“I can’t believe that he’s had David Cameron back in. It doesn’t reassure me at all,” says the 65-year-old. Asked if his scepticism is widely shared in this true blue Tory seat, he says: “It is with a lot of my friends and family, yes. I think things are going terrible.”..
...“If me and you did tax avoidance, we’d be going to prison, and he’s supposed to be representing us. I’m sorry, he doesn’t represent me and my values. I go to work, I work hard: I’ve got two jobs and I pay my taxes and bills like everybody else.”...
...“I think it needs change,” he adds. “I think the whole thing’s a mess really, the Conservative party: I don’t support them, but I’ve got friends that do, and they say they’re not going to vote for them.”
Not all local Conservatives are happy either: the former Tory council leader Tony Jefferson told the Stratford-upon-Avon Herald after the local elections: “The strong feedback from an awful lot of Conservatives from the doorstep was that Nadhim should have gone.”
Perteghella says the issue is much broader than Zahawi alone. “We’ve talked to lifelong Conservative voters who don’t feel that the party belongs to them any more. They feel let down,” she says...
Clearly a made up quote. No Conservative voter would ever say "I think things are going terrible.”
All true Conservative voters would have said "I think things are going good."
“David Grusch is a decorated Afghanistan combat veteran and former Air Force intelligence officer who worked in the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) and the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). From 2019 to 2021, he was the representative of the NRO to the Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force. From late 2021 to July 2022, he was the co-lead for UAP analysis at the NGA and its representative to the task force. He assisted in drafting the National Defense Authorization Act of 2023, which includes provisions for reporting of UFOs, including whistleblower protections and exemptions to non-disclosure orders and agreements.</>”
It’s on my watch list for when I hit Phnom Penh!
Talking of which, can I just say how much I love Chinese roads?
This one is exactly a year old - look at it. Beautiful. It used to take 6-9 hours to drive from Sihanoukville to Phnom Penh - now it takes 2. The road making is immaculate
They are the new Romans
Make sure you go to the Russian Market in Phnom Penh. Bought a teapot in there for $50, worth $750 in Thailand.
Was shown around by a guy who was an ambassador in SE Asia for one of the orders of Knight's Templars. His only benefit was a diplomatic passport, printed on white vellum. It was just fantastically medieval.
I assume you also know the Phnom Penh Foreign Correspondents Club? Pure Graham Greene...
“I can’t believe that he’s had David Cameron back in. It doesn’t reassure me at all,” says the 65-year-old. Asked if his scepticism is widely shared in this true blue Tory seat, he says: “It is with a lot of my friends and family, yes. I think things are going terrible.”..
...“If me and you did tax avoidance, we’d be going to prison, and he’s supposed to be representing us. I’m sorry, he doesn’t represent me and my values. I go to work, I work hard: I’ve got two jobs and I pay my taxes and bills like everybody else.”...
...“I think it needs change,” he adds. “I think the whole thing’s a mess really, the Conservative party: I don’t support them, but I’ve got friends that do, and they say they’re not going to vote for them.”
Not all local Conservatives are happy either: the former Tory council leader Tony Jefferson told the Stratford-upon-Avon Herald after the local elections: “The strong feedback from an awful lot of Conservatives from the doorstep was that Nadhim should have gone.”
Perteghella says the issue is much broader than Zahawi alone. “We’ve talked to lifelong Conservative voters who don’t feel that the party belongs to them any more. They feel let down,” she says...
Clearly a made up quote. No Conservative voter would ever say "I think things are going terrible.”
All true Conservative voters would have said "I think things are going good."
People talk about how we as a nation have been living beyond our means for years and it's true.
Once in power Labour ought to squeeze the wealthy 'til the pips squeak. The wealthy (and, relatively, I'm one of them) have been stashing up assets off borrowed government money for years.
Time for the rich to face the music: You want to live in a first world country? Well don't expected it to be paid for by borrowed money and other people's taxes.
Answer: Yes, Monaco sounds nice, Toodle Pip.
I recommend Cambodia. £350 for a year long visa
Zero taxes. No one cares. Do what you like in that year
You’ll need to buy health insurance (you don’t have do, but it’s advisable) and that’s it. Phnom Penh now has good private health care. Hospitals for rich Chinese
And that’s it. $2 for a gin and tonic in beautiful Koh Rong. $5 for an excellent Chinese meal in even more beautiful Koh Rong Sanloem
£17 for a litre of made-in-Huddersfield Vodka and £1.75 for a ready meal sweet & sour in the lovely Shettleston Asda; the good life is closer than you think.
“David Grusch is a decorated Afghanistan combat veteran and former Air Force intelligence officer who worked in the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) and the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). From 2019 to 2021, he was the representative of the NRO to the Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force. From late 2021 to July 2022, he was the co-lead for UAP analysis at the NGA and its representative to the task force. He assisted in drafting the National Defense Authorization Act of 2023, which includes provisions for reporting of UFOs, including whistleblower protections and exemptions to non-disclosure orders and agreements.</>”
It’s on my watch list for when I hit Phnom Penh!
Talking of which, can I just say how much I love Chinese roads?
This one is exactly a year old - look at it. Beautiful. It used to take 6-9 hours to drive from Sihanoukville to Phnom Penh - now it takes 2. The road making is immaculate
They are the new Romans
Make sure you go to the Russian Market in Phnom Penh. Bought a teapot in there for $50, worth $750 in Thailand.
Was shown around by a guy who was an ambassador in SE Asia for one of the orders of Knight's Templars. His only benefit was a diplomatic passport, printed on white vellum. It was just fantastically medieval.
I assume you also know the Phnom Penh Foreign Correspondents Club? Pure Graham Greene...
I love the PP FFC. I know Phnom Penh well
Sadly it shut during Covid and I fear may never reopen
People talk about how we as a nation have been living beyond our means for years and it's true.
Once in power Labour ought to squeeze the wealthy 'til the pips squeak. The wealthy (and, relatively, I'm one of them) have been stashing up assets off borrowed government money for years.
Time for the rich to face the music: You want to live in a first world country? Well don't expected it to be paid for by borrowed money and other people's taxes.
Answer: Yes, Monaco sounds nice, Toodle Pip.
I recommend Cambodia. £350 for a year long visa
Zero taxes. No one cares. Do what you like in that year
You’ll need to buy health insurance (you don’t have do, but it’s advisable) and that’s it. Phnom Penh now has good private health care. Hospitals for rich Chinese
And that’s it. $2 for a gin and tonic in beautiful Koh Rong. $5 for an excellent Chinese meal in even more beautiful Koh Rong Sanloem
£17 for a litre of made-in-Huddersfield Vodka and £1.75 for a ready meal sweet & sour in the lovely Shettleston Asda; the good life is closer than you think.
That said, how does the $4.3bn get paid? It’s not as if they have that much lying around in an account somewhere that isn’t customer funds, and no the US Gov doesn’t accept Bitcoin.
I'm not saying CZ wouldn't spend customer funds to keep himself out of jail but it's also not impossible that they had the money. Being a popular crypto shady exchange should be an incredibly profitable business, and they were in one of the top spots for ages. If you're not bothering with troublesome things like regulatory compliance and you don't even need banking, it's basically just a website, plus whatever they paid in bribes in whatever Mickey Mouse jurisdiction they were pretending to be based in at any one time.
Also he probably has crypto. Aside from the coins the exchange made up themselves, he was a bit-coin early adopter, and one with money as he was CTO at a successful Chinese exchange. He also knew about Ethereum early on and probably had tokens, there's a picture on Twitter of him and Vitalik Buterin when they came to Tokyo well before that launched [*]. Just on its own, a million dollars in ETH at the prelaunch price would be $4bn now.
As for getting the actual dollars to the US Treasury Department, I think Binance do still somehow have banking and I guess CZ does personally too but apart from that... Coinbase???
* The picture also has me in it, but I genuinely have absolutely no memory of this meeting.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
“David Grusch is a decorated Afghanistan combat veteran and former Air Force intelligence officer who worked in the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) and the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). From 2019 to 2021, he was the representative of the NRO to the Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force. From late 2021 to July 2022, he was the co-lead for UAP analysis at the NGA and its representative to the task force. He assisted in drafting the National Defense Authorization Act of 2023, which includes provisions for reporting of UFOs, including whistleblower protections and exemptions to non-disclosure orders and agreements.</>”
It’s on my watch list for when I hit Phnom Penh!
Talking of which, can I just say how much I love Chinese roads?
This one is exactly a year old - look at it. Beautiful. It used to take 6-9 hours to drive from Sihanoukville to Phnom Penh - now it takes 2. The road making is immaculate
They are the new Romans
Make sure you go to the Russian Market in Phnom Penh. Bought a teapot in there for $50, worth $750 in Thailand.
Was shown around by a guy who was an ambassador in SE Asia for one of the orders of Knight's Templars. His only benefit was a diplomatic passport, printed on white vellum. It was just fantastically medieval.
I assume you also know the Phnom Penh Foreign Correspondents Club? Pure Graham Greene...
I love the PP FFC. I know Phnom Penh well
Sadly it shut during Covid and I fear may never reopen
I'd say he 'can', yes, anyone 'can'. They are about to lose to Kier Starmer, so clearly the election is about policy not about personality. I don't think he has the balls or the brains to actually do it though. His time at the Treasury has been disastrous so far, even if you accept his ban on reducing the tax burden, there was still a lot of positive work he could have done that he hasn't. I'm expecting a couple of bribes that probably won't work, not tax cutting with real purpose. If I think the budget is good, I'll be the first to praise him and the PM.
I'll save Anabobazina the trouble:
KEIR
I before E, except after C[orbyn]
It *may* have been accidentally on purpose following yesterday's comments.
Would it be good for the Tories if they won another term in office? (I'msaying that knowing it would certainly be suboptimal for the country.)
They have no new ideas. They have no money to spend. They have no credibility. They are deeply unpopular. They are increasingly corrupt.
Losing now they should have a chance to rebuild.
Losing seven years from now and we'd be looking at the kind of hammering Roosevelt gave Alf Landon in 1936.
The optimal result for the Tories is surely a Labour majority of around 25 - small enough that they are in the game still, not so small that Starmer has to do deals with the Lib Dems that would lead to voting reform and bulldoze the foundation of their success for the last 140 years.
PR also likely means no Labour majorities again and ReformUK winning lots of seats as well as a Corbynite party.
It is not all one way traffic for LDs and social democrats as seen in Israel or New Zealand or many European nations
PR may not mean specifically Labour majorities again but a hybrid form of PR could deliver stable government on the centre-left for a generation. Specifically, the hybrid "majority bonus" system used off and on in Italy and Greece could deliver government by a stable centre-left coalition led by Labour, the stability being generated by PR supplemented by top up seats awarded to the largest pre-election coalition. In Greece that system delivered the radical left Syriza party to government in 2015-19.
The democratic advantage of that system is that it requires the coalitions to be settled before the election not after it, effectively leaving the choice of governing coalition to the electorate rather than delegating that choice to politicians in tortuous post-election in smoke filled rooms.
If applied in the UK context, the obvious pre-election coalition to emerge would be between Labour, the LDs and Greens on the centre-left. A Corbyn party would undoubtably split from Labour but its toxicity would guarantee it being given the cold shoulder by the centre-left coalition and it would end up in low single figures, probably contesting the election as part of a far left Marxist alliance. On the right, the question would be whether the Conservatives would form a coalition with Reform. I think they both would, but if the Conservatives did choose to go down that path, their combined vote would be bigger than the Conservatives' alone but the willingness to get into bed with the hard right would nonetheless leak votes to the centre-left coalition.
On present polling, allowing for the ability of Farage to repulse centrists, the centre-left Lab/LD/Green coalition might get 55%+ of the vote, the extreme left Corbynite alliance 3%, a Conservative-Reform coalition 30%-35%, the Scottish nationalists 3% and the extreme right perhaps 3%. With the bonus top up seats, the Lab/LD/Green coalition might end up between them with about 2/3rds of the parliamentary seats, shared out between them in proportion to their parties' votes.
I'd say he 'can', yes, anyone 'can'. They are about to lose to Kier Starmer, so clearly the election is about policy not about personality. I don't think he has the balls or the brains to actually do it though. His time at the Treasury has been disastrous so far, even if you accept his ban on reducing the tax burden, there was still a lot of positive work he could have done that he hasn't. I'm expecting a couple of bribes that probably won't work, not tax cutting with real purpose. If I think the budget is good, I'll be the first to praise him and the PM.
I'll save Anabobazina the trouble:
KEIR
I before E, except after C[orbyn]
It *may* have been accidentally on purpose following yesterday's comments.
Ah, I missed those. I'm afraid I'm only a part time PBer
What are the odds that the govt will be boasting of tax cuts all afternoon, and then by tomorrow morning the boffins will be stating after the changes in aggregate, taxes have gone up for the majority of workers?
People talk about how we as a nation have been living beyond our means for years and it's true.
Once in power Labour ought to squeeze the wealthy 'til the pips squeak. The wealthy (and, relatively, I'm one of them) have been stashing up assets off borrowed government money for years.
Time for the rich to face the music: You want to live in a first world country? Well don't expected it to be paid for by borrowed money and other people's taxes.
Answer: Yes, Monaco sounds nice, Toodle Pip.
It’s exceedingly ugly. Full of shiny tat and traffic jams consisting of expensive sports cars going at 5mph. Nearby Nice is much nicer.
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
NI receipts were £177.4bn in the last financial year. Income Tax receipts were £248.4bn.
To abolish NI and replace the income with an increase in Income Tax rates would require increasing income tax rates by almost exactly 5/7ths.
The 20% basic rate would have to become a 35% rate. The 40% rate up to about 69%
Employers NI is the main problem. It raises more than £100bn but is pretty much invisible to the voters. It's impossible for any Chancellor to give that up. We'd need an exceptionally determined and gifted politician to do so. And it's likely that any such individual would decide they could achieve most of the gain with less political cost by other means.
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
Thought you were talking about Northern Ireland for a moment (I agree on that, too - though maybe attempt to sell it off, rather than abolish)
You think we could sell off Northern Ireland?
I think it would be more likely to resemble one of those corporate deals where the parent company has to offer a bung to cover the pension fund of whatever it is divesting.
Maybe China would take it. They would be able to handle the security, although their methods might dig up memories of the distant past.
The fear for the Tories shouldn’t be that they will lose the election. Or that they could *really* lose the election.
It is that Labour have promised a public enquiry into where all the money has gone. Because we’re both paying record taxes and suffering services on their knees thanks to lack of money. The cash is going somewhere - and we have plentiful evidence of corruption to look at…
I cannot see this being anything to trouble the Tories.
It will either take so long it won't make a blind bit of difference or it will be merely dismissed as a political stunt.
I get the distinct impression the Labour team sense that a stack of criminal prosecutions would follow.
But that is because they are also delusional and think that there is some magic money somewhere if you just check the end of enough rainbows.
Are they ? There's a reasonable chance that they might be more realistic about our finances than the Tories. Though that's not the highest of bars.
I have made the point before that their plans to increase taxes by a billion here and a billion there by removing things like VAT exemptions for private schools and non dom status are utterly trivial compared with the amounts already being spent on education and health, not even 1% in the latter case. When you match these sums against the enormous perceived need to boost spending in these areas you are looking at either much higher general taxation or ruinous borrowing. I don't see anything "realistic" about that.
This suggestion that the books would somehow add up if "Tory graft" was eliminated takes this element of fantasy even further.
This is not to suggest that they should not or will not get their turn, they will and they deserve to do so. The Tories are completely out of ideas and business as usual is not an answer to our current plight.
What we really need to do is to get a much better return on current spending whether that is building a trainline, fixing an RAAC affected school or simply facilitating business by providing a vaguely competent service. Is it possible that a Labour government might want to challenge our public services this way? We can only hope so as a nation and wish them well.
It will probably be the next Labour government that has to explain to people that they can't get everything they want from the government.
I've got my popcorn ready.
In all seriousness, it will probably leave their left-wing badly exposed.
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
NI receipts were £177.4bn in the last financial year. Income Tax receipts were £248.4bn.
To abolish NI and replace the income with an increase in Income Tax rates would require increasing income tax rates by almost exactly 5/7ths.
The 20% basic rate would have to become a 35% rate. The 40% rate up to about 69%
Employers NI is the main problem. It raises more than £100bn but is pretty much invisible to the voters. It's impossible for any Chancellor to give that up. We'd need an exceptionally determined and gifted politician to do so. And it's likely that any such individual would decide they could achieve most of the gain with less political cost by other means.
Employer's NI is just a lie, isn't it?
Taxes should be as transparent as possible, and taxing work more than non-work is wrong.
I agree it won't happen, though, for the reasons you state.
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
I mean, wealth taxes, land value taxes, taxes on stock trading, and increases (not decreases) in inheritance tax aimed at the highest brackets (I'm talking inheritances valued over £5million for example) would be good ways to deal with the issue. Also closing all the tax loopholes in the other British territories, and actually putting resource towards investigating tax avoidance rather than, say, benefit fraud.
The fear for the Tories shouldn’t be that they will lose the election. Or that they could *really* lose the election.
It is that Labour have promised a public enquiry into where all the money has gone. Because we’re both paying record taxes and suffering services on their knees thanks to lack of money. The cash is going somewhere - and we have plentiful evidence of corruption to look at…
I cannot see this being anything to trouble the Tories.
It will either take so long it won't make a blind bit of difference or it will be merely dismissed as a political stunt.
I get the distinct impression the Labour team sense that a stack of criminal prosecutions would follow.
But that is because they are also delusional and think that there is some magic money somewhere if you just check the end of enough rainbows.
Are they ? There's a reasonable chance that they might be more realistic about our finances than the Tories. Though that's not the highest of bars.
