Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
Zelensky is also a shortarse, but it's not troubled him.
Starmer is also diminutive at 5ft.8 and two thirds. Compare this to the statuesque Boris Johnson at a whopping 5ft 8 and three quarters.
Macron is 5 foot 7. Biden by contrast is 6 ft and Trump 6 ft 3
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
Zelensky is also a shortarse, but it's not troubled him.
Starmer is also diminutive at 5ft.8 and two thirds. Compare this to the statuesque Boris Johnson at a whopping 5ft 8 and three quarters.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
Isn't it also due to Bonaparte's relatively average background in Corsica, which gave him the average height for the time - whereas all his generals were dukes and viscounts and, like all well fed aristocracy of the time, about six inches taller than average. So they towered over him, making him APPEAR relatively short
Also headdress, no? Simple athwartships bicorn hat vs assorted shakos and helmets and so on.
I think i'd read like 6 Sharpe novels before I figurued out what a shako was supposed to be. Not my proudest moment.
SNP in danger of finishing third in Scotland behind the Tories.
Labour 31%
SNP 31%
SCons 28%
I mean it is a subsample so as about as accurate as an American war movie.
Indeed but if the SNP finished third in Scotland on votes and seats that would be even more humiliating for Yousaf than the next election is likely to be for Rishi.
100+ seats lost in England and Wales and 2 or 3 gains in Scotland for the Tories? Looks on to me.
Yes Scotland has a habit of doing the opposite to England recently. 2010 saw Labour hold all its seats but the Tories win a majority in England. 2015 saw a Tory majority in England and the UK but an SNP landslide in Scotland. 2017 saw significant SNP losses to the Tories in Scotland but the Tories losing seats in England and their majority in the UK. 2019 saw the Conservatives win a majority in England and UK wide but lose over half their Scottish seats to the SNP.
2024 looks no different in terms of the SNP and Tories at least but it does look like Starmer might break the mould by being the first main UK party leader since Blair to win big in England and Scotland
We have our own elections up here and one of the things that concern me as a Unionist is how disaggregated they have become. A Labour government with a serious chunk of Scottish seats might improve that and I would welcome that, whatever reservations I have about SKS and his shadow cabinet.
'disaggregated', meaning, please?
Not being influenced by the same factors, not moving in the same direction, not correlated.
Thanks. Which, I suppose, is an indication of (a) devolution and (b) more generally a distinct polity.
Yes, which is why as a Unionist I don't like it. We are having our own conversation up here and it is no longer a UK one. I hope that changes.
On the other hand, any insistence that all conversations have to be the same across the UK - or the imposition of suich a doctrine - would be a priori unreasonable and inherently very damaging to the concept of a UK.
If the polls are to be believed labour are heading for a majority in Scotland Wales and England and a very large one overall at that
Far too early to say. Sunak still has the media onside to big him up and scythe down the hopeless Starmer. I reckon I am still on for my 20 seat Con majority.
It is reported that here in North Wales objectors to the blanket 20mph rule are tampering with the signs with one side 30 and the other side 20 and saying take your choice !!!
20mph sign vandals face police action for creating 'take-your-pick' speed limits
I have some sympathy with reducing the limits around urban streets in Cardiff, Newport and Swansea to 20mph, particularly around schools and play areas.
One of the pilot areas is through St Brides Major. The 20 is plenty limit runs all the way from where St Brides Common meets the village all the way out into the countryside on the other side of the village, which is where the GoSafe partnership hide to catch out motorists. Our village had been earmarked for a specific area in the central village between the two pubs was earmarked to drop from 30 to 20, which is fine by me. However , community council retired, bike riding retired so gooders with toe village o much time on their hands are lobbying the Vale Council to make the entire village a twenty, which means half a mile into the countryside at either end that's where Go Safe will be.
One good thing has come of the changes. When it was a 30 in St Brides, I tried to keep below 40. Now it is a 20 I try to stick below 30.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
Isn't it also due to Bonaparte's relatively average background in Corsica, which gave him the average height for the time - whereas all his generals were dukes and viscounts and, like all well fed aristocracy of the time, about six inches taller than average. So they towered over him, making him APPEAR relatively short
This really isn't my period, but didn't Bonaparte create a "new nobility"? Very much designed to put a stake through the heart of the old nobility? So, less likely they had aristocratic genes for generations? Or maybe I'm wrong in my thinking?
I'm pretty sure he had plenty of blue blooded French toffs in his higher ranks, even if he introduced some meritocracy as well
Indeed there is an excellent anecdote about this (possibly apocryphal, and possibly said by some other French dude, but too good not to quote anyway). One day all Bonaparte's posho generals were boasting about their amazing noble lineages, their ancestral families dating back to Charlemagne, their ancestors who were dukes and kings in the Carolingian era
Bonaparte listened to all this tedious vanglory for a time, then shut them all up by saying "pfff, je suis un ancetre!"
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
Zelensky is also a shortarse, but it's not troubled him.
Starmer is also diminutive at 5ft.8 and two thirds. Compare this to the statuesque Boris Johnson at a whopping 5ft 8 and three quarters.
That's around average height.
Perhaps it would assist in evaluating posts here if all posters were required to state their height alongside the username.
Honestly, that Just Stop Oil stunt at Osborne's wedding. It is beyond cringe. And the smirking lady of about 60 who did it. Jesus
Also, for a second the just-married couple must have been terrified they were being attacked, with acid or whatever
The radical Green lobby needs to rid itself of these effete middle class twats who come up with these stunts. A friend of mine joined XR and she said the meetings were mortifying. They were all clueless, trust fund bourgeois fuckwits with too much time, or old rich lefties with no brains. She quit in despair
What on Earth was she expecting?
My friend? I guess she expected some seriousness
She eventually got the impression a lot of the XR and JSO people didn't actually CARE that much about the cause. For a lot of them it was a lark, some fun, and a chance to socialise and get on TV
She ended up loathing them (she's quite working class, educated, a committed environmentalist)
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
Isn't it also due to Bonaparte's relatively average background in Corsica, which gave him the average height for the time - whereas all his generals were dukes and viscounts and, like all well fed aristocracy of the time, about six inches taller than average. So they towered over him, making him APPEAR relatively short
Also headdress, no? Simple athwartships bicorn hat vs assorted shakos and helmets and so on.
I think i'd read like 6 Sharpe novels before I figurued out what a shako was supposed to be. Not my proudest moment.
What did you ‘think’ it was? 😀
I don't remember, some piece of attire to be sure, but a picture far from what it was.
Nobody would care about Rishi’s stature if he wasn’t also shite.
And yet, despite being (I’m assuming) shorter than you he has become a Prime Minister, made millions from his career, married well and he will be in the history books. If he’s “shite” then it leaves a lot of us here as merely the flies buzzing around the shite who didn’t produce the shite but hope to benefit from it in some small way.
A better poll for the Conservatives, but it comes to something when 28% is better:
🚨 Latest poll for @ObserverUK Labour lead at 15 points. Labour: 43% (-1) Conservatives: 28% (+3) Lib Dems: 9% (n/c) SNP: 3% (n/c) Green: 6% (-1) Reform UK: 8% (+1) (Changes are from a poll released in the Observer last week)
Quite. There's no way on God's Earth that RefUK are going to poll 8% in a General Election, or anywhere remotely close. Most of that lot are pissed off Tory supporters who have a tantrum when talking to pollsters, but will traipse back home again when the Government of the country is at stake.
I think they could get a similar share to UKIP in 2015 which was 12.9%.
Why are you so convinced they won't get anything like 8%?
In the actual world no-one has heard of Reform party or whatever it's called.
Polling is pretty variable, and obviously the Tories are, justly, in some sort of terminal trouble.
For trying to predict the actual result in 2024 at the moment I would factor in these things as things stand:
1) There aren't going to be huge votes that make much difference for parties other than C, LD, Lab and SNP. 2) Sir K is not Blair; balanced by the fact that Rishi is not Major. 3) In 1997 the actual GE vote was, in round figures: Lab 43. Con 31 4) I think the 2024 GE vote will be not far from the 1997 figures, within about 3 percent points (Lab 40-46, Con 28-34) though geographically differently distributed, and turnout low 5) Tactical voting won't help the Tories
This is spot on. Turn-out will be low because a lot of natural Tories will stay away, too pissed-off with the state of the government to vote for them but too loyal to vote for someone else.
Yes, though what Tories have done to beget loyalty eludes me; the other thing to note is the numbers I suggest, while in a fairly narrow range, are the difference (this is IMHO - views abound about vote share and seats because of the alleged collapse of UNS) between not quite a majority and a landslide.
And I think, despite the polling extremes, we can exclude the possibility of Tories being reduced to 50-75 seats.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
Zelensky is also a shortarse, but it's not troubled him.
