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The (lack of) incumbency bonus – politicalbetting.com

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  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,960
    edited November 9
    Another senior long term employee of OpenAI has just announcing they are leaving. Something doesn't seem right there.
  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 22,052
    rcs1000 said:

    viewcode said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Trump declares war on the drug cartels.

    https://x.com/collinrugg/status/1854980821587050921

    1. "Deploy all necessary military assets, including the US Navy to impose the full naval embargo and the cartels."

    2. "Guarantee that the waters of the Western Hemisphere are not used to traffic illicit drugs to our country."

    3. "Order the Department of Defense to make appropriate use of special forces cyber warfare and other overt and covert actions to inflict maximum damage on cartel leadership, infrastructure, and operations."

    4. "Designate the major cartels as foreign terrorist organizations."

    5: "Sever their access to global financial systems."

    6. "Get the full cooperation of other governments to stop [the cartels], or we will expose every bribe, every kickback, every payoff, and every bit of corruption that is allowing the cartels to preserve their brutal reign."

    7. "Ask Congress to pass legislation ensuring that drug smugglers and human traffickers receive the de*th penalty."

    "When I'm back in the White House, the drug kingpins and vicious traffickers will never sleep soundly again."

    Didn't Tom Clancy write a book about when the US Government went to war on the cartels.

    (Ultimately, there is demand for drugs. There will therefore be a supply of drugs. If you want to stop drugs, stop demand for them.)
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clear_and_Present_Danger
    Yes, yes, I remember which book it was.

    From Red Storm Rising all the way through to Executive Orders, Clancy wrote some pretty decent thrillers.
    I quite liked "The Bear and the Dragon", which was basically the last good Ryan book. Then it all went downhill.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 23,100

    Does everyone know that the UN was led by a genuine, bona fide (Austrian) Nazi in the 1970s?

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Waldheim

    Under his leadership in 1975, UN Resolution 3379 was passed

    It determined "that Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination"

    It was eventually revoked in 1991

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_General_Assembly_Resolution_3379

    Yes :smile:. There have been various shock ! horror ! scandals about it. Perhaps it's a phenomenon of the silent "window of recent history" for all of us, in this case because you are relatively young for PB people?

    I did not, know, for example, know much about the 50s 60s until I started to read up about them.

    Many of the Great and the Good in West Germany in the 1950s to 1970s were senior officials in the Nazi era. There's a good Mark Felton video about it somewhere. A large proportion of senior Lawyers and Members of Parliament were former Nazis for many years, which may be linked to why the WG Government went to such lengths to avoid prosecuting any.
  • kyf_100kyf_100 Posts: 4,933
    DeclanF said:

    kyf_100 said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Double UAPs and UFOs hearing in Congress on Wednesday, which is larger than the previous one.

    Who is testifying will make the difference as to whether it's significant, but most of the media hasn't registered it at all, as yet.
    unlike June 2023.
    https://x.com/MarioNawfal/status/1854386103962177631

    Yawn. Nothing will come out. It’s all grift and rumours of rumours.

    As I have continually said.
    Even if that turns out to be true, it’s notable that the likes of Schumer and Rubio are giving a very different impression. Why? It’s not because they’re morons. They’ve had +40 people testify under oath behind closed doors. Who? Why?

    Why have they and many others pushed the UAP Disclosure Act now three years in a row, legally defining “technology of non human origin”?

    It’s remarkable how few people on this forum see how notable that legislation is, even if you think the motives are different to what its sponsors portray.
    Intelligent people can believe strange things all the time. From my perspective I find belief in deities weird, but I know many very intelligent people who do. It’s the same with UAPs etc. There are very many grifters and liars spinning yarns which suck people in. That’s all.
    For about two years you insisted Covid came from the wet market
    Oh fuck off. We do not know the origins of covid and the wet market is still a valid hypothesis.
    Where did SARS come from? Or MERS? Novel pathogens almost always originate in animals before making the transition to humans, usually through humans in close proximity.
    You haven’t won the debate over covid origins, even if you think you have. A lab leak is entirely plausible, but so is origins from the wet market.
    lol. You were absolutely insistent it came from the market now it’s “we do not know the origins”

    You’re a boring, timid, narrow minded science nerd with the imaginative capacity of a whelk, and you get scared by ideas which threaten your little world


    And you waste hours of you pathetic empty life trying to wind up people you have never met on a niche political/betting website.
    I don’t recall being insistent. I would certainly have thought it by far the likeliest explanation, just as with all the others diseases of zoonotic origins.
    lol

    If I live a pathetic empty life - *he writes, on a bus to the Korean demilitarised zone* - I’d hate to see your description of the life of, say, a boring midwit stay at home science academic living in Hornsey
    Each to their own. I find it fascinating how much you seem to need PB. And not just PB, but pointless arguments and nasty comments. Honestly if I want snark and nasty comments I just need to have coffee with fellow academics…
    As we have established many times PB is a portable pub. It’s brilliant for that. Given that I travel incessantly it’s very handy for me to have a pub I can take out of my pocket and meet old friends - and comfortingly boring regulars - and old sparring partners. Its actually stranger - to me - how much people who DON’T travel frequent PB, however I never criticize anyone for doing it as we all have our needs and desires and the PB pub rightly welcomes everyone

    And yes I love a good argument. I get easily bored and a nice dust-up enlivens the world

    Right. This is it. I could die here. Gulp
    I enjoy PB because I can get all of my weird political frustrations and arguments out here, to the point in my actual day to day life people think I'm completely apolitical and uninterested in the world around me. It's a good place to vent.

    In a world where everyone seems to argue about politics, all the time, most of my closest friends haven't a scooby what I really think about the issues of the day or who I vote for.

    Therefore to me PB is less like the village pub and more like the knocking shop I secretly visit to sate my kinky s&m desires, while appearing to friends and family as blandly asexual, perhaps a bit of missionary at Xmas...
    You've certainly behaved like a bully to some. Your desires have been sated. Pity about the effect on them.
    Ah, I know who you are.

    While I don't miss your hate-peddling, I'm nonetheless glad to see you're keeping well.
  • Sunil_PrasannanSunil_Prasannan Posts: 51,806
    viewcode said:

    rcs1000 said:

    viewcode said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Trump declares war on the drug cartels.

    https://x.com/collinrugg/status/1854980821587050921

    1. "Deploy all necessary military assets, including the US Navy to impose the full naval embargo and the cartels."

    2. "Guarantee that the waters of the Western Hemisphere are not used to traffic illicit drugs to our country."

    3. "Order the Department of Defense to make appropriate use of special forces cyber warfare and other overt and covert actions to inflict maximum damage on cartel leadership, infrastructure, and operations."

    4. "Designate the major cartels as foreign terrorist organizations."

    5: "Sever their access to global financial systems."

    6. "Get the full cooperation of other governments to stop [the cartels], or we will expose every bribe, every kickback, every payoff, and every bit of corruption that is allowing the cartels to preserve their brutal reign."

    7. "Ask Congress to pass legislation ensuring that drug smugglers and human traffickers receive the de*th penalty."

    "When I'm back in the White House, the drug kingpins and vicious traffickers will never sleep soundly again."

    Didn't Tom Clancy write a book about when the US Government went to war on the cartels.

    (Ultimately, there is demand for drugs. There will therefore be a supply of drugs. If you want to stop drugs, stop demand for them.)
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clear_and_Present_Danger
    Yes, yes, I remember which book it was.

    From Red Storm Rising all the way through to Executive Orders, Clancy wrote some pretty decent thrillers.
    I quite liked "The Bear and the Dragon", which was basically the last good Ryan book. Then it all went downhill.
    "Your conclusions were all wrong, Ryan. Halsey acted stupidly!"
  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 22,052
    MattW said:

    ...Many of the Great and the Good in West Germany in the 1950s to 1970s were senior officials in the Nazi era. There's a good Mark Felton video about it somewhere. A large proportion of senior Lawyers and Members of Parliament were former Nazis for many years, which may be linked to why the WG Government went to such lengths to avoid prosecuting any.

    I think it's this one:

    "Hitler's Generals in the West German Army"
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqH6rmN5MsE

  • MattWMattW Posts: 23,100
    edited November 9
    viewcode said:

    MattW said:

    ...Many of the Great and the Good in West Germany in the 1950s to 1970s were senior officials in the Nazi era. There's a good Mark Felton video about it somewhere. A large proportion of senior Lawyers and Members of Parliament were former Nazis for many years, which may be linked to why the WG Government went to such lengths to avoid prosecuting any.

    I think it's this one:

    "Hitler's Generals in the West German Army"
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqH6rmN5MsE

    That's related, but the one I'm after was about people in society in the establishment. The one you link is aiui about Bundeswehr Generals not implicated with Nazi crimes or links who were deemed to have clean hands.

    There's also this one, which is about the Naumann Circle, which was a network of hundreds of former Nazis in senior positions. But it's not that one either - unless there is a side comment. I'll have a listen.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eZ9ByBiYZs

    I think I may be thinking of a side reference; eg the notes on that bid mention an NYT article "53 EX-NAZIS HOLD BUNDESTAG SEATS; These Were Less the Choice of the West German People Than of the Parties," The New York Times, 9 May 1950
    https://www.nytimes.com/1950/05/09/archives/53-exnazis-hold-bundestag-seats-these-were-less-the-choice-of-the.html
  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 22,052
    MattW said:

    viewcode said:

    MattW said:

    ...Many of the Great and the Good in West Germany in the 1950s to 1970s were senior officials in the Nazi era. There's a good Mark Felton video about it somewhere. A large proportion of senior Lawyers and Members of Parliament were former Nazis for many years, which may be linked to why the WG Government went to such lengths to avoid prosecuting any.

    I think it's this one:

    "Hitler's Generals in the West German Army"
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqH6rmN5MsE

    That's related, but the one I'm after was about people in society in the establishment. The one you link is aiui about Bundeswehr Generals not implicated with Nazi crimes or links who were deemed to have clean hands.

    There's also this one, which is about the Naumann Circle, which was a network of hundreds of former Nazis in senior positions. But it's not that one either - unless there is a side comment. I'll have a listen.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eZ9ByBiYZs

    I think I may be thinking of a side reference; eg the notes on that bid mention an NYT article "53 EX-NAZIS HOLD BUNDESTAG SEATS; These Were Less the Choice of the West German People Than of the Parties," The New York Times, 9 May 1950
    https://www.nytimes.com/1950/05/09/archives/53-exnazis-hold-bundestag-seats-these-were-less-the-choice-of-the.html
    Leafing thru Dr Felton's extensive oeuvre to find it is probably beyond me at this point, I'm sorry... :(
  • MattWMattW Posts: 23,100
    edited November 9
    rcs1000 said:

    Trump declares war on the drug cartels.

    https://x.com/collinrugg/status/1854980821587050921

    1. "Deploy all necessary military assets, including the US Navy to impose the full naval embargo and the cartels."

    2. "Guarantee that the waters of the Western Hemisphere are not used to traffic illicit drugs to our country."

    3. "Order the Department of Defense to make appropriate use of special forces cyber warfare and other overt and covert actions to inflict maximum damage on cartel leadership, infrastructure, and operations."

    4. "Designate the major cartels as foreign terrorist organizations."

    5: "Sever their access to global financial systems."

    6. "Get the full cooperation of other governments to stop [the cartels], or we will expose every bribe, every kickback, every payoff, and every bit of corruption that is allowing the cartels to preserve their brutal reign."

    7. "Ask Congress to pass legislation ensuring that drug smugglers and human traffickers receive the de*th penalty."

    "When I'm back in the White House, the drug kingpins and vicious traffickers will never sleep soundly again."

    Didn't Tom Clancy write a book about when the US Government went to war on the cartels.

    (Ultimately, there is demand for drugs. There will therefore be a supply of drugs. If you want to stop drugs, stop demand for them.)
    Chump's weird in his narcissism. Is he going to get arrested himself for the profit he made from the laundry of narco-dollars?

    https://www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/corruption-and-money-laundering/explained-what-has-donald-trump-got-do-latin-american-drug-cartels/

  • MattWMattW Posts: 23,100
    viewcode said:

    MattW said:

    viewcode said:

    MattW said:

    ...Many of the Great and the Good in West Germany in the 1950s to 1970s were senior officials in the Nazi era. There's a good Mark Felton video about it somewhere. A large proportion of senior Lawyers and Members of Parliament were former Nazis for many years, which may be linked to why the WG Government went to such lengths to avoid prosecuting any.

    I think it's this one:

    "Hitler's Generals in the West German Army"
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqH6rmN5MsE

    That's related, but the one I'm after was about people in society in the establishment. The one you link is aiui about Bundeswehr Generals not implicated with Nazi crimes or links who were deemed to have clean hands.

    There's also this one, which is about the Naumann Circle, which was a network of hundreds of former Nazis in senior positions. But it's not that one either - unless there is a side comment. I'll have a listen.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eZ9ByBiYZs

    I think I may be thinking of a side reference; eg the notes on that bid mention an NYT article "53 EX-NAZIS HOLD BUNDESTAG SEATS; These Were Less the Choice of the West German People Than of the Parties," The New York Times, 9 May 1950
    https://www.nytimes.com/1950/05/09/archives/53-exnazis-hold-bundestag-seats-these-were-less-the-choice-of-the.html
    Leafing thru Dr Felton's extensive oeuvre to find it is probably beyond me at this point, I'm sorry... :(
    He needs an index.

    Do you suppose AI would know?
  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 22,052
    edited November 9
    MattW said:

    viewcode said:

    MattW said:

    viewcode said:

    MattW said:

    ...Many of the Great and the Good in West Germany in the 1950s to 1970s were senior officials in the Nazi era. There's a good Mark Felton video about it somewhere. A large proportion of senior Lawyers and Members of Parliament were former Nazis for many years, which may be linked to why the WG Government went to such lengths to avoid prosecuting any.

    I think it's this one:

    "Hitler's Generals in the West German Army"
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqH6rmN5MsE

    That's related, but the one I'm after was about people in society in the establishment. The one you link is aiui about Bundeswehr Generals not implicated with Nazi crimes or links who were deemed to have clean hands.

    There's also this one, which is about the Naumann Circle, which was a network of hundreds of former Nazis in senior positions. But it's not that one either - unless there is a side comment. I'll have a listen.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eZ9ByBiYZs

    I think I may be thinking of a side reference; eg the notes on that bid mention an NYT article "53 EX-NAZIS HOLD BUNDESTAG SEATS; These Were Less the Choice of the West German People Than of the Parties," The New York Times, 9 May 1950
    https://www.nytimes.com/1950/05/09/archives/53-exnazis-hold-bundestag-seats-these-were-less-the-choice-of-the.html
    Leafing thru Dr Felton's extensive oeuvre to find it is probably beyond me at this point, I'm sorry... :(
    He needs an index.

