I think the Tories have got a real case against the ONS, from saying that the UK was the outlier in not having recovered from COVID setting a terrible narrative for them on the economy to now suggesting that not only did we recover very quickly but we were among the first to do so and saw growth faster than everywhere except the US. I also think with the correct GDP data upfront the BoE would have felt more confident in raising interest rates earlier heading off inflation much faster.
Given the changes for 2022 and methodology update I also wouldn't be surprised if in September when the 2023 figures are updated there was no recession at the end of last year and in fact we saw growth all the way through the second half of 2023 which I think would have set a completely different narrative to the election and seen the Tories hold on to a lot more seats in the South East, East and South ending up on ~200 rather than ~130. If I was Rishi right now I'd be absolutely seething and Jeremy Hunt needs to call for an independent audit of ONS procedures because they keep getting it wrong, systematically there seems to be an approach that prefers to undershoot and revise upwards.
MPC members are too fixed on imperfect (largely backward looking) data. We’d be far better served if they instead spent each month touring the country, talking to people in cafes, street markets, job centres, small business owners, private recruitment firms and commodity and credit traders. And then voting at the end of each month with their gut.
"In 1993, he asked his sophomores where they thought the next genocide might happen, based on the geographic data. They pinpointed Rwanda. The following year, the Rwandan Genocide occurred. The New York Times interviewed some of the students involved in the project in 2008, when Walz was a U.S. congressman."
Where does he stand on the Peters Projection vs Mercator debate?
All right thinking people are on Team Peters.
HERESY!!!!
(IMO there is no one *good* map projection; they all have advantages and disadvantages.
From many years back I do have a favourite projection: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equirectangular_projection. Scottish people hate me for it because it squishes Scotland from its usual projection, but I like it because the x and y axes are regular. But that was some time ago and fashions may have changed.
I’ve got a suspicion these planned “30 attacks” on lawyers etc won’t actually materialise and we will see basically nothing. Maybe a few kids. Its probably the coppers (understandably) jumping at ghosts and bots on Telegram, who are deliberately trying to spook them
Indeed I think the riots, for now, are largely done
Pray that I’m right!
Hope you're right. If you are, no doubt you'll be singing Starmer's praises for dealing with it all so well.
Ah, nope
I believe riots have a life cycle, a natural term of birth and flourishing and decline. About a week?
It’s been about a week now
It hasn’t rained, though. To stop rioting heavy rain is needed.
I don’t recall heavy rain dampening the plasma screen riots (but I could be wrong). I believe it was the belated but firm police reaction plus a general sense of exhausted ennui in the rioting classes - you can see this sequence in riots around the western world
The difference here - maybe, and I sincerely hope this is wrong - is that because there is a perception of two sides then this could, instead, go on and on. As each side provokes the other - a sectarian stand off like Belfast. Let’s pray this ain’t so
I’ve got a suspicion these planned “30 attacks” on lawyers etc won’t actually materialise and we will see basically nothing. Maybe a few kids. Its probably the coppers (understandably) jumping at ghosts and bots on Telegram, who are deliberately trying to spook them
Indeed I think the riots, for now, are largely done
Pray that I’m right!
Hope you're right. If you are, no doubt you'll be singing Starmer's praises for dealing with it all so well.
Ah, nope
I believe riots have a life cycle, a natural term of birth and flourishing and decline. About a week?
It’s been about a week now
It hasn’t rained, though. To stop rioting heavy rain is needed.
The next bank holiday is in nineteen days time, so there's your deadline. It always rains on a Bank Holiday, it's the law
I think the Tories have got a real case against the ONS, from saying that the UK was the outlier in not having recovered from COVID setting a terrible narrative for them on the economy to now suggesting that not only did we recover very quickly but we were among the first to do so and saw growth faster than everywhere except the US. I also think with the correct GDP data upfront the BoE would have felt more confident in raising interest rates earlier heading off inflation much faster.
Given the changes for 2022 and methodology update I also wouldn't be surprised if in September when the 2023 figures are updated there was no recession at the end of last year and in fact we saw growth all the way through the second half of 2023 which I think would have set a completely different narrative to the election and seen the Tories hold on to a lot more seats in the South East, East and South ending up on ~200 rather than ~130. If I was Rishi right now I'd be absolutely seething and Jeremy Hunt needs to call for an independent audit of ONS procedures because they keep getting it wrong, systematically there seems to be an approach that prefers to undershoot and revise upwards.
MPC members are too fixed on imperfect (largely backward looking) data. We’d be far better served if they instead spent each month touring the country, talking to people in cafes, street markets, job centres, small business owners, private recruitment firms and commodity and credit traders. And then voting at the end of each month with their gut.
Yes, I remember posting at the time when the ONS was suggesting the economy wasn't growing that my own life experiences suggested it was. I'm glad to be proven right by the data but it shouldn't take 18 months to get the correct figures from the statistics body.
I did warn you the VP market was unpredictable. Although I missed the chance to short Shapiro, I was green on both of them.
I missed too.
I really do think that the Americans need to revise their over protracted Primary system, which seems to consume vast amounts of time and money, and create division within parties. Our parties might want to ponder this too.
The last fortnight has come up with a better pairing through a much shorter process and unified the party.
One of the Harris/Walz advantages is to be new and fresh, generating interest and attention at exactly the right time and 3 months to go.
And most important, generating money.
I suspect there will be another big uptick in donations after the addition of Walz to the ticket. perhaps even from some big corporate names. Wisconsin under Governor Walz has been very good at attracting inward investment. Corporate USA doesn't seem too worried by the "left wing" tag. Because it is nonsense.
In that respect, Shapiro and Walz are pretty similar. And both have a pretty good record on cutting red tape - "permitting reform" in US parlance" - to enable development.
If by 'left wing' they mean pro right to choose; public education; public healthcare, then sure. But those are all popular positions.
As Waltz puts it: "I'm the monster who introduce free school meals".
He’s also the monster who introduced 40-week abortions and porn in primary schools, in his own state.
age appropriate sex education starting in primary schools which if it follows what occurs in the UK is a combination of relationship advice with a tiny bit of what isn't at all an appropriate relationship (i.e. what is abuse)..
That is much funnier from Walz than Trump's lame attempts at humour - which seem to have dried up as he sinks into a fug and sounds increasingly deranged (or "weird" if you like).
Looking at that clip and his easy folksy manner with the crowd: perhaps it should be Walz/Harris?
He has a touch of Ronnie Reagan.
The Democrats have a Veep who would not scare the horses if the President fell under the proverbial bus.
The Republicans have somebody as Veep who would terrify the horses...
American politicians do "folksy" quite well, don't they? It was one of the secrets to George W Bush's success. In fact folksy seems to beat non-folksy most of the time.
From a brief glance back over the election history I think the last time the less folksy of the two candidates won was probably 1980, but Reagan was pretty folksy himself.
I'm not sure we have an equivalent to folksy in Britain.
I did warn you the VP market was unpredictable. Although I missed the chance to short Shapiro, I was green on both of them.
I missed too.
I really do think that the Americans need to revise their over protracted Primary system, which seems to consume vast amounts of time and money, and create division within parties. Our parties might want to ponder this too.
The last fortnight has come up with a better pairing through a much shorter process and unified the party.
One of the Harris/Walz advantages is to be new and fresh, generating interest and attention at exactly the right time and 3 months to go.
And most important, generating money.
I suspect there will be another big uptick in donations after the addition of Walz to the ticket. perhaps even from some big corporate names. Wisconsin under Governor Walz has been very good at attracting inward investment. Corporate USA doesn't seem too worried by the "left wing" tag. Because it is nonsense.
In that respect, Shapiro and Walz are pretty similar. And both have a pretty good record on cutting red tape - "permitting reform" in US parlance" - to enable development.
If by 'left wing' they mean pro right to choose; public education; public healthcare, then sure. But those are all popular positions.
As Waltz puts it: "I'm the monster who introduce free school meals".
He’s also the monster who introduced 40-week abortions and porn in primary schools, in his own state.
age appropriate sex education starting in primary schools which if it follows what occurs in the UK is a combination of relationship advice with a tiny bit of what isn't at all an appropriate relationship (i.e. what is abuse)..
I did warn you the VP market was unpredictable. Although I missed the chance to short Shapiro, I was green on both of them.
I missed too.
I really do think that the Americans need to revise their over protracted Primary system, which seems to consume vast amounts of time and money, and create division within parties. Our parties might want to ponder this too.
The last fortnight has come up with a better pairing through a much shorter process and unified the party.
One of the Harris/Walz advantages is to be new and fresh, generating interest and attention at exactly the right time and 3 months to go.
And most important, generating money.
I suspect there will be another big uptick in donations after the addition of Walz to the ticket. perhaps even from some big corporate names. Wisconsin under Governor Walz has been very good at attracting inward investment. Corporate USA doesn't seem too worried by the "left wing" tag. Because it is nonsense.
In that respect, Shapiro and Walz are pretty similar. And both have a pretty good record on cutting red tape - "permitting reform" in US parlance" - to enable development.
If by 'left wing' they mean pro right to choose; public education; public healthcare, then sure. But those are all popular positions.
As Waltz puts it: "I'm the monster who introduce free school meals".
He’s also the monster who introduced 40-week abortions and porn in primary schools, in his own state.
The porn is books such as “gender queer”, “this book is gay” and “let’s talk about it”, all of which are labelled 18+ on Amazon. There are pictures online about this content, I don’t need to link to it.
“I am self-declaring as a “community leader” for white English people.
From now on, if the police want to manage protests, I demand they speak to me and any other self identified community leaders.
I will tell the police what style will be suitable for our protests.
I’m guessing everyone is okay with this. I’m assuming I don’t need to be elected either?
If it’s acceptable for Birmingham, then it’s acceptable for the rest of us. Equality means equality.”
I can’t believe this cop hasn’t resigned already this morning
Why should he do that, when you see the weight of pb thinks this perfectly normal and acceptable, no doubt entirely representative of the view of his westminster paymasters (of all political colours).
Just as Twitter is not the world, neither is PB. In some ways that’s sad, we’d probably do a better job of governing than the last 8 or so UK governments
Anyone normal can see this is a frankly outrageous remark by a senior policeman
Oh I agree. But why do you think 2TK would expect his resignation? And given guidance has unlikely changed since 4th July, would would Sunak demand it either?
Seems to me that policing of potentially combustible events in some of these combative Muslim groups is done quietly by Thames House secondees. And for all I know, that is the right course. But it would rather indicate that our country has a bigger problem with secretarianism than is being let on.
He should be promoted. Homes, businesseses, friends and family are being attacked by violent mobs, the police have been unable to deal with all of it, people are understandably scared and the more hot-headed have come out to defend their community from the violent attackers. Police engage with the mob, engage with the older, wiser community leaders, reassure them and the mob disperse home with minimal fuss. Police will mop up any identified offenders quietly. That is good policing.
I’ve got a suspicion these planned “30 attacks” on lawyers etc won’t actually materialise and we will see basically nothing. Maybe a few kids. Its probably the coppers (understandably) jumping at ghosts and bots on Telegram, who are deliberately trying to spook them
Indeed I think the riots, for now, are largely done
Pray that I’m right!
Hope you're right. If you are, no doubt you'll be singing Starmer's praises for dealing with it all so well.
Ah, nope
I believe riots have a life cycle, a natural term of birth and flourishing and decline. About a week?
It’s been about a week now
It hasn’t rained, though. To stop rioting heavy rain is needed.
I don’t recall heavy rain dampening the plasma screen riots (but I could be wrong). I believe it was the belated but firm police reaction plus a general sense of exhausted ennui in the rioting classes - you can see this sequence in riots around the western world
The difference here - maybe, and I sincerely hope this is wrong - is that because there is a perception of two sides then this could, instead, go on and on. As each side provokes the other - a sectarian stand off like Belfast. Let’s pray this ain’t so
Even sectarian rioting in NI has a natural time limit before simmering down.
I think the Tories have got a real case against the ONS, from saying that the UK was the outlier in not having recovered from COVID setting a terrible narrative for them on the economy to now suggesting that not only did we recover very quickly but we were among the first to do so and saw growth faster than everywhere except the US. I also think with the correct GDP data upfront the BoE would have felt more confident in raising interest rates earlier heading off inflation much faster.
Given the changes for 2022 and methodology update I also wouldn't be surprised if in September when the 2023 figures are updated there was no recession at the end of last year and in fact we saw growth all the way through the second half of 2023 which I think would have set a completely different narrative to the election and seen the Tories hold on to a lot more seats in the South East, East and South ending up on ~200 rather than ~130. If I was Rishi right now I'd be absolutely seething and Jeremy Hunt needs to call for an independent audit of ONS procedures because they keep getting it wrong, systematically there seems to be an approach that prefers to undershoot and revise upwards.