I have made the point before that their plans to increase taxes by a billion here and a billion there by removing things like VAT exemptions for private schools and non dom status are utterly trivial compared with the amounts already being spent on education and health, not even 1% in the latter case. When you match these sums against the enormous perceived need to boost spending in these areas you are looking at either much higher general taxation or ruinous borrowing. I don't see anything "realistic" about that.
This suggestion that the books would somehow add up if "Tory graft" was eliminated takes this element of fantasy even further.
This is not to suggest that they should not or will not get their turn, they will and they deserve to do so. The Tories are completely out of ideas and business as usual is not an answer to our current plight.
What we really need to do is to get a much better return on current spending whether that is building a trainline, fixing an RAAC affected school or simply facilitating business by providing a vaguely competent service. Is it possible that a Labour government might want to challenge our public services this way? We can only hope so as a nation and wish them well.
It will probably be the next Labour government that has to explain to people that they can't get everything they want from the government.
I suspect that will come as refreshing relief to many: 'At last we have a government that isn't treating us like imbeciles.' The age of the magician politician is surely dead. Boris with his flatulent rhetoric, Truss with her junk economics; they killed all that off entirely.
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
Thought you were talking about Northern Ireland for a moment (I agree on that, too - though maybe attempt to sell it off, rather than abolish)
You think we could sell off Northern Ireland?
I think it would be more likely to resemble one of those corporate deals where the parent company has to offer a bung to cover the pension fund of whatever it is divesting.
Maybe China would take it. They would be able to handle the security, although their methods might dig up memories of the distant past.
"Attempt"
The politics of it in Ireland would be fascinating - leaders would have to be publicly in favour (of re-unification, not of paying) but yes you'd want economic support to take it on. Parallels with Germany, to some extent, I guess.
I was thinking the obvious thing would be to sell the Giant's Causeway to some rich American/Russian/Chinese/Saudi investor and include the rest of NI in the contract small print.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
Thought you were talking about Northern Ireland for a moment (I agree on that, too - though maybe attempt to sell it off, rather than abolish)
You think we could sell off Northern Ireland?
I think it would be more likely to resemble one of those corporate deals where the parent company has to offer a bung to cover the pension fund of whatever it is divesting.
Maybe China would take it. They would be able to handle the security, although their methods might dig up memories of the distant past.
"Attempt"
The politics of it in Ireland would be fascinating - leaders would have to be publicly in favour (of re-unification, not of paying) but yes you'd want economic support to take it on. Parallels with Germany, to some extent, I guess.
I was thinking the obvious thing would be to sell the Giant's Causeway to some rich American/Russian/Chinese/Saudi investor and include the rest of NI in the contract small print.
Under reunification I'm pretty sure the 6 counties would suddenly become some of the poorest parts of RoI, if not the entire EU. But also I wonder if you'd see a max exodus of unionists to the mainland - a big influx of older people to London and other urban centres. If that happens, could change the political scenery a lot.
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
NI receipts were £177.4bn in the last financial year. Income Tax receipts were £248.4bn.
To abolish NI and replace the income with an increase in Income Tax rates would require increasing income tax rates by almost exactly 5/7ths.
The 20% basic rate would have to become a 35% rate. The 40% rate up to about 69%
Employers NI is the main problem. It raises more than £100bn but is pretty much invisible to the voters. It's impossible for any Chancellor to give that up. We'd need an exceptionally determined and gifted politician to do so. And it's likely that any such individual would decide they could achieve most of the gain with less political cost by other means.
Employer's NI is just a lie, isn't it?
Taxes should be as transparent as possible, and taxing work more than non-work is wrong.
I agree it won't happen, though, for the reasons you state.
Yes. Employers NI is a lie. It is a great big £100bn lie. It's an ugly toad of a lie that blows raspberries at the idea the electorate might be part of an honest debate about taxation, spending, etc.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
Yes, I hear a lot of praise for Cooper, although I've not seen much of her myself. The thing is, on metrics, Davey is doing ok - slowly climbing polls, big by-election wins, likely to gain a fair number of seats at the election. These have more to do with the Conservative implosion than anything the LDs have done, but it helps.
I haven't been a member for over a decade now, so I'm not that aware of things, but that's my sense (LDs on here may correct me). LD is still nearest to my natural voting instincts, although I've no problem voting for Starmer's Labour, particularly against the Conservatives at present (and likely will, given I live in Selby & Ainsty).
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
Yes, I hear a lot of praise for Cooper, although I've not seen much of her myself. The thing is, on metrics, Davey is doing ok - slowly climbing polls, big by-election wins, likely to gain a fair number of seats at the election. These have more to do with the Conservative implosion than anything the LDs have done, but it helps.
I haven't been a member for over a decade now, so I'm not that aware of things, but that's my sense (LDs on here may correct me). LD is still nearest to my natural voting instincts, although I've no problem voting for Starmer's Labour, particularly against the Conservatives at present (and likely will, given I live in Selby & Ainsty).
Davey has done well for the same reason Starmer has done well - they aren't threatening enough to the status quo, so when people got pissed off with the Tories they flooded to whichever was more likely to beat the Tories where they live. Whereas I think a politician like Cooper (who is my local MP) would be able to expand beyond that.
Of course, it would not occur to you that they might have had a *negative* effect...
I was rather tongue in cheek!
But where are all those who said a ceasefire would be anti-semitic?
Who said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic? I cannot recall anyone on here saying that?
There were plenty here saying calls for a ceasefire were wrong, indeed that was how Parliament voted.
Is Jess Phillips allowed back now the IDF also want a ceasefire?
So you're making rubbish up, and no-one said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic...
But to your point: a 'ceasefire' can mean many different things. Most people I heard talk about this seemed to see it as 'Israel stop', with f-all to say about the hostages or rocket fire. It was all on Israel. This is more akin to a temporary peace deal, with give and take from both sides.
Which, if you read what I've been writing, is essentially what I was calling for (though I'd have preferred it to have gone further...).
I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. And if we go by the reporting, Hamas had earlier tried to negotiate a cessation of bombing to release some hostages and Israel were not willing to discuss it.
You could argue (as many here did) that Hamas should unilaterally have released hostages anyway but a) that's not how negotiations work and b) if Israel were still actively bombing Gaza there would have been no way for Hamas to release hostages and know they would be safe (again, this doesn't have to be because Hamas care about the wellbeing of hostages as much as they care about being seen as people you can sincerely do political negotiations with). So all the onus did sit with Israel for a ceasefire to happen.
"I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. "
That is rubbish. What is more, it is dangerous rubbish.
Hamas has fired many thousands of rockets into Israel over the years. And whilst these do not kill many people (often thanks to Iron Dome and the like), each once causes thousands of people to run for their shelters, any time of night and day. Imagine being an ordinary civilian living under that sort of pressure. In fact, if you're British and over eighty, you may not have to imagine.
That is not to excuse Israel. But Hamas's rockets give Israel a justifiable excuse to attack back. Hamas do not want peace.
I wasn't talking about "over the years", I was talking about the conflict now. And I'm aware "all" was hyperbole, and explained myself in response to TOPPING; but Israel have state of the art war capabilities and have killed roughly 0.5% of all the people in Gaza, and Hamas have home made rockets. One side of this war has much more power than the other, and so those asking for a ceasefire will obviously turn their attentions to that power, who is also an ally of ours, instead of the smaller power.
If we want to get into an argument about what "justifies" war, we need only look at the UN. Gaza is occupied territory, and has been since 1967, and it has been under blockade from land, sea and air since 2007. The UN states that an aggressor is defined by acts and not words, and such acts include "any military occupation, however temporary, resulting from such an invasion or attack" and "blockade of the ports or coasts of a State by the armed forces of another State".
Gaza falls into a sticky area here - it isn't a recognised state. If it was it is clear that the long term actions of the state of Israel would clearly make Israel the aggressor. This is not to condone any of the war crimes Hamas has done in reaction to that, but to explain that in international law if Hamas (as the elected government of Gaza, as people here often point out) wanted to declare war on Israel the casus belli would be there and likely legal (if Gaza was considered a state). If Gaza is not a state, but part of Israel, then what Israel is doing is still illegal and the acts of an aggressor - and part of the argument for why many people describe Israel as an apartheid state.
I'm interested in why you feel the need to downplay the experiences of Israelis who have ad family members killed by those 'homemade' rockets, and all of those who have to run for shelters whenever Hamas (and Hezbollah...) fire them.
Because it is clear that the deaths of civilians are clearly one sided. I feel empathy for the individuals involved, of course, but if we're talking the whole picture it's clear that Israel kills more Palestinians by an extremely large margin then Hamas kills Israelis. As well as that, as I've said, the state of Israel has both the infrastructure and military power to enforce its will on the entire of Gaza - Hamas does not have that power at all. That is not to say it is okay for Hamas to kill civilians - as I said, I don't think that Hamas should do war crimes either - but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective.
I also note that you brought up the idea of "justifiable excuse to attack back" and then skipped over the literal justifications in international law for why Israel would likely be considered an aggressor.
"but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective."
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
I mean, wealth taxes, land value taxes, taxes on stock trading, and increases (not decreases) in inheritance tax aimed at the highest brackets (I'm talking inheritances valued over £5million for example) would be good ways to deal with the issue. Also closing all the tax loopholes in the other British territories, and actually putting resource towards investigating tax avoidance rather than, say, benefit fraud.
Closing tax loopholes in the British overseas territories is not really something the UK government has the authority to do. They are protectorates but autonomous. Yes we can apply pressure (and have done) but the most effective pressure comes from more important players like the US and EU.
Most BOTs have managed to come off black and grey lists for non-transparent or uncooperative tax havens in recent years having done a fair bit on information sharing and secrecy, and they are now all introducing the global minimum tax either through QDMTT or simply increasing tax rates to 15%. The question then becomes whether they should have to have OECD-style tax rates for everyone when a. they don't need the tax revenue, b. they don't have the industrial or market power to compete in other ways. If you're a resource-poor island in the middle of nowhere, your choices for economic survival are limited: tourism, hosting military bases, fishing, or using your tax and regulatory system to attract international capital.
Slim pickings in this week's local by-elections. We have a LD defence in Powys today. Tomorrow there is an Ind defence in Cambridge and a Lab defence in Newham.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
Yes, I hear a lot of praise for Cooper, although I've not seen much of her myself. The thing is, on metrics, Davey is doing ok - slowly climbing polls, big by-election wins, likely to gain a fair number of seats at the election. These have more to do with the Conservative implosion than anything the LDs have done, but it helps.
I haven't been a member for over a decade now, so I'm not that aware of things, but that's my sense (LDs on here may correct me). LD is still nearest to my natural voting instincts, although I've no problem voting for Starmer's Labour, particularly against the Conservatives at present (and likely will, given I live in Selby & Ainsty).
Davey has done well for the same reason Starmer has done well - they aren't threatening enough to the status quo, so when people got pissed off with the Tories they flooded to whichever was more likely to beat the Tories where they live. Whereas I think a politician like Cooper (who is my local MP) would be able to expand beyond that.
Cooper is very good, I'm a fan. But there's no rush. She will be a good LD leader under a Labour government. As a LD member I'm very happy with Davey. He's intelligent, collegiate, by all accounts a nice man, and a good organiser.
Would it be good for the Tories if they won another term in office? (I'msaying that knowing it would certainly be suboptimal for the country.)
They have no new ideas. They have no money to spend. They have no credibility. They are deeply unpopular. They are increasingly corrupt.
Losing now they should have a chance to rebuild.
Losing seven years from now and we'd be looking at the kind of hammering Roosevelt gave Alf Landon in 1936.
The optimal result for the Tories is surely a Labour majority of around 25 - small enough that they are in the game still, not so small that Starmer has to do deals with the Lib Dems that would lead to voting reform and bulldoze the foundation of their success for the last 140 years.
PR also likely means no Labour majorities again and ReformUK winning lots of seats as well as a Corbynite party.
It is not all one way traffic for LDs and social democrats as seen in Israel or New Zealand or many European nations
PR may not mean specifically Labour majorities again but a hybrid form of PR could deliver stable government on the centre-left for a generation. Specifically, the hybrid "majority bonus" system used off and on in Italy and Greece could deliver government by a stable centre-left coalition led by Labour, the stability being generated by PR supplemented by top up seats awarded to the largest pre-election coalition. In Greece that system delivered the radical left Syriza party to government in 2015-19.
The democratic advantage of that system is that it requires the coalitions to be settled before the election not after it, effectively leaving the choice of governing coalition to the electorate rather than delegating that choice to politicians in tortuous post-election in smoke filled rooms.
If applied in the UK context, the obvious pre-election coalition to emerge would be between Labour, the LDs and Greens on the centre-left. A Corbyn party would undoubtably split from Labour but its toxicity would guarantee it being given the cold shoulder by the centre-left coalition and it would end up in low single figures, probably contesting the election as part of a far left Marxist alliance. On the right, the question would be whether the Conservatives would form a coalition with Reform. I think they both would, but if the Conservatives did choose to go down that path, their combined vote would be bigger than the Conservatives' alone but the willingness to get into bed with the hard right would nonetheless leak votes to the centre-left coalition.
On present polling, allowing for the ability of Farage to repulse centrists, the centre-left Lab/LD/Green coalition might get 55%+ of the vote, the extreme left Corbynite alliance 3%, a Conservative-Reform coalition 30%-35%, the Scottish nationalists 3% and the extreme right perhaps 3%. With the bonus top up seats, the Lab/LD/Green coalition might end up between them with about 2/3rds of the parliamentary seats, shared out between them in proportion to their parties' votes.
Meloni's hard right coalition in Italy was elected via PR, Sweden's government including the Sweden Democrats was elected via PR. Israel's hard right government was elected via PR. Greece now has a conservative government again, still with PR. New Zealand has just elected a rightwing coalition government with PR.
In 2015 with PR we would have had a Tory and UKIP government.
Plus the idea the Greens and Starmer would agree on barely anything at present is absurd
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
NI receipts were £177.4bn in the last financial year. Income Tax receipts were £248.4bn.
To abolish NI and replace the income with an increase in Income Tax rates would require increasing income tax rates by almost exactly 5/7ths.
The 20% basic rate would have to become a 35% rate. The 40% rate up to about 69%
Employers NI is the main problem. It raises more than £100bn but is pretty much invisible to the voters. It's impossible for any Chancellor to give that up. We'd need an exceptionally determined and gifted politician to do so. And it's likely that any such individual would decide they could achieve most of the gain with less political cost by other means.
Employer's NI is just a lie, isn't it?
Taxes should be as transparent as possible, and taxing work more than non-work is wrong.
I agree it won't happen, though, for the reasons you state.
The name itself is half the confusion, most people don’t know that the employer pays NI as well, and that Employer NI is paid on top of the salary.
The starting point would be to change the name to Payroll Tax, and have payslips add it to the gross salary - so everyone gets a 13% pay rise!
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
Yes, I hear a lot of praise for Cooper, although I've not seen much of her myself. The thing is, on metrics, Davey is doing ok - slowly climbing polls, big by-election wins, likely to gain a fair number of seats at the election. These have more to do with the Conservative implosion than anything the LDs have done, but it helps.
I haven't been a member for over a decade now, so I'm not that aware of things, but that's my sense (LDs on here may correct me). LD is still nearest to my natural voting instincts, although I've no problem voting for Starmer's Labour, particularly against the Conservatives at present (and likely will, given I live in Selby & Ainsty).
You're lucky to live in a constituency where your vote counts. And one with an exciting byelection into the bargain. I live in Lewisham Deptford, surely one of the constituencies where voting is most meaningless. A Labour majority of over 30k.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
Definitely a bit of the "something else" in the mix, I would guess. The polling bounce for RefUK is so immediate when Sunak became PM, and sustained, it must be related to some intrinsic and deeply held dislike of him among a small but discernable sector of the electorate whose views are somewhere to the right of mainstream Toryism. I think we all know what is going on. When some voters say "he's not one of us" they don't just mean he's too rich or has had too privileged an upbringing.
That's because you're judging other people by your own low standards.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
The coalition thing plays both ways. What is the point of a LibDem party that is not mature enough to deal with coalitions and accepting that means they won't always get their own way? It then is limited to a pressure party like the Greens or UKIP. I might vote for that in a council election or if offered Johnson v Corbyn, but it would have little appeal to me in a GE with at least one palatable leader from Tories or Labour.
By all means criticise parts of the coalition govt and accept mistakes were made, but also own the successes and achievements - just look at whats followed to see how an unmoderated party can act.
Of course, it would not occur to you that they might have had a *negative* effect...
I was rather tongue in cheek!
But where are all those who said a ceasefire would be anti-semitic?
Who said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic? I cannot recall anyone on here saying that?
There were plenty here saying calls for a ceasefire were wrong, indeed that was how Parliament voted.
Is Jess Phillips allowed back now the IDF also want a ceasefire?
So you're making rubbish up, and no-one said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic...
But to your point: a 'ceasefire' can mean many different things. Most people I heard talk about this seemed to see it as 'Israel stop', with f-all to say about the hostages or rocket fire. It was all on Israel. This is more akin to a temporary peace deal, with give and take from both sides.
Which, if you read what I've been writing, is essentially what I was calling for (though I'd have preferred it to have gone further...).
I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. And if we go by the reporting, Hamas had earlier tried to negotiate a cessation of bombing to release some hostages and Israel were not willing to discuss it.
You could argue (as many here did) that Hamas should unilaterally have released hostages anyway but a) that's not how negotiations work and b) if Israel were still actively bombing Gaza there would have been no way for Hamas to release hostages and know they would be safe (again, this doesn't have to be because Hamas care about the wellbeing of hostages as much as they care about being seen as people you can sincerely do political negotiations with). So all the onus did sit with Israel for a ceasefire to happen.
"I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. "
That is rubbish. What is more, it is dangerous rubbish.
