Incredible intelligence-led sting by cyclist on bike thief. Typical reluctance from the police.
I read this earlier. Very impressive and resourceful. But you have to wonder about the Police and their whole attitude. It seems any forces treat bike theft as a minor inconvenience.
They do. Cyclists, phone and laptop owners who have tracking data of their stolen possessions are treated as major inconveniences.
A friend had her bike stolen. The bike was lo-jacked in about seven different ways. Not going reveal all of them - some were her custom ideas (works in IT). Sufice it to say, location was just the first thing.
When she reported this to the police, she showed them what she had on her laptop on the bike. And got told that having that much information on the thieves was dodgy!
Be quite funny to turn it into a haunted bike that does naughty things to wifi...
"I'm a thirty second bomb! I'm a thirty second bomb! Twenty-nine! Twenty-eight! Twenty-seven!..."
EDIT: many years back a chap in Oxford was prosecuted for boobytrapping his bike. Involved a 1 Farad capacitor, IIRC.
Looks like Google have been rather naughty, suppressing the Rogan interview from YouTube’s search function. If not cock up and deliberate, a silly move as it just plays into the Trump narrative.
Looks like Google have been rather naughty, suppressing the Rogan interview from YouTube’s search function. If not cock up and deliberate, a silly move as it just plays into the Trump narrative.
Top link for me:
Or technically, it's the top link *after* the news stories about the podcast.
I'm sure you'll find he meant 'communist'. Which she 100% is. What with all the free-market economics and stuff that Marx espoused, unlike Elon and his state handouts.
FPT: Recently, I have been thinking, more and more, that we should be preparing for the possibility of global cooling. Why? Because of what I have read of the effects of volcanos, for example, Stommel and Stommel's "Volcano Weather": https://www.amazon.com/Volcano-Weather-Story-Without-Summer/dp/0915160714
We will have a volcanic eruption that cools the earth, some time in the future. Perhaps not again in my life time, but very likely in the next hundred years, and nearly certain in the next thousand.
If there is a way to predict such an event, long enough in advance to be useful, I am not aware of it. (We certainly should be looking for a way, or ways.)
I went to an Oxford Uni event yesterday where one of the speakers was an XR (Extinction Rebellion) founder, Rupert Read. He said that current thinking was that the climate in the UK was being made more unstable by failure to curb persistent emissions - perhaps irreversibly so, though he held out some hope of change - and could involve swings to more extreme cold as well as heat. The possible collapse of the Gulf Stream would be a relevant cause.
I didn't find him altogether persuasive, but it was distinctively different from the "world is simply getting hotter" thesis.
The collapse of the Gulf Stream would spell the end for Britain as we know it.
Probably not though it might not be pleasant for a while. Given the world is warming, it seems reasonable to assume the summers would still be warm and perhaps our climate would be more "continental" in nature - drier and colder in winter, drier and warmer in summer though of course it would still rain.
We might end up like Labrador or the NE United States - I doubt it would be Greenland though doubtless the Mail would blame Starmer if the glaciers started advancing towards London.
"The Gulf Stream originates in the Gulf of Mexico and transports warm water across the Atlantic towards north-west Europe. As such, it has a strong warming effect on the region and is the reason why the UK does not experience similarly harsh conditions to places like Canada or Siberia, despite being on a similar latitude." https://www.yourweather.co.uk/news/trending/what-will-happen-to-the-uk-if-the-gulf-stream-collapses.html
Canada copes perfectly well with extremes of temperature - yes, we'd need to adapt and perhaps quickly but it would be possible and certainly wouldn't be some kind of civilisation-ending event. Some Canadian cities have underground shopping areas which people go to and we would need to invest in the kind of winter infrastructure such as exists in Finland and Sweden but again we could...
The main problem - as with so much else - would be with housing. There would be a very large increase in demand for home heating as a result of how poorly constructed and insulated most British housing is.
Perun did Canadian defence procurement yesterday, and used us as a goodless worse example - getting our RFA tankers for about 12 times less pro-rata than the Canadians paid.
A contact of mine had some very sharp words about the ceo of the defence procurement company recently.
What? You didn’t realise it was a wholly owned company? Who’s ceo (who just happens to be the civil servant that recommended the structure) gets paid private sector bonuses to “incentivise him”
Number of Labour votes in London at the last 3 general elections
2024: 1.4 million 2019: 1.8 million 2017: 2.1 million
Number of Conservative votes in London at the last 3 general elections:
2024: 685,082 2019: 1,205,127 2017: 1,268,800
We know the Tories aren't popular in London, whereas the capital is supposed to be Labour's great reservoir of strength.
Labour won 59 of the 75 seats in London - 59 out of 412 so an important proportion but not as key as it was in 2019 when they won 49 out of 202. London was interesting in July - Labour, Conservatives and the LDs all lost share and indeed their combined vote went from 95% in 2019 to 74.6% with gains for the Greens, Reform and for the various Independents.
There was stronger Labour dominance in the North West - 65 seats out of 73 and of course Labour won all the regions in terms of seats if not votes (the South East and South West saw more Conservative votes but fewer seats and in the South West Labour won the most seats despite finishing just behind the Liberal Democrats in votes).
Well theres a thing...to get to my local large supermarket is two bus journeys..cost 4£ and takes an hour....to get to my local large supermarket by taxi takes 5 minutes is door to door and costs £6.40.....I guess starmer wants me to take that taxi as it will cost me 40p more but save 55 minutes extra travel
Incredible intelligence-led sting by cyclist on bike thief. Typical reluctance from the police.
I read this earlier. Very impressive and resourceful. But you have to wonder about the Police and their whole attitude. It seems any forces treat bike theft as a minor inconvenience.
Nothing new there. I remember having a valuable camera stolen in a burglary in 1991, I checked the secondhand camera shops in town, and one of them had it. It had been brought in by the thief and they were checking the electronics and had his details. I notified the police. A few days later the camera was returned, but the police never prosecuted him nor found and returned the other things stolen.
I remember back in the 90s being in my flat, two guys trying to kick the door in while I had my back against it. Phoned 999 for the police emergency.
7hrs later two bobbies turned up, asked if I'd seen the guys faces (no, they were wearing balaclavas) then said 'well, not much we can do' and left. Last I ever heard about it.
So when I had a bike stolen a few years ago I didn't even bother calling them.
Incredible intelligence-led sting by cyclist on bike thief. Typical reluctance from the police.
I read this earlier. Very impressive and resourceful. But you have to wonder about the Police and their whole attitude. It seems any forces treat bike theft as a minor inconvenience.
Nothing new there. I remember having a valuable camera stolen in a burglary in 1991, I checked the secondhand camera shops in town, and one of them had it. It had been brought in by the thief and they were checking the electronics and had his details. I notified the police. A few days later the camera was returned, but the police never prosecuted him nor found and returned the other things stolen.
I sometimes suspect the police use sirens to give criminals a sporting chance to scarper before they arrive. "We don't want any trouble now" is their modus operandum.
JD Vance laments the diversity of New York City ahead of Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally:
“London doesn’t feel fully English to me anymore. Right? New York of course is the classic American city. Over time, I think New York will start to feel less American.” https://x.com/patriottakes/status/1850580229665755330
Vance's own wife is the daughter of Indian immigrants so his whole approach to this issue is bizarre. London of course has never really been an English city anyway. It predates the arrival of the English and has always been a diverse city as you'd expect from a major port and former administrative centre of a vast multi ethnic empire. It's why it attracts people from all over the world and lets them all feel at home.
Reading this comment, you would think that London is no more diverse now than it was 50 years ago, but that's clearly not true. It has been transformed demographically.
London was already a very diverse city in 1974 but yes clearly it is even more so now. I don't know if you live in London like I do but in my experience, living here since 2010 and earlier for periods since 1997, it doesn't feel "foreign" in the slightest. It just feels like London. Immigration has helped to make it the most dynamic and successful part of the country, with the strongest economy, the best performing schools and thriving local communities. I wouldn't live anywhere else, and if JD Vance doesn't like it all the better.
What you are celebrating is essentially internal migration out of London: Brits out and migrants in. Maybe you benefit from this personally, but it's very much an "I'm all right, Jack" attitude.
It is hard to understand why people would want London to be a depopulating wasteland, which is what the reality would be if the immigration and economic growth of the last 30 years did not happen. The reality is just that things change over time and with economic and cultural circumstances. A lot of the 'Brits' who have left have made a lot of money out of rising house prices and are actually beneficiaries of immigration.
Having said that there is a good point that is made by people like Iain Sinclair: a lot of the people who have lived in London for many generations have left over the past few decades, which does change the psychological character of a place, but I suppose this is also true of a lot of places in England (ie rural villages etc).
The only constant is change.
I lived in Leman Street in E1 for five years, from 1997 to 2002. I was a few hundred yards from where the battle of Cable Street had been, and the whole area had been ground zero for immigration to London over the last 400 years.
