close to one.
The problem bro is that you claim to be Labour yet hate the man who is likely to deliver the first Labour Government since 2010. Why?
1 I dont claim to be Labour I stopped being Labour in 2020
2 I have explained many times why I will never vote Labour under SKS
3. He has gambled on winning over Tories and can afford to lose Socialists
I think it will backfire (we only have 18 months max to see if you with your massive Lab Majority or me with a hung Parliament is right
Do you not think that Labour being socialist will NEVER win as per 2017 and 2019?
No Labour being Socialist and offering something for the Many not the few produced the biggest swing to Lab since WW2 in 2017. 2019 was about an oven ready deal vs a 2nd Referendum nothing to do with Socialism
2017 was actually about stopping a hard Brexit, as soon as it looked like Corbyn's socialism might win you got 2019.
The Tory vote actually only rose 1.2% from 2017 to 2019, the main swing from 2017 to 2019 was Labour to LD. The LD voteshare in 2019 was up 4.2% on 2017 and the Labour voteshare down 7.9%
It was interesting to note that on the figures The Jezziah used to share obsessively showing why Labour voters voted Labour in 2017, just 56% did so because they liked Labour's policy offering.
That accords well with the 22-23% Labour were bumbling along at in the polls before the election campaign.
It's an astonishingly low number. Sure, it was the number given by the biggest single group for voting for Labour, but the idea that only just over half your voters like your policies is quite extraordinary.
The problem bro is that you claim to be Labour yet hate the man who is likely to deliver the first Labour Government since 2010. Why?
1 I dont claim to be Labour I stopped being Labour in 2020
2 I have explained many times why I will never vote Labour under SKS
3. He has gambled on winning over Tories and can afford to lose Socialists
I think it will backfire (we only have 18 months max to see if you with your massive Lab Majority or me with a hung Parliament is right
Do you not think that Labour being socialist will NEVER win as per 2017 and 2019?
No Labour being Socialist and offering something for the Many not the few produced the biggest swing to Lab since WW2 in 2017. 2019 was about an oven ready deal vs a 2nd Referendum nothing to do with Socialism
Left and right seem to have one thing in common at the moment. They both believe the end of the world may be nigh.
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes Allister Heath" (£)
Not just 'net zero'... add other time consuming hobby horses like Brexit to the list.
It has been clear for many years that surveillance capitalism was advancing out of control and also that AI is an existential risk, poorly understood by policymakers and not taken seriously. Even now it seems to be naively underestimated, people try and find answers and settle on something like 'you can't stop human learning', or come up with false reassurances that 'the risk of existential collapse is low', or 'it is not very advanced'.
Ai is not a direct risk, as it stands at the moment or in the foreseeable future (unless there is another technological stepchange).
The direct risk comes from idiots believing AI's are actually intelligent, and trusting them more than their own common sense, because the computer must be correct.
"Yes, I should put this screwdriver into the mains electrical socket. The AI told me too..."
From what I can see I would say the problem is with the rate it is advancing and the lack of control and oversight, which will lead to rapid 'paradigm shifts' - as we saw with the rapid advance of chatbots and image generation technology.
I'll say something controversial here: it's not advancing fast. elizabots would fool some people thirty years ago. There is no massively new innovative breakthrough; just more computer power and massively larger data sets.
(runs for cover)
You're absolutely right. The recent wave of enthusiasm is a classic hype bubble. We have not crossed an inflection point and nor are we close to one.
And I wonder why the people financially invested in that bubble are so keen to prevent new entrants via legislation?
Comments
Key to the miscalculation was Brexit’s impact on their party. Since Thatcher, there have been three legs to the Tory stool — the free-marketers, the traditionalist social conservatives and the metropolitan Tories — exemplified by the leadership of David Cameron and George Osborne.
Though this last group was more culturally liberal, economically they were still Thatcherites. They believed in free trade, globalisation, lower taxes to encourage investment and reduced public spending. Before the referendum, the social and economic liberals were broadly aligned.
Brexit smashed this coalition. But Leave liberals were slow to recognise that Brexit was also a revolt against their ideology, delivered by the populist arguments of those who were hardline on immigration, suspicious of big business, keen on culture wars and comfortable with a more interventionist state and better-funded public services. The famous Brexit pledge was, after all, more money for the NHS.