MPC members are too fixed on imperfect (largely backward looking) data. We’d be far better served if they instead spent each month touring the country, talking to people in cafes, street markets, job centres, small business owners, private recruitment firms and commodity and credit traders. And then voting at the end of each month with their gut.
Yes, I remember posting at the time when the ONS was suggesting the economy wasn't growing that my own life experiences suggested it was. I'm glad to be proven right by the data but it shouldn't take 18 months to get the correct figures from the statistics body.
Sack the core members and employ a few hundred officials to rove the country and do little more than ask “alright Delboy, how’s ya luck”.
I swear we’d have a saner monetary policy than now. A naughty person might suggest the public might vote to choose these officials. Let’s say one per 100k people?
Robert Jenrick is having quite a good rioting season. He’s everywhere making measured and conservative sounding noises. I’d make him slight favourite to win the leadership right now
He has issues tho. How come he’s so rich and got all these houses? Wiki is quite opaque. I presume he has mega wealthy parents and didn’t make £30 million by the age of 29
If it weren’t for a privileged backstory (the Tories have had enough of that) he’d be a clear favourite
The bigger news in that poll is probably the "Jury's out" verdict on Reeves. She is quite hard to relate to - that may not be such a bad thing for Starmer if she draws most of the ire from disappointment on economic policies.
“I am self-declaring as a “community leader” for white English people.
From now on, if the police want to manage protests, I demand they speak to me and any other self identified community leaders.
I will tell the police what style will be suitable for our protests.
I’m guessing everyone is okay with this. I’m assuming I don’t need to be elected either?
If it’s acceptable for Birmingham, then it’s acceptable for the rest of us. Equality means equality.”
You've got a load of racist asshats rioting. It just so happens that on this occasion, those asshats are majority-white. The targets are tending to be non-whites. I'd argue it makes sense to talk to the victims / targets of those asshats, and ensure that a) they will feel safer; b) get feedback from them on what would make them feel safe; and c) try to convince them not to take the law into their own hands in 'self-defence'.
It Alex Harmstong wants to represent racist asshats, let him. But you know what that would make him.
Not entirely impressive quote from HSE: “Our sympathies are with those who have lost loved ones to any work-related disease.
“Great Britain has a robust and well-established regulatory framework in place to protect workers from the health risks associated with exposure to hazardous substances.
“We continue to work with industry to raise awareness of managing the risks of exposure to respirable crystalline silica and we are considering options for future interventions to ensure workers are protected.”
Silicosis has been a known issue for c 200 years ... especially in Edinburgh stonemasons (the local sandstone was lethal).
That Betfair graph shows that if a week is a long time in politics, the past month has been its own geological epoch.
On 15th July, Trump was registering a 71% likelihood of being President again. Harris was on just 6%. Three weeks on, it's 50-47. Trump down 21%, Harris up 41%.
In three weeks.
And with the Democratic Convention wrapping up on the 22nd August, who can predict what those numbers be in another three weeks...?
Big events can have big effects.
Biden's replacement by Harris was a big event with a big effect.
If we get more big events then there might be more big effects.
Otherwise not.
I suspect there will be quite a few big events in the coming months: some will be positive for Trump and others for Harris.
Watching Walz, I was reminded of how British politicians in their prime like William Hague and Boris Johnson could use humour to demolish opponents. Coach Walz has that in spades.
Yes a bit of humour can be devastating. Walz seems like a nice guy but the attacks we are already seeing is that he is another progressive making this slate the most left wing in America's history. It has taken Trump an extraordinarily long time to refocus his guns that were set to attack Biden but that is the direction that they seem to be moving to.
Will this work? Americans have a very different idea of what is left wing than we do. I think personality matters more these days and Walz seems to have plenty. Still concerned that she didn't go for Shapiro though. That would have broadened the ticket. Lots of Trump outriders expressing relief that she didn't.
The MAGA were always going to depict Harris as far left (by US standards), so not sure there are many votes there.
Key for the Dems is to enthuse the base and GOTV especially women, the young and minorities. We saw in our election how critical that is. The Ed Davey style is the way to go, positive and fun.
I agree with the first point but that is why there were advantages in having someone more moderate (like Biden was) on the ticket for balance. She has left herself open and it remains to be seen whether this finds any traction or not.
I am concerned that there is an assumption that this is over because we would want it to be so. Trump is still ahead and this election is still to be won or lost. Harris has had 3 very good weeks but that has got her back to near parity, it has not given her a decisive lead.
Quite: Harris's accession, the Vance VP pick, and the general organization of the Democrats have turned this into a genuinely competitive Presidential election.
But let us not forget that in the US - as in pretty much the entire developed world - prices have risen faster than wages over the last four years. Voters don't like getting poorer, and generally punish the party in power.
The only reason that this election is competitive is because Trump is such a divisive candidate, and because Republicans (other than Trump) have engaged in a politically unpopular campaign to criminalize abortion.
I would make Trump still the narrow favorite, but it could easily go either way - and a landslide victory for either candidate is not impossible.
Some Leon level forecasting there. Literally anything can happen, and that prediction will be correct.
I will revise the forecast as we get nearer the election.
But here's my order of likelihood outcomes:
1. Very narrow Republican victory, with the Sunbelt coming through for Trump, but the rust belt remaining blue.
2. Very narrow Democrat victory, with at least one of the Sunbelt states holding solid.
3. Solid Democrat victory, with the Sunbelt staying blue, and a couple of competitive states -like Iowa or Florida - flipping blue.
4. Solid Republican victory, with all of Trump's 2016 wins, plus Virginia and Nevada.
That's more like it !
FWIW, I'm calling the Democrats slight favourites at this point. Looking at the map there seem to me to be several more plausible routes to a Democratic victory than Republican one. But we're not going to have a very good idea until there's more state polling.
In any event, I've been correct that Harris has been value so far.
“I am self-declaring as a “community leader” for white English people.
From now on, if the police want to manage protests, I demand they speak to me and any other self identified community leaders.
I will tell the police what style will be suitable for our protests.
I’m guessing everyone is okay with this. I’m assuming I don’t need to be elected either?
If it’s acceptable for Birmingham, then it’s acceptable for the rest of us. Equality means equality.”
You've got a load of racist asshats rioting. It just so happens that on this occasion, those asshats are majority-white. The targets are tending to be non-whites. I'd argue it makes sense to talk to the victims / targets of those asshats, and ensure that a) they will feel safer; b) get feedback from them on what would make them feel safe; and c) try to convince them not to take the law into their own hands in 'self-defence'.
It Alex Harmstong wants to represent racist asshats, let him. But you know what that would make him.
Just so we’re clear. You’re cool with the authorities letting one group in society “self police” by roaming the streets in hoods with machetes and clubs?
Robert Jenrick is having quite a good rioting season. He’s everywhere making measured and conservative sounding noises. I’d make him slight favourite to win the leadership right now
He has issues tho. How come he’s so rich and got all these houses? Wiki is quite opaque. I presume he has mega wealthy parents and didn’t make £30 million by the age of 29
If it weren’t for a privileged backstory (the Tories have had enough of that) he’d be a clear favourite
People pay good money for the time of Cambridge educated lawyers.
His wife is also a lawyer at some very prestigious firms too and very wealthy.
I know how you love the Macron stuff but Mrs Jenrick is nearly a decade older than Robert.
"In 1993, he asked his sophomores where they thought the next genocide might happen, based on the geographic data. They pinpointed Rwanda. The following year, the Rwandan Genocide occurred. The New York Times interviewed some of the students involved in the project in 2008, when Walz was a U.S. congressman."
Where does he stand on the Peters Projection vs Mercator debate?
All right thinking people are on Team Peters.
HERESY!!!!
(IMO there is no one *good* map projection; they all have advantages and disadvantages.
From many years back I do have a favourite projection: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equirectangular_projection. Scottish people hate me for it because it squishes Scotland from its usual projection, but I like it because the x and y axes are regular. But that was some time ago and fashions may have changed.
Mind, those crap projections lead to southron corporate nonsense like this delivery convo:
*burr burr* Hello, Mrs Ross, here is a parcel for you here in Inverness, can we leave another one for your neighbour in Lairg to pick up? It's so close by on the map.
Nationalists are turning the entire world into a single borderless global omnipolitics.
lol. It’s not nationalists. Its the internet and social media - and a shared language and culture
UK politicians pundits and journalists have been unhealthily obsessed with American politics for decades. We see it on here: indeed lefties are usually worse for this. Now it is being returned as Americans can see into British politics - via the net and social media
Watching Walz, I was reminded of how British politicians in their prime like William Hague and Boris Johnson could use humour to demolish opponents. Coach Walz has that in spades.
Yes a bit of humour can be devastating. Walz seems like a nice guy but the attacks we are already seeing is that he is another progressive making this slate the most left wing in America's history. It has taken Trump an extraordinarily long time to refocus his guns that were set to attack Biden but that is the direction that they seem to be moving to.
Will this work? Americans have a very different idea of what is left wing than we do. I think personality matters more these days and Walz seems to have plenty. Still concerned that she didn't go for Shapiro though. That would have broadened the ticket. Lots of Trump outriders expressing relief that she didn't.
Shapiro not being picked revealed that the number of Jew haters among the Dems is at a level capable of affecting elections.
Does it ? The vast majority of Jewish representation in Congress is Democratic, of course. And Shapiro himself is a very popular Democratic governor.
The Dems have the support of both Jews and Jew haters.
Its an interesting source of friction.
What we have seen in the western world during recent generations has been Jews trending politically to the right and Jew hatred moving politically to the left.
The USA has seen the second element but, not yet, much of the first.
Because Jews in Golders Green never voted for Mrs Thatcher to be their MP? This is nuts.
As for the Dems, Josh Shapiro was in the running until the day before the announcement. They probably already knew he is Jewish by that point. It's not as if he was hiding it. To conclude antisemitism cost Shapiro the VP nominee slot is bizarre.
It was a factor - 'progressives' didn't like Shapiro:
The strongest argument against picking Shapiro is rooted in his hardline stance against both the Gaza protests on Pennsylvania university campuses—some of which he compared to white supremacist encampments—and the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement seeking to reverse Israel’s brutal human-rights record in the Occupied Territories. In The New Republic, writer David Klion made the case that Shapiro’s elevation to the ticket would kill off much of the movement energy now marshaled behind Harris’s run.
Harris is no political fool and capable of seeing the advantages and disadvantages each potential VP candidate brought.
To accept this thesis demands Kamala and her team not notice Shapiro is Jewish until the last moment, literally the day before the announcement, else he'd have been ruled out weeks ago, or never ruled in.
No, it merely requires Harris to have considered the relative advantages and disadvantages of each candidate.
Even with the hostility towards him from 'progressives' Shapiro was a strong candidate.
Harris is married to a conservative Jewish lawyer. If he's willing to stump for her (which I presume he is), that neutralizes the benefits of Shapiro somewhat.
The main advantage Shapiro brought was a Pennsylvania boost - I don't see how Harris's husband helps there.
I do wonder if Harris would have been more likely to pick Shapiro if her own husband had not been Jewish.
The evidence for home state benefit from VP picks is pretty small, but yes, this pick probably makes Pennsylvania a little tougher than it would otherwise be.
On the other hand, it appears to have jazzed up the Democrat base without alienating moderates.
That Betfair graph shows that if a week is a long time in politics, the past month has been its own geological epoch.
On 15th July, Trump was registering a 71% likelihood of being President again. Harris was on just 6%. Three weeks on, it's 50-47. Trump down 21%, Harris up 41%.
In three weeks.
And with the Democratic Convention wrapping up on the 22nd August, who can predict what those numbers be in another three weeks...?
Big events can have big effects.
Biden's replacement by Harris was a big event with a big effect.
If we get more big events then there might be more big effects.
Otherwise not.
I suspect there will be quite a few big events in the coming months: some will be positive for Trump and others for Harris.
It's likely to be a wild ride.
So what you’re saying is just swing trade and lay the favourite?
I think the Tories have got a real case against the ONS, from saying that the UK was the outlier in not having recovered from COVID setting a terrible narrative for them on the economy to now suggesting that not only did we recover very quickly but we were among the first to do so and saw growth faster than everywhere except the US. I also think with the correct GDP data upfront the BoE would have felt more confident in raising interest rates earlier heading off inflation much faster.