Starmer is also diminutive at 5ft.8 and two thirds. Compare this to the statuesque Boris Johnson at a whopping 5ft 8 and three quarters.
That's around average height.
Perhaps it would assist in evaluating posts here if all posters were required to state their height alongside the username.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
Zelensky is also a shortarse, but it's not troubled him.
Starmer is also diminutive at 5ft.8 and two thirds. Compare this to the statuesque Boris Johnson at a whopping 5ft 8 and three quarters.
That's around average height.
Perhaps it would assist in evaluating posts here if all posters were required to state their height alongside the username.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
Isn't it also due to Bonaparte's relatively average background in Corsica, which gave him the average height for the time - whereas all his generals were dukes and viscounts and, like all well fed aristocracy of the time, about six inches taller than average. So they towered over him, making him APPEAR relatively short
This really isn't my period, but didn't Bonaparte create a "new nobility"? Very much designed to put a stake through the heart of the old nobility? So, less likely they had aristocratic genes for generations? Or maybe I'm wrong in my thinking?
I'm pretty sure he had plenty of blue blooded French toffs in his higher ranks, even if he introduced some meritocracy as well
Indeed there is an excellent anecdote about this (possibly apocryphal, and possibly said by some other French dude, but too good not to quote anyway). One day all Bonaparte's posho generals were boasting about their amazing noble lineages, their ancestral families dating back to Charlemagne, their ancestors who were dukes and kings in the Carolingian era
Bonaparte listened to all this tedious vanglory for a time, then shut them all up by saying "pfff, je suis un ancetre!"
I AM AN ANCESTOR
Good quote and very much in the Napeleon style albeit there were rather fewer aristocrats of aristocratic background in France when he was Emperor as half of them had been guillotined in the revolution or sent into exile.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
Zelensky is also a shortarse, but it's not troubled him.
Starmer is also diminutive at 5ft.8 and two thirds. Compare this to the statuesque Boris Johnson at a whopping 5ft 8 and three quarters.
That's around average height.
Perhaps it would assist in evaluating posts here if all posters were required to state their height alongside the username.
PtP [1.75m]
I'm about the same. I know average height in the UK is about 5'9 because I've read the research.
SNP in danger of finishing third in Scotland behind the Tories.
Labour 31%
SNP 31%
SCons 28%
I mean it is a subsample so as about as accurate as an American war movie.
Indeed but if the SNP finished third in Scotland on votes and seats that would be even more humiliating for Yousaf than the next election is likely to be for Rishi.
100+ seats lost in England and Wales and 2 or 3 gains in Scotland for the Tories? Looks on to me.
Yes Scotland has a habit of doing the opposite to England recently. 2010 saw Labour hold all its seats but the Tories win a majority in England. 2015 saw a Tory majority in England and the UK but an SNP landslide in Scotland. 2017 saw significant SNP losses to the Tories in Scotland but the Tories losing seats in England and their majority in the UK. 2019 saw the Conservatives win a majority in England and UK wide but lose over half their Scottish seats to the SNP.
2024 looks no different in terms of the SNP and Tories at least but it does look like Starmer might break the mould by being the first main UK party leader since Blair to win big in England and Scotland
We have our own elections up here and one of the things that concern me as a Unionist is how disaggregated they have become. A Labour government with a serious chunk of Scottish seats might improve that and I would welcome that, whatever reservations I have about SKS and his shadow cabinet.
'disaggregated', meaning, please?
Not being influenced by the same factors, not moving in the same direction, not correlated.
Thanks. Which, I suppose, is an indication of (a) devolution and (b) more generally a distinct polity.
Yes, which is why as a Unionist I don't like it. We are having our own conversation up here and it is no longer a UK one. I hope that changes.
On the other hand, any insistence that all conversations have to be the same across the UK - or the imposition of suich a doctrine - would be a priori unreasonable and inherently very damaging to the concept of a UK.
If the polls are to be believed labour are heading for a majority in Scotland Wales and England and a very large one overall at that
Far too early to say. Sunak still has the media onside to big him up and scythe down the hopeless Starmer. I reckon I am still on for my 20 seat Con majority.
It is reported that here in North Wales objectors to the blanket 20mph rule are tampering with the signs with one side 30 and the other side 20 and saying take your choice !!!
20mph sign vandals face police action for creating 'take-your-pick' speed limits
I have some sympathy with reducing the limits around urban streets in Cardiff, Newport and Swansea to 20mph, particularly around schools and play areas.
One of the pilot areas is through St Brides Major. The 20 is plenty limit runs all the way from where St Brides Common meets the village all the way out into the countryside on the other side of the village, which is where the GoSafe partnership hide to catch out motorists. Our village had been earmarked for a specific area in the central village between the two pubs was earmarked to drop from 30 to 20, which is fine by me. However , community council retired, bike riding retired so gooders with toe village o much time on their hands are lobbying the Vale Council to make the entire village a twenty, which means half a mile into the countryside at either end that's where Go Safe will be.
One good thing has come of the changes. When it was a 30 in St Brides, I tried to keep below 40. Now it is a 20 I try to stick below 30.
It does have merits around schools and play areas and certainly Llandudno Promenade but a blanket ban is unnecessary and actually concerns my son on his ability to attend a shout as RNLI crews do not have blue light authority
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He did. And we know where Peter the G stayed when he was in town: the house of the diarist John Evelyn
Apparently he absolutely wrecked the place. His soldiers vomited in the fireplaces and defecated in the wardrobes, and shot out all the windows for the bantz
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
Zelensky is also a shortarse, but it's not troubled him.
Starmer is also diminutive at 5ft.8 and two thirds. Compare this to the statuesque Boris Johnson at a whopping 5ft 8 and three quarters.
That's around average height.
Perhaps it would assist in evaluating posts here if all posters were required to state their height alongside the username.
PtP [1.75m]
MP (5ft8) None of your Remainer 1.72/3 m wokery in this part of South Wales.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He rented John Evelyn's house and trashed the holly hedges with drunken Russian larks
1.82m btw. All you posters look like little ants to me.
SNP in danger of finishing third in Scotland behind the Tories.
Labour 31%
SNP 31%
SCons 28%
I mean it is a subsample so as about as accurate as an American war movie.
Indeed but if the SNP finished third in Scotland on votes and seats that would be even more humiliating for Yousaf than the next election is likely to be for Rishi.
100+ seats lost in England and Wales and 2 or 3 gains in Scotland for the Tories? Looks on to me.
Yes Scotland has a habit of doing the opposite to England recently. 2010 saw Labour hold all its seats but the Tories win a majority in England. 2015 saw a Tory majority in England and the UK but an SNP landslide in Scotland. 2017 saw significant SNP losses to the Tories in Scotland but the Tories losing seats in England and their majority in the UK. 2019 saw the Conservatives win a majority in England and UK wide but lose over half their Scottish seats to the SNP.
2024 looks no different in terms of the SNP and Tories at least but it does look like Starmer might break the mould by being the first main UK party leader since Blair to win big in England and Scotland
We have our own elections up here and one of the things that concern me as a Unionist is how disaggregated they have become. A Labour government with a serious chunk of Scottish seats might improve that and I would welcome that, whatever reservations I have about SKS and his shadow cabinet.
'disaggregated', meaning, please?
Not being influenced by the same factors, not moving in the same direction, not correlated.
Thanks. Which, I suppose, is an indication of (a) devolution and (b) more generally a distinct polity.
Yes, which is why as a Unionist I don't like it. We are having our own conversation up here and it is no longer a UK one. I hope that changes.
On the other hand, any insistence that all conversations have to be the same across the UK - or the imposition of suich a doctrine - would be a priori unreasonable and inherently very damaging to the concept of a UK.
If the polls are to be believed labour are heading for a majority in Scotland Wales and England and a very large one overall at that
Far too early to say. Sunak still has the media onside to big him up and scythe down the hopeless Starmer. I reckon I am still on for my 20 seat Con majority.
It is reported that here in North Wales objectors to the blanket 20mph rule are tampering with the signs with one side 30 and the other side 20 and saying take your choice !!!
20mph sign vandals face police action for creating 'take-your-pick' speed limits
I have some sympathy with reducing the limits around urban streets in Cardiff, Newport and Swansea to 20mph, particularly around schools and play areas.
One of the pilot areas is through St Brides Major. The 20 is plenty limit runs all the way from where St Brides Common meets the village all the way out into the countryside on the other side of the village, which is where the GoSafe partnership hide to catch out motorists. Our village had been earmarked for a specific area in the central village between the two pubs was earmarked to drop from 30 to 20, which is fine by me. However , community council retired, bike riding retired so gooders with toe village o much time on their hands are lobbying the Vale Council to make the entire village a twenty, which means half a mile into the countryside at either end that's where Go Safe will be.
One good thing has come of the changes. When it was a 30 in St Brides, I tried to keep below 40. Now it is a 20 I try to stick below 30.
