I've just gone through the Conservative target list for seats for 2029.
None particularly scare me. Basingstoke is target 163, Guildford at 205, Crewe and Nantwich at 230 and Chichester at 258.
I think lots fall all at once, or very few at all.
As POTUS2024 proved and @rcs1000 repeatedly pointed out, they aren't independent. Trump got all the swing states, and I assume if Cons play their cards right they can take down a swathe.
I’d be wary about drawing that conclusion.
America is a two party system, GB wide we’re potentially a five party system at least, and votes could splinter is all sorts of directions.
2.5 party system, the 0.5 is just different in different areas.
Rep. Mike Waltz, Trump's likely NATSEC advisor, in an interview last week:
"Enforce the actual energy sanctions on Russia...I think that will get Putin to the table. We have leverage, like taking the handcuffs off of the long-range weapons we provided Ukraine as well."
We will see.
So far, there's nothing other than a couple of names to suggest what Trump might, or might not do, once in office.
In the meantime, Europe (some of it at least) is starting to do what it ought to have done sooner.
Europe delivered nearly 1,000,000 artillery shells to Ukraine this year, and aims to deliver another half million rounds by January, per the EU's Josep Borrell.
To put that into perspective: Russia has been firing 60,000 to 70,000 artillery shells per day in the past. It's apparently slowed down a great deal recently (lack of shells? lack of tubes?)
But Russia is making 3,000,000 a year, or over 8,000 a day, and they are also getting many from North Korea.
It may have shells. It can't replace the artillery tubes though. Of which it has now lost over 20,000 in Ukraine.
The Russian people’s threshold for absorbing needless misery amazes more each month.
It's an unfortunately necessary historic strength for them.
Yebbut - the Ukrainians have been blowing up their vodka plants...
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I'm the opposite, as I am increasingly hopeful it will not pass - I think it seems very rushed procedurally, and this is one of the few cases where warnings about slippery slopes need to be taken very seriously, as you really do not want to get this wrong, or fix the details later, even if some numbers of people will suffer in the intervening period.
@Leon can we find consensus that above 18 if you want surgery you can for trans issues?
Are you also happy that if people want to be called “she” they can be? What about for kids?
Where do you stand on gender?
I think we all agree there are two sexes.
I think have a third category for trans people where they can be protected. What do you think?
With the counter that any adult facilitating in the mutilation of genitals or healthy breast tissue for reasons of gender confusion on anyone under 18 will be prosecuted and imprisoned.
Have we found consensus?
Well not really. You will recall two of Viewcode's rants: "Britain is a safe country not a free country", and "we have adultised children and infantilised adults". Let's look at them
* Your remarks about protective categories for trans people have obvious problems (shall we call them "ghettoes" or "beyond the pale"? There are so many terms to pick from...). Are you going to put people in prison for not entering your protective category? * The "under 18" overlooks the fact that 16 and 17 year olds are legally adults and so have adult capacity. Are you going to put adults in prison for wanting to transition?
The UK has a real problem with blurred lines between "adult" and "child" and it really should be demarcated more sharply.
Are you saying that children become adults as midnight strikes, bit like the Harry Enfield sketch?
How else would you do it? That's how we used to do it years ago. But society is a lot different now and we have created a society full of twentysomethings living in their teenage bedrooms playing video games and having panic attacks at dust. Is that better?
Has there ever been a bright line divide between childhood and adulthood in UK law?
A hundred years ago, the age of criminal responsibility was 8, school leaving age was 14, the age of consent was 16, the age at which one could inherit or buy property was 21, and the voting age for most was 28.
Fifty years ago, the age of criminal responsibility was 10, the school leaving age was 16, the age of consent was variously 16, 17, or 21 depending on your circumstances, the age at which one could buy or inherit property was 18, and the voting age was 18.
Today, the age of criminal responsibility is 12 (in all but the most serious cases), the school leaving age is 18, the age of consent is universally 16, the age at which one can buy property remains at 18, and the voting age is 16 or 18 depending on where you live.
It seems to be that there's always been a lot of fudging involved, and that's probably for the best.
"A report detailing his "horrific" beatings of teenaged boys was presented to some Church leaders in 1982. But the recipients of that report "participated in an active cover-up" to prevent its findings, including that crimes had been committed, coming to light, the Makin review said."
Rep. Mike Waltz, Trump's likely NATSEC advisor, in an interview last week:
"Enforce the actual energy sanctions on Russia...I think that will get Putin to the table. We have leverage, like taking the handcuffs off of the long-range weapons we provided Ukraine as well."
We will see.
So far, there's nothing other than a couple of names to suggest what Trump might, or might not do, once in office.
In the meantime, Europe (some of it at least) is starting to do what it ought to have done sooner.
Europe delivered nearly 1,000,000 artillery shells to Ukraine this year, and aims to deliver another half million rounds by January, per the EU's Josep Borrell.
To put that into perspective: Russia has been firing 60,000 to 70,000 artillery shells per day in the past. It's apparently slowed down a great deal recently (lack of shells? lack of tubes?)
But Russia is making 3,000,000 a year, or over 8,000 a day, and they are also getting many from North Korea.
It may have shells. It can't replace the artillery tubes though. Of which it has now lost over 20,000 in Ukraine.
Russia still has an artillery advantage, and Russian artillery is by far the greatest source of Ukrainian casualties, and why the Russians have been able to make incremental advances this year.
At the start of the war there were lots of confident assertions about how the stronger economies of the West were going to crush Russia under a tidal wave of weapons production. That. Hasn't. Happened.