    Do you suppose AI would know?
    Good morning ChatGPT. The YouTuber Mark Felton has many videos about World War 2 Germany and the post-war years. Can you please list one or more of his videos that cover Nazis infitrating West German civil society.

    Good morning! Mark Felton has indeed created numerous videos on World War II and its aftermath. While I couldn't find a specific video solely focused on Nazis infiltrating West German civil society, his channel does cover related topics. You might find his video on Nazi fugitives in Argentina interesting, as it touches on post-war Nazi activities.

    If you're interested in more of his content, you can explore his YouTube channel for a variety of historical documentaries.
  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 22,052
    edited November 9
    viewcode said:

    MattW said:

    viewcode said:

    MattW said:

    viewcode said:

    MattW said:

    ...Many of the Great and the Good in West Germany in the 1950s to 1970s were senior officials in the Nazi era. There's a good Mark Felton video about it somewhere. A large proportion of senior Lawyers and Members of Parliament were former Nazis for many years, which may be linked to why the WG Government went to such lengths to avoid prosecuting any.

    I think it's this one:

    "Hitler's Generals in the West German Army"
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqH6rmN5MsE

    That's related, but the one I'm after was about people in society in the establishment. The one you link is aiui about Bundeswehr Generals not implicated with Nazi crimes or links who were deemed to have clean hands.

    There's also this one, which is about the Naumann Circle, which was a network of hundreds of former Nazis in senior positions. But it's not that one either - unless there is a side comment. I'll have a listen.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eZ9ByBiYZs

    I think I may be thinking of a side reference; eg the notes on that bid mention an NYT article "53 EX-NAZIS HOLD BUNDESTAG SEATS; These Were Less the Choice of the West German People Than of the Parties," The New York Times, 9 May 1950
    https://www.nytimes.com/1950/05/09/archives/53-exnazis-hold-bundestag-seats-these-were-less-the-choice-of-the.html
    Leafing thru Dr Felton's extensive oeuvre to find it is probably beyond me at this point, I'm sorry... :(
    He needs an index.

    Do you suppose AI would know?
    Good morning ChatGPT. The YouTuber Mark Felton has many videos about World War 2 Germany and the post-war years. Can you please list one or more of his videos that cover Nazis infitrating West German civil society.

    Good morning! Mark Felton has indeed created numerous videos on World War II and its aftermath. While I couldn't find a specific video solely focused on Nazis infiltrating West German civil society, his channel does cover related topics. You might find his video on Nazi fugitives in Argentina interesting, as it touches on post-war Nazi activities.

    If you're interested in more of his content, you can explore his YouTube channel for a variety of historical documentaries.
    Good morning Perplexity.ai. The YouTuber Mark Felton has many videos about World War 2 Germany and the post-war years. Can you please list one or more of his videos that cover Nazis infitrating West German civil society.

    Good morning. Mark Felton has indeed produced several videos covering World War II and post-war Germany. Based on the search results provided, one of his videos that specifically addresses the topic of Nazis infiltrating West German civil society is: "Secret Fourth Reich - The Naumann Circle Plot"

    This video discusses a secret Nazi organization in West Germany that attempted to infiltrate political parties in the early 1950s. The group, known as the Naumann Circle, was led by Dr. Werner Naumann, the last Propaganda Minister of Nazi Germany. Their goal was to establish a "Fourth Reich," essentially a successor to the defeated Third Reich...[snip]
  • Sean_FSean_F Posts: 37,338
    MattW said:

    Does everyone know that the UN was led by a genuine, bona fide (Austrian) Nazi in the 1970s?

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Waldheim

    Under his leadership in 1975, UN Resolution 3379 was passed

    It determined "that Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination"

    It was eventually revoked in 1991

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_General_Assembly_Resolution_3379

    Yes :smile:. There have been various shock ! horror ! scandals about it. Perhaps it's a phenomenon of the silent "window of recent history" for all of us, in this case because you are relatively young for PB people?

    I did not, know, for example, know much about the 50s 60s until I started to read up about them.

    Many of the Great and the Good in West Germany in the 1950s to 1970s were senior officials in the Nazi era. There's a good Mark Felton video about it somewhere. A large proportion of senior Lawyers and Members of Parliament were former Nazis for many years, which may be linked to why the WG Government went to such lengths to avoid prosecuting any.
    Most war criminals just faded back into civilian life. And in fact, most war criminals are not pathological. Men like Oskar Dirlewanger are outliers. They’re Browning’s “ordinary men.”
  • felixfelix Posts: 15,164
    kinabalu said:

    felix said:

    felix said:

    felix said:

    "A quite stupefying ignorance that makes him unfit to be the President of the United States."

    David Lammy strikes again.

    Oh no, it was Boris Johnson.

    What role does Boris have in government now?
    I am just wondering if anyone brought up his past comments on Trump when the Tories were dealing with Trump. I certainly don't remember you doing so but I may be wrong.
    The past is another country. Here and now is worth talking about. Lammy is potentially a problem, indeed there are many Labour MPs who will find the need to work with Trump quite difficult. Let's hope they can be grownups.
    So why can't Lammy's comments also be in the past?
    He's now Foreign secretary!
    You want him to resign because he said negative things about Donald Trump in the past?
    Where did I say that?
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 57,110
    Sean_F said:

    MattW said:

    Does everyone know that the UN was led by a genuine, bona fide (Austrian) Nazi in the 1970s?

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Waldheim

    Under his leadership in 1975, UN Resolution 3379 was passed

    It determined "that Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination"

    It was eventually revoked in 1991

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_General_Assembly_Resolution_3379

    Yes :smile:. There have been various shock ! horror ! scandals about it. Perhaps it's a phenomenon of the silent "window of recent history" for all of us, in this case because you are relatively young for PB people?

    I did not, know, for example, know much about the 50s 60s until I started to read up about them.

    Many of the Great and the Good in West Germany in the 1950s to 1970s were senior officials in the Nazi era. There's a good Mark Felton video about it somewhere. A large proportion of senior Lawyers and Members of Parliament were former Nazis for many years, which may be linked to why the WG Government went to such lengths to avoid prosecuting any.
    Most war criminals just faded back into civilian life. And in fact, most war criminals are not pathological. Men like Oskar Dirlewanger are outliers. They’re Browning’s “ordinary men.”
    You've read The Banality of Evil, I'm sure.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 49,859
    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.
  • Sean_FSean_F Posts: 37,338
    Ui
  • Sean_FSean_F Posts: 37,338
    rcs1000 said:

    Sean_F said:

    MattW said:

    Does everyone know that the UN was led by a genuine, bona fide (Austrian) Nazi in the 1970s?

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Waldheim

    Under his leadership in 1975, UN Resolution 3379 was passed

    It determined "that Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination"

    It was eventually revoked in 1991

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_General_Assembly_Resolution_3379

    Yes :smile:. There have been various shock ! horror ! scandals about it. Perhaps it's a phenomenon of the silent "window of recent history" for all of us, in this case because you are relatively young for PB people?

    I did not, know, for example, know much about the 50s 60s until I started to read up about them.

    Many of the Great and the Good in West Germany in the 1950s to 1970s were senior officials in the Nazi era. There's a good Mark Felton video about it somewhere. A large proportion of senior Lawyers and Members of Parliament were former Nazis for many years, which may be linked to why the WG Government went to such lengths to avoid prosecuting any.
    Most war criminals just faded back into civilian life. And in fact, most war criminals are not pathological. Men like Oskar Dirlewanger are outliers. They’re Browning’s “ordinary men.”
    You've read The Banality of Evil, I'm sure.
    Yes, which closely matches Browning’s thesis. Although, I think that Eichman was playing a part at his trial. He was really an enthusiast for mass murder

    It’s so easy just to draw up railway timetables, sell pesticides, make a list of
    groups marked down for special treatment.

    Yet, even many of those who got their hands more directly dirty, were nothing unusual. Once you’ve had comrades killed by partisans, and faced weeks of warfare, it’s an easy step to massacre a village in retaliation.



  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,543

    rcs1000 said:

    viewcode said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Trump declares war on the drug cartels.

    https://x.com/collinrugg/status/1854980821587050921

    1. "Deploy all necessary military assets, including the US Navy to impose the full naval embargo and the cartels."

    2. "Guarantee that the waters of the Western Hemisphere are not used to traffic illicit drugs to our country."

    3. "Order the Department of Defense to make appropriate use of special forces cyber warfare and other overt and covert actions to inflict maximum damage on cartel leadership, infrastructure, and operations."

    4. "Designate the major cartels as foreign terrorist organizations."

    5: "Sever their access to global financial systems."

    6. "Get the full cooperation of other governments to stop [the cartels], or we will expose every bribe, every kickback, every payoff, and every bit of corruption that is allowing the cartels to preserve their brutal reign."

    7. "Ask Congress to pass legislation ensuring that drug smugglers and human traffickers receive the de*th penalty."

    "When I'm back in the White House, the drug kingpins and vicious traffickers will never sleep soundly again."

    Didn't Tom Clancy write a book about when the US Government went to war on the cartels.

    (Ultimately, there is demand for drugs. There will therefore be a supply of drugs. If you want to stop drugs, stop demand for them.)
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clear_and_Present_Danger
    Yes, yes, I remember which book it was.

    From Red Storm Rising all the way through to Executive Orders, Clancy wrote some pretty decent thrillers.
    Then he went all Dale Brown.
    A while back I watched loads of interviews with Clancy, from his very early days an author until shortly before his death. It was fascinating how his views became somewhat more forceful. He turned from what seemed like a nice, intelligent guy who had found unexpected success, into a bit of a douchebag.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,543
    viewcode said:

    rcs1000 said:

    viewcode said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Trump declares war on the drug cartels.

    https://x.com/collinrugg/status/1854980821587050921

    1. "Deploy all necessary military assets, including the US Navy to impose the full naval embargo and the cartels."

    2. "Guarantee that the waters of the Western Hemisphere are not used to traffic illicit drugs to our country."

    3. "Order the Department of Defense to make appropriate use of special forces cyber warfare and other overt and covert actions to inflict maximum damage on cartel leadership, infrastructure, and operations."

    4. "Designate the major cartels as foreign terrorist organizations."

    5: "Sever their access to global financial systems."

    6. "Get the full cooperation of other governments to stop [the cartels], or we will expose every bribe, every kickback, every payoff, and every bit of corruption that is allowing the cartels to preserve their brutal reign."

    7. "Ask Congress to pass legislation ensuring that drug smugglers and human traffickers receive the de*th penalty."

    "When I'm back in the White House, the drug kingpins and vicious traffickers will never sleep soundly again."

    Didn't Tom Clancy write a book about when the US Government went to war on the cartels.

    (Ultimately, there is demand for drugs. There will therefore be a supply of drugs. If you want to stop drugs, stop demand for them.)
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clear_and_Present_Danger
    Yes, yes, I remember which book it was.

    From Red Storm Rising all the way through to Executive Orders, Clancy wrote some pretty decent thrillers.
    I quite liked "The Bear and the Dragon", which was basically the last good Ryan book. Then it all went downhill.
    I remember reading "Rainbow Six" when it first came out, and thinking what a return to form it was.

    Part of the problem was that he wrote himself into a corner. Jack Ryan was the main protagonist, and when he made him president, it meant the stories became more detached from reality. The good thing about his earlier Ryan books was that you could more or less imagine them happening behind the scenes. Once Ryan became president, that stopped. And trying to make his son an agent for a secret organisation was unbelievable.

    But I loved Clark's character, and Chavez's. The storyline should have continued with them, working in the shadows.
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 78,157
    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    "Tell Nancy I want her to know it was me"

  • viewcode said:

    rcs1000 said:

    viewcode said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Trump declares war on the drug cartels.

    https://x.com/collinrugg/status/1854980821587050921

    1. "Deploy all necessary military assets, including the US Navy to impose the full naval embargo and the cartels."

    2. "Guarantee that the waters of the Western Hemisphere are not used to traffic illicit drugs to our country."

    3. "Order the Department of Defense to make appropriate use of special forces cyber warfare and other overt and covert actions to inflict maximum damage on cartel leadership, infrastructure, and operations."

    4. "Designate the major cartels as foreign terrorist organizations."

    5: "Sever their access to global financial systems."

    6. "Get the full cooperation of other governments to stop [the cartels], or we will expose every bribe, every kickback, every payoff, and every bit of corruption that is allowing the cartels to preserve their brutal reign."

    7. "Ask Congress to pass legislation ensuring that drug smugglers and human traffickers receive the de*th penalty."

    "When I'm back in the White House, the drug kingpins and vicious traffickers will never sleep soundly again."

    Didn't Tom Clancy write a book about when the US Government went to war on the cartels.

    (Ultimately, there is demand for drugs. There will therefore be a supply of drugs. If you want to stop drugs, stop demand for them.)
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clear_and_Present_Danger
    Yes, yes, I remember which book it was.

    From Red Storm Rising all the way through to Executive Orders, Clancy wrote some pretty decent thrillers.
    I quite liked "The Bear and the Dragon", which was basically the last good Ryan book. Then it all went downhill.
    I remember reading "Rainbow Six" when it first came out, and thinking what a return to form it was.

    Part of the problem was that he wrote himself into a corner. Jack Ryan was the main protagonist, and when he made him president, it meant the stories became more detached from reality. The good thing about his earlier Ryan books was that you could more or less imagine them happening behind the scenes. Once Ryan became president, that stopped. And trying to make his son an agent for a secret organisation was unbelievable.

    But I loved Clark's character, and Chavez's. The storyline should have continued with them, working in the shadows.
    That feeling when you read your first Tom Clancy book. Still remember barely sleeping whilst consuming The Hunt For Red October.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,015
    MattW said:

    Nigelb said:

    I've been traveling the past few days (5 plane rides since the election, 2 universities) and maybe about 20% of people that I got to talk to really knew what tariffs were and what they meant*.

    They usually just thought it meant that a trade partner got punished by higher prices. They didn't realize it meant *they themselves* would get punished by higher prices.

    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885488542544289

    *This isn't their fault but i don't really know how to fix it. i have made a ton of videos on social explaining tariffs but i think people hear what they want to sometimes. Put econ classes in the high schools.
    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885490446811160

    *If Trump goes ahead with what he promised, there's a pretty good chance that will fix it.

    We already have examples since the Biden administration has been pursuing various Trumpist policies such as Drill, Baby, Drill and 100% tariffs on Chinese car imports.