You'll get done for anything above 24 mph [20 + (20*10%) + 2].
The problem with the limit is that it applies 24/7, and therefore includes times and road conditions when it is absurdly low. The same cn be said of all standard speed limits, but is particularly true of the very low ones which are essentially there because of schoolchildren or heavy pedestrian presence at certain times of day.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
Zelensky is also a shortarse, but it's not troubled him.
Starmer is also diminutive at 5ft.8 and two thirds. Compare this to the statuesque Boris Johnson at a whopping 5ft 8 and three quarters.
That's around average height.
Perhaps it would assist in evaluating posts here if all posters were required to state their height alongside the username.
PtP [1.75m]
MP (5ft8) None of your Remainer 1.72/3 m wokery in this part of South Wales.
Mexican Pete, it shocks me that you are so short, I worry that if you were standing in carpet I might mistake you for underlay, underlay.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He did. And we know where Peter the G stayed when he was in town: the house of the diarist John Evelyn
Apparently he absolutely wrecked the place. His soldiers vomited in the fireplaces and defecated in the wardrobes, and shot out all the windows for the bantz
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He rented John Evelyn's house and trashed the holly hedges with drunken Russian larks
1.82m btw. All you posters look like little ants to me.
One does wonder, occasionally, if there is something fundamentally savage, feral and atavistic in the Russian soul, something Scythian and barbaric, that never goes away
Peter the Great's soldiers behaved exactly and as badly as Vladimir Putin's soldiers do now, centuries later. The cruelty and the drinking, the grandiose torture, the looting and puking
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He rented John Evelyn's house and trashed the holly hedges with drunken Russian larks
1.82m btw. All you posters look like little ants to me.
One does wonder, occasionally, if there is something fundamentally savage, feral and atavistic in the Russian soul, something Scythian and barbaric, that never goes away
Peter the Great's soldiers behaved exactly and as badly as Vladimir Putin's soldiers do now, centuries later. The cruelty and the drinking, the grandiose torture, the looting and puking
We did as well. Even up to WW2 we had our moments. Difference is probably only in the last 80 years otherwise no real difference.
SNP in danger of finishing third in Scotland behind the Tories.
Labour 31%
SNP 31%
SCons 28%
I mean it is a subsample so as about as accurate as an American war movie.
Indeed but if the SNP finished third in Scotland on votes and seats that would be even more humiliating for Yousaf than the next election is likely to be for Rishi.
100+ seats lost in England and Wales and 2 or 3 gains in Scotland for the Tories? Looks on to me.
Yes Scotland has a habit of doing the opposite to England recently. 2010 saw Labour hold all its seats but the Tories win a majority in England. 2015 saw a Tory majority in England and the UK but an SNP landslide in Scotland. 2017 saw significant SNP losses to the Tories in Scotland but the Tories losing seats in England and their majority in the UK. 2019 saw the Conservatives win a majority in England and UK wide but lose over half their Scottish seats to the SNP.
2024 looks no different in terms of the SNP and Tories at least but it does look like Starmer might break the mould by being the first main UK party leader since Blair to win big in England and Scotland
We have our own elections up here and one of the things that concern me as a Unionist is how disaggregated they have become. A Labour government with a serious chunk of Scottish seats might improve that and I would welcome that, whatever reservations I have about SKS and his shadow cabinet.
'disaggregated', meaning, please?
Not being influenced by the same factors, not moving in the same direction, not correlated.
Thanks. Which, I suppose, is an indication of (a) devolution and (b) more generally a distinct polity.
Yes, which is why as a Unionist I don't like it. We are having our own conversation up here and it is no longer a UK one. I hope that changes.
On the other hand, any insistence that all conversations have to be the same across the UK - or the imposition of suich a doctrine - would be a priori unreasonable and inherently very damaging to the concept of a UK.
If the polls are to be believed labour are heading for a majority in Scotland Wales and England and a very large one overall at that
Far too early to say. Sunak still has the media onside to big him up and scythe down the hopeless Starmer. I reckon I am still on for my 20 seat Con majority.
It is reported that here in North Wales objectors to the blanket 20mph rule are tampering with the signs with one side 30 and the other side 20 and saying take your choice !!!
20mph sign vandals face police action for creating 'take-your-pick' speed limits
I have some sympathy with reducing the limits around urban streets in Cardiff, Newport and Swansea to 20mph, particularly around schools and play areas.
One of the pilot areas is through St Brides Major. The 20 is plenty limit runs all the way from where St Brides Common meets the village all the way out into the countryside on the other side of the village, which is where the GoSafe partnership hide to catch out motorists. Our village had been earmarked for a specific area in the central village between the two pubs was earmarked to drop from 30 to 20, which is fine by me. However , community council retired, bike riding retired so gooders with toe village o much time on their hands are lobbying the Vale Council to make the entire village a twenty, which means half a mile into the countryside at either end that's where Go Safe will be.
One good thing has come of the changes. When it was a 30 in St Brides, I tried to keep below 40. Now it is a 20 I try to stick below 30.
It does have merits around schools and play areas and certainly Llandudno Promenade but a blanket ban is unnecessary and actually concerns my son on his ability to attend a shout as RNLI crews do not have blue light authority
My understanding is the reduction will be more sophisticated than a straight 10mph drop everywhere. That would be unworkable.
The busybody problem persists with do gooders interfering by demanding the reduction limits further around here.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He rented John Evelyn's house and trashed the holly hedges with drunken Russian larks
1.82m btw. All you posters look like little ants to me.
One does wonder, occasionally, if there is something fundamentally savage, feral and atavistic in the Russian soul, something Scythian and barbaric, that never goes away
Peter the Great's soldiers behaved exactly and as badly as Vladimir Putin's soldiers do now, centuries later. The cruelty and the drinking, the grandiose torture, the looting and puking
We did as well. Even up to WW2 we had our moments. Difference is probably only in the last 80 years otherwise no real difference.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He did. And we know where Peter the G stayed when he was in town: the house of the diarist John Evelyn
Apparently he absolutely wrecked the place. His soldiers vomited in the fireplaces and defecated in the wardrobes, and shot out all the windows for the bantz
He actually got hands-on working the wood alongside the shipwrights. Damn sight more than any UK aristo or even selfimportant middle class type would do.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He rented John Evelyn's house and trashed the holly hedges with drunken Russian larks
1.82m btw. All you posters look like little ants to me.
One does wonder, occasionally, if there is something fundamentally savage, feral and atavistic in the Russian soul, something Scythian and barbaric, that never goes away
Peter the Great's soldiers behaved exactly and as badly as Vladimir Putin's soldiers do now, centuries later. The cruelty and the drinking, the grandiose torture, the looting and puking
We did as well. Even up to WW2 we had our moments. Difference is probably only in the last 80 years otherwise no real difference.
I'm sure British troops have been pretty barbaric, like all troops, but the behavour at Peter the Great's court, and his descendants, is peerless in its mad hedonistic sadism and wild bizarrerie. Drunken dwarf weddings and instant death-by-vodka and mad peasant ogres and the like. The Great is such a brilliant comedy because it doesn't actually exaggerate that much, and its filthy surrealism captures the sordid lunacy
SNP in danger of finishing third in Scotland behind the Tories.
Labour 31%
SNP 31%
SCons 28%
I mean it is a subsample so as about as accurate as an American war movie.
Indeed but if the SNP finished third in Scotland on votes and seats that would be even more humiliating for Yousaf than the next election is likely to be for Rishi.
100+ seats lost in England and Wales and 2 or 3 gains in Scotland for the Tories? Looks on to me.
Yes Scotland has a habit of doing the opposite to England recently. 2010 saw Labour hold all its seats but the Tories win a majority in England. 2015 saw a Tory majority in England and the UK but an SNP landslide in Scotland. 2017 saw significant SNP losses to the Tories in Scotland but the Tories losing seats in England and their majority in the UK. 2019 saw the Conservatives win a majority in England and UK wide but lose over half their Scottish seats to the SNP.
2024 looks no different in terms of the SNP and Tories at least but it does look like Starmer might break the mould by being the first main UK party leader since Blair to win big in England and Scotland
We have our own elections up here and one of the things that concern me as a Unionist is how disaggregated they have become. A Labour government with a serious chunk of Scottish seats might improve that and I would welcome that, whatever reservations I have about SKS and his shadow cabinet.
'disaggregated', meaning, please?
Not being influenced by the same factors, not moving in the same direction, not correlated.
Thanks. Which, I suppose, is an indication of (a) devolution and (b) more generally a distinct polity.
Yes, which is why as a Unionist I don't like it. We are having our own conversation up here and it is no longer a UK one. I hope that changes.
On the other hand, any insistence that all conversations have to be the same across the UK - or the imposition of suich a doctrine - would be a priori unreasonable and inherently very damaging to the concept of a UK.