Given the changes for 2022 and methodology update I also wouldn't be surprised if in September when the 2023 figures are updated there was no recession at the end of last year and in fact we saw growth all the way through the second half of 2023 which I think would have set a completely different narrative to the election and seen the Tories hold on to a lot more seats in the South East, East and South ending up on ~200 rather than ~130. If I was Rishi right now I'd be absolutely seething and Jeremy Hunt needs to call for an independent audit of ONS procedures because they keep getting it wrong, systematically there seems to be an approach that prefers to undershoot and revise upwards.
MPC members are too fixed on imperfect (largely backward looking) data. We’d be far better served if they instead spent each month touring the country, talking to people in cafes, street markets, job centres, small business owners, private recruitment firms and commodity and credit traders. And then voting at the end of each month with their gut.
Yes, I remember posting at the time when the ONS was suggesting the economy wasn't growing that my own life experiences suggested it was. I'm glad to be proven right by the data but it shouldn't take 18 months to get the correct figures from the statistics body.
You're not the only one - I've been saying I've been doing great, as have most people I know and that opportunities have never been better for many demographics for the last two years.
Sure there are many millions who have and are struggling but much of the poverty claiming and doom and glooming has been spurious.
That Betfair graph shows that if a week is a long time in politics, the past month has been its own geological epoch.
On 15th July, Trump was registering a 71% likelihood of being President again. Harris was on just 6%. Three weeks on, it's 50-47. Trump down 21%, Harris up 41%.
In three weeks.
And with the Democratic Convention wrapping up on the 22nd August, who can predict what those numbers be in another three weeks...?
Big events can have big effects.
Biden's replacement by Harris was a big event with a big effect.
If we get more big events then there might be more big effects.
Otherwise not.
I suspect there will be quite a few big events in the coming months: some will be positive for Trump and others for Harris.
It's likely to be a wild ride.
So what you’re saying is just swing trade and lay the favourite?
I think - if either candidate is showing more than a 55% probability - then you sell them.
Robert Jenrick is having quite a good rioting season. He’s everywhere making measured and conservative sounding noises. I’d make him slight favourite to win the leadership right now
He has issues tho. How come he’s so rich and got all these houses? Wiki is quite opaque. I presume he has mega wealthy parents and didn’t make £30 million by the age of 29
If it weren’t for a privileged backstory (the Tories have had enough of that) he’d be a clear favourite
People pay good money for the time of Cambridge educated lawyers.
His wife is also a lawyer at some very prestigious firms too and very wealthy.
I know how you love the Macron stuff but Mrs Jenrick is nearly a decade older than Robert.
Ah. Genuinely useful. So he made all that money himself and/or married well?
Good for him
He’s probably the best bet for the Tories - Badenoch is too lightweight and Patel too polarising. They need something of a blank slate and someone prepared to say conservative things
Crucially, he can point to his resignation as immigration minister and say he was principled on this pivotal issue. I reckon, sadly, this issue is probably going to grow in salience
That Betfair graph shows that if a week is a long time in politics, the past month has been its own geological epoch.
On 15th July, Trump was registering a 71% likelihood of being President again. Harris was on just 6%. Three weeks on, it's 50-47. Trump down 21%, Harris up 41%.
In three weeks.
And with the Democratic Convention wrapping up on the 22nd August, who can predict what those numbers be in another three weeks...?
Big events can have big effects.
Biden's replacement by Harris was a big event with a big effect.
If we get more big events then there might be more big effects.
Otherwise not.
I suspect there will be quite a few big events in the coming months: some will be positive for Trump and others for Harris.
It's likely to be a wild ride.
So what you’re saying is just swing trade and lay the favourite?
I think - if either candidate is showing more than a 55% probability - then you sell them.
For those who don’t know - NASA contracted with SpaceX and Boeing to provide human access to the International Space Station under the Commercial Crew program.
SpaceX’s Dragon, launched on Falcon 9 has been up and running for years.
Boeing is running so late that some thought they might miss the end of the Space Station - due to be decommissioned at the end of this decade.
Faults, mistakes, failed test flights. It’s been a mess.
The final checkout flight, with two astronauts, has turned into another mess. The thrusters for the space craft are acting up (among other things). Without thrusters, in space you are dead.
So the return of the astronauts on the Boeing Starliner has been delayed and now delayed again.
Further - the reason that the NASA administrator is saying that he will make the final decision is a sign. Within NASA, there is a process, by which an engineer who isn’t happy with a decision can formally kick it upstairs. So there is division in NASA about what to do.
One option is to return the astronauts on the next SpaceX Dragon. But it turns out that that Boeing deleted the option from Starliner to do an automated, unmanned return. If Starliner can’t leave ISS that’s another disaster - it bock one of the docking ports
Why politics?
1) The astronauts abandoning Starliner and going home in Dragon will nearly certainly end the Starliner program. A public humiliation for Boeing. 2) Boeing has a vast army of political supporters - the decision is political 3) if the astronauts return in Starliner and there is an accident. It will be a massive thing - hearings in Congress for a start. There would be accusations of political interference. 4) the NASA admin - Bill Nelson - is a political appointee and former Dem politician.
This is touching the White House and, potentially, November.
Not sure the astronauts want to come back on Starliner - would you, in their position?
If they have what I’ll euphemistically call an adverse event on re-entry, that will sure as hell affect politics in the run up to the election.
The sensible thing to do is send them back on Dragon, which has its own political implications, but is a lot less likely to end up with two dead explorers.
Then they need to either work out how to get Starliner back uncrewed, or instead send it off into space somewhere. If it’s stuck attached to the ISS in an unserviceable state, then everyone has several years of looking at it parked there, as a constant reminder of just how badly Boeing screwed the pooch on this one.
Looking at that clip and his easy folksy manner with the crowd: perhaps it should be Walz/Harris?
He has a touch of Ronnie Reagan.
The Democrats have a Veep who would not scare the horses if the President fell under the proverbial bus.
The Republicans have somebody as Veep who would terrify the horses...
American politicians do "folksy" quite well, don't they? It was one of the secrets to George W Bush's success. In fact folksy seems to beat non-folksy most of the time.
From a brief glance back over the election history I think the last time the less folksy of the two candidates won was probably 1980, but Reagan was pretty folksy himself.
I'm not sure we have an equivalent to folksy in Britain.
Sunny Jim was the last. They broke the mould after him.
Watching Walz, I was reminded of how British politicians in their prime like William Hague and Boris Johnson could use humour to demolish opponents. Coach Walz has that in spades.
Yes a bit of humour can be devastating. Walz seems like a nice guy but the attacks we are already seeing is that he is another progressive making this slate the most left wing in America's history. It has taken Trump an extraordinarily long time to refocus his guns that were set to attack Biden but that is the direction that they seem to be moving to.
Will this work? Americans have a very different idea of what is left wing than we do. I think personality matters more these days and Walz seems to have plenty. Still concerned that she didn't go for Shapiro though. That would have broadened the ticket. Lots of Trump outriders expressing relief that she didn't.
Shapiro not being picked revealed that the number of Jew haters among the Dems is at a level capable of affecting elections.
Does it ? The vast majority of Jewish representation in Congress is Democratic, of course. And Shapiro himself is a very popular Democratic governor.
The Dems have the support of both Jews and Jew haters.
Its an interesting source of friction.
What we have seen in the western world during recent generations has been Jews trending politically to the right and Jew hatred moving politically to the left.
The USA has seen the second element but, not yet, much of the first.
Because Jews in Golders Green never voted for Mrs Thatcher to be their MP? This is nuts.
As for the Dems, Josh Shapiro was in the running until the day before the announcement. They probably already knew he is Jewish by that point. It's not as if he was hiding it. To conclude antisemitism cost Shapiro the VP nominee slot is bizarre.
It was a factor - 'progressives' didn't like Shapiro:
The strongest argument against picking Shapiro is rooted in his hardline stance against both the Gaza protests on Pennsylvania university campuses—some of which he compared to white supremacist encampments—and the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement seeking to reverse Israel’s brutal human-rights record in the Occupied Territories. In The New Republic, writer David Klion made the case that Shapiro’s elevation to the ticket would kill off much of the movement energy now marshaled behind Harris’s run.
Harris is no political fool and capable of seeing the advantages and disadvantages each potential VP candidate brought.
To accept this thesis demands Kamala and her team not notice Shapiro is Jewish until the last moment, literally the day before the announcement, else he'd have been ruled out weeks ago, or never ruled in.
The reality is, I think, that it was a genuine close decision between the two. Harris only decided on Monday night.
I’ve got a suspicion these planned “30 attacks” on lawyers etc won’t actually materialise and we will see basically nothing. Maybe a few kids. Its probably the coppers (understandably) jumping at ghosts and bots on Telegram, who are deliberately trying to spook them
Indeed I think the riots, for now, are largely done
Pray that I’m right!
Hope you're right. If you are, no doubt you'll be singing Starmer's praises for dealing with it all so well.
Ah, nope
I believe riots have a life cycle, a natural term of birth and flourishing and decline. About a week?
It’s been about a week now
It hasn’t rained, though. To stop rioting heavy rain is needed.
I don’t recall heavy rain dampening the plasma screen riots (but I could be wrong). I believe it was the belated but firm police reaction plus a general sense of exhausted ennui in the rioting classes - you can see this sequence in riots around the western world
The difference here - maybe, and I sincerely hope this is wrong - is that because there is a perception of two sides then this could, instead, go on and on. As each side provokes the other - a sectarian stand off like Belfast. Let’s pray this ain’t so
Would you say that there are some fine people on both sides?
Robert Jenrick is having quite a good rioting season. He’s everywhere making measured and conservative sounding noises. I’d make him slight favourite to win the leadership right now
He has issues tho. How come he’s so rich and got all these houses? Wiki is quite opaque. I presume he has mega wealthy parents and didn’t make £30 million by the age of 29
If it weren’t for a privileged backstory (the Tories have had enough of that) he’d be a clear favourite
People pay good money for the time of Cambridge educated lawyers.
His wife is also a lawyer at some very prestigious firms too and very wealthy.
I know how you love the Macron stuff but Mrs Jenrick is nearly a decade older than Robert.
For those who don’t know - NASA contracted with SpaceX and Boeing to provide human access to the International Space Station under the Commercial Crew program.
SpaceX’s Dragon, launched on Falcon 9 has been up and running for years.
Boeing is running so late that some thought they might miss the end of the Space Station - due to be decommissioned at the end of this decade.
Faults, mistakes, failed test flights. It’s been a mess.
The final checkout flight, with two astronauts, has turned into another mess. The thrusters for the space craft are acting up (among other things). Without thrusters, in space you are dead.
So the return of the astronauts on the Boeing Starliner has been delayed and now delayed again.
Further - the reason that the NASA administrator is saying that he will make the final decision is a sign. Within NASA, there is a process, by which an engineer who isn’t happy with a decision can formally kick it upstairs. So there is division in NASA about what to do.
One option is to return the astronauts on the next SpaceX Dragon. But it turns out that that Boeing deleted the option from Starliner to do an automated, unmanned return. If Starliner can’t leave ISS that’s another disaster - it bock one of the docking ports
Why politics?
1) The astronauts abandoning Starliner and going home in Dragon will nearly certainly end the Starliner program. A public humiliation for Boeing. 2) Boeing has a vast army of political supporters - the decision is political 3) if the astronauts return in Starliner and there is an accident. It will be a massive thing - hearings in Congress for a start. There would be accusations of political interference. 4) the NASA admin - Bill Nelson - is a political appointee and former Dem politician.
This is touching the White House and, potentially, November.
Not sure the astronauts want to come back on Starliner - would you, in their position?
If they have what I’ll euphemistically call an adverse event on re-entry, that will sure as hell affect politics in the run up to the election.
The sensible thing to do is send them back on Dragon, which has its own political implications, but is a lot less likely to end up with two dead explorers.
Then they need to either work out how to get Starliner back uncrewed, or instead send it off into space somewhere. If it’s stuck attached to the ISS in an unserviceable state, then everyone has several years of looking at it parked there, as a constant reminder of just how badly Boeing screwed the pooch on this one.
“I am self-declaring as a “community leader” for white English people.
From now on, if the police want to manage protests, I demand they speak to me and any other self identified community leaders.
I will tell the police what style will be suitable for our protests.
I’m guessing everyone is okay with this. I’m assuming I don’t need to be elected either?
If it’s acceptable for Birmingham, then it’s acceptable for the rest of us. Equality means equality.”
