As our Sunil demonstrated a while back, there is more than one plausible way to compile a medal table.
The classic way is to list by golds first, and use silver and bronze as tie-breakers. The US tends however to do it by total medals. That usually enhances their position (and ours too).
Another way is to award points per medal - e.g. Gold 5, Silver 3, Bronze 1. Sunil did this and again it flattered us and the US. You can sod about with the ratios too, in which case you might well want to allocate relatively more for golds, because they really are a lot more valuable than silver and bronze.
A more controversial method would be to allocate more weight to the high status events. Most people accept that Track and Field is the centrepiece of the games, so medals there could be scored higher, with maybe a bonus for blue riband events like the 100m sprint, 1500m and marathon. Swimming, cycling and rowing would be in the mid-range. You could deduct points for winning the breakdancing.
How do like it so far?
Personally I think it was a highly successful games - for Paris, for France, and for the GB team.
I'd go for:
Gold 4 Silver 2 Bronze 1
There's also expectations versus reality.
The silver in synchronised swimming seems to be better than yet another silver in the velodrome or athletics relays.
And then there are comparisons with other countries - the relative performance is much worse this year.
The British team finishes seventh on golds, fourth on silvers and second on bronzes. I think the general idea now is to pretend that winning stuff isn't really that important after all, and to celebrate how hard everyone tried instead.
Team GB. Amongst the most successful losers in the world.
Think of the mountain of lottery tickets that were sacrificed to that end.
Edit: would make a good ski-jump in East London.
My original remarks may have been slightly churlish, but the skipload of bronzes does tell a story - as well as the outright collapses in performance in a variety of previously successful disciplines. As I've remarked previously, there'll be a number of sports governing bodies that are going to have their lotto loot cut drastically or removed at the end of all this.
Applauding effort is the correct approach for infants' school sports day or Parkrun, but elite level competition is a different matter. Celebrating near misses all the time is how you get the England football team and its extraordinary record of utter failure.
Those in charge of dishing out the lottery money are known for being pretty ruthless with both sports and athletes, when it comes to renewal of funding after each Games. Anyone older than about 20 who isn’t coming home from Paris with a medal, is likely to find themselves defunded and needing to find their own sponsors if they want to be in Los Angeles. It’s a brutal industry if you’re not winning.
Bin off the "artistic swimming," breaking, boxing (too much chance of being corrupt with dodgy judges and the entire IBA debacle), and greco-roman wrestling (sorry, but that's literally just in because of being Olympics, isn't it?). (The only reason I'm fine with dressage continuing is that we're good at it)
Return (in addition to the sports being returned next time, like cricket): - Ballooning (if sailing's fine, ballooning's fine) - Swimming obstacle race - Pistol duelling (they apparently used wax bullets last time; paintballs would be fine)
Add in (in addition to new ones like squash - seriously, artistic swimming was in and this wasn't?): - Larger paintball competition (we can watch from overhead and with drones; this could be really fun) - Hang-gliding competitions (the possibility of co-ordinating with the above so that teams can call in close air support is available for discussion) - Field gun competition to finish off (to effectively substitute for the Ancient Olympic hoplitodromos
Some excellent suggestions there, Andy!
I would add that I personally would object to dressage for the same reason I object to the likes of art swimming and breakdancing, except that dressage was part of the original games. It therefore gets a grudging pass with me.
Personally, I don't think there should be any sports in summer or winter olympics whuch rely on judges to tell you how nicely you're doing it. This includes gymnastics. But a friend of mine has suggested a less fundamentalist approach: you can have events which rely on judges, but only if there is a significant element of danger involved. Thus, gymnastics, diving, bmxing in: breaking, surfing, ice dancing out.
Overall lots to think about for Team GB. I think Cycling and Rowing are definitely on the up, Sailing seems to be nowhere, athletics had three near misses for gold but the pipeline looks reasonably good so 2028 could be a banner games for the athletics team.
I also think that a lot of the European countries who did well this time will drop off next time but Australia will likely be even better to get ready for their home games.
We should be aiming for a similar number of medals overall but with a higher win percentage, that should be the focus of the retrospective.
A 1% lead on the economy isn't really a huge margin for Harris though, especially given Hillary won the popular vote by 2% and lost still. It also depends in which swing states she has that lead or not
Harris leading on the economy is massive when she leads on everything else and the economy was Trump's last straw to grasp to.
She doesn't lead on immigration and the border where Trump is clearly ahead
How did you manage to paint yourself into the only-Trump-supporter-on-PB corner?
Because
Here's What Meghan Markle Said About Kamala Harris Back in 2020
"I'm so excited to see that kind of representation," the Duchess of Sussex said.
Bin off the "artistic swimming," breaking, boxing (too much chance of being corrupt with dodgy judges and the entire IBA debacle), and greco-roman wrestling (sorry, but that's literally just in because of being Olympics, isn't it?). (The only reason I'm fine with dressage continuing is that we're good at it)
Return (in addition to the sports being returned next time, like cricket): - Ballooning (if sailing's fine, ballooning's fine) - Swimming obstacle race - Pistol duelling (they apparently used wax bullets last time; paintballs would be fine)
Add in (in addition to new ones like squash - seriously, artistic swimming was in and this wasn't?): - Larger paintball competition (we can watch from overhead and with drones; this could be really fun) - Hang-gliding competitions (the possibility of co-ordinating with the above so that teams can call in close air support is available for discussion) - Field gun competition to finish off (to effectively substitute for the Ancient Olympic hoplitodromos
Some excellent suggestions there, Andy!
I would add that I personally would object to dressage for the same reason I object to the likes of art swimming and breakdancing, except that dressage was part of the original games. It therefore gets a grudging pass with me.
Personally, I don't think there should be any sports in summer or winter olympics whuch rely on judges to tell you how nicely you're doing it. This includes gymnastics. But a friend of mine has suggested a less fundamentalist approach: you can have events which rely on judges, but only if there is a significant element of danger involved. Thus, gymnastics, diving, bmxing in: breaking, surfing, ice dancing out.
On medals, I'm interested in the -6 on cycling golds, and why the total is so low.
I think the absence of Charlotte Dujardin the horse dancer, after whipping her horse abusively (24 strokes in one minute), may be significant. She has 3 golds, 1 silver and 2 bronzes from the last 3 Olympics.
On the cycling, I think two points:
1 - I get the impression that the training regime is marginally less hard charging than previously, although it is also the case that other countries have had 15-20 years to catch up since we really started getting our edge in 2004.
2 - I'm interested in whether our poisonous road culture, which is notably worse than most others in Western Europe in attitudes, has any long term impact on participation.
I haven't been able to find enough data to inform on this one (I suspect this impacts at this time more on wider professional cycling and where they choose to base), yet it is only 9 weeks since Kate Richardson had to withdraw from the Womens Tour de France after a driver of a 4x4 left her with a fractured scapula after hitting her when squeezing past on a 4m wide country lane near Holmfirth.
Do you think our "poisonous road culture" didn't exist 10 to 20 years ago?
I think it did. And I'd date it probably to starting in the 1920s or 1930s, and intensifying from the 1970s onwards with number of vehicles on our roads going from ~12-15m in 1970 to 41m+ now.
There's easy to find online media coverage from the 2000s or earlier.
I'm currently reading a history of cycle cammers, which slightly surprised me with how recently and how rapidly it has grown, even though I have been following the area for nearly a decade. The first known conviction for a third party report of an offence ie cammer as witness not victim, is reported as 2012. First vids online date from ~2006-7, and first crime reports as victim from ~2010.
A large majority of cammers have always been in motor vehicles, so there are probably earlier cases of dash cammers or motorcyclist cammers doing the same.
I think what has changed is visibility and public debate, and therefore an opportunity for voluntary or involuntary education, as from cammers we have a tool to drag the issue out into the public space and talk about it.
We have to due to traffic police numbers having been ~halved since 2000, and the speciality abolished in ~2002 by Mr Blair - one thing he got wrong.
Bin off the "artistic swimming," breaking, boxing (too much chance of being corrupt with dodgy judges and the entire IBA debacle), and greco-roman wrestling (sorry, but that's literally just in because of being Olympics, isn't it?). (The only reason I'm fine with dressage continuing is that we're good at it)
Return (in addition to the sports being returned next time, like cricket): - Ballooning (if sailing's fine, ballooning's fine) - Swimming obstacle race - Pistol duelling (they apparently used wax bullets last time; paintballs would be fine)
Add in (in addition to new ones like squash - seriously, artistic swimming was in and this wasn't?): - Larger paintball competition (we can watch from overhead and with drones; this could be really fun) - Hang-gliding competitions (the possibility of co-ordinating with the above so that teams can call in close air support is available for discussion) - Field gun competition to finish off (to effectively substitute for the Ancient Olympic hoplitodromos
Some excellent suggestions there, Andy!
I would add that I personally would object to dressage for the same reason I object to the likes of art swimming and breakdancing, except that dressage was part of the original games. It therefore gets a grudging pass with me.
Personally, I don't think there should be any sports in summer or winter olympics whuch rely on judges to tell you how nicely you're doing it. This includes gymnastics. But a friend of mine has suggested a less fundamentalist approach: you can have events which rely on judges, but only if there is a significant element of danger involved. Thus, gymnastics, diving, bmxing in: breaking, surfing, ice dancing out.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
On medals, I'm interested in the -6 on cycling golds, and why the total is so low.
I think the absence of Charlotte Dujardin the horse dancer, after whipping her horse abusively (24 strokes in one minute), may be significant. She has 3 golds, 1 silver and 2 bronzes from the last 3 Olympics.
On the cycling, I think two points:
1 - I get the impression that the training regime is marginally less hard charging than previously, although it is also the case that other countries have had 15-20 years to catch up since we really started getting our edge in 2004.
2 - I'm interested in whether our poisonous road culture, which is notably worse than most others in Western Europe in attitudes, has any long term impact on participation.