If the polls are to be believed labour are heading for a majority in Scotland Wales and England and a very large one overall at that
Far too early to say. Sunak still has the media onside to big him up and scythe down the hopeless Starmer. I reckon I am still on for my 20 seat Con majority.
It is reported that here in North Wales objectors to the blanket 20mph rule are tampering with the signs with one side 30 and the other side 20 and saying take your choice !!!
20mph sign vandals face police action for creating 'take-your-pick' speed limits
I have some sympathy with reducing the limits around urban streets in Cardiff, Newport and Swansea to 20mph, particularly around schools and play areas.
One of the pilot areas is through St Brides Major. The 20 is plenty limit runs all the way from where St Brides Common meets the village all the way out into the countryside on the other side of the village, which is where the GoSafe partnership hide to catch out motorists. Our village had been earmarked for a specific area in the central village between the two pubs was earmarked to drop from 30 to 20, which is fine by me. However , community council retired, bike riding retired so gooders with toe village o much time on their hands are lobbying the Vale Council to make the entire village a twenty, which means half a mile into the countryside at either end that's where Go Safe will be.
One good thing has come of the changes. When it was a 30 in St Brides, I tried to keep below 40. Now it is a 20 I try to stick below 30.
You'll get done for anything above 24 mph [20 + (20*10%) + 2].
The problem with the limit is that it applies 24/7, and therefore includes times and road conditions when it is absurdly low. The same cn be said of all standard speed limits, but is particularly true of the very low ones which are essentially there because of schoolchildren or heavy pedestrian presence at certain times of day.
I have fierce brakes!
My son got done for 36 in a thirty a few years ago and told me all about the 10% plus 2 after his speed awareness training. In around 1980 I went to a demonstration in Coventry for the new hand held speed guns. The copper running the demo explained that (at the time) West Midlands Police didn't prosecute for less than 39 in a 30, and the copper said he wouldn't tug a driver for less than 45 in a 30. Ah the good old days!
When we asked about whether the UK needs more or less of specific occupations though, most were net "more":
Service workers (such as hotel and bar staff): 34% "more" vs. 24% "fewer"
Healthcare workers: 63% "more" vs. 13% "fewer"
Teachers and lecturers: 35% "more" vs. 19% "fewer"
And that's the problem. Think of immigrants as a collective number, and people don't like the idea at all. Think of them more as individuals and people doing jobs, and the picture changes. The irony of "pay British workers more and invest in equipment to let them work more efficiently" is that the public sector is terrible at both of those, and that terribleness is driven by voters.
In a similar vein, More in Common did some polling on boats and Rwanda a while back.
Although there is majority support for Rwanda in itself, the public don't think it will work, and other ideas (the boring Centrist Dad ideas about cooperating with the French better and clearing the backlog etc) are more popular.
And (and this is where the collective/individual thing is relevant), there is majority support for exempting all sorts of groups from the Rwanda plan. Enough to basically kill the scheme stone dead if they were all acted upon.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He rented John Evelyn's house and trashed the holly hedges with drunken Russian larks
1.82m btw. All you posters look like little ants to me.
One does wonder, occasionally, if there is something fundamentally savage, feral and atavistic in the Russian soul, something Scythian and barbaric, that never goes away
Peter the Great's soldiers behaved exactly and as badly as Vladimir Putin's soldiers do now, centuries later. The cruelty and the drinking, the grandiose torture, the looting and puking
We did as well. Even up to WW2 we had our moments. Difference is probably only in the last 80 years otherwise no real difference.
Are we saying that Rishi is experiencing a significant gravitas shortfall?
Arrested Development isn't the cause of his Credibility Problem.
" Yeah, that's a cultural problem is what it is. You know, your average American male is in a perpetual state of adolescence, you know, arrested development."
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He did. And we know where Peter the G stayed when he was in town: the house of the diarist John Evelyn
Apparently he absolutely wrecked the place. His soldiers vomited in the fireplaces and defecated in the wardrobes, and shot out all the windows for the bantz
He actually got hands-on working the wood alongside the shipwrights. Damn sight more than any UK aristo or even selfimportant middle class type would do.
Oh yes, I'm not denying his achievements. He was genuinely "Great" if you measure him by what he got done, and how he transformed Russia (or by the number of serfs he killed, building St Peterburg), and also the sheer epic scale of his hands-on debauchery AND his hands-on determination
Pushkin's the Bronze Horseman is good on this. The massive horse (an infamous statue of Peter in the city he built) symbolically tramples the Russian people, yet it is still indisputably impressive
Are we saying that Rishi is experiencing a significant gravitas shortfall?
Arrested Development isn't the cause of his Credibility Problem.
" Yeah, that's a cultural problem is what it is. You know, your average American male is in a perpetual state of adolescence, you know, arrested development."
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
Isn't it also due to Bonaparte's relatively average background in Corsica, which gave him the average height for the time - whereas all his generals were dukes and viscounts and, like all well fed aristocracy of the time, about six inches taller than average. So they towered over him, making him APPEAR relatively short
This really isn't my period, but didn't Bonaparte create a "new nobility"? Very much designed to put a stake through the heart of the old nobility? So, less likely they had aristocratic genes for generations? Or maybe I'm wrong in my thinking?
Most of the New Men in the French Regime were actually from quite privileged backgrounds. They were not high aristocracy, in the main, but they were quite upper class. They would have had enough to eat as children.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He did. And we know where Peter the G stayed when he was in town: the house of the diarist John Evelyn
Apparently he absolutely wrecked the place. His soldiers vomited in the fireplaces and defecated in the wardrobes, and shot out all the windows for the bantz
He actually got hands-on working the wood alongside the shipwrights. Damn sight more than any UK aristo or even selfimportant middle class type would do.
Oh yes, I'm not denying his achievements. He was genuinely "Great" if you measure him by what he got done, and how he transformed Russia (or by the number of serfs he killed, building St Peterburg), and also the sheer epic scale of his hands-on debauchery AND his hands-on determination
Pushkin's the Bronze Horseman is good on this. The massive horse (an infamous statue of Peter in the city he built) symbolically tramples the Russian people, yet it is still indisputably impressive
Ordered the Petrograd book, anyway: I'd been eyeing it for some time.
When we asked about whether the UK needs more or less of specific occupations though, most were net "more":
Service workers (such as hotel and bar staff): 34% "more" vs. 24% "fewer"
Healthcare workers: 63% "more" vs. 13% "fewer"
Teachers and lecturers: 35% "more" vs. 19% "fewer"
And that's the problem. Think of immigrants as a collective number, and people don't like the idea at all. Think of them more as individuals and people doing jobs, and the picture changes. The irony of "pay British workers more and invest in equipment to let them work more efficiently" is that the public sector is terrible at both of those, and that terribleness is driven by voters.
In a similar vein, More in Common did some polling on boats and Rwanda a while back.
Although there is majority support for Rwanda in itself, the public don't think it will work, and other ideas (the boring Centrist Dad ideas about cooperating with the French better and clearing the backlog etc) are more popular.
And (and this is where the collective/individual thing is relevant), there is majority support for exempting all sorts of groups from the Rwanda plan. Enough to basically kill the scheme stone dead if they were all acted upon.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
Zelensky is also a shortarse, but it's not troubled him.
Tommy DeVito : You mean, let me understand this cause, ya know maybe it's me, I'm a little fucked up maybe, but I'm funny how, I mean funny like I'm a clown, I amuse you? I make you laugh, I'm here to fuckin' amuse you? What do you mean funny, funny how? How am I funny?
Henry Hill : Just... you know, how you tell the story, what?
Tommy DeVito : No, no, I don't know, you said it. How do I know? You said I'm funny. How the fuck am I funny, what the fuck is so funny about me? Tell me, tell me what's funny!
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He did. And we know where Peter the G stayed when he was in town: the house of the diarist John Evelyn
Apparently he absolutely wrecked the place. His soldiers vomited in the fireplaces and defecated in the wardrobes, and shot out all the windows for the bantz
He actually got hands-on working the wood alongside the shipwrights. Damn sight more than any UK aristo or even selfimportant middle class type would do.
Symonds was actually quite a hands on guy - part of the problem with him was that he believed that the only way to learn to build ships was to sail them, then build them. No theory required.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He did. And we know where Peter the G stayed when he was in town: the house of the diarist John Evelyn
Apparently he absolutely wrecked the place. His soldiers vomited in the fireplaces and defecated in the wardrobes, and shot out all the windows for the bantz
He actually got hands-on working the wood alongside the shipwrights. Damn sight more than any UK aristo or even selfimportant middle class type would do.
Oh yes, I'm not denying his achievements. He was genuinely "Great" if you measure him by what he got done, and how he transformed Russia (or by the number of serfs he killed, building St Peterburg), and also the sheer epic scale of his hands-on debauchery AND his hands-on determination
Pushkin's the Bronze Horseman is good on this. The massive horse (an infamous statue of Peter in the city he built) symbolically tramples the Russian people, yet it is still indisputably impressive
Pushkin is a genius. A true sign of what Russia is capable of had things gone better.