You've got a load of racist asshats rioting. It just so happens that on this occasion, those asshats are majority-white. The targets are tending to be non-whites. I'd argue it makes sense to talk to the victims / targets of those asshats, and ensure that a) they will feel safer; b) get feedback from them on what would make them feel safe; and c) try to convince them not to take the law into their own hands in 'self-defence'.
It Alex Harmstong wants to represent racist asshats, let him. But you know what that would make him.
Just so we’re clear. You’re cool with the authorities letting one group in society “self police” by roaming the streets in hoods with machetes and clubs?
No; but I don't think that is what he was saying.
Just so we're clear: You're cool with racist asshats trying to kill immigrants?
I did warn you the VP market was unpredictable. Although I missed the chance to short Shapiro, I was green on both of them.
I missed too.
I really do think that the Americans need to revise their over protracted Primary system, which seems to consume vast amounts of time and money, and create division within parties. Our parties might want to ponder this too.
The last fortnight has come up with a better pairing through a much shorter process and unified the party.
One of the Harris/Walz advantages is to be new and fresh, generating interest and attention at exactly the right time and 3 months to go.
And most important, generating money.
I suspect there will be another big uptick in donations after the addition of Walz to the ticket. perhaps even from some big corporate names. Wisconsin under Governor Walz has been very good at attracting inward investment. Corporate USA doesn't seem too worried by the "left wing" tag. Because it is nonsense.
In that respect, Shapiro and Walz are pretty similar. And both have a pretty good record on cutting red tape - "permitting reform" in US parlance" - to enable development.
If by 'left wing' they mean pro right to choose; public education; public healthcare, then sure. But those are all popular positions.
As Waltz puts it: "I'm the monster who introduce free school meals".
He’s also the monster who introduced 40-week abortions and porn in primary schools, in his own state.
age appropriate sex education starting in primary schools which if it follows what occurs in the UK is a combination of relationship advice with a tiny bit of what isn't at all an appropriate relationship (i.e. what is abuse)..
Designed to cover some awful edge cases by the looks of it.
The GOP is obsessed with late term abortions. As that article says, late term abortions are exceedingly rare and only carried out in extreme circumstances. (You can see UK figures at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/abortion-statistics-for-england-and-wales-2021/abortion-statistics-england-and-wales-2021 ) The question then is whether you regulate these through legal controls or trust women, their doctors and midwives to make sensible decisions. The UK law was written to appear quite restrictive, but in practice allows for sensible clinical judgement. Minnesota have opted for a less restrictive law. Practice ends up being pretty much the same.
Looking at that clip and his easy folksy manner with the crowd: perhaps it should be Walz/Harris?
He has a touch of Ronnie Reagan.
The Democrats have a Veep who would not scare the horses if the President fell under the proverbial bus.
The Republicans have somebody as Veep who would terrify the horses...
American politicians do "folksy" quite well, don't they? It was one of the secrets to George W Bush's success. In fact folksy seems to beat non-folksy most of the time.
From a brief glance back over the election history I think the last time the less folksy of the two candidates won was probably 1980, but Reagan was pretty folksy himself.
I'm not sure we have an equivalent to folksy in Britain.
Sunny Jim was the last. They broke the mould after him.
Perhaps the British folksy is the pint down the pub test. It also seems to explain most election results post-Thatcher. I don't think anyone would have revelled in the idea of sharing a pint with Maggie, but there's always the exception that proves the rule.
Your post reads very much like concern trolling, of the sort our regular Russian-sponsored visitors practise.
No I'm just concerned that power politicians are using our problems to foment the far right in their own countries. E.g by pushing far right conspiracies of the great replacement
I did warn you the VP market was unpredictable. Although I missed the chance to short Shapiro, I was green on both of them.
I missed too.
I really do think that the Americans need to revise their over protracted Primary system, which seems to consume vast amounts of time and money, and create division within parties. Our parties might want to ponder this too.
The last fortnight has come up with a better pairing through a much shorter process and unified the party.
One of the Harris/Walz advantages is to be new and fresh, generating interest and attention at exactly the right time and 3 months to go.
And most important, generating money.
I suspect there will be another big uptick in donations after the addition of Walz to the ticket. perhaps even from some big corporate names. Wisconsin under Governor Walz has been very good at attracting inward investment. Corporate USA doesn't seem too worried by the "left wing" tag. Because it is nonsense.
In that respect, Shapiro and Walz are pretty similar. And both have a pretty good record on cutting red tape - "permitting reform" in US parlance" - to enable development.
If by 'left wing' they mean pro right to choose; public education; public healthcare, then sure. But those are all popular positions.
As Waltz puts it: "I'm the monster who introduce free school meals".
He’s also the monster who introduced 40-week abortions and porn in primary schools, in his own state.
The porn is books such as “gender queer”, “this book is gay” and “let’s talk about it”, all of which are labelled 18+ on Amazon. There are pictures online about this content, I don’t need to link to it.
The abortion bill, as I understand it, "ensures that the state’s existing protections remain in place no matter who sits on future courts."
So I don't think he's done anything to change existing abortion law, merely codified the state's supreme court existing case law.
That said, Minnesota does have the second most liberal abortion law in the US, behind a Red State.
Watching Walz, I was reminded of how British politicians in their prime like William Hague and Boris Johnson could use humour to demolish opponents. Coach Walz has that in spades.
Yes a bit of humour can be devastating. Walz seems like a nice guy but the attacks we are already seeing is that he is another progressive making this slate the most left wing in America's history. It has taken Trump an extraordinarily long time to refocus his guns that were set to attack Biden but that is the direction that they seem to be moving to.
Will this work? Americans have a very different idea of what is left wing than we do. I think personality matters more these days and Walz seems to have plenty. Still concerned that she didn't go for Shapiro though. That would have broadened the ticket. Lots of Trump outriders expressing relief that she didn't.
Shapiro not being picked revealed that the number of Jew haters among the Dems is at a level capable of affecting elections.
Does it ? The vast majority of Jewish representation in Congress is Democratic, of course. And Shapiro himself is a very popular Democratic governor.
The Dems have the support of both Jews and Jew haters.
Its an interesting source of friction.
What we have seen in the western world during recent generations has been Jews trending politically to the right and Jew hatred moving politically to the left.
The USA has seen the second element but, not yet, much of the first.
Because Jews in Golders Green never voted for Mrs Thatcher to be their MP? This is nuts.
As for the Dems, Josh Shapiro was in the running until the day before the announcement. They probably already knew he is Jewish by that point. It's not as if he was hiding it. To conclude antisemitism cost Shapiro the VP nominee slot is bizarre.
It was a factor - 'progressives' didn't like Shapiro:
The strongest argument against picking Shapiro is rooted in his hardline stance against both the Gaza protests on Pennsylvania university campuses—some of which he compared to white supremacist encampments—and the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement seeking to reverse Israel’s brutal human-rights record in the Occupied Territories. In The New Republic, writer David Klion made the case that Shapiro’s elevation to the ticket would kill off much of the movement energy now marshaled behind Harris’s run.
Harris is no political fool and capable of seeing the advantages and disadvantages each potential VP candidate brought.
To accept this thesis demands Kamala and her team not notice Shapiro is Jewish until the last moment, literally the day before the announcement, else he'd have been ruled out weeks ago, or never ruled in.
The reality is, I think, that it was a genuine close decision between the two. Harris only decided on Monday night.
After Butler PA, veep choices might be more important than in usual years. I watched quite a bit of the congressional hearing of the shooting, it struck me that the secret service do not appear particularly fit for purpose in general, not just in protecting Trump.
It must be a worry that someone is able to try something similar again, against one of the top 4 on the bill (or 5 including rfk I suppose).
Jenrick has been fanning the flames recently trying to win over the right and far right of the Tory membership. It's dangerous stuff. For example saying people who said "God is great in London" should have been arrested. How ridiculous.
That Betfair graph shows that if a week is a long time in politics, the past month has been its own geological epoch.
On 15th July, Trump was registering a 71% likelihood of being President again. Harris was on just 6%. Three weeks on, it's 50-47. Trump down 21%, Harris up 41%.
In three weeks.
And with the Democratic Convention wrapping up on the 22nd August, who can predict what those numbers be in another three weeks...?
Big events can have big effects.
Biden's replacement by Harris was a big event with a big effect.
If we get more big events then there might be more big effects.
Otherwise not.
I suspect there will be quite a few big events in the coming months: some will be positive for Trump and others for Harris.
It's likely to be a wild ride.
So what you’re saying is just swing trade and lay the favourite?
I think - if either candidate is showing more than a 55% probability - then you sell them.
Wouldn't it be easier to back the outsider ?
That also works, albeit I like you guard against edge cases like assassinations.
"In 1993, he asked his sophomores where they thought the next genocide might happen, based on the geographic data. They pinpointed Rwanda. The following year, the Rwandan Genocide occurred. The New York Times interviewed some of the students involved in the project in 2008, when Walz was a U.S. congressman."
Where does he stand on the Peters Projection vs Mercator debate?
All right thinking people are on Team Peters.
HERESY!!!!
(IMO there is no one *good* map projection; they all have advantages and disadvantages.
The globe one works quite well?
Google Earth makes it sort of portable.
Although looking at Google Earth depicting a globe on a flat screen is effectively a projection, of course!
The Google Maps (and Open Street Map) projection is an abomination.
It was allocated its own pseudo EPSG id of 900913 (see what they did there) but it there is an official one.
Has anyone seen Sir Ed recently? Looks like he's hopped it over to Minnesota.
American politicos do watch and learn from UK politics and vice versa, so it's far from unlikely that Walz or his advisers are directly drawing from the Davey experience. It was one of the features of the election that got most coverage overseas. I had European colleagues asking me about it, unprompted. The 21st century fairground answer to Biden plagiarising the Kinnock speech.
I did warn you the VP market was unpredictable. Although I missed the chance to short Shapiro, I was green on both of them.
I missed too.
I really do think that the Americans need to revise their over protracted Primary system, which seems to consume vast amounts of time and money, and create division within parties. Our parties might want to ponder this too.
The last fortnight has come up with a better pairing through a much shorter process and unified the party.
One of the Harris/Walz advantages is to be new and fresh, generating interest and attention at exactly the right time and 3 months to go.
And most important, generating money.
I suspect there will be another big uptick in donations after the addition of Walz to the ticket. perhaps even from some big corporate names. Wisconsin under Governor Walz has been very good at attracting inward investment. Corporate USA doesn't seem too worried by the "left wing" tag. Because it is nonsense.
In that respect, Shapiro and Walz are pretty similar. And both have a pretty good record on cutting red tape - "permitting reform" in US parlance" - to enable development.
If by 'left wing' they mean pro right to choose; public education; public healthcare, then sure. But those are all popular positions.
As Waltz puts it: "I'm the monster who introduce free school meals".
He’s also the monster who introduced 40-week abortions and porn in primary schools, in his own state.
Citation required.
Given the rumours about Trump´s relationship with Epstein and the extremely creepy things he has said about his own daughter, I must say I often wonder about "projection" by the right wind nutters when they make these bald and clearly extremely misleading (at best) statements.
“I am self-declaring as a “community leader” for white English people.
From now on, if the police want to manage protests, I demand they speak to me and any other self identified community leaders.
I will tell the police what style will be suitable for our protests.
I’m guessing everyone is okay with this. I’m assuming I don’t need to be elected either?
If it’s acceptable for Birmingham, then it’s acceptable for the rest of us. Equality means equality.”
You've got a load of racist asshats rioting. It just so happens that on this occasion, those asshats are majority-white. The targets are tending to be non-whites. I'd argue it makes sense to talk to the victims / targets of those asshats, and ensure that a) they will feel safer; b) get feedback from them on what would make them feel safe; and c) try to convince them not to take the law into their own hands in 'self-defence'.
It Alex Harmstong wants to represent racist asshats, let him. But you know what that would make him.
Just so we’re clear. You’re cool with the authorities letting one group in society “self police” by roaming the streets in hoods with machetes and clubs?
No; but I don't think that is what he was saying.
Just so we're clear: You're cool with racist asshats trying to kill immigrants?
No of course I’m not. When have I ever given the impression that I am? But I am pretty uneasy that authorities seem to be selectively surrendering our streets to mob rule.
It’s been such a failure of comms this whole thing. It’s easy. “The only division we recognise in our society is between the law abiding and criminality.”
For those who don’t know - NASA contracted with SpaceX and Boeing to provide human access to the International Space Station under the Commercial Crew program.
SpaceX’s Dragon, launched on Falcon 9 has been up and running for years.
Boeing is running so late that some thought they might miss the end of the Space Station - due to be decommissioned at the end of this decade.
