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What will the King’s speech do to rising pessimism? – politicalbetting.com

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  • Options

    Leon said:

    TimS said:

    The longer term trend on this is not so bad. People much less pessimistic than they were a year ago, and roughly similar to where they were just before Partygate broke out.

    As 1997 showed, this doesn't necessarily translate into Tory votes, in fact people may partly feel more optimistic because they expect a change of government. I think there are a few things likely to make the public less pessimistic than in 2022:

    - Inflation is now falling, albeit still high, rather than skyrocketing. Particularly noticeable in heating bills as we enter winter
    - For all that Sunak's government is a bit limp, it's not the same crazed chaos as under latter day Johnson or the Truss-Kwarteng fever dream
    - The Russia-Ukraine war was pretty terrifying when it started but is now part of the furniture

    So I don't think I agree with the header. There's a short term rise in pessimism but it's well down longer term.

    Yes, I agree

    Also, I think the nation is finally getting over Brexit. The departure of Boris has probably drawn a lot of the poison, but I also sense a genuine feeling of: it's done, like it or not, make the best of it. Clearly a lot of people, a sizeable majority, regret it - as things stand- but I doubt half of those people want to actually revisit it

    This itself removes a shadow from British politics. We are in the post-Brexit era now, with its advantages and disadvantages; turns out it wasn't the immediate sunlit uplands promised by some, but neither was it the catastrophe that broke up the UK threatened by others. Meh
    Speak for yourself Buster! Brexit is the weeping sore that will continue to infect UK politics no matter how much you wish for it to stop.
    Brexit is like having a baby, that grows up to be Jimmy Saville.
    Can you fix it?
  • Options
    BurgessianBurgessian Posts: 2,469
    Sean_F said:

    isam said:

    Away from the cricket:

    "Pink Floyd co-founder Roger Waters says the world doesn’t really know “what actually happened” when Hamas unleashed their unprecedented attack on Israel on Oct. 7, but he’s not convinced it wasn’t a “false flag operation.”"

    https://twitter.com/thedailybeast/status/1721880191079690397

    I went for a walk yesterday and listened to Waters speaking to Joe Rogan from 2022. I wanted to listen to his Desert Island Discs, but the audio was too low. So this was obviously from before the Oct 7 attack. Joe rogan is controversial too I think, i had never listened to him before

    I don’t know too much about the Israel/Palestine situation, except the basics. I knew Waters was considered an anti semite by some, and he addressed this by saying pretty much what Corbyn etc say; that they’re anti the Israeli govt not Jewish people. He described a concert he played in a multi cultural part of the area after cancelling one in Tel Aviv after BDS contacted him, and how there are segregated roads for non Jews/Christians. Apartheid worse than SA in the 80s according to him; apparent Mandela and Tutu agreed

    He said he is just anti war, not pro one side or the other; said the same for Russia vs Ukraine. I love some of his albums with Pink Floyd, and find some of his anti war songs v moving, esp ‘When the tigers Broke free’ which describes his fathers death in WW2, and like his way with words generally on all subjects, so was interested to hear his defence of the allegations.

    Seems as though he might have gone a bit far with what you’ve quoted though, or certainly he’s swimming against the media tide.
    He’s a mad Jew-Hater (Israel are as bad as the Nazis, sticking up an inflatable pig with a Star of David at a concert, wearing an SS uniform), and a shill for Putin.
    I dunno. David Gilmour's wife has been pretty outspoken about Waters. Unlikely to be a Pink Floyd reunion any time soon.
  • Options
    ydoethurydoethur Posts: 67,523
    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
  • Options
    rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 54,189
    Omnium said:

    Ghedebrav said:

    viewcode said:

    Andy_JS said:

    "'Wine o'clock' culture blamed for UK women being biggest boozers in world: Shock report reveals one in four get hammered each month

    Quarter of women admit having six or more alcoholic drinks on single occasion
    This is more than double the average rate of 12 per cent among the 33 countries"

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-12720545/Wine-oclock-UK-women-biggest-boozers-world.html

    That's been known for quite some time, but it's so much in the background we forget how common it is. Alcohol culture is ingrained in the UK, so much it's a commonplace to be offered an alcoholic drink when entering a home. It's spread to women over the past decade or two or three, and I'm amazed by how many people are to all intents and purposes high-functioning alcoholics.
    Drinking heavily once a month and alcoholic are quite different things.

    We do drink a fair amount in the UK but aiui we're a fair bit lower than in the mid-2000s, which was the high point (or low point, depending on your POV).
    Having a day off once a month and not being an alcoholic is entirely the same thing. Hic!
    I don't drink on approximately half of days.

    Albeit, I've spread those days out across the whole year, so it's more a "not drinking for 12 hours each day" kind of thing.
  • Options
    stodgestodge Posts: 12,916
    Evening all :)

    I see my "worries" over Sadiq Khan's polling were misplaced as he leads Susan Hall by a modest 25 points. His "drag" on the Labour number seems to be 5% given the VI poll for London which in itself is very interesting.

    We've got the data tables from YouGov (as expected, Queen Mary University was the client).

    https://d3nkl3psvxxpe9.cloudfront.net/documents/QMULResults_231017_London_W.pdf

    When all respondents are included, Labour is on 38%, Don't Knows on 16%, Conservatives on 13%. More DKs (18%) in Outer London than in Inner London (14%). Labour leads in North London 42-9 by the way. Labour has a 30 point lead (40-10) among the largest demographic (25-49) with the Conservatives ahead only among the 65+ age group.

    There's little encouragement for the Conservatives overall but the poll confirms what I've suspected for a while - the Greens will do well in Inner London and could well finish second in the new Stratford Constituency and perhaps also in West Ham & Beckton.

    Finally, I hope those who read my occasional bletherings lumped on WITHOUT A FIGHT this morning.
  • Options
    rcs1000 said:

    On the subject of Roger Waters, I've stayed at his place down near Winchester.

    Did you warm your bones beside the fire?
  • Options

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    I've just sent British Gas an enormous bill for the errors they've made in handling my father's old account.

    It will be interesting to see what they come back with.

    Would be nice if they paid up, but would be funny if I was able to threaten them with debt collectors.

    Is it fewer than £5,000 pounds?
    I think you mean 'less,' and of course it is. I haven't done more than 20 hours work on it so far. Who do you think I am, a banker?
    Fewer is a hill I am prepared to die on.

    Take them to the small claims court.
    No, monetary value is a continuous variable. So it is less not fewer.
  • Options
    isamisam Posts: 41,037
    kyf_100 said:

    Sandpit said:

    Away from the cricket:

    "Pink Floyd co-founder Roger Waters says the world doesn’t really know “what actually happened” when Hamas unleashed their unprecedented attack on Israel on Oct. 7, but he’s not convinced it wasn’t a “false flag operation.”"

    https://twitter.com/thedailybeast/status/1721880191079690397

    He’s sadly gone the full anti-Semite, even as he insists he hasn’t.
    The same Roger Waters who thought it would be fun to cosplay as an SS officer earlier this year?

    https://news.sky.com/story/pink-floyd-star-roger-waters-says-he-was-opposing-fascism-when-he-wore-nazi-inspired-uniform-12890501

    Imagine my surprise.
    Well it was part of the story of The Wall, which he wrote 45 years ago. It’s quite well known that the main character turns into a far right type fascist towards the end, and no doubt Waters plays that part in the stage show
  • Options
    HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 117,210

    If there's a riot at the weekend the Met chief is gone.

    Huge call.

    Tommy Robinson to lead EDL members to London on Saturday to meet pro Palestinian protestors.

    The police also have the Lord Mayor's Show to manage as well

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12720035/armistice-day-far-right-hooligans-clash-pro-palestine-march-tommy-robinson-tweet.html#comments
  • Options
    rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 54,189
    isam said:

    kyf_100 said:

    Sandpit said:

    Away from the cricket:

    "Pink Floyd co-founder Roger Waters says the world doesn’t really know “what actually happened” when Hamas unleashed their unprecedented attack on Israel on Oct. 7, but he’s not convinced it wasn’t a “false flag operation.”"

    https://twitter.com/thedailybeast/status/1721880191079690397

    He’s sadly gone the full anti-Semite, even as he insists he hasn’t.
    The same Roger Waters who thought it would be fun to cosplay as an SS officer earlier this year?

    https://news.sky.com/story/pink-floyd-star-roger-waters-says-he-was-opposing-fascism-when-he-wore-nazi-inspired-uniform-12890501

    Imagine my surprise.
    Well it was part of the story of The Wall, which he wrote 45 years ago. It’s quite well known that the main character turns into a far right type fascist towards the end, and no doubt Waters plays that part in the stage show
    I thought it was meant to be a warning *against* fascism.
  • Options
    Sean_FSean_F Posts: 36,012

    Leon said:

    TimS said:

    The longer term trend on this is not so bad. People much less pessimistic than they were a year ago, and roughly similar to where they were just before Partygate broke out.

    As 1997 showed, this doesn't necessarily translate into Tory votes, in fact people may partly feel more optimistic because they expect a change of government. I think there are a few things likely to make the public less pessimistic than in 2022:

    - Inflation is now falling, albeit still high, rather than skyrocketing. Particularly noticeable in heating bills as we enter winter
    - For all that Sunak's government is a bit limp, it's not the same crazed chaos as under latter day Johnson or the Truss-Kwarteng fever dream
    - The Russia-Ukraine war was pretty terrifying when it started but is now part of the furniture

    So I don't think I agree with the header. There's a short term rise in pessimism but it's well down longer term.

    Yes, I agree

    Also, I think the nation is finally getting over Brexit. The departure of Boris has probably drawn a lot of the poison, but I also sense a genuine feeling of: it's done, like it or not, make the best of it. Clearly a lot of people, a sizeable majority, regret it - as things stand- but I doubt half of those people want to actually revisit it

    This itself removes a shadow from British politics. We are in the post-Brexit era now, with its advantages and disadvantages; turns out it wasn't the immediate sunlit uplands promised by some, but neither was it the catastrophe that broke up the UK threatened by others. Meh
    Speak for yourself Buster! Brexit is the weeping sore that will continue to infect UK politics no matter how much you wish for it to stop.
    Brexit is like having a baby, that grows up to be Jimmy Saville.
    Now then, now then.
    “Just because she’s dead, it doesn’t mean she can’t have some fun.”
  • Options
    MightyAlexMightyAlex Posts: 1,466
    edited November 2023

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    I've just sent British Gas an enormous bill for the errors they've made in handling my father's old account.

    It will be interesting to see what they come back with.

    Would be nice if they paid up, but would be funny if I was able to threaten them with debt collectors.

    Is it fewer than £5,000 pounds?
    I think you mean 'less,' and of course it is. I haven't done more than 20 hours work on it so far. Who do you think I am, a banker?
    Fewer is a hill I am prepared to die on.