I recommend all his poetry, and Eugene Onegin, to anyone who even vaguely likes to read.
Katie Boulter struggling against last year's champion.
Being schooled. Might be different in a year's time.
Why? She’s 26, if she was going to reach the very top she’d be there by now.
British players tend to develop slowly.
Indeed, I personally am not expecting to reach maturity for another ten years.
Reminds me of one of my favourite modern poems
When I am an old woman I shall wear purple With a red hat which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me. And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves And satin sandals, and say we’ve no money for butter. I shall sit down on the pavement when I’m tired And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells And run my stick along the public railings And make up for the sobriety of my youth. I shall go out in my slippers in the rain And pick flowers in other people’s gardens And learn to spit.
You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat And eat three pounds of sausages at a go Or only bread and pickle for a week And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes.
But now we must have clothes that keep us dry And pay our rent and not swear in the street And set a good example for the children. We must have friends to dinner and read the papers.
But maybe I ought to practise a little now? So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.
Katie Boulter struggling against last year's champion.
Being schooled. Might be different in a year's time.
Why? She’s 26, if she was going to reach the very top she’d be there by now.
British players tend to develop slowly.
Indeed, I personally am not expecting to reach maturity for another ten years.
Reminds me of one of my favourite modern poems
When I am an old woman I shall wear purple With a red hat which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me. And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves And satin sandals, and say we’ve no money for butter. I shall sit down on the pavement when I’m tired And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells And run my stick along the public railings And make up for the sobriety of my youth. I shall go out in my slippers in the rain And pick flowers in other people’s gardens And learn to spit.
You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat And eat three pounds of sausages at a go Or only bread and pickle for a week And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes.
But now we must have clothes that keep us dry And pay our rent and not swear in the street And set a good example for the children. We must have friends to dinner and read the papers.
But maybe I ought to practise a little now? So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.
Coreta, 47, a manager from Somerton, called the prime minister “a weak dog”. Ann, 72, from Selby, focused on his small physical stature. “He is a little mouse to look at,” she said. “I hate seeing him alongside other statesmen because he looks so tiny.” Craig, 39, a software tester from Selby, was blunter still: “I’d probably say a dodo for Rishi, because he’s pretty much dead to me like a dodo.”
Tryl, who acted as the moderator, said: “These were by far the worst set of groups we’ve done on impressions of Rishi Sunak. Whereas previously people have been willing to give him some benefit of the doubt, and usually fell back on the fact that even if he’s out of touch he’s competent and the best person to clear up the mess from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, things have shifted. The cost of living crisis being compounded with the mortgage crisis has exacerbated Sunak’s personal weaknesses.”
I know people don't like bringing up his height but it is an issue for the voters.
Why? Am genuinely curious.
It's a gravitas issue.
Gravitas is a bit like pornography, hard to describe but you know it when you see it.
Being a shortarse is seen as having a lack of gravitas.
The voters are weird.
It's a declining trend but in focus you'll occasionally hear a comment against a female politician saying she shouldn't be leader/PM because what if she has to make an important decision at that time of the month.
Like no male politician has ever made decisions based on their reproductive organs.
On that basis I suppose the very shortarse Napoleon Bonaparte had no gravitas, despite conquering half of Europe and creating the basis for modern French law
Bonaparte wasn't a shortarse, it was only inaccurate British media reporting that said he was.
Though it’s hard to say if and why the British invented the short Napoleon trope, there is some truth in Cruikshank’s representation: Napoleon was probably significantly shorter than his troops.
Several sources note that his elite guards were taller than most Frenchmen, and thus Napoleon had the appearance of being shorter than he really was. Yet interpretations of Napoleon’s death certificate estimate that his height when he died was between 5’2” and 5’7” (1.58 and 1.7 meters).
The discrepancy is often explained by the disparity between the 19th-century French inch, which was 2.71 cm, and the current inch measurement, which is 2.54 cm. Sources consequently estimate that Napoleon was probably closer to 5’6” or 5’7” (1.68 or 1.7 meters) than to 5’2”.
Although the range may seem short by 21st-century standards, it was typical in the 19th century, when most Frenchmen stood between 5’2” and 5’6” (1.58 and 1.68 meters) tall. Napoleon was thus average or taller, no matter the interpretation.
People must have been terrified by Edward IV, who was 6ft 4 in the 15th century.
It also reminds me of one of my favourite silly sci-fi stories, which involved transplanted romans from Pompeii, not being told they had been moved into the 20th century. Modern humans dressed as romans and spoke latin, but almost all were notably taller than average, and one thing that made the locals twig something was up was the carrots were weird and the chickens were really really big compared to what they were used to.
Peter the Great must have been especially intimidating: an enormous six foot eight giant, and also the all-powerful Tsar of all the Russias, who, if he was in the mood, would force you to drink a litre of neat vodka in one go for his own amusement, to see if you passed out, or died
I've seen the famous cup he used for this stunt. It is kept at the summer palace in St Petersburg. Diplomats lived in terror of it
Which reminds me: a new series of The Great is coming soon. HUZZAH
There's a memorial to him on the Thames, near Greenwich. He apparently came to London to check up on the latest ship-building tech of the time.
He did. And we know where Peter the G stayed when he was in town: the house of the diarist John Evelyn
Apparently he absolutely wrecked the place. His soldiers vomited in the fireplaces and defecated in the wardrobes, and shot out all the windows for the bantz
He actually got hands-on working the wood alongside the shipwrights. Damn sight more than any UK aristo or even selfimportant middle class type would do.
Oh yes, I'm not denying his achievements. He was genuinely "Great" if you measure him by what he got done, and how he transformed Russia (or by the number of serfs he killed, building St Peterburg), and also the sheer epic scale of his hands-on debauchery AND his hands-on determination
Pushkin's the Bronze Horseman is good on this. The massive horse (an infamous statue of Peter in the city he built) symbolically tramples the Russian people, yet it is still indisputably impressive
Pushkin is a genius. A true sign of what Russia is capable of had things gone better.
I recommend all his poetry, and Eugene Onegin, to anyone who even vaguely likes to read.
Also: Lermontov's "A Hero of Our Times", Turgenev's "Torrents of Spring", and Bulgakov's "The Master and Margarita", for people who want to explore a bit beyond the usual Tolstoy and Dostoevsky
Surprised to see Sweden come in far below Denmark, there, and the Netherlands, height kings of europe. Montenegro is always the interesting outlier of very tall people for Southeastern Europe.
The Italians also look pretty short ish, according to this even about 4 or 5 cm below their neighbours in Greece.
The Dutch have suddenly started shrinking, tho. No one is quite sure why (just as no one is quite sure why they suddenly got so much taller than other northwest Europeans)
Not sure why Gardenwalker's having a go at me over Rishi's height, which I think we can all agree is inherited from one's parents, whether we like it or not, and since his parents are from India his height is going to be reflected by that.
Surprised to see Sweden come in far below Denmark, there.
The Italians also look pretty short ish, according to this even about 4 or 5 cm below their neighbours in Greece.
Immigration. If 10% of your country - the newcomers - suddenly has an average male height of five foot six, not five eleven, then that briskly brings down the overall average
You see the same with many stats, in many countries
Not sure why Gardenwalker's having a go at me over Rishi's height, which I think we can all agree is inherited from one's parents, whether we like it or not, and since his parents are from India his height is going to be reflected by that.
His parents are from East Africa, albeit his grandfather came from the Punjab.
Gordon Brown handbook. Fair enough. Politics is ultimately about winning.
Blair and Brown are very much part of Starmer's team and heading to the Lords apparently
That's created an amusing image of Blair and Brown bickering all the way to the Lords, for some reason.
Something like the awkward paired and ceremonial walks together of Sunak and Starmer, or earlier Corbyn and Johnson, for the state opening of parliament.
Interesting to see the discussion is relentlessly one of heredity. Not a thought given to environment, or regression to the mean.
Well, there do seem be some genetic differences between northern and southern europe, too.
Lighter complexions and taller bodies were originally just supposed to be adaptations to the more northern climates, and environments, n'est-ce-pas ?
Likewise, IQ, it was once alleged, though we now all know better: that IQ is a unique human variable in that it shows no variation across populations, unlike every other single human variable, for reasons we cannot discern, but nonetheless are fundamentally and miraculously true, like the Word of God, and must not be questioned, and this in addition to the fact that IQ is a useless and laughable measure, except for when it is being prayed in aid of people accused of capital crimes when it is an all-important, entirely reliable measure and can save them from the death penalty because the IQ is too low, even though IQ is meaningless
I doubt many voters care a toss about Rishi Sunak's height, and short height doesn't correspond to a lack of gravitas anyway. Too many will care about his skin colour, but for those who don't, in other words who are not racists, the main thing about the way he comes across is that he is softly spoken and genteel. He is the most genteel PM of my lifetime. He basically seems like a nice guy until you realise he's a Tory. Sad to say that most voters probably want a strong-seeming leader (whatever his height) who appears ready and willing to give them a damned hard kick up the arse, the same way they prefer (treatment-wise that is) nurses who are right old fascistic battleaxes rather than nice feminine girls.