Faults, mistakes, failed test flights. It’s been a mess.
The final checkout flight, with two astronauts, has turned into another mess. The thrusters for the space craft are acting up (among other things). Without thrusters, in space you are dead.
So the return of the astronauts on the Boeing Starliner has been delayed and now delayed again.
Further - the reason that the NASA administrator is saying that he will make the final decision is a sign. Within NASA, there is a process, by which an engineer who isn’t happy with a decision can formally kick it upstairs. So there is division in NASA about what to do.
One option is to return the astronauts on the next SpaceX Dragon. But it turns out that that Boeing deleted the option from Starliner to do an automated, unmanned return. If Starliner can’t leave ISS that’s another disaster - it bock one of the docking ports
Why politics?
1) The astronauts abandoning Starliner and going home in Dragon will nearly certainly end the Starliner program. A public humiliation for Boeing. 2) Boeing has a vast army of political supporters - the decision is political 3) if the astronauts return in Starliner and there is an accident. It will be a massive thing - hearings in Congress for a start. There would be accusations of political interference. 4) the NASA admin - Bill Nelson - is a political appointee and former Dem politician.
This is touching the White House and, potentially, November.
Not sure the astronauts want to come back on Starliner - would you, in their position?
If they have what I’ll euphemistically call an adverse event on re-entry, that will sure as hell affect politics in the run up to the election.
The sensible thing to do is send them back on Dragon, which has its own political implications, but is a lot less likely to end up with two dead explorers.
Then they need to either work out how to get Starliner back uncrewed, or instead send it off into space somewhere. If it’s stuck attached to the ISS in an unserviceable state, then everyone has several years of looking at it parked there, as a constant reminder of just how badly Boeing screwed the pooch on this one.
Boeing has not had a good few years.
There's definitely a documentary that should look at the twin fortunes of Boeing and Intel over the last decade. Both companies receive huge government support and both companies are currently in the shit for various reasons but mainly due to quality and falling behind the competition. Both companies were run by engineers in their glory days and both were taken over by lesser bean counters and everything turned to shit. Intel has gone back to Pat Gelsinger but probably 5 years too late and Boeing just seems to be stuck with Harvard/Yale MBA types.
Two US titans that are now in the doldrums because of poor management, political interference and fundamentally resting on their laurels and letting the competition just swoop in past them. For the US both companies are of critical importance IMO and both look like they are going to have another very difficult 10 years.
Jenrick is playing a dangerous game, accusing Starmer of double standards over policing.
No-one's produced any concrete evidence of thst so far , and it potentialky plays into Musk's Trumpian narrative.
Rather than taking shots at Musk, why don’t you head over to his platform and see the evidence for yourself? If you prefer, you can try Sky News instead, where you will find similar evidence.
“I am self-declaring as a “community leader” for white English people.
From now on, if the police want to manage protests, I demand they speak to me and any other self identified community leaders.
I will tell the police what style will be suitable for our protests.
I’m guessing everyone is okay with this. I’m assuming I don’t need to be elected either?
If it’s acceptable for Birmingham, then it’s acceptable for the rest of us. Equality means equality.”
You've got a load of racist asshats rioting. It just so happens that on this occasion, those asshats are majority-white. The targets are tending to be non-whites. I'd argue it makes sense to talk to the victims / targets of those asshats, and ensure that a) they will feel safer; b) get feedback from them on what would make them feel safe; and c) try to convince them not to take the law into their own hands in 'self-defence'.
It Alex Harmstong wants to represent racist asshats, let him. But you know what that would make him.
Just so we’re clear. You’re cool with the authorities letting one group in society “self police” by roaming the streets in hoods with machetes and clubs?
No; but I don't think that is what he was saying.
Just so we're clear: You're cool with racist asshats trying to kill immigrants?
No of course I’m not. When have I ever given the impression that I am? But I am pretty uneasy that authorities seem to be selectively surrendering our streets to mob rule.
It’s been such a failure of comms this whole thing. It’s easy. “The only division we recognise in our society is between the law abiding and criminality.”
You seem *very* keen to divert the blame for this mess off the asshats who are doing it and onto 'others'.
I'd argue the only 'failure in comms' is people making misrepresenting stuff up and making stuff up.
I did warn you the VP market was unpredictable. Although I missed the chance to short Shapiro, I was green on both of them.
I missed too.
I really do think that the Americans need to revise their over protracted Primary system, which seems to consume vast amounts of time and money, and create division within parties. Our parties might want to ponder this too.
The last fortnight has come up with a better pairing through a much shorter process and unified the party.
One of the Harris/Walz advantages is to be new and fresh, generating interest and attention at exactly the right time and 3 months to go.
And most important, generating money.
I suspect there will be another big uptick in donations after the addition of Walz to the ticket. perhaps even from some big corporate names. Wisconsin under Governor Walz has been very good at attracting inward investment. Corporate USA doesn't seem too worried by the "left wing" tag. Because it is nonsense.
In that respect, Shapiro and Walz are pretty similar. And both have a pretty good record on cutting red tape - "permitting reform" in US parlance" - to enable development.
If by 'left wing' they mean pro right to choose; public education; public healthcare, then sure. But those are all popular positions.
As Waltz puts it: "I'm the monster who introduce free school meals".
He’s also the monster who introduced 40-week abortions and porn in primary schools, in his own state.
Citation required.
Given the rumours about Trump´s relationship with Epstein and the extremely creepy things he has said about his own daughter, I must say I often wonder about "projection" by the right wind nutters when they make these bald and clearly extremely misleading (at best) statements.
Robert Jenrick is having quite a good rioting season. He’s everywhere making measured and conservative sounding noises. I’d make him slight favourite to win the leadership right now
He has issues tho. How come he’s so rich and got all these houses? Wiki is quite opaque. I presume he has mega wealthy parents and didn’t make £30 million by the age of 29
If it weren’t for a privileged backstory (the Tories have had enough of that) he’d be a clear favourite
People pay good money for the time of Cambridge educated lawyers.
His wife is also a lawyer at some very prestigious firms too and very wealthy.
I know how you love the Macron stuff but Mrs Jenrick is nearly a decade older than Robert.
Good luck to conservatives if they elect Jenrick.
He'll be out within two years.
You’re only saying that because if he wins you’re going to the poorhouse.
Your post reads very much like concern trolling, of the sort our regular Russian-sponsored visitors practise.
No I'm just concerned that power politicians are using our problems to foment the far right in their own countries. E.g by pushing far right conspiracies of the great replacement
We had a "great replacement" when 25,000 Normans conquered a population of around 2.5 million Saxons and others nearly a thousand years ago.
The likes of Rep. Collins (who seems an idiot of the first order) implies you have to be white to be British - news to me. The current problems are as much intra-communal as inter-communal. The second and third generation British Muslims, Hindus and others are appalled by the intolerance and hostility of the more recent arrivals who seem less able or unwilling to integrate than their predecessors.
No shit Sherlock. They have been doing it for the last 20 years. The difference is that now we know and can therefore defend ourselves more efficiently.
This Grey War is winnable and if we choose to resist and even fire back, the Russians will lose this as they did the Cold War.
I did warn you the VP market was unpredictable. Although I missed the chance to short Shapiro, I was green on both of them.
I missed too.
I really do think that the Americans need to revise their over protracted Primary system, which seems to consume vast amounts of time and money, and create division within parties. Our parties might want to ponder this too.
The last fortnight has come up with a better pairing through a much shorter process and unified the party.
One of the Harris/Walz advantages is to be new and fresh, generating interest and attention at exactly the right time and 3 months to go.
And most important, generating money.
I suspect there will be another big uptick in donations after the addition of Walz to the ticket. perhaps even from some big corporate names. Wisconsin under Governor Walz has been very good at attracting inward investment. Corporate USA doesn't seem too worried by the "left wing" tag. Because it is nonsense.
In that respect, Shapiro and Walz are pretty similar. And both have a pretty good record on cutting red tape - "permitting reform" in US parlance" - to enable development.
If by 'left wing' they mean pro right to choose; public education; public healthcare, then sure. But those are all popular positions.
As Waltz puts it: "I'm the monster who introduce free school meals".
He’s also the monster who introduced 40-week abortions and porn in primary schools, in his own state.
age appropriate sex education starting in primary schools which if it follows what occurs in the UK is a combination of relationship advice with a tiny bit of what isn't at all an appropriate relationship (i.e. what is abuse)..
Here is appropriate sex education for primary school aged children:
Exactly as I said upthread. And I’m pretty sure these “30 expected attacks” on migration lawyers etc are Russian bots and trolls whipping up nonsense on Telegram. If they eventuate it will be surprising
“I am self-declaring as a “community leader” for white English people.
From now on, if the police want to manage protests, I demand they speak to me and any other self identified community leaders.
I will tell the police what style will be suitable for our protests.
I’m guessing everyone is okay with this. I’m assuming I don’t need to be elected either?
If it’s acceptable for Birmingham, then it’s acceptable for the rest of us. Equality means equality.”
You've got a load of racist asshats rioting. It just so happens that on this occasion, those asshats are majority-white. The targets are tending to be non-whites. I'd argue it makes sense to talk to the victims / targets of those asshats, and ensure that a) they will feel safer; b) get feedback from them on what would make them feel safe; and c) try to convince them not to take the law into their own hands in 'self-defence'.
It Alex Harmstong wants to represent racist asshats, let him. But you know what that would make him.
Just so we’re clear. You’re cool with the authorities letting one group in society “self police” by roaming the streets in hoods with machetes and clubs?
No; but I don't think that is what he was saying.
Just so we're clear: You're cool with racist asshats trying to kill immigrants?
No of course I’m not. When have I ever given the impression that I am? But I am pretty uneasy that authorities seem to be selectively surrendering our streets to mob rule.
It’s been such a failure of comms this whole thing. It’s easy. “The only division we recognise in our society is between the law abiding and criminality.”
You seem *very* keen to divert the blame for this mess off the asshats who are doing it and onto 'others'.
I'd argue the only 'failure in comms' is people making misrepresenting stuff up and making stuff up.
Anyone who is using violence or the threat of violence to intimidate others, needs removing from society for a very long time. It’s not complicated JJ.
Watching Walz, I was reminded of how British politicians in their prime like William Hague and Boris Johnson could use humour to demolish opponents. Coach Walz has that in spades.
Yes a bit of humour can be devastating. Walz seems like a nice guy but the attacks we are already seeing is that he is another progressive making this slate the most left wing in America's history. It has taken Trump an extraordinarily long time to refocus his guns that were set to attack Biden but that is the direction that they seem to be moving to.
Will this work? Americans have a very different idea of what is left wing than we do. I think personality matters more these days and Walz seems to have plenty. Still concerned that she didn't go for Shapiro though. That would have broadened the ticket. Lots of Trump outriders expressing relief that she didn't.
Shapiro not being picked revealed that the number of Jew haters among the Dems is at a level capable of affecting elections.
Does it ? The vast majority of Jewish representation in Congress is Democratic, of course. And Shapiro himself is a very popular Democratic governor.
The Dems have the support of both Jews and Jew haters.
Its an interesting source of friction.
What we have seen in the western world during recent generations has been Jews trending politically to the right and Jew hatred moving politically to the left.
The USA has seen the second element but, not yet, much of the first.
Because Jews in Golders Green never voted for Mrs Thatcher to be their MP? This is nuts.
As for the Dems, Josh Shapiro was in the running until the day before the announcement. They probably already knew he is Jewish by that point. It's not as if he was hiding it. To conclude antisemitism cost Shapiro the VP nominee slot is bizarre.
It was a factor - 'progressives' didn't like Shapiro:
The strongest argument against picking Shapiro is rooted in his hardline stance against both the Gaza protests on Pennsylvania university campuses—some of which he compared to white supremacist encampments—and the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement seeking to reverse Israel’s brutal human-rights record in the Occupied Territories. In The New Republic, writer David Klion made the case that Shapiro’s elevation to the ticket would kill off much of the movement energy now marshaled behind Harris’s run.
Harris is no political fool and capable of seeing the advantages and disadvantages each potential VP candidate brought.
To accept this thesis demands Kamala and her team not notice Shapiro is Jewish until the last moment, literally the day before the announcement, else he'd have been ruled out weeks ago, or never ruled in.
The reality is, I think, that it was a genuine close decision between the two. Harris only decided on Monday night.
After Butler PA, veep choices might be more important than in usual years. I watched quite a bit of the congressional hearing of the shooting, it struck me that the secret service do not appear particularly fit for purpose in general, not just in protecting Trump.