During the referendum itself, the alliance made sense. But once it was over, instead of allying with the globalists and Remainers turned soft-Brexiters, many free-market Leavers made common cause with populists who never shared their economic vision. They believed that maximising “Brexit freedoms” would secure the smaller state.
Key UK service industries — and prosperous southern voters — were sacrificed to a bad trade deal as they built a new Tory electoral coalition. This delivered victory but handed their party to populists and weakened those who shared their economic values. The clues were always there, not least in the openly interventionist Boris Johnson’s “fuck business” outburst. The pandemic destroyed their room for manoeuvre by wrecking the public finances but the pass had already been sold.
Their desperate attempt to regain the initiative was to abandon a core belief in fiscal prudence for the chaos of the Liz Truss government: it shredded the Tory reputation for economic competence and the free-market cause.
But even when Truss used her only party conference speech as leader to rail against the “anti-growth coalition”, she failed to notice it was sitting in front of her, in the rows of Nimbys, immigration hawks and urbanite-hating culture warriors. The party is locked into a low growth economic model and a belief in spending cuts which struggles to be specific.
In retrospect, you could probably have achieved 50% of the reductions in R by closing nightclubs/karaoke bars/live music venues and requiring masks on public transport, while letting people otherwise go about their business.
The limitations on people visiting each other in their homes, or on going outside for a walk, were absolutely indefensible.
(And in between those two there were restrictions of varying degrees of sense.)
To borrow Oscar Wilde’s quip about the death of Little Nell, it would take a heart of stone not to hear the wails of free-market Brexiters without laughing.
Striking up a conversation with a stranger would be considered evidence of being a sociopath or drunk. Or both.
https://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/23559439.ben-houchen-involved-row-hartlepool-asset-transfer/
AI - the LLM models at least - are parasitic on Stack Overflow. ChatGPT is trained on Stack Overflow and Reddit text. It has no knowledge of Linux filesystems, except that which it has extracted from those very experts.
If you take away the text for it to parse, then ChatGPT can't function. As from whence would it get its knowledge?
Sure, some aspects of restrictions could be better targeted, but the idea that we could have carried on living normally while this was going on was delusional.
Sure, some aspects of restrictions could be better targeted, but Is Iowa not doing things differently this year.
Also, things will change between now and the next General Election.
The problem is that we don't know which way things will move.
Oh, and it's in Britain.
The only downside is that it's in the inferior county of Yorkshire...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22dIkWYUAxQ
The new Code Interpreter mode is also quite impressive.
I have to say selling millions of pounds worth of (even brownfield) real estate for less than a tenner raised my eyebrow.
Brexit however has changed that coalition. Boris managed to win over working class voters on a ticket of regaining sovereignty and reducing immigration, fighting Woke and rebuilding British industry and more investment in public services on a scale no Tory leader had managed since Salisbury or Baldwin. Upper middle class voters who backed Remain however are now increasingly voting Liberal or even Starmer Labour
If you think Labour have a greater chance than 80% of winning most seats, and you fancy placing a bet this far out from an election, it would make sense for you to bet on them because that's the implied probability of that outcome at Betfair at the moment:
https://www.betfair.com/exchange/plus/politics/market/1.167249009
(^ I do not advise this.)
"Canada's population is just weeks away from reaching the 40 million mark"
https://dailyhive.com/canada/canadas-population-40-million
"Humanity’s annihilation is far more likely than anyone dares contemplate
The obsession with net zero has left elites bizarrely blind to the risks posed by AI, biowarfare and nukes
Allister Heath" (£)
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/05/31/humanitys-annihilation-more-likely-than-we-dare-contemplate/
Equally if they are wrong in the other direction your team is f*****!