    That's only a tiny market proportion, but what's happened to the sales of Chinse cars in the USA?

    If Chump does that to a larger share of the market, GM et al with fuck over Mr and Mrs USA because they will be able to do so.
    That's the question.

    If Trump simply continued with Biden's policies, with a few tweaks to keep MAGA happy, he'd likely be a pretty successful president. And they'd probably go along with it.

    If he goes full steam ahead with some of the stuff that he's promised, then he's going to do a lot of damage both to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 43,309

    malcolmg said:

    malcolmg said:

    viewcode said:

    A decision on a new US ambassador is likely to be taken within days, with David Miliband, Peter Mandelson and Cathy Ashton all on the shortlist, the Guardian understands.

    Guardian

    Well that'll improve things 😞😞😞😞😞
    The United States made Shirley Temple an Ambassador. What would be our equivalent for this appointment? Billie Piper?

    Holly Willoughby would be an eye catching appointment.

    I would like to see Helen Skelton get it. 👍🏻
    Holy lumping F***, what a bunch of dumb losers, surprised if any of them could tie a shoelace, especially dumbo Holly
    We could send you to be UK Ambassador Malc.

    Why does it have to be an Oxbridge type with Whitehall background, why not a Scot? Trump has Scottish roots and runs a hotel in Scotland, he would love to have you there, seated next to him at all the dinners, to cut through all the crap and tell it like it is.
    I could sort him out big time, be no crawling or pussyfooting about , he would get his horoscope read.
    PS: His hotel is just down the road , I could meet him there for sure.
    I read horoscopes too. What’s going on in houses and planets on someone’s birthday so surreally matches their personality. Judging by how Trump goes about things, I wouldn’t be surprised if he was born under a black moon. I expect the planets were all out of place on his birthday as well.

    I’m a Scorpio, hence so self reliant and hungry for knowledge and answers. Looking at my horoscope, do you have tips for what I should do at the weekend? A bumper 11 races on ITV tomorrow, is the plan. If you say I will be lucky in love this week, I’ll go down the pub.
    @MoonRabbit would not surprise me if Nicholls went through the card at Wincanton today, will certainly win most of them
  • Morning all.

    Another day, another round of various parts of Twitter absilutely overflowing with antisemitic and other racist
    references Trump or not, I think Euriope and the U.K. are going to have block parts of the site eventually, for reasons of.stability.
  • moonshinemoonshine Posts: 5,747
    Nigelb said:

    MattW said:

    Nigelb said:

    I've been traveling the past few days (5 plane rides since the election, 2 universities) and maybe about 20% of people that I got to talk to really knew what tariffs were and what they meant*.

    They usually just thought it meant that a trade partner got punished by higher prices. They didn't realize it meant *they themselves* would get punished by higher prices.

    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885488542544289

    *This isn't their fault but i don't really know how to fix it. i have made a ton of videos on social explaining tariffs but i think people hear what they want to sometimes. Put econ classes in the high schools.
    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885490446811160

    *If Trump goes ahead with what he promised, there's a pretty good chance that will fix it.

    We already have examples since the Biden administration has been pursuing various Trumpist policies such as Drill, Baby, Drill and 100% tariffs on Chinese car imports.

    That's only a tiny market proportion, but what's happened to the sales of Chinse cars in the USA?

    If Chump does that to a larger share of the market, GM et al with fuck over Mr and Mrs USA because they will be able to do so.
    That's the question.

    If Trump simply continued with Biden's policies, with a few tweaks to keep MAGA happy, he'd likely be a pretty successful president. And they'd probably go along with it.

    If he goes full steam ahead with some of the stuff that he's promised, then he's going to do a lot of damage both to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
    Biden has left behind a world in flames and a structural budget deficit that has driven gold to record highs. He has been a disaster. I hope trump brings down the whole crumbling edifice of his predecessor.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,228
    Just want it known that I just got my hair cut in the most Korean barbers in the most Korean corner of Seoul where everyone spoke very fast and only in Korean

    Yet somehow the universal language of “number 3 back and sides, longer on top” did the job again.
  • nico679nico679 Posts: 6,274
    Some amazing ticket splitting in Arizona.

    Maricopa County Trump + 11 Lake +2

    Pinal County Trump +17 Lake +6

    These were batches that were supposed to be much better for Lake . People seem to like Trump but not the wannabe Trump .
  • This morning's number 1 reas Twitter thread in the U.K. is "Epstein was.a Jewish Mossad agent".

    This is are serious issues for our society.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,228
    moonshine said:

    Nigelb said:

    MattW said:

    Nigelb said:

    I've been traveling the past few days (5 plane rides since the election, 2 universities) and maybe about 20% of people that I got to talk to really knew what tariffs were and what they meant*.

    They usually just thought it meant that a trade partner got punished by higher prices. They didn't realize it meant *they themselves* would get punished by higher prices.

    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885488542544289

    *This isn't their fault but i don't really know how to fix it. i have made a ton of videos on social explaining tariffs but i think people hear what they want to sometimes. Put econ classes in the high schools.
    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885490446811160

    *If Trump goes ahead with what he promised, there's a pretty good chance that will fix it.

    We already have examples since the Biden administration has been pursuing various Trumpist policies such as Drill, Baby, Drill and 100% tariffs on Chinese car imports.

    That's only a tiny market proportion, but what's happened to the sales of Chinse cars in the USA?

    If Chump does that to a larger share of the market, GM et al with fuck over Mr and Mrs USA because they will be able to do so.
    That's the question.

    If Trump simply continued with Biden's policies, with a few tweaks to keep MAGA happy, he'd likely be a pretty successful president. And they'd probably go along with it.

    If he goes full steam ahead with some of the stuff that he's promised, then he's going to do a lot of damage both to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
    Biden has left behind a world in flames and a structural budget deficit that has driven gold to record highs. He has been a disaster. I hope trump brings down the whole crumbling edifice of his predecessor.
    Biden has left Ukraine on the edge of defeat. And we are meant to think Trump is far far worse
  • Apologies for all rhe haywire posting, as the mobile is playing up again.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,228

    This morning's number 1 reas Twitter thread in the U.K. is "Epstein was.a Jewish Mossad agent".

    This is are serious issues for our society.

    The accusations against Epstein are far from ridiculous
  • Look at the hundreds, or thousands of posts, on that topic, though.

    Just rampant unmoderated hatred.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,543
    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Nigelb said:

    MattW said:

    Nigelb said:

    I've been traveling the past few days (5 plane rides since the election, 2 universities) and maybe about 20% of people that I got to talk to really knew what tariffs were and what they meant*.

    They usually just thought it meant that a trade partner got punished by higher prices. They didn't realize it meant *they themselves* would get punished by higher prices.

    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885488542544289

    *This isn't their fault but i don't really know how to fix it. i have made a ton of videos on social explaining tariffs but i think people hear what they want to sometimes. Put econ classes in the high schools.
    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885490446811160

    *If Trump goes ahead with what he promised, there's a pretty good chance that will fix it.

    We already have examples since the Biden administration has been pursuing various Trumpist policies such as Drill, Baby, Drill and 100% tariffs on Chinese car imports.

    That's only a tiny market proportion, but what's happened to the sales of Chinse cars in the USA?

    If Chump does that to a larger share of the market, GM et al with fuck over Mr and Mrs USA because they will be able to do so.
    That's the question.

    If Trump simply continued with Biden's policies, with a few tweaks to keep MAGA happy, he'd likely be a pretty successful president. And they'd probably go along with it.

    If he goes full steam ahead with some of the stuff that he's promised, then he's going to do a lot of damage both to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
    Biden has left behind a world in flames and a structural budget deficit that has driven gold to record highs. He has been a disaster. I hope trump brings down the whole crumbling edifice of his predecessor.
    Biden has left Ukraine on the edge of defeat. And we are meant to think Trump is far far worse
    You don't think the GOP played more than a minor role in that?
  • AlanbrookeAlanbrooke Posts: 25,392
    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    Dianne Feinstein 2
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 54,569
    nico679 said:

    Some amazing ticket splitting in Arizona.

    Maricopa County Trump + 11 Lake +2

    Pinal County Trump +17 Lake +6

    These were batches that were supposed to be much better for Lake . People seem to like Trump but not the wannabe Trump .

    Arizona wins this year’s slow counting award. They only have 3m votes to count, it’s now Day 5 and they’re around 80%. Only 40k votes between the two Senate candidates.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,015

    Morning all.

    Another day, another round of various parts of Twitter absilutely overflowing with antisemitic and other racist
    references Trump or not, I think Euriope and the U.K. are going to have block parts of the site eventually, for reasons of.stability.

    I saw that too - and my feed is pretty well protected.

    On the other had, it's still entirely usable, if you regularly block/mute that stuff.
    That makes it far less of the town square it used to be, but it's still, for me at least, worthwhile. For now.

    Yours right though; for new users coming to it fresh it's going to be a horror show.
  • Richard_TyndallRichard_Tyndall Posts: 32,503
    edited November 9
    Okay I have completely changed my view of Trump. He was, and will be, the greatest President in US history.

    Why?

    "Madeleine Westerhout, who worked as Mr Trump’s personal secretary until 2019, told his New York hush money trial earlier this year that the president-elect would edit his social media on paper by hand after she had written them down for him."

    “It is my understanding that he liked to use the Oxford comma.”

    Truly the sign of a great man!

    ;)
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 11,043
    rcs1000 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    HYUFD said:

    ydoethur said:

    https://x.com/AliFortescue/status/1854951128112206119

    Nigel Farage tells me there need to be “concessions on both sides” on Ukraine

    Does he mean territorial concessions on Ukrainian side? “I’m not playing your silly game”

    Farage suggests Ukraine will have to be a part of NATO. But how much of Ukraine?

    I am 100% sure Trump can’t end it. He was BSing. If Ukraine and Europe say nope, we can’t agree to that proposal, there’s zilch Trump can do about it.
    He can cut off the arms supply.

    If he does, Ukraine are more buggered than a rent boy in the Kremlin. The only other country that could help are China, who are aligned with Russia.

    Incidentally, Biden could have brought the Israeli attacks on Gaza to a shrieking halt by cutting arms to Israel - but if he had, then Israel would have been attacked again, possibly fatally, so he didn't.
    It is up to NATO members, particularly European members, to fund more aid to Ukraine.

    US taxpayers can't be expected to continue to fund most of the NATO aid to Ukraine when it isn't even on their continent
    Why would Europe do that? It is through the looking glass loony to complain about the USA backsliding on Ukraine - there is no such thing as the USA backsliding on Ukraine. We are only chucking the kitchen sink at Ukraine because the USA wishes it. If the USA decides someone else is public enemy number 1, such as Iran, China, Saudi Arabia (no sniggering at the back) then they will be public enemy number 1, to suggest otherwise will be treachery and beyond the pale, and Ukraine will become as vital a world cause as Nepal. PB morale warriors will sagely nod their heads and move on from Ukraine about as quickly as David Lammy moved on from the war on Trump.
    Errr, I would suggest that:

    (a) It is morally right to support a democracy that has been invaded
    And
    (b) It is in our best interests that countries who go around invading other countries don't prosper
    Well, Israel and Turkey (and frankly America) are currently occupying parts of other countries, and facing very little by way of meaningful sanction.

    But leaving that aside, your points are bland sentiments that don't form the basis of a solid argument justifying the current British involvement in Ukraine in my opinion. Of course it is morally right to support a democracy that has been invaded - but the nature and degree of that support is the debatable point. Of course it would be good if invaders suffered negative consequences - again, the degree to which we should inflict consequences upon ourselves to get revenge on those countries is highly debatable.
    Your argument would be a lot more persuasive if you hadn't repeatedly chosen to believe and repeat Russian lies about the fate of MH17.
    Be fair! He also believes Russian lies about Ukrainian bioweapon labs.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,015
    MORGAN STANLEY: “.. we modeled 60% tariffs on China and 10% on the rest of the world, all at once. We estimated that policy would boost core inflation by roughly 0.9pp and reduce GDP growth by around 1½pp. A more phased approach, and one that may be more targeted, would imply smaller effects because they would be spread over time. With an already robust economy, moderate #tariffs would hurt growth but not necessarily cause a recession.”
    https://x.com/carlquintanilla/status/1855034495281328251

    The U.S. economy post Biden is pretty resilient. If Trump doesn't go absolutely wild, he'll get away with a fair amount of stuff.
    I'd be interested to see the effects modelled for Europe.
  • DecrepiterJohnLDecrepiterJohnL Posts: 27,836

    Okay I have completely changd my view of Trump. He was, and will be, the greatest President in US history.

    Why?

    "Madeleine Westerhout, who worked as Mr Trump’s personal secretary until 2019, told his New York hush money trial earlier this year that the president-elect would edit his social media on paper by hand after she had written them down for him."

    “It is my understanding that he liked to use the Oxford comma.”

    Truly the sign of a great man!

    ;)

    Oxford comma, British ties, what's not to like? He even put in a shift at McDonalds once he found out Kemi had worked there.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,350

    Okay I have completely changed my view of Trump. He was, and will be, the greatest President in US history.

    Why?

    "Madeleine Westerhout, who worked as Mr Trump’s personal secretary until 2019, told his New York hush money trial earlier this year that the president-elect would edit his social media on paper by hand after she had written them down for him."

    “It is my understanding that he liked to use the Oxford comma.”

    Truly the sign of a great man!

    ;)

    Are we sure that’s not a euphemism?
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,228
    edited November 9

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Nigelb said:

    MattW said:

    Nigelb said:

    I've been traveling the past few days (5 plane rides since the election, 2 universities) and maybe about 20% of people that I got to talk to really knew what tariffs were and what they meant*.

    They usually just thought it meant that a trade partner got punished by higher prices. They didn't realize it meant *they themselves* would get punished by higher prices.

    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885488542544289

    *This isn't their fault but i don't really know how to fix it. i have made a ton of videos on social explaining tariffs but i think people hear what they want to sometimes. Put econ classes in the high schools.
    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885490446811160

    *If Trump goes ahead with what he promised, there's a pretty good chance that will fix it.

    We already have examples since the Biden administration has been pursuing various Trumpist policies such as Drill, Baby, Drill and 100% tariffs on Chinese car imports.

    That's only a tiny market proportion, but what's happened to the sales of Chinse cars in the USA?

    If Chump does that to a larger share of the market, GM et al with fuck over Mr and Mrs USA because they will be able to do so.
    That's the question.

    If Trump simply continued with Biden's policies, with a few tweaks to keep MAGA happy, he'd likely be a pretty successful president. And they'd probably go along with it.

