NEW: Two polls this week show President Biden leading Trump by a wide margin among likely voters. Although we should never rely on polls, I’d much rather be Biden than Trump right now:ABC News 49% to 45% (+4)NPR/Marist 52% to 47% (+5) pic.twitter.com/INWqQb7Ban
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Rather depressing stuff.
I imagine he assumes that being locked up will play to his base and enhance his standing as a martyr.
Has he considered, however, that if he's locked up in New York, even if he's found not guilty and released he could still have his bail revoked in Washington or Georgia and end up in prison until he comes to trial - trials he's made every effort to delay?
Can't imagine that will help with independents or even moderate republicans.
Though I wouldn't choose to be either.
I see none of them quoted this, FWIW.
...A senior Palestinian official familiar with the proposal told the BBC that Hamas had agreed to end "hostile activity forever" if the conditions were met...
The Israelis will want guarantees before they agree anything. This didn't even guarantee that the hostages are still alive.
As for the other play, can I suggest a merging of things?
TRUSS
for Manchester United
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2024/05/06/ipswich-take-aim-sky-sports-pundit-leeds-promotion-parade/
Israel’s economy must be having a pretty hard time of it and I’m not sure they’re going to want trade sanctions from Turkey indefinitely.
Not quite the Grand Canyon rim (I agree with others on that by the way, strangely unmoving vs elsewhere in that region) but a pleasant breakfast view. Sliced cheese for scale.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/07/israel-idf-control-rafah-crossing-gaza-palestine-side-hamas-war-latest-update
Israeli military forces have taken control of the Palestinian side of the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, a key strategic objective and the sole gateway between Egypt and Gaza for humanitarian aid, Israeli military officials have confirmed.
“At the moment we have operational control of the Gazan side of the Rafah crossing and we have special forces scanning the crossing … That is what is happening in the upcoming hours. The operation is not over … I can’t give a timeline,” a military official said on Tuesday morning.
The spokesperson of the Gaza border authority on Tuesday confirmed the presence of Israeli tanks at the Rafah crossing. Aid officials in the territory said that the flow of aid through the crossing has been halted...
Which, coupled to their long history of false phrases and double dealing, leaves them with a credibility gap slightly larger than Donald Trump's ego.
Hamas are in a weak negotiating position. Doubly so because Netanyahu and large chunks of his cabinet want to continue the war. The people of Gaza literally have guns pointed at their head and the finger round the trigger is tightening. They really can't afford for Hamas to ask for or even unilaterally agree to generous terms.
The point I think you are missing is that releasing hostages is what will get them a deal, not the other way around.
True story. When we were at our lowest ebb four or five years ago attempted to sympathise on FB with a soon to be ex-friend’s lament over a poor Tottenham performance by saying “could be worse, you could be an Ipswich fan like me”.
“Fuck off with comparing us to your tiny club”, my old school chum replied.
“Well, we won the league more recently than you” I replied.
He unfriended me and we haven’t spoken since. His loss.
TRUSS isn't me saying Liz Truss for manager, just as TRUSS isn't saying make her PM again. TRUSS is that moment where you blow it up, a deliberate demolition of the mess in front of you when you can see you must go back to the foundations.
I am not interested in who the next manager will be, because any manager hired by this football club within its current structure will be a failure. We don't need a new manager, we need TRUSS. Blow it up.
OT: I’d like to see polling from the swing states. While in theory, a fair lead gets you the electoral college automatically, the polarisation of the electorate and “sectionalism” as they used to call it…
I’m rather surprised that after all the Israeli effort, no hostages have been found, alive or dead. Apart from the three the Israelis shot themselves!
Or have I misread it?
I'd strongly argue that Hamas giving up hostile activity would be a prerequisite of reconstruction; because reconstruction's rather hard if one side is still hostile. As for compensation: that's a whole other mess.
Personally, I don't want genocide by any of the parties involved in this hideous situation. And that means both Israel and Hamas.
His entire internal “story” is that he is the winner. Always. Winning the presidency escalated that to insane levels.
Actually, provably, publicly losing is an existential event for his personality.
Truss : presumably she would introduce 1-1-8 formation at Man U?
Update on the Regents Park cycling collision story I commented on at the weekend.
I hadn't noticed the excellent name of the Police Sergeant involved, who is presumably ex-Rainbow.
"Police Detective Sergeant Ropafadzo Bungo"
I also had not noticed witness statements that they considered the cyclist not to have been at fault. But I stand by my comments that certain things are readily available to be done on the Outer Circle to improve safety.
https://archive.ph/1BfAa
(To be fair, there's the official pretext for the invasion and the actual reason.)
I'd suggest the decision is for the Iranian Government, not Hamas. They would either reinvent Hamas, or create something else similar.
If that is too near to judge dispassionately - recall the recent Balkan Wars. Consider the example of the Croat militias. When the Americans armed the anti-Serb forces to end the war, they made clear
1) the purpose of the offensive was to drive the Serbs out if land they had conquered.
2) atrocities would be dealt with very harshly.