I haven't been able to find enough data to inform on this one (I suspect this impacts at this time more on wider professional cycling and where they choose to base), yet it is only 9 weeks since Kate Richardson had to withdraw from the Womens Tour de France after a driver of a 4x4 left her with a fractured scapula after hitting her when squeezing past on a 4m wide country lane near Holmfirth.
Do you think our "poisonous road culture" didn't exist 10 to 20 years ago?
I think it did. And I'd date it probably to starting in the 1920s or 1930s, and intensifying from the 1970s onwards with number of vehicles on our roads going from ~12-15m in 1970 to 41m+ now.
There's easy to find online media coverage from the 2000s or earlier.
I'm currently reading a history of cycle cammers, which slightly surprised me with how recently and how rapidly it has grown, even though I have been following the area for nearly a decade. The first known conviction for a third party report of an offence ie cammer as witness not victim, is reported as 2012. First vids online date from ~2006-7, and first crime reports as victim from ~2010.
A large majority of cammers have always been in motor vehicles, so there are probably earlier cases of dash cammers or motorcyclist cammers doing the same.
I think what has changed is visibility and public debate, and therefore an opportunity for voluntary or involuntary education, as from cammers we have a tool to drag the issue out into the public space and talk about it.
We have to due to traffic police numbers having been ~halved since 2000, and the speciality abolished in ~2002 by Mr Blair - one thing he got wrong.
I quite enjoyed watching this sort of 'city of the future' about Glasgow from 1971.
Bin off the "artistic swimming," breaking, boxing (too much chance of being corrupt with dodgy judges and the entire IBA debacle), and greco-roman wrestling (sorry, but that's literally just in because of being Olympics, isn't it?). (The only reason I'm fine with dressage continuing is that we're good at it)
Return (in addition to the sports being returned next time, like cricket): - Ballooning (if sailing's fine, ballooning's fine) - Swimming obstacle race - Pistol duelling (they apparently used wax bullets last time; paintballs would be fine)
Add in (in addition to new ones like squash - seriously, artistic swimming was in and this wasn't?): - Larger paintball competition (we can watch from overhead and with drones; this could be really fun) - Hang-gliding competitions (the possibility of co-ordinating with the above so that teams can call in close air support is available for discussion) - Field gun competition to finish off (to effectively substitute for the Ancient Olympic hoplitodromos
Some excellent suggestions there, Andy!
I would add that I personally would object to dressage for the same reason I object to the likes of art swimming and breakdancing, except that dressage was part of the original games. It therefore gets a grudging pass with me.
Personally, I don't think there should be any sports in summer or winter olympics whuch rely on judges to tell you how nicely you're doing it. This includes gymnastics. But a friend of mine has suggested a less fundamentalist approach: you can have events which rely on judges, but only if there is a significant element of danger involved. Thus, gymnastics, diving, bmxing in: breaking, surfing, ice dancing out.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
If there's a grift in it for them why not?
The simple fact is that austerity decimated civic society and services so the place looks a shambles. After 14 years of Conservative Governments inner cities are derelict, the highways are pot-holed and our green and pleasant land is a repository for fly-tipped waste. I don't suppose resolving all that is high on Labour's to-do list, and it certainly won't be on the next Conservative Government's top fifty agenda.
It absolutely should be. Its one way they can win again
I work in the shit-shovelling industry and local authorities are penniless and can't afford to chase fly-tippers. The environmental regulators are underfunded, they are not fulfilling their obligations. Landfill sites are stinking so badly because they are not inspected by the EA, NRW, SEPA and NIEA to the extent they used to be. I used to get a weekly inspection at a hazardous waste transfer station during the last Labour Government, that same site gets a random visit every 18 months. Water companies and farmers have been allowed to pump raw sewage and slurry into surface waters in their quest for profit and shareholders dividends.
What the f*** is Sean Thomas drinking when he suggests that the Tories will clean up the mess? The Tories trashed the place.Of course, Thomas is on the payroll of the Conservatives's in-house comic!
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
Tories should embrace the National Trust.
The Tories should embrace all the things that Britain is great at and that get centrist dads and moms nostalgic: the National Trust, the BBC, our university sector, the NHS. Talk about British exceptionalism. Leaving the immigrant-bashing and Islamophobia to Reform UK.
Bin off the "artistic swimming," breaking, boxing (too much chance of being corrupt with dodgy judges and the entire IBA debacle), and greco-roman wrestling (sorry, but that's literally just in because of being Olympics, isn't it?). (The only reason I'm fine with dressage continuing is that we're good at it)
Return (in addition to the sports being returned next time, like cricket): - Ballooning (if sailing's fine, ballooning's fine) - Swimming obstacle race - Pistol duelling (they apparently used wax bullets last time; paintballs would be fine)
Add in (in addition to new ones like squash - seriously, artistic swimming was in and this wasn't?): - Larger paintball competition (we can watch from overhead and with drones; this could be really fun) - Hang-gliding competitions (the possibility of co-ordinating with the above so that teams can call in close air support is available for discussion) - Field gun competition to finish off (to effectively substitute for the Ancient Olympic hoplitodromos
Some excellent suggestions there, Andy!
I would add that I personally would object to dressage for the same reason I object to the likes of art swimming and breakdancing, except that dressage was part of the original games. It therefore gets a grudging pass with me.
Personally, I don't think there should be any sports in summer or winter olympics whuch rely on judges to tell you how nicely you're doing it. This includes gymnastics. But a friend of mine has suggested a less fundamentalist approach: you can have events which rely on judges, but only if there is a significant element of danger involved. Thus, gymnastics, diving, bmxing in: breaking, surfing, ice dancing out.
Bin off the "artistic swimming," breaking, boxing (too much chance of being corrupt with dodgy judges and the entire IBA debacle), and greco-roman wrestling (sorry, but that's literally just in because of being Olympics, isn't it?). (The only reason I'm fine with dressage continuing is that we're good at it)
Return (in addition to the sports being returned next time, like cricket): - Ballooning (if sailing's fine, ballooning's fine) - Swimming obstacle race - Pistol duelling (they apparently used wax bullets last time; paintballs would be fine)
Add in (in addition to new ones like squash - seriously, artistic swimming was in and this wasn't?): - Larger paintball competition (we can watch from overhead and with drones; this could be really fun) - Hang-gliding competitions (the possibility of co-ordinating with the above so that teams can call in close air support is available for discussion) - Field gun competition to finish off (to effectively substitute for the Ancient Olympic hoplitodromos
I rather like that, but am baffled by the comparison of sailing with ballooning. Sailing is physically challenging as well as requiring skill. I presume with ballooning you just get blown along with the wind so you haven't even got that comparison because tacking on a beat (the most exciting and strenuous part of sailing) will take you into the direction of the wind rather than being blown along by it.
I’m possibly wanting ballooning more than I should. I think a huge ballooning competition would be an epic was to open the Games. Of course, it’s very weather-dependent. If it’s blowing a hooly, say, they might have to cancel it. Unless they decide it has to go ahead anyway, in which case it could be even more of a spectacle.
Maybe we could add a propellor, driven from an on-board bicycle to give some more control and direction. Probably getting a bit too silly, though.
(Considers breaking, synchronised drowning, and dressage). Nah, let’s go with it.
Should be worth watching at the Stornoway Olympics.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
Tories are only interested in leaving their house to their grandchildren.
On medals, I'm interested in the -6 on cycling golds, and why the total is so low.
I think the absence of Charlotte Dujardin the horse dancer, after whipping her horse abusively (24 strokes in one minute), may be significant. She has 3 golds, 1 silver and 2 bronzes from the last 3 Olympics.
On the cycling, I think two points:
1 - I get the impression that the training regime is marginally less hard charging than previously, although it is also the case that other countries have had 15-20 years to catch up since we really started getting our edge in 2004.
2 - I'm interested in whether our poisonous road culture, which is notably worse than most others in Western Europe in attitudes, has any long term impact on participation.
I haven't been able to find enough data to inform on this one (I suspect this impacts at this time more on wider professional cycling and where they choose to base), yet it is only 9 weeks since Kate Richardson had to withdraw from the Womens Tour de France after a driver of a 4x4 left her with a fractured scapula after hitting her when squeezing past on a 4m wide country lane near Holmfirth.
Do you think our "poisonous road culture" didn't exist 10 to 20 years ago?
I think it did. And I'd date it probably to starting in the 1920s or 1930s, and intensifying from the 1970s onwards with number of vehicles on our roads going from ~12-15m in 1970 to 41m+ now.
There's easy to find online media coverage from the 2000s or earlier.
I'm currently reading a history of cycle cammers, which slightly surprised me with how recently and how rapidly it has grown, even though I have been following the area for nearly a decade. The first known conviction for a third party report of an offence ie cammer as witness not victim, is reported as 2012. First vids online date from ~2006-7, and first crime reports as victim from ~2010.
A large majority of cammers have always been in motor vehicles, so there are probably earlier cases of dash cammers or motorcyclist cammers doing the same.
I think what has changed is visibility and public debate, and therefore an opportunity for voluntary or involuntary education, as from cammers we have a tool to drag the issue out into the public space and talk about it.
We have to due to traffic police numbers having been ~halved since 2000, and the speciality abolished in ~2002 by Mr Blair - one thing he got wrong.
I quite enjoyed watching this sort of 'city of the future' about Glasgow from 1971.
"This is the story of the most astonishing and destructive thing never to happen to London. It was far-reaching and visionary; planning on a scale rarely seen in this country. It was a transport scheme to end all transport schemes. And it was utterly unacceptable to the general public."
On medals, I'm interested in the -6 on cycling golds, and why the total is so low.
I think the absence of Charlotte Dujardin the horse dancer, after whipping her horse abusively (24 strokes in one minute), may be significant. She has 3 golds, 1 silver and 2 bronzes from the last 3 Olympics.
