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After the Veep debate Trump is now the favourite – politicalbetting.com
After the Veep debate Trump is now the favourite – politicalbetting.com
I haven’t watched the Veep debate in full but of the clips I have seen neither man had a gaffe and I’d probably make the result a draw but I’d give the win to Vance because he came in with very low expectations.
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A very cordial and polite debate, much better than Trump and Harris, and with substantive discussions of policy differences.
I did watch it, in a better time zone than UK, and credit is due to both men, as well as the moderators who asked difficult questions and pressed for an answer if the candidate initially ignored the question.
The closest to a gaffe was Walz mis-speaking that he was friends with school shooters, when I think he meant to say that he had become friends with the families of the victims of school shootings.
Shhh! My dad was a Tory MP: why I didn’t tell my friends
Growing up, Adam Hart was proud that his father, Simon, had a job that other people were interested in. Then the internet abuse started. At university having the Conservative secretary of state for Wales as a parent was social death
...In June 2016, when I was revising for my GCSEs, the MP Jo Cox was murdered after leaving her constituency surgery. Like everyone else, I had read many news articles about murders, but this one, with its pictures of a fortysomething MP with two kids, felt odd.
At home, the powers-that-be reviewed our “home security”. We failed on account of the public footpath that runs past our front door. Some men fitted a panic button in my parents’ wardrobe as well as a motion-triggered alarm outside the door. The first night the alarm was in operation a badger walked past and set it off, summoning Dyfed-Powys police to our house at 3am. As my sister and I were away, my parents saw the policemen at the door and assumed one of us had died.
https://www.thetimes.com/article/b5a924ff-7014-4a6f-9bf8-5585687d8454
Her approach seems to be:
- “this thing over here is a problem”
- “What would you do about it”
- “It’s far too early to talk about things like that”
But not getting cross is a key political skill that Kemi needs to work on. It is useful in real life too, especially for night time posting on PB.
We also need to get to a point in our public discourse where all sides can acknowledge that things are not capable of being improved, let alone resolved, by a 6 or 7 word soundbite. Life is simply much more complicated than that. From the small bits I have seen Vance and Walz seem to have got closer to acknowledging that than most "debates" in this country in recent years.
If you raise a political topic, as a politician, you ought at least to have a rough idea of how you might go about addressing it.
Of course no one expects detailed policy from her, but the odd clue might be good.
Until a few months ago, she was a cabinet minister, so she's had more opportunity than most opposition MPs - indeed has been required to have considered views on all manner of policy.
This morning it was all about small businesses having too much regulation and red tape. Then and got shirty when asked what regulations she would tackle.
Though you have to ask serious questions about the sampling for all immediate post debate polls. There's likely to be a huge over sampling of the politically engaged.
A medical negligence story at Surrey Health Trust. Lot of awful details, but this is the paragraph that concerns me the most. If commenting, I recommend reading the piece.
The trust lost a nine-month legal battle with the BBC and The Times to block access to and redact documents in two employment tribunal cases
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c62g7ed3qzxo
He’s very clear the solution to everything is to leave the ECHR, but he can’t explain with honesty what problems he thinks that actually fixes.
A Programming Note: 60 Minutes is scheduled to air a primetime election special on a Monday edition of the broadcast on October 7 at 8 PM. For over half a century, 60 Minutes has invited the Democratic and Republican tickets to appear on our broadcast as Americans head to the polls.
This year, both the Harris and Trump campaigns agreed to sit down with 60 Minutes. Vice President Harris will speak with correspondent Bill Whitaker. After initially accepting 60 Minutes’ request for an interview with Scott Pelley, former President Trump’s campaign has decided not to participate. Pelley will address this Monday evening.
Our election special will broadcast the Harris interview on Monday as planned. Our original invitation to former President Donald Trump to be interviewed on 60 Minutes stands.
https://x.com/60Minutes/status/1841236651994915183
This is pretty much where they were 10 days ago and is some slippage on the part of Harris from the 57 or 58 times she was at the end of last week.