3) everyone agreed to this
4) within 5 minutes of stating the offensive, some of the Croat militias started mistreating civilians
5) the Americans had been expecting this. They cut the units in question off from supplies and support. The militias in question were wiped out by Serb counter attacks. Which the Americans practically encouraged
6) even after the first round of this, the Americans had to do it again.
The State polling is even more important.
Other recent polls of likely voters have Trump ahead, and Trump is also doing a little better in the swing states than in national polling.
"Because it took her 59 days to die from head injury “complications”, she will not appear on official data as a pedestrian killed on a road following a collision with a cyclist."
It's been some years since I was there, however.
If it is, will you be visiting Calatrava's beetle building? I find Calatrava interesting, but his buildings not creative except in concept. On details I go more for Wren.
Probably the busiest week of the year .
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2024/04/30/trump-leads-biden-swing-states-poll/73510374007/
Nòoooooooooo
Not sure whether this has been mentioned (as have not read recent threads) but worth noting the following from the ICJ President -
"Judge Joan Donoghue was President of the ICJ when it made its original Provisional Measures Order (“the Order”) in the case brought by South Africa against Israel. She explained the meaning of the Order when interviewed by Stephen Sackur on BBC’s Hardtalk programme, broadcast on 25 April 2024.
During the interview she said:
“I’m glad I have a chance to address that because the Court’s test for deciding whether to impose [provisional] measures uses the idea of plausibility, but the test is the plausibility of the rights that are asserted by the applicant, in this case South Africa. So the court decided that the Palestinians had a plausible right to be protected from genocide and that South Africa had the right to present that claim in the court. It then looked at the facts as well, but it did not decide – and this is something where I’m correcting what’s often said in the media – it didn’t decide that the claim of genocide was plausible.
It did emphasize in the Order that there was a risk of irreparable harm to the Palestinian right to be protected from genocide but the shorthand that often appears, which is that there’s a plausible case of genocide, isn’t what the court decided.”
No doubt all the signatories to the letter making this mistaken claim, including a number of lawyers and judges who should have known better, will be equally forward in correcting their claim.
Experienced every emotion but never wavered
The two guesses so far - Valencia and Venice, are quite cold in afraid.
For some debate, this story has hit road.cc for the Monday live blog; there'll be some interesting comments which are usually perceptive if with certain biases.
I got as far as the first one noting the nominally distinguished policeman. I'll have another look later.
https://road.cc/content/news/no-charges-cyclist-after-crash-which-oap-was-killed-308209
(Update - yes quite good comments from many viewpoints.)
Discussing the evidence of Hope Hicks and getting an interesting insight into the mindset of those who support Donald Trump.
Well worth a watch. You get monsters like Donald Trump because of people like Hope Hicks.
Heartening news on Biden vote. I remain optimistic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19m_U_HHqrg
DW is a bit like the German equivalent of the BBC Foreign Service. The documentary is in English.
Deutsche Bank was Donald Trump's lender of choice, so it is sort of on-topic for this thread.
Swinney has a number of problems, including a record of incompetence and positive harm in many of the posts he has held over his career. His time in charge of education was perhaps the, one hesitates to say highlight, of his career. But age isn't one of the many problems he faces. The SNP have replaced Yousless with Useless. 2 more years to go.
It's absolutely routine in the USA, and Trump is a normal criminal defendant found guilty of the criminal of contempt of Court, whilst his bail conditions require him not to commit *any* offences.
Being purist, it has nothing to do with his likely candidacy for President. He is responsible for the consequences whether he jumps out of a window, or commits contempt. If the Republicans are stupid enough to select a charged criminal suspect as their candidate, that's their lookout.
The thing is, this team? I actively WANT us to lose.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/
This was not the position in 2016 when he was well behind on the polling and got fewer votes over the country as a whole and still won. He is well ahead of where he was then, well ahead.
If he was anyone other than Donald Trump you would be calling this for him at this stage. We don't because we don't want to believe it. I don't want to believe it. But Trump is winning and the markets referred to in the thread header are high on Hopium.
Then I became a United fan.
As Aston Villa manager he vowed to get them out of Division 2. They were relegated.
That's a race that is neck and neck when we're still 6 months out from election day. Trump may be favourite but the polling lead isn't insurmountable in the way it is for the Tories here (where most people assume a small swingback but in this case it still leaves them 10+ points behind).
Rumble strips could help, if used correctly - which assumes a competence on the part of the authorities which may not exist. I'd have no objection if no hazard is introduced for everyday cyclists or wheelers in any conditions.
"Make it more dangerous for people riding cycles" is a sticky-plaster strategy used far too often that usually has unintended consequences. It is usually a plaster on an inadequate design.
An example of poor quality basic design is on the celebrated roundabout at Fender Lane in Cambridge with a raised parallel crossing to prioritise pedestrians / cyclists. There some of the speed reduction "20mph" signs (down from 30mph) have been installed so close to the pedestrian crossing that there is not even enough distance from the sign to the crossing to do a Highway Code distance emergency stop from 20mph, never mind for dozy people who have not seen the sign, or dangerous people who are ignoring it.
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/12j2Esnn-eY
(never pales)