On the cycling, I think two points:
1 - I get the impression that the training regime is marginally less hard charging than previously, although it is also the case that other countries have had 15-20 years to catch up since we really started getting our edge in 2004.
2 - I'm interested in whether our poisonous road culture, which is notably worse than most others in Western Europe in attitudes, has any long term impact on participation.
I haven't been able to find enough data to inform on this one (I suspect this impacts at this time more on wider professional cycling and where they choose to base), yet it is only 9 weeks since Kate Richardson had to withdraw from the Womens Tour de France after a driver of a 4x4 left her with a fractured scapula after hitting her when squeezing past on a 4m wide country lane near Holmfirth.
Do you think our "poisonous road culture" didn't exist 10 to 20 years ago?
I think it did. And I'd date it probably to starting in the 1920s or 1930s, and intensifying from the 1970s onwards with number of vehicles on our roads going from ~12-15m in 1970 to 41m+ now.
There's easy to find online media coverage from the 2000s or earlier.
I'm currently reading a history of cycle cammers, which slightly surprised me with how recently and how rapidly it has grown, even though I have been following the area for nearly a decade. The first known conviction for a third party report of an offence ie cammer as witness not victim, is reported as 2012. First vids online date from ~2006-7, and first crime reports as victim from ~2010.
A large majority of cammers have always been in motor vehicles, so there are probably earlier cases of dash cammers or motorcyclist cammers doing the same.
I think what has changed is visibility and public debate, and therefore an opportunity for voluntary or involuntary education, as from cammers we have a tool to drag the issue out into the public space and talk about it.
We have to due to traffic police numbers having been ~halved since 2000, and the speciality abolished in ~2002 by Mr Blair - one thing he got wrong.
Yep, it's worth reminding people that the biggest "grasses" are motorists themselves. Indeed, I'm aware of one conviction for seriously injuring a cyclist was only secured due to a friendly driver providing their footage in court (via a pack of DVDs - Scottish courts are rubbish, and the 4k footage provided to the police ends up potato quality).
Bin off the "artistic swimming," breaking, boxing (too much chance of being corrupt with dodgy judges and the entire IBA debacle), and greco-roman wrestling (sorry, but that's literally just in because of being Olympics, isn't it?). (The only reason I'm fine with dressage continuing is that we're good at it)
Return (in addition to the sports being returned next time, like cricket): - Ballooning (if sailing's fine, ballooning's fine) - Swimming obstacle race - Pistol duelling (they apparently used wax bullets last time; paintballs would be fine)
Add in (in addition to new ones like squash - seriously, artistic swimming was in and this wasn't?): - Larger paintball competition (we can watch from overhead and with drones; this could be really fun) - Hang-gliding competitions (the possibility of co-ordinating with the above so that teams can call in close air support is available for discussion) - Field gun competition to finish off (to effectively substitute for the Ancient Olympic hoplitodromos
Some excellent suggestions there, Andy!
I would add that I personally would object to dressage for the same reason I object to the likes of art swimming and breakdancing, except that dressage was part of the original games. It therefore gets a grudging pass with me.
Personally, I don't think there should be any sports in summer or winter olympics whuch rely on judges to tell you how nicely you're doing it. This includes gymnastics. But a friend of mine has suggested a less fundamentalist approach: you can have events which rely on judges, but only if there is a significant element of danger involved. Thus, gymnastics, diving, bmxing in: breaking, surfing, ice dancing out.
Are you sure that's a good idea? Our nuclear missiles never work when we test them, and we can't test them very often for fear of becoming a laughing stock.
I know there's been some criticism, but I think these Olympic games have been wonderful. Vive la France!
Yes. And for some reason I've just had a real burst of sadness about leaving the European Union. Not anger, that's gone now, just sadness.
When we belonged to the EU we owned Paris, Berlin, Madrid, Lisbon, Prague and Rome. We owned the Rhone, the Rhine, the Danube, the Pyrenees and the Alps. We could turn up to visit or live there and no one could stop us and chuck us out after 90 days. But we exchanged all that for some magic beans in a bag marked " sovereignty".
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
Tories should embrace the National Trust.
The Tories should embrace all the things that Britain is great at and that get centrist dads and moms nostalgic: the National Trust, the BBC, our university sector, the NHS. Talk about British exceptionalism. Leaving the immigrant-bashing and Islamophobia to Reform UK.
You'd have to be living in the past to think that lot were great.
Why don't you add FA Cup final Saturday, Ford Cortinas and Berni Inns.
Overall lots to think about for Team GB. I think Cycling and Rowing are definitely on the up, Sailing seems to be nowhere, athletics had three near misses for gold but the pipeline looks reasonably good so 2028 could be a banner games for the athletics team.
I also think that a lot of the European countries who did well this time will drop off next time but Australia will likely be even better to get ready for their home games.
We should be aiming for a similar number of medals overall but with a higher win percentage, that should be the focus of the retrospective.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
I don't know if I've recommended you this before, but anyhoo
Bin off the "artistic swimming," breaking, boxing (too much chance of being corrupt with dodgy judges and the entire IBA debacle), and greco-roman wrestling (sorry, but that's literally just in because of being Olympics, isn't it?). (The only reason I'm fine with dressage continuing is that we're good at it)
Return (in addition to the sports being returned next time, like cricket): - Ballooning (if sailing's fine, ballooning's fine) - Swimming obstacle race - Pistol duelling (they apparently used wax bullets last time; paintballs would be fine)
Add in (in addition to new ones like squash - seriously, artistic swimming was in and this wasn't?): - Larger paintball competition (we can watch from overhead and with drones; this could be really fun) - Hang-gliding competitions (the possibility of co-ordinating with the above so that teams can call in close air support is available for discussion) - Field gun competition to finish off (to effectively substitute for the Ancient Olympic hoplitodromos
Some excellent suggestions there, Andy!
I would add that I personally would object to dressage for the same reason I object to the likes of art swimming and breakdancing, except that dressage was part of the original games. It therefore gets a grudging pass with me.
Personally, I don't think there should be any sports in summer or winter olympics whuch rely on judges to tell you how nicely you're doing it. This includes gymnastics. But a friend of mine has suggested a less fundamentalist approach: you can have events which rely on judges, but only if there is a significant element of danger involved. Thus, gymnastics, diving, bmxing in: breaking, surfing, ice dancing out.
I know there's been some criticism, but I think these Olympic games have been wonderful. Vive la France!
I think the sport has been good and Team GB generally delivered for the large funding it gets from the taxpayer and lottery. However some of the commentary has been terrible - Very little explanation or analysis of the actual events but loads of "how everyone is FEELING" and even worse, loads of How difficult it is to do (insert some random part of the event like leading from the front, not leading from the front, having to run in heats , not having to run in heats etc
Oh and never a fan of womens boxing anyway but two of the weights were a farce given the gender rules to allow the gold medal boxers .It was actually grotesque to see the bloodied face of the loser in the final.
Best commentators were Steve Cram (sharp as nails) Michael Johnson Beth Tweddle
On medals, I'm interested in the -6 on cycling golds, and why the total is so low.
I think the absence of Charlotte Dujardin the horse dancer, after whipping her horse abusively (24 strokes in one minute), may be significant. She has 3 golds, 1 silver and 2 bronzes from the last 3 Olympics.
On the cycling, I think two points:
1 - I get the impression that the training regime is marginally less hard charging than previously, although it is also the case that other countries have had 15-20 years to catch up since we really started getting our edge in 2004.
2 - I'm interested in whether our poisonous road culture, which is notably worse than most others in Western Europe in attitudes, has any long term impact on participation.
I haven't been able to find enough data to inform on this one (I suspect this impacts at this time more on wider professional cycling and where they choose to base), yet it is only 9 weeks since Kate Richardson had to withdraw from the Womens Tour de France after a driver of a 4x4 left her with a fractured scapula after hitting her when squeezing past on a 4m wide country lane near Holmfirth.
Do you think our "poisonous road culture" didn't exist 10 to 20 years ago?
I think it did. And I'd date it probably to starting in the 1920s or 1930s, and intensifying from the 1970s onwards with number of vehicles on our roads going from ~12-15m in 1970 to 41m+ now.
There's easy to find online media coverage from the 2000s or earlier.
I'm currently reading a history of cycle cammers, which slightly surprised me with how recently and how rapidly it has grown, even though I have been following the area for nearly a decade. The first known conviction for a third party report of an offence ie cammer as witness not victim, is reported as 2012. First vids online date from ~2006-7, and first crime reports as victim from ~2010.
A large majority of cammers have always been in motor vehicles, so there are probably earlier cases of dash cammers or motorcyclist cammers doing the same.
I think what has changed is visibility and public debate, and therefore an opportunity for voluntary or involuntary education, as from cammers we have a tool to drag the issue out into the public space and talk about it.
We have to due to traffic police numbers having been ~halved since 2000, and the speciality abolished in ~2002 by Mr Blair - one thing he got wrong.
As a non-cycling, non-driving observer, it does seem to me that standards of driving and cycling have dropped. Whether that is due to a greater sense of entitlement, or more crowded roads, or confusing and badly-publicised changes to the Highway Code, I couldn't say.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
If there's a grift in it for them why not?
The simple fact is that austerity decimated civic society and services so the place looks a shambles. After 14 years of Conservative Governments inner cities are derelict, the highways are pot-holed and our green and pleasant land is a repository for fly-tipped waste. I don't suppose resolving all that is high on Labour's to-do list, and it certainly won't be on the next Conservative Government's top fifty agenda.
I thought I'd repeatedly read that inner cities are on the up with lots of new apartments being built and we should empty all the towns and move to the cities or something.
Now I read the inner cities are derelict.
I suspect the truth is somewhere between the extremes.