Back in the 17th Century, the French Huguenots came, and built their churches (and resulted in a bunch of funny street names). Then in the 19th Century, it was Eastern Europe's Jews who came. Then it was the Pakistanis and Bangladeshis who pushed out the Jews (who'd all gentrified and moved up to Golders Green and Pinner).
And now, the Pakistanis and Bangladeshis are being pushed out thanks to gentrification of Shoreditch and Spitalfields, and old houses are being torn down and being replaced by expensive apartment complexes.
JD Vance laments the diversity of New York City ahead of Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally:
“London doesn’t feel fully English to me anymore. Right? New York of course is the classic American city. Over time, I think New York will start to feel less American.” https://x.com/patriottakes/status/1850580229665755330
Vance's own wife is the daughter of Indian immigrants so his whole approach to this issue is bizarre. London of course has never really been an English city anyway. It predates the arrival of the English and has always been a diverse city as you'd expect from a major port and former administrative centre of a vast multi ethnic empire. It's why it attracts people from all over the world and lets them all feel at home.
Reading this comment, you would think that London is no more diverse now than it was 50 years ago, but that's clearly not true. It has been transformed demographically.
London was already a very diverse city in 1974 but yes clearly it is even more so now. I don't know if you live in London like I do but in my experience, living here since 2010 and earlier for periods since 1997, it doesn't feel "foreign" in the slightest. It just feels like London. Immigration has helped to make it the most dynamic and successful part of the country, with the strongest economy, the best performing schools and thriving local communities. I wouldn't live anywhere else, and if JD Vance doesn't like it all the better.
What you are celebrating is essentially internal migration out of London: Brits out and migrants in. Maybe you benefit from this personally, but it's very much an "I'm all right, Jack" attitude.
It is hard to understand why people would want London to be a depopulating wasteland, which is what the reality would be if the immigration and economic growth of the last 30 years did not happen. The reality is just that things change over time and with economic and cultural circumstances. A lot of the 'Brits' who have left have made a lot of money out of rising house prices and are actually beneficiaries of immigration.
Having said that there is a good point that is made by people like Iain Sinclair: a lot of the people who have lived in London for many generations have left over the past few decades, which does change the psychological character of a place, but I suppose this is also true of a lot of places in England (ie rural villages etc).
The only constant is change.
I lived in Leman Street in E1 for five years, from 1997 to 2002. I was a few hundred yards from where the battle of Cable Street had been, and the whole area had been ground zero for immigration to London over the last 400 years.
Back in the 17th Century, the French Huguenots came, and built their churches (and resulted in a bunch of funny street names). Then in the 19th Century, it was Eastern Europe's Jews who came. Then it was the Pakistanis and Bangladeshis who pushed out the Jews (who'd all gentrified and moved up to Golders Green and Pinner).
And now, the Pakistanis and Bangladeshis are being pushed out thanks to gentrification of Shoreditch and Spitalfields, and old houses are being torn down and being replaced by expensive apartment complexes.
Just think, if the Huguenots had never come we would never have had Huguenot descendant Nigel Farage ranting against excess immigration
If Trump does win it looks like he will win the popular vote and the GOP will win Congress too (even if the Democrats narrow the margin in the Senate).
That would make it the biggest GOP win in a national US election since Bush was re elected in 2004. Harris is basically a female and black John Kerry so fits that narrative.
On average 538 has Harris ahead by 0.4% in Michigan, by 0.1% in Wisconsin and Trump by 0.3% in Pennsylvania (which has an above average number of Puerto Ricans who might react badly to the comedian's insults yesterday to their ancestral homeland).
On the generic congressional ballot, the Democrats are outperforming Harris by a couple of percent. So, it's entirely possible that Trump wins the White House, while the Democrats take back the House.
Labour’s Fare Betrayal: SKS "Takes £520 a Year Out of the Pockets of Workers Travelling by Bus"
Although he could neither define a worker or recall what a bus is.
*Workers in England.
Here in the glorious world of West Scotia we are still at the mercy of FirstBus and their ilk. Sometimes they graciously limit a daily charge if the fancy takes them, sometimes not. Either way, you're getting milked.
Yes, you can see a scenario where Robinson becomes UKIP Leader once out of jail and targets ex BNP and UKIP white working class voters even Farage's Reform is too establishment to reach.
Tice has already annoyed some on the far right by distancing Reform from Robinson
JD Vance laments the diversity of New York City ahead of Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally:
“London doesn’t feel fully English to me anymore. Right? New York of course is the classic American city. Over time, I think New York will start to feel less American.” https://x.com/patriottakes/status/1850580229665755330
Vance's own wife is the daughter of Indian immigrants so his whole approach to this issue is bizarre. London of course has never really been an English city anyway. It predates the arrival of the English and has always been a diverse city as you'd expect from a major port and former administrative centre of a vast multi ethnic empire. It's why it attracts people from all over the world and lets them all feel at home.
Reading this comment, you would think that London is no more diverse now than it was 50 years ago, but that's clearly not true. It has been transformed demographically.
London was already a very diverse city in 1974 but yes clearly it is even more so now. I don't know if you live in London like I do but in my experience, living here since 2010 and earlier for periods since 1997, it doesn't feel "foreign" in the slightest. It just feels like London. Immigration has helped to make it the most dynamic and successful part of the country, with the strongest economy, the best performing schools and thriving local communities. I wouldn't live anywhere else, and if JD Vance doesn't like it all the better.
What you are celebrating is essentially internal migration out of London: Brits out and migrants in. Maybe you benefit from this personally, but it's very much an "I'm all right, Jack" attitude.
It is hard to understand why people would want London to be a depopulating wasteland, which is what the reality would be if the immigration and economic growth of the last 30 years did not happen. The reality is just that things change over time and with economic and cultural circumstances. A lot of the 'Brits' who have left have made a lot of money out of rising house prices and are actually beneficiaries of immigration.
Having said that there is a good point that is made by people like Iain Sinclair: a lot of the people who have lived in London for many generations have left over the past few decades, which does change the psychological character of a place, but I suppose this is also true of a lot of places in England (ie rural villages etc).
The only constant is change.
I lived in Leman Street in E1 for five years, from 1997 to 2002. I was a few hundred yards from where the battle of Cable Street had been, and the whole area had been ground zero for immigration to London over the last 400 years.
Back in the 17th Century, the French Huguenots came, and built their churches (and resulted in a bunch of funny street names). Then in the 19th Century, it was Eastern Europe's Jews who came. Then it was the Pakistanis and Bangladeshis who pushed out the Jews (who'd all gentrified and moved up to Golders Green and Pinner).
And now, the Pakistanis and Bangladeshis are being pushed out thanks to gentrification of Shoreditch and Spitalfields, and old houses are being torn down and being replaced by expensive apartment complexes.
My flatmate went for a wander (he was like that) and asking an old bloke why the kids were throwing paving slabs and rocks at each other. Bangladeshi Independence day....
Wonder what the hipsters will do for summer rioting?
And of course, when Home Secretaries were fun....
Note that he is using an actual wall for cover. Versus the soldiers using a plate glass shop window.
Interesting to see local Government re-organisation is back on the political agenda and will be an integral part of the English Devolution Bill, due to be published next month.
Will this finally mark the end of the two-tier system in England? If so, how will this impact the 2025 County Council elections especially if the authorities being elected could cease to exist within the life of the current Parliament?
Taking Surrey for example, will the County take over the functions of the eleven Districts and Boroughs (the Cornwall solution) ir will the County be divided into three with each having the population of a London Borough (roughly 350,000) ?
Well theres a thing...to get to my local large supermarket is two bus journeys..cost 4£ and takes an hour....to get to my local large supermarket by taxi takes 5 minutes is door to door and costs £6.40.....I guess starmer wants me to take that taxi as it will cost me 40p more but save 55 minutes extra travel
Israel has passed two laws banning the UN's Palestinian refugee agency (Unrwa) from operating in Israel, and in occupied areas under its control, by large majorities.
A number of countries, including the US the UK and Germany, have expressed serious concern about the move.
Note the numbers - passed by far more than just Netanyahu and co, but including the left. There's immense anger in Israel over UNRWA staff's role in 7 October attacks and a belief, with strong evidence, its flaws have led to Hamas exerting considerable control over iit and being aided by it.
Yes, you can see a scenario where Robinson becomes UKIP Leader once out of jail and targets ex BNP and UKIP white working class voters even Farage's Reform is too establishment to reach.
Tice has already annoyed some on the far right by distancing Reform from Robinson
Incredible intelligence-led sting by cyclist on bike thief. Typical reluctance from the police.
I read this earlier. Very impressive and resourceful. But you have to wonder about the Police and their whole attitude. It seems any forces treat bike theft as a minor inconvenience.
They do. Cyclists, phone and laptop owners who have tracking data of their stolen possessions are treated as major inconveniences.