    Take them to the small claims court.
    No, monetary value is a continuous variable. So it is less not fewer.
    Financial system is all computer based, right? So money must be discrete value.
  • Options
    OmniumOmnium Posts: 9,822
    rcs1000 said:

    Omnium said:

    Ghedebrav said:

    viewcode said:

    Andy_JS said:

    "'Wine o'clock' culture blamed for UK women being biggest boozers in world: Shock report reveals one in four get hammered each month

    Quarter of women admit having six or more alcoholic drinks on single occasion
    This is more than double the average rate of 12 per cent among the 33 countries"

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-12720545/Wine-oclock-UK-women-biggest-boozers-world.html

    That's been known for quite some time, but it's so much in the background we forget how common it is. Alcohol culture is ingrained in the UK, so much it's a commonplace to be offered an alcoholic drink when entering a home. It's spread to women over the past decade or two or three, and I'm amazed by how many people are to all intents and purposes high-functioning alcoholics.
    Drinking heavily once a month and alcoholic are quite different things.

    We do drink a fair amount in the UK but aiui we're a fair bit lower than in the mid-2000s, which was the high point (or low point, depending on your POV).
    Having a day off once a month and not being an alcoholic is entirely the same thing. Hic!
    I don't drink on approximately half of days.

    Albeit, I've spread those days out across the whole year, so it's more a "not drinking for 12 hours each day" kind of thing.
    Years ago I went for a medical on joining a new company. The Doc asked me when was the last day I hadn't had a drink. Yesterday! I responded - clearly having the medical in view. Oh, very good, he said, and passed me with flying colours.
  • Options
    ChrisChris Posts: 11,150
    "Boris Johnson suggested injecting himself with Covid on live television in the early days of the pandemic to prove it did not pose a threat to the public, the Covid inquiry has heard."
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67347456

    Crazier than Trump, Bolosonaro and Orban rolled into one.
  • Options
    isamisam Posts: 41,037
    rcs1000 said:

    isam said:

    kyf_100 said:

    Sandpit said:

    Away from the cricket:

    "Pink Floyd co-founder Roger Waters says the world doesn’t really know “what actually happened” when Hamas unleashed their unprecedented attack on Israel on Oct. 7, but he’s not convinced it wasn’t a “false flag operation.”"

    https://twitter.com/thedailybeast/status/1721880191079690397

    He’s sadly gone the full anti-Semite, even as he insists he hasn’t.
    The same Roger Waters who thought it would be fun to cosplay as an SS officer earlier this year?

    https://news.sky.com/story/pink-floyd-star-roger-waters-says-he-was-opposing-fascism-when-he-wore-nazi-inspired-uniform-12890501

    Imagine my surprise.
    Well it was part of the story of The Wall, which he wrote 45 years ago. It’s quite well known that the main character turns into a far right type fascist towards the end, and no doubt Waters plays that part in the stage show
    I thought it was meant to be a warning *against* fascism.
    It may be, but the character goes crazy and turns into a fascist. The songs called In the Flesh pt2. The lyrics are racist, homophobic, anti semitic etc etc out of context
  • Options
    noneoftheabovenoneoftheabove Posts: 20,893
    edited November 2023
    HYUFD said:

    If there's a riot at the weekend the Met chief is gone.

    Huge call.

    Tommy Robinson to lead EDL members to London on Saturday to meet pro Palestinian protestors.

    The police also have the Lord Mayor's Show to manage as well

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12720035/armistice-day-far-right-hooligans-clash-pro-palestine-march-tommy-robinson-tweet.html#comments
    Edit - Ignore, assumed it was Sunday. Chelsea Man City and West Ham Forest too.
  • Options
    isam said:

    kyf_100 said:

    Sandpit said:

    Away from the cricket:

    "Pink Floyd co-founder Roger Waters says the world doesn’t really know “what actually happened” when Hamas unleashed their unprecedented attack on Israel on Oct. 7, but he’s not convinced it wasn’t a “false flag operation.”"

    https://twitter.com/thedailybeast/status/1721880191079690397

    He’s sadly gone the full anti-Semite, even as he insists he hasn’t.
    The same Roger Waters who thought it would be fun to cosplay as an SS officer earlier this year?

    https://news.sky.com/story/pink-floyd-star-roger-waters-says-he-was-opposing-fascism-when-he-wore-nazi-inspired-uniform-12890501

    Imagine my surprise.
    Well it was part of the story of The Wall, which he wrote 45 years ago. It’s quite well known that the main character turns into a far right type fascist towards the end, and no doubt Waters plays that part in the stage show
    Yep. The main character, Pink, has a fevered, drug-induced dream of being a dictator iirc.

    A lot can be thrown at Waters in his later outings but this accusation doesn't stand up.
  • Options
    JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 39,172
    Omnium said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Omnium said:

    Ghedebrav said:

    viewcode said:

    Andy_JS said:

    "'Wine o'clock' culture blamed for UK women being biggest boozers in world: Shock report reveals one in four get hammered each month

    Quarter of women admit having six or more alcoholic drinks on single occasion
    This is more than double the average rate of 12 per cent among the 33 countries"

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-12720545/Wine-oclock-UK-women-biggest-boozers-world.html

    That's been known for quite some time, but it's so much in the background we forget how common it is. Alcohol culture is ingrained in the UK, so much it's a commonplace to be offered an alcoholic drink when entering a home. It's spread to women over the past decade or two or three, and I'm amazed by how many people are to all intents and purposes high-functioning alcoholics.
    Drinking heavily once a month and alcoholic are quite different things.

    We do drink a fair amount in the UK but aiui we're a fair bit lower than in the mid-2000s, which was the high point (or low point, depending on your POV).
    Having a day off once a month and not being an alcoholic is entirely the same thing. Hic!
    I don't drink on approximately half of days.

    Albeit, I've spread those days out across the whole year, so it's more a "not drinking for 12 hours each day" kind of thing.
    Years ago I went for a medical on joining a new company. The Doc asked me when was the last day I hadn't had a drink. Yesterday! I responded - clearly having the medical in view. Oh, very good, he said, and passed me with flying colours.
    My surgeon once visited me in hospital whilst smoking a cigar, and with a bottle of whisky in hand. He checked my chart to see what drugs I was on, then poured some whisky into tumblers for us...
  • Options
    isamisam Posts: 41,037
    HYUFD said:

    If there's a riot at the weekend the Met chief is gone.

    Huge call.

    Tommy Robinson to lead EDL members to London on Saturday to meet pro Palestinian protestors.

    The police also have the Lord Mayor's Show to manage as well

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12720035/armistice-day-far-right-hooligans-clash-pro-palestine-march-tommy-robinson-tweet.html#comments
    Danny Ings right up the front

    https://x.com/thecultraspod/status/1721602559457026482?s=46&t=CW4pL-mMpTqsJXCdjW0Z6Q
  • Options
    MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 25,418
    HYUFD said:

    If there's a riot at the weekend the Met chief is gone.

    Huge call.

    Tommy Robinson to lead EDL members to London on Saturday to meet pro Palestinian protestors.

    The police also have the Lord Mayor's Show to manage as well

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12720035/armistice-day-far-right-hooligans-clash-pro-palestine-march-tommy-robinson-tweet.html#comments
    Little Tommy Two Names and his vigilantes are by tacit invitation of the Home Secretary and her incendiary language.

    She loves it when a plan comes together.
  • Options
    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
  • Options
    OmniumOmnium Posts: 9,822

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    It wouldn't be unless the answer was clearly John Pertwee.
  • Options
    ydoethurydoethur Posts: 67,523

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
  • Options
    Omnium said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Omnium said:

    Ghedebrav said:

    viewcode said:

    Andy_JS said:

    "'Wine o'clock' culture blamed for UK women being biggest boozers in world: Shock report reveals one in four get hammered each month

    Quarter of women admit having six or more alcoholic drinks on single occasion
    This is more than double the average rate of 12 per cent among the 33 countries"

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-12720545/Wine-oclock-UK-women-biggest-boozers-world.html

    That's been known for quite some time, but it's so much in the background we forget how common it is. Alcohol culture is ingrained in the UK, so much it's a commonplace to be offered an alcoholic drink when entering a home. It's spread to women over the past decade or two or three, and I'm amazed by how many people are to all intents and purposes high-functioning alcoholics.
    Drinking heavily once a month and alcoholic are quite different things.

    We do drink a fair amount in the UK but aiui we're a fair bit lower than in the mid-2000s, which was the high point (or low point, depending on your POV).
    Having a day off once a month and not being an alcoholic is entirely the same thing. Hic!
    I don't drink on approximately half of days.

    Albeit, I've spread those days out across the whole year, so it's more a "not drinking for 12 hours each day" kind of thing.
    Years ago I went for a medical on joining a new company. The Doc asked me when was the last day I hadn't had a drink. Yesterday! I responded - clearly having the medical in view. Oh, very good, he said, and passed me with flying colours.
    As the RN staff report in a ship's medic put it

    "I have head it said that an alcoholic is someone who drinks more than their doctor. Thanks to the efforts of X, we have no alcoholics on this ship."
  • Options

    Omnium said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Omnium said:

    Ghedebrav said:

    viewcode said:

    Andy_JS said:

    "'Wine o'clock' culture blamed for UK women being biggest boozers in world: Shock report reveals one in four get hammered each month

    Quarter of women admit having six or more alcoholic drinks on single occasion
    This is more than double the average rate of 12 per cent among the 33 countries"

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-12720545/Wine-oclock-UK-women-biggest-boozers-world.html

    That's been known for quite some time, but it's so much in the background we forget how common it is. Alcohol culture is ingrained in the UK, so much it's a commonplace to be offered an alcoholic drink when entering a home. It's spread to women over the past decade or two or three, and I'm amazed by how many people are to all intents and purposes high-functioning alcoholics.
    Drinking heavily once a month and alcoholic are quite different things.

    We do drink a fair amount in the UK but aiui we're a fair bit lower than in the mid-2000s, which was the high point (or low point, depending on your POV).
    Having a day off once a month and not being an alcoholic is entirely the same thing. Hic!
    I don't drink on approximately half of days.

    Albeit, I've spread those days out across the whole year, so it's more a "not drinking for 12 hours each day" kind of thing.
    Years ago I went for a medical on joining a new company. The Doc asked me when was the last day I hadn't had a drink. Yesterday! I responded - clearly having the medical in view. Oh, very good, he said, and passed me with flying colours.
    My surgeon once visited me in hospital whilst smoking a cigar, and with a bottle of whisky in hand. He checked my chart to see what drugs I was on, then poured some whisky into tumblers for us...
    Outstanding. Was this 'clap hands' NHS?
  • Options
    nico679nico679 Posts: 5,091
    Braverman wants to be Tory leader so it’s in her interests that Sunak loses the GE . Perhaps she’ll just keep spewing out vile policies to toxify further brand Tory .
  • Options

    HYUFD said:

    If there's a riot at the weekend the Met chief is gone.

    Huge call.