Hamas has fired many thousands of rockets into Israel over the years. And whilst these do not kill many people (often thanks to Iron Dome and the like), each once causes thousands of people to run for their shelters, any time of night and day. Imagine being an ordinary civilian living under that sort of pressure. In fact, if you're British and over eighty, you may not have to imagine.
That is not to excuse Israel. But Hamas's rockets give Israel a justifiable excuse to attack back. Hamas do not want peace.
I wasn't talking about "over the years", I was talking about the conflict now. And I'm aware "all" was hyperbole, and explained myself in response to TOPPING; but Israel have state of the art war capabilities and have killed roughly 0.5% of all the people in Gaza, and Hamas have home made rockets. One side of this war has much more power than the other, and so those asking for a ceasefire will obviously turn their attentions to that power, who is also an ally of ours, instead of the smaller power.
If we want to get into an argument about what "justifies" war, we need only look at the UN. Gaza is occupied territory, and has been since 1967, and it has been under blockade from land, sea and air since 2007. The UN states that an aggressor is defined by acts and not words, and such acts include "any military occupation, however temporary, resulting from such an invasion or attack" and "blockade of the ports or coasts of a State by the armed forces of another State".
Gaza falls into a sticky area here - it isn't a recognised state. If it was it is clear that the long term actions of the state of Israel would clearly make Israel the aggressor. This is not to condone any of the war crimes Hamas has done in reaction to that, but to explain that in international law if Hamas (as the elected government of Gaza, as people here often point out) wanted to declare war on Israel the casus belli would be there and likely legal (if Gaza was considered a state). If Gaza is not a state, but part of Israel, then what Israel is doing is still illegal and the acts of an aggressor - and part of the argument for why many people describe Israel as an apartheid state.
I'm interested in why you feel the need to downplay the experiences of Israelis who have ad family members killed by those 'homemade' rockets, and all of those who have to run for shelters whenever Hamas (and Hezbollah...) fire them.
Because it is clear that the deaths of civilians are clearly one sided. I feel empathy for the individuals involved, of course, but if we're talking the whole picture it's clear that Israel kills more Palestinians by an extremely large margin then Hamas kills Israelis. As well as that, as I've said, the state of Israel has both the infrastructure and military power to enforce its will on the entire of Gaza - Hamas does not have that power at all. That is not to say it is okay for Hamas to kill civilians - as I said, I don't think that Hamas should do war crimes either - but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective.
I also note that you brought up the idea of "justifiable excuse to attack back" and then skipped over the literal justifications in international law for why Israel would likely be considered an aggressor.
"but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective."
7th October was pretty effective.
But that is what makes it so shocking to most people and to Israel, right? October 7th was the anomaly, not the rule. And Hamas managed to kill 1200 people and kidnap a few hundred, plus break down some parts of the border fence and some barracks - whereas Israel has levelled entire sections of Gaza, killed more than ten times that, and displaced many hundreds of thousands of Palestinians (and is arguing to displace all 2 million people in Gaza).
That, again, is not to say what Hamas did was acceptable or not a significant act of violence - but that in comparison to what the state of Israel can do (and has done in the past) it is not really in the same league.
Would it be good for the Tories if they won another term in office? (I'msaying that knowing it would certainly be suboptimal for the country.)
They have no new ideas. They have no money to spend. They have no credibility. They are deeply unpopular. They are increasingly corrupt.
Losing now they should have a chance to rebuild.
Losing seven years from now and we'd be looking at the kind of hammering Roosevelt gave Alf Landon in 1936.
The optimal result for the Tories is surely a Labour majority of around 25 - small enough that they are in the game still, not so small that Starmer has to do deals with the Lib Dems that would lead to voting reform and bulldoze the foundation of their success for the last 140 years.
PR also likely means no Labour majorities again and ReformUK winning lots of seats as well as a Corbynite party.
It is not all one way traffic for LDs and social democrats as seen in Israel or New Zealand or many European nations
PR may not mean specifically Labour majorities again but a hybrid form of PR could deliver stable government on the centre-left for a generation. Specifically, the hybrid "majority bonus" system used off and on in Italy and Greece could deliver government by a stable centre-left coalition led by Labour, the stability being generated by PR supplemented by top up seats awarded to the largest pre-election coalition. In Greece that system delivered the radical left Syriza party to government in 2015-19.
The democratic advantage of that system is that it requires the coalitions to be settled before the election not after it, effectively leaving the choice of governing coalition to the electorate rather than delegating that choice to politicians in tortuous post-election in smoke filled rooms.
If applied in the UK context, the obvious pre-election coalition to emerge would be between Labour, the LDs and Greens on the centre-left. A Corbyn party would undoubtably split from Labour but its toxicity would guarantee it being given the cold shoulder by the centre-left coalition and it would end up in low single figures, probably contesting the election as part of a far left Marxist alliance. On the right, the question would be whether the Conservatives would form a coalition with Reform. I think they both would, but if the Conservatives did choose to go down that path, their combined vote would be bigger than the Conservatives' alone but the willingness to get into bed with the hard right would nonetheless leak votes to the centre-left coalition.
On present polling, allowing for the ability of Farage to repulse centrists, the centre-left Lab/LD/Green coalition might get 55%+ of the vote, the extreme left Corbynite alliance 3%, a Conservative-Reform coalition 30%-35%, the Scottish nationalists 3% and the extreme right perhaps 3%. With the bonus top up seats, the Lab/LD/Green coalition might end up between them with about 2/3rds of the parliamentary seats, shared out between them in proportion to their parties' votes.
Meloni's hard right coalition in Italy was elected via PR, Sweden's government including the Sweden Democrats was elected via PR. Israel's hard right government was elected via PR. Greece now has a conservative government again, still with PR. New Zealand has just elected a rightwing coalition government with PR.
In 2015 with PR we would have had a Tory and UKIP government.
Plus the idea the Greens and Starmer would agree on barely anything at present is absurd
Speculating on PR delivering either a hard right or permanent centre-left government is pointless. Under PR people's votes would have been different. UKIP might well have scored more than they actually did in 2015, and they would have deserved to, but so would the Greens and who knows what other new parties, and the large numbers of people who agonised over letting the SNP hold the balance of power wouldn't have needed to agonise, which would almost certainly have boosted both Lib Dem and Labour votes.
Would it be good for the Tories if they won another term in office? (I'msaying that knowing it would certainly be suboptimal for the country.)
They have no new ideas. They have no money to spend. They have no credibility. They are deeply unpopular. They are increasingly corrupt.
Losing now they should have a chance to rebuild.
Losing seven years from now and we'd be looking at the kind of hammering Roosevelt gave Alf Landon in 1936.
The optimal result for the Tories is surely a Labour majority of around 25 - small enough that they are in the game still, not so small that Starmer has to do deals with the Lib Dems that would lead to voting reform and bulldoze the foundation of their success for the last 140 years.
PR also likely means no Labour majorities again and ReformUK winning lots of seats as well as a Corbynite party.
It is not all one way traffic for LDs and social democrats as seen in Israel or New Zealand or many European nations
PR may not mean specifically Labour majorities again but a hybrid form of PR could deliver stable government on the centre-left for a generation. Specifically, the hybrid "majority bonus" system used off and on in Italy and Greece could deliver government by a stable centre-left coalition led by Labour, the stability being generated by PR supplemented by top up seats awarded to the largest pre-election coalition. In Greece that system delivered the radical left Syriza party to government in 2015-19.
The democratic advantage of that system is that it requires the coalitions to be settled before the election not after it, effectively leaving the choice of governing coalition to the electorate rather than delegating that choice to politicians in tortuous post-election in smoke filled rooms.
If applied in the UK context, the obvious pre-election coalition to emerge would be between Labour, the LDs and Greens on the centre-left. A Corbyn party would undoubtably split from Labour but its toxicity would guarantee it being given the cold shoulder by the centre-left coalition and it would end up in low single figures, probably contesting the election as part of a far left Marxist alliance. On the right, the question would be whether the Conservatives would form a coalition with Reform. I think they both would, but if the Conservatives did choose to go down that path, their combined vote would be bigger than the Conservatives' alone but the willingness to get into bed with the hard right would nonetheless leak votes to the centre-left coalition.
On present polling, allowing for the ability of Farage to repulse centrists, the centre-left Lab/LD/Green coalition might get 55%+ of the vote, the extreme left Corbynite alliance 3%, a Conservative-Reform coalition 30%-35%, the Scottish nationalists 3% and the extreme right perhaps 3%. With the bonus top up seats, the Lab/LD/Green coalition might end up between them with about 2/3rds of the parliamentary seats, shared out between them in proportion to their parties' votes.
The right wing parties won 40% in 2010, 51% in 2015, 45% in 2017 and 47% in 2019. I don't think you can assume that Labour, Lib Dem and Greens would be winning 55% in perpetuity. Nor that the Greens would be anything other than a liability, like their Scottish cunterparts.
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
Correct. It’s an absurd tax that complicates the system needlessly, purely so the government can lie about the true rate of income tax. See also the moronic attack on the PA at £100k. Just make the £100k+ rate 45p FFS.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
The coalition thing plays both ways. What is the point of a LibDem party that is not mature enough to deal with coalitions and accepting that means they won't always get their own way? It then is limited to a pressure party like the Greens or UKIP. I might vote for that in a council election or if offered Johnson v Corbyn, but it would have little appeal to me in a GE with at least one palatable leader from Tories or Labour.
By all means criticise parts of the coalition govt and accept mistakes were made, but also own the successes and achievements - just look at whats followed to see how an unmoderated party can act.
But that's not how even sympathetic voters view the coalition for the LDs (especially not voters my age whose first vote was for the LDs). They immediately reneged on a big pledge to their base of voters, and they seemed to get very little out of the coalition outside of being Cameron's meat shield. Any bad policy the Tories pushed, the story of why LDs were backing it was more up front than the Tories being the people wanting it anyway. And it also gave cover for Cameron's "modernising" of the party to go after Orange Booker "social liberals" when that "modernising" (as we can now see) was pretty flimsy.
Sure, one could argue that a "serious" party should go into government and take the knocks that come with it - but in many ways being the junior partner in a coalition gives you a lot of leverage and the LDs never did that; they signed it away right at the start. If it had been a grace and favours deal - a "no, you really have to convince us on every vote" deal - then they would have been able to have more impact on policy (in my view). People forget that that election, whilst not a Labour victory by any amounts, was not a Conservative victory either - people still didn't buy what the Conservatives were selling enough to give them a majority (and didn't give the Tories a governing majority until Johnson turned up - Cameron's majority was razor thin and almost immediately destroyed by his pledge to hold an EU referendum). We've had Tory policy hegemony without the kind of political enthusiasm you would expect to allow that for 13 years; and the LDs enabled that.
Imagine a scenario where in 2010 the coalition didn't form like it did, and Labour got it's act together a lot quicker because of that. The conservative minority government might have fallen and a new GE could have given a majority to Labour led government before 2015. What a different world we would have lived in.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
The coalition thing plays both ways. What is the point of a LibDem party that is not mature enough to deal with coalitions and accepting that means they won't always get their own way? It then is limited to a pressure party like the Greens or UKIP. I might vote for that in a council election or if offered Johnson v Corbyn, but it would have little appeal to me in a GE with at least one palatable leader from Tories or Labour.
By all means criticise parts of the coalition govt and accept mistakes were made, but also own the successes and achievements - just look at whats followed to see how an unmoderated party can act.
But that's not how even sympathetic voters view the coalition for the LDs (especially not voters my age whose first vote was for the LDs). They immediately reneged on a big pledge to their base of voters, and they seemed to get very little out of the coalition outside of being Cameron's meat shield. Any bad policy the Tories pushed, the story of why LDs were backing it was more up front than the Tories being the people wanting it anyway. And it also gave cover for Cameron's "modernising" of the party to go after Orange Booker "social liberals" when that "modernising" (as we can now see) was pretty flimsy.
Sure, one could argue that a "serious" party should go into government and take the knocks that come with it - but in many ways being the junior partner in a coalition gives you a lot of leverage and the LDs never did that; they signed it away right at the start. If it had been a grace and favours deal - a "no, you really have to convince us on every vote" deal - then they would have been able to have more impact on policy (in my view). People forget that that election, whilst not a Labour victory by any amounts, was not a Conservative victory either - people still didn't buy what the Conservatives were selling enough to give them a majority (and didn't give the Tories a governing majority until Johnson turned up - Cameron's majority was razor thin and almost immediately destroyed by his pledge to hold an EU referendum). We've had Tory policy hegemony without the kind of political enthusiasm you would expect to allow that for 13 years; and the LDs enabled that.
Imagine a scenario where in 2010 the coalition didn't form like it did, and Labour got it's act together a lot quicker because of that. The conservative minority government might have fallen and a new GE could have given a majority to Labour led government before 2015. What a different world we would have lived in.
Labour might have cobbled together an anti-Conservative coalition, in 2010, as the Spanish Socialists have just done, but it would have split apart, and resulted in a bigger Labour defeat, in due course.
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
I mean, wealth taxes, land value taxes, taxes on stock trading, and increases (not decreases) in inheritance tax aimed at the highest brackets (I'm talking inheritances valued over £5million for example) would be good ways to deal with the issue. Also closing all the tax loopholes in the other British territories, and actually putting resource towards investigating tax avoidance rather than, say, benefit fraud.
Closing tax loopholes in the British overseas territories is not really something the UK government has the authority to do. They are protectorates but autonomous. Yes we can apply pressure (and have done) but the most effective pressure comes from more important players like the US and EU.
Most BOTs have managed to come off black and grey lists for non-transparent or uncooperative tax havens in recent years having done a fair bit on information sharing and secrecy, and they are now all introducing the global minimum tax either through QDMTT or simply increasing tax rates to 15%. The question then becomes whether they should have to have OECD-style tax rates for everyone when a. they don't need the tax revenue, b. they don't have the industrial or market power to compete in other ways. If you're a resource-poor island in the middle of nowhere, your choices for economic survival are limited: tourism, hosting military bases, fishing, or using your tax and regulatory system to attract international capital.
I agree that using tax and regulation to attract international capital is a rational choice for islands that would otherwise suffer from ruthless market competition, but the negative externalities for the rest of the world should encourage us to think of a different solution.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
The coalition thing plays both ways. What is the point of a LibDem party that is not mature enough to deal with coalitions and accepting that means they won't always get their own way? It then is limited to a pressure party like the Greens or UKIP. I might vote for that in a council election or if offered Johnson v Corbyn, but it would have little appeal to me in a GE with at least one palatable leader from Tories or Labour.
By all means criticise parts of the coalition govt and accept mistakes were made, but also own the successes and achievements - just look at whats followed to see how an unmoderated party can act.
But that's not how even sympathetic voters view the coalition for the LDs (especially not voters my age whose first vote was for the LDs). They immediately reneged on a big pledge to their base of voters, and they seemed to get very little out of the coalition outside of being Cameron's meat shield. Any bad policy the Tories pushed, the story of why LDs were backing it was more up front than the Tories being the people wanting it anyway. And it also gave cover for Cameron's "modernising" of the party to go after Orange Booker "social liberals" when that "modernising" (as we can now see) was pretty flimsy.
Sure, one could argue that a "serious" party should go into government and take the knocks that come with it - but in many ways being the junior partner in a coalition gives you a lot of leverage and the LDs never did that; they signed it away right at the start. If it had been a grace and favours deal - a "no, you really have to convince us on every vote" deal - then they would have been able to have more impact on policy (in my view). People forget that that election, whilst not a Labour victory by any amounts, was not a Conservative victory either - people still didn't buy what the Conservatives were selling enough to give them a majority (and didn't give the Tories a governing majority until Johnson turned up - Cameron's majority was razor thin and almost immediately destroyed by his pledge to hold an EU referendum). We've had Tory policy hegemony without the kind of political enthusiasm you would expect to allow that for 13 years; and the LDs enabled that.
Imagine a scenario where in 2010 the coalition didn't form like it did, and Labour got it's act together a lot quicker because of that. The conservative minority government might have fallen and a new GE could have given a majority to Labour led government before 2015. What a different world we would have lived in.
Labour might have cobbled together an anti-Conservative coalition, in 2010, as the Spanish Socialists have just done, but it would have split apart, and resulted in a bigger Labour defeat, in due course.
In due course we are all dead, as the late, great JM Keynes almost said.
Of course, it would not occur to you that they might have had a *negative* effect...
I was rather tongue in cheek!
But where are all those who said a ceasefire would be anti-semitic?
Who said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic? I cannot recall anyone on here saying that?
There were plenty here saying calls for a ceasefire were wrong, indeed that was how Parliament voted.
Is Jess Phillips allowed back now the IDF also want a ceasefire?
So you're making rubbish up, and no-one said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic...
But to your point: a 'ceasefire' can mean many different things. Most people I heard talk about this seemed to see it as 'Israel stop', with f-all to say about the hostages or rocket fire. It was all on Israel. This is more akin to a temporary peace deal, with give and take from both sides.
Which, if you read what I've been writing, is essentially what I was calling for (though I'd have preferred it to have gone further...).
I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. And if we go by the reporting, Hamas had earlier tried to negotiate a cessation of bombing to release some hostages and Israel were not willing to discuss it.
You could argue (as many here did) that Hamas should unilaterally have released hostages anyway but a) that's not how negotiations work and b) if Israel were still actively bombing Gaza there would have been no way for Hamas to release hostages and know they would be safe (again, this doesn't have to be because Hamas care about the wellbeing of hostages as much as they care about being seen as people you can sincerely do political negotiations with). So all the onus did sit with Israel for a ceasefire to happen.
"I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. "
That is rubbish. What is more, it is dangerous rubbish.
Hamas has fired many thousands of rockets into Israel over the years. And whilst these do not kill many people (often thanks to Iron Dome and the like), each once causes thousands of people to run for their shelters, any time of night and day. Imagine being an ordinary civilian living under that sort of pressure. In fact, if you're British and over eighty, you may not have to imagine.