I doubt many voters care a toss about Rishi Sunak's height, and short height doesn't correspond to a lack of gravitas anyway. Too many will care about his skin colour, but for those who don't the main thing about the way he comes across is that he is softly spoken and genteel. He is the most genteel PM of my lifetime. Sad to say that most voters probably want a strong-seeming leader who appears ready and willing to give them a damned hard kick up the arse, the same way they prefer (treatment-wise that is) nurses who are right old fascistic battleaxes than nice feminine girls.
Well, I love feminine nurses but I think you're right.
Churchill and Zelensky are the same height as Sunak but projecting more force.
It's all a bit "man the lifeboats, every MP for themselves" now.
Nobody can "stop the boats" because the only practical means of doing so is to deploy lethal force, and however degenerate our Government becomes it seems highly improbable that it will resort to machine gunning the dinghies in the Channel as a means of persuading the boat people to give up.
The politicians simply don't want to admit their powerlessness, that's all.
It's all a bit "man the lifeboats, every MP for themselves" now.
Nobody can "stop the boats" because the only practical means of doing so is to deploy lethal force, and however degenerate our Government becomes it seems highly improbable that it will resort to machine gunning the dinghies in the Channel as a means of persuading the boat people to give up.
The politicians simply don't want to admit their powerlessness, that's all.
Would you care to put that to a referendum?
For info no I would vote against but as climate change increases migrant flows it is absolutely going to happen we already have eu countries doing things we would shy at.
Interesting to see the discussion is relentlessly one of heredity. Not a thought given to environment, or regression to the mean.
Well, there do seem be some genetic differences between northern and southern europe, too.
Lighter complexions and taller bodies were originally just supposed to be adaptations to the more northern climates, and environments, n'est-ce-pas ?
Likewise, IQ, it was once alleged, though we now all know better: that IQ is a unique human variable in that it shows no variation across populations, unlike every other single human variable, for reasons we cannot discern, but nonetheless are fundamentally and miraculously true, like the Word of God, and must not be questioned, and this in addition to the fact that IQ is a useless and laughable measure, except for when it is being prayed in aid of people accused of capital crimes when it is an all-important, entirely reliable measure and can save them from the death penalty because the IQ is too low, even though IQ is meaningless
Although the Romans, Babylonians, Sumerians and Greeks seemed to have been doing rather better on the IQ front in antiquity, ofcourse..
South-East Asian countries seem to record very high IQ scores, although I think IQ is an extremely limited measure of intelligence.
It's all a bit "man the lifeboats, every MP for themselves" now.
Nobody can "stop the boats" because the only practical means of doing so is to deploy lethal force, and however degenerate our Government becomes it seems highly improbable that it will resort to machine gunning the dinghies in the Channel as a means of persuading the boat people to give up.
The politicians simply don't want to admit their powerlessness, that's all.
It could ram one or two or employ dirty methods of a covert kind. The scary thing is that the boats seem likely to become a bigger and bigger issue and God knows what the government will do to get re-elected.
I doubt many voters care a toss about Rishi Sunak's height, and short height doesn't correspond to a lack of gravitas anyway. Too many will care about his skin colour, but for those who don't, in other words who are not racists, the main thing about the way he comes across is that he is softly spoken and genteel. He is the most genteel PM of my lifetime. He basically seems like a nice guy until you realise he's a Tory. Sad to say that most voters probably want a strong-seeming leader (whatever his height) who appears ready and willing to give them a damned hard kick up the arse, the same way they prefer (treatment-wise that is) nurses who are right old fascistic battleaxes rather than nice feminine girls.
No, it's not his "genteelness". It's the fact this genteelness comes from his attending one of the greatest public schools in the country, from his having a successful career as a merchant banker (earning millions) and from his marrying a literal billionairess, who nonetheless avoided UK taxes. And: he doesn't have any "working class friends"
Sunak is seen as a posh, effete, out of touch trillionaire, partly because he IS. This is sad, as a lot of us wanted him to do well, and wished him well, but the times are tough and he doesn't, it seems, have the grit - or any particularly good ideas, to address this adversity
He's no worse than Starmer (for different reasons) but the country has anyway decided Fuck the Tories (after 13 years, most of them squandered) and Tories can't complain. They HAVE squandered 13 years in power
Interesting to see the discussion is relentlessly one of heredity. Not a thought given to environment, or regression to the mean.
Well, there do seem be some genetic differences between northern and southern europe, too.
Lighter complexions and taller bodies were originally just supposed to be adaptations to the more northern climates, and environments, n'est-ce-pas ?
Likewise, IQ, it was once alleged, though we now all know better: that IQ is a unique human variable in that it shows no variation across populations, unlike every other single human variable, for reasons we cannot discern, but nonetheless are fundamentally and miraculously true, like the Word of God, and must not be questioned, and this in addition to the fact that IQ is a useless and laughable measure, except for when it is being prayed in aid of people accused of capital crimes when it is an all-important, entirely reliable measure and can save them from the death penalty because the IQ is too low, even though IQ is meaningless
Although the Romans, Babylonians, Sumerians and Greeks seemed to have been doing rather better on the IQ front in antiquity, ofcourse..
South-East Asian countries seem to record very high IQ scores, although I think IQ is an extremely limited measure of intelligence.
Not south east Asia. East Asia. Japan, Taiwan, Korea, coastal China, etc. All high IQ. Unfortunately right now IQ *seems* to be inversely proportionate to fecundity in reproduction. The name for this phenomenon is dysgenic drift, and it can be seen within societies as well as across them, though it is highly controversial as a concept
Interesting to see the discussion is relentlessly one of heredity. Not a thought given to environment, or regression to the mean.
Well, there do seem be some genetic differences between northern and southern europe, too.
Lighter complexions and taller bodies were originally just supposed to be adaptations to the more northern climates, and environments, n'est-ce-pas ?
Likewise, IQ, it was once alleged, though we now all know better: that IQ is a unique human variable in that it shows no variation across populations, unlike every other single human variable, for reasons we cannot discern, but nonetheless are fundamentally and miraculously true, like the Word of God, and must not be questioned, and this in addition to the fact that IQ is a useless and laughable measure, except for when it is being prayed in aid of people accused of capital crimes when it is an all-important, entirely reliable measure and can save them from the death penalty because the IQ is too low, even though IQ is meaningless
I used to get quite high scores in IQ tests. I'd like to think that makes me smart enough to get a low score if it would save me from the noose.
SNP in danger of finishing third in Scotland behind the Tories.
Labour 31%
SNP 31%
SCons 28%
I mean it is a subsample so as about as accurate as an American war movie.
Indeed but if the SNP finished third in Scotland on votes and seats that would be even more humiliating for Yousaf than the next election is likely to be for Rishi.
100+ seats lost in England and Wales and 2 or 3 gains in Scotland for the Tories? Looks on to me.
Yes Scotland has a habit of doing the opposite to England recently. 2010 saw Labour hold all its seats but the Tories win a majority in England. 2015 saw a Tory majority in England and the UK but an SNP landslide in Scotland. 2017 saw significant SNP losses to the Tories in Scotland but the Tories losing seats in England and their majority in the UK. 2019 saw the Conservatives win a majority in England and UK wide but lose over half their Scottish seats to the SNP.
2024 looks no different in terms of the SNP and Tories at least but it does look like Starmer might break the mould by being the first main UK party leader since Blair to win big in England and Scotland
We have our own elections up here and one of the things that concern me as a Unionist is how disaggregated they have become. A Labour government with a serious chunk of Scottish seats might improve that and I would welcome that, whatever reservations I have about SKS and his shadow cabinet.
'disaggregated', meaning, please?
Not being influenced by the same factors, not moving in the same direction, not correlated.
Thanks. Which, I suppose, is an indication of (a) devolution and (b) more generally a distinct polity.
Yes, which is why as a Unionist I don't like it. We are having our own conversation up here and it is no longer a UK one. I hope that changes.
On the other hand, any insistence that all conversations have to be the same across the UK - or the imposition of suich a doctrine - would be a priori unreasonable and inherently very damaging to the concept of a UK.
If the polls are to be believed labour are heading for a majority in Scotland Wales and England and a very large one overall at that
Far too early to say. Sunak still has the media onside to big him up and scythe down the hopeless Starmer. I reckon I am still on for my 20 seat Con majority.
It is reported that here in North Wales objectors to the blanket 20mph rule are tampering with the signs with one side 30 and the other side 20 and saying take your choice !!!