    Tommy Robinson to lead EDL members to London on Saturday to meet pro Palestinian protestors.

    The police also have the Lord Mayor's Show to manage as well

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12720035/armistice-day-far-right-hooligans-clash-pro-palestine-march-tommy-robinson-tweet.html#comments
    Edit - Ignore, assumed it was Sunday. Chelsea Man City and West Ham Forest too.
    Can we not thrown in a protest march by Argentina for return of the Maldives for good measure?
  • Options
    kinabalukinabalu Posts: 39,429
    Bake Off. Dessert week.
  • Options
    StuartinromfordStuartinromford Posts: 14,645
    edited November 2023
    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
    I once taught A Level physics at a girls' secondary.

    They were distraught at the Smith-Capaldi, because Dr Who was no longer "hot". Their word, not mine.

    An odd group, who I was very fond of.

    (Way before my time, so hard to tell, but I suspect that Troughton was probably closest to ur-Doctor.)
  • Options
    NigelbNigelb Posts: 63,022

    If there's a riot at the weekend the Met chief is gone.

    Huge call.

    There could also be one were they to ban the protest at so late a stage.
    And the hurdle for banning them under the current law is a very high one.

  • Options
    nico679 said:

    Braverman wants to be Tory leader so it’s in her interests that Sunak loses the GE . Perhaps she’ll just keep spewing out vile policies to toxify further brand Tory .

    Will she be sacked at the xmas reshuffle?

    Is that her game plan?

    Then she has no fingers anywhere near the election loss?

    So hard to keep up with this collapsing tory administration.
  • Options
    viewcodeviewcode Posts: 19,127
    edited November 2023
    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
    Gaaah. You can make convincing arguments for Hartnell, Troughton, Pertwee, Baker T, Tennant, Smith and even Capaldi. Baker was very good for most of his run but the later years went off a bit. I won't go thru the others because I'll get ranty.
  • Options
    rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 54,189

    Omnium said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Omnium said:

    Ghedebrav said:

    viewcode said:

    Andy_JS said:

    "'Wine o'clock' culture blamed for UK women being biggest boozers in world: Shock report reveals one in four get hammered each month

    Quarter of women admit having six or more alcoholic drinks on single occasion
    This is more than double the average rate of 12 per cent among the 33 countries"

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-12720545/Wine-oclock-UK-women-biggest-boozers-world.html

    That's been known for quite some time, but it's so much in the background we forget how common it is. Alcohol culture is ingrained in the UK, so much it's a commonplace to be offered an alcoholic drink when entering a home. It's spread to women over the past decade or two or three, and I'm amazed by how many people are to all intents and purposes high-functioning alcoholics.
    Drinking heavily once a month and alcoholic are quite different things.

    We do drink a fair amount in the UK but aiui we're a fair bit lower than in the mid-2000s, which was the high point (or low point, depending on your POV).
    Having a day off once a month and not being an alcoholic is entirely the same thing. Hic!
    I don't drink on approximately half of days.

    Albeit, I've spread those days out across the whole year, so it's more a "not drinking for 12 hours each day" kind of thing.
    Years ago I went for a medical on joining a new company. The Doc asked me when was the last day I hadn't had a drink. Yesterday! I responded - clearly having the medical in view. Oh, very good, he said, and passed me with flying colours.
    As the RN staff report in a ship's medic put it

    "I have head it said that an alcoholic is someone who drinks more than their doctor. Thanks to the efforts of X, we have no alcoholics on this ship."
    I'm in LA. I don't think my doctor is old enough to drink yet.
  • Options
    viewcodeviewcode Posts: 19,127
    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    I find that...good. 😃
  • Options
    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
    Gaaah. You can make convincing arguments for Hartnell, Troughton, Pertwee, Baker, Tennant, Smith and even Capaldi. Baker was very good for most of his run but the later years went off a bit. I won't go thru the others because I'll get ranty.
    I did say it might be too early.

    No one comes close imho except Troughton.

    But maybe what matters is the era you grew up in?
  • Options
    Chris said:

    "Boris Johnson suggested injecting himself with Covid on live television in the early days of the pandemic to prove it did not pose a threat to the public, the Covid inquiry has heard."
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67347456

    Crazier than Trump, Bolosonaro and Orban rolled into one.

    How much £ per term is Eton again?
  • Options
    JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 39,172

    Omnium said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Omnium said:

    Ghedebrav said:

    viewcode said:

    Andy_JS said:

    "'Wine o'clock' culture blamed for UK women being biggest boozers in world: Shock report reveals one in four get hammered each month

    Quarter of women admit having six or more alcoholic drinks on single occasion
    This is more than double the average rate of 12 per cent among the 33 countries"

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-12720545/Wine-oclock-UK-women-biggest-boozers-world.html

    That's been known for quite some time, but it's so much in the background we forget how common it is. Alcohol culture is ingrained in the UK, so much it's a commonplace to be offered an alcoholic drink when entering a home. It's spread to women over the past decade or two or three, and I'm amazed by how many people are to all intents and purposes high-functioning alcoholics.
    Drinking heavily once a month and alcoholic are quite different things.

    We do drink a fair amount in the UK but aiui we're a fair bit lower than in the mid-2000s, which was the high point (or low point, depending on your POV).
    Having a day off once a month and not being an alcoholic is entirely the same thing. Hic!
    I don't drink on approximately half of days.

    Albeit, I've spread those days out across the whole year, so it's more a "not drinking for 12 hours each day" kind of thing.
    Years ago I went for a medical on joining a new company. The Doc asked me when was the last day I hadn't had a drink. Yesterday! I responded - clearly having the medical in view. Oh, very good, he said, and passed me with flying colours.
    My surgeon once visited me in hospital whilst smoking a cigar, and with a bottle of whisky in hand. He checked my chart to see what drugs I was on, then poured some whisky into tumblers for us...
    Outstanding. Was this 'clap hands' NHS?
    Well, he did some work for the NHS at the time. But this was at the London Independent Hospital in Stepney Green. The Prof. was a bit of a law unto himself. :)
  • Options
    isamisam Posts: 41,037

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
    Gaaah. You can make convincing arguments for Hartnell, Troughton, Pertwee, Baker, Tennant, Smith and even Capaldi. Baker was very good for most of his run but the later years went off a bit. I won't go thru the others because I'll get ranty.
    I did say it might be too early.

    No one comes close imho except Troughton.

    But maybe what matters is the era you grew up in?
    Pertwee thinks he is the Doctor

    https://youtu.be/HD_aLhoxc64?si=rs7NrNkdv-W2RqY7
  • Options
    NigelbNigelb Posts: 63,022
    .
    Chris said:

    "Boris Johnson suggested injecting himself with Covid on live television in the early days of the pandemic to prove it did not pose a threat to the public, the Covid inquiry has heard."
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67347456

    Crazier than Trump, Bolosonaro and Orban rolled into one.

    Not entirely surprising that we failed to take any effective immediate action right at the beginning, then.
  • Options
    This is all making the collapse of Major's administration look like a gentle warm decline.


    (((Dan Hodges)))
    @DPJHodges
    ·
    26m
    So just to summarise where we are this evening. The government has announced that if you want to ride a pedicab in London you will be arrested. But if you want to join a march that carries a significant risk of violence and disorder you can fill yer boots…
  • Options
    nico679nico679 Posts: 5,091

    nico679 said:

    Braverman wants to be Tory leader so it’s in her interests that Sunak loses the GE . Perhaps she’ll just keep spewing out vile policies to toxify further brand Tory .

    Will she be sacked at the xmas reshuffle?

    Is that her game plan?

    Then she has no fingers anywhere near the election loss?

    So hard to keep up with this collapsing tory administration.
    I think her ideal strategy is to flunk out and play the martyr. She knows that if Sunak loses then she’s the perfect candidate for the membership .
  • Options
    Chris said:

    "Boris Johnson suggested injecting himself with Covid on live television in the early days of the pandemic to prove it did not pose a threat to the public, the Covid inquiry has heard."
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67347456

    Crazier than Trump, Bolosonaro and Orban rolled into one.

    I am a gobby bastard but even I am lost for words.
  • Options
    viewcodeviewcode Posts: 19,127

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    I've just sent British Gas an enormous bill for the errors they've made in handling my father's old account.

    It will be interesting to see what they come back with.

    Would be nice if they paid up, but would be funny if I was able to threaten them with debt collectors.

    Is it fewer than £5,000 pounds?
    I think you mean 'less,' and of course it is. I haven't done more than 20 hours work on it so far. Who do you think I am, a banker?
    Fewer is a hill I am prepared to die on.

    Take them to the small claims court.
    No, monetary value is a continuous variable. So it is less not fewer.
    Financial system is all computer based, right? So money must be discrete value.
    I once explained an error in a hundred billion dollar sum down to about the 16th decimal place of a cent. True story.

    (Yes, really. Never got thanked. Not a problem in Present Job)

    If you allow decimal points, you can make a discrete variable approximate a continuous variable to whatever fidelity you want
  • Options
    SandyRentoolSandyRentool Posts: 20,765
    Tonight we have Young Boys at Man City.

    Add your own punchline.
  • Options
    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    I've just sent British Gas an enormous bill for the errors they've made in handling my father's old account.

    It will be interesting to see what they come back with.

    Would be nice if they paid up, but would be funny if I was able to threaten them with debt collectors.

    Is it fewer than £5,000 pounds?
    I think you mean 'less,' and of course it is. I haven't done more than 20 hours work on it so far. Who do you think I am, a banker?
    Fewer is a hill I am prepared to die on.

    Take them to the small claims court.
    No, monetary value is a continuous variable. So it is less not fewer.
    Financial system is all computer based, right? So money must be discrete value.
    I once explained an error in a hundred billion dollar sum down to about the 16th decimal place of a cent. True story.

    (Yes, really. Never got thanked. Not a problem in Present Job)

    If you allow decimal points, you can make a discrete variable approximate a continuous variable to whatever fidelity you want
    People who can't tell the difference between whole numbers and decimals, are missing the point.
  • Options
    SandyRentoolSandyRentool Posts: 20,765
    Chris said:

    "Boris Johnson suggested injecting himself with Covid on live television in the early days of the pandemic to prove it did not pose a threat to the public, the Covid inquiry has heard."
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67347456

    Crazier than Trump, Bolosonaro and Orban rolled into one.

    When did he inject himself with bullshit? It keeps spewing out of his mouth.
  • Options
    NigelbNigelb Posts: 63,022
    Didn’t someone call this guy a moderate ?

    Glenn Youngkin on Fox: We have been completely straightforward and clear. I will back a bill to ban abortion
    https://twitter.com/DNCWarRoom/status/1721905412545614221
  • Options
    stodgestodge Posts: 12,916

    This is all making the collapse of Major's administration look like a gentle warm decline.