A friend had her bike stolen. The bike was lo-jacked in about seven different ways. Not going reveal all of them - some were her custom ideas (works in IT). Sufice it to say, location was just the first thing.
When she reported this to the police, she showed them what she had on her laptop on the bike. And got told that having that much information on the thieves was dodgy!
Be quite funny to turn it into a haunted bike that does naughty things to wifi...
"I'm a thirty second bomb! I'm a thirty second bomb! Twenty-nine! Twenty-eight! Twenty-seven!..."
EDIT: many years back a chap in Oxford was prosecuted for boobytrapping his bike. Involved a 1 Farad capacitor, IIRC.
Ouch! Does seem a bit naughty, if amusing.
I wonder what static voltage you could get a bike (and passenger) up to (assuming it isn't raining) with a suitable modification to the wheel hub?
A small extra incentive not to put your foot down...
[I had a (fairly distinctive) bike stolen in Oxford many years ago that was actually recovered by a very observant policeman. Sadly written off by a car later although it did complete a good number of tours first.]
If Trump does win it looks like he will win the popular vote and the GOP will win Congress too (even if the Democrats narrow the margin in the Senate).
That would make it the biggest GOP win in a national US election since Bush was re elected in 2004. Harris is basically a female and black John Kerry so fits that narrative.
On average 538 has Harris ahead by 0.4% in Michigan, by 0.1% in Wisconsin and Trump by 0.3% in Pennsylvania (which has an above average number of Puerto Ricans who might react badly to the comedian's insults yesterday to their ancestral homeland).
On the generic congressional ballot, the Democrats are outperforming Harris by a couple of percent. So, it's entirely possible that Trump wins the White House, while the Democrats take back the House.
Even then the GOP almost certainly take the Senate
Interesting to see local Government re-organisation is back on the political agenda and will be an integral part of the English Devolution Bill, due to be published next month.
Will this finally mark the end of the two-tier system in England? If so, how will this impact the 2025 County Council elections especially if the authorities being elected could cease to exist within the life of the current Parliament?
Taking Surrey for example, will the County take over the functions of the eleven Districts and Boroughs (the Cornwall solution) ir will the County be divided into three with each having the population of a London Borough (roughly 350,000) ?
I am trying not to be cynical, but I am imagining Sir Humphrey rubbing his hands with glee at some ineffectual new layer of regional government being set up and a whole new Whitehall department being created to oversee the poor loves.
Looks like Google have been rather naughty, suppressing the Rogan interview from YouTube’s search function. If not cock up and deliberate, a silly move as it just plays into the Trump narrative.
Seems you are spreading conspiracy stuff once more. A simple check shows that isn't true.
I'd be sad if all blondes with blue eyes, strawberry blondes and gingers died out because, quite frankly - although it won't happen in my lifetime - I find them prettier than brunettes but that is probably the natural end point in c.200 years on current trends. Through the summations of millions of individual choices and intermixing we'll probably all eventually become mixed race, a bit like how the Spanish did and probably look a bit more like them.
I don't think it necessarily make you a racist if you mourned this, and nor does any one race have more value than another, but I don't share the worries that it will fundamentally change Britain because I think all those people will adopt the values of the prevailing culture, including their heritage and traditions as Eric Kaufmann argues in "Whiteshift". Bit would I miss the blondes? Yes, I would.
[Having said that, it's not irrevocable either - over tens of thousands of years pigmentation would tend to lighten again because it will have to in order to get enough vitamin D, recognising that evolution will be much much slower in an advanced society where far more people survive. If we decide to actually try to have kids, that is.]
An underappreciated comment. That said... if people with dark skin tend to find other people with dark skin more sexually attractive, and people with light skin (etc), then one might easily end up with a "islands" of physical characteristics.
Interesting to see local Government re-organisation is back on the political agenda and will be an integral part of the English Devolution Bill, due to be published next month.
Will this finally mark the end of the two-tier system in England? If so, how will this impact the 2025 County Council elections especially if the authorities being elected could cease to exist within the life of the current Parliament?
Taking Surrey for example, will the County take over the functions of the eleven Districts and Boroughs (the Cornwall solution) ir will the County be divided into three with each having the population of a London Borough (roughly 350,000) ?
Labour have always been terrified of English nationalism. It's a pretty clear attempt to undermine and balkanise the dominant part of the union, one that is generally hostile to the socialists.
That and providing yet more cushy and futile jobs for their public sector union paymasters of course.
If Trump does win it looks like he will win the popular vote and the GOP will win Congress too (even if the Democrats narrow the margin in the Senate).
That would make it the biggest GOP win in a national US election since Bush was re elected in 2004. Harris is basically a female and black John Kerry so fits that narrative.
On average 538 has Harris ahead by 0.4% in Michigan, by 0.1% in Wisconsin and Trump by 0.3% in Pennsylvania (which has an above average number of Puerto Ricans who might react badly to the comedian's insults yesterday to their ancestral homeland).
On the generic congressional ballot, the Democrats are outperforming Harris by a couple of percent. So, it's entirely possible that Trump wins the White House, while the Democrats take back the House.
Even then the GOP almost certainly take the Senate
I wrote a thread on that very thing.
(FWIW, there has never been a US election where the House and Presidency have both flipped in different directions.)
Interesting to see local Government re-organisation is back on the political agenda and will be an integral part of the English Devolution Bill, due to be published next month.
Will this finally mark the end of the two-tier system in England? If so, how will this impact the 2025 County Council elections especially if the authorities being elected could cease to exist within the life of the current Parliament?
Taking Surrey for example, will the County take over the functions of the eleven Districts and Boroughs (the Cornwall solution) ir will the County be divided into three with each having the population of a London Borough (roughly 350,000) ?
I am trying not to be cynical, but I am imagining Sir Humphrey rubbing his hands with glee at some ineffectual new layer of regional government being set up and a whole new Whitehall department being created to oversee the poor loves.
In Durham they just got rid of the district councils and the county council took on all duties. Sadly it did not adopt the name County of County Durham County Council.
Two tier is just daft. Rubbish in your bin - District Council; rubbish you take to the tip* - County Council.
*I believe that they are referring to as "Household Waste Recycling Centres" in wokespeak. But tip is shorter.
Interesting to see local Government re-organisation is back on the political agenda and will be an integral part of the English Devolution Bill, due to be published next month.
Will this finally mark the end of the two-tier system in England? If so, how will this impact the 2025 County Council elections especially if the authorities being elected could cease to exist within the life of the current Parliament?
Taking Surrey for example, will the County take over the functions of the eleven Districts and Boroughs (the Cornwall solution) ir will the County be divided into three with each having the population of a London Borough (roughly 350,000) ?
Labour have always been terrified of English nationalism. It's a pretty clear attempt to undermine and balkanise the dominant part of the union, one that is generally hostile to the socialists.
That and providing yet more cushy and futile jobs for their public sector union paymasters of course.
I'm not sure what is being proposed but you and @ohnotnow seem to have already decided what it is before it's even published.
Back in the real world, the Conservatives kept promising "devolution" to English local authorities especially Conservative-run County Councils but never really delivered because at heart they distrusted local Government of all stripes and much preferred all power to be at Whitehall and Westminster.
The centralising failures have been booted out - have another batch of centralising failures replaced them? We'll see.
Incredible intelligence-led sting by cyclist on bike thief. Typical reluctance from the police.
I read this earlier. Very impressive and resourceful. But you have to wonder about the Police and their whole attitude. It seems any forces treat bike theft as a minor inconvenience.
They do. Cyclists, phone and laptop owners who have tracking data of their stolen possessions are treated as major inconveniences.
A friend had her bike stolen. The bike was lo-jacked in about seven different ways. Not going reveal all of them - some were her custom ideas (works in IT). Sufice it to say, location was just the first thing.
When she reported this to the police, she showed them what she had on her laptop on the bike. And got told that having that much information on the thieves was dodgy!
Be quite funny to turn it into a haunted bike that does naughty things to wifi...
"I'm a thirty second bomb! I'm a thirty second bomb! Twenty-nine! Twenty-eight! Twenty-seven!..."
EDIT: many years back a chap in Oxford was prosecuted for boobytrapping his bike. Involved a 1 Farad capacitor, IIRC.
Ouch! Does seem a bit naughty, if amusing.
I wonder what static voltage you could get a bike (and passenger) up to (assuming it isn't raining) with a suitable modification to the wheel hub?
A small extra incentive not to put your foot down...
[I had a (fairly distinctive) bike stolen in Oxford many years ago that was actually recovered by a very observant policeman. Sadly written off by a car later although it did complete a good number of tours first.]
A fully charged 1 Farad capacitor could be lethal, I think.