One of the things that has been noted in America is that there are damned few undecideds in this race, far fewer than you normally have. I think that the vast majority have made up their minds one way or another. The question is which side will be more successful in getting their supporters to the polls. Given the early voting, specifically in PA, I am hopeful that will be Harris but I very much doubt we shall see much movement in the polls themselves over the next 4 weeks. Its going to remain tight to the end.
There's some sort of AI system which calculates trajectories and de-prioritises warheads which aren't going to hit important (however that might be pre-defined) targets.
A good way of dealing with mass attacks like last night.
Some of us like slick politicians, others crave brash "authenticity". It's a large part of Populist appeal.
I wouldn't take the story on face value.
Were this a third world country I suspect there would be reports of sophisticated poll rigging..
Starmer had been somewhat coy about that but has confirmed it this morning. Probably not going to improve relations with his Palestinian wing.
There’s not a lot of undecided voters, although last night’s debate might have swung a handful one way or the other. They both came across a lot better than they have done at rallies of their own supporters, realising they were talking to a much broader audience.
It’s now all about the GOTV operations in the swing states, and there’s plenty of evidence that both teams have a lot of boots on the ground encouraging registration and early/postal voting - which is something that Trump was terrible at doing in 2020, preferring to encourage on-the-day voting.
https://x.com/townhallcom/status/1841310046681976902
In general imo Cleverly told a far more convincing political / personal story on the overall trends and his record as a Minister, and exposed some of Jenrick's exaggerated claims - especially around the universal solution of leaving the ECHR. TBF he went second. He was weaker and quite waffly on specifics.
I thought Jenrick gave jabs which responded to the particular audience, which is people still attached to the Conservative Party who have the spare time and the spare cash (unless funded) to attend a conference. He was talking to the relatively wealthy people in the hall as to how he would take money from relatively poorer people and give it to them.
Jenrick is very mathematically-challenged. He declared that his increase in the Defence budget to 3% would be funded from cutting Overseas Aid. From the 2023 number of 2.3% to 3.0% requires an extra £22bn per annum at 2023 prices. If we take the more normal 2% rather than the exceptional 2.3%, the extra required money is £31 bn.
The total aid budget spent overseas in 2023 was £11.1bn (plus the £4.3 bn of overseas aid spent on on refugees in the UK). And I don't think even Generic Bob would aim to cut all of it 2 or 3 times.
Go figure. Jenrick didn't. No wonder he unlawfully overspent his campaign expenses when he was first elected as an MP, and claimed he had not done so.
Listening to the Kemi Badenoch interview half an hour ago, 1 - She said SHE set the Minimum Wage, and she would not have approved it is she thought it too high, 2 - She's was talking about Business Rates, whilst I expect her chosen micro-cafe example of a business killed-by-bureaucracy-and-taxes is below the threshold. She's a fish in a barrel waiting to be shot.
I found this bit in the BBC article telling:
"After reviewing the surgeon’s employment record, which included a long wait to become a consultant, Prof Poston said: "I do not know this individual, but you would be concerned that there were problems during the course of that training and progression through training.”"
I have experience of this, and it can be a red flag. The Trainers know the individual is a nightmare, but lack the firm evidence to "release him from training"*, so he carries on to completion, albeit with a bad reputation, but sooner or later gets a job elsewhere. I wouldn't want to be the Training Programme Director with my signature on his Specialist Registration.
* yes this really is the euphemism for chucking someone off the programme.
https://election.lab.ufl.edu/early-vote/2024-early-voting/
As for minimum wage killing off a cafe, increase the prices heck everyone has done that including Costa and McDonalds.
The debate was an indication that this might be so.
Instead of being wasted on frivolities. Such as fixing the actual medical fucking negligence.
amusing to see people slagging off Rings of Power on the previous thread on the basis that it is 'woke'.
This is of course utter bollocks. There is nothing woke about it at all. Moreover most of those criticising its accuracy clearly don't know their Tolkein beyond the Peter Jackson films - which contained huge numbers of inaccuracies themselves.
Rings of Power has just been renewed for its third season and is going from strength to strength. For most Tolkein fans who move beyond just Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit it is a great series filling in a lot of detail on Tolkein's lore. The 'go woke, go broke' crowd are just bitter because they weren't able to bring it down with their whining about non-white characters.