    (((Dan Hodges)))
    @DPJHodges
    ·
    26m
    So just to summarise where we are this evening. The government has announced that if you want to ride a pedicab in London you will be arrested. But if you want to join a march that carries a significant risk of violence and disorder you can fill yer boots…

    The Met have apparently given the go-ahead for the march from Hyde Park to Nine Elms on Saturday. Presumably they will be in strength at Victoria to stop anyone trying to go up Victoria Street towards Westminster Abbey.

    As for Tommy Robinson and his cohorts - well, they should equally be kept well away from the Cenotaph AND the pro-Palestine march. There's no need to "defend the Cenotaph" - the Met have plenty of officerds and can call in more if need be.
  • Options
    TazTaz Posts: 11,374

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Nope.
  • Options
    GIN1138GIN1138 Posts: 20,931
    Chris said:

    "Boris Johnson suggested injecting himself with Covid on live television in the early days of the pandemic to prove it did not pose a threat to the public, the Covid inquiry has heard."
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67347456

    Crazier than Trump, Bolosonaro and Orban rolled into one.

    Would have made for an interesting news conference...
  • Options
    NigelbNigelb Posts: 63,022
    Twitter algos…

    When Senator Warren posted against antisemitism yesterday, the top replies were complaints about her not focusing on Muslims. (https://twitter.com/SenWarren/status/1721632913727377761)

    When she posts against Islamophobia today, the top replies complain she is not focusing on Jews. (https://twitter.com/SenWarren/status/1721924994567975054)

    https://twitter.com/MattGertz/status/1721951076784476540
  • Options
    TazTaz Posts: 11,374
    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
    Gaaah. You can make convincing arguments for Hartnell, Troughton, Pertwee, Baker T, Tennant, Smith and even Capaldi. Baker was very good for most of his run but the later years went off a bit. I won't go thru the others because I'll get ranty.
    Season 17 often gets a bum rap but I love,it. Had a few too many on Saturday so,was wide awake Sunday in the small hours so watched Shada on IPlayer. Nothing better than a camp,Christopher Neame wandering around Cambridge with a carpet bag.
  • Options
    ohnotnowohnotnow Posts: 2,978
    Taz said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Nope.
    I would argue the point about Baker vs. Troughton mind you.
  • Options
    TazTaz Posts: 11,374
    edited November 2023
    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    Unlike Unearthly Child

    Thanks to Stef Coburn.

    Quite a lot of vitriol about it on Twitter. God knows why. Ian Levine seems like he will self combust over it. Apart from the first episode it’s quite dull.
  • Options

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    I've just sent British Gas an enormous bill for the errors they've made in handling my father's old account.

    It will be interesting to see what they come back with.

    Would be nice if they paid up, but would be funny if I was able to threaten them with debt collectors.

    Is it fewer than £5,000 pounds?
    I think you mean 'less,' and of course it is. I haven't done more than 20 hours work on it so far. Who do you think I am, a banker?
    Fewer is a hill I am prepared to die on.

    Take them to the small claims court.
    No, monetary value is a continuous variable. So it is less not fewer.
    Financial system is all computer based, right? So money must be discrete value.
    Everything is made up of subatomic particles, so everything is discrete ultimately. A computer can divide 1 into pieces that are smaller than the human brain can really comprehend. So within the confines of human understanding in which human language operates it is less not fewer for money just as it is less not fewer for any continuous quantity.
  • Options
    viewcodeviewcode Posts: 19,127

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
    Gaaah. You can make convincing arguments for Hartnell, Troughton, Pertwee, Baker, Tennant, Smith and even Capaldi. Baker was very good for most of his run but the later years went off a bit. I won't go thru the others because I'll get ranty.
    I did say it might be too early.

    No one comes close imho except Troughton.

    But maybe what matters is the era you grew up in?
    Yes, and it's true that the Doctor of your childhood is a bit enhanced. Which is the only reason why people like, say Davison. But there is a part of me that thinks The Eleventh Hour to The Angels Take Manhattan was the best the show ever got. You can find gems in most of the Doctors: even Baker C had Revelation OTD. so it's not clear-cut. I think poor Jodes is the only one without at least one stone-cold classic (or possibly McCoy, depending on what you think of Remembrance)

  • Options
    Nigelb said:

    Didn’t someone call this guy a moderate ?

    Glenn Youngkin on Fox: We have been completely straightforward and clear. I will back a bill to ban abortion
    https://twitter.com/DNCWarRoom/status/1721905412545614221

    Nowadays a Republican moderate is someone who will ban all abortions but won't execute you for having one.
  • Options
    ohnotnowohnotnow Posts: 2,978
    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    I've just sent British Gas an enormous bill for the errors they've made in handling my father's old account.

    It will be interesting to see what they come back with.

    Would be nice if they paid up, but would be funny if I was able to threaten them with debt collectors.

    Is it fewer than £5,000 pounds?
    I think you mean 'less,' and of course it is. I haven't done more than 20 hours work on it so far. Who do you think I am, a banker?
    Fewer is a hill I am prepared to die on.

    Take them to the small claims court.
    No, monetary value is a continuous variable. So it is less not fewer.
    Financial system is all computer based, right? So money must be discrete value.
    I once explained an error in a hundred billion dollar sum down to about the 16th decimal place of a cent. True story.

    (Yes, really. Never got thanked. Not a problem in Present Job)

    If you allow decimal points, you can make a discrete variable approximate a continuous variable to whatever fidelity you want
    Aside from constantly having this argument at work with people who want to use floating point columns in MySQL... I once knew a very successful professor who was delighted to get three papers out of one simulation by running it on a 32bit floating point system, then a 64bit one. Totally different results so got two papers out of that.

    Then got a third one detailing why it had happened.

  • Options
    TazTaz Posts: 11,374
    ohnotnow said:

    Taz said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Nope.
    I would argue the point about Baker vs. Troughton mind you.
    I think, as viewcode said, you can make cases for a few. Troughton is very good. Certainly. Quite a few of his stories are mediocre but he elevates them with his performance. But Tom Baker is just magnetic and charismatic in a way the others aren’t.

  • Options
    So how can the Cons win the next GE?

    Put everything into the London Mayoral election and hope Corbyn splits the Lab vote there. Win there and that is all that would be talked about - even if you had lost everywhere else. Then you spin that Lab are in disarray and push ahead to a GE with momentum on your side. Run a very good campaign and hope that Lab makes at least one big genuine mistake that your press allies can feast on without looking ridiculous or out of touch. You might just edge a 2017 style result.

    Problems - 1) Susan Hall. Whoever thought she was a good idea as a London candidate?
    2) Lab aren't hiding that they know your Home Secretary is a total liability. Check out her approval numbers with the public. They are Trussian (or Corbynesque if you prefer). That she is still in office proves that Mr Sunak is either weak or out of touch. Possibly both.
    3) The King's Speech is as big a platform as anyone gets in this country. What did we get? Lots of words but no real proposed action. Tinkering round the edges and trying to set wizard-wheeze traps for the Lab leader. What the Americans would call 'Inside Baseball' stuff. The people behind this stuff are just not up to their jobs
  • Options
    viewcodeviewcode Posts: 19,127
    Taz said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
    Gaaah. You can make convincing arguments for Hartnell, Troughton, Pertwee, Baker T, Tennant, Smith and even Capaldi. Baker was very good for most of his run but the later years went off a bit. I won't go thru the others because I'll get ranty.
    Season 17 often gets a bum rap but I love,it. Had a few too many on Saturday so,was wide awake Sunday in the small hours so watched Shada on IPlayer. Nothing better than a camp,Christopher Neame wandering around Cambridge with a carpet bag.
    Well yes, but season 17 had a few too many stinkers, which I won't list because it's depressing. But season 18 got better and Full Circle/State of Decay/Warriors of the Gate and Logopolis really aren't bad.
  • Options
    TazTaz Posts: 11,374
    viewcode said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
    Gaaah. You can make convincing arguments for Hartnell, Troughton, Pertwee, Baker, Tennant, Smith and even Capaldi. Baker was very good for most of his run but the later years went off a bit. I won't go thru the others because I'll get ranty.
    I did say it might be too early.

    No one comes close imho except Troughton.

    But maybe what matters is the era you grew up in?
    Yes, and it's true that the Doctor of your childhood is a bit enhanced. Which is the only reason why people like, say Davison. But there is a part of me that thinks The Eleventh Hour to The Angels Take Manhattan was the best the show ever got. You can find gems in most of the Doctors: even Baker C had Revelation OTD. so it's not clear-cut. I think poor Jodes is the only one without at least one stone-cold classic (or possibly McCoy, depending on what you think of Remembrance)

    For me McCoy had several stone cold classics. Fenric, Greatest Show, Remembrance and even Ghost Light.

    The Cartmel vision, as it took shape, was pretty interesting and the character of the doctor was becoming a little darker and, dare I say, more interesting.
  • Options
    MightyAlexMightyAlex Posts: 1,466
    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    I've just sent British Gas an enormous bill for the errors they've made in handling my father's old account.

    It will be interesting to see what they come back with.

    Would be nice if they paid up, but would be funny if I was able to threaten them with debt collectors.

    Is it fewer than £5,000 pounds?
    I think you mean 'less,' and of course it is. I haven't done more than 20 hours work on it so far. Who do you think I am, a banker?
    Fewer is a hill I am prepared to die on.

    Take them to the small claims court.
    No, monetary value is a continuous variable. So it is less not fewer.
    Financial system is all computer based, right? So money must be discrete value.
    I once explained an error in a hundred billion dollar sum down to about the 16th decimal place of a cent. True story.

    (Yes, really. Never got thanked. Not a problem in Present Job)

    If you allow decimal points, you can make a discrete variable approximate a continuous variable to whatever fidelity you want
    You might have to hold my hand here but...

    Even if you use say BigDecimal data type there is still a finite number of digits before or after the dp? So we're constrained within the financial system to discrete valuations, yes?
  • Options
    DavidLDavidL Posts: 51,480
    Bugger. I should have followed my comment on saying it wasn't over between Afghanistan and Australia with cold hard cash.

    On topic, no, the UK is heading into recession next year or at the very least zero growth. The Tories have had so many forks stuck into them it is getting embarrassing.
  • Options
    ydoethurydoethur Posts: 67,523

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
    I once taught A Level physics at a girls' secondary.

    They were distraught at the Smith-Capaldi, because Dr Who was no longer "hot". Their word, not mine.

    An odd group, who I was very fond of.

    (Way before my time, so hard to tell, but I suspect that Troughton was probably closest to ur-Doctor.)
    I was once, as a cover lesson, showing War Horse to a group of Year 10s (also at a girls' secondary).

    They watched the cavalry getting machine gunned and one of them said, horrified, 'I hope the horses are alright.'

    Back flashed another, 'Tom Hiddleston's dead and you're worrying about a horse?'
  • Options
    CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 40,057
    DavidL said:

    Bugger. I should have followed my comment on saying it wasn't over between Afghanistan and Australia with cold hard cash.

    On topic, no, the UK is heading into recession next year or at the very least zero growth. The Tories have had so many forks stuck into them it is getting embarrassing.