Bin off the "artistic swimming," breaking, boxing (too much chance of being corrupt with dodgy judges and the entire IBA debacle), and greco-roman wrestling (sorry, but that's literally just in because of being Olympics, isn't it?). (The only reason I'm fine with dressage continuing is that we're good at it)
Return (in addition to the sports being returned next time, like cricket): - Ballooning (if sailing's fine, ballooning's fine) - Swimming obstacle race - Pistol duelling (they apparently used wax bullets last time; paintballs would be fine)
Add in (in addition to new ones like squash - seriously, artistic swimming was in and this wasn't?): - Larger paintball competition (we can watch from overhead and with drones; this could be really fun) - Hang-gliding competitions (the possibility of co-ordinating with the above so that teams can call in close air support is available for discussion) - Field gun competition to finish off (to effectively substitute for the Ancient Olympic hoplitodromos
Some excellent suggestions there, Andy!
I would add that I personally would object to dressage for the same reason I object to the likes of art swimming and breakdancing, except that dressage was part of the original games. It therefore gets a grudging pass with me.
Personally, I don't think there should be any sports in summer or winter olympics whuch rely on judges to tell you how nicely you're doing it. This includes gymnastics. But a friend of mine has suggested a less fundamentalist approach: you can have events which rely on judges, but only if there is a significant element of danger involved. Thus, gymnastics, diving, bmxing in: breaking, surfing, ice dancing out.
Are you sure that's a good idea? Our nuclear missiles never work when we test them, and we can't test them very often for fear of becoming a laughing stock.
I know there's been some criticism, but I think these Olympic games have been wonderful. Vive la France!
I haven't watched much, but I have enjoyed what I have watched. And I'm not the sort to usually like watching sport = aside from motorsport, thatis.
The presentation has been good as well, both at the events and in the studio.
As for our results: we did well. There can be such a fine line between gold, silver and bronze that sometimes it is down to luck on the day. I can't seem much in general to complain about.
Also: for many of these athletes, including those who did not get medals, or those who came last, this games will be the highlight of their lives. They can say they are Olympians. And in that way they've beaten ?all? of us. Congrats to them all.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
Yes, though I imagine the £1,048,250 average house price, 75% of residents with a good education and 82% of residents middle class ABC1 with an average local household income of £68,950 probably helps Richmond upon Thames stay clean and presentable too https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/seatdetails.py?seat=Richmond Park
I know there's been some criticism, but I think these Olympic games have been wonderful. Vive la France!
I think the sport has been good and Team GB generally delivered for the large funding it gets from the taxpayer and lottery. However some of the commentary has been terrible - Very little explanation or analysis of the actual events but loads of "how everyone is FEELING" and even worse, loads of How difficult it is to do (insert some random part of the event like leading from the front, not leading from the front, having to run in heats , not having to run in heats etc
Oh and never a fan of womens boxing anyway but two of the weights were a farce given the gender rules to allow the gold medal boxers .It was actually grotesque to see the bloodied face of the loser in the final
The BBC coverage has been decidedly patchy, and the issues about gender should have been worked out long before. Nothing to do with the French organisers though, and it's those that I'd clap on the back.
Bin off the "artistic swimming," breaking, boxing (too much chance of being corrupt with dodgy judges and the entire IBA debacle), and greco-roman wrestling (sorry, but that's literally just in because of being Olympics, isn't it?). (The only reason I'm fine with dressage continuing is that we're good at it)
Return (in addition to the sports being returned next time, like cricket): - Ballooning (if sailing's fine, ballooning's fine) - Swimming obstacle race - Pistol duelling (they apparently used wax bullets last time; paintballs would be fine)
Add in (in addition to new ones like squash - seriously, artistic swimming was in and this wasn't?): - Larger paintball competition (we can watch from overhead and with drones; this could be really fun) - Hang-gliding competitions (the possibility of co-ordinating with the above so that teams can call in close air support is available for discussion) - Field gun competition to finish off (to effectively substitute for the Ancient Olympic hoplitodromos
Some excellent suggestions there, Andy!
I would add that I personally would object to dressage for the same reason I object to the likes of art swimming and breakdancing, except that dressage was part of the original games. It therefore gets a grudging pass with me.
Personally, I don't think there should be any sports in summer or winter olympics whuch rely on judges to tell you how nicely you're doing it. This includes gymnastics. But a friend of mine has suggested a less fundamentalist approach: you can have events which rely on judges, but only if there is a significant element of danger involved. Thus, gymnastics, diving, bmxing in: breaking, surfing, ice dancing out.
I know there's been some criticism, but I think these Olympic games have been wonderful. Vive la France!
I think the sport has been good and Team GB generally delivered for the large funding it gets from the taxpayer and lottery. However some of the commentary has been terrible - Very little explanation or analysis of the actual events but loads of "how everyone is FEELING" and even worse, loads of How difficult it is to do (insert some random part of the event like leading from the front, not leading from the front, having to run in heats , not having to run in heats etc
Oh and never a fan of womens boxing anyway but two of the weights were a farce given the gender rules to allow the gold medal boxers .It was actually grotesque to see the bloodied face of the loser in the final
The BBC coverage has been decidedly patchy, and the issues about gender should have been worked out long before. Nothing to do with the French organisers though, and it's those that I'd clap on the back.
Although the French organisers were responsible for the Pool being "too blue" - I kid you not that was complained about by a pundit on the diving to keep with the theme of must making everything being really difficult for the athletes to show how they are all heroes . Apparently London 2012 's pool had a lot of pink in it as well as blue which was better for the divers
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
If there's a grift in it for them why not?
The simple fact is that austerity decimated civic society and services so the place looks a shambles. After 14 years of Conservative Governments inner cities are derelict, the highways are pot-holed and our green and pleasant land is a repository for fly-tipped waste. I don't suppose resolving all that is high on Labour's to-do list, and it certainly won't be on the next Conservative Government's top fifty agenda.
I thought I'd repeatedly read that inner cities are on the up with lots of new apartments being built and we should empty all the towns and move to the cities or something.
Now I read the inner cities are derelict.
I suspect the truth is somewhere between the extremes.
The last Government detested the notion of 15 minute cities. 15 minute cities were "too woke". That's how malign and mad they were.
A Finnish neo-Nazi shared instructions to commit arson and urged people to file false reports in order to waste police resources during the riots last week.
The man in his early twenties, whom The Times is not naming, can be revealed as an instigator of the far-right action last week. He helped run a group chat on the app Telegram, where tens of thousands of people shared ideas for riot locations and hateful content about immigrants and Jewish people.
Social media sites have come under increased scrutiny since the stabbings in Southport. Misinformation about the suspect spread quickly, as well as locations for possible protests and incitement for riots.
The individual is understood to live in southern Finland and began posting extreme right-wing content online as a teenager. According to police records unearthed by journalists at YLE, the Finnish public broadcaster, he was previously investigated by Finnish police for making an illegal threat. He became an administrator for the Southport Wake Up group on Telegram, which became connected to the riots.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
Yes, though I imagine the £1,048,250 average house price, 75% of residents with a good education and 82% of residents middle class ABC1 with an average local household income of £68,950 probably helps Richmond upon Thames stay clean and presentable too https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/seatdetails.py?seat=Richmond Park
And yet, the French manage to make even their poor towns look almost as good, at least in the centre, as the very richest parts of Britain
Something has gone badly wrong with our civic realm, and we CAN fix it. Enough of this pathetic defeatism
Start with shop fronts and signage. Abolish the hideous KEBAB SHOP and CHICKEN SHACK neon and plastic
If you make a town centre pretty and safe, then people will come back, and do more shopping, and dining, and drinking, and that means new places will open, creating a virtuous cycle. We do the opposite. We let our town centres get uglier and scruffier then we wonder why our high streets are deserted
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
You could try visiting some of these towns - you might get a better idea of what you're talking about.
This Olympics closing ceremony is not doing it for me. The commentators seem happy enough so perhaps you need to be there (or maybe I'm a miserable old git).
It seems very bitty with no obvious links from one section to the next, and it looks as if a tourist has pointed a camera at some people having a good time, rather than it having been planned for television. I can see people singing, but not really hear them, and what are they looking at and waving to?
It is said that Hamas have pulled out of ceasefire talks due this week. Given that the US and plenty of Middle East countries were trying to use these talks as way to mitigate against or limit the now long awaited Iranian action, this doesnt bode well. The Iasraelis seem convinced that the Iranians will aim at high profile political & military targets.
Meanwhile, Russian claims that they have halted the Ukrainian advance in Kursk and Belgorod may at last have some truth, at least in part. It appears Ukrainian advances in a number of areas have stopped but they have been saying next to nothing since Day 1, nor have their allies. All the information is out of Russia and its a bit conflicting at times.
As downthread comments on the Olympics, of course it was fantastic, because that event has a soul. London should bid again and UKG should throw the kitchen sink at that bid because it still has the greatest potential in Eureope as a location. No other UK city is of interest to the IOC.
I know there's been some criticism, but I think these Olympic games have been wonderful. Vive la France!
I think the sport has been good and Team GB generally delivered for the large funding it gets from the taxpayer and lottery. However some of the commentary has been terrible - Very little explanation or analysis of the actual events but loads of "how everyone is FEELING" and even worse, loads of How difficult it is to do (insert some random part of the event like leading from the front, not leading from the front, having to run in heats , not having to run in heats etc
Oh and never a fan of womens boxing anyway but two of the weights were a farce given the gender rules to allow the gold medal boxers .It was actually grotesque to see the bloodied face of the loser in the final
The BBC coverage has been decidedly patchy, and the issues about gender should have been worked out long before. Nothing to do with the French organisers though, and it's those that I'd clap on the back.
Although the French organisers were responsible for the Pool being "too blue" - I kid you not that was complained about by a pundit on the diving to keep with the theme of must making everything being really difficult for the athletes to show how they are all heroes . Apparently London 2012 's pool had a lot of pink in it as well as blue which was better for the divers
A while back, I wondered why the dive pool has little streams of water arcing into it below the diving boards. The reason is that the water breaks up the pool's surface by forming ripples, allowing the divers to more easily see it as they do their manoeuvres.