That is not to excuse Israel. But Hamas's rockets give Israel a justifiable excuse to attack back. Hamas do not want peace.
I wasn't talking about "over the years", I was talking about the conflict now. And I'm aware "all" was hyperbole, and explained myself in response to TOPPING; but Israel have state of the art war capabilities and have killed roughly 0.5% of all the people in Gaza, and Hamas have home made rockets. One side of this war has much more power than the other, and so those asking for a ceasefire will obviously turn their attentions to that power, who is also an ally of ours, instead of the smaller power.
If we want to get into an argument about what "justifies" war, we need only look at the UN. Gaza is occupied territory, and has been since 1967, and it has been under blockade from land, sea and air since 2007. The UN states that an aggressor is defined by acts and not words, and such acts include "any military occupation, however temporary, resulting from such an invasion or attack" and "blockade of the ports or coasts of a State by the armed forces of another State".
Gaza falls into a sticky area here - it isn't a recognised state. If it was it is clear that the long term actions of the state of Israel would clearly make Israel the aggressor. This is not to condone any of the war crimes Hamas has done in reaction to that, but to explain that in international law if Hamas (as the elected government of Gaza, as people here often point out) wanted to declare war on Israel the casus belli would be there and likely legal (if Gaza was considered a state). If Gaza is not a state, but part of Israel, then what Israel is doing is still illegal and the acts of an aggressor - and part of the argument for why many people describe Israel as an apartheid state.
I'm interested in why you feel the need to downplay the experiences of Israelis who have ad family members killed by those 'homemade' rockets, and all of those who have to run for shelters whenever Hamas (and Hezbollah...) fire them.
Because it is clear that the deaths of civilians are clearly one sided. I feel empathy for the individuals involved, of course, but if we're talking the whole picture it's clear that Israel kills more Palestinians by an extremely large margin then Hamas kills Israelis. As well as that, as I've said, the state of Israel has both the infrastructure and military power to enforce its will on the entire of Gaza - Hamas does not have that power at all. That is not to say it is okay for Hamas to kill civilians - as I said, I don't think that Hamas should do war crimes either - but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective.
I also note that you brought up the idea of "justifiable excuse to attack back" and then skipped over the literal justifications in international law for why Israel would likely be considered an aggressor.
"but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective."
7th October was pretty effective.
But that is what makes it so shocking to most people and to Israel, right? October 7th was the anomaly, not the rule. And Hamas managed to kill 1200 people and kidnap a few hundred, plus break down some parts of the border fence and some barracks - whereas Israel has levelled entire sections of Gaza, killed more than ten times that, and displaced many hundreds of thousands of Palestinians (and is arguing to displace all 2 million people in Gaza).
That, again, is not to say what Hamas did was acceptable or not a significant act of violence - but that in comparison to what the state of Israel can do (and has done in the past) it is not really in the same league.
This is oversimplifying. Just as Ukraine includes the sum of its allies support, so with Hamas.
If the Islamic world of the middle east wished to support Hamas in the sense of combining to take on Israel in a military way, with a particular end in view, neither the laws of war or history prevents it. Despite all the talk, huffing and puffing etc, the combined might of these many countries has no intention of actually taking part in the Hamas military cause against Israel in such a way as to allow it to win.
The fact that Hamas is not in the same league as Israel tells you about how effective each has been in garnering support and alliances, but doesn't tell you what amount of force is justified in Israel's efforts to neutralise a real threat to its civilians.
Of course, it would not occur to you that they might have had a *negative* effect...
I was rather tongue in cheek!
But where are all those who said a ceasefire would be anti-semitic?
Who said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic? I cannot recall anyone on here saying that?
There were plenty here saying calls for a ceasefire were wrong, indeed that was how Parliament voted.
Is Jess Phillips allowed back now the IDF also want a ceasefire?
So you're making rubbish up, and no-one said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic...
But to your point: a 'ceasefire' can mean many different things. Most people I heard talk about this seemed to see it as 'Israel stop', with f-all to say about the hostages or rocket fire. It was all on Israel. This is more akin to a temporary peace deal, with give and take from both sides.
Which, if you read what I've been writing, is essentially what I was calling for (though I'd have preferred it to have gone further...).
I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. And if we go by the reporting, Hamas had earlier tried to negotiate a cessation of bombing to release some hostages and Israel were not willing to discuss it.
You could argue (as many here did) that Hamas should unilaterally have released hostages anyway but a) that's not how negotiations work and b) if Israel were still actively bombing Gaza there would have been no way for Hamas to release hostages and know they would be safe (again, this doesn't have to be because Hamas care about the wellbeing of hostages as much as they care about being seen as people you can sincerely do political negotiations with). So all the onus did sit with Israel for a ceasefire to happen.
"I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. "
That is rubbish. What is more, it is dangerous rubbish.
Hamas has fired many thousands of rockets into Israel over the years. And whilst these do not kill many people (often thanks to Iron Dome and the like), each once causes thousands of people to run for their shelters, any time of night and day. Imagine being an ordinary civilian living under that sort of pressure. In fact, if you're British and over eighty, you may not have to imagine.
That is not to excuse Israel. But Hamas's rockets give Israel a justifiable excuse to attack back. Hamas do not want peace.
I wasn't talking about "over the years", I was talking about the conflict now. And I'm aware "all" was hyperbole, and explained myself in response to TOPPING; but Israel have state of the art war capabilities and have killed roughly 0.5% of all the people in Gaza, and Hamas have home made rockets. One side of this war has much more power than the other, and so those asking for a ceasefire will obviously turn their attentions to that power, who is also an ally of ours, instead of the smaller power.
If we want to get into an argument about what "justifies" war, we need only look at the UN. Gaza is occupied territory, and has been since 1967, and it has been under blockade from land, sea and air since 2007. The UN states that an aggressor is defined by acts and not words, and such acts include "any military occupation, however temporary, resulting from such an invasion or attack" and "blockade of the ports or coasts of a State by the armed forces of another State".
Gaza falls into a sticky area here - it isn't a recognised state. If it was it is clear that the long term actions of the state of Israel would clearly make Israel the aggressor. This is not to condone any of the war crimes Hamas has done in reaction to that, but to explain that in international law if Hamas (as the elected government of Gaza, as people here often point out) wanted to declare war on Israel the casus belli would be there and likely legal (if Gaza was considered a state). If Gaza is not a state, but part of Israel, then what Israel is doing is still illegal and the acts of an aggressor - and part of the argument for why many people describe Israel as an apartheid state.
I'm interested in why you feel the need to downplay the experiences of Israelis who have ad family members killed by those 'homemade' rockets, and all of those who have to run for shelters whenever Hamas (and Hezbollah...) fire them.
Because it is clear that the deaths of civilians are clearly one sided. I feel empathy for the individuals involved, of course, but if we're talking the whole picture it's clear that Israel kills more Palestinians by an extremely large margin then Hamas kills Israelis. As well as that, as I've said, the state of Israel has both the infrastructure and military power to enforce its will on the entire of Gaza - Hamas does not have that power at all. That is not to say it is okay for Hamas to kill civilians - as I said, I don't think that Hamas should do war crimes either - but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective.
I also note that you brought up the idea of "justifiable excuse to attack back" and then skipped over the literal justifications in international law for why Israel would likely be considered an aggressor.
"but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective."
7th October was pretty effective.
But that is what makes it so shocking to most people and to Israel, right? October 7th was the anomaly, not the rule. And Hamas managed to kill 1200 people and kidnap a few hundred, plus break down some parts of the border fence and some barracks - whereas Israel has levelled entire sections of Gaza, killed more than ten times that, and displaced many hundreds of thousands of Palestinians (and is arguing to displace all 2 million people in Gaza).
That, again, is not to say what Hamas did was acceptable or not a significant act of violence - but that in comparison to what the state of Israel can do (and has done in the past) it is not really in the same league.
Try re-writing that post with September 11 instead of October 7, and then the consequences for Afghanistan instead of Gaza. Exactly the same logic, excluding the final bit about displacing all people in Gaza, which isn't true anyway.
Having written that, I have realised that I don't really know what point you're making anyway. Terrorism is fine as long as the perpetrators aren't very good at it?
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
The coalition thing plays both ways. What is the point of a LibDem party that is not mature enough to deal with coalitions and accepting that means they won't always get their own way? It then is limited to a pressure party like the Greens or UKIP. I might vote for that in a council election or if offered Johnson v Corbyn, but it would have little appeal to me in a GE with at least one palatable leader from Tories or Labour.
By all means criticise parts of the coalition govt and accept mistakes were made, but also own the successes and achievements - just look at whats followed to see how an unmoderated party can act.
But that's not how even sympathetic voters view the coalition for the LDs (especially not voters my age whose first vote was for the LDs). They immediately reneged on a big pledge to their base of voters, and they seemed to get very little out of the coalition outside of being Cameron's meat shield. Any bad policy the Tories pushed, the story of why LDs were backing it was more up front than the Tories being the people wanting it anyway. And it also gave cover for Cameron's "modernising" of the party to go after Orange Booker "social liberals" when that "modernising" (as we can now see) was pretty flimsy.
Sure, one could argue that a "serious" party should go into government and take the knocks that come with it - but in many ways being the junior partner in a coalition gives you a lot of leverage and the LDs never did that; they signed it away right at the start. If it had been a grace and favours deal - a "no, you really have to convince us on every vote" deal - then they would have been able to have more impact on policy (in my view). People forget that that election, whilst not a Labour victory by any amounts, was not a Conservative victory either - people still didn't buy what the Conservatives were selling enough to give them a majority (and didn't give the Tories a governing majority until Johnson turned up - Cameron's majority was razor thin and almost immediately destroyed by his pledge to hold an EU referendum). We've had Tory policy hegemony without the kind of political enthusiasm you would expect to allow that for 13 years; and the LDs enabled that.
Imagine a scenario where in 2010 the coalition didn't form like it did, and Labour got it's act together a lot quicker because of that. The conservative minority government might have fallen and a new GE could have given a majority to Labour led government before 2015. What a different world we would have lived in.
There are two distinct camps. Pragmatist centrists and leftish liberals. As a pragmatist, if what the LDs are offering is a Labour led government, I kind of think, well why not just vote Labour? And sometimes the Tories have a point too, or at least did in the past. Whereas leftish liberals may well be happy with LDs as a simple pressure group to stop Labour getting too authoritarian or socially conservative.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
Yes, I hear a lot of praise for Cooper, although I've not seen much of her myself. The thing is, on metrics, Davey is doing ok - slowly climbing polls, big by-election wins, likely to gain a fair number of seats at the election. These have more to do with the Conservative implosion than anything the LDs have done, but it helps.
I haven't been a member for over a decade now, so I'm not that aware of things, but that's my sense (LDs on here may correct me). LD is still nearest to my natural voting instincts, although I've no problem voting for Starmer's Labour, particularly against the Conservatives at present (and likely will, given I live in Selby & Ainsty).
You're lucky to live in a constituency where your vote counts. And one with an exciting byelection into the bargain. I live in Lewisham Deptford, surely one of the constituencies where voting is most meaningless. A Labour majority of over 30k.
Second time in over 20 years of voting. First was in Cardiff where I helped elect a LD, replacing Labour. Second the recent by election. Every other GE - and most council elections - the result has not been in any doubt. I had thought the boundary changes might make the new Selby+ constituency interesting, but it certainly should be interesting now. One benefit (the only one!) of all those safe seats has been that I've felt free to vote for the party I most closely align with - next GE will be my first tactical vote, I think!
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
The coalition thing plays both ways. What is the point of a LibDem party that is not mature enough to deal with coalitions and accepting that means they won't always get their own way? It then is limited to a pressure party like the Greens or UKIP. I might vote for that in a council election or if offered Johnson v Corbyn, but it would have little appeal to me in a GE with at least one palatable leader from Tories or Labour.
By all means criticise parts of the coalition govt and accept mistakes were made, but also own the successes and achievements - just look at whats followed to see how an unmoderated party can act.
But that's not how even sympathetic voters view the coalition for the LDs (especially not voters my age whose first vote was for the LDs). They immediately reneged on a big pledge to their base of voters, and they seemed to get very little out of the coalition outside of being Cameron's meat shield. Any bad policy the Tories pushed, the story of why LDs were backing it was more up front than the Tories being the people wanting it anyway. And it also gave cover for Cameron's "modernising" of the party to go after Orange Booker "social liberals" when that "modernising" (as we can now see) was pretty flimsy.
Sure, one could argue that a "serious" party should go into government and take the knocks that come with it - but in many ways being the junior partner in a coalition gives you a lot of leverage and the LDs never did that; they signed it away right at the start. If it had been a grace and favours deal - a "no, you really have to convince us on every vote" deal - then they would have been able to have more impact on policy (in my view). People forget that that election, whilst not a Labour victory by any amounts, was not a Conservative victory either - people still didn't buy what the Conservatives were selling enough to give them a majority (and didn't give the Tories a governing majority until Johnson turned up - Cameron's majority was razor thin and almost immediately destroyed by his pledge to hold an EU referendum). We've had Tory policy hegemony without the kind of political enthusiasm you would expect to allow that for 13 years; and the LDs enabled that.
Imagine a scenario where in 2010 the coalition didn't form like it did, and Labour got it's act together a lot quicker because of that. The conservative minority government might have fallen and a new GE could have given a majority to Labour led government before 2015. What a different world we would have lived in.
Just as its time for a change now (to Labour from Tory) so it was in 2010. Labour were out of ideas. Brown had nothing left to give. They lost the election. If they had somehow clung to power in 2015 they might have sunk to a 1997 (2024?) style wipeout.
Of course, it would not occur to you that they might have had a *negative* effect...
I was rather tongue in cheek!
But where are all those who said a ceasefire would be anti-semitic?
Who said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic? I cannot recall anyone on here saying that?
There were plenty here saying calls for a ceasefire were wrong, indeed that was how Parliament voted.
Is Jess Phillips allowed back now the IDF also want a ceasefire?
So you're making rubbish up, and no-one said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic...
But to your point: a 'ceasefire' can mean many different things. Most people I heard talk about this seemed to see it as 'Israel stop', with f-all to say about the hostages or rocket fire. It was all on Israel. This is more akin to a temporary peace deal, with give and take from both sides.
Which, if you read what I've been writing, is essentially what I was calling for (though I'd have preferred it to have gone further...).
I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. And if we go by the reporting, Hamas had earlier tried to negotiate a cessation of bombing to release some hostages and Israel were not willing to discuss it.
You could argue (as many here did) that Hamas should unilaterally have released hostages anyway but a) that's not how negotiations work and b) if Israel were still actively bombing Gaza there would have been no way for Hamas to release hostages and know they would be safe (again, this doesn't have to be because Hamas care about the wellbeing of hostages as much as they care about being seen as people you can sincerely do political negotiations with). So all the onus did sit with Israel for a ceasefire to happen.
"I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. "
That is rubbish. What is more, it is dangerous rubbish.
Hamas has fired many thousands of rockets into Israel over the years. And whilst these do not kill many people (often thanks to Iron Dome and the like), each once causes thousands of people to run for their shelters, any time of night and day. Imagine being an ordinary civilian living under that sort of pressure. In fact, if you're British and over eighty, you may not have to imagine.
That is not to excuse Israel. But Hamas's rockets give Israel a justifiable excuse to attack back. Hamas do not want peace.
I wasn't talking about "over the years", I was talking about the conflict now. And I'm aware "all" was hyperbole, and explained myself in response to TOPPING; but Israel have state of the art war capabilities and have killed roughly 0.5% of all the people in Gaza, and Hamas have home made rockets. One side of this war has much more power than the other, and so those asking for a ceasefire will obviously turn their attentions to that power, who is also an ally of ours, instead of the smaller power.
If we want to get into an argument about what "justifies" war, we need only look at the UN. Gaza is occupied territory, and has been since 1967, and it has been under blockade from land, sea and air since 2007. The UN states that an aggressor is defined by acts and not words, and such acts include "any military occupation, however temporary, resulting from such an invasion or attack" and "blockade of the ports or coasts of a State by the armed forces of another State".
Gaza falls into a sticky area here - it isn't a recognised state. If it was it is clear that the long term actions of the state of Israel would clearly make Israel the aggressor. This is not to condone any of the war crimes Hamas has done in reaction to that, but to explain that in international law if Hamas (as the elected government of Gaza, as people here often point out) wanted to declare war on Israel the casus belli would be there and likely legal (if Gaza was considered a state). If Gaza is not a state, but part of Israel, then what Israel is doing is still illegal and the acts of an aggressor - and part of the argument for why many people describe Israel as an apartheid state.
I'm interested in why you feel the need to downplay the experiences of Israelis who have ad family members killed by those 'homemade' rockets, and all of those who have to run for shelters whenever Hamas (and Hezbollah...) fire them.
Because it is clear that the deaths of civilians are clearly one sided. I feel empathy for the individuals involved, of course, but if we're talking the whole picture it's clear that Israel kills more Palestinians by an extremely large margin then Hamas kills Israelis. As well as that, as I've said, the state of Israel has both the infrastructure and military power to enforce its will on the entire of Gaza - Hamas does not have that power at all. That is not to say it is okay for Hamas to kill civilians - as I said, I don't think that Hamas should do war crimes either - but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective.
I also note that you brought up the idea of "justifiable excuse to attack back" and then skipped over the literal justifications in international law for why Israel would likely be considered an aggressor.
"but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective."
7th October was pretty effective.
But that is what makes it so shocking to most people and to Israel, right? October 7th was the anomaly, not the rule. And Hamas managed to kill 1200 people and kidnap a few hundred, plus break down some parts of the border fence and some barracks - whereas Israel has levelled entire sections of Gaza, killed more than ten times that, and displaced many hundreds of thousands of Palestinians (and is arguing to displace all 2 million people in Gaza).