Just need Mickey Ds to start serving decaf, however, and I would be all over it at, what, 99p for not a bad outside coffee.
ETA: I must concede, the prioritisation exercise tends to mean that all garments are let through without being intercepted by an iron
Calling on Iran to stop its attacks, he added: "Together with its proxies like Hezbollah, Iran has menaced the Middle East for far too long, chaos and destruction brought not just to Israel, but to the people they live amongst in Lebanon and beyond.
"Make no mistake, Britain stands full square against such violence. We support Israel's reasonable demand for the security of its people."
Iran has menaced the Middle East for far, far too long. Dubya Bush made a mistake prioritising Iraq for regime change in 2003 when Iran is the real puppet master.
Its long past time for regime change in Iran. After sending a barrage of missiles against Israel last night I would 100% support all-out conflict with Iran to bring in regime change and the elimination of the Ayatollahs.
That it would rid the world of not just the people behind such terrorists as Hamas and Hezbollah, but also one of the major arms dealers to Putin too is an added bonus.
Suspending senior staff is extremely expensive for Trust's. It cost a Trust near me £4 000 000 to settle a wrongful dismissal case recently when the Trust couldn't show due process in getting rid of a "nightmare" Specialist.
Other than that atm yes Slow Horses is the daddy; fantastic all round if a touch weaker than S1-2. Plus rapidly emerging as approaching the group of best (British) actors of their generation is none other than Bilbo Baggins himself, Martin Freeman. To take his place alongside Riz Ahmed, Tom Hardy, Gary Oldman (obvs) and Stephen Graham.
I know because I have done it. It's a chess game, and you have to cut off these excuses before they arise. When I was TPD I didn't sign off anyone who I wouldn't have been happy treating my own family, though one case in particular ran for years.
Tom Tugendhat said it is “upsetting” that his Tory leadership rival Robert Jenrick used footage of a soldier he served with in Afghanistan who died shortly after the film was taken.
Mr Jenrick has already sparked a row with the video, in which he claimed the SAS “kill rather than capture terrorists” because of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).
In an interview with BBC Newsnight, Mr Tugendhat said the statement made by the former immigration minister “just isn’t true”.
He added: “What’s particularly upsetting is that video is using a piece of footage of some of the people I served with, one of whom there died shortly after that film was taken in an accident.
“And he’s not able to defend himself from the accusation that is being levelled against him. That’s footage of a soldier in northern Afghanistan in around 2002.
“I do not think we should be using footage of our special forces in operations… I would not put that video out. In fact I’d pull it down.”
All four Tory leadership candidates are set to address the party faithful on the final day of the annual Conservative Party Conference in Birmingham from 10:45am this morning.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/10/02/politics-latest-speech-badenoch-jenrick-cleverly-tugendhat/
As a start - Galadriel as a petulant child. Who is, among other things, been alive for most of the history of the world. And lived in heaven, chatted with the archangels and told Feanor where to get off.
And is commander of the Northern Armies. Which don't, apparently, have any actual soldiers.
I would add Toby Jones to your list as well.
The Norse, Romans, Greeks, Egyptians etc all had elements of petulant and capricious attitudes within their mythologies.
I've not read Tolkien beyond The Hobbit/LOTR so I don't know if it is consistent with his other writings, but the idea that an immortal could be petulant is certainly consistent with historical mythologies.
This is one of the reason that people keep trying to create manoeuvring warheads. Your basic ballistic missile is going really fast (well, the warhead is) but is following a perfectly predictable line.
The problem is that if you want to manoeuvre, you need to "spend" a lot of energy. Which means you slow down rapidly. Which makes you an easier target - much lower tier interceptors (which are cheaper and smaller) can be used. The Americans looked at this, periodically, since the 1960s, developing various prototypes. And decided against putting them into production.
We currently have millions being spent on lawyers to try and stop the SPMs getting their money from the Post Office.
This seems to be a systemic problem.
I know trebuchets. I built one. Everyone should have one.
I don't disagree with a lot of your comment - the destabilising inpact of Hamas, Hezbollah and the pro-Iranian Houthis goes far beyond what they do or try to do to Israel. They have weakened or radicalised the incumbent Governments in their own areas and prevented said Governments from being able to adopt a more realistic relationship with Israel.