The biggest national Republican win since 1994 was in 2010: "Republicans regained control of the U.S. House they had lost in the 2006 midterm election, picking up a net total of 63 seats and erasing the gains Democrats made in 2006 and 2008. Although the sitting president's party usually loses seats in a midterm election, the 2010 election resulted in the highest losses by a party in a House midterm election since 1938,[6][7] as well as the largest House swing since 1948.[8] In total, 52 House Democrats were defeated, including 34 freshman and sophomore representatives." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections
Republicans won 51.7 percent of the total vote for the House, the Democrats 44.9 percent. (The House popular vote is not entirely comparable to the popular for the presidency, for two reasons: It does not include DC, and the parties do not contest every seat, especially recently.)
Republicans have won most of the House elections since 1994. I like to say -- and there is evidence to support me -- that the two best recruiters for the Republican Party in recent decades have been Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.
(Early next year I might be able to do a more extensive analysis for you, maybe even including a few graphs.)
Interesting to see local Government re-organisation is back on the political agenda and will be an integral part of the English Devolution Bill, due to be published next month.
Will this finally mark the end of the two-tier system in England? If so, how will this impact the 2025 County Council elections especially if the authorities being elected could cease to exist within the life of the current Parliament?
Taking Surrey for example, will the County take over the functions of the eleven Districts and Boroughs (the Cornwall solution) ir will the County be divided into three with each having the population of a London Borough (roughly 350,000) ?
I am trying not to be cynical, but I am imagining Sir Humphrey rubbing his hands with glee at some ineffectual new layer of regional government being set up and a whole new Whitehall department being created to oversee the poor loves.
In Durham they just got rid of the district councils and the county council took on all duties. Sadly it did not adopt the name County of County Durham County Council.
Two tier is just daft. Rubbish in your bin - District Council; rubbish you take to the tip* - County Council.
*I believe that they are referring to as "Household Waste Recycling Centres" in wokespeak. But tip is shorter.
I'd be sad if all blondes with blue eyes, strawberry blondes and gingers died out because, quite frankly - although it won't happen in my lifetime - I find them prettier than brunettes but that is probably the natural end point in c.200 years on current trends. Through the summations of millions of individual choices and intermixing we'll probably all eventually become mixed race, a bit like how the Spanish did and probably look a bit more like them.
I don't think it necessarily make you a racist if you mourned this, and nor does any one race have more value than another, but I don't share the worries that it will fundamentally change Britain because I think all those people will adopt the values of the prevailing culture, including their heritage and traditions as Eric Kaufmann argues in "Whiteshift". Bit would I miss the blondes? Yes, I would.
[Having said that, it's not irrevocable either - over tens of thousands of years pigmentation would tend to lighten again because it will have to in order to get enough vitamin D, recognising that evolution will be much much slower in an advanced society where far more people survive. If we decide to actually try to have kids, that is.]
An underappreciated comment. That said... if people with dark skin tend to find other people with dark skin more sexually attractive, and people with light skin (etc), then one might easily end up with a "islands" of physical characteristics.
It also is a misunderstanding of how genetics works. For example in "A Muppet Christmas Carol" Tiny Tim is a small frog, not some weird frog/pig hybrid. Its the same for people.
Interesting to see local Government re-organisation is back on the political agenda and will be an integral part of the English Devolution Bill, due to be published next month.
Will this finally mark the end of the two-tier system in England? If so, how will this impact the 2025 County Council elections especially if the authorities being elected could cease to exist within the life of the current Parliament?
Taking Surrey for example, will the County take over the functions of the eleven Districts and Boroughs (the Cornwall solution) ir will the County be divided into three with each having the population of a London Borough (roughly 350,000) ?
Labour have always been terrified of English nationalism. It's a pretty clear attempt to undermine and balkanise the dominant part of the union, one that is generally hostile to the socialists.
That and providing yet more cushy and futile jobs for their public sector union paymasters of course.
I think your final sentence roughly translates as the party of labour standing up for the interests of labour. It may have escaped your attention, but that is why the Labour Party exists.
I'd be sad if all blondes with blue eyes, strawberry blondes and gingers died out because, quite frankly - although it won't happen in my lifetime - I find them prettier than brunettes but that is probably the natural end point in c.200 years on current trends. Through the summations of millions of individual choices and intermixing we'll probably all eventually become mixed race, a bit like how the Spanish did and probably look a bit more like them.
I don't think it necessarily make you a racist if you mourned this, and nor does any one race have more value than another, but I don't share the worries that it will fundamentally change Britain because I think all those people will adopt the values of the prevailing culture, including their heritage and traditions as Eric Kaufmann argues in "Whiteshift". Bit would I miss the blondes? Yes, I would.
[Having said that, it's not irrevocable either - over tens of thousands of years pigmentation would tend to lighten again because it will have to in order to get enough vitamin D, recognising that evolution will be much much slower in an advanced society where far more people survive. If we decide to actually try to have kids, that is.]
An underappreciated comment. That said... if people with dark skin tend to find other people with dark skin more sexually attractive, and people with light skin (etc), then one might easily end up with a "islands" of physical characteristics.
It needs a pretty strong and unrealistic preference to maintain those islands for very long with sufficient mixing. And race traitor horndogs like me will always fuck it up. Although my progeny weirdly whiter looking in complexion than most white people, despite being genetically 1/2 white, 3/8 black, 1/8 yellow.
If Trump does win it looks like he will win the popular vote and the GOP will win Congress too (even if the Democrats narrow the margin in the Senate).
That would make it the biggest GOP win in a national US election since Bush was re elected in 2004. Harris is basically a female and black John Kerry so fits that narrative.
On average 538 has Harris ahead by 0.4% in Michigan, by 0.1% in Wisconsin and Trump by 0.3% in Pennsylvania (which has an above average number of Puerto Ricans who might react badly to the comedian's insults yesterday to their ancestral homeland).
On the generic congressional ballot, the Democrats are outperforming Harris by a couple of percent. So, it's entirely possible that Trump wins the White House, while the Democrats take back the House.
Even then the GOP almost certainly take the Senate
I wrote a thread on that very thing.
(FWIW, there has never been a US election where the House and Presidency have both flipped in different directions.)
Looks like Google have been rather naughty, suppressing the Rogan interview from YouTube’s search function. If not cock up and deliberate, a silly move as it just plays into the Trump narrative.
Top link for me:
Sorry to be more specific when I say Google… it’s if you try a native search from within YouTube itself. It was certainly the case when I tried earlier this evening and a great many non-political accts confirmed as much. And Musk too.
If Trump does win it looks like he will win the popular vote and the GOP will win Congress too (even if the Democrats narrow the margin in the Senate).
That would make it the biggest GOP win in a national US election since Bush was re elected in 2004. Harris is basically a female and black John Kerry so fits that narrative.
On average 538 has Harris ahead by 0.4% in Michigan, by 0.1% in Wisconsin and Trump by 0.3% in Pennsylvania (which has an above average number of Puerto Ricans who might react badly to the comedian's insults yesterday to their ancestral homeland).
On the generic congressional ballot, the Democrats are outperforming Harris by a couple of percent. So, it's entirely possible that Trump wins the White House, while the Democrats take back the House.
Even then the GOP almost certainly take the Senate
If Dems take the House then Trump can't be made POTUS via the House if/when there is a draw in ECV.
I remember at the 2016 US election when the initial exit poll was done . Trumps favourables were worse than Clinton’s so that was a false flag in terms of who was likely to win . Many disliked Trump but still voted for him .
At the exit poll next week the figure I’ll be looking out for is the gender breakdown . We are likely to see the biggest ever gender disparity and because more women vote if that figure is higher than normal then it’s likely curtains for Trump .
If Trump does win it looks like he will win the popular vote and the GOP will win Congress too (even if the Democrats narrow the margin in the Senate).
That would make it the biggest GOP win in a national US election since Bush was re elected in 2004. Harris is basically a female and black John Kerry so fits that narrative.
On average 538 has Harris ahead by 0.4% in Michigan, by 0.1% in Wisconsin and Trump by 0.3% in Pennsylvania (which has an above average number of Puerto Ricans who might react badly to the comedian's insults yesterday to their ancestral homeland).
On the generic congressional ballot, the Democrats are outperforming Harris by a couple of percent. So, it's entirely possible that Trump wins the White House, while the Democrats take back the House.
Even then the GOP almost certainly take the Senate
If Dems take the House then Trump can't be made POTUS via the House if/when there is a draw in ECV.
Is it the new House or the existing one that votes in a tie? And in any case it is one EC vote per state rather than a majority of the House, so biased to Republicans isnt it?
You can add on IT equipment, office space, electricity heating, lighting, life assurance, private healthcare, central overheadsz sick pay, etc. on top.
All employers will work on a M-factor they have to multiply anyone's salary by to calculate what that person needs to make "per head" for them to break even within their business model so their employment makes sense.
I've seen these range from 1.4 to 2.8 depending on overheads and how big the firm is, but no doubt some go higher.
For office based, desk oriented white collar, 2 seems to be quite common.