That, again, is not to say what Hamas did was acceptable or not a significant act of violence - but that in comparison to what the state of Israel can do (and has done in the past) it is not really in the same league.
Try re-writing that post with September 11 instead of October 7, and then the consequences for Afghanistan instead of Gaza. Exactly the same logic, excluding the final bit about displacing all people in Gaza, which isn't true anyway.
Having written that, I have realised that I don't really know what point you're making anyway. Terrorism is fine as long as the perpetrators aren't very good at it?
I think 148grrs is a classic punch up ideologue. Israel has the power, therefore bad. Hamas are just freedom fighters.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
Yes, I hear a lot of praise for Cooper, although I've not seen much of her myself. The thing is, on metrics, Davey is doing ok - slowly climbing polls, big by-election wins, likely to gain a fair number of seats at the election. These have more to do with the Conservative implosion than anything the LDs have done, but it helps.
I haven't been a member for over a decade now, so I'm not that aware of things, but that's my sense (LDs on here may correct me). LD is still nearest to my natural voting instincts, although I've no problem voting for Starmer's Labour, particularly against the Conservatives at present (and likely will, given I live in Selby & Ainsty).
You're lucky to live in a constituency where your vote counts. And one with an exciting byelection into the bargain. I live in Lewisham Deptford, surely one of the constituencies where voting is most meaningless. A Labour majority of over 30k.
This argument, while attractive, is wrong. If lots of votes are altogether meaningless then it follows that all votes are meaningless except in the rare case of a seat being decided by exactly one vote. This would mean of course that in general no-one should vote because there would always be something more important to do, like feeding the cat or tickling the baby's toes, and the chance of it making a difference are virtually Zero.
But if no-one voted, following that valid argument, then the system collapses.
Therefore all voting is meaningful for the good reasons that the alternative view lacks coherence, and because a 30k majority arises out of actual people actually voting, all of whom are free to choose differently next time.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
Yes, I hear a lot of praise for Cooper, although I've not seen much of her myself. The thing is, on metrics, Davey is doing ok - slowly climbing polls, big by-election wins, likely to gain a fair number of seats at the election. These have more to do with the Conservative implosion than anything the LDs have done, but it helps.
I haven't been a member for over a decade now, so I'm not that aware of things, but that's my sense (LDs on here may correct me). LD is still nearest to my natural voting instincts, although I've no problem voting for Starmer's Labour, particularly against the Conservatives at present (and likely will, given I live in Selby & Ainsty).
Davey has done well for the same reason Starmer has done well - they aren't threatening enough to the status quo, so when people got pissed off with the Tories they flooded to whichever was more likely to beat the Tories where they live. Whereas I think a politician like Cooper (who is my local MP) would be able to expand beyond that.
Cooper is very good, I'm a fan. But there's no rush. She will be a good LD leader under a Labour government. As a LD member I'm very happy with Davey. He's intelligent, collegiate, by all accounts a nice man, and a good organiser.
Of course, it would not occur to you that they might have had a *negative* effect...
I was rather tongue in cheek!
But where are all those who said a ceasefire would be anti-semitic?
Who said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic? I cannot recall anyone on here saying that?
There were plenty here saying calls for a ceasefire were wrong, indeed that was how Parliament voted.
Is Jess Phillips allowed back now the IDF also want a ceasefire?
So you're making rubbish up, and no-one said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic...
But to your point: a 'ceasefire' can mean many different things. Most people I heard talk about this seemed to see it as 'Israel stop', with f-all to say about the hostages or rocket fire. It was all on Israel. This is more akin to a temporary peace deal, with give and take from both sides.
Which, if you read what I've been writing, is essentially what I was calling for (though I'd have preferred it to have gone further...).
I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. And if we go by the reporting, Hamas had earlier tried to negotiate a cessation of bombing to release some hostages and Israel were not willing to discuss it.
You could argue (as many here did) that Hamas should unilaterally have released hostages anyway but a) that's not how negotiations work and b) if Israel were still actively bombing Gaza there would have been no way for Hamas to release hostages and know they would be safe (again, this doesn't have to be because Hamas care about the wellbeing of hostages as much as they care about being seen as people you can sincerely do political negotiations with). So all the onus did sit with Israel for a ceasefire to happen.
"I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. "
That is rubbish. What is more, it is dangerous rubbish.
Hamas has fired many thousands of rockets into Israel over the years. And whilst these do not kill many people (often thanks to Iron Dome and the like), each once causes thousands of people to run for their shelters, any time of night and day. Imagine being an ordinary civilian living under that sort of pressure. In fact, if you're British and over eighty, you may not have to imagine.
That is not to excuse Israel. But Hamas's rockets give Israel a justifiable excuse to attack back. Hamas do not want peace.
I wasn't talking about "over the years", I was talking about the conflict now. And I'm aware "all" was hyperbole, and explained myself in response to TOPPING; but Israel have state of the art war capabilities and have killed roughly 0.5% of all the people in Gaza, and Hamas have home made rockets. One side of this war has much more power than the other, and so those asking for a ceasefire will obviously turn their attentions to that power, who is also an ally of ours, instead of the smaller power.
If we want to get into an argument about what "justifies" war, we need only look at the UN. Gaza is occupied territory, and has been since 1967, and it has been under blockade from land, sea and air since 2007. The UN states that an aggressor is defined by acts and not words, and such acts include "any military occupation, however temporary, resulting from such an invasion or attack" and "blockade of the ports or coasts of a State by the armed forces of another State".
Gaza falls into a sticky area here - it isn't a recognised state. If it was it is clear that the long term actions of the state of Israel would clearly make Israel the aggressor. This is not to condone any of the war crimes Hamas has done in reaction to that, but to explain that in international law if Hamas (as the elected government of Gaza, as people here often point out) wanted to declare war on Israel the casus belli would be there and likely legal (if Gaza was considered a state). If Gaza is not a state, but part of Israel, then what Israel is doing is still illegal and the acts of an aggressor - and part of the argument for why many people describe Israel as an apartheid state.
I'm interested in why you feel the need to downplay the experiences of Israelis who have ad family members killed by those 'homemade' rockets, and all of those who have to run for shelters whenever Hamas (and Hezbollah...) fire them.
Because it is clear that the deaths of civilians are clearly one sided. I feel empathy for the individuals involved, of course, but if we're talking the whole picture it's clear that Israel kills more Palestinians by an extremely large margin then Hamas kills Israelis. As well as that, as I've said, the state of Israel has both the infrastructure and military power to enforce its will on the entire of Gaza - Hamas does not have that power at all. That is not to say it is okay for Hamas to kill civilians - as I said, I don't think that Hamas should do war crimes either - but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective.
I also note that you brought up the idea of "justifiable excuse to attack back" and then skipped over the literal justifications in international law for why Israel would likely be considered an aggressor.
"but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective."
7th October was pretty effective.
But that is what makes it so shocking to most people and to Israel, right? October 7th was the anomaly, not the rule. And Hamas managed to kill 1200 people and kidnap a few hundred, plus break down some parts of the border fence and some barracks - whereas Israel has levelled entire sections of Gaza, killed more than ten times that, and displaced many hundreds of thousands of Palestinians (and is arguing to displace all 2 million people in Gaza).
That, again, is not to say what Hamas did was acceptable or not a significant act of violence - but that in comparison to what the state of Israel can do (and has done in the past) it is not really in the same league.
Try re-writing that post with September 11 instead of October 7, and then the consequences for Afghanistan instead of Gaza. Exactly the same logic, excluding the final bit about displacing all people in Gaza, which isn't true anyway.
Having written that, I have realised that I don't really know what point you're making anyway. Terrorism is fine as long as the perpetrators aren't very good at it?
Deliberately targeting women and children in a terror attack, good.
Civilians casualties as a result of attacking military targets, bad.
Deliberately hiding civilians in military facilities, and disguising military bases as schools and hospitals, well they’re both good too.
All because Jews=Power=Bad.
Where were all the protests for the innocent residents of Rostov-on-Don, the Russian town that has been the target of many Ukranian missiles in the past year?
In terms of absolute numbers I think he's right, certainly since 1951 say. Although given his access to data processing, both as an individual and the people he employs, shouldn't he (has he?) produced a bar chart to that effect?
From yesterday's discussion... Falklands knicker wetting...
The FI are a lot harder to take now due to a much greater British military presence but they would also be a lot harder to take back due to the long runway at Maggie's Pleasant Airfield. This would make sustaining an invasion force and defending the air space a lot easier.
The RN has more firepower now but a lot less capability to sustain it at 50 deg S for anything but the briefest period. The task force took 10 tankers and 6 supply ships in 1982, there are only 6 tankers and 1 supply ship in the entire RFA today.
All of the surface combatants use VLS which means once they've fired their missiles they can only be re-armed in port. That port being Pompey. Not ideal for a conflict in the South Atlantic.
A possible strategy would be to TLAM the shit out of the Argentinian mainland but Biden might tell the UK to chill before the pressure could tell on their fucking idiotic Wheeltappers and Juntas El Presidente.
Of course, it would not occur to you that they might have had a *negative* effect...
I was rather tongue in cheek!
But where are all those who said a ceasefire would be anti-semitic?
Who said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic? I cannot recall anyone on here saying that?
There were plenty here saying calls for a ceasefire were wrong, indeed that was how Parliament voted.
Is Jess Phillips allowed back now the IDF also want a ceasefire?
So you're making rubbish up, and no-one said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic...
But to your point: a 'ceasefire' can mean many different things. Most people I heard talk about this seemed to see it as 'Israel stop', with f-all to say about the hostages or rocket fire. It was all on Israel. This is more akin to a temporary peace deal, with give and take from both sides.
Which, if you read what I've been writing, is essentially what I was calling for (though I'd have preferred it to have gone further...).
I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. And if we go by the reporting, Hamas had earlier tried to negotiate a cessation of bombing to release some hostages and Israel were not willing to discuss it.
You could argue (as many here did) that Hamas should unilaterally have released hostages anyway but a) that's not how negotiations work and b) if Israel were still actively bombing Gaza there would have been no way for Hamas to release hostages and know they would be safe (again, this doesn't have to be because Hamas care about the wellbeing of hostages as much as they care about being seen as people you can sincerely do political negotiations with). So all the onus did sit with Israel for a ceasefire to happen.
"I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. "
That is rubbish. What is more, it is dangerous rubbish.
Hamas has fired many thousands of rockets into Israel over the years. And whilst these do not kill many people (often thanks to Iron Dome and the like), each once causes thousands of people to run for their shelters, any time of night and day. Imagine being an ordinary civilian living under that sort of pressure. In fact, if you're British and over eighty, you may not have to imagine.
That is not to excuse Israel. But Hamas's rockets give Israel a justifiable excuse to attack back. Hamas do not want peace.
I wasn't talking about "over the years", I was talking about the conflict now. And I'm aware "all" was hyperbole, and explained myself in response to TOPPING; but Israel have state of the art war capabilities and have killed roughly 0.5% of all the people in Gaza, and Hamas have home made rockets. One side of this war has much more power than the other, and so those asking for a ceasefire will obviously turn their attentions to that power, who is also an ally of ours, instead of the smaller power.
If we want to get into an argument about what "justifies" war, we need only look at the UN. Gaza is occupied territory, and has been since 1967, and it has been under blockade from land, sea and air since 2007. The UN states that an aggressor is defined by acts and not words, and such acts include "any military occupation, however temporary, resulting from such an invasion or attack" and "blockade of the ports or coasts of a State by the armed forces of another State".
Gaza falls into a sticky area here - it isn't a recognised state. If it was it is clear that the long term actions of the state of Israel would clearly make Israel the aggressor. This is not to condone any of the war crimes Hamas has done in reaction to that, but to explain that in international law if Hamas (as the elected government of Gaza, as people here often point out) wanted to declare war on Israel the casus belli would be there and likely legal (if Gaza was considered a state). If Gaza is not a state, but part of Israel, then what Israel is doing is still illegal and the acts of an aggressor - and part of the argument for why many people describe Israel as an apartheid state.
I'm interested in why you feel the need to downplay the experiences of Israelis who have ad family members killed by those 'homemade' rockets, and all of those who have to run for shelters whenever Hamas (and Hezbollah...) fire them.
Because it is clear that the deaths of civilians are clearly one sided. I feel empathy for the individuals involved, of course, but if we're talking the whole picture it's clear that Israel kills more Palestinians by an extremely large margin then Hamas kills Israelis. As well as that, as I've said, the state of Israel has both the infrastructure and military power to enforce its will on the entire of Gaza - Hamas does not have that power at all. That is not to say it is okay for Hamas to kill civilians - as I said, I don't think that Hamas should do war crimes either - but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective.
I also note that you brought up the idea of "justifiable excuse to attack back" and then skipped over the literal justifications in international law for why Israel would likely be considered an aggressor.
"but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective."
7th October was pretty effective.
But that is what makes it so shocking to most people and to Israel, right? October 7th was the anomaly, not the rule. And Hamas managed to kill 1200 people and kidnap a few hundred, plus break down some parts of the border fence and some barracks - whereas Israel has levelled entire sections of Gaza, killed more than ten times that, and displaced many hundreds of thousands of Palestinians (and is arguing to displace all 2 million people in Gaza).
That, again, is not to say what Hamas did was acceptable or not a significant act of violence - but that in comparison to what the state of Israel can do (and has done in the past) it is not really in the same league.
This is oversimplifying. Just as Ukraine includes the sum of its allies support, so with Hamas.
If the Islamic world of the middle east wished to support Hamas in the sense of combining to take on Israel in a military way, with a particular end in view, neither the laws of war or history prevents it. Despite all the talk, huffing and puffing etc, the combined might of these many countries has no intention of actually taking part in the Hamas military cause against Israel in such a way as to allow it to win.
The fact that Hamas is not in the same league as Israel tells you about how effective each has been in garnering support and alliances, but doesn't tell you what amount of force is justified in Israel's efforts to neutralise a real threat to its civilians.
Even that's oversimplifying. The Palestinian cause used to be widely supported by the surrounding Arab nations, with Egypt, (Trans)Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and others all actively participating in the 1948 Israeli War of Independence. Since then, and following similar defeats (1967 and 1973) most of those nations have given up and made peace with Israel (main exceptions being Syria, which has simply collapsed, Lebanon, which is a client state of Syria, and Saudi Arabia which as we know was in the process of normalising relations with Israel).
Whether the Arab nations' loss of interest in supporting the Palestinian cause (and to be clear I specifically mean in terms of pushing back Israel's borders, not support for a two-state solution) is because they keep losing, or for any other reason, is not relevant. The fact remains that Hamas and their ilk have repeatedly failed to achieve their aims on the battlefield, and also continue to reject any political solution that includes the state of Israel continuing to exist. So, what else is there?
Of course, it would not occur to you that they might have had a *negative* effect...
I was rather tongue in cheek!
But where are all those who said a ceasefire would be anti-semitic?
Who said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic? I cannot recall anyone on here saying that?
There were plenty here saying calls for a ceasefire were wrong, indeed that was how Parliament voted.
Is Jess Phillips allowed back now the IDF also want a ceasefire?
So you're making rubbish up, and no-one said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic...
But to your point: a 'ceasefire' can mean many different things. Most people I heard talk about this seemed to see it as 'Israel stop', with f-all to say about the hostages or rocket fire. It was all on Israel. This is more akin to a temporary peace deal, with give and take from both sides.
Which, if you read what I've been writing, is essentially what I was calling for (though I'd have preferred it to have gone further...).
I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. And if we go by the reporting, Hamas had earlier tried to negotiate a cessation of bombing to release some hostages and Israel were not willing to discuss it.
You could argue (as many here did) that Hamas should unilaterally have released hostages anyway but a) that's not how negotiations work and b) if Israel were still actively bombing Gaza there would have been no way for Hamas to release hostages and know they would be safe (again, this doesn't have to be because Hamas care about the wellbeing of hostages as much as they care about being seen as people you can sincerely do political negotiations with). So all the onus did sit with Israel for a ceasefire to happen.
"I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. "
That is rubbish. What is more, it is dangerous rubbish.
Hamas has fired many thousands of rockets into Israel over the years. And whilst these do not kill many people (often thanks to Iron Dome and the like), each once causes thousands of people to run for their shelters, any time of night and day. Imagine being an ordinary civilian living under that sort of pressure. In fact, if you're British and over eighty, you may not have to imagine.
That is not to excuse Israel. But Hamas's rockets give Israel a justifiable excuse to attack back. Hamas do not want peace.
I wasn't talking about "over the years", I was talking about the conflict now. And I'm aware "all" was hyperbole, and explained myself in response to TOPPING; but Israel have state of the art war capabilities and have killed roughly 0.5% of all the people in Gaza, and Hamas have home made rockets. One side of this war has much more power than the other, and so those asking for a ceasefire will obviously turn their attentions to that power, who is also an ally of ours, instead of the smaller power.
If we want to get into an argument about what "justifies" war, we need only look at the UN. Gaza is occupied territory, and has been since 1967, and it has been under blockade from land, sea and air since 2007. The UN states that an aggressor is defined by acts and not words, and such acts include "any military occupation, however temporary, resulting from such an invasion or attack" and "blockade of the ports or coasts of a State by the armed forces of another State".
Gaza falls into a sticky area here - it isn't a recognised state. If it was it is clear that the long term actions of the state of Israel would clearly make Israel the aggressor. This is not to condone any of the war crimes Hamas has done in reaction to that, but to explain that in international law if Hamas (as the elected government of Gaza, as people here often point out) wanted to declare war on Israel the casus belli would be there and likely legal (if Gaza was considered a state). If Gaza is not a state, but part of Israel, then what Israel is doing is still illegal and the acts of an aggressor - and part of the argument for why many people describe Israel as an apartheid state.