    If he goes full steam ahead with some of the stuff that he's promised, then he's going to do a lot of damage both to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
    Biden has left behind a world in flames and a structural budget deficit that has driven gold to record highs. He has been a disaster. I hope trump brings down the whole crumbling edifice of his predecessor.
    Biden has left Ukraine on the edge of defeat. And we are meant to think Trump is far far worse
    You don't think the GOP played more than a minor role in that?
    The Ukraine war has been unwinnable for a long time

    There is a chance the crazy ass Trump might actually save Ukrainian lives and bring it to an end. Ditto Gaza

    Can he be worse than Biden, in foreign policy terms? I guess he might quit NATO but more likely he will demand Europeans pay more for their own defence - and fair enough

    It’s trumps economic policies that truly worry me
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,015

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    Dianne Feinstein 2
    Unlikely.
    As a member if Congress, she faces reelection every two years. As the last six months showed, she's still an operator.

    It wouldn't surprises me if this is her last term. Though she might stick out the full administration.
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 11,043

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Double UAPs and UFOs hearing in Congress on Wednesday, which is larger than the previous one.

    Who is testifying will make the difference as to whether it's significant, but most of the media hasn't registered it at all, as yet.
    unlike June 2023.
    https://x.com/MarioNawfal/status/1854386103962177631

    Yawn. Nothing will come out. It’s all grift and rumours of rumours.

    As I have continually said.
    Even if that turns out to be true, it’s notable that the likes of Schumer and Rubio are giving a very different impression. Why? It’s not because they’re morons. They’ve had +40 people testify under oath behind closed doors. Who? Why?

    Why have they and many others pushed the UAP Disclosure Act now three years in a row, legally defining “technology of non human origin”?

    It’s remarkable how few people on this forum see how notable that legislation is, even if you think the motives are different to what its sponsors portray.
    Intelligent people can believe strange things all the time. From my perspective I find belief in deities weird, but I know many very intelligent people who do. It’s the same with UAPs etc. There are very many grifters and liars spinning yarns which suck people in. That’s all.
    For about two years you insisted Covid came from the wet market
    Oh fuck off. We do not know the origins of covid and the wet market is still a valid hypothesis.
    Where did SARS come from? Or MERS? Novel pathogens almost always originate in animals before making the transition to humans, usually through humans in close proximity.
    You haven’t won the debate over covid origins, even if you think you have. A lab leak is entirely plausible, but so is origins from the wet market.
    The wet market is not merely a valid hypothesis: it is the broadly accepted view among virologists. The genomic evidence of early viral diversity strongly supports it. You have to come up with some convoluted story to make the lab leak “theory” fit the evidence.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,543

    viewcode said:

    rcs1000 said:

    viewcode said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Trump declares war on the drug cartels.

    https://x.com/collinrugg/status/1854980821587050921

    1. "Deploy all necessary military assets, including the US Navy to impose the full naval embargo and the cartels."

    2. "Guarantee that the waters of the Western Hemisphere are not used to traffic illicit drugs to our country."

    3. "Order the Department of Defense to make appropriate use of special forces cyber warfare and other overt and covert actions to inflict maximum damage on cartel leadership, infrastructure, and operations."

    4. "Designate the major cartels as foreign terrorist organizations."

    5: "Sever their access to global financial systems."

    6. "Get the full cooperation of other governments to stop [the cartels], or we will expose every bribe, every kickback, every payoff, and every bit of corruption that is allowing the cartels to preserve their brutal reign."

    7. "Ask Congress to pass legislation ensuring that drug smugglers and human traffickers receive the de*th penalty."

    "When I'm back in the White House, the drug kingpins and vicious traffickers will never sleep soundly again."

    Didn't Tom Clancy write a book about when the US Government went to war on the cartels.

    (Ultimately, there is demand for drugs. There will therefore be a supply of drugs. If you want to stop drugs, stop demand for them.)
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clear_and_Present_Danger
    Yes, yes, I remember which book it was.

    From Red Storm Rising all the way through to Executive Orders, Clancy wrote some pretty decent thrillers.
    I quite liked "The Bear and the Dragon", which was basically the last good Ryan book. Then it all went downhill.
    I remember reading "Rainbow Six" when it first came out, and thinking what a return to form it was.

    Part of the problem was that he wrote himself into a corner. Jack Ryan was the main protagonist, and when he made him president, it meant the stories became more detached from reality. The good thing about his earlier Ryan books was that you could more or less imagine them happening behind the scenes. Once Ryan became president, that stopped. And trying to make his son an agent for a secret organisation was unbelievable.

    But I loved Clark's character, and Chavez's. The storyline should have continued with them, working in the shadows.
    That feeling when you read your first Tom Clancy book. Still remember barely sleeping whilst consuming The Hunt For Red October.
    I used to quite like Dale Brown's books, which were fairly similar to Clancy's. I remember being wowed by the first "Flight of the Old Dog". But he ever quite reached the heights of Clancy at his best.

    I should get a copy and re-read it, to see if it still holds up. I listened to "Red Storm Rising" recently, and that is still a blooming good thriller, despite the world having moved on.
  • AlanbrookeAlanbrooke Posts: 25,392
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Nigelb said:

    MattW said:

    Nigelb said:

    I've been traveling the past few days (5 plane rides since the election, 2 universities) and maybe about 20% of people that I got to talk to really knew what tariffs were and what they meant*.

    They usually just thought it meant that a trade partner got punished by higher prices. They didn't realize it meant *they themselves* would get punished by higher prices.

    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885488542544289

    *This isn't their fault but i don't really know how to fix it. i have made a ton of videos on social explaining tariffs but i think people hear what they want to sometimes. Put econ classes in the high schools.
    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885490446811160

    *If Trump goes ahead with what he promised, there's a pretty good chance that will fix it.

    We already have examples since the Biden administration has been pursuing various Trumpist policies such as Drill, Baby, Drill and 100% tariffs on Chinese car imports.

    That's only a tiny market proportion, but what's happened to the sales of Chinse cars in the USA?

    If Chump does that to a larger share of the market, GM et al with fuck over Mr and Mrs USA because they will be able to do so.
    That's the question.

    If Trump simply continued with Biden's policies, with a few tweaks to keep MAGA happy, he'd likely be a pretty successful president. And they'd probably go along with it.

    If he goes full steam ahead with some of the stuff that he's promised, then he's going to do a lot of damage both to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
    Biden has left behind a world in flames and a structural budget deficit that has driven gold to record highs. He has been a disaster. I hope trump brings down the whole crumbling edifice of his predecessor.
    Biden has left Ukraine on the edge of defeat. And we are meant to think Trump is far far worse
    You don't think the GOP played more than a minor role in that?
    The Ukraine was has been unwinnable for a long time

    There is a chance the crazy ass Trump might actually save Ukrainian lives and bring it to an end. Ditto Gaza

    Can he be worse than Biden, in foreign policy terms? I guess he might quit NATO but more likely he will demand Europeans pay more for their own defence - and fair enough

    It’s trumps economic policies that truly worry me
    Ukraine is winnable, we just have to use the right weapons.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/11/09/west-greatest-weapon-war-with-china-online-porn/
  • Leon said:

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Nigelb said:

    MattW said:

    Nigelb said:

    I've been traveling the past few days (5 plane rides since the election, 2 universities) and maybe about 20% of people that I got to talk to really knew what tariffs were and what they meant*.

    They usually just thought it meant that a trade partner got punished by higher prices. They didn't realize it meant *they themselves* would get punished by higher prices.

    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885488542544289

    *This isn't their fault but i don't really know how to fix it. i have made a ton of videos on social explaining tariffs but i think people hear what they want to sometimes. Put econ classes in the high schools.
    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885490446811160

    *If Trump goes ahead with what he promised, there's a pretty good chance that will fix it.

    We already have examples since the Biden administration has been pursuing various Trumpist policies such as Drill, Baby, Drill and 100% tariffs on Chinese car imports.

    That's only a tiny market proportion, but what's happened to the sales of Chinse cars in the USA?

    If Chump does that to a larger share of the market, GM et al with fuck over Mr and Mrs USA because they will be able to do so.
    That's the question.

    If Trump simply continued with Biden's policies, with a few tweaks to keep MAGA happy, he'd likely be a pretty successful president. And they'd probably go along with it.

    If he goes full steam ahead with some of the stuff that he's promised, then he's going to do a lot of damage both to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
    Biden has left behind a world in flames and a structural budget deficit that has driven gold to record highs. He has been a disaster. I hope trump brings down the whole crumbling edifice of his predecessor.
    Biden has left Ukraine on the edge of defeat. And we are meant to think Trump is far far worse
    You don't think the GOP played more than a minor role in that?
    The Ukraine was has been unwinnable for a long time

    There is a chance the crazy ass Trump might actually save Ukrainian lives and bring it to an end. Ditto Gaza

    Can he be worse than Biden, in foreign policy terms? I guess he might quit NATO but more likely he will demand Europeans pay more for their own defence - and fair enough

    It’s trumps economic policies that truly worry me
    Yes, I agree with most of this.
    Biden in fact did well on the economic fundamentals.
  • DopermeanDopermean Posts: 492
    felix said:

    kinabalu said:

    felix said:

    felix said:

    felix said:

    "A quite stupefying ignorance that makes him unfit to be the President of the United States."

    David Lammy strikes again.

    Oh no, it was Boris Johnson.

    What role does Boris have in government now?
    I am just wondering if anyone brought up his past comments on Trump when the Tories were dealing with Trump. I certainly don't remember you doing so but I may be wrong.
    The past is another country. Here and now is worth talking about. Lammy is potentially a problem, indeed there are many Labour MPs who will find the need to work with Trump quite difficult. Let's hope they can be grownups.
    So why can't Lammy's comments also be in the past?
    He's now Foreign secretary!
    You want him to resign because he said negative things about Donald Trump in the past?
    Where did I say that?
    Even the Telegraph has reported that Lammy has spent months preparing for the possibility that Trump would win.
    As govt in waiting they were preparing for the worst outcomes, that has the scent of competence...
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,228
    Nigelb said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    Dianne Feinstein 2
    Unlikely.
    As a member if Congress, she faces reelection every two years. As the last six months showed, she's still an operator.

    It wouldn't surprises me if this is her last term. Though she might stick out the full administration.
    I can’t believe you skipped the DMZ on your Korean tour?! It’s outstanding. Strange, sad, compelling, eerie, dark, enlightening, unique, emotionally profound and hugely noomy

    By a distance the highlight of my fortnight in Korea
  • nico679nico679 Posts: 6,274
    Sandpit said:

    nico679 said:

    Some amazing ticket splitting in Arizona.

    Maricopa County Trump + 11 Lake +2

    Pinal County Trump +17 Lake +6

    These were batches that were supposed to be much better for Lake . People seem to like Trump but not the wannabe Trump .

    Arizona wins this year’s slow counting award. They only have 3m votes to count, it’s now Day 5 and they’re around 80%. Only 40k votes between the two Senate candidates.
    Maricopa county is huge in terms of votes so this adds to the delays . And they have to match the signatures of all the mail in ballots . The last drops for Lake were poor considering how much she’s underperforming Trump .
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,543
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Nigelb said:

    MattW said:

    Nigelb said:

    I've been traveling the past few days (5 plane rides since the election, 2 universities) and maybe about 20% of people that I got to talk to really knew what tariffs were and what they meant*.

    They usually just thought it meant that a trade partner got punished by higher prices. They didn't realize it meant *they themselves* would get punished by higher prices.

    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885488542544289

    *This isn't their fault but i don't really know how to fix it. i have made a ton of videos on social explaining tariffs but i think people hear what they want to sometimes. Put econ classes in the high schools.
    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885490446811160

    *If Trump goes ahead with what he promised, there's a pretty good chance that will fix it.

    We already have examples since the Biden administration has been pursuing various Trumpist policies such as Drill, Baby, Drill and 100% tariffs on Chinese car imports.

    That's only a tiny market proportion, but what's happened to the sales of Chinse cars in the USA?

    If Chump does that to a larger share of the market, GM et al with fuck over Mr and Mrs USA because they will be able to do so.
    That's the question.

    If Trump simply continued with Biden's policies, with a few tweaks to keep MAGA happy, he'd likely be a pretty successful president. And they'd probably go along with it.

    If he goes full steam ahead with some of the stuff that he's promised, then he's going to do a lot of damage both to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
    Biden has left behind a world in flames and a structural budget deficit that has driven gold to record highs. He has been a disaster. I hope trump brings down the whole crumbling edifice of his predecessor.
    Biden has left Ukraine on the edge of defeat. And we are meant to think Trump is far far worse
    You don't think the GOP played more than a minor role in that?
    The Ukraine war has been unwinnable for a long time

    There is a chance the crazy ass Trump might actually save Ukrainian lives and bring it to an end. Ditto Gaza

    Can he be worse than Biden, in foreign policy terms? I guess he might quit NATO but more likely he will demand Europeans pay more for their own defence - and fair enough

    It’s trumps economic policies that truly worry me
    In terms of Ukraine, what do you mean by 'win' ? What do you mean by 'end', given Putin's worldview and desires?

    I'd argue the war is certainly winnable, given the will of the west. I'd go further, and argue that we must 'win' it.
  • StuartinromfordStuartinromford Posts: 17,207
    nico679 said:

    Some amazing ticket splitting in Arizona.

    Maricopa County Trump + 11 Lake +2

    Pinal County Trump +17 Lake +6

    These were batches that were supposed to be much better for Lake . People seem to like Trump but not the wannabe Trump .

    Often the way. Take away the charismatic strongman's charisma, people listen to the words and don't like them as much. Look at what happened to all the Republican wannabes in the primary race.

    Besides, charismatic strongmen tend to be even worse at succession planning than the Biden presidency.
  • AlanbrookeAlanbrooke Posts: 25,392
    edited November 9
    Nigelb said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    Dianne Feinstein 2
    Unlikely.
    As a member if Congress, she faces reelection every two years. As the last six months showed, she's still an operator.

    It wouldn't surprises me if this is her last term. Though she might stick out the full administration.
    Pelosi is a crazy old witch who should have retired years ago.

    You appear to think the longer she stays in the better her mental faculties will be, I can assure you they are only heading downwards. There's also the SC judge the Dems are desperate to shift. And for balance why has nobody got rid of Mitch McConnell ?

    This is a problem the US system has in that it the oldies hang in too long as they cant afford to retire.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,228
    edited November 9

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Double UAPs and UFOs hearing in Congress on Wednesday, which is larger than the previous one.

    Who is testifying will make the difference as to whether it's significant, but most of the media hasn't registered it at all, as yet.
    unlike June 2023.
    https://x.com/MarioNawfal/status/1854386103962177631

    Yawn. Nothing will come out. It’s all grift and rumours of rumours.