It must be a worry that someone is able to try something similar again, against one of the top 4 on the bill (or 5 including rfk I suppose).
Nixon picked Agnew on the basis nobody would think of doing anything that would make Agnew President, when JF and Robert Kennedy had both been assassinated in the preceding five years.
Watching Walz, I was reminded of how British politicians in their prime like William Hague and Boris Johnson could use humour to demolish opponents. Coach Walz has that in spades.
Yes a bit of humour can be devastating. Walz seems like a nice guy but the attacks we are already seeing is that he is another progressive making this slate the most left wing in America's history. It has taken Trump an extraordinarily long time to refocus his guns that were set to attack Biden but that is the direction that they seem to be moving to.
Will this work? Americans have a very different idea of what is left wing than we do. I think personality matters more these days and Walz seems to have plenty. Still concerned that she didn't go for Shapiro though. That would have broadened the ticket. Lots of Trump outriders expressing relief that she didn't.
The MAGA were always going to depict Harris as far left (by US standards), so not sure there are many votes there.
Key for the Dems is to enthuse the base and GOTV especially women, the young and minorities. We saw in our election how critical that is. The Ed Davey style is the way to go, positive and fun.
I agree with the first point but that is why there were advantages in having someone more moderate (like Biden was) on the ticket for balance. She has left herself open and it remains to be seen whether this finds any traction or not.
I am concerned that there is an assumption that this is over because we would want it to be so. Trump is still ahead and this election is still to be won or lost. Harris has had 3 very good weeks but that has got her back to near parity, it has not given her a decisive lead.
Quite: Harris's accession, the Vance VP pick, and the general organization of the Democrats have turned this into a genuinely competitive Presidential election.
But let us not forget that in the US - as in pretty much the entire developed world - prices have risen faster than wages over the last four years. Voters don't like getting poorer, and generally punish the party in power.
The only reason that this election is competitive is because Trump is such a divisive candidate, and because Republicans (other than Trump) have engaged in a politically unpopular campaign to criminalize abortion.
I would make Trump still the narrow favorite, but it could easily go either way - and a landslide victory for either candidate is not impossible.
Some Leon level forecasting there. Literally anything can happen, and that prediction will be correct.
I will revise the forecast as we get nearer the election.
But here's my order of likelihood outcomes:
1. Very narrow Republican victory, with the Sunbelt coming through for Trump, but the rust belt remaining blue.
2. Very narrow Democrat victory, with at least one of the Sunbelt states holding solid.
3. Solid Democrat victory, with the Sunbelt staying blue, and a couple of competitive states -like Iowa or Florida - flipping blue.
4. Solid Republican victory, with all of Trump's 2016 wins, plus Virginia and Nevada.
On (1) - doesn't Harris win if she holds the 3 rust belt marginals?
Watching Walz, I was reminded of how British politicians in their prime like William Hague and Boris Johnson could use humour to demolish opponents. Coach Walz has that in spades.
Yes a bit of humour can be devastating. Walz seems like a nice guy but the attacks we are already seeing is that he is another progressive making this slate the most left wing in America's history. It has taken Trump an extraordinarily long time to refocus his guns that were set to attack Biden but that is the direction that they seem to be moving to.
Will this work? Americans have a very different idea of what is left wing than we do. I think personality matters more these days and Walz seems to have plenty. Still concerned that she didn't go for Shapiro though. That would have broadened the ticket. Lots of Trump outriders expressing relief that she didn't.
Shapiro not being picked revealed that the number of Jew haters among the Dems is at a level capable of affecting elections.
Does it ? The vast majority of Jewish representation in Congress is Democratic, of course. And Shapiro himself is a very popular Democratic governor.
The Dems have the support of both Jews and Jew haters.
Its an interesting source of friction.
What we have seen in the western world during recent generations has been Jews trending politically to the right and Jew hatred moving politically to the left.
The USA has seen the second element but, not yet, much of the first.
Because Jews in Golders Green never voted for Mrs Thatcher to be their MP? This is nuts.
As for the Dems, Josh Shapiro was in the running until the day before the announcement. They probably already knew he is Jewish by that point. It's not as if he was hiding it. To conclude antisemitism cost Shapiro the VP nominee slot is bizarre.
It was a factor - 'progressives' didn't like Shapiro:
The strongest argument against picking Shapiro is rooted in his hardline stance against both the Gaza protests on Pennsylvania university campuses—some of which he compared to white supremacist encampments—and the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement seeking to reverse Israel’s brutal human-rights record in the Occupied Territories. In The New Republic, writer David Klion made the case that Shapiro’s elevation to the ticket would kill off much of the movement energy now marshaled behind Harris’s run.
Harris is no political fool and capable of seeing the advantages and disadvantages each potential VP candidate brought.
To accept this thesis demands Kamala and her team not notice Shapiro is Jewish until the last moment, literally the day before the announcement, else he'd have been ruled out weeks ago, or never ruled in.
No, it merely requires Harris to have considered the relative advantages and disadvantages of each candidate.
Even with the hostility towards him from 'progressives' Shapiro was a strong candidate.
Harris is married to a conservative Jewish lawyer. If he's willing to stump for her (which I presume he is), that neutralizes the benefits of Shapiro somewhat.
The main advantage Shapiro brought was a Pennsylvania boost - I don't see how Harris's husband helps there.
I do wonder if Harris would have been more likely to pick Shapiro if her own husband had not been Jewish.
The evidence for home state benefit from VP picks is pretty small, but yes, this pick probably makes Pennsylvania a little tougher than it would otherwise be.
On the other hand, it appears to have jazzed up the Democrat base without alienating moderates.
It's been welcomed by pretty well everyone, all the way from Bernie Sanders to Joe Manchin - who represent the respective outer edges of what even counts as a Democrat. Job done, I think.
Jenrick is playing a dangerous game, accusing Starmer of double standards over policing.
No-one's produced any concrete evidence of thst so far , and it potentialky plays into Musk's Trumpian narrative.
You’ve not seen the interview with West Midlands Police then
Yes, of all the things to happen during these riots that is actually the most disturbing to me. The riots will come to an end but the pervasive attitude among police and politicians to deal with self appointed "community leaders" won't and that is fundamentally just wrong. Policing should be the same for everyone and "community leaders" should be ignored.
Has anyone seen Sir Ed recently? Looks like he's hopped it over to Minnesota.
American politicos do watch and learn from UK politics and vice versa, so it's far from unlikely that Walz or his advisers are directly drawing from the Davey experience. It was one of the features of the election that got most coverage overseas. I had European colleagues asking me about it, unprompted. The 21st century fairground answer to Biden plagiarising the Kinnock speech.
I was very unhappy about the Davey antics at the start BUT combined with his Political Broadcast about him and his son he showed himself as the best sort of human and really helped. His image was a marked contrast to Staid Starmer and Rich Rishi.
At the next election (2029) I think with Labour having disappointed (their traditional role) struggling to get beyond 34% and Conservatives still split the danger is that any protest vote will go to Reform or the Greens. It may be that the Liberal Democrats need a new fresh (female?) leader.
For those who don’t know - NASA contracted with SpaceX and Boeing to provide human access to the International Space Station under the Commercial Crew program.
SpaceX’s Dragon, launched on Falcon 9 has been up and running for years.
Boeing is running so late that some thought they might miss the end of the Space Station - due to be decommissioned at the end of this decade.
Faults, mistakes, failed test flights. It’s been a mess.
The final checkout flight, with two astronauts, has turned into another mess. The thrusters for the space craft are acting up (among other things). Without thrusters, in space you are dead.
So the return of the astronauts on the Boeing Starliner has been delayed and now delayed again.
Further - the reason that the NASA administrator is saying that he will make the final decision is a sign. Within NASA, there is a process, by which an engineer who isn’t happy with a decision can formally kick it upstairs. So there is division in NASA about what to do.
One option is to return the astronauts on the next SpaceX Dragon. But it turns out that that Boeing deleted the option from Starliner to do an automated, unmanned return. If Starliner can’t leave ISS that’s another disaster - it bock one of the docking ports
Why politics?
1) The astronauts abandoning Starliner and going home in Dragon will nearly certainly end the Starliner program. A public humiliation for Boeing. 2) Boeing has a vast army of political supporters - the decision is political 3) if the astronauts return in Starliner and there is an accident. It will be a massive thing - hearings in Congress for a start. There would be accusations of political interference. 4) the NASA admin - Bill Nelson - is a political appointee and former Dem politician.
This is touching the White House and, potentially, November.
Not sure the astronauts want to come back on Starliner - would you, in their position?
If they have what I’ll euphemistically call an adverse event on re-entry, that will sure as hell affect politics in the run up to the election.
The sensible thing to do is send them back on Dragon, which has its own political implications, but is a lot less likely to end up with two dead explorers.
Then they need to either work out how to get Starliner back uncrewed, or instead send it off into space somewhere. If it’s stuck attached to the ISS in an unserviceable state, then everyone has several years of looking at it parked there, as a constant reminder of just how badly Boeing screwed the pooch on this one.
Boeing has not had a good few years.
There's definitely a documentary that should look at the twin fortunes of Boeing and Intel over the last decade. Both companies receive huge government support and both companies are currently in the shit for various reasons but mainly due to quality and falling behind the competition. Both companies were run by engineers in their glory days and both were taken over by lesser bean counters and everything turned to shit. Intel has gone back to Pat Gelsinger but probably 5 years too late and Boeing just seems to be stuck with Harvard/Yale MBA types.
Two US titans that are now in the doldrums because of poor management, political interference and fundamentally resting on their laurels and letting the competition just swoop in past them. For the US both companies are of critical importance IMO and both look like they are going to have another very difficult 10 years.
IMV Intel's failures are a lot more understandable.
Boeing made an unforced decision to go down the upgrade-the-737-yet-again route with the 737 Max, rather then build a clean design. And the Starliner mess can only be put down to bad management, with a tiny dose of bad luck in parts.
Intel had various choices to make about new processes; these decisions need to be made several years in advance, and cost billions. Put simply, when they moved to 10nm, they made some wrong decisions - but they were only wrong with hindsight.
As far as I'm aware, they made the decision for good technical reasons, and bean-counting had little to do with it. TSMC, and to a lesser extent Samsung, made better decisions. They just chose a poorer path. And because these fab plants cost billions, and new processes cost even more, they've been stuck on that poor path for a few years.
Some other architectural issues that they've faced are also faced by ARM and others. The recent heat issue is all on them, though.
That Betfair graph shows that if a week is a long time in politics, the past month has been its own geological epoch.
On 15th July, Trump was registering a 71% likelihood of being President again. Harris was on just 6%. Three weeks on, it's 50-47. Trump down 21%, Harris up 41%.
In three weeks.
And with the Democratic Convention wrapping up on the 22nd August, who can predict what those numbers be in another three weeks...?
Big events can have big effects.
Biden's replacement by Harris was a big event with a big effect.
If we get more big events then there might be more big effects.
Otherwise not.
I suspect there will be quite a few big events in the coming months: some will be positive for Trump and others for Harris.
It's likely to be a wild ride.
So what you’re saying is just swing trade and lay the favourite?
I think - if either candidate is showing more than a 55% probability - then you sell them.
Wouldn't it be easier to back the outsider ?
In theory, it's the same trade either way, but in practice it depends both on your existing position, and the relative odds. For quite a while, for instance, you could get significantly longer odds backing Harris than you could laying Trump, even after it was obvious she'd got the nomination.
Jenrick is playing a dangerous game, accusing Starmer of double standards over policing.
No-one's produced any concrete evidence of thst so far , and it potentialky plays into Musk's Trumpian narrative.
Rather than taking shots at Musk, why don’t you head over to his platform and see the evidence for yourself? If you prefer, you can try Sky News instead, where you will find similar evidence.
Well, the evidence I've seen so far today, retreated and tweeted many times, is a man in Birmingham, who has now been arrested, seemingly X soon as the police have seen the video.
I clearly remember an article in 2011 accusing Starmer of being racist because of the speed and zeal with which he was rounding up the young men involved in the riots, then.
Chris Giles @ChrisGiles_ In the US, Democrats have a better candidate with better economic proposals, but it is difficult for them to campaign on the economy
Why?
1. Public aren't feeling the econ vibes (even if there are partisan elements)
“I am self-declaring as a “community leader” for white English people.
From now on, if the police want to manage protests, I demand they speak to me and any other self identified community leaders.
I will tell the police what style will be suitable for our protests.
I’m guessing everyone is okay with this. I’m assuming I don’t need to be elected either?
If it’s acceptable for Birmingham, then it’s acceptable for the rest of us. Equality means equality.”