I'm interested in why you feel the need to downplay the experiences of Israelis who have ad family members killed by those 'homemade' rockets, and all of those who have to run for shelters whenever Hamas (and Hezbollah...) fire them.
Because it is clear that the deaths of civilians are clearly one sided. I feel empathy for the individuals involved, of course, but if we're talking the whole picture it's clear that Israel kills more Palestinians by an extremely large margin then Hamas kills Israelis. As well as that, as I've said, the state of Israel has both the infrastructure and military power to enforce its will on the entire of Gaza - Hamas does not have that power at all. That is not to say it is okay for Hamas to kill civilians - as I said, I don't think that Hamas should do war crimes either - but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective.
I also note that you brought up the idea of "justifiable excuse to attack back" and then skipped over the literal justifications in international law for why Israel would likely be considered an aggressor.
"but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective."
7th October was pretty effective.
But that is what makes it so shocking to most people and to Israel, right? October 7th was the anomaly, not the rule. And Hamas managed to kill 1200 people and kidnap a few hundred, plus break down some parts of the border fence and some barracks - whereas Israel has levelled entire sections of Gaza, killed more than ten times that, and displaced many hundreds of thousands of Palestinians (and is arguing to displace all 2 million people in Gaza).
That, again, is not to say what Hamas did was acceptable or not a significant act of violence - but that in comparison to what the state of Israel can do (and has done in the past) it is not really in the same league.
Try re-writing that post with September 11 instead of October 7, and then the consequences for Afghanistan instead of Gaza. Exactly the same logic, excluding the final bit about displacing all people in Gaza, which isn't true anyway.
Having written that, I have realised that I don't really know what point you're making anyway. Terrorism is fine as long as the perpetrators aren't very good at it?
I think 148grrs is a classic punch up ideologue. Israel has the power, therefore bad. Hamas are just freedom fighters.
That is exactly it. The struggle today is a binary one between the powerful and the powerless. That is it. And the powerless therefore all have common cause against the powerful.
In terms of absolute numbers I think he's right, certainly since 1951 say. Although given his access to data processing, both as an individual and the people he employs, shouldn't he (has he?) produced a bar chart to that effect?
There’s two particular outliers in the last couple of years, namely Ukraine and Hong Kong. One is temporary refuge-seeking from a war, and the other is the UK honouring a long-standing agreement to a former British protectorate.
Still doesn’t mean that we don’t need to build a million houses a year, starting about a decade ago.
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
I mean, wealth taxes, land value taxes, taxes on stock trading, and increases (not decreases) in inheritance tax aimed at the highest brackets (I'm talking inheritances valued over £5million for example) would be good ways to deal with the issue. Also closing all the tax loopholes in the other British territories, and actually putting resource towards investigating tax avoidance rather than, say, benefit fraud.
Closing tax loopholes in the British overseas territories is not really something the UK government has the authority to do. They are protectorates but autonomous. Yes we can apply pressure (and have done) but the most effective pressure comes from more important players like the US and EU.
Most BOTs have managed to come off black and grey lists for non-transparent or uncooperative tax havens in recent years having done a fair bit on information sharing and secrecy, and they are now all introducing the global minimum tax either through QDMTT or simply increasing tax rates to 15%. The question then becomes whether they should have to have OECD-style tax rates for everyone when a. they don't need the tax revenue, b. they don't have the industrial or market power to compete in other ways. If you're a resource-poor island in the middle of nowhere, your choices for economic survival are limited: tourism, hosting military bases, fishing, or using your tax and regulatory system to attract international capital.
What's the point of having gun boats if you can't bully a few small islands. See France-Monaco 1962.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
The coalition thing plays both ways. What is the point of a LibDem party that is not mature enough to deal with coalitions and accepting that means they won't always get their own way? It then is limited to a pressure party like the Greens or UKIP. I might vote for that in a council election or if offered Johnson v Corbyn, but it would have little appeal to me in a GE with at least one palatable leader from Tories or Labour.
By all means criticise parts of the coalition govt and accept mistakes were made, but also own the successes and achievements - just look at whats followed to see how an unmoderated party can act.
But that's not how even sympathetic voters view the coalition for the LDs (especially not voters my age whose first vote was for the LDs). They immediately reneged on a big pledge to their base of voters, and they seemed to get very little out of the coalition outside of being Cameron's meat shield. Any bad policy the Tories pushed, the story of why LDs were backing it was more up front than the Tories being the people wanting it anyway. And it also gave cover for Cameron's "modernising" of the party to go after Orange Booker "social liberals" when that "modernising" (as we can now see) was pretty flimsy.
Sure, one could argue that a "serious" party should go into government and take the knocks that come with it - but in many ways being the junior partner in a coalition gives you a lot of leverage and the LDs never did that; they signed it away right at the start. If it had been a grace and favours deal - a "no, you really have to convince us on every vote" deal - then they would have been able to have more impact on policy (in my view). People forget that that election, whilst not a Labour victory by any amounts, was not a Conservative victory either - people still didn't buy what the Conservatives were selling enough to give them a majority (and didn't give the Tories a governing majority until Johnson turned up - Cameron's majority was razor thin and almost immediately destroyed by his pledge to hold an EU referendum). We've had Tory policy hegemony without the kind of political enthusiasm you would expect to allow that for 13 years; and the LDs enabled that.
Imagine a scenario where in 2010 the coalition didn't form like it did, and Labour got it's act together a lot quicker because of that. The conservative minority government might have fallen and a new GE could have given a majority to Labour led government before 2015. What a different world we would have lived in.
Labour might have cobbled together an anti-Conservative coalition, in 2010, as the Spanish Socialists have just done, but it would have split apart, and resulted in a bigger Labour defeat, in due course.
The Spanish system is completely different, though. The coalition cobbled together in Spain was to get Pedro Sanchez voted in a PM. He has been and that cannot be undone. He is now there for four years - unless he calls for an early election or Catalan separatists vote with PP and Vox to bring the government down, which they will not do. The challenge Sanchez has is to get meaningful legislation through. It's one he is used to as he has never been in charge of a majority government.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
Yes, I hear a lot of praise for Cooper, although I've not seen much of her myself. The thing is, on metrics, Davey is doing ok - slowly climbing polls, big by-election wins, likely to gain a fair number of seats at the election. These have more to do with the Conservative implosion than anything the LDs have done, but it helps.
I haven't been a member for over a decade now, so I'm not that aware of things, but that's my sense (LDs on here may correct me). LD is still nearest to my natural voting instincts, although I've no problem voting for Starmer's Labour, particularly against the Conservatives at present (and likely will, given I live in Selby & Ainsty).
Davey has done well for the same reason Starmer has done well - they aren't threatening enough to the status quo, so when people got pissed off with the Tories they flooded to whichever was more likely to beat the Tories where they live. Whereas I think a politician like Cooper (who is my local MP) would be able to expand beyond that.
Cooper is very good, I'm a fan. But there's no rush. She will be a good LD leader under a Labour government. As a LD member I'm very happy with Davey. He's intelligent, collegiate, by all accounts a nice man, and a good organiser.
Sounds like he'd make an excellent LD president
Back in 2010 I had the feeling that Clegg was over-awed and over-excited at the prospect of being in Government, as were some at least of those close to him.
Kennedy’s alcoholism was more than just a tragedy for him.
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
I mean, wealth taxes, land value taxes, taxes on stock trading, and increases (not decreases) in inheritance tax aimed at the highest brackets (I'm talking inheritances valued over £5million for example) would be good ways to deal with the issue. Also closing all the tax loopholes in the other British territories, and actually putting resource towards investigating tax avoidance rather than, say, benefit fraud.
Closing tax loopholes in the British overseas territories is not really something the UK government has the authority to do. They are protectorates but autonomous. Yes we can apply pressure (and have done) but the most effective pressure comes from more important players like the US and EU.
Most BOTs have managed to come off black and grey lists for non-transparent or uncooperative tax havens in recent years having done a fair bit on information sharing and secrecy, and they are now all introducing the global minimum tax either through QDMTT or simply increasing tax rates to 15%. The question then becomes whether they should have to have OECD-style tax rates for everyone when a. they don't need the tax revenue, b. they don't have the industrial or market power to compete in other ways. If you're a resource-poor island in the middle of nowhere, your choices for economic survival are limited: tourism, hosting military bases, fishing, or using your tax and regulatory system to attract international capital.
What's the point of having gun boats if you can't bully a few small islands. See France-Monaco 1962.
That worked out really well, those French boats did a brilliant job of getting all those globetrotting multimillionaires out of Monaco.
In terms of absolute numbers I think he's right, certainly since 1951 say. Although given his access to data processing, both as an individual and the people he employs, shouldn't he (has he?) produced a bar chart to that effect?
There’s two particular outliers in the last couple of years, namely Ukraine and Hong Kong. One is temporary refuge-seeking from a war, and the other is the UK honouring a long-standing agreement to a former British protectorate.
Still doesn’t mean that we don’t need to build a million houses a year, starting about a decade ago.
I know quite a few Ukrainians (and a few Russians masquerading as Ukrainians. LOL) and I don't think any of them have expressed any intention of going back. The ones with kids in school in the UK have explicitly told us they are here for good.
The two who live with us don't even want to discuss it.
Of course, it would not occur to you that they might have had a *negative* effect...
I was rather tongue in cheek!
But where are all those who said a ceasefire would be anti-semitic?
Who said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic? I cannot recall anyone on here saying that?
There were plenty here saying calls for a ceasefire were wrong, indeed that was how Parliament voted.
Is Jess Phillips allowed back now the IDF also want a ceasefire?
So you're making rubbish up, and no-one said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic...
But to your point: a 'ceasefire' can mean many different things. Most people I heard talk about this seemed to see it as 'Israel stop', with f-all to say about the hostages or rocket fire. It was all on Israel. This is more akin to a temporary peace deal, with give and take from both sides.
Which, if you read what I've been writing, is essentially what I was calling for (though I'd have preferred it to have gone further...).
I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. And if we go by the reporting, Hamas had earlier tried to negotiate a cessation of bombing to release some hostages and Israel were not willing to discuss it.
You could argue (as many here did) that Hamas should unilaterally have released hostages anyway but a) that's not how negotiations work and b) if Israel were still actively bombing Gaza there would have been no way for Hamas to release hostages and know they would be safe (again, this doesn't have to be because Hamas care about the wellbeing of hostages as much as they care about being seen as people you can sincerely do political negotiations with). So all the onus did sit with Israel for a ceasefire to happen.
"I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. "
That is rubbish. What is more, it is dangerous rubbish.
Hamas has fired many thousands of rockets into Israel over the years. And whilst these do not kill many people (often thanks to Iron Dome and the like), each once causes thousands of people to run for their shelters, any time of night and day. Imagine being an ordinary civilian living under that sort of pressure. In fact, if you're British and over eighty, you may not have to imagine.
That is not to excuse Israel. But Hamas's rockets give Israel a justifiable excuse to attack back. Hamas do not want peace.
I wasn't talking about "over the years", I was talking about the conflict now. And I'm aware "all" was hyperbole, and explained myself in response to TOPPING; but Israel have state of the art war capabilities and have killed roughly 0.5% of all the people in Gaza, and Hamas have home made rockets. One side of this war has much more power than the other, and so those asking for a ceasefire will obviously turn their attentions to that power, who is also an ally of ours, instead of the smaller power.
If we want to get into an argument about what "justifies" war, we need only look at the UN. Gaza is occupied territory, and has been since 1967, and it has been under blockade from land, sea and air since 2007. The UN states that an aggressor is defined by acts and not words, and such acts include "any military occupation, however temporary, resulting from such an invasion or attack" and "blockade of the ports or coasts of a State by the armed forces of another State".
Gaza falls into a sticky area here - it isn't a recognised state. If it was it is clear that the long term actions of the state of Israel would clearly make Israel the aggressor. This is not to condone any of the war crimes Hamas has done in reaction to that, but to explain that in international law if Hamas (as the elected government of Gaza, as people here often point out) wanted to declare war on Israel the casus belli would be there and likely legal (if Gaza was considered a state). If Gaza is not a state, but part of Israel, then what Israel is doing is still illegal and the acts of an aggressor - and part of the argument for why many people describe Israel as an apartheid state.
I'm interested in why you feel the need to downplay the experiences of Israelis who have ad family members killed by those 'homemade' rockets, and all of those who have to run for shelters whenever Hamas (and Hezbollah...) fire them.
Because it is clear that the deaths of civilians are clearly one sided. I feel empathy for the individuals involved, of course, but if we're talking the whole picture it's clear that Israel kills more Palestinians by an extremely large margin then Hamas kills Israelis. As well as that, as I've said, the state of Israel has both the infrastructure and military power to enforce its will on the entire of Gaza - Hamas does not have that power at all. That is not to say it is okay for Hamas to kill civilians - as I said, I don't think that Hamas should do war crimes either - but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective.
I also note that you brought up the idea of "justifiable excuse to attack back" and then skipped over the literal justifications in international law for why Israel would likely be considered an aggressor.
"but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective."
7th October was pretty effective.
But that is what makes it so shocking to most people and to Israel, right? October 7th was the anomaly, not the rule. And Hamas managed to kill 1200 people and kidnap a few hundred, plus break down some parts of the border fence and some barracks - whereas Israel has levelled entire sections of Gaza, killed more than ten times that, and displaced many hundreds of thousands of Palestinians (and is arguing to displace all 2 million people in Gaza).
That, again, is not to say what Hamas did was acceptable or not a significant act of violence - but that in comparison to what the state of Israel can do (and has done in the past) it is not really in the same league.
Try re-writing that post with September 11 instead of October 7, and then the consequences for Afghanistan instead of Gaza. Exactly the same logic, excluding the final bit about displacing all people in Gaza, which isn't true anyway.
Having written that, I have realised that I don't really know what point you're making anyway. Terrorism is fine as long as the perpetrators aren't very good at it?
I think 148grrs is a classic punch up ideologue. Israel has the power, therefore bad. Hamas are just freedom fighters.
I do wonder on whose side such people would have been on throughout Israel's history up to the point where it became clearly militarily superior to the Palestinians. Essentially, if you believe in the ideology of "punching up", Israel making peace with its neighbours (particularly Egypt in 1979 - an order of magnitude larger than Israel and with a significantly larger and more modern army up to that point) made it much less worthy of support on the international stage. Which is utterly absurd logic.
Even today, Hamas is clearly a proxy for Iran (population also an order of magnitude larger than Israel, modern military, huge oil revenues), and also has Hezbollah sitting on Israel's northern border). It is simply bonkers to look at the bigger picture in the Middle East and conclude that Israel is anything other than a massive underdog.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
Yes, I hear a lot of praise for Cooper, although I've not seen much of her myself. The thing is, on metrics, Davey is doing ok - slowly climbing polls, big by-election wins, likely to gain a fair number of seats at the election. These have more to do with the Conservative implosion than anything the LDs have done, but it helps.
I haven't been a member for over a decade now, so I'm not that aware of things, but that's my sense (LDs on here may correct me). LD is still nearest to my natural voting instincts, although I've no problem voting for Starmer's Labour, particularly against the Conservatives at present (and likely will, given I live in Selby & Ainsty).
Davey has done well for the same reason Starmer has done well - they aren't threatening enough to the status quo, so when people got pissed off with the Tories they flooded to whichever was more likely to beat the Tories where they live. Whereas I think a politician like Cooper (who is my local MP) would be able to expand beyond that.
Cooper is very good, I'm a fan. But there's no rush. She will be a good LD leader under a Labour government. As a LD member I'm very happy with Davey. He's intelligent, collegiate, by all accounts a nice man, and a good organiser.
Sounds like he'd make an excellent LD president
Back in 2010 I had the feeling that Clegg was over-awed and over-excited at the prospect of being in Government, as were some at least of those close to him.
Kennedy’s alcoholism was more than just a tragedy for him.
Don't forget that the prize for coalition was a referendum on how we elect to Westminster. The country said - happy with FPTP. So the big idea that the Lib Dems would do better if only the voting system was fairer was rejected out of hand. Now it may be that the type of system was the issue, but actually I think it was more that FPTP has been shown to work, at least in as much as stable governments. (It's manifest failures in other spheres need not be brought up).
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
I mean, wealth taxes, land value taxes, taxes on stock trading, and increases (not decreases) in inheritance tax aimed at the highest brackets (I'm talking inheritances valued over £5million for example) would be good ways to deal with the issue. Also closing all the tax loopholes in the other British territories, and actually putting resource towards investigating tax avoidance rather than, say, benefit fraud.
Closing tax loopholes in the British overseas territories is not really something the UK government has the authority to do. They are protectorates but autonomous. Yes we can apply pressure (and have done) but the most effective pressure comes from more important players like the US and EU.
Most BOTs have managed to come off black and grey lists for non-transparent or uncooperative tax havens in recent years having done a fair bit on information sharing and secrecy, and they are now all introducing the global minimum tax either through QDMTT or simply increasing tax rates to 15%. The question then becomes whether they should have to have OECD-style tax rates for everyone when a. they don't need the tax revenue, b. they don't have the industrial or market power to compete in other ways. If you're a resource-poor island in the middle of nowhere, your choices for economic survival are limited: tourism, hosting military bases, fishing, or using your tax and regulatory system to attract international capital.
What's the point of having gun boats if you can't bully a few small islands. See France-Monaco 1962.
That worked out really well, those French boats did a brilliant job of getting all those globetrotting multimillionaires out of Monaco.
Worked for the French.
"The Principality of Monaco was then forced to make major concessions regarding tax in return for a strengthening of its sovereignty. After several months of discussion, the crisis was resolved with the agreements of May 18th, 1963. France obtained from Monaco a substantial adjustment of its tax provisions, which we present here, with the aim of abolishing all the competitive advantages granted to companies established in Monaco and limiting the departure of French people to the Principality who aim to transfer their tax residence there."