20mph sign vandals face police action for creating 'take-your-pick' speed limits
I have some sympathy with reducing the limits around urban streets in Cardiff, Newport and Swansea to 20mph, particularly around schools and play areas.
One of the pilot areas is through St Brides Major. The 20 is plenty limit runs all the way from where St Brides Common meets the village all the way out into the countryside on the other side of the village, which is where the GoSafe partnership hide to catch out motorists. Our village had been earmarked for a specific area in the central village between the two pubs was earmarked to drop from 30 to 20, which is fine by me. However , community council retired, bike riding retired so gooders with toe village o much time on their hands are lobbying the Vale Council to make the entire village a twenty, which means half a mile into the countryside at either end that's where Go Safe will be.
One good thing has come of the changes. When it was a 30 in St Brides, I tried to keep below 40. Now it is a 20 I try to stick below 30.
You'll get done for anything above 24 mph [20 + (20*10%) + 2].
The problem with the limit is that it applies 24/7, and therefore includes times and road conditions when it is absurdly low. The same cn be said of all standard speed limits, but is particularly true of the very low ones which are essentially there because of schoolchildren or heavy pedestrian presence at certain times of day.
The problem is that drivers are supposed to use their judgement to drive at a speed appropriate to the road conditions, but too many of them do not, and it's too hard to convict people for driving dangerously in such circumstances unless they've caused a major collision. It's much easier to convict if there's an egregious breach of the speed limit, because it's an objective rather than subjective measure.
I would prefer it if the general public could be trusted to use their judgement to drive appropriately to the conditions, but it does then need to be possible to enforce consequences for those who break that trust. That's the missing piece.
Interesting to see the discussion is relentlessly one of heredity. Not a thought given to environment, or regression to the mean.
Well, there do seem be some genetic differences between northern and southern europe, too.
Lighter complexions and taller bodies were originally just supposed to be adaptations to the more northern climates, and environments, n'est-ce-pas ?
Taller equals better nourished. I think it happened in the Netherlands because of the draining of the marshes, leaving that highly nourished and nourishing agricultural land, allowing them to produce an abundance of food - Edam and the like.
Interesting to see the discussion is relentlessly one of heredity. Not a thought given to environment, or regression to the mean.
Well, there do seem be some genetic differences between northern and southern europe, too.
Lighter complexions and taller bodies were originally just supposed to be adaptations to the more northern climates, and environments, n'est-ce-pas ?
Likewise, IQ, it was once alleged, though we now all know better: that IQ is a unique human variable in that it shows no variation across populations, unlike every other single human variable, for reasons we cannot discern, but nonetheless are fundamentally and miraculously true, like the Word of God, and must not be questioned, and this in addition to the fact that IQ is a useless and laughable measure, except for when it is being prayed in aid of people accused of capital crimes when it is an all-important, entirely reliable measure and can save them from the death penalty because the IQ is too low, even though IQ is meaningless
I used to get quite high scores in IQ tests. I'd like to think that makes me smart enough to get a low score if it would save me from the noose.
If you're a lady, you could "plead your belly" - announce your pregnancy in court. In the days of the axeman and the hangman, that generally spared you execution. Some female criminals used to get Up The Junction just to avoid the rope, and fair enough
I doubt many voters care a toss about Rishi Sunak's height, and short height doesn't correspond to a lack of gravitas anyway. Too many will care about his skin colour, but for those who don't, in other words who are not racists, the main thing about the way he comes across is that he is softly spoken and genteel. He is the most genteel PM of my lifetime. He basically seems like a nice guy until you realise he's a Tory. Sad to say that most voters probably want a strong-seeming leader (whatever his height) who appears ready and willing to give them a damned hard kick up the arse, the same way they prefer (treatment-wise that is) nurses who are right old fascistic battleaxes rather than nice feminine girls.
No, it's not his "genteelness". It's the fact this genteelness comes from his attending one of the greatest public schools in the country, from his having a successful career as a merchant banker (earning millions) and from his marrying a literal billionairess, who nonetheless avoided UK taxes. And: he doesn't have any "working class friends"
Sunak is seen as a posh, effete, out of touch trillionaire, partly because he IS. This is sad, as a lot of us wanted him to do well, and wished him well, but the times are tough and he doesn't, it seems, have the grit - or any particularly good ideas, to address this adversity
He's no worse than Starmer (for different reasons) but the country has anyway decided Fuck the Tories (after 13 years, most of them squandered) and Tories can't complain. They HAVE squandered 13 years in power
What is the difference between genteel and effete?
I went to the same school that he did. One thing I'm sure of from decades of personal experience of conversations with people is that the vast majority don't have the slightest clue what it's like to go to such a place. Even my ex-wife acquired no clue. That is no criticism. I don't have a clue about what it's like to go to a school down the road either. I'm kinda interested in the perception of Sunak~WinColl. Funny thing is I don't really give a damn about that even though I'm both anti-WinColl and anti-Tory. I wouldn't necessarily prefer a self-made Tory leader who spoke like a barrow boy.
Andy Burnham or Angela Rayner would wipe the floor with Rishi Sunak in an election, because they have about a million times more clue about how the other half lives. Sir Keir though?
Interesting to see the discussion is relentlessly one of heredity. Not a thought given to environment, or regression to the mean.
Well, there do seem be some genetic differences between northern and southern europe, too.
Lighter complexions and taller bodies were originally just supposed to be adaptations to the more northern climates, and environments, n'est-ce-pas ?
Likewise, IQ, it was once alleged, though we now all know better: that IQ is a unique human variable in that it shows no variation across populations, unlike every other single human variable, for reasons we cannot discern, but nonetheless are fundamentally and miraculously true, like the Word of God, and must not be questioned, and this in addition to the fact that IQ is a useless and laughable measure, except for when it is being prayed in aid of people accused of capital crimes when it is an all-important, entirely reliable measure and can save them from the death penalty because the IQ is too low, even though IQ is meaningless
Although the Romans, Babylonians, Sumerians and Greeks seemed to have been doing rather better on the IQ front in antiquity, ofcourse..
South-East Asian countries seem to record very high IQ scores, although I think IQ is an extremely limited measure of intelligence.
Not south east Asia. East Asia. Japan, Taiwan, Korea, coastal China, etc. All high IQ. Unfortunately right now IQ *seems* to be inversely proportionate to fecundity in reproduction. The name for this phenomenon is dysgenic drift, and it can be seen within societies as well as across them, though it is highly controversial as a concept
It seems very unlikely that any race has evolved to have lower IQ. What purpose would that serve? Therefore the variations are likelier to be down to cultural or environmental factors.
I doubt many voters care a toss about Rishi Sunak's height, and short height doesn't correspond to a lack of gravitas anyway. Too many will care about his skin colour, but for those who don't, in other words who are not racists, the main thing about the way he comes across is that he is softly spoken and genteel. He is the most genteel PM of my lifetime. He basically seems like a nice guy until you realise he's a Tory. Sad to say that most voters probably want a strong-seeming leader (whatever his height) who appears ready and willing to give them a damned hard kick up the arse, the same way they prefer (treatment-wise that is) nurses who are right old fascistic battleaxes rather than nice feminine girls.
No, it's not his "genteelness". It's the fact this genteelness comes from his attending one of the greatest public schools in the country, from his having a successful career as a merchant banker (earning millions) and from his marrying a literal billionairess, who nonetheless avoided UK taxes. And: he doesn't have any "working class friends"
Sunak is seen as a posh, effete, out of touch trillionaire, partly because he IS. This is sad, as a lot of us wanted him to do well, and wished him well, but the times are tough and he doesn't, it seems, have the grit - or any particularly good ideas, to address this adversity
He's no worse than Starmer (for different reasons) but the country has anyway decided Fuck the Tories (after 13 years, most of them squandered) and Tories can't complain. They HAVE squandered 13 years in power
What is the difference between genteel and effete?
I went to the same school that he did. One thing I'm sure of from decades of personal experience of conversations with people is that the vast majority don't have the slightest clue what it's like to go to such a place. Even my ex-wife acquired no clue. That is no criticism. I don't have a clue about what it's like to go to a school down the road either. I'm kinda interested in the perception of Sunak~WinColl.
Andy Burnham or Angela Rayner would wipe the floor with Rishi Sunak in an election, because they have about a million times more clue about how the other half lives. Sir Keir though?
Starmer is proper lower middle class. Son of a nurse and a toolmaker. Not coal miner stuff, but definitely Not Posh like Sunak. He's smart: so he got into a good grammar school
I believe he has seen more of ordinary life than most Etonians (or Wykehamists). This does not, of course, mean he will be any better as PM than Sunak, Boris, May or Truss, indeed I have grave doubts, but he is almost certainly gonna get the job, so let us pray
I doubt many voters care a toss about Rishi Sunak's height, and short height doesn't correspond to a lack of gravitas anyway. Too many will care about his skin colour, but for those who don't the main thing about the way he comes across is that he is softly spoken and genteel. He is the most genteel PM of my lifetime. Sad to say that most voters probably want a strong-seeming leader who appears ready and willing to give them a damned hard kick up the arse, the same way they prefer (treatment-wise that is) nurses who are right old fascistic battleaxes than nice feminine girls.