Related to the topic: Turns out that the electoral college advantage swings back and forth between the two parties. For example: "It’s important to remember that the electoral college bias hasn’t favored just Republicans in recent years. As recently as 2012, Democrats actually had an advantage. Barack Obama won the popular vote by 3.9 percentage points — but he also won Colorado, which was the tipping-point state, by 5.4 percentage points. So the electoral college bias in 2012 was 1.5 percentage points in favor of Democrats."
Looking at recent polls, Lenny Bronner concludes: "If these trends continue — and that’s a big if, as there is no doubt this is a close race and polls do and can change — Harris could win the presidential race without as many votes as previous Democratic nominees. That is, as long as she can eke out a victory in the tipping-point state." source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/08/09/harris-popular-vote-electoral-college/
That's so tentative that I am not sure just how useful it is as betting advice, now -- but it does provide one more way to guesstimate the winner -- and there should be much more data avalable before election day.
I know there's been some criticism, but I think these Olympic games have been wonderful. Vive la France!
I think the sport has been good and Team GB generally delivered for the large funding it gets from the taxpayer and lottery. However some of the commentary has been terrible - Very little explanation or analysis of the actual events but loads of "how everyone is FEELING" and even worse, loads of How difficult it is to do (insert some random part of the event like leading from the front, not leading from the front, having to run in heats , not having to run in heats etc
Oh and never a fan of womens boxing anyway but two of the weights were a farce given the gender rules to allow the gold medal boxers .It was actually grotesque to see the bloodied face of the loser in the final
The BBC coverage has been decidedly patchy, and the issues about gender should have been worked out long before. Nothing to do with the French organisers though, and it's those that I'd clap on the back.
The BBC commentators acted as though they were interviewing 5 year old kids after sports day .
I know there's been some criticism, but I think these Olympic games have been wonderful. Vive la France!
Yes. And for some reason I've just had a real burst of sadness about leaving the European Union. Not anger, that's gone now, just sadness.
Well then, all you had to do was give us one single referendum - just one, any one, on Maastricht or Lisbon or the Consitution - and we would have had our say and we'd have stayed in the EU but with a different arrangement. And yet you didn't, did you? In your odious arrogance and cowardice you guys - and the wet Tories - kept putting off that date with democracy, so in the end the whole fucking thing blew up
LEARN FROM THIS
The Establishment is making the exact same mistake with immigration. Ignoring the people, again and again, thereby steering the entite train towards disaster
I'm thinking of not going abroad this autumn, and instead walking from home
There's a walk that starts in Marlborough and is footpath all the way to Lyme Regis. That's 126 miles, so five days for me
My parents are staying in Sandbanks when I'm thinking of doing the walk, so maybe a couple of days coastal walk from Lyme Regis to there to make it a week's walk before a few days in Sandbanks
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
Yes, though I imagine the £1,048,250 average house price, 75% of residents with a good education and 82% of residents middle class ABC1 with an average local household income of £68,950 probably helps Richmond upon Thames stay clean and presentable too https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/seatdetails.py?seat=Richmond Park
And yet, the French manage to make even their poor towns look almost as good, at least in the centre, as the very richest parts of Britain
Something has gone badly wrong with our civic realm, and we CAN fix it. Enough of this pathetic defeatism
Start with shop fronts and signage. Abolish the hideous KEBAB SHOP and CHICKEN SHACK neon and plastic
If you make a town centre pretty and safe, then people will come back, and do more shopping, and dining, and drinking, and that means new places will open, creating a virtuous cycle. We do the opposite. We let our town centres get uglier and scruffier then we wonder why our high streets are deserted
A lot of the garish plastic shop signs were made in China, in an early version of drop-shipping, or a trial run for Covid ppe. Local entrepreneur sells sign to shopkeeper, then orders it from China, and fits it in a few weeks. I knew a couple of people doing this.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
Yes, though I imagine the £1,048,250 average house price, 75% of residents with a good education and 82% of residents middle class ABC1 with an average local household income of £68,950 probably helps Richmond upon Thames stay clean and presentable too https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/seatdetails.py?seat=Richmond Park
And yet, the French manage to make even their poor towns look almost as good, at least in the centre, as the very richest parts of Britain
Something has gone badly wrong with our civic realm, and we CAN fix it. Enough of this pathetic defeatism
Start with shop fronts and signage. Abolish the hideous KEBAB SHOP and CHICKEN SHACK neon and plastic
If you make a town centre pretty and safe, then people will come back, and do more shopping, and dining, and drinking, and that means new places will open, creating a virtuous cycle. We do the opposite. We let our town centres get uglier and scruffier then we wonder why our high streets are deserted
Aye but the "torch regulations" brigade will come along and shout about NIMBY scum.
It's mad that you can have a lovely Victorian/Edwardian/even Georgian set of flats and some arsehole can rip the shop front out and cover it plastic crap.
Any attempt to improve the public realm in the kind of "left behind" towns you describe is met with feral opposition from the very people who have overseen the decline in those towns.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
Tories should embrace the National Trust.
Once upon a time, they did - nowadays NT seem to be mainly focused on making people ashamed to be British.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
Yes, though I imagine the £1,048,250 average house price, 75% of residents with a good education and 82% of residents middle class ABC1 with an average local household income of £68,950 probably helps Richmond upon Thames stay clean and presentable too https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/seatdetails.py?seat=Richmond Park
And yet, the French manage to make even their poor towns look almost as good, at least in the centre, as the very richest parts of Britain
Something has gone badly wrong with our civic realm, and we CAN fix it. Enough of this pathetic defeatism
Start with shop fronts and signage. Abolish the hideous KEBAB SHOP and CHICKEN SHACK neon and plastic
If you make a town centre pretty and safe, then people will come back, and do more shopping, and dining, and drinking, and that means new places will open, creating a virtuous cycle. We do the opposite. We let our town centres get uglier and scruffier then we wonder why our high streets are deserted
If you want to improve town centres then:
1) Turn empty Georgian/Victorian retail units into housing
2) Demolish 1960s retail units
3) Crack down on petty crime
4) Get rid of all the druggies / drifters / beggars / homeless / purposeless immigrants who wander about them
In short you need to make the experience more enjoyable than a trip to the supermarket.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
Tories are only interested in leaving their house to their grandchildren.
I don't think that's true, HYUFD's mania on the subject aside. But I was talking about conservative themes which the Tories ought to be using to develop a wider offer.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
If there's a grift in it for them why not?
The simple fact is that austerity decimated civic society and services so the place looks a shambles. After 14 years of Conservative Governments inner cities are derelict, the highways are pot-holed and our green and pleasant land is a repository for fly-tipped waste. I don't suppose resolving all that is high on Labour's to-do list, and it certainly won't be on the next Conservative Government's top fifty agenda.
It absolutely should be. Its one way they can win again
I work in the shit-shovelling industry and local authorities are penniless and can't afford to chase fly-tippers. The environmental regulators are underfunded, they are not fulfilling their obligations. Landfill sites are stinking so badly because they are not inspected by the EA, NRW, SEPA and NIEA to the extent they used to be. I used to get a weekly inspection at a hazardous waste transfer station during the last Labour Government, that same site gets a random visit every 18 months. Water companies and farmers have been allowed to pump raw sewage and slurry into surface waters in their quest for profit and shareholders dividends.
What the f*** is Sean Thomas drinking when he suggests that the Tories will clean up the mess? The Tories trashed the place.Of course, Thomas is on the payroll of the Conservatives's in-house comic!
I dunno who this Sean Thomas guy is, apart from my stalker who agrees with me, but I agree with YOU
The last Tory government's record on all this was shameful. Utterly shameful. However I do not believe Labour will be any better and they will probably build even uglier houses and towers, it's what they do
The Tories need to completely revamp themselves, and acquire entirely new purposes. This could be one of them. Make Britain Beautiful Again. eg Rebuild our bombed cities from the war as they were. Exeter and Coventry, Derby and Birmingham. Do it. Do what the Poles, the Czechs, the French and the Germans have done, and are still doing. And if an architect objects, hurl her into the most polluted stretch of the Wye
There have been numerous videos of captured Russian soldiers in Kursk and numbers like 500-1,000 are being bandied about as a total number of Russian soldiers captured in the six days of the operation.
There keep on being claims by Russians of Ukrainians crossing the border at other points - this time further north in Kursk - but nothing solid, so could be panic-fuelled rumours.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
Yes, though I imagine the £1,048,250 average house price, 75% of residents with a good education and 82% of residents middle class ABC1 with an average local household income of £68,950 probably helps Richmond upon Thames stay clean and presentable too https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/seatdetails.py?seat=Richmond Park
And yet, the French manage to make even their poor towns look almost as good, at least in the centre, as the very richest parts of Britain
Something has gone badly wrong with our civic realm, and we CAN fix it. Enough of this pathetic defeatism
Start with shop fronts and signage. Abolish the hideous KEBAB SHOP and CHICKEN SHACK neon and plastic
If you make a town centre pretty and safe, then people will come back, and do more shopping, and dining, and drinking, and that means new places will open, creating a virtuous cycle. We do the opposite. We let our town centres get uglier and scruffier then we wonder why our high streets are deserted
If you want to improve town centres then:
1) Turn empty Georgian/Victorian retail units into housing
2) Demolish 1960s retail units
3) Crack down on petty crime
4) Get rid of all the druggies / drifters / beggars / homeless / purposeless immigrants who wander about them
In short you need to make the experience more enjoyable than a trip to the supermarket.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
If there's a grift in it for them why not?
The simple fact is that austerity decimated civic society and services so the place looks a shambles. After 14 years of Conservative Governments inner cities are derelict, the highways are pot-holed and our green and pleasant land is a repository for fly-tipped waste. I don't suppose resolving all that is high on Labour's to-do list, and it certainly won't be on the next Conservative Government's top fifty agenda.