    Not oven ready, just like Brexit.
  • Options
    ydoethurydoethur Posts: 67,523
    edited November 2023

    Chris said:

    "Boris Johnson suggested injecting himself with Covid on live television in the early days of the pandemic to prove it did not pose a threat to the public, the Covid inquiry has heard."
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67347456

    Crazier than Trump, Bolosonaro and Orban rolled into one.

    How much £ per term is Eton again?
    Considering they got a load of completely thick c**ts like Johnson and Rees-Mogg through A-levels and even into unis (albeit not such good ones in their cases) I would have said they must be geniuses who are worth every penny.
  • Options
    SandyRentoolSandyRentool Posts: 20,765
    Not only are posters discussing a silly children's TV programme, but some have the audacity to say Season instead of Series.

    Bring back "Is that photo AI?".
  • Options
    TazTaz Posts: 11,374
    viewcode said:

    Taz said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
    Gaaah. You can make convincing arguments for Hartnell, Troughton, Pertwee, Baker T, Tennant, Smith and even Capaldi. Baker was very good for most of his run but the later years went off a bit. I won't go thru the others because I'll get ranty.
    Season 17 often gets a bum rap but I love,it. Had a few too many on Saturday so,was wide awake Sunday in the small hours so watched Shada on IPlayer. Nothing better than a camp,Christopher Neame wandering around Cambridge with a carpet bag.
    Well yes, but season 17 had a few too many stinkers, which I won't list because it's depressing. But season 18 got better and Full Circle/State of Decay/Warriors of the Gate and Logopolis really aren't bad.
    Horses for courses. I really cannot fault any of season 17, production values aside. Horns of Nimon was a classic Xmas pantomime. If the series can do horror why not slapstick.

    The season was Hated by fandom at the time but more appreciated now.

    18 was okay considering all the behind the scenes stuff. E space trilogy was strong as was keeper of traken but Tom was right to leave/be hoofed out by then.
  • Options
    OmniumOmnium Posts: 9,822

    Chris said:

    "Boris Johnson suggested injecting himself with Covid on live television in the early days of the pandemic to prove it did not pose a threat to the public, the Covid inquiry has heard."
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67347456

    Crazier than Trump, Bolosonaro and Orban rolled into one.

    I am a gobby bastard but even I am lost for words.
    Nine pairs of shoes and a choice of shirts though?
  • Options
    ohnotnowohnotnow Posts: 2,978
    Taz said:

    viewcode said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
    Gaaah. You can make convincing arguments for Hartnell, Troughton, Pertwee, Baker, Tennant, Smith and even Capaldi. Baker was very good for most of his run but the later years went off a bit. I won't go thru the others because I'll get ranty.
    I did say it might be too early.

    No one comes close imho except Troughton.

    But maybe what matters is the era you grew up in?
    Yes, and it's true that the Doctor of your childhood is a bit enhanced. Which is the only reason why people like, say Davison. But there is a part of me that thinks The Eleventh Hour to The Angels Take Manhattan was the best the show ever got. You can find gems in most of the Doctors: even Baker C had Revelation OTD. so it's not clear-cut. I think poor Jodes is the only one without at least one stone-cold classic (or possibly McCoy, depending on what you think of Remembrance)

    For me McCoy had several stone cold classics. Fenric, Greatest Show, Remembrance and even Ghost Light.

    The Cartmel vision, as it took shape, was pretty interesting and the character of the doctor was becoming a little darker and, dare I say, more interesting.
    If you mean it was becoming a pale shadow of Troughton or early Hartnell - then yes.

    FIGHT.

    Also, Atari > Amiga.
  • Options
    Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 25,636

    So how can the Cons win the next GE?

    Put everything into the London Mayoral election and hope Corbyn splits the Lab vote there. Win there and that is all that would be talked about - even if you had lost everywhere else. Then you spin that Lab are in disarray and push ahead to a GE with momentum on your side. Run a very good campaign and hope that Lab makes at least one big genuine mistake that your press allies can feast on without looking ridiculous or out of touch. You might just edge a 2017 style result.

    Problems - 1) Susan Hall. Whoever thought she was a good idea as a London candidate?
    2) Lab aren't hiding that they know your Home Secretary is a total liability. Check out her approval numbers with the public. They are Trussian (or Corbynesque if you prefer). That she is still in office proves that Mr Sunak is either weak or out of touch. Possibly both.
    3) The King's Speech is as big a platform as anyone gets in this country. What did we get? Lots of words but no real proposed action. Tinkering round the edges and trying to set wizard-wheeze traps for the Lab leader. What the Americans would call 'Inside Baseball' stuff. The people behind this stuff are just not up to their jobs

    Your analysis of the problems, and their order of importance, is rather lacking.

    Susan Hall was elected because CCHQ in their wisdom nixed two good candidates in favour of a 'leadership-friendly moderniser' who was then brought down by groping allegations.

    Braverman is about results. Like Truss, she's happy to be unpopular (and when was the last popular Home Sec.?) and let the results speak for themselves. She is definitely acting up and challenging Sunak to sack her, which lends a somewhat negative impression of her thinking on how likely we are to stop the boats.

    This brings us to the only 'real' problem here - that this Government has no policies, except bad ones. They don't want to grow the economy; they don't want to rationalise the State; they don't want to improve the delivery of public services; they don't want to get more houses built - not in a serious and determined fashion anyway.
  • Options
    TazTaz Posts: 11,374
    viewcode said:

    Taz said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
    Gaaah. You can make convincing arguments for Hartnell, Troughton, Pertwee, Baker T, Tennant, Smith and even Capaldi. Baker was very good for most of his run but the later years went off a bit. I won't go thru the others because I'll get ranty.
    Season 17 often gets a bum rap but I love,it. Had a few too many on Saturday so,was wide awake Sunday in the small hours so watched Shada on IPlayer. Nothing better than a camp,Christopher Neame wandering around Cambridge with a carpet bag.
    Well yes, but season 17 had a few too many stinkers, which I won't list because it's depressing. But season 18 got better and Full Circle/State of Decay/Warriors of the Gate and Logopolis really aren't bad.
    Horses for courses. I really cannot fault any of season 17, production values aside. Horns of Nimon was a classic Xmas pantomime. If the series can do horror why not slapstick.

    Hated by fandom at the time but more appreciated now.

    18 was okay considering all the behind the scenes stuff. E space trilogy was strong as was keeper of traken

    Not only are posters discussing a silly children's TV programme, but some have the audacity to say Season instead of Series.

    Bring back "Is that photo AI?".

    It’s better than people calling whole stories ‘episodes’ !
  • Options

    So how can the Cons win the next GE?

    Put everything into the London Mayoral election and hope Corbyn splits the Lab vote there. Win there and that is all that would be talked about - even if you had lost everywhere else. Then you spin that Lab are in disarray and push ahead to a GE with momentum on your side. Run a very good campaign and hope that Lab makes at least one big genuine mistake that your press allies can feast on without looking ridiculous or out of touch. You might just edge a 2017 style result.

    Problems - 1) Susan Hall. Whoever thought she was a good idea as a London candidate?
    2) Lab aren't hiding that they know your Home Secretary is a total liability. Check out her approval numbers with the public. They are Trussian (or Corbynesque if you prefer). That she is still in office proves that Mr Sunak is either weak or out of touch. Possibly both.
    3) The King's Speech is as big a platform as anyone gets in this country. What did we get? Lots of words but no real proposed action. Tinkering round the edges and trying to set wizard-wheeze traps for the Lab leader. What the Americans would call 'Inside Baseball' stuff. The people behind this stuff are just not up to their jobs

    Governing by laying traps for your opponents is such a ludicrously stupid tactic.

    If you bring good governance, chances are your opponents will in time create their own messes. Constantly setting traps is generally obvious and makes you look mendacious and like you are using government as your plaything.

    Although this government seem to be obsessed with the tactic more than any I’ve ever seen, Brown was another PM who had tendencies towards this, and similarly it didn’t work.
  • Options
    ohnotnowohnotnow Posts: 2,978
    Taz said:

    ohnotnow said:

    Taz said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Nope.
    I would argue the point about Baker vs. Troughton mind you.
    I think, as viewcode said, you can make cases for a few. Troughton is very good. Certainly. Quite a few of his stories are mediocre but he elevates them with his performance. But Tom Baker is just magnetic and charismatic in a way the others aren’t.

    I think I'm slightly biased against Tom as he was the Dr. of my childhood. So I hold his stories and performance to a higher standard. But they are cracking by and large.
  • Options
    LeonLeon Posts: 47,687
    viewcode said:

    Andy_JS said:

    "'Wine o'clock' culture blamed for UK women being biggest boozers in world: Shock report reveals one in four get hammered each month

    Quarter of women admit having six or more alcoholic drinks on single occasion
    This is more than double the average rate of 12 per cent among the 33 countries"

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-12720545/Wine-oclock-UK-women-biggest-boozers-world.html

    That's been known for quite some time, but it's so much in the background we forget how common it is. Alcohol culture is ingrained in the UK, so much it's a commonplace to be offered an alcoholic drink when entering a home. It's spread to women over the past decade or two or three, and I'm amazed by how many people are to all intents and purposes high-functioning alcoholics.
    Have you noticed our climate? Of COURSE we are alcoholics
  • Options
    stodgestodge Posts: 12,916

    So how can the Cons win the next GE?

    Put everything into the London Mayoral election and hope Corbyn splits the Lab vote there. Win there and that is all that would be talked about - even if you had lost everywhere else. Then you spin that Lab are in disarray and push ahead to a GE with momentum on your side. Run a very good campaign and hope that Lab makes at least one big genuine mistake that your press allies can feast on without looking ridiculous or out of touch. You might just edge a 2017 style result.

    Problems - 1) Susan Hall. Whoever thought she was a good idea as a London candidate?
    2) Lab aren't hiding that they know your Home Secretary is a total liability. Check out her approval numbers with the public. They are Trussian (or Corbynesque if you prefer). That she is still in office proves that Mr Sunak is either weak or out of touch. Possibly both.
    3) The King's Speech is as big a platform as anyone gets in this country. What did we get? Lots of words but no real proposed action. Tinkering round the edges and trying to set wizard-wheeze traps for the Lab leader. What the Americans would call 'Inside Baseball' stuff. The people behind this stuff are just not up to their jobs

    Your analysis of the problems, and their order of importance, is rather lacking.

    Susan Hall was elected because CCHQ in their wisdom nixed two good candidates in favour of a 'leadership-friendly moderniser' who was then brought down by groping allegations.

    Braverman is about results. Like Truss, she's happy to be unpopular (and when was the last popular Home Sec.?) and let the results speak for themselves. She is definitely acting up and challenging Sunak to sack her, which lends a somewhat negative impression of her thinking on how likely we are to stop the boats.