    As I have continually said.
    Even if that turns out to be true, it’s notable that the likes of Schumer and Rubio are giving a very different impression. Why? It’s not because they’re morons. They’ve had +40 people testify under oath behind closed doors. Who? Why?

    Why have they and many others pushed the UAP Disclosure Act now three years in a row, legally defining “technology of non human origin”?

    It’s remarkable how few people on this forum see how notable that legislation is, even if you think the motives are different to what its sponsors portray.
    Intelligent people can believe strange things all the time. From my perspective I find belief in deities weird, but I know many very intelligent people who do. It’s the same with UAPs etc. There are very many grifters and liars spinning yarns which suck people in. That’s all.
    For about two years you insisted Covid came from the wet market
    Oh fuck off. We do not know the origins of covid and the wet market is still a valid hypothesis.
    Where did SARS come from? Or MERS? Novel pathogens almost always originate in animals before making the transition to humans, usually through humans in close proximity.
    You haven’t won the debate over covid origins, even if you think you have. A lab leak is entirely plausible, but so is origins from the wet market.
    The wet market is not merely a valid hypothesis: it is the broadly accepted view among virologists. The genomic evidence of early viral diversity strongly supports it. You have to come up with some convoluted story to make the lab leak “theory” fit the evidence.
    I’ll let you into a secret

    When I go around the world and hear discussions about Covid origins - and people do talk about it, unprompted, it was a universal trauma - the idea it came from the wet market is regarded with pure mocking derision. And some anger about the lies we were told

    The world knows it came from the lab. It’s done. It’s over. Give it up
  • DecrepiterJohnLDecrepiterJohnL Posts: 27,836
    Dopermean said:

    felix said:

    kinabalu said:

    felix said:

    felix said:

    felix said:

    "A quite stupefying ignorance that makes him unfit to be the President of the United States."

    David Lammy strikes again.

    Oh no, it was Boris Johnson.

    What role does Boris have in government now?
    I am just wondering if anyone brought up his past comments on Trump when the Tories were dealing with Trump. I certainly don't remember you doing so but I may be wrong.
    The past is another country. Here and now is worth talking about. Lammy is potentially a problem, indeed there are many Labour MPs who will find the need to work with Trump quite difficult. Let's hope they can be grownups.
    So why can't Lammy's comments also be in the past?
    He's now Foreign secretary!
    You want him to resign because he said negative things about Donald Trump in the past?
    Where did I say that?
    Even the Telegraph has reported that Lammy has spent months preparing for the possibility that Trump would win.
    As govt in waiting they were preparing for the worst outcomes, that has the scent of competence...
    David Lammy is worth a punt for next Labour leader if, as I expect, Keir Starmer will step down either just before or just after the next election. That said, he is not even named in Betfair's next PM market so the wisdom of crowds is against me, and him.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,543
    Leon said:

    Nigelb said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    Dianne Feinstein 2
    Unlikely.
    As a member if Congress, she faces reelection every two years. As the last six months showed, she's still an operator.

    It wouldn't surprises me if this is her last term. Though she might stick out the full administration.
    I can’t believe you skipped the DMZ on your Korean tour?! It’s outstanding. Strange, sad, compelling, eerie, dark, enlightening, unique, emotionally profound and hugely noomy

    By a distance the highlight of my fortnight in Korea
    I was half expecting you to do a Travis King and make a dash for the north... ;)
  • nico679nico679 Posts: 6,274
    The problem with the House is by the time they’ve settled in they’re almost back to campaigning with these two year election cycles .
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,543
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Double UAPs and UFOs hearing in Congress on Wednesday, which is larger than the previous one.

    Who is testifying will make the difference as to whether it's significant, but most of the media hasn't registered it at all, as yet.
    unlike June 2023.
    https://x.com/MarioNawfal/status/1854386103962177631

    Yawn. Nothing will come out. It’s all grift and rumours of rumours.

    As I have continually said.
    Even if that turns out to be true, it’s notable that the likes of Schumer and Rubio are giving a very different impression. Why? It’s not because they’re morons. They’ve had +40 people testify under oath behind closed doors. Who? Why?

    Why have they and many others pushed the UAP Disclosure Act now three years in a row, legally defining “technology of non human origin”?

    It’s remarkable how few people on this forum see how notable that legislation is, even if you think the motives are different to what its sponsors portray.
    Intelligent people can believe strange things all the time. From my perspective I find belief in deities weird, but I know many very intelligent people who do. It’s the same with UAPs etc. There are very many grifters and liars spinning yarns which suck people in. That’s all.
    For about two years you insisted Covid came from the wet market
    Oh fuck off. We do not know the origins of covid and the wet market is still a valid hypothesis.
    Where did SARS come from? Or MERS? Novel pathogens almost always originate in animals before making the transition to humans, usually through humans in close proximity.
    You haven’t won the debate over covid origins, even if you think you have. A lab leak is entirely plausible, but so is origins from the wet market.
    The wet market is not merely a valid hypothesis: it is the broadly accepted view among virologists. The genomic evidence of early viral diversity strongly supports it. You have to come up with some convoluted story to make the lab leak “theory” fit the evidence.
    I’ll let you into a secret

    When I go around the world and hear discussions about Covid origins - and people do talk about it, unprompted, it was a universal trauma - the idea it came from the wet market is regarded with pure mocking derision. And some anger about the lies we were told

    The world knows it came from the lab. It’s done. It’s over. Give it up
    LOL. You do realise those are the words of someone trying to close down a debate because they know they've lost?

    And I bet the drug-addled sociopaths and disease-ridden prostitutes you consort with on your 'travels' just nod along to your rantings.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 50,181

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Nigelb said:

    MattW said:

    Nigelb said:

    I've been traveling the past few days (5 plane rides since the election, 2 universities) and maybe about 20% of people that I got to talk to really knew what tariffs were and what they meant*.

    They usually just thought it meant that a trade partner got punished by higher prices. They didn't realize it meant *they themselves* would get punished by higher prices.

    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885488542544289

    *This isn't their fault but i don't really know how to fix it. i have made a ton of videos on social explaining tariffs but i think people hear what they want to sometimes. Put econ classes in the high schools.
    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885490446811160

    *If Trump goes ahead with what he promised, there's a pretty good chance that will fix it.

    We already have examples since the Biden administration has been pursuing various Trumpist policies such as Drill, Baby, Drill and 100% tariffs on Chinese car imports.

    That's only a tiny market proportion, but what's happened to the sales of Chinse cars in the USA?

    If Chump does that to a larger share of the market, GM et al with fuck over Mr and Mrs USA because they will be able to do so.
    That's the question.

    If Trump simply continued with Biden's policies, with a few tweaks to keep MAGA happy, he'd likely be a pretty successful president. And they'd probably go along with it.

    If he goes full steam ahead with some of the stuff that he's promised, then he's going to do a lot of damage both to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
    Biden has left behind a world in flames and a structural budget deficit that has driven gold to record highs. He has been a disaster. I hope trump brings down the whole crumbling edifice of his predecessor.
    Biden has left Ukraine on the edge of defeat. And we are meant to think Trump is far far worse
    You don't think the GOP played more than a minor role in that?
    The Ukraine was has been unwinnable for a long time

    There is a chance the crazy ass Trump might actually save Ukrainian lives and bring it to an end. Ditto Gaza

    Can he be worse than Biden, in foreign policy terms? I guess he might quit NATO but more likely he will demand Europeans pay more for their own defence - and fair enough

    It’s trumps economic policies that truly worry me
    Ukraine is winnable, we just have to use the right weapons.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/11/09/west-greatest-weapon-war-with-china-online-porn/
    Back in the USENET days, one of the people I connected with online was an ex US Navy helicopter pilot. Cold War times etc…

    For anti-submarine warfare, they would drop sonar buoys from the helicopter. The Russian surface vessels in the area would try and pick up any that didn’t sink to their operating depth - sometimes they would just sit on the surface.

    To prank the Russians, sometimes they dropped the canisters the buoys came in - think giant tennis ball can. So the Russians would see it, send a boat, pick it up.

    Some Russian ships would illuminate them with targeting radars and general act nasty. For them, they would use the sonar buoy cans as a toilet, first.

    Some would be polite. Even make contact on the radio, tell jokes etc. For them, them would fill the cans with beer and copies of Playboy…
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,228

    Leon said:

    Nigelb said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    Dianne Feinstein 2
    Unlikely.
    As a member if Congress, she faces reelection every two years. As the last six months showed, she's still an operator.

    It wouldn't surprises me if this is her last term. Though she might stick out the full administration.
    I can’t believe you skipped the DMZ on your Korean tour?! It’s outstanding. Strange, sad, compelling, eerie, dark, enlightening, unique, emotionally profound and hugely noomy

    By a distance the highlight of my fortnight in Korea
    I was half expecting you to do a Travis King and make a dash for the north... ;)
    They’ve closed the JSA - where you got to be “in” North Korea - because of him. Unlikely to reopen

    The DMZ is spellbinding. The hour you get in the observatory - staring into North Korea, looking at their lives and laundry - is like nothing else. Moving and disturbing to the Nth degree

    Everyone was v jel of my binos. I was able to say “ooh I can see a guy on a moped” as they all strained to squint
  • boulayboulay Posts: 5,484
    Clarkson doing a much better job of skewering the IHT changes to farmers than the Tories so far.

    https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/31603540/labour-government-destroy-farmers-cant-fight-back-reeves/

    The point about a farmer he knows with 600 cows which alone are worth £1.2m yet alone the land and buildings and equipment demonstrates that maybe Reeves and co didn’t think it through that well.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 43,309
    carnforth said:

    carnforth said:

    Leon said:

    Why are really attractive young Korean women with hoodies and clipboards so attractive?

    I decided recently that the hoodie is actually a really attractive garment for women to wear. This goes against all the orthodoxy that pertains to what clothing is attractive, and I have no reason why it should be so, but it is pleasing to see you come to the same conclusion on a different continent.
    Is there some tenuous relationship to this phenomonon perhaps?

    https://karinaaslanova.blogspot.com/2014/10/why-do-women-wear-mens-shirts-in.html
    Apparently a thing:

    https://www.thrillist.com/sex-dating/nation/why-women-steal-your-hoodies
    As bollox as a hoodie fantasy
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 43,309
    viewcode said:

    DeclanF said:

    What is this court case that somebody mentioned on the trans issue?

    It's not about the trans issue. It's about the definition of woman in the Equality Act 2010 and whether it includes a man who has obtained a GRC under the GRA. It is also of course whether the definition of man in the Equality Act includes a woman with a GRC. So it's also about the interaction of the two Acts. It is an appeal by For Women Scotland against the decision of Lady Haldane.

    You can read the submissions by FWS and other parties online - https://forwomen.scot/22/10/2024/uk-supreme-court/#:~:text=Ahead of our appeal being,written submission to the court.&text=Written cases have now also,Sex Matters (published here).

    I don't believe the Scots government has yet made available its submissions online. The hearing is 26-27 November.
    Indeed. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 (GRA) states that "...Where a full gender recognition certificate (GRC) is issued to a person, the person’s gender becomes for all purposes the acquired gender (so that, if the acquired gender is the male gender, the person’s sex becomes that of a man and, if it is the female gender, the person’s sex becomes that of a woman)....", thereby creating(?) the concept of "legal sex" as different from the physical ones.

    But that Act acknowledges that it can be set aside in certain circumstances and has been in certain cases (I think one is nobility inheritance). A later act, the Equality Act 2010, and subsequent case law laid down that one should not discriminate against somebody due to gender reassignment, but - again - there are exceptions allowed if they are "a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim" (exact wording? I may have the wrong words?). The Equality Act also says that sex should not be discriminated against, which raises the question - which definition of "sex" now?

    There are currently many arguments about which definition of sex should be used, what is a proportionate means, and what is a legitimate aim. An attempt by For Women Scotland (FWS) to resolve this was found against them in the Scottish court, they appealed it to the Supreme Court, and that is the court case that DeclanF refers to.
    more absolute bollox, fecking halfwits need to get a life. Sort out some real problems rather than pander to halfwits wanting to pretend they are something different to reality.
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 11,043
    rcs1000 said:

    rcs1000 said:

    HYUFD said:

    ydoethur said:

    https://x.com/AliFortescue/status/1854951128112206119

    Nigel Farage tells me there need to be “concessions on both sides” on Ukraine

    Does he mean territorial concessions on Ukrainian side? “I’m not playing your silly game”

    Farage suggests Ukraine will have to be a part of NATO. But how much of Ukraine?

    I am 100% sure Trump can’t end it. He was BSing. If Ukraine and Europe say nope, we can’t agree to that proposal, there’s zilch Trump can do about it.
    He can cut off the arms supply.

    If he does, Ukraine are more buggered than a rent boy in the Kremlin. The only other country that could help are China, who are aligned with Russia.

    Incidentally, Biden could have brought the Israeli attacks on Gaza to a shrieking halt by cutting arms to Israel - but if he had, then Israel would have been attacked again, possibly fatally, so he didn't.
    It is up to NATO members, particularly European members, to fund more aid to Ukraine.

    US taxpayers can't be expected to continue to fund most of the NATO aid to Ukraine when it isn't even on their continent
    Why would Europe do that? It is through the looking glass loony to complain about the USA backsliding on Ukraine - there is no such thing as the USA backsliding on Ukraine. We are only chucking the kitchen sink at Ukraine because the USA wishes it. If the USA decides someone else is public enemy number 1, such as Iran, China, Saudi Arabia (no sniggering at the back) then they will be public enemy number 1, to suggest otherwise will be treachery and beyond the pale, and Ukraine will become as vital a world cause as Nepal. PB morale warriors will sagely nod their heads and move on from Ukraine about as quickly as David Lammy moved on from the war on Trump.
    Ludicrous. Ukraine is vital to the security and independence of central and eastern Europe. Why do you think Putin wants it so much? And we plainly haven't thrown the kitchen sink at Ukraine (well Russia), witness all the debate about defensive vs offensive weapons, tanks, fighter jets and long range missiles that can hit inside Russia. The war ending on Putin's terms with no security guarantees for Ukraine is not a particularly stable result. Russian revanchism remains and Ukraine doesn't seem to have many other options than going nuclear.
    I'm sorry but our current policy is what is ludicrous.
    Agreed.