I thought I'd repeatedly read that inner cities are on the up with lots of new apartments being built and we should empty all the towns and move to the cities or something.
Now I read the inner cities are derelict.
I suspect the truth is somewhere between the extremes.
The last Government detested the notion of 15 minute cities. 15 minute cities were "too woke". That's how malign and mad they were.
There's nothing stopping people living in '15 minute cities' if they want to.
Its trying to oppose '15 minute cities' on places where it cannot work where the problem is.
Last day in Belgium. Turned up at a small coastal resort I'd never heard of - Wenduine - which was astonishingly busy. A festival of Americana was underway. This feels a weirdly appropriate way to end my stay here.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
Yes, though I imagine the £1,048,250 average house price, 75% of residents with a good education and 82% of residents middle class ABC1 with an average local household income of £68,950 probably helps Richmond upon Thames stay clean and presentable too https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/seatdetails.py?seat=Richmond Park
And yet, the French manage to make even their poor towns look almost as good, at least in the centre, as the very richest parts of Britain
Something has gone badly wrong with our civic realm, and we CAN fix it. Enough of this pathetic defeatism
Start with shop fronts and signage. Abolish the hideous KEBAB SHOP and CHICKEN SHACK neon and plastic
If you make a town centre pretty and safe, then people will come back, and do more shopping, and dining, and drinking, and that means new places will open, creating a virtuous cycle. We do the opposite. We let our town centres get uglier and scruffier then we wonder why our high streets are deserted
Some of them, go to a few of the ex industrial towns that voted for Le Pen or Melenchon or the Paris suburbs and you will find it rather less pretty.
Though I agree we need to support our high streets and shops with tax breaks and shopping and free parking and ensure they aren't mainly takeaways, nail bars, estate agents and hairdressers and coffee shops.
The French in their small towns and provincial cities also still prefer to shop in person for clothes, browse at bookstops and shop for food at butchers, fish and vegetable markets and delicatessens rather than order most of it on Amazon and Ocado and Asda online which helps their high streets stay alive
Whilst speaking of the Olympics , there is a respected book in sports coaching called "The medal factory - The cost of gold" by Kenny Pryce about how British Cycling took the Lottery money back in the mid 2000s to create the gold medal success it did - and the then fallout from it - accusations of bullying etc - UK sport turned their backs on them when it became woke to which was disgraceful given British Cycling did everything asked of them by UK Sport at the time (ie to win gold medals )
A 1% lead on the economy isn't really a huge margin for Harris though, especially given Hillary won the popular vote by 2% and lost still. It also depends in which swing states she has that lead or not
Harris leading on the economy is massive when she leads on everything else and the economy was Trump's last straw to grasp to.
She doesn't lead on immigration and the border where Trump is clearly ahead
How did you manage to paint yourself into the only-Trump-supporter-on-PB corner?
Because
Here's What Meghan Markle Said About Kamala Harris Back in 2020
"I'm so excited to see that kind of representation," the Duchess of Sussex said.
I've actually heard this reconstruction from the Deskford carnyx in the National Museum. Like something out of C. Julius Caesar De Bello Gallico. I *think* the reconstruction is also on display but am not sure.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
If there's a grift in it for them why not?
The simple fact is that austerity decimated civic society and services so the place looks a shambles. After 14 years of Conservative Governments inner cities are derelict, the highways are pot-holed and our green and pleasant land is a repository for fly-tipped waste. I don't suppose resolving all that is high on Labour's to-do list, and it certainly won't be on the next Conservative Government's top fifty agenda.
I thought I'd repeatedly read that inner cities are on the up with lots of new apartments being built and we should empty all the towns and move to the cities or something.
Now I read the inner cities are derelict.
I suspect the truth is somewhere between the extremes.
The last Government detested the notion of 15 minute cities. 15 minute cities were "too woke". That's how malign and mad they were.
There's nothing stopping people living in '15 minute cities' if they want to.
Its trying to oppose '15 minute cities' on places where it cannot work where the problem is.
The last government tried to ban 15 minute cities where they were already present ...
I'm thinking of not going abroad this autumn, and instead walking from home
There's a walk that starts in Marlborough and is footpath all the way to Lyme Regis. That's 126 miles, so five days for me
My parents are staying in Sandbanks when I'm thinking of doing the walk, so maybe a couple of days coastal walk from Lyme Regis to there to make it a week's walk before a few days in Sandbanks
It's actually part of a longer walk from Norfolk; the Peddar's Way down to Ivinghoe Beacon near Tring; then the Ridgeway to Avebury, then the Wessex Ridgeway from there to Lyme Regis.
In fact, I listened to the negotiations for the government back after the 2010 GE whist wild camping in a field on that trail. And I *may* have seen Madonna in a pub one lunchtime; there were two women sitting at the next table, one of whom looked very much you would imagine her to look in everyday clothes, and I think there was one discrete security guard nearby. And no, I did not go up to ask; I just let them get on with their conversation. Later on I discovered that she and Guy Ritchie owned a nearby estate, though against that, they had got divorced a couple of years earlier.
It was a: "I'm sure that's Madonna sitting over there!" moment.
Ukraine has just bombed cooling systems at the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant — Europe’s largest plant.
Anything official?
Russians started a fire with tyres in the cooling towers. This is presumably to cause enough damage that it will take a long time to get the station generating electricity when they are forced to withdraw.
You're following the wrong people on twitter for your news if that's what you're reading.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
If there's a grift in it for them why not?
The simple fact is that austerity decimated civic society and services so the place looks a shambles. After 14 years of Conservative Governments inner cities are derelict, the highways are pot-holed and our green and pleasant land is a repository for fly-tipped waste. I don't suppose resolving all that is high on Labour's to-do list, and it certainly won't be on the next Conservative Government's top fifty agenda.
I thought I'd repeatedly read that inner cities are on the up with lots of new apartments being built and we should empty all the towns and move to the cities or something.
Now I read the inner cities are derelict.
I suspect the truth is somewhere between the extremes.
The last Government detested the notion of 15 minute cities. 15 minute cities were "too woke". That's how malign and mad they were.
There's nothing stopping people living in '15 minute cities' if they want to.
Its trying to oppose '15 minute cities' on places where it cannot work where the problem is.
Where wouldn't it work?
80% of people in the UK live in urban areas, and even people who live in small rural villages take a great deal of pride in their local pub, shop, doctor, dentist. 15 minutes is nearly a mile by foot, perhaps 3 miles by bike. That's a big area.
You get a few people living in seriously remote spots in the Highlands, Hebrides and so on. But no one is suggesting trying to help those folks out (sadly).
Ukraine has just bombed cooling systems at the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant — Europe’s largest plant.
Anything official?
There's pictures of fire under one of the cooling towers, with claims that Russians set fire to car tyres underneath it. I *doubt* it was a bomb, given the towers are still standing, but could be wrong.
I'm thinking of not going abroad this autumn, and instead walking from home
There's a walk that starts in Marlborough and is footpath all the way to Lyme Regis. That's 126 miles, so five days for me
My parents are staying in Sandbanks when I'm thinking of doing the walk, so maybe a couple of days coastal walk from Lyme Regis to there to make it a week's walk before a few days in Sandbanks
Ooh, nice. Only slight point is that the landslips seem bad this year so don't be too surprised if you have a diversion or two in the Lyme-Abbotsbury sector. Also a diversion may be needed to the W of Kimmeridge thanks to army training. But the Jurassic Coast path website will have that taped.
They also charge a small fortune to see the swannery at Abbotsbury so I'm not sure if the coast is accessible there, but there is a very nice walk into the village with a hilltop chapel louring above, and a magnificent abbatial barn.
Ukraine has just bombed cooling systems at the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant — Europe’s largest plant.
Anything official?
There's pictures of fire under one of the cooling towers, with claims that Russians set fire to car tyres underneath it. I *doubt* it was a bomb, given the towers are still standing, but could be wrong.
Ukraine has just bombed cooling systems at the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant — Europe’s largest plant.
Anything official?
Russians started a fire with tyres in the cooling towers. This is presumably to cause enough damage that it will take a long time to get the station generating electricity when they are forced to withdraw.
You're following the wrong people on twitter for your news if that's what you're reading.
Ukraine has just bombed cooling systems at the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant — Europe’s largest plant.
Anything official?
There's pictures of fire under one of the cooling towers, with claims that Russians set fire to car tyres underneath it. I *doubt* it was a bomb, given the towers are still standing, but could be wrong.
If anyone wants to create your 15-minute city boundary, you can create one using google maps. Layers > More > Map tools > Travel time.
A typical low density rural Scottish town of 10,000 can be covered by two or three. Ullapool is almost a perfect fit for one. Stirling would be 6. Aberdeen about 15.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
If there's a grift in it for them why not?
The simple fact is that austerity decimated civic society and services so the place looks a shambles. After 14 years of Conservative Governments inner cities are derelict, the highways are pot-holed and our green and pleasant land is a repository for fly-tipped waste. I don't suppose resolving all that is high on Labour's to-do list, and it certainly won't be on the next Conservative Government's top fifty agenda.
I thought I'd repeatedly read that inner cities are on the up with lots of new apartments being built and we should empty all the towns and move to the cities or something.
Now I read the inner cities are derelict.
I suspect the truth is somewhere between the extremes.
The last Government detested the notion of 15 minute cities. 15 minute cities were "too woke". That's how malign and mad they were.
There's nothing stopping people living in '15 minute cities' if they want to.
Its trying to oppose '15 minute cities' on places where it cannot work where the problem is.
Where wouldn't it work?
80% of people in the UK live in urban areas, and even people who live in small rural villages take a great deal of pride in their local pub, shop, doctor, dentist. 15 minutes is nearly a mile by foot, perhaps 3 miles by bike. That's a big area.