    This brings us to the only 'real' problem here - that this Government has no policies, except bad ones. They don't want to grow the economy; they don't want to rationalise the State; they don't want to improve the delivery of public services; they don't want to get more houses built - not in a serious and determined fashion anyway.
    So we come back to the central question - based on their record and their ideas for governing Britain in the mid to late 2020s, why would anyone want to vote Conservative at the next election?
  • Options
    DavidLDavidL Posts: 51,480

    TOPPING said:

    Ghedebrav said:

    Just caught up on the gist of the speech. Wow. Pedicabs, vaping and forcing criminals to attend sentencing. Parish pump stuff. So parochial; embarrassing for country that aspires to be a global leader.

    Purely from a strategic point of view, we're approaching an election, and the government have the initiative by default - they're squandering it, and Sunak continues to be really, really bad at politics. There's no vision, no answers to the big questions. Just performative nibbling around the edges.

    Can someone explain to me how one can force someone to attend the dock? What happens if they just leave the country?
    No idea but if it's for sentencing then they are about to force that person to do a stretch in HMP so forcing is perhaps not the challenge you think it is.

    Meanwhile - it is your fault that the nation is largely poppyless because no one carries cash any more. Proud of yourself?
    TOPPING said:

    Ghedebrav said:

    Just caught up on the gist of the speech. Wow. Pedicabs, vaping and forcing criminals to attend sentencing. Parish pump stuff. So parochial; embarrassing for country that aspires to be a global leader.

    Purely from a strategic point of view, we're approaching an election, and the government have the initiative by default - they're squandering it, and Sunak continues to be really, really bad at politics. There's no vision, no answers to the big questions. Just performative nibbling around the edges.

    Can someone explain to me how one can force someone to attend the dock? What happens if they just leave the country?
    No idea but if it's for sentencing then they are about to force that person to do a stretch in HMP so forcing is perhaps not the challenge you think it is.

    Meanwhile - it is your fault that the nation is largely poppyless because no one carries cash any more. Proud of yourself?
    Probably a reaction to compulsory poppy fascism.
    Definitely noticed a huge decline in people wearing them and indeed people selling them. It does appear that poppy fascism may have backfired: there was a period not too long ago where newsreaders/poilticians/anyone on the telly were lambasted by an angry twitter mob if their failed to wear a poppy (which is easily done by accident – the sodding things just fall off).
    Or you change jackets. I buy 2-3 of these buggers a year.
  • Options

    Not only are posters discussing a silly children's TV programme, but some have the audacity to say Season instead of Series.

    Bring back "Is that photo AI?".

    "Sunil started his Tube travels during Season 1994/5" :lol:
  • Options
    LeonLeon Posts: 47,687

    Leon said:

    TimS said:

    The longer term trend on this is not so bad. People much less pessimistic than they were a year ago, and roughly similar to where they were just before Partygate broke out.

    As 1997 showed, this doesn't necessarily translate into Tory votes, in fact people may partly feel more optimistic because they expect a change of government. I think there are a few things likely to make the public less pessimistic than in 2022:

    - Inflation is now falling, albeit still high, rather than skyrocketing. Particularly noticeable in heating bills as we enter winter
    - For all that Sunak's government is a bit limp, it's not the same crazed chaos as under latter day Johnson or the Truss-Kwarteng fever dream
    - The Russia-Ukraine war was pretty terrifying when it started but is now part of the furniture

    So I don't think I agree with the header. There's a short term rise in pessimism but it's well down longer term.

    Yes, I agree

    Also, I think the nation is finally getting over Brexit. The departure of Boris has probably drawn a lot of the poison, but I also sense a genuine feeling of: it's done, like it or not, make the best of it. Clearly a lot of people, a sizeable majority, regret it - as things stand- but I doubt half of those people want to actually revisit it

    This itself removes a shadow from British politics. We are in the post-Brexit era now, with its advantages and disadvantages; turns out it wasn't the immediate sunlit uplands promised by some, but neither was it the catastrophe that broke up the UK threatened by others. Meh
    Speak for yourself Buster! Brexit is the weeping sore that will continue to infect UK politics no matter how much you wish for it to stop.
    Brexit is like having a baby, that grows up to be Jimmy Saville.
    I just had drinks with my favourite Cornish friends. All smart and funny

    One of them pointed out that Jimmy Savile probably had a lot of fun, and died happy. Which I realised is almost certainly true, and quite disconcerting


    Another one told me this superb anecdote. He was living in Bangor in Wales during 9/11. He was so enraged by it the next day he vandalised the local mosque - which was tiny, it being Bangor. Like a two room bungalow. He graffiti'd a Star of David and a swastika on the door, not quite knowing what else to do

    The next day he was consumed with guilt and remorse and went BACK to the mosque and graffitoed under his graffiti the word "SORRY"
  • Options
    JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 39,172
    ohnotnow said:

    Taz said:

    viewcode said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    ydoethur said:

    Meanwhile, in "Boris Johnson lies" non-news,

    Lister also confirms the Cummings recollection of Johnson saying in September 2020, "Let the bodies pile high." This was, Lister says, "an unfortunate turn of phrase".

    https://twitter.com/peterwalker99/status/1721930133852807314

    🧐At the time Boris Johnson said suggestions he had made the remarks about letting bodies pile high were “total rubbish”. His official No 10 spokesman told reporters: “This is untrue and he has denied that.”

    https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1721957791437369841

    That's genuinely astonishing.

    Cummings has actually told the truth about something?
    I suspect that Domski has the same attitude to truth as BoJo.

    Say stuff that is convenient at the time, pretty much independent of its truth.

    It's actually more annoying than people who lie all the time- at least with them, you know what to do. See the "guards of the Sapphire City" puzzles, where you ask a guard what the other guard would say.
    I think it was also in "Death to the Daleks", a mid-70s four parter with Pertwee and Sarah Jane and... goshdarn it's on iPlayer! (scampers off)
    It was actually in Pyramids of Mars with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.

    But don't worry, that's on iPlayer too...
    is it too early in the evening to say that Tom Baker was easily the best doctor?
    Is that even controversial?
    Gaaah. You can make convincing arguments for Hartnell, Troughton, Pertwee, Baker, Tennant, Smith and even Capaldi. Baker was very good for most of his run but the later years went off a bit. I won't go thru the others because I'll get ranty.
    I did say it might be too early.

    No one comes close imho except Troughton.

    But maybe what matters is the era you grew up in?
    Yes, and it's true that the Doctor of your childhood is a bit enhanced. Which is the only reason why people like, say Davison. But there is a part of me that thinks The Eleventh Hour to The Angels Take Manhattan was the best the show ever got. You can find gems in most of the Doctors: even Baker C had Revelation OTD. so it's not clear-cut. I think poor Jodes is the only one without at least one stone-cold classic (or possibly McCoy, depending on what you think of Remembrance)

    For me McCoy had several stone cold classics. Fenric, Greatest Show, Remembrance and even Ghost Light.

    The Cartmel vision, as it took shape, was pretty interesting and the character of the doctor was becoming a little darker and, dare I say, more interesting.
    If you mean it was becoming a pale shadow of Troughton or early Hartnell - then yes.

    FIGHT.

    Also, Atari > Amiga.
    Acorn > Amiga > Apple > Atari ;)

    (Acorn chose its name so it would be alphabetically before Apple...)

    (And when Acorn formed a joint venture with Apple, its project name was 'Fruit and Nut'...)
  • Options
    DavidLDavidL Posts: 51,480
    stodge said:

    So how can the Cons win the next GE?

    Put everything into the London Mayoral election and hope Corbyn splits the Lab vote there. Win there and that is all that would be talked about - even if you had lost everywhere else. Then you spin that Lab are in disarray and push ahead to a GE with momentum on your side. Run a very good campaign and hope that Lab makes at least one big genuine mistake that your press allies can feast on without looking ridiculous or out of touch. You might just edge a 2017 style result.

    Problems - 1) Susan Hall. Whoever thought she was a good idea as a London candidate?
    2) Lab aren't hiding that they know your Home Secretary is a total liability. Check out her approval numbers with the public. They are Trussian (or Corbynesque if you prefer). That she is still in office proves that Mr Sunak is either weak or out of touch. Possibly both.
    3) The King's Speech is as big a platform as anyone gets in this country. What did we get? Lots of words but no real proposed action. Tinkering round the edges and trying to set wizard-wheeze traps for the Lab leader. What the Americans would call 'Inside Baseball' stuff. The people behind this stuff are just not up to their jobs

    Your analysis of the problems, and their order of importance, is rather lacking.

    Susan Hall was elected because CCHQ in their wisdom nixed two good candidates in favour of a 'leadership-friendly moderniser' who was then brought down by groping allegations.

    Braverman is about results. Like Truss, she's happy to be unpopular (and when was the last popular Home Sec.?) and let the results speak for themselves. She is definitely acting up and challenging Sunak to sack her, which lends a somewhat negative impression of her thinking on how likely we are to stop the boats.

    This brings us to the only 'real' problem here - that this Government has no policies, except bad ones. They don't want to grow the economy; they don't want to rationalise the State; they don't want to improve the delivery of public services; they don't want to get more houses built - not in a serious and determined fashion anyway.
    So we come back to the central question - based on their record and their ideas for governing Britain in the mid to late 2020s, why would anyone want to vote Conservative at the next election?
    Tricky question. If there is an answer it it that you do not think SKS will be any better and just might be worse. Hard to imagine I know but by no means impossible.
  • Options
    TazTaz Posts: 11,374

    So how can the Cons win the next GE?

    Put everything into the London Mayoral election and hope Corbyn splits the Lab vote there. Win there and that is all that would be talked about - even if you had lost everywhere else. Then you spin that Lab are in disarray and push ahead to a GE with momentum on your side. Run a very good campaign and hope that Lab makes at least one big genuine mistake that your press allies can feast on without looking ridiculous or out of touch. You might just edge a 2017 style result.

    Problems - 1) Susan Hall. Whoever thought she was a good idea as a London candidate?
    2) Lab aren't hiding that they know your Home Secretary is a total liability. Check out her approval numbers with the public. They are Trussian (or Corbynesque if you prefer). That she is still in office proves that Mr Sunak is either weak or out of touch. Possibly both.
    3) The King's Speech is as big a platform as anyone gets in this country. What did we get? Lots of words but no real proposed action. Tinkering round the edges and trying to set wizard-wheeze traps for the Lab leader. What the Americans would call 'Inside Baseball' stuff. The people behind this stuff are just not up to their jobs

    Governing by laying traps for your opponents is such a ludicrously stupid tactic.

    If you bring good governance, chances are your opponents will in time create their own messes. Constantly setting traps is generally obvious and makes you look mendacious and like you are using government as your plaything.

    Although this government seem to be obsessed with the tactic more than any I’ve ever seen, Brown was another PM who had tendencies towards this, and similarly it didn’t work.
    Won’t work now either.

    I don’t think there’s any way back for them.