You've got a load of racist asshats rioting. It just so happens that on this occasion, those asshats are majority-white. The targets are tending to be non-whites. I'd argue it makes sense to talk to the victims / targets of those asshats, and ensure that a) they will feel safer; b) get feedback from them on what would make them feel safe; and c) try to convince them not to take the law into their own hands in 'self-defence'.
It Alex Harmstong wants to represent racist asshats, let him. But you know what that would make him.
Just so we’re clear. You’re cool with the authorities letting one group in society “self police” by roaming the streets in hoods with machetes and clubs?
No; but I don't think that is what he was saying.
Just so we're clear: You're cool with racist asshats trying to kill immigrants?
No of course I’m not. When have I ever given the impression that I am? But I am pretty uneasy that authorities seem to be selectively surrendering our streets to mob rule.
It’s been such a failure of comms this whole thing. It’s easy. “The only division we recognise in our society is between the law abiding and criminality.”
You seem *very* keen to divert the blame for this mess off the asshats who are doing it and onto 'others'.
I'd argue the only 'failure in comms' is people making misrepresenting stuff up and making stuff up.
Anyone who is using violence or the threat of violence to intimidate others, needs removing from society for a very long time. It’s not complicated JJ.
For those who don’t know - NASA contracted with SpaceX and Boeing to provide human access to the International Space Station under the Commercial Crew program.
SpaceX’s Dragon, launched on Falcon 9 has been up and running for years.
Boeing is running so late that some thought they might miss the end of the Space Station - due to be decommissioned at the end of this decade.
Faults, mistakes, failed test flights. It’s been a mess.
The final checkout flight, with two astronauts, has turned into another mess. The thrusters for the space craft are acting up (among other things). Without thrusters, in space you are dead.
So the return of the astronauts on the Boeing Starliner has been delayed and now delayed again.
Further - the reason that the NASA administrator is saying that he will make the final decision is a sign. Within NASA, there is a process, by which an engineer who isn’t happy with a decision can formally kick it upstairs. So there is division in NASA about what to do.
One option is to return the astronauts on the next SpaceX Dragon. But it turns out that that Boeing deleted the option from Starliner to do an automated, unmanned return. If Starliner can’t leave ISS that’s another disaster - it bock one of the docking ports
Why politics?
1) The astronauts abandoning Starliner and going home in Dragon will nearly certainly end the Starliner program. A public humiliation for Boeing. 2) Boeing has a vast army of political supporters - the decision is political 3) if the astronauts return in Starliner and there is an accident. It will be a massive thing - hearings in Congress for a start. There would be accusations of political interference. 4) the NASA admin - Bill Nelson - is a political appointee and former Dem politician.
This is touching the White House and, potentially, November.
Not sure the astronauts want to come back on Starliner - would you, in their position?
If they have what I’ll euphemistically call an adverse event on re-entry, that will sure as hell affect politics in the run up to the election.
The sensible thing to do is send them back on Dragon, which has its own political implications, but is a lot less likely to end up with two dead explorers.
Then they need to either work out how to get Starliner back uncrewed, or instead send it off into space somewhere. If it’s stuck attached to the ISS in an unserviceable state, then everyone has several years of looking at it parked there, as a constant reminder of just how badly Boeing screwed the pooch on this one.
Boeing has not had a good few years.
There's definitely a documentary that should look at the twin fortunes of Boeing and Intel over the last decade. Both companies receive huge government support and both companies are currently in the shit for various reasons but mainly due to quality and falling behind the competition. Both companies were run by engineers in their glory days and both were taken over by lesser bean counters and everything turned to shit. Intel has gone back to Pat Gelsinger but probably 5 years too late and Boeing just seems to be stuck with Harvard/Yale MBA types.
Two US titans that are now in the doldrums because of poor management, political interference and fundamentally resting on their laurels and letting the competition just swoop in past them. For the US both companies are of critical importance IMO and both look like they are going to have another very difficult 10 years.
Intel potentially has a faster route to recovery, I think.
Jenrick is playing a dangerous game, accusing Starmer of double standards over policing.
No-one's produced any concrete evidence of thst so far , and it potentialky plays into Musk's Trumpian narrative.
You’ve not seen the interview with West Midlands Police then
Yes, of all the things to happen during these riots that is actually the most disturbing to me. The riots will come to an end but the pervasive attitude among police and politicians to deal with self appointed "community leaders" won't and that is fundamentally just wrong. Policing should be the same for everyone and "community leaders" should be ignored.
Arguably it’s the natural evolution of our acceptance of things like sharia courts. If parallel communities can have parallel legal systems then why not parallel policing by and of themselves? Makes a kind of sense…
Except that in a liberal democracy based on fair and equal treatment of everyone, by the sole accepted authorities, it is a disaster
“I am self-declaring as a “community leader” for white English people.
From now on, if the police want to manage protests, I demand they speak to me and any other self identified community leaders.
I will tell the police what style will be suitable for our protests.
I’m guessing everyone is okay with this. I’m assuming I don’t need to be elected either?
If it’s acceptable for Birmingham, then it’s acceptable for the rest of us. Equality means equality.”
You've got a load of racist asshats rioting. It just so happens that on this occasion, those asshats are majority-white. The targets are tending to be non-whites. I'd argue it makes sense to talk to the victims / targets of those asshats, and ensure that a) they will feel safer; b) get feedback from them on what would make them feel safe; and c) try to convince them not to take the law into their own hands in 'self-defence'.
It Alex Harmstong wants to represent racist asshats, let him. But you know what that would make him.
Just so we’re clear. You’re cool with the authorities letting one group in society “self police” by roaming the streets in hoods with machetes and clubs?
No; but I don't think that is what he was saying.
Just so we're clear: You're cool with racist asshats trying to kill immigrants?
No of course I’m not. When have I ever given the impression that I am? But I am pretty uneasy that authorities seem to be selectively surrendering our streets to mob rule.
It’s been such a failure of comms this whole thing. It’s easy. “The only division we recognise in our society is between the law abiding and criminality.”
You seem *very* keen to divert the blame for this mess off the asshats who are doing it and onto 'others'.
I'd argue the only 'failure in comms' is people making misrepresenting stuff up and making stuff up.
Anyone who is using violence or the threat of violence to intimidate others, needs removing from society for a very long time. It’s not complicated JJ.
Who, in your view, is instigating this violence?
Does it matter? Taking to the streets with a weapon is not justifiable under any circumstance. Let law enforcement deal with it, vigilantes will just make things worse and innocent people will get hurt just like that guy who's now in hospital with a lacerated liver after being targeted by a Muslim gang for the heinous crime of going to the pub.
Jenrick is playing a dangerous game, accusing Starmer of double standards over policing.
No-one's produced any concrete evidence of thst so far , and it potentialky plays into Musk's Trumpian narrative.
You’ve not seen the interview with West Midlands Police then
Yes, of all the things to happen during these riots that is actually the most disturbing to me. The riots will come to an end but the pervasive attitude among police and politicians to deal with self appointed "community leaders" won't and that is fundamentally just wrong. Policing should be the same for everyone and "community leaders" should be ignored.
Arguably it’s the natural evolution of our acceptance of things like sharia courts. If parallel communities can have parallel legal systems then why not parallel policing by and of themselves? Makes a kind of sense…
Except that in a liberal democracy based on fair and equal treatment of everyone, by the sole accepted authorities, it is a disaster
I agree it's a very dangerous road to go down for democracies. The outer edges of the Republican Party are advocating something similar for their version of Christianity (which has very little to do with Christ).
Just listened to Farage explaining that his "police suppressing information" narrative was collected from the utterances of Andrew Tate.
And of course traitors calling the lawlessness as "the Farage Riots" make him the biggest victim of the last fortnight. Don't worry about little girls losing their lives in Southport, the real victim is Nigel.
For those who don’t know - NASA contracted with SpaceX and Boeing to provide human access to the International Space Station under the Commercial Crew program.
SpaceX’s Dragon, launched on Falcon 9 has been up and running for years.
Boeing is running so late that some thought they might miss the end of the Space Station - due to be decommissioned at the end of this decade.
Faults, mistakes, failed test flights. It’s been a mess.
The final checkout flight, with two astronauts, has turned into another mess. The thrusters for the space craft are acting up (among other things). Without thrusters, in space you are dead.
So the return of the astronauts on the Boeing Starliner has been delayed and now delayed again.
Further - the reason that the NASA administrator is saying that he will make the final decision is a sign. Within NASA, there is a process, by which an engineer who isn’t happy with a decision can formally kick it upstairs. So there is division in NASA about what to do.
One option is to return the astronauts on the next SpaceX Dragon. But it turns out that that Boeing deleted the option from Starliner to do an automated, unmanned return. If Starliner can’t leave ISS that’s another disaster - it bock one of the docking ports
Why politics?
1) The astronauts abandoning Starliner and going home in Dragon will nearly certainly end the Starliner program. A public humiliation for Boeing. 2) Boeing has a vast army of political supporters - the decision is political 3) if the astronauts return in Starliner and there is an accident. It will be a massive thing - hearings in Congress for a start. There would be accusations of political interference. 4) the NASA admin - Bill Nelson - is a political appointee and former Dem politician.
This is touching the White House and, potentially, November.
Not sure the astronauts want to come back on Starliner - would you, in their position?
If they have what I’ll euphemistically call an adverse event on re-entry, that will sure as hell affect politics in the run up to the election.
The sensible thing to do is send them back on Dragon, which has its own political implications, but is a lot less likely to end up with two dead explorers.
Then they need to either work out how to get Starliner back uncrewed, or instead send it off into space somewhere. If it’s stuck attached to the ISS in an unserviceable state, then everyone has several years of looking at it parked there, as a constant reminder of just how badly Boeing screwed the pooch on this one.
Boeing has not had a good few years.
There's definitely a documentary that should look at the twin fortunes of Boeing and Intel over the last decade. Both companies receive huge government support and both companies are currently in the shit for various reasons but mainly due to quality and falling behind the competition. Both companies were run by engineers in their glory days and both were taken over by lesser bean counters and everything turned to shit. Intel has gone back to Pat Gelsinger but probably 5 years too late and Boeing just seems to be stuck with Harvard/Yale MBA types.
Two US titans that are now in the doldrums because of poor management, political interference and fundamentally resting on their laurels and letting the competition just swoop in past them. For the US both companies are of critical importance IMO and both look like they are going to have another very difficult 10 years.
Intel potentially has a faster route to recovery, I think.
Lets see what comes of their 20A and 18A processors. Rumours are that 15th gen is only a 10% IPC improvement on 14th gen and now it's become "wait for 16th gen" for the big improvement in IPC and PPW.
Buttigieg: Of course they are trying to say he is too far-left. If it was Manchin, they would be saying the same, it is all they know... If you think making sure everyone in Minnesota had paid family leave is too far-left, vast majority of Americans think that’s a good idea https://x.com/Acyn/status/1820994816135909617
Jenrick is playing a dangerous game, accusing Starmer of double standards over policing.
No-one's produced any concrete evidence of thst so far , and it potentialky plays into Musk's Trumpian narrative.
Rather than taking shots at Musk, why don’t you head over to his platform and see the evidence for yourself? If you prefer, you can try Sky News instead, where you will find similar evidence.
Well, the evidence I've seen so far today, retreated and tweeted many times, is a man in Birmingham, who has now been arrested, seemingly X soon as the police have seen the video.
I clearly remember an article in 2011 accusing Starmer of being racist because of the speed and zeal with which he was rounding up the young men involved in the riots, then.
Good morning
This report on Sky speaks to the issues and the question being asked is why were the police absent even though the community leader had informed them of the gathering
I'm not sure why they'd bother other than a lack of imagination. You can see even on here how easy it is to spread any old crap nyou want and find plenty of racists to lap it up and even embelish it
“I am self-declaring as a “community leader” for white English people.
From now on, if the police want to manage protests, I demand they speak to me and any other self identified community leaders.
I will tell the police what style will be suitable for our protests.
I’m guessing everyone is okay with this. I’m assuming I don’t need to be elected either?
If it’s acceptable for Birmingham, then it’s acceptable for the rest of us. Equality means equality.”
You've got a load of racist asshats rioting. It just so happens that on this occasion, those asshats are majority-white. The targets are tending to be non-whites. I'd argue it makes sense to talk to the victims / targets of those asshats, and ensure that a) they will feel safer; b) get feedback from them on what would make them feel safe; and c) try to convince them not to take the law into their own hands in 'self-defence'.
It Alex Harmstong wants to represent racist asshats, let him. But you know what that would make him.