You get a few people living in seriously remote spots in the Highlands, Hebrides and so on. But no one is suggesting trying to help those folks out (sadly).
For starters you would need to live within a 15 minute walk of a big supermarket.
Preferably more than one - people like a choice.
Preferably less than 15 minutes as who wants to carry their supermarket shopping for that long, especially in the dark or in bad weather.
And no a 'city' or 'local' sized store will not work, it has to be full sized, and nor will some corner shop.
Ukraine has just bombed cooling systems at the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant — Europe’s largest plant.
Anything official?
There's pictures of fire under one of the cooling towers, with claims that Russians set fire to car tyres underneath it. I *doubt* it was a bomb, given the towers are still standing, but could be wrong.
Oh good sounds pretty dangerous thing to fuck about with.
Cooling towers? Not so much. Some have thousands of wooden slats in to increase the water's surface area, but that very much depends on the type.
Not everything in a nuclear power plant involves radioactivity. I also believe (but might be wrong) that the Zap plant is currently shut down.
It's in a cold shutdown, but still needs an electricity supply to keep the nuclear material cold.
A fire is a dangerous thing. Easy to lose control of it once it has started.
This only makes sense to me as the Russians causing as much damage as possible before withdrawing, which makes me hopeful that the Ukrainian attack into Kursk has down more damage to Russia than we can see.
But the Russians sometimes do things that don't make sense, so it might be just random destruction and petty revenge.
This Olympics closing ceremony is not doing it for me. The commentators seem happy enough so perhaps you need to be there (or maybe I'm a miserable old git).
It seems very bitty with no obvious links from one section to the next, and it looks as if a tourist has pointed a camera at some people having a good time, rather than it having been planned for television. I can see people singing, but not really hear them, and what are they looking at and waving to?
On subsidizing sports through a lottery: If it provides places for your citizens to exercise, or even encourages them to do so, it might be a good investment in better health, given the importance of exercise to health. (I am serious when I urge Nick Palmer to bring in cross country skiing to his localities with, if necessary, artificial snow. Swimming is about as good as XC skiing, so building facilities for thar makes sense, too.)
I'm thinking of not going abroad this autumn, and instead walking from home
There's a walk that starts in Marlborough and is footpath all the way to Lyme Regis. That's 126 miles, so five days for me
My parents are staying in Sandbanks when I'm thinking of doing the walk, so maybe a couple of days coastal walk from Lyme Regis to there to make it a week's walk before a few days in Sandbanks
It's actually part of a longer walk from Norfolk; the Peddar's Way down to Ivinghoe Beacon near Tring; then the Ridgeway to Avebury, then the Wessex Ridgeway from there to Lyme Regis.
In fact, I listened to the negotiations for the government back after the 2010 GE whist wild camping in a field on that trail. And I *may* have seen Madonna in a pub one lunchtime; there were two women sitting at the next table, one of whom looked very much you would imagine her to look in everyday clothes, and I think there was one discrete security guard nearby. And no, I did not go up to ask; I just let them get on with their conversation. Later on I discovered that she and Guy Ritchie owned a nearby estate, though against that, they had got divorced a couple of years earlier.
It was a: "I'm sure that's Madonna sitting over there!" moment.
Was it her? I've no idea.
I know it's only part of the walk, and I'm I'm obviously going to have to do the rest of it to Norfolk!
I found the link I posted by looking up Treacle Bolly, the path between Marlborough and Preshute. It happens to be be the start of the Marlborough leg of the walk
One of the articles I read this morning about Treacle Bolly was this one with some interesting etymological suggestions
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
I sketched out an idea for a thread header about this a while back. Possibly a new raison d'etre for the Tories: making Britain beautiful. Somewhere we can be proud to leave to our grandchildren.
If there's a grift in it for them why not?
The simple fact is that austerity decimated civic society and services so the place looks a shambles. After 14 years of Conservative Governments inner cities are derelict, the highways are pot-holed and our green and pleasant land is a repository for fly-tipped waste. I don't suppose resolving all that is high on Labour's to-do list, and it certainly won't be on the next Conservative Government's top fifty agenda.
I thought I'd repeatedly read that inner cities are on the up with lots of new apartments being built and we should empty all the towns and move to the cities or something.
Now I read the inner cities are derelict.
I suspect the truth is somewhere between the extremes.
The last Government detested the notion of 15 minute cities. 15 minute cities were "too woke". That's how malign and mad they were.
There's nothing stopping people living in '15 minute cities' if they want to.
Its trying to oppose '15 minute cities' on places where it cannot work where the problem is.
Where wouldn't it work?
80% of people in the UK live in urban areas, and even people who live in small rural villages take a great deal of pride in their local pub, shop, doctor, dentist. 15 minutes is nearly a mile by foot, perhaps 3 miles by bike. That's a big area.
You get a few people living in seriously remote spots in the Highlands, Hebrides and so on. But no one is suggesting trying to help those folks out (sadly).
For starters you would need to live within a 15 minute walk of a big supermarket.
Preferably more than one - people like a choice.
Preferably less than 15 minutes as who wants to carry their supermarket shopping for that long, especially in the dark or in bad weather.
And no a 'city' or 'local' sized store will not work, it has to be full sized, and nor will some corner shop.
Why would you need a big supermarket inside your 15 minute city when you can just drive to one? What else do you want - an airport?!
I think you've fallen for this conspiracy theory that it's about trapping people in zones. It's just about providing local services, locally. Oddly enough, "would you like to be able to pop round to the dentist" has stunning levels of support.
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
Yes, though I imagine the £1,048,250 average house price, 75% of residents with a good education and 82% of residents middle class ABC1 with an average local household income of £68,950 probably helps Richmond upon Thames stay clean and presentable too https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/seatdetails.py?seat=Richmond Park
And yet, the French manage to make even their poor towns look almost as good, at least in the centre, as the very richest parts of Britain
Something has gone badly wrong with our civic realm, and we CAN fix it. Enough of this pathetic defeatism
Start with shop fronts and signage. Abolish the hideous KEBAB SHOP and CHICKEN SHACK neon and plastic
If you make a town centre pretty and safe, then people will come back, and do more shopping, and dining, and drinking, and that means new places will open, creating a virtuous cycle. We do the opposite. We let our town centres get uglier and scruffier then we wonder why our high streets are deserted
Some of them, go to a few of the ex industrial towns that voted for Le Pen or Melenchon or the Paris suburbs and you will find it rather less pretty.
Though I agree we need to support our high streets and shops with tax breaks and shopping and free parking and ensure they aren't mainly takeaways, nail bars, estate agents and hairdressers and coffee shops.
The French in their small towns and provincial cities also still prefer to shop in person for clothes, browse at bookstops and shop for food at butchers, fish and vegetable markets and delicatessens rather than order most of it on Amazon and Ocado and Asda online which helps their high streets stay alive
But even their left behind towns are enviable
I've just been to a French town that voted first for Le Pen, and then, second Zemmour and the extreme right! Macron was nowhere
It was Beziers, and the centre is, yes, beautiful, with nice street furniture and lovely cobbled squares. In Britain it would be one of our loveliest towns
Having been mean about Britain for weeks, gotta say Richmond riverside looks pretty good this evening
Somehow we need to make all the left behind towns have a hint of Richmond upon Thames. It’s not going to be easy - but we really really really need to try
Cleaning out town centres, getting rid of litter, erasing graffiti, giving little towns a reason to be proud. That’s the way. The French do it. We can, too
Yes, though I imagine the £1,048,250 average house price, 75% of residents with a good education and 82% of residents middle class ABC1 with an average local household income of £68,950 probably helps Richmond upon Thames stay clean and presentable too https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/seatdetails.py?seat=Richmond Park
In the fag packet Google sheets analysis I did recently, it's one of the worst councils in the country for building new homes too.
Comments
But no prize for coming first...
Duelling (FALKEN'S MAZE)
Duelling (BLACK JACK)
Duelling (GIN RUMMY)
Duelling (HEARTS)
Duelling (BRIDGE)
Duelling (CHECKERS)
Duelling (CHESS)
Duelling (POKER)
Duelling (FIGHTER COMBAT)
Duelling (GUERRILLA ENGAGEMENT)
Duelling (DESERT WARFARE)
Duelling (AIR-TO-GROUND ACTIONS)
Duelling (THEATERWIDE TACTICAL WARFARE)
Duelling (THEATERWIDE BIOTOXIC AND CHEMICAL WARFARE)
Duelling (GLOBAL THERMONUCLEAR WAR)
I also think that a lot of the European countries who did well this time will drop off next time but Australia will likely be even better to get ready for their home games.
We should be aiming for a similar number of medals overall but with a higher win percentage, that should be the focus of the retrospective.
https://x.com/aTeXan575/status/1822400536723001393
(First bit is a little ropey - but give it a mo)
There's easy to find online media coverage from the 2000s or earlier.
I'm currently reading a history of cycle cammers, which slightly surprised me with how recently and how rapidly it has grown, even though I have been following the area for nearly a decade. The first known conviction for a third party report of an offence ie cammer as witness not victim, is reported as 2012. First vids online date from ~2006-7, and first crime reports as victim from ~2010.
This is the first 3rd party report vid from 2012 by CycleGaz:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZCS3FLgYWM
A large majority of cammers have always been in motor vehicles, so there are probably earlier cases of dash cammers or motorcyclist cammers doing the same.
I think what has changed is visibility and public debate, and therefore an opportunity for voluntary or involuntary education, as from cammers we have a tool to drag the issue out into the public space and talk about it.
We have to due to traffic police numbers having been ~halved since 2000, and the speciality abolished in ~2002 by Mr Blair - one thing he got wrong.
Balloons and Blunderbusses.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nofEIB9fS04
Surprisingly, demolishing half the city to make space for motorways is the way to go!