Unfortunately, one of the more predictable impacts of the events of October 2023 (nearly a year, would you believe?) was the marginalising of moderate Arab opinion.
However, if we have a plan to reduce Iranian influcence, we'd better have a good idea how to a) stop it returning and b) fill the vacuum removing said influence would create.
Lebanon and Yemen need proper time and effort to return them to functioning states and that's a commitment I don't see. The greatest enemies to radicalism and populism are stability and prosperity and that's what's needed in those countries and elsewhere in the region.
Even Gaza, and you may disagree, would benefit hugely from some proper capitalism, some proper investment, the kind which doesn't end up in the hands of terrorists but ends up helping the people. Can Abbas provide that guarantee for a post-Hamas Gaza or will we have to go elsewhere?
After Hamas is eradicated I would love to see nothing more than a Marshall Plan to develop Gaza into a thriving area where people have opportunities, jobs and incomes that mean they have no interest in going back to the old ways.
The right kind of stability is needed. Stability of law and order, stability of respecting business rights, stability of peaceful transfers of power etc.
Stability of "we have had the same leader for decades" is a problem not a good thing.
Judging from the videos online, there was at least a couple of exoatmosperic interceptions - presumably by the Arrow missiles.
You might well argue that destabilising Lebanon to get rid of the PLO was necessary, but that is what led to the Islamisation of resistance to Israel from what had been a fairly secular nationalist movement.
It's blowback in the same way that the USA created the Taliban.
USSR surely?
There's no point going into conflicts like these without a clear and unambiguous post-war plan (which can be broadcast well in advance so your opponents aren't just fighting the present but the future as well).
*She* was the one who tried to get everyone to bar Annatar (Pretty Sauron) from the Elven realms. On the grounds that (a) He seemed a bit problematic (b) He claims to be a Maiar sent by the Valar - but she didn't recognise him from actually living in Aman.
And she sized up the Fellowship of the Ring in about 5 minutes.
So they turned the wise, intelligent woman into an idiot teenager. Woke?
"Sauron, I think he even really loves Galadriel and you see that at the very end. He wishes he could get her back. He has feelings, he has something, there is something... and then he goes crazy about the rings. It's about passion, he's got passion."
I don't think it's in Sauron's nature, at this point of his life, to love anyone other than himself.
The reason the Taliban was created, was that the government of Afghanistan, which was mostly the Northern Alliance, was getting too friendly to India for Pakistan's liking. The Afghan government was seeking a counterbalance to Pakistani attempts to control the country.
The Northern Alliance, roughly, mapped onto the groups sponsored by the Americans during the 80s.
Another reason I'm so guarded of him.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/portillo-rant-triggers-a-storm-in-the-forces-1577144.html
The evidence for Jenrick being able to transform himself into a reasonably well rounded human being with a penchant for pastel coloured blazers is limited.
I think the only saving grace for it is that the next season isn't already written like season 2 was before filming so they can start to take fan feedback into account and sack the terrible writers and bring in actual lore experts that won't give us stupid concepts like Orc wives and babies or Galadriel thirsting after Sauron even after she fucking knows it's Sauron. I think there's been an admission within Amazon studios that they need to change direction on the story and lore so I expect season 3 will be much closer to what people expected from the beginning.
However it is not that surprising Yale educated Vance was reasonably articulate in debate relative to Chadron State college educated Walz.
Walz performed well on abortion and the 2020 riots but Vance was more confident on foreign policy and the Middle East situation. Walz also notably opposed bans on gun ownership which some liberal Democrats have pushed which might help Harris in more rural areas and small towns.
Overall a relatively cordial affair and some agreement between them even. A CBS snap post debate poll had it effectively tied, 42% gave it to Vance and 41% to Walz
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/vp-debate-polls-jd-vance-tim-walz-b2622415.html
There's your brief, recent history of Gaza and the result of it all was October 7th and a lot of destruction there now. Hence now it requires a Marshall Plan (sans Hamas) for regeneration. Something I have no doubt the Israelis would be super in favour of, as they were the potential regeneration when the left.
Doesn't mean that Hamas shouldn't be eliminated if that is what it takes.