Billing targets for law firms were traditionally x3 salary
Looks like Google have been rather naughty, suppressing the Rogan interview from YouTube’s search function. If not cock up and deliberate, a silly move as it just plays into the Trump narrative.
Top link for me:
Sorry to be more specific when I say Google… it’s if you try a native search from within YouTube itself. It was certainly the case when I tried earlier this evening and a great many non-political accts confirmed as much. And Musk too.
I remember at the 2016 US election when the initial exit poll was done . Trumps favourables were worse than Clinton’s so that was a false flag in terms of who was likely to win . Many disliked Trump but still voted for him .
At the exit poll next week the figure I’ll be looking out for is the gender breakdown . We are likely to see the biggest ever gender disparity and because more women vote if that figure is higher than normal then it’s likely curtains for Trump .
I agree re gender breakdowns.
It will also be extremely interesting to see if the abortion referendum in Arizona boosts female turnout there.
At the exit poll next week the figure I’ll be looking out for is the gender breakdown . We are likely to see the biggest ever gender disparity and because more women vote if that figure is higher than normal then it’s likely curtains for Trump .
I said on here the minute it was announced that cutting WFA was a political disaster and I'm calling the £2 bus cut another disaster and i'm obvs not the only one.
Why are Lab doing this stupid stuff for a few quid?
Luke Tryl @LukeTryl · 9h If you want an idea of why removing the £2 bus fare cap may be so damaging beyond polls, read Greg's quote from our focus group. At a time of deep political distrust it's one of few recent examples of a policy people can point to that tangibly improves their lives for the better
Looks like Google have been rather naughty, suppressing the Rogan interview from YouTube’s search function. If not cock up and deliberate, a silly move as it just plays into the Trump narrative.
Top link for me:
Sorry to be more specific when I say Google… it’s if you try a native search from within YouTube itself. It was certainly the case when I tried earlier this evening and a great many non-political accts confirmed as much. And Musk too.
Seems fine to me:
Very strange. Don’t know how to add a photo on here but it is still not showing for me if you do a search in the search bar, you get 2-3 hits from third party accts with snippets and then news coverage of the interview (largely negative), then Puerto Rico stuff. I can scroll through perhaps the first 50 hits and still not find it.
Conversely if I search for example Rogan Hancock or Rogan Brian Cox, those interviews come up in full as the first hits.
It might be algorithm driven but it does feel strange given the full interview is by far a more viewed video than anything in the search output.
I said on here the minute it was announced that cutting WFA was a political disaster and I'm calling the £2 bus cut another disaster and i'm obvs not the only one.
Why are Lab doing this stupid stuff for a few quid?
Luke Tryl @LukeTryl · 9h If you want an idea of why removing the £2 bus fare cap may be so damaging beyond polls, read Greg's quote from our focus group. At a time of deep political distrust it's one of few recent examples of a policy people can point to that tangibly improves their lives for the better
If Trump does win it looks like he will win the popular vote and the GOP will win Congress too (even if the Democrats narrow the margin in the Senate).
That would make it the biggest GOP win in a national US election since Bush was re elected in 2004. Harris is basically a female and black John Kerry so fits that narrative.
On average 538 has Harris ahead by 0.4% in Michigan, by 0.1% in Wisconsin and Trump by 0.3% in Pennsylvania (which has an above average number of Puerto Ricans who might react badly to the comedian's insults yesterday to their ancestral homeland).
On the generic congressional ballot, the Democrats are outperforming Harris by a couple of percent. So, it's entirely possible that Trump wins the White House, while the Democrats take back the House.
Even then the GOP almost certainly take the Senate
If Dems take the House then Trump can't be made POTUS via the House if/when there is a draw in ECV.
There won't be a tie in the ECV given the Dems almost certainly win Ne02
You can add on IT equipment, office space, electricity heating, lighting, life assurance, private healthcare, central overheadsz sick pay, etc. on top.
All employers will work on a M-factor they have to multiply anyone's salary by to calculate what that person needs to make "per head" for them to break even within their business model so their employment makes sense.
I've seen these range from 1.4 to 2.8 depending on overheads and how big the firm is, but no doubt some go higher.
For office based, desk oriented white collar, 2 seems to be quite common.
Billing targets for law firms were traditionally x3 salary
Billing rates need to cover all of the overhead hours too that don't get billed. Not just the costs of the individual.
And when you have HR, finance, IT, marketing, admin, etc. that are never directly billable, those of us doing the real graft have to carry a lot of passengers.
Washington Post has now lost 9% of its entire subscription base in the 4 days since Bezos stopped their endorsement of Harris. That's pretty impressive and yet another sign to me that there are things that the polling is just not picking up.
The chance that the House will decide the presidential election is "remote": "The relevant language in the 12th Amendment is admirably clear: “The person having the greatest number of [electoral] votes shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of electors appointed.” If that majority is not achieved, the House would properly decide the election.
There are only two situations in which that could happen — both highly unlikely. First, there could be a tie vote in the electoral college. Second, a third-party candidate could take enough electoral votes from the top two to prevent anyone from winning a majority of electors.
Effectively, either situation is almost as good as a win for Trump because the House vote on the presidency would not involve all 435 members as individuals. Each state delegation would get one vote. And Republicans are very likely to continue their control of the House caucuses from at least 26 states after the election." source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/10/28/election-house-trump-steal/
The biggest national Republican win since 1994 was in 2010: "Republicans regained control of the U.S. House they had lost in the 2006 midterm election, picking up a net total of 63 seats and erasing the gains Democrats made in 2006 and 2008. Although the sitting president's party usually loses seats in a midterm election, the 2010 election resulted in the highest losses by a party in a House midterm election since 1938,[6][7] as well as the largest House swing since 1948.[8] In total, 52 House Democrats were defeated, including 34 freshman and sophomore representatives." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections
Republicans won 51.7 percent of the total vote for the House, the Democrats 44.9 percent. (The House popular vote is not entirely comparable to the popular for the presidency, for two reasons: It does not include DC, and the parties do not contest every seat, especially recently.)
Republicans have won most of the House elections since 1994. I like to say -- and there is evidence to support me -- that the two best recruiters for the Republican Party in recent decades have been Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.
(Early next year I might be able to do a more extensive analysis for you, maybe even including a few graphs.)
And the biggest recruiter for the Democrats has been Donald Trump who won the House in 2018 and Senate in 2020.
For 2026 House and Senate Republican candidates a Harris win is ironically best, for Democrats a Trump win
Washington Post has now lost 9% of its entire subscription base in the 4 days since Bezos stopped their endorsement of Harris. That's pretty impressive and yet another sign to me that there are things that the polling is just not picking up.
It feels rather unlikely those subs will be quickly replaced from the right or independents. But I suppose Bezos can afford it. It’s a weird thing for him to even own frankly.
Washington — Voters in Puerto Rico who are angered by an offensive remark about the island at former President Donald Trump's campaign rally at Madison Square Garden in New York on Sunday have little recourse because residents of the territory cannot vote in the presidential election.
But there are millions of Puerto Ricans living in one of the 50 states who are eligible to vote. According to the Pew Research Center, Puerto Ricans make up the second-largest Hispanic voting group, with nearly 6 million voters living in the mainland U.S. as of 2021. Pennsylvania in particular has a sizable Puerto Rican population whose votes could make a difference in the battleground state.
Looks like Google have been rather naughty, suppressing the Rogan interview from YouTube’s search function. If not cock up and deliberate, a silly move as it just plays into the Trump narrative.
Top link for me:
Sorry to be more specific when I say Google… it’s if you try a native search from within YouTube itself. It was certainly the case when I tried earlier this evening and a great many non-political accts confirmed as much. And Musk too.
Seems fine to me:
Very strange. Don’t know how to add a photo on here but it is still not showing for me if you do a search in the search bar, you get 2-3 hits from third party accts with snippets and then news coverage of the interview (largely negative), then Puerto Rico stuff. I can scroll through perhaps the first 50 hits and still not find it.
Conversely if I search for example Rogan Hancock or Rogan Brian Cox, those interviews come up in full as the first hits.
It might be algorithm driven but it does feel strange given the full interview is by far a more viewed video than anything in the search output.
Google is disappearing up its own arse - a combination of twiddling the algorithms, "AI" and tons of garbage on the Internet.
Washington — Voters in Puerto Rico who are angered by an offensive remark about the island at former President Donald Trump's campaign rally at Madison Square Garden in New York on Sunday have little recourse because residents of the territory cannot vote in the presidential election.
But there are millions of Puerto Ricans living in one of the 50 states who are eligible to vote. According to the Pew Research Center, Puerto Ricans make up the second-largest Hispanic voting group, with nearly 6 million voters living in the mainland U.S. as of 2021. Pennsylvania in particular has a sizable Puerto Rican population whose votes could make a difference in the battleground state.