    It's time to put boots on the ground and expel Russia from Ukraine. In the long term it is less risky to stand up to aggression.
    The merit of a long term risk is that there's a long term to have it in.
    You should never exercise, because it increases the short term risk of a heart attack. Of course, it means you'll likely live longer, but hey ho.
    This is kinda what Trump believes… https://edition.cnn.com/2017/05/15/politics/donald-trump-exercise/index.html
  • TimSTimS Posts: 12,983

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Nigelb said:

    MattW said:

    Nigelb said:

    I've been traveling the past few days (5 plane rides since the election, 2 universities) and maybe about 20% of people that I got to talk to really knew what tariffs were and what they meant*.

    They usually just thought it meant that a trade partner got punished by higher prices. They didn't realize it meant *they themselves* would get punished by higher prices.

    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885488542544289

    *This isn't their fault but i don't really know how to fix it. i have made a ton of videos on social explaining tariffs but i think people hear what they want to sometimes. Put econ classes in the high schools.
    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885490446811160

    *If Trump goes ahead with what he promised, there's a pretty good chance that will fix it.

    We already have examples since the Biden administration has been pursuing various Trumpist policies such as Drill, Baby, Drill and 100% tariffs on Chinese car imports.

    That's only a tiny market proportion, but what's happened to the sales of Chinse cars in the USA?

    If Chump does that to a larger share of the market, GM et al with fuck over Mr and Mrs USA because they will be able to do so.
    That's the question.

    If Trump simply continued with Biden's policies, with a few tweaks to keep MAGA happy, he'd likely be a pretty successful president. And they'd probably go along with it.

    If he goes full steam ahead with some of the stuff that he's promised, then he's going to do a lot of damage both to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
    Biden has left behind a world in flames and a structural budget deficit that has driven gold to record highs. He has been a disaster. I hope trump brings down the whole crumbling edifice of his predecessor.
    Biden has left Ukraine on the edge of defeat. And we are meant to think Trump is far far worse
    You don't think the GOP played more than a minor role in that?
    The Ukraine war has been unwinnable for a long time

    There is a chance the crazy ass Trump might actually save Ukrainian lives and bring it to an end. Ditto Gaza

    Can he be worse than Biden, in foreign policy terms? I guess he might quit NATO but more likely he will demand Europeans pay more for their own defence - and fair enough

    It’s trumps economic policies that truly worry me
    In terms of Ukraine, what do you mean by 'win' ? What do you mean by 'end', given Putin's worldview and desires?

    I'd argue the war is certainly winnable, given the will of the west. I'd go further, and argue that we must 'win' it.
    It depends how you frame the war. From my perspective this is already WW3, and Ukraine is one battle in that war, just as Korea or Vietnam or Afghanistan were battles in the Cold War, or Poland was a battle in WW2.

    We absolutely have to win WW3, otherwise we are all dead. And the only way to win it without ending up all dead is to win it early, and comprehensively, deterring the aggressor from extending the front into other countries. That can either be done with a frozen conflict followed by economic warfare until the Russian economy collapses and Putin is removed, or by victory by Ukraine on the battlefield. A frozen conflict with a functioning Russia means more war later.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 43,309
    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    She at least still had all her marbles intact
  • Dopermean said:

    felix said:

    kinabalu said:

    felix said:

    felix said:

    felix said:

    "A quite stupefying ignorance that makes him unfit to be the President of the United States."

    David Lammy strikes again.

    Oh no, it was Boris Johnson.

    What role does Boris have in government now?
    I am just wondering if anyone brought up his past comments on Trump when the Tories were dealing with Trump. I certainly don't remember you doing so but I may be wrong.
    The past is another country. Here and now is worth talking about. Lammy is potentially a problem, indeed there are many Labour MPs who will find the need to work with Trump quite difficult. Let's hope they can be grownups.
    So why can't Lammy's comments also be in the past?
    He's now Foreign secretary!
    You want him to resign because he said negative things about Donald Trump in the past?
    Where did I say that?
    Even the Telegraph has reported that Lammy has spent months preparing for the possibility that Trump would win.
    As govt in waiting they were preparing for the worst outcomes, that has the scent of competence...
    David Lammy is worth a punt for next Labour leader if, as I expect, Keir Starmer will step down either just before or just after the next election. That said, he is not even named in Betfair's next PM market so the wisdom of crowds is against me, and him.
    Now it really must be April the First !
  • TimSTimS Posts: 12,983
    boulay said:

    Clarkson doing a much better job of skewering the IHT changes to farmers than the Tories so far.

    https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/31603540/labour-government-destroy-farmers-cant-fight-back-reeves/

    The point about a farmer he knows with 600 cows which alone are worth £1.2m yet alone the land and buildings and equipment demonstrates that maybe Reeves and co didn’t think it through that well.

    I think the government will feel the need to tinker with the APR rules a bit in due course. There is over a year to go until the changes come in and farms will be doing some planning in the meantime - there are various options out there. But tinkering seems likely too.
  • One area where Trump's foreign policy does in fact worry me is Iran.

    He will be seething, about the assasination attempt, this morning.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,350

    One area where Trump's foreign policy does in fact worry me is Iran.

    He will be seething, about the assasination attempt, this morning.

    Donald Trump is remarkably lucky that all the assassination attempts he faces seem to be (a) organised by whoever he wants to get mad at at a given moment and (b) mind-bendingly incompetently executed (pun intended).

    One might say suspiciously lucky.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,543
    TimS said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Nigelb said:

    MattW said:

    Nigelb said:

    I've been traveling the past few days (5 plane rides since the election, 2 universities) and maybe about 20% of people that I got to talk to really knew what tariffs were and what they meant*.

    They usually just thought it meant that a trade partner got punished by higher prices. They didn't realize it meant *they themselves* would get punished by higher prices.

    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885488542544289

    *This isn't their fault but i don't really know how to fix it. i have made a ton of videos on social explaining tariffs but i think people hear what they want to sometimes. Put econ classes in the high schools.
    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885490446811160

    *If Trump goes ahead with what he promised, there's a pretty good chance that will fix it.

    We already have examples since the Biden administration has been pursuing various Trumpist policies such as Drill, Baby, Drill and 100% tariffs on Chinese car imports.

    That's only a tiny market proportion, but what's happened to the sales of Chinse cars in the USA?

    If Chump does that to a larger share of the market, GM et al with fuck over Mr and Mrs USA because they will be able to do so.
    That's the question.

    If Trump simply continued with Biden's policies, with a few tweaks to keep MAGA happy, he'd likely be a pretty successful president. And they'd probably go along with it.

    If he goes full steam ahead with some of the stuff that he's promised, then he's going to do a lot of damage both to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
    Biden has left behind a world in flames and a structural budget deficit that has driven gold to record highs. He has been a disaster. I hope trump brings down the whole crumbling edifice of his predecessor.
    Biden has left Ukraine on the edge of defeat. And we are meant to think Trump is far far worse
    You don't think the GOP played more than a minor role in that?
    The Ukraine war has been unwinnable for a long time

    There is a chance the crazy ass Trump might actually save Ukrainian lives and bring it to an end. Ditto Gaza

    Can he be worse than Biden, in foreign policy terms? I guess he might quit NATO but more likely he will demand Europeans pay more for their own defence - and fair enough

    It’s trumps economic policies that truly worry me
    In terms of Ukraine, what do you mean by 'win' ? What do you mean by 'end', given Putin's worldview and desires?

    I'd argue the war is certainly winnable, given the will of the west. I'd go further, and argue that we must 'win' it.
    It depends how you frame the war. From my perspective this is already WW3, and Ukraine is one battle in that war, just as Korea or Vietnam or Afghanistan were battles in the Cold War, or Poland was a battle in WW2.

    We absolutely have to win WW3, otherwise we are all dead. And the only way to win it without ending up all dead is to win it early, and comprehensively, deterring the aggressor from extending the front into other countries. That can either be done with a frozen conflict followed by economic warfare until the Russian economy collapses and Putin is removed, or by victory by Ukraine on the battlefield. A frozen conflict with a functioning Russia means more war later.
    Pretty much my exact view. We are already at war; it is just the media, politicians and public prefer to ignore it.

    The question is how long they can continue to ignore it.

    And sadly, it is not just Russia. If Russia gets a 'win' from Ukraine, it will embolden other world leaders to embark on such adventures. They need to see that the potential cost of such adventures is not worth the potential reward.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,015
    Leon said:

    Nigelb said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    Dianne Feinstein 2
    Unlikely.
    As a member if Congress, she faces reelection every two years. As the last six months showed, she's still an operator.

    It wouldn't surprises me if this is her last term. Though she might stick out the full administration.
    I can’t believe you skipped the DMZ on your Korean tour?! It’s outstanding. Strange, sad, compelling, eerie, dark, enlightening, unique, emotionally profound and hugely noomy

    By a distance the highlight of my fortnight in Korea
    One for next time.
    Just didn’t fit into a driving itinerary which took in most of the country.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 43,309

    Dopermean said:

    felix said:

    kinabalu said:

    felix said:

    felix said:

    felix said:

    "A quite stupefying ignorance that makes him unfit to be the President of the United States."

    David Lammy strikes again.

    Oh no, it was Boris Johnson.

    What role does Boris have in government now?
    I am just wondering if anyone brought up his past comments on Trump when the Tories were dealing with Trump. I certainly don't remember you doing so but I may be wrong.
    The past is another country. Here and now is worth talking about. Lammy is potentially a problem, indeed there are many Labour MPs who will find the need to work with Trump quite difficult. Let's hope they can be grownups.
    So why can't Lammy's comments also be in the past?
    He's now Foreign secretary!
    You want him to resign because he said negative things about Donald Trump in the past?
    Where did I say that?
    Even the Telegraph has reported that Lammy has spent months preparing for the possibility that Trump would win.
    As govt in waiting they were preparing for the worst outcomes, that has the scent of competence...
    David Lammy is worth a punt for next Labour leader if, as I expect, Keir Starmer will step down either just before or just after the next election. That said, he is not even named in Betfair's next PM market so the wisdom of crowds is against me, and him.
    Now it really must be April the First !
    10 of them all at once
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,015
    RIP Tony Todd.

    Candyman, Candyman…
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,350
    malcolmg said:

    Dopermean said:

    felix said:

    kinabalu said:

    felix said:

    felix said:

    felix said:

    "A quite stupefying ignorance that makes him unfit to be the President of the United States."

    David Lammy strikes again.

    Oh no, it was Boris Johnson.

    What role does Boris have in government now?
    I am just wondering if anyone brought up his past comments on Trump when the Tories were dealing with Trump. I certainly don't remember you doing so but I may be wrong.
    The past is another country. Here and now is worth talking about. Lammy is potentially a problem, indeed there are many Labour MPs who will find the need to work with Trump quite difficult. Let's hope they can be grownups.
    So why can't Lammy's comments also be in the past?
    He's now Foreign secretary!
    You want him to resign because he said negative things about Donald Trump in the past?
    Where did I say that?
    Even the Telegraph has reported that Lammy has spent months preparing for the possibility that Trump would win.
    As govt in waiting they were preparing for the worst outcomes, that has the scent of competence...
    David Lammy is worth a punt for next Labour leader if, as I expect, Keir Starmer will step down either just before or just after the next election. That said, he is not even named in Betfair's next PM market so the wisdom of crowds is against me, and him.
    Now it really must be April the First !
    10 of them all at once
    Is this a reference to Leon's prolificity going nuclear or to David Lammy's chances of being PM?
  • malcolmg said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    She at least still had all her marbles intact
    Dementia really is incredibly sad, I know many people in their eighties who have a mind as sharp as anyone half their age, and then people in their seventies who really have lost it. Away from the politics of it, it is desperately sad that we watched a president go down, and clearly go down a severe dementia way. It is possible/probable that Reagan had very early indications of dementia towards the end of his presidency, but that was a time where there was no real medication that could hold anything back.
    Biden is so visibly gone, and his friends and family must have known the scale of how far gone he was for a number of years, but all colluded and covered up (even on here we had those who said Biden was fine and all this was just bigotry of a man who had overcome a debilitating stammer), not just to get him to the end of his term with dignity, but to actually attempt to seek a further four years.

    It is slightly concerning that the systems you would think are in place such as regular medical testing didnt force the issue and invoke the necessary constitutional processes to hand over to his VP. And this should have probably been done quite some time ago.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,350

    malcolmg said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    She at least still had all her marbles intact
    Dementia really is incredibly sad, I know many people in their eighties who have a mind as sharp as anyone half their age, and then people in their seventies who really have lost it. Away from the politics of it, it is desperately sad that we watched a president go down, and clearly go down a severe dementia way. It is possible/probable that Reagan had very early indications of dementia towards the end of his presidency, but that was a time where there was no real medication that could hold anything back.
    Biden is so visibly gone, and his friends and family must have known the scale of how far gone he was for a number of years, but all colluded and covered up (even on here we had those who said Biden was fine and all this was just bigotry of a man who had overcome a debilitating stammer), not just to get him to the end of his term with dignity, but to actually attempt to seek a further four years.

    It is slightly concerning that the systems you would think are in place such as regular medical testing didnt force the issue and invoke the necessary constitutional processes to hand over to his VP. And this should have probably been done quite some time ago.
    So when do you reckon he will hand over to Vance, on that basis?
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,015

    Nigelb said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    Dianne Feinstein 2
    Unlikely.
    As a member if Congress, she faces reelection every two years. As the last six months showed, she's still an operator.

    It wouldn't surprises me if this is her last term. Though she might stick out the full administration.
    Pelosi is a crazy old witch who should have retired years ago.

    You appear to think the longer she stays in the better her mental faculties will be, I can assure you they are only heading downwards. There's also the SC judge the Dems are desperate to shift. And for balance why has nobody got rid of Mitch McConnell ?

    This is a problem the US system has in that it the oldies hang in too long as they cant afford to retire.
    I didn’t express any opinion on whether she should stay.
    Just remarking on your risible comparison.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 12,983
    edited November 9
    I’m on my 4th city in 4 days and enjoying comparing them. Today it’s Cardiff, then Swansea.

    I wrote of the lack of centrepiece cathedrals in British cities. Well this one is of course centred on a castle, but the degree to which the principality stadium dominates the very centre of the city is quite unique. Slap bang in the middle.

    I rather like Cardiff. The nightlife was by far the rowdiest and most joyous of the cities I’ve visited this week. Proper Magalluf-on-Taff.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,794
    ydoethur said:

    malcolmg said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    She at least still had all her marbles intact
    Dementia really is incredibly sad, I know many people in their eighties who have a mind as sharp as anyone half their age, and then people in their seventies who really have lost it. Away from the politics of it, it is desperately sad that we watched a president go down, and clearly go down a severe dementia way. It is possible/probable that Reagan had very early indications of dementia towards the end of his presidency, but that was a time where there was no real medication that could hold anything back.
    Biden is so visibly gone, and his friends and family must have known the scale of how far gone he was for a number of years, but all colluded and covered up (even on here we had those who said Biden was fine and all this was just bigotry of a man who had overcome a debilitating stammer), not just to get him to the end of his term with dignity, but to actually attempt to seek a further four years.