"So that gives fair gap for LAB in the latest round of polling but, of course, the five-week general election campaign could change all of that. Just remember what happened to TMay at GE2017"
Can easily see SKS being as bad as TM when under scrutiny. Fortunately for him RS is no Jeremy Corbyn and wont gain ground as quick as Jezza did
Hung Parliament nailed on as by GE 2024 inflation will be less than 3% and the Tories will get credit for solving the cost of living crisis (undeserved) so will start with a small deficit of no less than 10% and will pull a few points back as Sunak outperforms SKS and the Right wing press do their thing
Unfortunately, many of them are mutually exclusive.
https://twitter.com/newstatesman/status/1663991750292062217?s=61&t=s0ae0IFncdLS1Dc7J0P_TQ
It is also because the b*****d on the phone diagonally opposite was effing and jeffing and being a dick, and vanishing into earphones and tablet is the best way of being inconspicuous and not be thumped.
Who is the second best rugby team in South Africa? South Africa reserve
Who is the third best rugby team in South Africa? Scotland.
The cost of renovating some chemical brownfield sites is *massive* - enough to make them not worth the bother. Little items like mercury bearings in sewage works are far more problematic than the pollution from the sewage itself - especially if they've been buried.
Corbyn led Labour to their worst ever electoral defeat.
JC fan please explain.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/05/06/blasphemy-codes-still-with-us-if-js-mill-were-alive-today/
2 I have explained many times why I will never vote Labour under SKS
3. He has gambled on winning over Tories and can afford to lose Socialists
I think it will backfire (we only have 18 months max to see if you with your massive Lab Majority or me with a hung Parliament is right
Nobody aged under 70 has ever voted in a general election in which they didn't. (Although Rupe was narky in 2010 when the Tories only won most seats and failed to win a majority.)
It isn't - and the reverse can be slow and damaging. Trump was elected in 2016, but some of his decisions are causing reverses in some US states today.
- Inflation looks stickier than hoped. It may well stay 5%+ for the rest of this year, which is hardly low enough to fly the 'mission accomplished' banner.
- If it does come down to 2%, that may be because we're entering a recession, which hardly bodes well for the incumbent.
I agree there's a path to a hung parliament, but it looks to me like there's risks in both directions for Sunak.
It has been clear for many years that surveillance capitalism was advancing out of control and also that AI is an existential risk, poorly understood by policymakers and not taken seriously. Even now it seems to be naively underestimated, people try and find answers and settle on something like 'you can't stop human learning', or come up with false reassurances that 'the risk of existential collapse is low', or 'it is not very advanced'.
The direct risk comes from idiots believing AI's are actually intelligent, and trusting them more than their own common sense, because the computer must be correct.
"Yes, I should put this screwdriver into the mains electrical socket. The AI told me too..."
But having aligned themselves with rightwing illiberal nationalists to get the fact of Brexit they wanted, they were then trapped with a form of Brexit they really didn't. Heart of stone etc etc.
Except that their strategic screwup has taken the rest of us down as well.
2019 was about an oven ready deal vs a 2nd Referendum nothing to do with Socialism
https://twitter.com/chelleryn99/status/1650997009699024896/photo/1
I do accept though that even they are a better choice than the corrupt, mendacious incompetents of the current government. The Tories need to be chucked out for the good of democracy, even if little better.
https://www.forces.net/women/mod-launches-investigation-after-veteran-mocked-over-medals-garden-party
There's so much to be said about this, from many angles. But I'll just say this: would the mocking soldiers have been so contemptuous if they'd required her services on the field? Or whether they'd have said the same to a male medic?
32,100 km2
You cannot assert that 2017 was something Corbyn did and 2019 was just something that happened. He was the leader for both elections. His skills and his weaknesses are there for all to see and you need to consider both elections to have anything sensible to say about him.
The Tory vote actually only rose 1.2% from 2017 to 2019, the main swing from 2017 to 2019 was Labour to LD. The LD voteshare in 2019 was up 4.2% on 2017 and the Labour voteshare down 7.9%
2024 will be Rupes last ever GE you would have thought
SKS has been bought by Rupe.
I predict SKS will get less votes for LAB in 2024 than the 12m Jezza got in 2017 but may well win most seats
(runs for cover)
That accords well with the 22-23% Labour were bumbling along at in the polls before the election campaign.
It's an astonishingly low number. Sure, it was the number given by the biggest single group for voting for Labour, but the idea that only just over half your voters like your policies is quite extraordinary.
It also shows how imposingly May screwed up.
Hmmm ...