The chance that the House will decide the presidential election is "remote": "The relevant language in the 12th Amendment is admirably clear: “The person having the greatest number of [electoral] votes shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of electors appointed.” If that majority is not achieved, the House would properly decide the election.
There are only two situations in which that could happen — both highly unlikely. First, there could be a tie vote in the electoral college. Second, a third-party candidate could take enough electoral votes from the top two to prevent anyone from winning a majority of electors.
Effectively, either situation is almost as good as a win for Trump because the House vote on the presidency would not involve all 435 members as individuals. Each state delegation would get one vote. And Republicans are very likely to continue their control of the House caucuses from at least 26 states after the election." source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/10/28/election-house-trump-steal/
What about if some states do not send in ratified slates of electors? Winning, say 260-200 with the remaining EVs unratified should therefore send it to the House - even if Harris led in each of the states that refuse to certify, right? Not that I'm saying that will happen, but it is a scenario that meets the criteria.
Washington Post has now lost 9% of its entire subscription base in the 4 days since Bezos stopped their endorsement of Harris. That's pretty impressive and yet another sign to me that there are things that the polling is just not picking up.
It feels rather unlikely those subs will be quickly replaced from the right or independents. But I suppose Bezos can afford it. It’s a weird thing for him to even own frankly.
Washington Post has now lost 9% of its entire subscription base in the 4 days since Bezos stopped their endorsement of Harris. That's pretty impressive and yet another sign to me that there are things that the polling is just not picking up.
It feels rather unlikely those subs will be quickly replaced from the right or independents. But I suppose Bezos can afford it. It’s a weird thing for him to even own frankly.
He thinks that it makes the politicians pay attention to him. People used to own newspapers in this country for the same reasons and in some cases still do.
Looks like Google have been rather naughty, suppressing the Rogan interview from YouTube’s search function. If not cock up and deliberate, a silly move as it just plays into the Trump narrative.
Top link for me:
Sorry to be more specific when I say Google… it’s if you try a native search from within YouTube itself. It was certainly the case when I tried earlier this evening and a great many non-political accts confirmed as much. And Musk too.
I just tried on youtube and it didn't come up at all, just commentary on the podcast. But you can find it easily enough.
I said on here the minute it was announced that cutting WFA was a political disaster and I'm calling the £2 bus cut another disaster and i'm obvs not the only one.
Why are Lab doing this stupid stuff for a few quid?
Luke Tryl @LukeTryl · 9h If you want an idea of why removing the £2 bus fare cap may be so damaging beyond polls, read Greg's quote from our focus group. At a time of deep political distrust it's one of few recent examples of a policy people can point to that tangibly improves their lives for the better
Washington Post has now lost 9% of its entire subscription base in the 4 days since Bezos stopped their endorsement of Harris. That's pretty impressive and yet another sign to me that there are things that the polling is just not picking up.
It feels rather unlikely those subs will be quickly replaced from the right or independents. But I suppose Bezos can afford it. It’s a weird thing for him to even own frankly.
If Trump does win it looks like he will win the popular vote and the GOP will win Congress too (even if the Democrats narrow the margin in the Senate).
That would make it the biggest GOP win in a national US election since Bush was re elected in 2004. Harris is basically a female and black John Kerry so fits that narrative.
On average 538 has Harris ahead by 0.4% in Michigan, by 0.1% in Wisconsin and Trump by 0.3% in Pennsylvania (which has an above average number of Puerto Ricans who might react badly to the comedian's insults yesterday to their ancestral homeland).
On the generic congressional ballot, the Democrats are outperforming Harris by a couple of percent. So, it's entirely possible that Trump wins the White House, while the Democrats take back the House.
Even then the GOP almost certainly take the Senate
If Dems take the House then Trump can't be made POTUS via the House if/when there is a draw in ECV.
Er yes he can... depends on state-by-state delegations not the overall House numbers.
I'd be sad if all blondes with blue eyes, strawberry blondes and gingers died out because, quite frankly - although it won't happen in my lifetime - I find them prettier than brunettes but that is probably the natural end point in c.200 years on current trends. Through the summations of millions of individual choices and intermixing we'll probably all eventually become mixed race, a bit like how the Spanish did and probably look a bit more like them.
I don't think it necessarily make you a racist if you mourned this, and nor does any one race have more value than another, but I don't share the worries that it will fundamentally change Britain because I think all those people will adopt the values of the prevailing culture, including their heritage and traditions as Eric Kaufmann argues in "Whiteshift". Bit would I miss the blondes? Yes, I would.
[Having said that, it's not irrevocable either - over tens of thousands of years pigmentation would tend to lighten again because it will have to in order to get enough vitamin D, recognising that evolution will be much much slower in an advanced society where far more people survive. If we decide to actually try to have kids, that is.]
An underappreciated comment. That said... if people with dark skin tend to find other people with dark skin more sexually attractive, and people with light skin (etc), then one might easily end up with a "islands" of physical characteristics.
It also is a misunderstanding of how genetics works. For example in "A Muppet Christmas Carol" Tiny Tim is a small frog, not some weird frog/pig hybrid. Its the same for people.
Always good when PBers bring solid evidence to an argument
Washington — Voters in Puerto Rico who are angered by an offensive remark about the island at former President Donald Trump's campaign rally at Madison Square Garden in New York on Sunday have little recourse because residents of the territory cannot vote in the presidential election.
But there are millions of Puerto Ricans living in one of the 50 states who are eligible to vote. According to the Pew Research Center, Puerto Ricans make up the second-largest Hispanic voting group, with nearly 6 million voters living in the mainland U.S. as of 2021. Pennsylvania in particular has a sizable Puerto Rican population whose votes could make a difference in the battleground state.
Puerto Rico's population (3.3 million at the 2020 census) ranks between Utah (also 3.3 million) and Connecticut (3.6 million). So, if it were granted Statehood, it would have 6 electors.
Interesting to see local Government re-organisation is back on the political agenda and will be an integral part of the English Devolution Bill, due to be published next month.
Will this finally mark the end of the two-tier system in England? If so, how will this impact the 2025 County Council elections especially if the authorities being elected could cease to exist within the life of the current Parliament?
Taking Surrey for example, will the County take over the functions of the eleven Districts and Boroughs (the Cornwall solution) ir will the County be divided into three with each having the population of a London Borough (roughly 350,000) ?
I am trying not to be cynical, but I am imagining Sir Humphrey rubbing his hands with glee at some ineffectual new layer of regional government being set up and a whole new Whitehall department being created to oversee the poor loves.
In Durham they just got rid of the district councils and the county council took on all duties. Sadly it did not adopt the name County of County Durham County Council.
Two tier is just daft. Rubbish in your bin - District Council; rubbish you take to the tip* - County Council.
*I believe that they are referring to as "Household Waste Recycling Centres" in wokespeak. But tip is shorter.
If we are going to combine more district and county councils into unitaries then we also need stronger Parish and Town councils. Otherwise many could find most of their council decisions taken over the other side of the county
Washington Post has now lost 9% of its entire subscription base in the 4 days since Bezos stopped their endorsement of Harris. That's pretty impressive and yet another sign to me that there are things that the polling is just not picking up.
It feels rather unlikely those subs will be quickly replaced from the right or independents. But I suppose Bezos can afford it. It’s a weird thing for him to even own frankly.
So is it a trophy or a pulpit?
Either way, it's badly diminished.
Diminished by not being partisan?
Diminished by being nine percent smaller than it was a few days ago. Not yet decimated, but I suspect that's a matter of time.
Looks like Google have been rather naughty, suppressing the Rogan interview from YouTube’s search function. If not cock up and deliberate, a silly move as it just plays into the Trump narrative.
Top link for me:
Sorry to be more specific when I say Google… it’s if you try a native search from within YouTube itself. It was certainly the case when I tried earlier this evening and a great many non-political accts confirmed as much. And Musk too.
Seems fine to me:
Very strange. Don’t know how to add a photo on here but it is still not showing for me if you do a search in the search bar, you get 2-3 hits from third party accts with snippets and then news coverage of the interview (largely negative), then Puerto Rico stuff. I can scroll through perhaps the first 50 hits and still not find it.
Conversely if I search for example Rogan Hancock or Rogan Brian Cox, those interviews come up in full as the first hits.
It might be algorithm driven but it does feel strange given the full interview is by far a more viewed video than anything in the search output.
Google is disappearing up its own arse - a combination of twiddling the algorithms, "AI" and tons of garbage on the Internet.
Washington Post has now lost 9% of its entire subscription base in the 4 days since Bezos stopped their endorsement of Harris. That's pretty impressive and yet another sign to me that there are things that the polling is just not picking up.
It feels rather unlikely those subs will be quickly replaced from the right or independents. But I suppose Bezos can afford it. It’s a weird thing for him to even own frankly.
So is it a trophy or a pulpit?
Either way, it's badly diminished.
Diminished by not being partisan?