    It is slightly concerning that the systems you would think are in place such as regular medical testing didnt force the issue and invoke the necessary constitutional processes to hand over to his VP. And this should have probably been done quite some time ago.
    So when do you reckon he will hand over to Vance, on that basis?
    I am not entirely convinced that Vance will be minded to wait until the inauguration before he makes his move. Trump had so obviously lost it in the last few weeks of the campaign but his momentum carried him through. He is in a far worse state now than Biden was in 2022, let alone 2020.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,350
    edited November 9
    TimS said:

    I’m on my 4th city in 4 days and enjoying comparing them. Today it’s Cardiff, then Swansea.

    I wrote of the lack of centrepiece cathedrals in British cities. Well this one is of course centred on a castle, but the degree to which the principality stadium dominates the very centre of the city is quite unique. Slap bang in the middle.

    I rather like Cardiff. The nightlife was by far the rowdiest and most joyous of the cities I’ve visited this week. Proper Magalluf-on-Taff.

    Really? Lincoln, York, Worcester, Hereford, Gloucester, Canterbury, Winchester, Exeter, Chester, Norwich, Coventry, Carlisle, Rochester, Bristol, Lichfield, Wakefield, Liverpool all spring to mind without any great effort on my part.
  • CookieCookie Posts: 13,765

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Double UAPs and UFOs hearing in Congress on Wednesday, which is larger than the previous one.

    Who is testifying will make the difference as to whether it's significant, but most of the media hasn't registered it at all, as yet.
    unlike June 2023.
    https://x.com/MarioNawfal/status/1854386103962177631

    Yawn. Nothing will come out. It’s all grift and rumours of rumours.

    As I have continually said.
    Even if that turns out to be true, it’s notable that the likes of Schumer and Rubio are giving a very different impression. Why? It’s not because they’re morons. They’ve had +40 people testify under oath behind closed doors. Who? Why?

    Why have they and many others pushed the UAP Disclosure Act now three years in a row, legally defining “technology of non human origin”?

    It’s remarkable how few people on this forum see how notable that legislation is, even if you think the motives are different to what its sponsors portray.
    Intelligent people can believe strange things all the time. From my perspective I find belief in deities weird, but I know many very intelligent people who do. It’s the same with UAPs etc. There are very many grifters and liars spinning yarns which suck people in. That’s all.
    For about two years you insisted Covid came from the wet market
    Oh fuck off. We do not know the origins of covid and the wet market is still a valid hypothesis.
    Where did SARS come from? Or MERS? Novel pathogens almost always originate in animals before making the transition to humans, usually through humans in close proximity.
    You haven’t won the debate over covid origins, even if you think you have. A lab leak is entirely plausible, but so is origins from the wet market.
    The wet market is not merely a valid hypothesis: it is the broadly accepted view among virologists. The genomic evidence of early viral diversity strongly supports it. You have to come up with some convoluted story to make the lab leak “theory” fit the evidence.
    It's the broadly accepted view among virologists because the lab leak theory makes virology look distinctly dubious.

    From an occam's razor POV, it looks like lab leak. Wet market needs far more coincidences. Now coincidences do happen, but thay doesn't mean we should write off the most straightforward explanation i.e. that ground zero for a new mutant virus being in a city where viruses were deliberately mutated in a not-very-well-secured lab wasn't a coincidence.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,350
    DavidL said:

    ydoethur said:

    malcolmg said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    She at least still had all her marbles intact
    Dementia really is incredibly sad, I know many people in their eighties who have a mind as sharp as anyone half their age, and then people in their seventies who really have lost it. Away from the politics of it, it is desperately sad that we watched a president go down, and clearly go down a severe dementia way. It is possible/probable that Reagan had very early indications of dementia towards the end of his presidency, but that was a time where there was no real medication that could hold anything back.
    Biden is so visibly gone, and his friends and family must have known the scale of how far gone he was for a number of years, but all colluded and covered up (even on here we had those who said Biden was fine and all this was just bigotry of a man who had overcome a debilitating stammer), not just to get him to the end of his term with dignity, but to actually attempt to seek a further four years.

    It is slightly concerning that the systems you would think are in place such as regular medical testing didnt force the issue and invoke the necessary constitutional processes to hand over to his VP. And this should have probably been done quite some time ago.
    So when do you reckon he will hand over to Vance, on that basis?
    I am not entirely convinced that Vance will be minded to wait until the inauguration before he makes his move. Trump had so obviously lost it in the last few weeks of the campaign but his momentum carried him through. He is in a far worse state now than Biden was in 2022, let alone 2020.
    There's a shark over there.

    Will Trump take the electrocution as promised, or will he let the Hammervance Shark eat him?
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 35,977
    DavidL said:

    ydoethur said:

    malcolmg said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    She at least still had all her marbles intact
    Dementia really is incredibly sad, I know many people in their eighties who have a mind as sharp as anyone half their age, and then people in their seventies who really have lost it. Away from the politics of it, it is desperately sad that we watched a president go down, and clearly go down a severe dementia way. It is possible/probable that Reagan had very early indications of dementia towards the end of his presidency, but that was a time where there was no real medication that could hold anything back.
    Biden is so visibly gone, and his friends and family must have known the scale of how far gone he was for a number of years, but all colluded and covered up (even on here we had those who said Biden was fine and all this was just bigotry of a man who had overcome a debilitating stammer), not just to get him to the end of his term with dignity, but to actually attempt to seek a further four years.

    It is slightly concerning that the systems you would think are in place such as regular medical testing didnt force the issue and invoke the necessary constitutional processes to hand over to his VP. And this should have probably been done quite some time ago.
    So when do you reckon he will hand over to Vance, on that basis?
    I am not entirely convinced that Vance will be minded to wait until the inauguration before he makes his move. Trump had so obviously lost it in the last few weeks of the campaign but his momentum carried him through. He is in a far worse state now than Biden was in 2022, let alone 2020.
    @LadPolitics Will Donald Trump serve a full term as President? Yes - 4/11 No - 2/1
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,350
    Cookie said:

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Double UAPs and UFOs hearing in Congress on Wednesday, which is larger than the previous one.

    Who is testifying will make the difference as to whether it's significant, but most of the media hasn't registered it at all, as yet.
    unlike June 2023.
    https://x.com/MarioNawfal/status/1854386103962177631

    Yawn. Nothing will come out. It’s all grift and rumours of rumours.

    As I have continually said.
    Even if that turns out to be true, it’s notable that the likes of Schumer and Rubio are giving a very different impression. Why? It’s not because they’re morons. They’ve had +40 people testify under oath behind closed doors. Who? Why?

    Why have they and many others pushed the UAP Disclosure Act now three years in a row, legally defining “technology of non human origin”?

    It’s remarkable how few people on this forum see how notable that legislation is, even if you think the motives are different to what its sponsors portray.
    Intelligent people can believe strange things all the time. From my perspective I find belief in deities weird, but I know many very intelligent people who do. It’s the same with UAPs etc. There are very many grifters and liars spinning yarns which suck people in. That’s all.
    For about two years you insisted Covid came from the wet market
    Oh fuck off. We do not know the origins of covid and the wet market is still a valid hypothesis.
    Where did SARS come from? Or MERS? Novel pathogens almost always originate in animals before making the transition to humans, usually through humans in close proximity.
    You haven’t won the debate over covid origins, even if you think you have. A lab leak is entirely plausible, but so is origins from the wet market.
    The wet market is not merely a valid hypothesis: it is the broadly accepted view among virologists. The genomic evidence of early viral diversity strongly supports it. You have to come up with some convoluted story to make the lab leak “theory” fit the evidence.
    It's the broadly accepted view among virologists because the lab leak theory makes virology look distinctly dubious.

    From an occam's razor POV, it looks like lab leak. Wet market needs far more coincidences. Now coincidences do happen, but thay doesn't mean we should write off the most straightforward explanation i.e. that ground zero for a new mutant virus being in a city where viruses were deliberately mutated in a not-very-well-secured lab wasn't a coincidence.
    I've never understood why people dogmatically think it's either/or.*

    Surely the simplest explanation is that both are correct - I.e. that samples from the lab were being illegally sold in the wet market due to internal corruption?

    *Well, actually I understand why Leon does, and it's because he can't understand complex chains of causation.
  • algarkirkalgarkirk Posts: 12,496
    TimS said:

    boulay said:

    Clarkson doing a much better job of skewering the IHT changes to farmers than the Tories so far.

    https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/31603540/labour-government-destroy-farmers-cant-fight-back-reeves/

    The point about a farmer he knows with 600 cows which alone are worth £1.2m yet alone the land and buildings and equipment demonstrates that maybe Reeves and co didn’t think it through that well.

    I think the government will feel the need to tinker with the APR rules a bit in due course. There is over a year to go until the changes come in and farms will be doing some planning in the meantime - there are various options out there. But tinkering seems likely too.
    Yes. The BBC farming prog this morning (started 6.30 am) was talking to a very good Cumbrian accountant who talked sense about all this. The particular unfairness would be on now old farmers who relied, quite properly, on the current laws but now don't have time (basically 7 years) to plan properly. Tinkering with this is urgent.
  • kjhkjh Posts: 11,782
    Leon said:

    Nigelb said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    Dianne Feinstein 2
    Unlikely.
    As a member if Congress, she faces reelection every two years. As the last six months showed, she's still an operator.

    It wouldn't surprises me if this is her last term. Though she might stick out the full administration.
    I can’t believe you skipped the DMZ on your Korean tour?! It’s outstanding. Strange, sad, compelling, eerie, dark, enlightening, unique, emotionally profound and hugely noomy

    By a distance the highlight of my fortnight in Korea
    In the 90s I spent a few months working in Nicosia. One day I walked to the wall at one of the widest points. A soldier invited me up to look across. It was like looking at a world after the extermination of humans with with nature taking back control with young trees breaking through the tarmac in the road. The only humans to enter being the odd UN patrol.
  • Daveyboy1961Daveyboy1961 Posts: 3,883
    ydoethur said:

    One area where Trump's foreign policy does in fact worry me is Iran.

    He will be seething, about the assasination attempt, this morning.

    Donald Trump is remarkably lucky that all the assassination attempts he faces seem to be (a) organised by whoever he wants to get mad at at a given moment and (b) mind-bendingly incompetently executed (pun intended).

    One might say suspiciously lucky.
    I remember after the Brighton bombing I think the IRA said "we only have to be lucky once, you have to be lucky always"
  • RattersRatters Posts: 1,075

    TimS said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Nigelb said:

    MattW said:

    Nigelb said:

    I've been traveling the past few days (5 plane rides since the election, 2 universities) and maybe about 20% of people that I got to talk to really knew what tariffs were and what they meant*.

    They usually just thought it meant that a trade partner got punished by higher prices. They didn't realize it meant *they themselves* would get punished by higher prices.

    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885488542544289

    *This isn't their fault but i don't really know how to fix it. i have made a ton of videos on social explaining tariffs but i think people hear what they want to sometimes. Put econ classes in the high schools.
    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885490446811160

    *If Trump goes ahead with what he promised, there's a pretty good chance that will fix it.

    We already have examples since the Biden administration has been pursuing various Trumpist policies such as Drill, Baby, Drill and 100% tariffs on Chinese car imports.

    That's only a tiny market proportion, but what's happened to the sales of Chinse cars in the USA?

    If Chump does that to a larger share of the market, GM et al with fuck over Mr and Mrs USA because they will be able to do so.
    That's the question.

    If Trump simply continued with Biden's policies, with a few tweaks to keep MAGA happy, he'd likely be a pretty successful president. And they'd probably go along with it.

    If he goes full steam ahead with some of the stuff that he's promised, then he's going to do a lot of damage both to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
    Biden has left behind a world in flames and a structural budget deficit that has driven gold to record highs. He has been a disaster. I hope trump brings down the whole crumbling edifice of his predecessor.
    Biden has left Ukraine on the edge of defeat. And we are meant to think Trump is far far worse
    You don't think the GOP played more than a minor role in that?
    The Ukraine war has been unwinnable for a long time

    There is a chance the crazy ass Trump might actually save Ukrainian lives and bring it to an end. Ditto Gaza

    Can he be worse than Biden, in foreign policy terms? I guess he might quit NATO but more likely he will demand Europeans pay more for their own defence - and fair enough

    It’s trumps economic policies that truly worry me
    In terms of Ukraine, what do you mean by 'win' ? What do you mean by 'end', given Putin's worldview and desires?

    I'd argue the war is certainly winnable, given the will of the west. I'd go further, and argue that we must 'win' it.
    It depends how you frame the war. From my perspective this is already WW3, and Ukraine is one battle in that war, just as Korea or Vietnam or Afghanistan were battles in the Cold War, or Poland was a battle in WW2.

    We absolutely have to win WW3, otherwise we are all dead. And the only way to win it without ending up all dead is to win it early, and comprehensively, deterring the aggressor from extending the front into other countries. That can either be done with a frozen conflict followed by economic warfare until the Russian economy collapses and Putin is removed, or by victory by Ukraine on the battlefield. A frozen conflict with a functioning Russia means more war later.
    Pretty much my exact view. We are already at war; it is just the media, politicians and public prefer to ignore it.

    The question is how long they can continue to ignore it.

    And sadly, it is not just Russia. If Russia gets a 'win' from Ukraine, it will embolden other world leaders to embark on such adventures. They need to see that the potential cost of such adventures is not worth the potential reward.
    I don't understand why Europe has not introduced an embargo on all gas from Russia. We are spending money fighting them with one hand and funding them with another.

    It's much harder to find alternative buyers of gas than it is oil given transport limitations for a country like Russia that doesn't have large LNG export capacity.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,015
    Would be an interesting choice.

    Kash Patel, the next possible Director of Central Intelligence under Trump:

    “We’re going to come after the people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections. We’re going to come after you.”

    https://x.com/highbrow_nobrow/status/1854966300420063322
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,543

    malcolmg said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    She at least still had all her marbles intact
    Dementia really is incredibly sad, I know many people in their eighties who have a mind as sharp as anyone half their age, and then people in their seventies who really have lost it. Away from the politics of it, it is desperately sad that we watched a president go down, and clearly go down a severe dementia way. It is possible/probable that Reagan had very early indications of dementia towards the end of his presidency, but that was a time where there was no real medication that could hold anything back.
    Biden is so visibly gone, and his friends and family must have known the scale of how far gone he was for a number of years, but all colluded and covered up (even on here we had those who said Biden was fine and all this was just bigotry of a man who had overcome a debilitating stammer), not just to get him to the end of his term with dignity, but to actually attempt to seek a further four years.