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
I mean, wealth taxes, land value taxes, taxes on stock trading, and increases (not decreases) in inheritance tax aimed at the highest brackets (I'm talking inheritances valued over £5million for example) would be good ways to deal with the issue. Also closing all the tax loopholes in the other British territories, and actually putting resource towards investigating tax avoidance rather than, say, benefit fraud.
Closing tax loopholes in the British overseas territories is not really something the UK government has the authority to do. They are protectorates but autonomous. Yes we can apply pressure (and have done) but the most effective pressure comes from more important players like the US and EU.
Most BOTs have managed to come off black and grey lists for non-transparent or uncooperative tax havens in recent years having done a fair bit on information sharing and secrecy, and they are now all introducing the global minimum tax either through QDMTT or simply increasing tax rates to 15%. The question then becomes whether they should have to have OECD-style tax rates for everyone when a. they don't need the tax revenue, b. they don't have the industrial or market power to compete in other ways. If you're a resource-poor island in the middle of nowhere, your choices for economic survival are limited: tourism, hosting military bases, fishing, or using your tax and regulatory system to attract international capital.
What's the point of having gun boats if you can't bully a few small islands. See France-Monaco 1962.
That worked out really well, those French boats did a brilliant job of getting all those globetrotting multimillionaires out of Monaco.
Worked for the French.
"The Principality of Monaco was then forced to make major concessions regarding tax in return for a strengthening of its sovereignty. After several months of discussion, the crisis was resolved with the agreements of May 18th, 1963. France obtained from Monaco a substantial adjustment of its tax provisions, which we present here, with the aim of abolishing all the competitive advantages granted to companies established in Monaco and limiting the departure of French people to the Principality who aim to transfer their tax residence there."
Turns out the parasitical fuckers needed France more than France needed them.
The really rich French just bought a passport from Malta or Greece, then relocated themselves to, err, Monaco - all made a lot easier by various EU treaties over the years. The slightly-less-rich French just moved to London.
Of course, it would not occur to you that they might have had a *negative* effect...
I was rather tongue in cheek!
But where are all those who said a ceasefire would be anti-semitic?
Who said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic? I cannot recall anyone on here saying that?
There were plenty here saying calls for a ceasefire were wrong, indeed that was how Parliament voted.
Is Jess Phillips allowed back now the IDF also want a ceasefire?
So you're making rubbish up, and no-one said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic...
But to your point: a 'ceasefire' can mean many different things. Most people I heard talk about this seemed to see it as 'Israel stop', with f-all to say about the hostages or rocket fire. It was all on Israel. This is more akin to a temporary peace deal, with give and take from both sides.
Which, if you read what I've been writing, is essentially what I was calling for (though I'd have preferred it to have gone further...).
I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. And if we go by the reporting, Hamas had earlier tried to negotiate a cessation of bombing to release some hostages and Israel were not willing to discuss it.
You could argue (as many here did) that Hamas should unilaterally have released hostages anyway but a) that's not how negotiations work and b) if Israel were still actively bombing Gaza there would have been no way for Hamas to release hostages and know they would be safe (again, this doesn't have to be because Hamas care about the wellbeing of hostages as much as they care about being seen as people you can sincerely do political negotiations with). So all the onus did sit with Israel for a ceasefire to happen.
"I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. "
That is rubbish. What is more, it is dangerous rubbish.
Hamas has fired many thousands of rockets into Israel over the years. And whilst these do not kill many people (often thanks to Iron Dome and the like), each once causes thousands of people to run for their shelters, any time of night and day. Imagine being an ordinary civilian living under that sort of pressure. In fact, if you're British and over eighty, you may not have to imagine.
That is not to excuse Israel. But Hamas's rockets give Israel a justifiable excuse to attack back. Hamas do not want peace.
I wasn't talking about "over the years", I was talking about the conflict now. And I'm aware "all" was hyperbole, and explained myself in response to TOPPING; but Israel have state of the art war capabilities and have killed roughly 0.5% of all the people in Gaza, and Hamas have home made rockets. One side of this war has much more power than the other, and so those asking for a ceasefire will obviously turn their attentions to that power, who is also an ally of ours, instead of the smaller power.
If we want to get into an argument about what "justifies" war, we need only look at the UN. Gaza is occupied territory, and has been since 1967, and it has been under blockade from land, sea and air since 2007. The UN states that an aggressor is defined by acts and not words, and such acts include "any military occupation, however temporary, resulting from such an invasion or attack" and "blockade of the ports or coasts of a State by the armed forces of another State".
Gaza falls into a sticky area here - it isn't a recognised state. If it was it is clear that the long term actions of the state of Israel would clearly make Israel the aggressor. This is not to condone any of the war crimes Hamas has done in reaction to that, but to explain that in international law if Hamas (as the elected government of Gaza, as people here often point out) wanted to declare war on Israel the casus belli would be there and likely legal (if Gaza was considered a state). If Gaza is not a state, but part of Israel, then what Israel is doing is still illegal and the acts of an aggressor - and part of the argument for why many people describe Israel as an apartheid state.
I'm interested in why you feel the need to downplay the experiences of Israelis who have ad family members killed by those 'homemade' rockets, and all of those who have to run for shelters whenever Hamas (and Hezbollah...) fire them.
Because it is clear that the deaths of civilians are clearly one sided. I feel empathy for the individuals involved, of course, but if we're talking the whole picture it's clear that Israel kills more Palestinians by an extremely large margin then Hamas kills Israelis. As well as that, as I've said, the state of Israel has both the infrastructure and military power to enforce its will on the entire of Gaza - Hamas does not have that power at all. That is not to say it is okay for Hamas to kill civilians - as I said, I don't think that Hamas should do war crimes either - but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective.
I also note that you brought up the idea of "justifiable excuse to attack back" and then skipped over the literal justifications in international law for why Israel would likely be considered an aggressor.
"but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective."
7th October was pretty effective.
But that is what makes it so shocking to most people and to Israel, right? October 7th was the anomaly, not the rule. And Hamas managed to kill 1200 people and kidnap a few hundred, plus break down some parts of the border fence and some barracks - whereas Israel has levelled entire sections of Gaza, killed more than ten times that, and displaced many hundreds of thousands of Palestinians (and is arguing to displace all 2 million people in Gaza).
That, again, is not to say what Hamas did was acceptable or not a significant act of violence - but that in comparison to what the state of Israel can do (and has done in the past) it is not really in the same league.
This is oversimplifying. Just as Ukraine includes the sum of its allies support, so with Hamas.
If the Islamic world of the middle east wished to support Hamas in the sense of combining to take on Israel in a military way, with a particular end in view, neither the laws of war or history prevents it. Despite all the talk, huffing and puffing etc, the combined might of these many countries has no intention of actually taking part in the Hamas military cause against Israel in such a way as to allow it to win.
The fact that Hamas is not in the same league as Israel tells you about how effective each has been in garnering support and alliances, but doesn't tell you what amount of force is justified in Israel's efforts to neutralise a real threat to its civilians.
Even that's oversimplifying. The Palestinian cause used to be widely supported by the surrounding Arab nations, with Egypt, (Trans)Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and others all actively participating in the 1948 Israeli War of Independence. Since then, and following similar defeats (1967 and 1973) most of those nations have given up and made peace with Israel (main exceptions being Syria, which has simply collapsed, Lebanon, which is a client state of Syria, and Saudi Arabia which as we know was in the process of normalising relations with Israel).
Whether the Arab nations' loss of interest in supporting the Palestinian cause (and to be clear I specifically mean in terms of pushing back Israel's borders, not support for a two-state solution) is because they keep losing, or for any other reason, is not relevant. The fact remains that Hamas and their ilk have repeatedly failed to achieve their aims on the battlefield, and also continue to reject any political solution that includes the state of Israel continuing to exist. So, what else is there?
What else is there. Better aims, better organisation, better allies. Hamas has been a lesson in how to lose friends and alienate people.
Look carefully at that polling tracker in the header and one thing stands out: the inexorable rise and rise of the Lib Dems. Unstoppable force meets eminently moveable object.
The other thing that stands out is the very clear jump in RefUK polling as soon as Sunak became PM. Whether down to (misplaced) perception of him as a wishy washy liberal, or "something else", who can tell. Ref actually declined during Truss's tenure.
I'm old enough to remember speculation* in early 2000s about whether the LDs would become the new opposition. Crossover surely coming now - step forward Ed Davey, your time has come
*newspaper article, I think, though maybe it was a LD leaflet
Davey has just been dull hasn’t he? Charlie Kennedy would have been leading the Gaza marching and signing up the students.
Recently, the LDs have got their leaders in at the wrong times.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey 2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I keep being surprised that Davey hasn't passed on the torch to Daisy Cooper, who I imagine is odds on to be the next leader after him. She's young, charismatic, telegenic, and does not defend the coalition years something that is still pretty important to some floating voters. Daisy Cooper as LD leader (or, if we take some of those strange poll projections, LOTO) would be much more able to hold a Labour government to account from the left and the right - on the left from issues on immigration and human rights and some economic issues, on the right from other economic positions.
The coalition thing plays both ways. What is the point of a LibDem party that is not mature enough to deal with coalitions and accepting that means they won't always get their own way? It then is limited to a pressure party like the Greens or UKIP. I might vote for that in a council election or if offered Johnson v Corbyn, but it would have little appeal to me in a GE with at least one palatable leader from Tories or Labour.
By all means criticise parts of the coalition govt and accept mistakes were made, but also own the successes and achievements - just look at whats followed to see how an unmoderated party can act.
But that's not how even sympathetic voters view the coalition for the LDs (especially not voters my age whose first vote was for the LDs). They immediately reneged on a big pledge to their base of voters, and they seemed to get very little out of the coalition outside of being Cameron's meat shield. Any bad policy the Tories pushed, the story of why LDs were backing it was more up front than the Tories being the people wanting it anyway. And it also gave cover for Cameron's "modernising" of the party to go after Orange Booker "social liberals" when that "modernising" (as we can now see) was pretty flimsy.
Sure, one could argue that a "serious" party should go into government and take the knocks that come with it - but in many ways being the junior partner in a coalition gives you a lot of leverage and the LDs never did that; they signed it away right at the start. If it had been a grace and favours deal - a "no, you really have to convince us on every vote" deal - then they would have been able to have more impact on policy (in my view). People forget that that election, whilst not a Labour victory by any amounts, was not a Conservative victory either - people still didn't buy what the Conservatives were selling enough to give them a majority (and didn't give the Tories a governing majority until Johnson turned up - Cameron's majority was razor thin and almost immediately destroyed by his pledge to hold an EU referendum). We've had Tory policy hegemony without the kind of political enthusiasm you would expect to allow that for 13 years; and the LDs enabled that.
Imagine a scenario where in 2010 the coalition didn't form like it did, and Labour got it's act together a lot quicker because of that. The conservative minority government might have fallen and a new GE could have given a majority to Labour led government before 2015. What a different world we would have lived in.
I agree with the first paragraph but not most of the second. One thing the LDs did get out of the coalition agreement was that there would be no general election until 2015. In 2010 there was a serious threat that if the Conservatives could only form a minority government, Cameron would call another election in October 2010. If the LDs offered a DUP type supply and confidence agreement, Cameron would not have promised not to go to the voters again. Cameron would have even been able to use it as a sword of damacles. "If you don't vote for xxx, I'll call an election".
The result of such a counterfactual election can never beknown, but almost everyone was predicting that the Conservatives would gain enough seats to have a workking majority.
The real problem with the coalition as you said is the absurdly quick finalisation of the coatlition agreement, and that the LD ministers were prepared to actively promote Conservative policies rather than pass them off as "a necessary part of forming a coalition".
I don't agree with boring. However the obsessive focus on a country the size of Wales is odd.
Patrick Wintour, diplomatic editor of the Guardian, described it as the biggest foreign policy crisis for 20 years. Really? Admittedly there is concern about wider potential instability in the region but when you consider Syria, Libya, the Muslim Brotherhood coming to power in Egypt, Afghanistan, Crimea and the Donbass. The full on Russia/Ukraine war. It's a ridiculous notion.
In terms of absolute numbers I think he's right, certainly since 1951 say. Although given his access to data processing, both as an individual and the people he employs, shouldn't he (has he?) produced a bar chart to that effect?
There’s two particular outliers in the last couple of years, namely Ukraine and Hong Kong. One is temporary refuge-seeking from a war, and the other is the UK honouring a long-standing agreement to a former British protectorate.
Still doesn’t mean that we don’t need to build a million houses a year, starting about a decade ago.
I know quite a few Ukrainians (and a few Russians masquerading as Ukrainians. LOL) and I don't think any of them have expressed any intention of going back. The ones with kids in school in the UK have explicitly told us they are here for good.
The two who live with us don't even want to discuss it.
Yes there’s potentially a few problems coming when the war finishes. Many of the women in the UK will now be widows for example. However, there will be massive international investment coming into the place when the war finishes, and the vast majority will return to their families.
This is clearly also an issue for many other European countries, there’s an estimated 5m displaced Ukranians at the moment.
However, there will be massive international investment coming into the place when the war finishes, and the vast majority will return to their families.
People here seem to think taxes and spending are too high. Most people seem to disagree with you:
People always want more taxes as long as those taxes apply to someone else.
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
I mean, wealth taxes, land value taxes, taxes on stock trading, and increases (not decreases) in inheritance tax aimed at the highest brackets (I'm talking inheritances valued over £5million for example) would be good ways to deal with the issue. Also closing all the tax loopholes in the other British territories, and actually putting resource towards investigating tax avoidance rather than, say, benefit fraud.
Closing tax loopholes in the British overseas territories is not really something the UK government has the authority to do. They are protectorates but autonomous. Yes we can apply pressure (and have done) but the most effective pressure comes from more important players like the US and EU.
Most BOTs have managed to come off black and grey lists for non-transparent or uncooperative tax havens in recent years having done a fair bit on information sharing and secrecy, and they are now all introducing the global minimum tax either through QDMTT or simply increasing tax rates to 15%. The question then becomes whether they should have to have OECD-style tax rates for everyone when a. they don't need the tax revenue, b. they don't have the industrial or market power to compete in other ways. If you're a resource-poor island in the middle of nowhere, your choices for economic survival are limited: tourism, hosting military bases, fishing, or using your tax and regulatory system to attract international capital.
What's the point of having gun boats if you can't bully a few small islands. See France-Monaco 1962.
That worked out really well, those French boats did a brilliant job of getting all those globetrotting multimillionaires out of Monaco.
Worked for the French.
"The Principality of Monaco was then forced to make major concessions regarding tax in return for a strengthening of its sovereignty. After several months of discussion, the crisis was resolved with the agreements of May 18th, 1963. France obtained from Monaco a substantial adjustment of its tax provisions, which we present here, with the aim of abolishing all the competitive advantages granted to companies established in Monaco and limiting the departure of French people to the Principality who aim to transfer their tax residence there."
Turns out the parasitical fuckers needed France more than France needed them.
The really rich French just bought a passport from Malta or Greece, then relocated themselves to, err, Monaco - all made a lot easier by various EU treaties over the years. The slightly-less-rich French just moved to London.
Do you think from the 1963 treaty:
a> France increased its tax take b>France decreased its tax take c> Nothing changed
Of course, it would not occur to you that they might have had a *negative* effect...
I was rather tongue in cheek!
But where are all those who said a ceasefire would be anti-semitic?
Who said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic? I cannot recall anyone on here saying that?
There were plenty here saying calls for a ceasefire were wrong, indeed that was how Parliament voted.
Is Jess Phillips allowed back now the IDF also want a ceasefire?
So you're making rubbish up, and no-one said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic...
But to your point: a 'ceasefire' can mean many different things. Most people I heard talk about this seemed to see it as 'Israel stop', with f-all to say about the hostages or rocket fire. It was all on Israel. This is more akin to a temporary peace deal, with give and take from both sides.
Which, if you read what I've been writing, is essentially what I was calling for (though I'd have preferred it to have gone further...).
I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. And if we go by the reporting, Hamas had earlier tried to negotiate a cessation of bombing to release some hostages and Israel were not willing to discuss it.
You could argue (as many here did) that Hamas should unilaterally have released hostages anyway but a) that's not how negotiations work and b) if Israel were still actively bombing Gaza there would have been no way for Hamas to release hostages and know they would be safe (again, this doesn't have to be because Hamas care about the wellbeing of hostages as much as they care about being seen as people you can sincerely do political negotiations with). So all the onus did sit with Israel for a ceasefire to happen.
"I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. "
That is rubbish. What is more, it is dangerous rubbish.
Hamas has fired many thousands of rockets into Israel over the years. And whilst these do not kill many people (often thanks to Iron Dome and the like), each once causes thousands of people to run for their shelters, any time of night and day. Imagine being an ordinary civilian living under that sort of pressure. In fact, if you're British and over eighty, you may not have to imagine.
That is not to excuse Israel. But Hamas's rockets give Israel a justifiable excuse to attack back. Hamas do not want peace.
I wasn't talking about "over the years", I was talking about the conflict now. And I'm aware "all" was hyperbole, and explained myself in response to TOPPING; but Israel have state of the art war capabilities and have killed roughly 0.5% of all the people in Gaza, and Hamas have home made rockets. One side of this war has much more power than the other, and so those asking for a ceasefire will obviously turn their attentions to that power, who is also an ally of ours, instead of the smaller power.
If we want to get into an argument about what "justifies" war, we need only look at the UN. Gaza is occupied territory, and has been since 1967, and it has been under blockade from land, sea and air since 2007. The UN states that an aggressor is defined by acts and not words, and such acts include "any military occupation, however temporary, resulting from such an invasion or attack" and "blockade of the ports or coasts of a State by the armed forces of another State".
