Donald Trump is ineligible for the US presidency under the constitution's insurrection clause, the Colorado Supreme Court has ruled.Sky's @Stone_SkyNews has the latest, reporting live from Washington.? https://t.co/VVprTsviHm? Sky 501, Virgin 602, Freeview 233 pic.twitter.com/AEe7zujaNC
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First-ish btw
Trump. We all thought we were getting boned this morning ☺️
LAB: 42% (-1)
CON: 24% (-1)
LDEM: 11% (-2)
REF: 10% (-1)
GRN: 6% (+1)
https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1737375280656699494?t=bDcbQQY-Fdvl7qcqMZQ-8A&s=19
Dirty sleazy everybody on the slide?
I seriously wonder if we will see an attempt on Trump’s life if he gets REALLY close to winning. Because, if you honestly think Trump is a new Hitler - and a dictator manque - as many honestly do - then assassination is the lesser crime than letting him seize power
Good morning everyone.
Back from my first pre-Christmas weekend away in Kent. One thing that I notice is that Canterbury is smaller than my North Notts market town, yet has *four* Universities; part of levelling up needs to be long term institutions, which here are rather missing.
TSE will be impressed - it was a Strictly Finals Party, watching and walking, and unfortunately not much dancing.
My first recommended PB TV for the holiday: a 1972 series called Nairn Across Britain - 50 years ago, when OGH was (possibly) a twenty-something stylish young gent in a fur coat and orange jeans.
Ian Nairn taking rail a canal boat across Britain looking at towns along the canals, and reflecting on what it was & what he thought could happen.
This episode is along the Trans-Pennine canal from Salford to Leeds.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01rwfkm
I would have said it doesn't really describe him very well.
Come Unstuck Next Time would have been better.
Next time being Georgia.
The backbench MP – who represents Penistone and Stocksbridge – is facing claims that she has caused "significant damage to the reputation of the House as a whole, or of its members generally", according to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards.
One US commentator last night suggested a replica of the Doomsday Clock, calling it the Civil War Clock. It just edged a little closer to midnight.
He has just been ruled ineligible to stand for President by the Colorado Supreme Court, as pointed out by TSE, which is one straw in the wind (and will be Appealed to the Supreme Court), and other problematic developments for him have happened in the last few days. I think from briefly following the news that the 'sympatheric' Judge in the Florida documents case has just been heavily slapped down again by her superior court.
So there is also a question of what Trump-supporting Extreme Right terrorist/militia groups will do - Promise Keepers, Proud Boys etc - by way of violence in those circumstances.
It is on Youtube and was shown on the BBC in the late eighties. I believe it was an amalgam of several of his other series.
Nairn may have been an old soak, he died relatively young of Cirrhosis in quite pitiful circumstances and it was very sad, but he liked Newcastle, so what a guy.
The catch - and it is a significant catch - is that although we all know Mr Small One is as guilty as hell of various treasons, strategems and spoils so far he hasn't actually been convicted of any of them.
Just as likely is that said hospital consultant will seek to work more hours to maintain the original £75k net.
As for hospital consultants working cash in hand, don't make me laugh. Even in the building trade, if you find someone who wants to work cash in hand I can pretty much guarantee you've found a cowboy. Good trades won't touch it.
All to save rNHS, of course
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/other/drakeford-sparks-fury-over-new-pub-tax-hike-as-plans-could-be-final-nail-in-coffin/ar-AA1lKOMy?ocid=entnewsntp&cvid=67d61d8f75904cfca1bcc87d67ad1e5c&ei=15
Roberts has already ruled over a decade ago - yes before the MAGA SC majority - that the Presidency did not constitute the position of “Officer” and that has been reaffirmed. There is also the small matter Trump hasn’t been convicted by a jury.
The SC will also be mindful - as will the Democrat -appointed justices - that such decisions can also swing both ways and that it creates bad precedent by encouraging parties to use the law to go after their opponents. That is how democracies truly die.
At the end of the day, the CSC knows this won’t pass the SC. It’s political posturing and it’s worth noting the CSC is fully appointed by the Governor, meaning that it has a, errr, slight political bias. Even so, the decision only passed 4-3.
To defeat Trump, you have to beat him at the ballot box.
Prosecute him through the courts, then if he's found guilty lock him up and ban him from standing.
Trump got about 1.4m votes in Colorado, btw.
Penny Mordaunt: Boris Johnson’s messages vanished from my phone
Penny Mordaunt has told the Covid inquiry that a series of WhatsApp messages with Boris Johnson mysteriously disappeared from her phone, and that Johnson’s then chief of staff ignored 14 attempts by her to arrange a meeting to discuss the matter.
In a further twist to the saga of 5,000 WhatsApp messages lost by Johnson, Mordaunt said she was told by Cabinet Office officials it would cost about £40,000 to examine her phone to determine what had happened.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/dec/19/penny-mordaunt-boris-johnsons-messages-vanished-from-my-phone
£40,000 to look at her phone?! Kevin from Unlocks4U in the High Street will do it for 20 quid.
*They tell me off for using an ampersand in their name.
https://www.parliament.uk/mps-lords-and-offices/standards-and-financial-interests/parliamentary-commissioner-for-standards/complaints-and-investigations/allegations-currently-under-investigation-by-the-commissioner/
Will you commit to a peaceful transfer of power after the election?