    The kings speech was somewhat uninspired. This is a govt out of ideas
  • Options
    Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 33,254
    @PickardJE
    even in my worst presumptions about the handling of the pandemic I never imagined the prime minister of the United Kingdom proposing to blow-dry the virus out of his own nostrils and threatening to inject himself with it live on TV


    @ayeshahazarika
    We often ponder what gave Liz Truss the confidence to think “F*ck it… why not give it a go? I mean, how hard can it really be?” Think we’ve found our answer
  • Options
    DavidLDavidL Posts: 51,480
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    TimS said:

    The longer term trend on this is not so bad. People much less pessimistic than they were a year ago, and roughly similar to where they were just before Partygate broke out.

    As 1997 showed, this doesn't necessarily translate into Tory votes, in fact people may partly feel more optimistic because they expect a change of government. I think there are a few things likely to make the public less pessimistic than in 2022:

    - Inflation is now falling, albeit still high, rather than skyrocketing. Particularly noticeable in heating bills as we enter winter
    - For all that Sunak's government is a bit limp, it's not the same crazed chaos as under latter day Johnson or the Truss-Kwarteng fever dream
    - The Russia-Ukraine war was pretty terrifying when it started but is now part of the furniture

    So I don't think I agree with the header. There's a short term rise in pessimism but it's well down longer term.

    Yes, I agree

    Also, I think the nation is finally getting over Brexit. The departure of Boris has probably drawn a lot of the poison, but I also sense a genuine feeling of: it's done, like it or not, make the best of it. Clearly a lot of people, a sizeable majority, regret it - as things stand- but I doubt half of those people want to actually revisit it

    This itself removes a shadow from British politics. We are in the post-Brexit era now, with its advantages and disadvantages; turns out it wasn't the immediate sunlit uplands promised by some, but neither was it the catastrophe that broke up the UK threatened by others. Meh
    Speak for yourself Buster! Brexit is the weeping sore that will continue to infect UK politics no matter how much you wish for it to stop.
    Brexit is like having a baby, that grows up to be Jimmy Saville.
    I just had drinks with my favourite Cornish friends. All smart and funny

    One of them pointed out that Jimmy Savile probably had a lot of fun, and died happy. Which I realised is almost certainly true, and quite disconcerting


    Another one told me this superb anecdote. He was living in Bangor in Wales during 9/11. He was so enraged by it the next day he vandalised the local mosque - which was tiny, it being Bangor. Like a two room bungalow. He graffiti'd a Star of David and a swastika on the door, not quite knowing what else to do

    The next day he was consumed with guilt and remorse and went BACK to the mosque and graffitoed under his graffiti the word "SORRY"
    Brilliantly British.
  • Options
    Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 33,254
    @TimJ_B
    Despite Mr Johnson's repeated denials, Eddie Lister has told the COVID inquiry he did in September 2020 say he would rather 'let the bodies pile high' than impose another lockdown...

    @danbloom1
    As well as Boris Johnson himself denying it ... Downing Street denied the "bodies pile high" claims in the strongest possible terms on 25/26 April 2021, issuing a No10 spokesperson statement that read (in its entirety): "This is just another lie."
  • Options
    EabhalEabhal Posts: 6,017
    Leon said:

    viewcode said:

    Andy_JS said:

    "'Wine o'clock' culture blamed for UK women being biggest boozers in world: Shock report reveals one in four get hammered each month

    Quarter of women admit having six or more alcoholic drinks on single occasion
    This is more than double the average rate of 12 per cent among the 33 countries"

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-12720545/Wine-oclock-UK-women-biggest-boozers-world.html

    That's been known for quite some time, but it's so much in the background we forget how common it is. Alcohol culture is ingrained in the UK, so much it's a commonplace to be offered an alcoholic drink when entering a home. It's spread to women over the past decade or two or three, and I'm amazed by how many people are to all intents and purposes high-functioning alcoholics.
    Have you noticed our climate? Of COURSE we are alcoholics
    I shall pull the data on sunshine hours/rainfall and alcohol consumption and get back to you.

    I'd expect north-west of Scotland to be bad, while Moray, East Lothian/Fife/Angus to be basically sober.
  • Options
    stodge said:

    So how can the Cons win the next GE?

    Put everything into the London Mayoral election and hope Corbyn splits the Lab vote there. Win there and that is all that would be talked about - even if you had lost everywhere else. Then you spin that Lab are in disarray and push ahead to a GE with momentum on your side. Run a very good campaign and hope that Lab makes at least one big genuine mistake that your press allies can feast on without looking ridiculous or out of touch. You might just edge a 2017 style result.

    Problems - 1) Susan Hall. Whoever thought she was a good idea as a London candidate?
    2) Lab aren't hiding that they know your Home Secretary is a total liability. Check out her approval numbers with the public. They are Trussian (or Corbynesque if you prefer). That she is still in office proves that Mr Sunak is either weak or out of touch. Possibly both.
    3) The King's Speech is as big a platform as anyone gets in this country. What did we get? Lots of words but no real proposed action. Tinkering round the edges and trying to set wizard-wheeze traps for the Lab leader. What the Americans would call 'Inside Baseball' stuff. The people behind this stuff are just not up to their jobs

    Your analysis of the problems, and their order of importance, is rather lacking.

    Susan Hall was elected because CCHQ in their wisdom nixed two good candidates in favour of a 'leadership-friendly moderniser' who was then brought down by groping allegations.

    Braverman is about results. Like Truss, she's happy to be unpopular (and when was the last popular Home Sec.?) and let the results speak for themselves. She is definitely acting up and challenging Sunak to sack her, which lends a somewhat negative impression of her thinking on how likely we are to stop the boats.

    This brings us to the only 'real' problem here - that this Government has no policies, except bad ones. They don't want to grow the economy; they don't want to rationalise the State; they don't want to improve the delivery of public services; they don't want to get more houses built - not in a serious and determined fashion anyway.
    So we come back to the central question - based on their record and their ideas for governing Britain in the mid to late 2020s, why would anyone want to vote Conservative at the next election?
    Oldies have done very well.

    And for young northerners who want to learn a trade rather than keep studying then things have never been better.
  • Options
    Taz said:



    The kings speech was somewhat uninspired.

    I actually enjoyed the interplay between Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush.
  • Options
    Scott_xP said:

    @PickardJE
    even in my worst presumptions about the handling of the pandemic I never imagined the prime minister of the United Kingdom proposing to blow-dry the virus out of his own nostrils and threatening to inject himself with it live on TV


    @ayeshahazarika
    We often ponder what gave Liz Truss the confidence to think “F*ck it… why not give it a go? I mean, how hard can it really be?” Think we’ve found our answer

    Slander even to hint that Britain Trump was a thing.
  • Options

    stodge said:

    So how can the Cons win the next GE?

    Put everything into the London Mayoral election and hope Corbyn splits the Lab vote there. Win there and that is all that would be talked about - even if you had lost everywhere else. Then you spin that Lab are in disarray and push ahead to a GE with momentum on your side. Run a very good campaign and hope that Lab makes at least one big genuine mistake that your press allies can feast on without looking ridiculous or out of touch. You might just edge a 2017 style result.

    Problems - 1) Susan Hall. Whoever thought she was a good idea as a London candidate?
    2) Lab aren't hiding that they know your Home Secretary is a total liability. Check out her approval numbers with the public. They are Trussian (or Corbynesque if you prefer). That she is still in office proves that Mr Sunak is either weak or out of touch. Possibly both.
    3) The King's Speech is as big a platform as anyone gets in this country. What did we get? Lots of words but no real proposed action. Tinkering round the edges and trying to set wizard-wheeze traps for the Lab leader. What the Americans would call 'Inside Baseball' stuff. The people behind this stuff are just not up to their jobs

    Your analysis of the problems, and their order of importance, is rather lacking.

    Susan Hall was elected because CCHQ in their wisdom nixed two good candidates in favour of a 'leadership-friendly moderniser' who was then brought down by groping allegations.

    Braverman is about results. Like Truss, she's happy to be unpopular (and when was the last popular Home Sec.?) and let the results speak for themselves. She is definitely acting up and challenging Sunak to sack her, which lends a somewhat negative impression of her thinking on how likely we are to stop the boats.

    This brings us to the only 'real' problem here - that this Government has no policies, except bad ones. They don't want to grow the economy; they don't want to rationalise the State; they don't want to improve the delivery of public services; they don't want to get more houses built - not in a serious and determined fashion anyway.
    So we come back to the central question - based on their record and their ideas for governing Britain in the mid to late 2020s, why would anyone want to vote Conservative at the next election?
    Oldies have done very well.

    And for young northerners who want to learn a trade rather than keep studying then things have never been better.
    Now which things have the government done well on.

    I'll suggest that they've got about right the energy subsidies mixture of helping everyone last winter, helping the vulnerable this year and encouraging energy efficiency.
  • Options
    Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 25,636
    stodge said:

    So how can the Cons win the next GE?

    Put everything into the London Mayoral election and hope Corbyn splits the Lab vote there. Win there and that is all that would be talked about - even if you had lost everywhere else. Then you spin that Lab are in disarray and push ahead to a GE with momentum on your side. Run a very good campaign and hope that Lab makes at least one big genuine mistake that your press allies can feast on without looking ridiculous or out of touch. You might just edge a 2017 style result.

    Problems - 1) Susan Hall. Whoever thought she was a good idea as a London candidate?
    2) Lab aren't hiding that they know your Home Secretary is a total liability. Check out her approval numbers with the public. They are Trussian (or Corbynesque if you prefer). That she is still in office proves that Mr Sunak is either weak or out of touch. Possibly both.
    3) The King's Speech is as big a platform as anyone gets in this country. What did we get? Lots of words but no real proposed action. Tinkering round the edges and trying to set wizard-wheeze traps for the Lab leader. What the Americans would call 'Inside Baseball' stuff. The people behind this stuff are just not up to their jobs

    Your analysis of the problems, and their order of importance, is rather lacking.

    Susan Hall was elected because CCHQ in their wisdom nixed two good candidates in favour of a 'leadership-friendly moderniser' who was then brought down by groping allegations.

    Braverman is about results. Like Truss, she's happy to be unpopular (and when was the last popular Home Sec.?) and let the results speak for themselves. She is definitely acting up and challenging Sunak to sack her, which lends a somewhat negative impression of her thinking on how likely we are to stop the boats.

    This brings us to the only 'real' problem here - that this Government has no policies, except bad ones. They don't want to grow the economy; they don't want to rationalise the State; they don't want to improve the delivery of public services; they don't want to get more houses built - not in a serious and determined fashion anyway.
    So we come back to the central question - based on their record and their ideas for governing Britain in the mid to late 2020s, why would anyone want to vote Conservative at the next election?
    No reason currently. But it's never too late to Govern well, and stand on that record and the promise of more. Labour has a set of dead end policies that will be hugely costly and deeply unpopular. Sunak seems quite happy to keep the seat warm - the UK public deserves two parties competing to offer a winning prospectus to improve their lives, not conspiring to impose policies that erode standards of living further.
  • Options
    PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 76,023

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    I've just sent British Gas an enormous bill for the errors they've made in handling my father's old account.