Quarterstaff
Longbow
I work in the shit-shovelling industry and local authorities are penniless and can't afford to chase fly-tippers. The environmental regulators are underfunded, they are not fulfilling their obligations. Landfill sites are stinking so badly because they are not inspected by the EA, NRW, SEPA and NIEA to the extent they used to be. I used to get a weekly inspection at a hazardous waste transfer station during the last Labour Government, that same site gets a random visit every 18 months. Water companies and farmers have been allowed to pump raw sewage and slurry into surface waters in their quest for profit and shareholders dividends.
What the f*** is Sean Thomas drinking when he suggests that the Tories will clean up the mess? The Tories trashed the place.Of course, Thomas is on the payroll of the Conservatives's in-house comic!
"This is the story of the most astonishing and destructive thing never to happen to London. It was far-reaching and visionary; planning on a scale rarely seen in this country. It was a transport scheme to end all transport schemes. And it was utterly unacceptable to the general public."
From February: Trident missile test fails for second time in a row
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-68355395
My entry:
What A Man by Linda Lyndell (1968)
https://youtu.be/qMfG-bX7NxI
Why don't you add FA Cup final Saturday, Ford Cortinas and Berni Inns.
https://nitter.poast.org/createstreets
Duelling (banjos)
Oh and never a fan of womens boxing anyway but two of the weights were a farce given the gender rules to allow the gold medal boxers .It was actually grotesque to see the bloodied face of the loser in the final.
Best commentators were
Steve Cram (sharp as nails)
Michael Johnson
Beth Tweddle
Most of the rest were terrible
Now I read the inner cities are derelict.
I suspect the truth is somewhere between the extremes.
The presentation has been good as well, both at the events and in the studio.
As for our results: we did well. There can be such a fine line between gold, silver and bronze that sometimes it is down to luck on the day. I can't seem much in general to complain about.
Also: for many of these athletes, including those who did not get medals, or those who came last, this games will be the highlight of their lives. They can say they are Olympians. And in that way they've beaten ?all? of us. Congrats to them all.
https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/seatdetails.py?seat=Richmond Park
It was invented by the French in the persons of Monsieur de Grandpré and Monsieur le Pique in 1808.
https://blog.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/2012/08/24/the-first-duel-fought-in-hot-air-balloons-paris-1808/
Something has gone badly wrong with our civic realm, and we CAN fix it. Enough of this pathetic defeatism
Start with shop fronts and signage. Abolish the hideous KEBAB SHOP and CHICKEN SHACK neon and plastic
If you make a town centre pretty and safe, then people will come back, and do more shopping, and dining, and drinking, and that means new places will open, creating a virtuous cycle. We do the opposite. We let our town centres get uglier and scruffier then we wonder why our high streets are deserted
I've been to that pub, it has a great setting.
But most places look nice in the right light.
It seems very bitty with no obvious links from one section to the next, and it looks as if a tourist has pointed a camera at some people having a good time, rather than it having been planned for television. I can see people singing, but not really hear them, and what are they looking at and waving to?
Meanwhile, Russian claims that they have halted the Ukrainian advance in Kursk and Belgorod may at last have some truth, at least in part. It appears Ukrainian advances in a number of areas have stopped but they have been saying next to nothing since Day 1, nor have their allies. All the information is out of Russia and its a bit conflicting at times.
As downthread comments on the Olympics, of course it was fantastic, because that event has a soul. London should bid again and UKG should throw the kitchen sink at that bid because it still has the greatest potential in Eureope as a location. No other UK city is of interest to the IOC.
Looking at recent polls, Lenny Bronner concludes: "If these trends continue — and that’s a big if, as there is no doubt this is a close race and polls do and can change — Harris could win the presidential race without as many votes as previous Democratic nominees. That is, as long as she can eke out a victory in the tipping-point state."
source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/08/09/harris-popular-vote-electoral-college/
That's so tentative that I am not sure just how useful it is as betting advice, now -- but it does provide one more way to guesstimate the winner -- and there should be much more data avalable before election day.
LEARN FROM THIS
The Establishment is making the exact same mistake with immigration. Ignoring the people, again and again, thereby steering the entite train towards disaster
There's a walk that starts in Marlborough and is footpath all the way to Lyme Regis. That's 126 miles, so five days for me
My parents are staying in Sandbanks when I'm thinking of doing the walk, so maybe a couple of days coastal walk from Lyme Regis to there to make it a week's walk before a few days in Sandbanks
This is the walk
https://ldwa.org.uk/ldp/members/show_path.php?menu_type=S&path_name=Wessex+Ridgeway
It's mad that you can have a lovely Victorian/Edwardian/even Georgian set of flats and some arsehole can rip the shop front out and cover it plastic crap.
Any attempt to improve the public realm in the kind of "left behind" towns you describe is met with feral opposition from the very people who have overseen the decline in those towns.
For example, Paisley reminded us all of why we don't want to go there: https://road.cc/content/news/cycle-lane-plans-dropped-paisley-council-300763
1) Turn empty Georgian/Victorian retail units into housing
2) Demolish 1960s retail units
3) Crack down on petty crime
4) Get rid of all the druggies / drifters / beggars / homeless / purposeless immigrants who wander about them
In short you need to make the experience more enjoyable than a trip to the supermarket.
The last Tory government's record on all this was shameful. Utterly shameful. However I do not believe Labour will be any better and they will probably build even uglier houses and towers, it's what they do
The Tories need to completely revamp themselves, and acquire entirely new purposes. This could be one of them. Make Britain Beautiful Again. eg Rebuild our bombed cities from the war as they were. Exeter and Coventry, Derby and Birmingham. Do it. Do what the Poles, the Czechs, the French and the Germans have done, and are still doing. And if an architect objects, hurl her into the most polluted stretch of the Wye
There keep on being claims by Russians of Ukrainians crossing the border at other points - this time further north in Kursk - but nothing solid, so could be panic-fuelled rumours.
Its trying to oppose '15 minute cities' on places where it cannot work where the problem is.
But I do wonder whether any of the Chinese who had been charged with cheating won gold medals.
Though I agree we need to support our high streets and shops with tax breaks and shopping and free parking and ensure they aren't mainly takeaways, nail bars, estate agents and hairdressers and coffee shops.
The French in their small towns and provincial cities also still prefer to shop in person for clothes, browse at bookstops and shop for food at butchers, fish and vegetable markets and delicatessens rather than order most of it on Amazon and Ocado and Asda online which helps their high streets stay alive
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/aug/11/the-guardian-view-on-post-16-qualifications-the-switch-to-t-levels-has-been-botched
Ukraine has just bombed cooling systems at the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant — Europe’s largest plant.
Anything official?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=auR-lJfzTeY
It's actually part of a longer walk from Norfolk; the Peddar's Way down to Ivinghoe Beacon near Tring; then the Ridgeway to Avebury, then the Wessex Ridgeway from there to Lyme Regis.
In fact, I listened to the negotiations for the government back after the 2010 GE whist wild camping in a field on that trail. And I *may* have seen Madonna in a pub one lunchtime; there were two women sitting at the next table, one of whom looked very much you would imagine her to look in everyday clothes, and I think there was one discrete security guard nearby. And no, I did not go up to ask; I just let them get on with their conversation. Later on I discovered that she and Guy Ritchie owned a nearby estate, though against that, they had got divorced a couple of years earlier.
It was a: "I'm sure that's Madonna sitting over there!" moment.
Was it her? I've no idea.
You're following the wrong people on twitter for your news if that's what you're reading.
80% of people in the UK live in urban areas, and even people who live in small rural villages take a great deal of pride in their local pub, shop, doctor, dentist. 15 minutes is nearly a mile by foot, perhaps 3 miles by bike. That's a big area.
You get a few people living in seriously remote spots in the Highlands, Hebrides and so on. But no one is suggesting trying to help those folks out (sadly).
Edit: https://x.com/NOELreports/status/1822705146091966613 for the piccie.
They also charge a small fortune to see the swannery at Abbotsbury so I'm not sure if the coast is accessible there, but there is a very nice walk into the village with a hilltop chapel louring above, and a magnificent abbatial barn.
Not everything in a nuclear power plant involves radioactivity. I also believe (but might be wrong) that the Zap plant is currently shut down.
Winter Olympics?
A typical low density rural Scottish town of 10,000 can be covered by two or three. Ullapool is almost a perfect fit for one. Stirling would be 6. Aberdeen about 15.
Preferably more than one - people like a choice.
Preferably less than 15 minutes as who wants to carry their supermarket shopping for that long, especially in the dark or in bad weather.
And no a 'city' or 'local' sized store will not work, it has to be full sized, and nor will some corner shop.
A fire is a dangerous thing. Easy to lose control of it once it has started.
This only makes sense to me as the Russians causing as much damage as possible before withdrawing, which makes me hopeful that the Ukrainian attack into Kursk has down more damage to Russia than we can see.
But the Russians sometimes do things that don't make sense, so it might be just random destruction and petty revenge.
I found the link I posted by looking up Treacle Bolly, the path between Marlborough and Preshute. It happens to be be the start of the Marlborough leg of the walk
One of the articles I read this morning about Treacle Bolly was this one with some interesting etymological suggestions
https://towerandtown.org.uk/main.asp?varFunction=showarticle&vararticletypeid=2&varItemid=1851
I got to the end of the article, then saw that it was written by a lovely lady on my old mail route who I've had chats with about my walks
I can't wait to tell her that I've read her article
I think you've fallen for this conspiracy theory that it's about trapping people in zones. It's just about providing local services, locally. Oddly enough, "would you like to be able to pop round to the dentist" has stunning levels of support.
I've just been to a French town that voted first for Le Pen, and then, second Zemmour and the extreme right! Macron was nowhere
It was Beziers, and the centre is, yes, beautiful, with nice street furniture and lovely cobbled squares. In Britain it would be one of our loveliest towns
https://www.francebleu.fr/occitanie/herault-34/beziers-34032/elections