Gaza falls into a sticky area here - it isn't a recognised state. If it was it is clear that the long term actions of the state of Israel would clearly make Israel the aggressor. This is not to condone any of the war crimes Hamas has done in reaction to that, but to explain that in international law if Hamas (as the elected government of Gaza, as people here often point out) wanted to declare war on Israel the casus belli would be there and likely legal (if Gaza was considered a state). If Gaza is not a state, but part of Israel, then what Israel is doing is still illegal and the acts of an aggressor - and part of the argument for why many people describe Israel as an apartheid state.
I'm interested in why you feel the need to downplay the experiences of Israelis who have ad family members killed by those 'homemade' rockets, and all of those who have to run for shelters whenever Hamas (and Hezbollah...) fire them.
Because it is clear that the deaths of civilians are clearly one sided. I feel empathy for the individuals involved, of course, but if we're talking the whole picture it's clear that Israel kills more Palestinians by an extremely large margin then Hamas kills Israelis. As well as that, as I've said, the state of Israel has both the infrastructure and military power to enforce its will on the entire of Gaza - Hamas does not have that power at all. That is not to say it is okay for Hamas to kill civilians - as I said, I don't think that Hamas should do war crimes either - but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective.
I also note that you brought up the idea of "justifiable excuse to attack back" and then skipped over the literal justifications in international law for why Israel would likely be considered an aggressor.
At least you're honest enough to admit that you downplay the experiences of Israelis!
"..but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective"
WTAF. Do you call what Hamas did last month 'ineffective' ? Why do you downplay everything Hamas does?
Of course, it would not occur to you that they might have had a *negative* effect...
I was rather tongue in cheek!
But where are all those who said a ceasefire would be anti-semitic?
Who said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic? I cannot recall anyone on here saying that?
There were plenty here saying calls for a ceasefire were wrong, indeed that was how Parliament voted.
Is Jess Phillips allowed back now the IDF also want a ceasefire?
So you're making rubbish up, and no-one said a ceasefire would be anti-Semitic...
But to your point: a 'ceasefire' can mean many different things. Most people I heard talk about this seemed to see it as 'Israel stop', with f-all to say about the hostages or rocket fire. It was all on Israel. This is more akin to a temporary peace deal, with give and take from both sides.
Which, if you read what I've been writing, is essentially what I was calling for (though I'd have preferred it to have gone further...).
I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. And if we go by the reporting, Hamas had earlier tried to negotiate a cessation of bombing to release some hostages and Israel were not willing to discuss it.
You could argue (as many here did) that Hamas should unilaterally have released hostages anyway but a) that's not how negotiations work and b) if Israel were still actively bombing Gaza there would have been no way for Hamas to release hostages and know they would be safe (again, this doesn't have to be because Hamas care about the wellbeing of hostages as much as they care about being seen as people you can sincerely do political negotiations with). So all the onus did sit with Israel for a ceasefire to happen.
"I mean, Israel was the one doing all of the bombing - so they were the only ones who you could call for a ceasefire from. "
That is rubbish. What is more, it is dangerous rubbish.
Hamas has fired many thousands of rockets into Israel over the years. And whilst these do not kill many people (often thanks to Iron Dome and the like), each once causes thousands of people to run for their shelters, any time of night and day. Imagine being an ordinary civilian living under that sort of pressure. In fact, if you're British and over eighty, you may not have to imagine.
That is not to excuse Israel. But Hamas's rockets give Israel a justifiable excuse to attack back. Hamas do not want peace.
I wasn't talking about "over the years", I was talking about the conflict now. And I'm aware "all" was hyperbole, and explained myself in response to TOPPING; but Israel have state of the art war capabilities and have killed roughly 0.5% of all the people in Gaza, and Hamas have home made rockets. One side of this war has much more power than the other, and so those asking for a ceasefire will obviously turn their attentions to that power, who is also an ally of ours, instead of the smaller power.
If we want to get into an argument about what "justifies" war, we need only look at the UN. Gaza is occupied territory, and has been since 1967, and it has been under blockade from land, sea and air since 2007. The UN states that an aggressor is defined by acts and not words, and such acts include "any military occupation, however temporary, resulting from such an invasion or attack" and "blockade of the ports or coasts of a State by the armed forces of another State".
Gaza falls into a sticky area here - it isn't a recognised state. If it was it is clear that the long term actions of the state of Israel would clearly make Israel the aggressor. This is not to condone any of the war crimes Hamas has done in reaction to that, but to explain that in international law if Hamas (as the elected government of Gaza, as people here often point out) wanted to declare war on Israel the casus belli would be there and likely legal (if Gaza was considered a state). If Gaza is not a state, but part of Israel, then what Israel is doing is still illegal and the acts of an aggressor - and part of the argument for why many people describe Israel as an apartheid state.
I'm interested in why you feel the need to downplay the experiences of Israelis who have ad family members killed by those 'homemade' rockets, and all of those who have to run for shelters whenever Hamas (and Hezbollah...) fire them.
Because it is clear that the deaths of civilians are clearly one sided. I feel empathy for the individuals involved, of course, but if we're talking the whole picture it's clear that Israel kills more Palestinians by an extremely large margin then Hamas kills Israelis. As well as that, as I've said, the state of Israel has both the infrastructure and military power to enforce its will on the entire of Gaza - Hamas does not have that power at all. That is not to say it is okay for Hamas to kill civilians - as I said, I don't think that Hamas should do war crimes either - but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective.
I also note that you brought up the idea of "justifiable excuse to attack back" and then skipped over the literal justifications in international law for why Israel would likely be considered an aggressor.
"but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective, and when Israeli attacks Palestinians they are highly effective."
7th October was pretty effective.
But that is what makes it so shocking to most people and to Israel, right? October 7th was the anomaly, not the rule. And Hamas managed to kill 1200 people and kidnap a few hundred, plus break down some parts of the border fence and some barracks - whereas Israel has levelled entire sections of Gaza, killed more than ten times that, and displaced many hundreds of thousands of Palestinians (and is arguing to displace all 2 million people in Gaza).
That, again, is not to say what Hamas did was acceptable or not a significant act of violence - but that in comparison to what the state of Israel can do (and has done in the past) it is not really in the same league.
Hamas's rockets *are* the rule, given the amount they fire them. And every time they fire one, Israelis have to run for their shelters. It's crass to say they're 'homemade' rocket, as if that makes them any less deadly, damaging and disrupting.
Comments
Was shown around by a guy who was an ambassador in SE Asia for one of the orders of Knight's Templars. His only benefit was a diplomatic passport, printed on white vellum. It was just fantastically medieval.
I assume you also know the Phnom Penh Foreign Correspondents Club? Pure Graham Greene...
Sadly it shut during Covid and I fear may never reopen
Also he probably has crypto. Aside from the coins the exchange made up themselves, he was a bit-coin early adopter, and one with money as he was CTO at a successful Chinese exchange. He also knew about Ethereum early on and probably had tokens, there's a picture on Twitter of him and Vitalik Buterin when they came to Tokyo well before that launched [*]. Just on its own, a million dollars in ETH at the prelaunch price would be $4bn now.
As for getting the actual dollars to the US Treasury Department, I think Binance do still somehow have banking and I guess CZ does personally too but apart from that... Coinbase???
* The picture also has me in it, but I genuinely have absolutely no memory of this meeting.
2019: two loons/shysters leading the two main parties, you need someone sensible, steady - Davey
2024 (presumably): two really dull leaders, you need someone with a bit of flamboyance/able to get media attention - I'm not a big fan. but might have been a good time for Moran or, really, anyone but Davey
As with Truss, I'm not sure there was ever a good time for Swinson (not as nutty as Truss, but they both come across as weird)
Campbell was ~10 years too late. The other choices were reasonable enough at the time. Clegg's punchable face wasn't immediately obviously punchable. Although I did have the good sense to vote against him for the leadership, backing instead that paragon of virtue Chris Huhne
I don't understand why we have NI at all, anyway. Tweaking the rate is pointless. Just abolish it FFS.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Majority_bonus_system
The democratic advantage of that system is that it requires the coalitions to be settled before the election not after it, effectively leaving the choice of governing coalition to the electorate rather than delegating that choice to politicians in tortuous post-election in smoke filled rooms.
If applied in the UK context, the obvious pre-election coalition to emerge would be between Labour, the LDs and Greens on the centre-left. A Corbyn party would undoubtably split from Labour but its toxicity would guarantee it being given the cold shoulder by the centre-left coalition and it would end up in low single figures, probably contesting the election as part of a far left Marxist alliance. On the right, the question would be whether the Conservatives would form a coalition with Reform. I think they both would, but if the Conservatives did choose to go down that path, their combined vote would be bigger than the Conservatives' alone but the willingness to get into bed with the hard right would nonetheless leak votes to the centre-left coalition.
On present polling, allowing for the ability of Farage to repulse centrists, the centre-left Lab/LD/Green coalition might get 55%+ of the vote, the extreme left Corbynite alliance 3%, a Conservative-Reform coalition 30%-35%, the Scottish nationalists 3% and the extreme right perhaps 3%. With the bonus top up seats, the Lab/LD/Green coalition might end up between them with about 2/3rds of the parliamentary seats, shared out between them in proportion to their parties' votes.
Overpromise, overclaim, underdeliver.
To abolish NI and replace the income with an increase in Income Tax rates would require increasing income tax rates by almost exactly 5/7ths.
The 20% basic rate would have to become a 35% rate. The 40% rate up to about 69%
Employers NI is the main problem. It raises more than £100bn but is pretty much invisible to the voters. It's impossible for any Chancellor to give that up. We'd need an exceptionally determined and gifted politician to do so. And it's likely that any such individual would decide they could achieve most of the gain with less political cost by other means.
I think it would be more likely to resemble one of those corporate deals where the parent company has to offer a bung to cover the pension fund of whatever it is divesting.
Maybe China would take it. They would be able to handle the security, although their methods might dig up memories of the distant past.
In all seriousness, it will probably leave their left-wing badly exposed.
Taxes should be as transparent as possible, and taxing work more than non-work is wrong.
I agree it won't happen, though, for the reasons you state.
Without her I think it'd still be there.
The politics of it in Ireland would be fascinating - leaders would have to be publicly in favour (of re-unification, not of paying) but yes you'd want economic support to take it on. Parallels with Germany, to some extent, I guess.
I was thinking the obvious thing would be to sell the Giant's Causeway to some rich American/Russian/Chinese/Saudi investor and include the rest of NI in the contract small print.
I haven't been a member for over a decade now, so I'm not that aware of things, but that's my sense (LDs on here may correct me). LD is still nearest to my natural voting instincts, although I've no problem voting for Starmer's Labour, particularly against the Conservatives at present (and likely will, given I live in Selby & Ainsty).
7th October was pretty effective.
Most BOTs have managed to come off black and grey lists for non-transparent or uncooperative tax havens in recent years having done a fair bit on information sharing and secrecy, and they are now all introducing the global minimum tax either through QDMTT or simply increasing tax rates to 15%. The question then becomes whether they should have to have OECD-style tax rates for everyone when a. they don't need the tax revenue, b. they don't have the industrial or market power to compete in other ways. If you're a resource-poor island in the middle of nowhere, your choices for economic survival are limited: tourism, hosting military bases, fishing, or using your tax and regulatory system to attract international capital.
In 2015 with PR we would have had a Tory and UKIP government.
Plus the idea the Greens and Starmer would agree on barely anything at present is absurd
The starting point would be to change the name to Payroll Tax, and have payslips add it to the gross salary - so everyone gets a 13% pay rise!
By all means criticise parts of the coalition govt and accept mistakes were made, but also own the successes and achievements - just look at whats followed to see how an unmoderated party can act.
That, again, is not to say what Hamas did was acceptable or not a significant act of violence - but that in comparison to what the state of Israel can do (and has done in the past) it is not really in the same league.
Just restrict NI only to funding some healthcare, JSA and state pensions as it was originally intended to do.
Sure, one could argue that a "serious" party should go into government and take the knocks that come with it - but in many ways being the junior partner in a coalition gives you a lot of leverage and the LDs never did that; they signed it away right at the start. If it had been a grace and favours deal - a "no, you really have to convince us on every vote" deal - then they would have been able to have more impact on policy (in my view). People forget that that election, whilst not a Labour victory by any amounts, was not a Conservative victory either - people still didn't buy what the Conservatives were selling enough to give them a majority (and didn't give the Tories a governing majority until Johnson turned up - Cameron's majority was razor thin and almost immediately destroyed by his pledge to hold an EU referendum). We've had Tory policy hegemony without the kind of political enthusiasm you would expect to allow that for 13 years; and the LDs enabled that.
Imagine a scenario where in 2010 the coalition didn't form like it did, and Labour got it's act together a lot quicker because of that. The conservative minority government might have fallen and a new GE could have given a majority to Labour led government before 2015. What a different world we would have lived in.
If the Islamic world of the middle east wished to support Hamas in the sense of combining to take on Israel in a military way, with a particular end in view, neither the laws of war or history prevents it. Despite all the talk, huffing and puffing etc, the combined might of these many countries has no intention of actually taking part in the Hamas military cause against Israel in such a way as to allow it to win.
The fact that Hamas is not in the same league as Israel tells you about how effective each has been in garnering support and alliances, but doesn't tell you what amount of force is justified in Israel's efforts to neutralise a real threat to its civilians.
Having written that, I have realised that I don't really know what point you're making anyway. Terrorism is fine as long as the perpetrators aren't very good at it?
*goes back to listening to Frank Dikotter on audible*
That's another convenient lie.
Most voters think that spending on them should rise, and taxes on other people should rise.
This is not news!
@GoodwinMJ
The Conservative Party is the most pro-immigration party we've ever had"
https://twitter.com/GoodwinMJ/status/1727272324318335273
But if no-one voted, following that valid argument, then the system collapses.
Therefore all voting is meaningful for the good reasons that the alternative view lacks coherence, and because a 30k majority arises out of actual people actually voting, all of whom are free to choose differently next time.
Civilians casualties as a result of attacking military targets, bad.
Deliberately hiding civilians in military facilities, and disguising military bases as schools and hospitals, well they’re both good too.
All because Jews=Power=Bad.
Where were all the protests for the innocent residents of Rostov-on-Don, the Russian town that has been the target of many Ukranian missiles in the past year?
That should be built on so NI is focused on contributory welfare and some healthcare and social care funding
The FI are a lot harder to take now due to a much greater British military presence but they would also be a lot harder to take back due to the long runway at Maggie's Pleasant Airfield. This would make sustaining an invasion force and defending the air space a lot easier.
The RN has more firepower now but a lot less capability to sustain it at 50 deg S for anything but the briefest period. The task force took 10 tankers and 6 supply ships in 1982, there are only 6 tankers and 1 supply ship in the entire RFA today.
All of the surface combatants use VLS which means once they've fired their missiles they can only be re-armed in port. That port being Pompey. Not ideal for a conflict in the South Atlantic.
A possible strategy would be to TLAM the shit out of the Argentinian mainland but Biden might tell the UK to chill before the pressure could tell on their fucking idiotic Wheeltappers and Juntas El Presidente.
Whether the Arab nations' loss of interest in supporting the Palestinian cause (and to be clear I specifically mean in terms of pushing back Israel's borders, not support for a two-state solution) is because they keep losing, or for any other reason, is not relevant. The fact remains that Hamas and their ilk have repeatedly failed to achieve their aims on the battlefield, and also continue to reject any political solution that includes the state of Israel continuing to exist. So, what else is there?
Hence Queers for Palestine.
Still doesn’t mean that we don’t need to build a million houses a year, starting about a decade ago.
@GeorgeWParker
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23m
Whole press gallery hit by power cut, half an hour before Autumn Statement. Great
60% of 'Progressive Activists' are prepared to pay more tax, most of the rest of the UK isn't
https://x.com/LukeTryl/status/1727254564141961575?s=20
I don’t give a toss about any of them
There. Said it
Kennedy’s alcoholism was more than just a tragedy for him.
I missed him growing the economy, but if he said it grew, I can't argue with that.
The two who live with us don't even want to discuss it.
Even today, Hamas is clearly a proxy for Iran (population also an order of magnitude larger than Israel, modern military, huge oil revenues), and also has Hezbollah sitting on Israel's northern border). It is simply bonkers to look at the bigger picture in the Middle East and conclude that Israel is anything other than a massive underdog.
"The Principality of Monaco was then forced to make major concessions regarding tax in return for a strengthening of its sovereignty. After several months of discussion, the crisis was resolved with the agreements of May 18th, 1963. France obtained from Monaco a substantial adjustment of its tax provisions, which we present here, with the aim of abolishing all the competitive advantages granted to companies established in Monaco and limiting the departure of French people to the Principality who aim to transfer their tax residence there."
https://www.valeri-agency.com/en/pages/1963-franco-monegasque-tax-treaty.html
Turns out the parasitical fuckers needed France more than France needed them.
The result of such a counterfactual election can never beknown, but almost everyone was predicting that the Conservatives would gain enough seats to have a workking majority.
The real problem with the coalition as you said is the absurdly quick finalisation of the coatlition agreement, and that the LD ministers were prepared to actively promote Conservative policies rather than pass them off as "a necessary part of forming a coalition".
Patrick Wintour, diplomatic editor of the Guardian, described it as the biggest foreign policy crisis for 20 years. Really? Admittedly there is concern about wider potential instability in the region but when you consider Syria, Libya, the Muslim Brotherhood coming to power in Egypt, Afghanistan, Crimea and the Donbass. The full on Russia/Ukraine war. It's a ridiculous notion.
This is clearly also an issue for many other European countries, there’s an estimated 5m displaced Ukranians at the moment.
However, there will be massive international investment coming into the place when the war finishes, and the vast majority will return to their families.
a> France increased its tax take
b>France decreased its tax take
c> Nothing changed
"..but to say that when they attack Israel and Israelis they are ineffective"
WTAF. Do you call what Hamas did last month 'ineffective' ? Why do you downplay everything Hamas does?