Diminished by being nine percent smaller than it was a few days ago. Not yet decimated, but I suspect that's a matter of time.
Close to being decimated. A long way before it's elonned.
Washington Post has now lost 9% of its entire subscription base in the 4 days since Bezos stopped their endorsement of Harris. That's pretty impressive and yet another sign to me that there are things that the polling is just not picking up.
It feels rather unlikely those subs will be quickly replaced from the right or independents. But I suppose Bezos can afford it. It’s a weird thing for him to even own frankly.
So is it a trophy or a pulpit?
Either way, it's badly diminished.
Diminished by not being partisan?
Diminished by being nine percent smaller than it was a few days ago. Not yet decimated, but I suspect that's a matter of time.
Newspapers are always partisan. Always have been.
Pretty much what they were invented for, back in the day.
I said on here the minute it was announced that cutting WFA was a political disaster and I'm calling the £2 bus cut another disaster and i'm obvs not the only one.
Why are Lab doing this stupid stuff for a few quid?
Luke Tryl @LukeTryl · 9h If you want an idea of why removing the £2 bus fare cap may be so damaging beyond polls, read Greg's quote from our focus group. At a time of deep political distrust it's one of few recent examples of a policy people can point to that tangibly improves their lives for the better
Your dismissing of billions of pounds as a few quid is the problem.
Scrapping unnecessary expenditure like the WFA is precisely the right thing to do and when it saves billions of pounds per year that is massive not inconsequential.
Washington Post has now lost 9% of its entire subscription base in the 4 days since Bezos stopped their endorsement of Harris. That's pretty impressive and yet another sign to me that there are things that the polling is just not picking up.
It feels rather unlikely those subs will be quickly replaced from the right or independents. But I suppose Bezos can afford it. It’s a weird thing for him to even own frankly.
So is it a trophy or a pulpit?
Either way, it's badly diminished.
Diminished by not being partisan?
Diminished by being nine percent smaller than it was a few days ago. Not yet decimated, but I suspect that's a matter of time.
Close to being decimated. A long way before it's elonned.
I'd be sad if all blondes with blue eyes, strawberry blondes and gingers died out because, quite frankly - although it won't happen in my lifetime - I find them prettier than brunettes but that is probably the natural end point in c.200 years on current trends. Through the summations of millions of individual choices and intermixing we'll probably all eventually become mixed race, a bit like how the Spanish did and probably look a bit more like them.
I don't think it necessarily make you a racist if you mourned this, and nor does any one race have more value than another, but I don't share the worries that it will fundamentally change Britain because I think all those people will adopt the values of the prevailing culture, including their heritage and traditions as Eric Kaufmann argues in "Whiteshift". Bit would I miss the blondes? Yes, I would.
[Having said that, it's not irrevocable either - over tens of thousands of years pigmentation would tend to lighten again because it will have to in order to get enough vitamin D, recognising that evolution will be much much slower in an advanced society where far more people survive. If we decide to actually try to have kids, that is.]
An underappreciated comment. That said... if people with dark skin tend to find other people with dark skin more sexually attractive, and people with light skin (etc), then one might easily end up with a "islands" of physical characteristics.
It also is a misunderstanding of how genetics works. For example in "A Muppet Christmas Carol" Tiny Tim is a small frog, not some weird frog/pig hybrid. Its the same for people.
Always good when PBers bring solid evidence to an argument
I think Foxy may need to revise his genetics. To start with a frog is a different species from a human. Note the definition of a species....
The only thing this will hurt is the newspaper and its staff. Bezos is too rich to care.
Many will lose jobs. Or the whole thing will close.
Now maybe you can argue the editor should have published the Harris endorsement and then resigned. Bezos can't actually stop the printing press.
Three of the editorial board have resigned.
I’m afraid it’s inevitable, though. Bezos apparently wants “more conservative voices”, so he seems set on turning it into something that’s not really the WaPo that its subscribers want. Will it attract other readers ? Perhaps; perhaps not.
What’s undeniable is that the timing of this is pretty crass. It just makes it look entirely done as a suck up to Trump.
Looks like Google have been rather naughty, suppressing the Rogan interview from YouTube’s search function. If not cock up and deliberate, a silly move as it just plays into the Trump narrative.
Top link for me:
Sorry to be more specific when I say Google… it’s if you try a native search from within YouTube itself. It was certainly the case when I tried earlier this evening and a great many non-political accts confirmed as much. And Musk too.
I just tried on youtube and it didn't come up at all, just commentary on the podcast. But you can find it easily enough.
Whatever the cause, Rogan himself has now (re)tweeted about it.
I'd be sad if all blondes with blue eyes, strawberry blondes and gingers died out because, quite frankly - although it won't happen in my lifetime - I find them prettier than brunettes but that is probably the natural end point in c.200 years on current trends. Through the summations of millions of individual choices and intermixing we'll probably all eventually become mixed race, a bit like how the Spanish did and probably look a bit more like them.
I don't think it necessarily make you a racist if you mourned this, and nor does any one race have more value than another, but I don't share the worries that it will fundamentally change Britain because I think all those people will adopt the values of the prevailing culture, including their heritage and traditions as Eric Kaufmann argues in "Whiteshift". Bit would I miss the blondes? Yes, I would.
[Having said that, it's not irrevocable either - over tens of thousands of years pigmentation would tend to lighten again because it will have to in order to get enough vitamin D, recognising that evolution will be much much slower in an advanced society where far more people survive. If we decide to actually try to have kids, that is.]
An underappreciated comment. That said... if people with dark skin tend to find other people with dark skin more sexually attractive, and people with light skin (etc), then one might easily end up with a "islands" of physical characteristics.
It also is a misunderstanding of how genetics works. For example in "A Muppet Christmas Carol" Tiny Tim is a small frog, not some weird frog/pig hybrid. Its the same for people.
I said on here the minute it was announced that cutting WFA was a political disaster and I'm calling the £2 bus cut another disaster and i'm obvs not the only one.
Why are Lab doing this stupid stuff for a few quid?
Well when you are dumb enough to rule out changing the rates of VAT, national insurance, income tax, and corporation tax — which are the main fiscal levers — all you are left with are relatively small changes at the margins. Those small changes are often disproportionately painful to particular groups, whilst raising quite small amounts of money, or alternately not cutting costs that much.
So we end with scrapping the winter fuel allowance, which will really hurt those just above the threshold, raising employer national insurance (making employment more expensive), and the brainwave of making bus travel more expensive which hurts some of the poorest people and makes public transport less attractive. VAT on school fees is another daft idea, I don't even like the idea of private education, but I'm damned if I can see the sense in making any type of education more expensive.
Short of pulling the mother of all rabbits out of the hat on Wednesday I expect that the budget is going to be an absolute stinker. By Thursday a hell of a lot of people are going to be asking themselves why did they vote Labour.
The only thing this will hurt is the newspaper and its staff. Bezos is too rich to care.
Many will lose jobs. Or the whole thing will close.
Now maybe you can argue the editor should have published the Harris endorsement and then resigned. Bezos can't actually stop the printing press.
Three of the editorial board have resigned.
I’m afraid it’s inevitable, though. Bezos apparently wants “more conservative voices”, so he seems set on turning it into something that’s not really the WaPo that its subscribers want. Will it attract other readers ? Perhaps; perhaps not.
What’s undeniable is that the timing of this is pretty crass. It just makes it look entirely done as a suck up to Trump.
I suspect there are $x0bn reasons why the owner of AWS may want to keep the next potential president happy...
Labour’s Fare Betrayal: SKS "Takes £520 a Year Out of the Pockets of Workers Travelling by Bus"
Although he could neither define a worker or recall what a bus is.
*Workers in England.
Here in the glorious world of West Scotia we are still at the mercy of FirstBus and their ilk. Sometimes they graciously limit a daily charge if the fancy takes them, sometimes not. Either way, you're getting milked.
I'm in Scotland this week. Had a lovely reminder on Sunday of what life without Sunday trading hours could be like. Bit of a bugger that the SNP all voted to force England to retain it. The bishops cam fuck off on this one too, obviously.
Comments
#New General election poll - Arizona
🔵 Harris 46% (+1)
🔴 Trump 45%
Arizona University #D - 846 RV - 10/20
https://x.com/PpollingNumbers/status/1850998410158948682
NEW: Elon Musk quietly deletes post from his pro-Trump PAC calling Kamala
Harris a “C-word” (tap to see deleted post text)
https://x.com/MeidasTouch/status/1850957652706410910
Indeed the Lab vote held up rather better in a low turnout General Election.
EDIT: many years back a chap in Oxford was prosecuted for boobytrapping his bike. Involved a 1 Farad capacitor, IIRC.
What? You didn’t realise it was a wholly owned company? Who’s ceo (who just happens to be the civil servant that recommended the structure) gets paid private sector bonuses to “incentivise him”
There was stronger Labour dominance in the North West - 65 seats out of 73 and of course Labour won all the regions in terms of seats if not votes (the South East and South West saw more Conservative votes but fewer seats and in the South West Labour won the most seats despite finishing just behind the Liberal Democrats in votes).