Well, I love feminine nurses but I think you're right.
Churchill and Zelensky are the same height as Sunak but projecting more force.
The thing with Sunak's build is he's not just small in height, but he's overall a complete homunculus.
Churchill and Zelensky while lacking height could both make up for it in girth.
Being overweight is generally frowned upon, but for a short person it can help make up for the perspective of being tiny as its something else you notice and don't look just plain miniature then.
Still not the reason to vote against Sunak. What he lacks in body size he more than makes up for with other flaws anyway.
Comments
I have some sympathy with reducing the limits around urban streets in Cardiff, Newport and Swansea to 20mph, particularly around schools and play areas.
One of the pilot areas is through St Brides Major. The 20 is plenty limit runs all the way from where St Brides Common meets the village all the way out into the countryside on the other side of the village, which is where the GoSafe partnership hide to catch out motorists. Our village had been earmarked for a specific area in the central village between the two pubs was earmarked to drop from 30 to 20, which is fine by me. However , community council retired, bike riding retired so gooders with toe village o much time on their hands are lobbying the Vale Council to make the entire village a twenty, which means half a mile into the countryside at either end that's where Go Safe will be.
One good thing has come of the changes. When it was a 30 in St Brides, I tried to keep below 40. Now it is a 20 I try to stick below 30.
Indeed there is an excellent anecdote about this (possibly apocryphal, and possibly said by some other French dude, but too good not to quote anyway). One day all Bonaparte's posho generals were boasting about their amazing noble lineages, their ancestral families dating back to Charlemagne, their ancestors who were dukes and kings in the Carolingian era
Bonaparte listened to all this tedious vanglory for a time, then shut them all up by saying "pfff, je suis un ancetre!"
I AM AN ANCESTOR
ETA though not by most on here.
PtP [1.75m]
She eventually got the impression a lot of the XR and JSO people didn't actually CARE that much about the cause. For a lot of them it was a lark, some fun, and a chance to socialise and get on TV
She ended up loathing them (she's quite working class, educated, a committed environmentalist)
Lots of lightning in the north of England!
And I think, despite the polling extremes, we can exclude the possibility of Tories being reduced to 50-75 seats.
Obviously a far more suitable PM.
Indeed even Marshal Ney was only son of a master cooper
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michel_Ney
Might be different in a year's time.
Apparently he absolutely wrecked the place. His soldiers vomited in the fireplaces and defecated in the wardrobes, and shot out all the windows for the bantz
So, basically, typical Russian guests
http://www.shadyoldlady.com/location.php?loc=1249
An honest UK trains advert...
1.82m btw. All you posters look like little ants to me.
The problem with the limit is that it applies 24/7, and therefore includes times and road conditions when it is absurdly low. The same cn be said of all standard speed limits, but is particularly true of the very low ones which are essentially there because of schoolchildren or heavy pedestrian presence at certain times of day.
Peter the Great's soldiers behaved exactly and as badly as Vladimir Putin's soldiers do now, centuries later. The cruelty and the drinking, the grandiose torture, the looting and puking
The busybody problem persists with do gooders interfering by demanding the reduction limits further around here.
Series win
Nervy finish though.
There is a brilliant book about it all:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/St-Petersburg-Centuries-Murderous-Desire/dp/0091959462/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1688850326&sr=1-1
My son got done for 36 in a thirty a few years ago and told me all about the 10% plus 2 after his speed awareness training. In around 1980 I went to a demonstration in Coventry for the new hand held speed guns. The copper running the demo explained that (at the time) West Midlands Police didn't prosecute for less than 39 in a 30, and the copper said he wouldn't tug a driver for less than 45 in a 30. Ah the good old days!
In a similar vein, More in Common did some polling on boats and Rwanda a while back.
https://www.moreincommon.org.uk/media/ewea5z1x/britons-and-refugees-what-do-the-public-really-think.pdf
Some interesting tidbits:
Although there is majority support for Rwanda in itself, the public don't think it will work, and other ideas (the boring Centrist Dad ideas about cooperating with the French better and clearing the backlog etc) are more popular.
And (and this is where the collective/individual thing is relevant), there is majority support for exempting all sorts of groups from the Rwanda plan. Enough to basically kill the scheme stone dead if they were all acted upon.
Pushkin's the Bronze Horseman is good on this. The massive horse (an infamous statue of Peter in the city he built) symbolically tramples the Russian people, yet it is still indisputably impressive
Tommy DeVito : You mean, let me understand this cause, ya know maybe it's me, I'm a little fucked up maybe, but I'm funny how, I mean funny like I'm a clown, I amuse you? I make you laugh, I'm here to fuckin' amuse you? What do you mean funny, funny how? How am I funny?
Henry Hill : Just... you know, how you tell the story, what?
Tommy DeVito : No, no, I don't know, you said it. How do I know? You said I'm funny. How the fuck am I funny, what the fuck is so funny about me? Tell me, tell me what's funny!
I recommend all his poetry, and Eugene Onegin, to anyone who even vaguely likes to read.
https://www.worlddata.info/average-bodyheight.php
When I am an old woman I shall wear purple
With a red hat which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
And satin sandals, and say we’ve no money for butter.
I shall sit down on the pavement when I’m tired
And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
And run my stick along the public railings
And make up for the sobriety of my youth.
I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
And pick flowers in other people’s gardens
And learn to spit.
You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat
And eat three pounds of sausages at a go
Or only bread and pickle for a week
And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes.
But now we must have clothes that keep us dry
And pay our rent and not swear in the street
And set a good example for the children.
We must have friends to dinner and read the papers.
But maybe I ought to practise a little now?
So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised
When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.
The Italians also look pretty short ish, according to this even about 4 or 5 cm below their neighbours in Greece.
Immigration blurs the picture, too
You see the same with many stats, in many countries
So it is perfectly possible to be short and beautiful, you see.
https://news.sky.com/story/thursdays-national-newspaper-front-pages-12427754
Lighter complexions and taller bodies were originally just supposed to be adaptations to the more northern climates, and environments, n'est-ce-pas ?
Gordon wanted to do more - so he started spending all the the taxes from those wonderful derivatives traders in the banks. Boom? What boom?
Something like the awkward paired and ceremonial walks together of Sunak and Starmer, or earlier Corbyn and Johnson, for the state opening of parliament.
Churchill and Zelensky are the same height as Sunak but projecting more force.
South-East Asian countries seem to record very high IQ scores, although I think IQ is an extremely limited measure of intelligence.
The scary thing is that the boats seem likely to become a bigger and bigger issue and God knows what the government will do to get re-elected.
Sunak is seen as a posh, effete, out of touch trillionaire, partly because he IS. This is sad, as a lot of us wanted him to do well, and wished him well, but the times are tough and he doesn't, it seems, have the grit - or any particularly good ideas, to address this adversity
He's no worse than Starmer (for different reasons) but the country has anyway decided Fuck the Tories (after 13 years, most of them squandered) and Tories can't complain. They HAVE squandered 13 years in power
I would prefer it if the general public could be trusted to use their judgement to drive appropriately to the conditions, but it does then need to be possible to enforce consequences for those who break that trust. That's the missing piece.
I went to the same school that he did. One thing I'm sure of from decades of personal experience of conversations with people is that the vast majority don't have the slightest clue what it's like to go to such a place. Even my ex-wife acquired no clue. That is no criticism. I don't have a clue about what it's like to go to a school down the road either. I'm kinda interested in the perception of Sunak~WinColl. Funny thing is I don't really give a damn about that even though I'm both anti-WinColl and anti-Tory. I wouldn't necessarily prefer a self-made Tory leader who spoke like a barrow boy.
Andy Burnham or Angela Rayner would wipe the floor with Rishi Sunak in an election, because they have about a million times more clue about how the other half lives. Sir Keir though?
This is Starmer's childhood home
https://twitter.com/Adele_Thames/status/1246756402007244802/photo/1
I believe he has seen more of ordinary life than most Etonians (or Wykehamists). This does not, of course, mean he will be any better as PM than Sunak, Boris, May or Truss, indeed I have grave doubts, but he is almost certainly gonna get the job, so let us pray
Churchill and Zelensky while lacking height could both make up for it in girth.
Being overweight is generally frowned upon, but for a short person it can help make up for the perspective of being tiny as its something else you notice and don't look just plain miniature then.
Still not the reason to vote against Sunak. What he lacks in body size he more than makes up for with other flaws anyway.