Just so we’re clear. You’re cool with the authorities letting one group in society “self police” by roaming the streets in hoods with machetes and clubs?
No; but I don't think that is what he was saying.
Just so we're clear: You're cool with racist asshats trying to kill immigrants?
No of course I’m not. When have I ever given the impression that I am? But I am pretty uneasy that authorities seem to be selectively surrendering our streets to mob rule.
It’s been such a failure of comms this whole thing. It’s easy. “The only division we recognise in our society is between the law abiding and criminality.”
You seem *very* keen to divert the blame for this mess off the asshats who are doing it and onto 'others'.
I'd argue the only 'failure in comms' is people making misrepresenting stuff up and making stuff up.
Anyone who is using violence or the threat of violence to intimidate others, needs removing from society for a very long time. It’s not complicated JJ.
Who, in your view, is instigating this violence?
Does it matter? Taking to the streets with a weapon is not justifiable under any circumstance. Let law enforcement deal with it, vigilantes will just make things worse and innocent people will get hurt just like that guy who's now in hospital with a lacerated liver after being targeted by a Muslim gang for the heinous crime of going to the pub.
People on this thread are shitting on a police officer for daring to talk to *victim* communities from this violence, in part to stop them from counter-protesting. Do you find that odd?
And it needs to be clear: the victims of this violence are generally the immigrant communities, *not* the racist asshats who are 'protesting'. If those racist asshats went home and wanked heir little dicks, there would be none of this particular violence.
Jenrick is playing a dangerous game, accusing Starmer of double standards over policing.
No-one's produced any concrete evidence of thst so far , and it potentialky plays into Musk's Trumpian narrative.
You’ve not seen the interview with West Midlands Police then
Yes, of all the things to happen during these riots that is actually the most disturbing to me. The riots will come to an end but the pervasive attitude among police and politicians to deal with self appointed "community leaders" won't and that is fundamentally just wrong. Policing should be the same for everyone and "community leaders" should be ignored.
Arguably it’s the natural evolution of our acceptance of things like sharia courts. If parallel communities can have parallel legal systems then why not parallel policing by and of themselves? Makes a kind of sense…
Except that in a liberal democracy based on fair and equal treatment of everyone, by the sole accepted authorities, it is a disaster
Hang on.
How is a Sharia court different from a Beth Din one? And how is that different from people accepting binding arbitration from a non state court body?
What power does a Sharia court to - say - imprison someone? Ultimately, any "punishments" they enforce exist only to the extent that someone chooses to part of that community.
Comments
The Republicans have somebody as Veep who would terrify the horses...
The difference here - maybe, and I sincerely hope this is wrong - is that because there is a perception of two sides then this could, instead, go on and on. As each side provokes the other - a sectarian stand off like Belfast. Let’s pray this ain’t so
The primary school bit appears to be this https://www.house.mn.gov/sessiondaily/Story/15595
age appropriate sex education starting in primary schools which if it follows what occurs in the UK is a combination of relationship advice with a tiny bit of what isn't at all an appropriate relationship (i.e. what is abuse)..
I'm totally back in love with my Big Short.
From a brief glance back over the election history I think the last time the less folksy of the two candidates won was probably 1980, but Reagan was pretty folksy himself.
I'm not sure we have an equivalent to folksy in Britain.
Designed to cover some awful edge cases by the looks of it.
@nicholascecil
@IpsosUK and @EveningStandardSir Keir Starmer’s net satisfaction rating jumps from -19 as Opposition Leader to +7 as Prime Minister, @IpsosUK poll for @EveningStandard
https://x.com/nicholascecil/status/1821118391442198540
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/minnesota-governor-signs-broad-abortion-rights-bill-law-rcna68513
Here’s the legislative sponsor of the bill about putting tampons in the boys rooms in schools, which is why TamponTim is trending
https://x.com/libsoftiktok/status/1820886230332260548
The porn is books such as “gender queer”, “this book is gay” and “let’s talk about it”, all of which are labelled 18+ on Amazon. There are pictures online about this content, I don’t need to link to it.
Homes, businesseses, friends and family are being attacked by violent mobs, the police have been unable to deal with all of it, people are understandably scared and the more hot-headed have come out to defend their community from the violent attackers.
Police engage with the mob, engage with the older, wiser community leaders, reassure them and the mob disperse home with minimal fuss. Police will mop up any identified offenders quietly. That is good policing.
https://x.com/RepMikeCollins/status/1820805495646560580
I swear we’d have a saner monetary policy than now. A naughty person might suggest the public might vote to choose these officials. Let’s say one per 100k people?
Robert Jenrick is having quite a good rioting season. He’s everywhere making measured and conservative sounding noises. I’d make him slight favourite to win the leadership right now
He has issues tho. How come he’s so rich and got all these houses? Wiki is quite opaque. I presume he has mega wealthy parents and didn’t make £30 million by the age of 29
If it weren’t for a privileged backstory (the Tories have had enough of that) he’d be a clear favourite
It Alex Harmstong wants to represent racist asshats, let him. But you know what that would make him.
O/T but specially for @Malmesbury ... the spread of silicosis as an occupational disease.
CAn't say I'm surprised, when seeing how workies on nearby house refits cut the stuff dry with huge clouds of dust.
This might be one of the papers quoted:
https://thorax.bmj.com/content/early/2024/07/04/thorax-2024-221715
Not entirely impressive quote from HSE: “Our sympathies are with those who have lost loved ones to any work-related disease.
“Great Britain has a robust and well-established regulatory framework in place to protect workers from the health risks associated with exposure to hazardous substances.
“We continue to work with industry to raise awareness of managing the risks of exposure to respirable crystalline silica and we are considering options for future interventions to ensure workers are protected.”
Silicosis has been a known issue for c 200 years ... especially in Edinburgh stonemasons (the local sandstone was lethal).
Easier to get to than Gatwick, tho
It's likely to be a wild ride.
FWIW, I'm calling the Democrats slight favourites at this point.
Looking at the map there seem to me to be several more plausible routes to a Democratic victory than Republican one. But we're not going to have a very good idea until there's more state polling.
In any event, I've been correct that Harris has been value so far.
His wife is also a lawyer at some very prestigious firms too and very wealthy.
I know how you love the Macron stuff but Mrs Jenrick is nearly a decade older than Robert.
*burr burr* Hello, Mrs Ross, here is a parcel for you here in Inverness, can we leave another one for your neighbour in Lairg to pick up? It's so close by on the map.
UK politicians pundits and journalists have been unhealthily obsessed with American politics for decades. We see it on here: indeed lefties are usually worse for this. Now it is being returned as Americans can see into British politics - via the net and social media
On the other hand, it appears to have jazzed up the Democrat base without alienating moderates.
Sure there are many millions who have and are struggling but much of the poverty claiming and doom and glooming has been spurious.
Good for him
He’s probably the best bet for the Tories - Badenoch is too lightweight and Patel too polarising. They need something of a blank slate and someone prepared to say conservative things
Crucially, he can point to his resignation as immigration minister and say he was principled on this pivotal issue. I reckon, sadly, this issue is probably going to grow in salience
IDENTIFIED AND CHARGED
The arrest of the 46-year-old relates to violent disorder outside The Clumsy Swan pub in Yardley on Monday evening.
#Birmingham
Harris only decided on Monday night.
He'll be out within two years.
Just so we're clear: You're cool with racist asshats trying to kill immigrants?
So I don't think he's done anything to change existing abortion law, merely codified the state's supreme court existing case law.
That said, Minnesota does have the second most liberal abortion law in the US, behind a Red State.
It must be a worry that someone is able to try something similar again, against one of the top 4 on the bill (or 5 including rfk I suppose).
It was allocated its own pseudo EPSG id of 900913 (see what they did there) but it there is an official one.
https://epsg.io/3857
It should be banned.
PS I thought Mollweide was the choice of whole-world maps now?
Alex Wickham
@alexwickham
Exclusive:
*UK authorities suspect foreign state actors used bots and fake accounts to amplify the FarRightThugsUnite hashtag and other posts on X
*Russians also seen bragging about infiltrating far-right UK Telegram channels
Story with
@elthorn22
>>>
https://x.com/alexwickham/status/1821117387090936065
It’s been such a failure of comms this whole thing. It’s easy. “The only division we recognise in our society is between the law abiding and criminality.”
No-one's produced any concrete evidence of thst so far , and it potentialky plays into Musk's Trumpian narrative.
Two US titans that are now in the doldrums because of poor management, political interference and fundamentally resting on their laurels and letting the competition just swoop in past them. For the US both companies are of critical importance IMO and both look like they are going to have another very difficult 10 years.
So juice8882 is LAZY. And has their tweets protected. And their handle includes what I would guess is their birth year, 1982, and the number 88...
I'd argue the only 'failure in comms' is people making misrepresenting stuff up and making stuff up.
The likes of Rep. Collins (who seems an idiot of the first order) implies you have to be white to be British - news to me. The current problems are as much intra-communal as inter-communal. The second and third generation British Muslims, Hindus and others are appalled by the intolerance and hostility of the more recent arrivals who seem less able or unwilling to integrate than their predecessors.
This Grey War is winnable and if we choose to resist and even fire back, the Russians will lose this as they did the Cold War.
https://youtube.com/shorts/kUJo-bw1u5g?si=YnKUW9z2u9DVdmjb
Job done, I think.
At the next election (2029) I think with Labour having disappointed (their traditional role) struggling to get beyond 34% and Conservatives still split the danger is that any protest vote will go to Reform or the Greens. It may be that the Liberal Democrats need a new fresh (female?) leader.
Boeing made an unforced decision to go down the upgrade-the-737-yet-again route with the 737 Max, rather then build a clean design. And the Starliner mess can only be put down to bad management, with a tiny dose of bad luck in parts.
Intel had various choices to make about new processes; these decisions need to be made several years in advance, and cost billions. Put simply, when they moved to 10nm, they made some wrong decisions - but they were only wrong with hindsight.
As far as I'm aware, they made the decision for good technical reasons, and bean-counting had little to do with it. TSMC, and to a lesser extent Samsung, made better decisions. They just chose a poorer path. And because these fab plants cost billions, and new processes cost even more, they've been stuck on that poor path for a few years.
Some other architectural issues that they've faced are also faced by ARM and others. The recent heat issue is all on them, though.
For quite a while, for instance, you could get significantly longer odds backing Harris than you could laying Trump, even after it was obvious she'd got the nomination.
I clearly remember an article in 2011 accusing Starmer of being racist because of the speed and zeal with which he was rounding up the young men involved in the riots, then.
Chris Giles
@ChrisGiles_
In the US, Democrats have a better candidate with better economic proposals, but it is difficult for them to campaign on the economy
Why?
1. Public aren't feeling the econ vibes (even if there are partisan elements)
https://x.com/ChrisGiles_/status/1821109248723451967
Except that in a liberal democracy based on fair and equal treatment of everyone, by the sole accepted authorities, it is a disaster
https://x.com/WMPolice/status/1821102935775870988?t=mEL-XNcQUOwLrRlHIKOc7g&s=19
Policing riots often requires arrests a day or two later, it doesn't mean ignoring offenders, just good policing.
The outer edges of the Republican Party are advocating something similar for their version of Christianity (which has very little to do with Christ).
Just listened to Farage explaining that his "police suppressing information" narrative was collected from the utterances of Andrew Tate.
And of course traitors calling the lawlessness as "the Farage Riots" make him the biggest victim of the last fortnight. Don't worry about little girls losing their lives in Southport, the real victim is Nigel.
https://www.lbc.co.uk/news/nigel-farage-admits-getting-caught-up-in-andrew-tates-misinformation-following-s/
https://x.com/theonlypeterkay/status/1820952373767872676/mediaViewer?currentTweet=1820952373767872676¤tTweetUser=theonlypeterkay
One for the older members of Political Betting.
https://x.com/Acyn/status/1820994816135909617
This report on Sky speaks to the issues and the question being asked is why were the police absent even though the community leader had informed them of the gathering
Police fail to stop armed counter-protesters
https://news.sky.com/video/share-13192163
I suspect these rioters will target paediatricians next.
And it needs to be clear: the victims of this violence are generally the immigrant communities, *not* the racist asshats who are 'protesting'. If those racist asshats went home and wanked heir little dicks, there would be none of this particular violence.
How is a Sharia court different from a Beth Din one? And how is that different from people accepting binding arbitration from a non state court body?
What power does a Sharia court to - say - imprison someone? Ultimately, any "punishments" they enforce exist only to the extent that someone chooses to part of that community.