TRUMP: "We're gonna have to see what happens."
https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1308895705860321283
A lady of negotiable patriotism?
It may not be logical in purely financial terms but such decisions are based value judgements weighing up lots of factors and doing the same work for less money is definitely one that triggers a lot of people to reassess their careers.
Looking at her bio, she's from South Yorkshire, child of a doctor, Tory, and alumna of the University of Cambridge, I am sorry but that screams brilliance and UK patriot.
Abuse at ballet schools - it is shocking but thoroughly unsurprising. The ingredients are all there.
I passing, there’s a reason why ballet makes such an effective theme for horror (Suspiria being one of the greatest horror movies of all time).
My guess is SCOTUS will rule 6-3 lifting the Colorado judgement but there is a fair chance Kagan might join the conservative justices.
Actually I'm revising that I think it'll be a 7-2 decision in Trump's favour.
America is in a dark place. It’s tragic. There has to be a way through. I hope they find it.
To summarise he said that the government was actually coming for them but they attack him because he stands between the government and the people they are trying to “come for”. He made himself sound like a revolutionary for the people, their protector, the man who defends them from kings, tyrants and their rights being removed. They forget he’s a privileged plutocrat from a glitzy New York social scene and think of him as John Wayne riding the evil rancher out of town.
The average US voter isn’t thinking about constitutional details and facts they want to be told someone is protecting them from a threat real or imagined.
We often think that the US is like us because we speak the same language and there are certain cultural similarities but a huge amount of Americans, especially outside of “New England” and California are very removed from us with their views in the role of the state and have a culture of self-reliance we don’t have. There is often said to be a different culture between “Anglo Saxons” and mainland Europeans but the difference between most Americans and most Europeans (including us) is probably larger.
All of these legal issues feed his narrative and bolster his position and it’s really not great, exasperated by the political nature of prosecutors and courts in the US. Maybe if they had ignored him it would have achieved more.
Short of a stroke or death I think he will win. Maybe him winning will be better in the sense that he gets what he wants and his ego is fed and it deflates the narrative that unseen forces are manipulating the system to keep him out and so the system is corrupt. if he loses I think it will cause an even bigger rupture in the US.
Can't believe we're persisting with this nonsense!
https://twitter.com/freddiesayers/status/1736821631731831042
I mean I do get your point but it is predicated on a set of assumptions about the NHS which I think are false, and all on the negative side.
For postgrads that goes up to 84.5%
https://x.com/christiancalgie/status/1737380918011006998?s=46&t=cxkq0jndvkhIwWZCCEL3QQ
Unfortunately, I think there are a fair few of Trump’s opponents in the US who believe that all means justify the end of stopping Trump - and, if that attitude prevails, it really is going to be a sh1tshow.
So we may see a cut in Feb especially if the Fed does the same.
And I suspect the odds of a May election may have risen a few percent
I doubt that but I can see Kagan joining the conservatives. If it is 9-0, it’s because the other two Justices are fully aware that they need to stop this tactic now before it gets too entrenched.
The second half of the 2020s might be worse than the first.
You and Leon make it sound like the Democrats are the ones with form in this area…
Agreed that SC will likely overturn the Colorado judgement.
But the Supreme Court is unlikely to support Trump over the Rule of Law. There are limits.
Plus the Colorado Supreme Court report is a very detailed take down of those making the case for Trump.
The democrats are working themselves up to it
And no, this does not diminish or detract from the fact that some Republicans also have violent intent and indeed a recent history of quasi-insurrection
America is going down a dark tunnel
Even without a student loan is 69.5%
45% income tax
22.5% from the withdrawal of the allowance
2% NI
Must have been beneath Morse to do anything about it.
We would probably have to ‘rearm’ and look for an alliance with the Germans and French, assuming that the latter hadn’t also fallen under Putins spell. Would we take in Ukrainian refugees?
How would the British right react? I can see Farage backing Trump, but there would be a dividing line with the Conservative right that went all in on Ukraine.
Either way a hard path for a new government to navigate.
Europe will never spend enough to defend itself
Is there any point at which the Democrats see sense at tell Biden to stand down?
I am so glad I have tax advisers.
From the economics of the situation, a May election feels optimal. However, I suppose on the other side of that you could say October gives the chance for there to have been possible further rate cuts (though I suspect when they do come down it will be very tentatively).
Both sides are inherently difficult to prove of course but let's not maintain* the fiction that the Laffer Curve is proven or probable.
(* I am not suggesting you were btw)
Utterly charming.
FPT: I believe in the Gospel of Thomas Jesus slays a dragon, although sadly that gospel never made it into the Bible.
I always quite liked the fact that Oxford had a proper scruffy town attached to it; adds to the charm for me as opposed to e.g. Cambridge. But then I’m from Donny.
If Trump effectively abandons NATO who do we want as our ultimate ally? Mighty America, our superpower cousin (and Five Eyes friend) for the last century, or France and Germany and Bulgaria?
Let’s pray we are never forced to choose, but if forced to choose we should go with the USA, every time
Inside the US, I suspect that the damage will be far less pronounced, as it has already largely been done. The federal system also inoculates many states from the worst of what Trump can do. You would not want t be a minority in a GOP-run state, though.
One side effect of the next Trump presidency will be that if Labour is in charge when he takes power once more, the UK is going to get much closer to the EU very quickly, with the backing of a large majority of the population.