    It will be interesting to see what they come back with.

    Would be nice if they paid up, but would be funny if I was able to threaten them with debt collectors.

    Is it fewer than £5,000 pounds?
    I think you mean 'less,' and of course it is. I haven't done more than 20 hours work on it so far. Who do you think I am, a banker?
    Fewer is a hill I am prepared to die on.

    Take them to the small claims court.
    No, monetary value is a continuous variable. So it is less not fewer.
    Money is definitely discrete. It is also correct to use "less than".
  • Options
    LeonLeon Posts: 47,687
    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    TimS said:

    The longer term trend on this is not so bad. People much less pessimistic than they were a year ago, and roughly similar to where they were just before Partygate broke out.

    As 1997 showed, this doesn't necessarily translate into Tory votes, in fact people may partly feel more optimistic because they expect a change of government. I think there are a few things likely to make the public less pessimistic than in 2022:

    - Inflation is now falling, albeit still high, rather than skyrocketing. Particularly noticeable in heating bills as we enter winter
    - For all that Sunak's government is a bit limp, it's not the same crazed chaos as under latter day Johnson or the Truss-Kwarteng fever dream
    - The Russia-Ukraine war was pretty terrifying when it started but is now part of the furniture

    So I don't think I agree with the header. There's a short term rise in pessimism but it's well down longer term.

    Yes, I agree

    Also, I think the nation is finally getting over Brexit. The departure of Boris has probably drawn a lot of the poison, but I also sense a genuine feeling of: it's done, like it or not, make the best of it. Clearly a lot of people, a sizeable majority, regret it - as things stand- but I doubt half of those people want to actually revisit it

    This itself removes a shadow from British politics. We are in the post-Brexit era now, with its advantages and disadvantages; turns out it wasn't the immediate sunlit uplands promised by some, but neither was it the catastrophe that broke up the UK threatened by others. Meh
    Speak for yourself Buster! Brexit is the weeping sore that will continue to infect UK politics no matter how much you wish for it to stop.
    Brexit is like having a baby, that grows up to be Jimmy Saville.
    I just had drinks with my favourite Cornish friends. All smart and funny

    One of them pointed out that Jimmy Savile probably had a lot of fun, and died happy. Which I realised is almost certainly true, and quite disconcerting


    Another one told me this superb anecdote. He was living in Bangor in Wales during 9/11. He was so enraged by it the next day he vandalised the local mosque - which was tiny, it being Bangor. Like a two room bungalow. He graffiti'd a Star of David and a swastika on the door, not quite knowing what else to do

    The next day he was consumed with guilt and remorse and went BACK to the mosque and graffitoed under his graffiti the word "SORRY"
    Brilliantly British.
    It has gone straight into my Top Ten Anecdotes al All Time On Anything. It is genius

    Even now I am chuckling
  • Options
    geoffwgeoffw Posts: 8,186
    Pulpstar said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    I've just sent British Gas an enormous bill for the errors they've made in handling my father's old account.

    It will be interesting to see what they come back with.

    Would be nice if they paid up, but would be funny if I was able to threaten them with debt collectors.

    Is it fewer than £5,000 pounds?
    I think you mean 'less,' and of course it is. I haven't done more than 20 hours work on it so far. Who do you think I am, a banker?
    Fewer is a hill I am prepared to die on.

    Take them to the small claims court.
    No, monetary value is a continuous variable. So it is less not fewer.
    Money is definitely discrete. It is also correct to use "less than".
    Jules has fewer coins than Jim but Jim has less money in the bank.
  • Options
    FoxyFoxy Posts: 44,937
    edited November 2023

    HYUFD said:

    If there's a riot at the weekend the Met chief is gone.

    Huge call.

    Tommy Robinson to lead EDL members to London on Saturday to meet pro Palestinian protestors.

    The police also have the Lord Mayor's Show to manage as well

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12720035/armistice-day-far-right-hooligans-clash-pro-palestine-march-tommy-robinson-tweet.html#comments
    Little Tommy Two Names and his vigilantes are by tacit invitation of the Home Secretary and her incendiary language.

    She loves it when a plan comes together.
    The EDL have been known to fly Israeli flags. Not from any genuine support, but mostly to provoke a scrap with Muslims.

    https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2011/12/29/jdl-and-far-right-parties-find-common-ground

    War degrades everything. No one is unpolluted.
  • Options
    squareroot2squareroot2 Posts: 6,391
    Pulpstar said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    I've just sent British Gas an enormous bill for the errors they've made in handling my father's old account.

    It will be interesting to see what they come back with.

    Would be nice if they paid up, but would be funny if I was able to threaten them with debt collectors.

    Is it fewer than £5,000 pounds?
    I think you mean 'less,' and of course it is. I haven't done more than 20 hours work on it so far. Who do you think I am, a banker?
    Fewer is a hill I am prepared to die on.

    Take them to the small claims court.
    No, monetary value is a continuous variable. So it is less not fewer.
    Money is definitely discrete. It is also correct to use "less than".
    Indeed it is.

    I spent some time recently explaining the difference between re...search and research. One has to try to ensure the English language lives however frequently it is bastardised.
  • Options
    LeonLeon Posts: 47,687
    Foxy said:

    HYUFD said:

    If there's a riot at the weekend the Met chief is gone.

    Huge call.

    Tommy Robinson to lead EDL members to London on Saturday to meet pro Palestinian protestors.

    The police also have the Lord Mayor's Show to manage as well

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12720035/armistice-day-far-right-hooligans-clash-pro-palestine-march-tommy-robinson-tweet.html#comments
    Little Tommy Two Names and his vigilantes are by tacit invitation of the Home Secretary and her incendiary language.

    She loves it when a plan comes together.
    The EDL have been known to fly Israeli flags. Not from any genuine support, but mostly to provoke a scrap with Muslims.

    https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2011/12/29/jdl-and-far-right-parties-find-common-ground

    War degrades everything. No one is unpolluted.
    "mostly to provoke a scrap with Muslims"

    Never, it must be said, a particularly hard thing to do, looking at the recent history of the world
  • Options
    StuartinromfordStuartinromford Posts: 14,645
    edited November 2023

    stodge said:

    So how can the Cons win the next GE?

    Put everything into the London Mayoral election and hope Corbyn splits the Lab vote there. Win there and that is all that would be talked about - even if you had lost everywhere else. Then you spin that Lab are in disarray and push ahead to a GE with momentum on your side. Run a very good campaign and hope that Lab makes at least one big genuine mistake that your press allies can feast on without looking ridiculous or out of touch. You might just edge a 2017 style result.

    Problems - 1) Susan Hall. Whoever thought she was a good idea as a London candidate?
    2) Lab aren't hiding that they know your Home Secretary is a total liability. Check out her approval numbers with the public. They are Trussian (or Corbynesque if you prefer). That she is still in office proves that Mr Sunak is either weak or out of touch. Possibly both.
    3) The King's Speech is as big a platform as anyone gets in this country. What did we get? Lots of words but no real proposed action. Tinkering round the edges and trying to set wizard-wheeze traps for the Lab leader. What the Americans would call 'Inside Baseball' stuff. The people behind this stuff are just not up to their jobs

    Your analysis of the problems, and their order of importance, is rather lacking.

    Susan Hall was elected because CCHQ in their wisdom nixed two good candidates in favour of a 'leadership-friendly moderniser' who was then brought down by groping allegations.

    Braverman is about results. Like Truss, she's happy to be unpopular (and when was the last popular Home Sec.?) and let the results speak for themselves. She is definitely acting up and challenging Sunak to sack her, which lends a somewhat negative impression of her thinking on how likely we are to stop the boats.

    This brings us to the only 'real' problem here - that this Government has no policies, except bad ones. They don't want to grow the economy; they don't want to rationalise the State; they don't want to improve the delivery of public services; they don't want to get more houses built - not in a serious and determined fashion anyway.
    So we come back to the central question - based on their record and their ideas for governing Britain in the mid to late 2020s, why would anyone want to vote Conservative at the next election?
    No reason currently. But it's never too late to Govern well, and stand on that record and the promise of more. Labour has a set of dead end policies that will be hugely costly and deeply unpopular. Sunak seems quite happy to keep the seat warm - the UK public deserves two parties competing to offer a winning prospectus to improve their lives, not conspiring to impose policies that erode standards of living further.
    We disagree (to say the least) on what "to govern well" might mean... but yes. If the main point of a King's Speech is to lay traps for the other lot, that's nature's way of telling you that your time in government should be over. The door is over there, try not to let it slam on the way out.
  • Options
    stodgestodge Posts: 12,916

    stodge said:

    So how can the Cons win the next GE?

    Put everything into the London Mayoral election and hope Corbyn splits the Lab vote there. Win there and that is all that would be talked about - even if you had lost everywhere else. Then you spin that Lab are in disarray and push ahead to a GE with momentum on your side. Run a very good campaign and hope that Lab makes at least one big genuine mistake that your press allies can feast on without looking ridiculous or out of touch. You might just edge a 2017 style result.

    Problems - 1) Susan Hall. Whoever thought she was a good idea as a London candidate?
    2) Lab aren't hiding that they know your Home Secretary is a total liability. Check out her approval numbers with the public. They are Trussian (or Corbynesque if you prefer). That she is still in office proves that Mr Sunak is either weak or out of touch. Possibly both.
    3) The King's Speech is as big a platform as anyone gets in this country. What did we get? Lots of words but no real proposed action. Tinkering round the edges and trying to set wizard-wheeze traps for the Lab leader. What the Americans would call 'Inside Baseball' stuff. The people behind this stuff are just not up to their jobs

    Your analysis of the problems, and their order of importance, is rather lacking.

    Susan Hall was elected because CCHQ in their wisdom nixed two good candidates in favour of a 'leadership-friendly moderniser' who was then brought down by groping allegations.

    Braverman is about results. Like Truss, she's happy to be unpopular (and when was the last popular Home Sec.?) and let the results speak for themselves. She is definitely acting up and challenging Sunak to sack her, which lends a somewhat negative impression of her thinking on how likely we are to stop the boats.

    This brings us to the only 'real' problem here - that this Government has no policies, except bad ones. They don't want to grow the economy; they don't want to rationalise the State; they don't want to improve the delivery of public services; they don't want to get more houses built - not in a serious and determined fashion anyway.
    So we come back to the central question - based on their record and their ideas for governing Britain in the mid to late 2020s, why would anyone want to vote Conservative at the next election?
    Oldies have done very well.

    And for young northerners who want to learn a trade rather than keep studying then things have never been better.
    Yes and many continue to vote Conservative but the polls suggest there's been a healthy swing to Labour even among that core demographic.

    The "young northerners" may still come out and support but will they be enough? Will they even bother?
This discussion has been closed.