7hrs later two bobbies turned up, asked if I'd seen the guys faces (no, they were wearing balaclavas) then said 'well, not much we can do' and left. Last I ever heard about it.
So when I had a bike stolen a few years ago I didn't even bother calling them.
https://x.com/Maks_NAFO_FELLA/status/1850836002329207156
I lived in Leman Street in E1 for five years, from 1997 to 2002. I was a few hundred yards from where the battle of Cable Street had been, and the whole area had been ground zero for immigration to London over the last 400 years.
Back in the 17th Century, the French Huguenots came, and built their churches (and resulted in a bunch of funny street names). Then in the 19th Century, it was Eastern Europe's Jews who came. Then it was the Pakistanis and Bangladeshis who pushed out the Jews (who'd all gentrified and moved up to Golders Green and Pinner).
And now, the Pakistanis and Bangladeshis are being pushed out thanks to gentrification of Shoreditch and Spitalfields, and old houses are being torn down and being replaced by expensive apartment complexes.
Here in the glorious world of West Scotia we are still at the mercy of FirstBus and their ilk. Sometimes they graciously limit a daily charge if the fancy takes them, sometimes not. Either way, you're getting milked.
Tice has already annoyed some on the far right by distancing Reform from Robinson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgTB0GYg1cM
Wonder what the hipsters will do for summer rioting?
And of course, when Home Secretaries were fun....
Note that he is using an actual wall for cover. Versus the soldiers using a plate glass shop window.
Interesting to see local Government re-organisation is back on the political agenda and will be an integral part of the English Devolution Bill, due to be published next month.
Will this finally mark the end of the two-tier system in England? If so, how will this impact the 2025 County Council elections especially if the authorities being elected could cease to exist within the life of the current Parliament?
Taking Surrey for example, will the County take over the functions of the eleven Districts and Boroughs (the Cornwall solution) ir will the County be divided into three with each having the population of a London Borough (roughly 350,000) ?
"The most popular date for giving birth in 2023 was 28 September..."
So nine months after Santa sneaks into the house and empties his sack.
I wonder what static voltage you could get a bike (and passenger) up to (assuming it isn't raining) with a suitable modification to the wheel hub?
A small extra incentive not to put your foot down...
[I had a (fairly distinctive) bike stolen in Oxford many years ago that was actually recovered by a very observant policeman. Sadly written off by a car later although it did complete a good number of tours first.]
That and providing yet more cushy and futile jobs for their public sector union paymasters of course.
(FWIW, there has never been a US election where the House and Presidency have both flipped in different directions.)
Two tier is just daft. Rubbish in your bin - District Council; rubbish you take to the tip* - County Council.
*I believe that they are referring to as "Household Waste Recycling Centres" in wokespeak. But tip is shorter.
Back in the real world, the Conservatives kept promising "devolution" to English local authorities especially Conservative-run County Councils but never really delivered because at heart they distrusted local Government of all stripes and much preferred all power to be at Whitehall and Westminster.
The centralising failures have been booted out - have another batch of centralising failures replaced them? We'll see.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections
Republicans won 51.7 percent of the total vote for the House, the Democrats 44.9 percent. (The House popular vote is not entirely comparable to the popular for the presidency, for two reasons: It does not include DC, and the parties do not contest every seat, especially recently.)
Republicans have won most of the House elections since 1994. I like to say -- and there is evidence to support me -- that the two best recruiters for the Republican Party in recent decades have been Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.
(Early next year I might be able to do a more extensive analysis for you, maybe even including a few graphs.)
@BGrueskin
Unfathomable: Washpost has lost 200,000 subscribers since Bezos pulled the Harris endorsement. That's 8% of its base in a few days.
Keep in mind its net gain for most of 2024 was only 4,000 (not a typo) subscribers.
Major scoop via @davidfolkenflik
https://x.com/BGrueskin/status/1850984604762534083
John Harris
@johnharris1969
·
4h
Go on, do something really really stupid
England’s bus fare cap will rise from £2 to £3 in 2025, says Starmer
https://x.com/johnharris1969/status/1850939323266593007
At the exit poll next week the figure I’ll be looking out for is the gender breakdown . We are likely to see the biggest ever gender disparity and because more women vote if that figure is higher than normal then it’s likely curtains for Trump .
Many will lose jobs. Or the whole thing will close.
Now maybe you can argue the editor should have published the Harris endorsement and then resigned. Bezos can't actually stop the printing press.
Presumably Bezos wants something out of owning it? Credibility maybe? Now fucked.
If buying a media outlet and driving it into the ground is a thing, does Bezos really want to be "no better than Musk" ?
It will also be extremely interesting to see if the abortion referendum in Arizona boosts female turnout there.
Why are Lab doing this stupid stuff for a few quid?
Luke Tryl
@LukeTryl
·
9h
If you want an idea of why removing the £2 bus fare cap may be so damaging beyond polls, read Greg's quote from our focus group. At a time of deep political distrust it's one of few recent examples of a policy people can point to that tangibly improves their lives for the better
https://x.com/LukeTryl/status/1850861580444983553
Conversely if I search for example Rogan Hancock or Rogan Brian Cox, those interviews come up in full as the first hits.
It might be algorithm driven but it does feel strange given the full interview is by far a more viewed video than anything in the search output.
@PaulCliftonBBC
Latest from @networkrail on plans to tackle the crowding problems at Euston station @NetworkRailEUS
https://x.com/PaulCliftonBBC/status/1850949207714087411
And when you have HR, finance, IT, marketing, admin, etc. that are never directly billable, those of us doing the real graft have to carry a lot of passengers.
There are only two situations in which that could happen — both highly unlikely. First, there could be a tie vote in the electoral college. Second, a third-party candidate could take enough electoral votes from the top two to prevent anyone from winning a majority of electors.
Effectively, either situation is almost as good as a win for Trump because the House vote on the presidency would not involve all 435 members as individuals. Each state delegation would get one vote. And Republicans are very likely to continue their control of the House caucuses from at least 26 states after the election."
source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/10/28/election-house-trump-steal/
Donald Trump who won the House in 2018 and Senate in
2020.
For 2026 House and Senate Republican candidates a Harris win is ironically best, for Democrats a Trump win
But there are millions of Puerto Ricans living in one of the 50 states who are eligible to vote. According to the Pew Research Center, Puerto Ricans make up the second-largest Hispanic voting group, with nearly 6 million voters living in the mainland U.S. as of 2021. Pennsylvania in particular has a sizable Puerto Rican population whose votes could make a difference in the battleground state.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/can-puerto-rico-vote-us-elections/
https://x.com/FKadoseneye_/status/1850710691721740748
Winning, say 260-200 with the remaining EVs unratified should therefore send it to the House - even if Harris led in each of the states that refuse to certify, right?
Not that I'm saying that will happen, but it is a scenario that meets the criteria.
Either way, it's badly diminished.
We have been on a dayout today with our daughter in law visiting us from Vancouver and return to find
The Speaker tearing strips out of Reeves
Starmer increasing bus fares of all things
The whole government unable to define working people
ETH sacked by Manchester United (what took them so long)
I didn't have much faith in Starmer but he is just out of his depth and simply not a politician, much like Sunak
If there are no goodies in this Statement on Wednesday, then crossover in the polls with the conservatives is not as unlikely as it once seemed
Pretty much what they were invented for, back in the day.
Scrapping unnecessary expenditure like the WFA is precisely the right thing to do and when it saves billions of pounds per year that is massive not inconsequential.
End up in a Dumpster"
Well, we can hope.
I’m afraid it’s inevitable, though. Bezos apparently wants “more conservative voices”, so he seems set on turning it into something that’s not really the WaPo that its subscribers want.
Will it attract other readers ? Perhaps; perhaps not.
What’s undeniable is that the timing of this is pretty crass. It just makes it look entirely done as a suck up to Trump.
https://www.newsflare.com/video/681420/sewage-pipe-bursts-in-china-sending-fountain-of-yellow-liquid-several-stories-high-and-shattering-car-windows
A Frig?
So we end with scrapping the winter fuel allowance, which will really hurt those just above the threshold, raising employer national insurance (making employment more expensive), and the brainwave of making bus travel more expensive which hurts some of the poorest people and makes public transport less attractive. VAT on school fees is another daft idea, I don't even like the idea of private education, but I'm damned if I can see the sense in making any type of education more expensive.
Short of pulling the mother of all rabbits out of the hat on Wednesday I expect that the budget is going to be an absolute stinker. By Thursday a hell of a lot of people are going to be asking themselves why did they vote Labour.
👆 interesting
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14010227/Disgusted-Heathrow-Airport-passengers-urine-sewage-dripping-ceiling-arrivals.html