    It is slightly concerning that the systems you would think are in place such as regular medical testing didnt force the issue and invoke the necessary constitutional processes to hand over to his VP. And this should have probably been done quite some time ago.
    My granddad ended up in a very good council-run home for the last year or so of his life. My dad was surprised to discover someone he knew was also in there, a guy who used to run a car-repair workshop. He was around fifty years of age, and was more physically and mentally decrepit than my granddad, who was 100.

    Dementia is a cruel disease. But like Parkinson's and other 'old' diseases, they become more cruel when they inflict the young.
  • eekeek Posts: 28,362
    edited November 9
    ydoethur said:

    TimS said:

    I’m on my 4th city in 4 days and enjoying comparing them. Today it’s Cardiff, then Swansea.

    I wrote of the lack of centrepiece cathedrals in British cities. Well this one is of course centred on a castle, but the degree to which the principality stadium dominates the very centre of the city is quite unique. Slap bang in the middle.

    I rather like Cardiff. The nightlife was by far the rowdiest and most joyous of the cities I’ve visited this week. Proper Magalluf-on-Taff.

    Really? Lincoln, York, Worcester, Hereford, Gloucester, Canterbury, Winchester, Exeter, Chester, Norwich, Coventry, Carlisle, Rochester, Bristol, Lichfield, Wakefield, Liverpool all spring to mind without any great effort on my part.
    TimS's tour was Manchester, Leeds and Birmingham - At least 2 of which are towns that over took the original nearby Cathedral Cities (Chester and Ripon)..

    So neither have medieval cathedrals because they were originally small towns which just happened to have the perfect location when the industrial revolution came..
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,228
    ydoethur said:

    Cookie said:

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Double UAPs and UFOs hearing in Congress on Wednesday, which is larger than the previous one.

    Who is testifying will make the difference as to whether it's significant, but most of the media hasn't registered it at all, as yet.
    unlike June 2023.
    https://x.com/MarioNawfal/status/1854386103962177631

    Yawn. Nothing will come out. It’s all grift and rumours of rumours.

    As I have continually said.
    Even if that turns out to be true, it’s notable that the likes of Schumer and Rubio are giving a very different impression. Why? It’s not because they’re morons. They’ve had +40 people testify under oath behind closed doors. Who? Why?

    Why have they and many others pushed the UAP Disclosure Act now three years in a row, legally defining “technology of non human origin”?

    It’s remarkable how few people on this forum see how notable that legislation is, even if you think the motives are different to what its sponsors portray.
    Intelligent people can believe strange things all the time. From my perspective I find belief in deities weird, but I know many very intelligent people who do. It’s the same with UAPs etc. There are very many grifters and liars spinning yarns which suck people in. That’s all.
    For about two years you insisted Covid came from the wet market
    Oh fuck off. We do not know the origins of covid and the wet market is still a valid hypothesis.
    Where did SARS come from? Or MERS? Novel pathogens almost always originate in animals before making the transition to humans, usually through humans in close proximity.
    You haven’t won the debate over covid origins, even if you think you have. A lab leak is entirely plausible, but so is origins from the wet market.
    The wet market is not merely a valid hypothesis: it is the broadly accepted view among virologists. The genomic evidence of early viral diversity strongly supports it. You have to come up with some convoluted story to make the lab leak “theory” fit the evidence.
    It's the broadly accepted view among virologists because the lab leak theory makes virology look distinctly dubious.

    From an occam's razor POV, it looks like lab leak. Wet market needs far more coincidences. Now coincidences do happen, but thay doesn't mean we should write off the most straightforward explanation i.e. that ground zero for a new mutant virus being in a city where viruses were deliberately mutated in a not-very-well-secured lab wasn't a coincidence.
    I've never understood why people dogmatically think it's either/or.*

    Surely the simplest explanation is that both are correct - I.e. that samples from the lab were being illegally sold in the wet market due to internal corruption?

    *Well, actually I understand why Leon does, and it's because he can't understand complex chains of causation.
    The great irony here is that the Chinese themselves told us the solution - the chain of events - in a very early paper published in (I think) January 2020

    Two Chinese boffins looked at all the evidence - the geography and virology - and said, quite plainly, “it is highly like the virus accidentally infected a worker at the Wuhan CDC who then went to the nearby market (300 yards away) from where it spread in ideal conditions”

    There. That’s probably what happened. We’ve know all along and everything else is politics and lies

    Of course the Chinese made the paper disappear and the two scientists - I believe - have likewise vanished. Very sad
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 50,181

    malcolmg said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    She at least still had all her marbles intact
    Dementia really is incredibly sad, I know many people in their eighties who have a mind as sharp as anyone half their age, and then people in their seventies who really have lost it. Away from the politics of it, it is desperately sad that we watched a president go down, and clearly go down a severe dementia way. It is possible/probable that Reagan had very early indications of dementia towards the end of his presidency, but that was a time where there was no real medication that could hold anything back.
    Biden is so visibly gone, and his friends and family must have known the scale of how far gone he was for a number of years, but all colluded and covered up (even on here we had those who said Biden was fine and all this was just bigotry of a man who had overcome a debilitating stammer), not just to get him to the end of his term with dignity, but to actually attempt to seek a further four years.

    It is slightly concerning that the systems you would think are in place such as regular medical testing didnt force the issue and invoke the necessary constitutional processes to hand over to his VP. And this should have probably been done quite some time ago.
    There is definitely an issue with age that is not directly dementia related.

    How many people do you see who go off the rails in early old age? See the discussion of Tom Clancy, above? The stereotype of the angry old man shouting at birds has something to it.

    See various, once serious, political figures who’ve gone MAGA.

    If you look back at historical figures (such as Captain Cook, Lord Charles Beresford etc) their biographers keep saying the same thing - they were different men from 10 years before, almost becoming parodies of themselves.
  • boulayboulay Posts: 5,484
    ydoethur said:

    TimS said:

    I’m on my 4th city in 4 days and enjoying comparing them. Today it’s Cardiff, then Swansea.

    I wrote of the lack of centrepiece cathedrals in British cities. Well this one is of course centred on a castle, but the degree to which the principality stadium dominates the very centre of the city is quite unique. Slap bang in the middle.

    I rather like Cardiff. The nightlife was by far the rowdiest and most joyous of the cities I’ve visited this week. Proper Magalluf-on-Taff.

    Really? Lincoln, York, Worcester, Hereford, Gloucester, Canterbury, Winchester, Exeter, Chester, Norwich, Coventry, Carlisle, Rochester, Bristol, Lichfield, Wakefield, Liverpool all spring to mind without any great effort on my part.
    Wasn’t Tim referring to the lack of centrepiece cathedrals in major cities, seem to recall he gave a nod to cathedral cities as “large towns” with a cathedral which is true really.
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 11,043
    Cookie said:

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Double UAPs and UFOs hearing in Congress on Wednesday, which is larger than the previous one.

    Who is testifying will make the difference as to whether it's significant, but most of the media hasn't registered it at all, as yet.
    unlike June 2023.
    https://x.com/MarioNawfal/status/1854386103962177631

    Yawn. Nothing will come out. It’s all grift and rumours of rumours.

    As I have continually said.
    Even if that turns out to be true, it’s notable that the likes of Schumer and Rubio are giving a very different impression. Why? It’s not because they’re morons. They’ve had +40 people testify under oath behind closed doors. Who? Why?

    Why have they and many others pushed the UAP Disclosure Act now three years in a row, legally defining “technology of non human origin”?

    It’s remarkable how few people on this forum see how notable that legislation is, even if you think the motives are different to what its sponsors portray.
    Intelligent people can believe strange things all the time. From my perspective I find belief in deities weird, but I know many very intelligent people who do. It’s the same with UAPs etc. There are very many grifters and liars spinning yarns which suck people in. That’s all.
    For about two years you insisted Covid came from the wet market
    Oh fuck off. We do not know the origins of covid and the wet market is still a valid hypothesis.
    Where did SARS come from? Or MERS? Novel pathogens almost always originate in animals before making the transition to humans, usually through humans in close proximity.
    You haven’t won the debate over covid origins, even if you think you have. A lab leak is entirely plausible, but so is origins from the wet market.
    The wet market is not merely a valid hypothesis: it is the broadly accepted view among virologists. The genomic evidence of early viral diversity strongly supports it. You have to come up with some convoluted story to make the lab leak “theory” fit the evidence.
    It's the broadly accepted view among virologists because the lab leak theory makes virology look distinctly dubious.

    From an occam's razor POV, it looks like lab leak. Wet market needs far more coincidences. Now coincidences do happen, but thay doesn't mean we should write off the most straightforward explanation i.e. that ground zero for a new mutant virus being in a city where viruses were deliberately mutated in a not-very-well-secured lab wasn't a coincidence.
    The early COVID-19 cases cluster around the wet market, and were nowhere near the lab. Environmental samples show SARS-CoV-2 was at the market in the right timeframe. There’s no evidence of the right sort of virus at the lab. China invested heavily in coronavirus labs after SARS, so there are a lot of labs around, meaning it’s less of a coincidence than lab leak enthusiasts believe. The viral genome shows no signs of being deliberately mutated. Novel virus outbreaks are almost always zoonotic. The early diversity of the viral genome shows it can’t have arisen from a single sample (as in the lab leak theory), but does match there being a reservoir of infected animals existing (as with the wet market).
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,543
    Ratters said:

    TimS said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    moonshine said:

    Nigelb said:

    MattW said:

    Nigelb said:

    I've been traveling the past few days (5 plane rides since the election, 2 universities) and maybe about 20% of people that I got to talk to really knew what tariffs were and what they meant*.

    They usually just thought it meant that a trade partner got punished by higher prices. They didn't realize it meant *they themselves* would get punished by higher prices.

    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885488542544289

    *This isn't their fault but i don't really know how to fix it. i have made a ton of videos on social explaining tariffs but i think people hear what they want to sometimes. Put econ classes in the high schools.
    https://x.com/kylascan/status/1854885490446811160

    *If Trump goes ahead with what he promised, there's a pretty good chance that will fix it.

    We already have examples since the Biden administration has been pursuing various Trumpist policies such as Drill, Baby, Drill and 100% tariffs on Chinese car imports.

    That's only a tiny market proportion, but what's happened to the sales of Chinse cars in the USA?

    If Chump does that to a larger share of the market, GM et al with fuck over Mr and Mrs USA because they will be able to do so.
    That's the question.

    If Trump simply continued with Biden's policies, with a few tweaks to keep MAGA happy, he'd likely be a pretty successful president. And they'd probably go along with it.

    If he goes full steam ahead with some of the stuff that he's promised, then he's going to do a lot of damage both to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
    Biden has left behind a world in flames and a structural budget deficit that has driven gold to record highs. He has been a disaster. I hope trump brings down the whole crumbling edifice of his predecessor.
    Biden has left Ukraine on the edge of defeat. And we are meant to think Trump is far far worse
    You don't think the GOP played more than a minor role in that?
    The Ukraine war has been unwinnable for a long time

    There is a chance the crazy ass Trump might actually save Ukrainian lives and bring it to an end. Ditto Gaza

    Can he be worse than Biden, in foreign policy terms? I guess he might quit NATO but more likely he will demand Europeans pay more for their own defence - and fair enough

    It’s trumps economic policies that truly worry me
    In terms of Ukraine, what do you mean by 'win' ? What do you mean by 'end', given Putin's worldview and desires?

    I'd argue the war is certainly winnable, given the will of the west. I'd go further, and argue that we must 'win' it.
    It depends how you frame the war. From my perspective this is already WW3, and Ukraine is one battle in that war, just as Korea or Vietnam or Afghanistan were battles in the Cold War, or Poland was a battle in WW2.

    We absolutely have to win WW3, otherwise we are all dead. And the only way to win it without ending up all dead is to win it early, and comprehensively, deterring the aggressor from extending the front into other countries. That can either be done with a frozen conflict followed by economic warfare until the Russian economy collapses and Putin is removed, or by victory by Ukraine on the battlefield. A frozen conflict with a functioning Russia means more war later.
    Pretty much my exact view. We are already at war; it is just the media, politicians and public prefer to ignore it.

    The question is how long they can continue to ignore it.

    And sadly, it is not just Russia. If Russia gets a 'win' from Ukraine, it will embolden other world leaders to embark on such adventures. They need to see that the potential cost of such adventures is not worth the potential reward.
    I don't understand why Europe has not introduced an embargo on all gas from Russia. We are spending money fighting them with one hand and funding them with another.

    It's much harder to find alternative buyers of gas than it is oil given transport limitations for a country like Russia that doesn't have large LNG export capacity.
    A couple of landlocked European countries (Austria and Slovakia) are screwed without pipeline gas from Russia. And Hungary does not care.
  • StuartinromfordStuartinromford Posts: 17,207
    DavidL said:

    ydoethur said:

    malcolmg said:

    IanB2 said:

    Pelosi is accusing others of clinging on until too old an age? Well I never.

    She at least still had all her marbles intact
    Dementia really is incredibly sad, I know many people in their eighties who have a mind as sharp as anyone half their age, and then people in their seventies who really have lost it. Away from the politics of it, it is desperately sad that we watched a president go down, and clearly go down a severe dementia way. It is possible/probable that Reagan had very early indications of dementia towards the end of his presidency, but that was a time where there was no real medication that could hold anything back.
    Biden is so visibly gone, and his friends and family must have known the scale of how far gone he was for a number of years, but all colluded and covered up (even on here we had those who said Biden was fine and all this was just bigotry of a man who had overcome a debilitating stammer), not just to get him to the end of his term with dignity, but to actually attempt to seek a further four years.

    It is slightly concerning that the systems you would think are in place such as regular medical testing didnt force the issue and invoke the necessary constitutional processes to hand over to his VP. And this should have probably been done quite some time ago.
    So when do you reckon he will hand over to Vance, on that basis?
    I am not entirely convinced that Vance will be minded to wait until the inauguration before he makes his move. Trump had so obviously lost it in the last few weeks of the campaign but his momentum carried him through. He is in a far worse state now than Biden was in 2022, let alone 2020.
    What serves Vance and co better?

    Ditching Trump now he's done his job and is just an embarrassing old man, or keeping him as a popular figurehead (to some) and lightning conductor (to others) while they get on with running the country?

    A shootout seems likely, but it's less obvious who wins it.
This discussion has been closed.