All of these self-deluding reassurances about how the deficit isn't so bad, and greater Ukrainian accuracy makes up the shortfall are really dangerous. They fool ourselves into thinking that the West is doing okay, when it is actually failing Ukraine by not providing enough ammunition.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I'm the opposite, as I am increasingly hopeful it will not pass - I think it seems very rushed procedurally, and this is one of the few cases where warnings about slippery slopes need to be taken very seriously, as you really do not want to get this wrong, or fix the details later, even if some numbers of people will suffer in the intervening period.
In what way do you think it is rushed? I think it's a conversation society needs to have and am glad Starmer is making it a free vote. I hope we can get through this debate without it going all post-truth, and people can make their points and make the law better, if indeed it does pass.
"A report detailing his "horrific" beatings of teenaged boys was presented to some Church leaders in 1982. But the recipients of that report "participated in an active cover-up" to prevent its findings, including that crimes had been committed, coming to light, the Makin review said."
I'd be more surprised if a report found that there hadn't been active cover ups of such things. It's entirely expected in fact. Which may be an unfair characterisation of the organisation, the few major examples colouring our view of the whole, but it will take a long time for that perception to change.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I would certainly vote against. Any controls would inevitably get watered down over the years and I think coercion is too big a risk the way our society works. You often hear the argument that the death penalty for murderers is unacceptable due to the risk of falsely executing just one innocent person. Ironically enough it’s often the same groups that argue that who make the case for voluntary euthanasia. But let’s see what our democracy decides.
Will be interesting to see what 650MPs decide, no doubt with considerable input from constituents. A shame we can’t make everything a vote of conscience really.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I'm the opposite, as I am increasingly hopeful it will not pass - I think it seems very rushed procedurally, and this is one of the few cases where warnings about slippery slopes need to be taken very seriously, as you really do not want to get this wrong, or fix the details later, even if some numbers of people will suffer in the intervening period.
If will be years and years before this comes back if this isn't passed. MPs will spend months in committee after this reading.
I've just gone through the Conservative target list for seats for 2029.
None particularly scare me. Basingstoke is target 163, Guildford at 205, Crewe and Nantwich at 230 and Chichester at 258.
I think lots fall all at once, or very few at all.
Yes I agree with that. If the campaign is good and Labour are in trouble with 5 years of zero growth, tax rises and high interest rates lots of seats will fall and we could get to up to 37% with Labour down on ~25-28% and lots of seats will change hands, well over 100 and probably close to 200.
I think the Tories will need to offer something to the younger voter.
I think voters aged 30-50 will be the key. There's going to be millions who won't have seen real terms pay rises for around 5 years, facing high interest rates on mortgages and generally have shorter attention spans/memories than older voters who may not be as ready to forget the 2022-2024 period of Tory government. The core vote was reached in 2024, the task will be to add 3-4m to that figure all across the nation. Policies that help 30-50 something people with kids, a mortgage and car payments will be key for the Tories.
I also think further measures for first time buyers is extremely important the Tories need to offer policies that help bring the average age of a first time buyer down from ~38 to ~30 again. We need more investment in new houses and frankly to cut immigration by many hundreds of thousands per year to reduce demand for housing. On both Labour will have to make headway or I think young people under 30 will turn to Reform just as the anti-immigration ticket won over young people for Trump in the US. Reform will be very, very successful in linking high immigration to high housing costs and inflation.
The 2022-24 Conservative Government could have been so much worse.
It could have been the Labour Government 2024-2028. The one that didn't have to resolve the aftermath of Brexit. Of Covid. Of Ukraine. Of the cost of living crisis/
The Labour Government 2024-2028 just had woes of its own making.
Is Ukraine resolved now then?
The pressures on hydrocarbon prices have been significantly dealt with, after the initial "OMFG!!!!!!" reaction.
Every few months, a poster breathlessly comments about NEW AND IMPORTANT INFORMATION about ALIENS or UFOs.
And a couple of other posters (usually the same ones...) chime in about how it's going to be the BIGGEST WORLD-CHANGING NEWS!!!!
And every time, the information that was so important turns out to be a nothingburger.
Rather than being such a smug know it all, you should open your mind and go and read last year’s Schumer-Rounds amendment, written by the office of the Senate Majority Leader (so implicitly endorsed by the Biden White House) and sponsored and passed on a bipartisan basis, with the approval of Senate Gang of 8 leaders.
They are privy to much that we are not and thought it a priority to try and pass what must count as the most bizarre bill in US democratic history. Why? Then watch Schumer’s speech on the floor after Mike Turner and Mike Rogers killed it in House Committee, for confirmation of how high passions ran.
There is more than one answer to the question of wtf is going but it amazes me how unfascinated you are by the question. If the accusation was an equivalently sized criminal conspiracy in govt about any other area of public policy I suspect your interest level would differ.
I think part of the reason is that it has become an article of faith that UAP/UFO issues are for crazies, and that that cultural framing is very hard to overcome, particularly in a very often statistically-focused community like PB.
But recent political developments on UAP's, with the level of senior admissions of uncertainty, don't bear this out; this simply has yet to filter through to most of the media or wider public, though, because the social stigma on it, and worry of mockery, is still strong.
Has anyone mentioned the Stephen Flynn story? After mercilessly attacking Douglas Ross for having two jobs (MP and MSP) apparently its now perfectly OK for Stephen Flynn to propose to do the same.
And he's definitely not planning to take over the SNP leadership. No no no...
Lets just say that its created a real furore up here.
"A report detailing his "horrific" beatings of teenaged boys was presented to some Church leaders in 1982. But the recipients of that report "participated in an active cover-up" to prevent its findings, including that crimes had been committed, coming to light, the Makin review said."
Every few months, a poster breathlessly comments about NEW AND IMPORTANT INFORMATION about ALIENS or UFOs.
And a couple of other posters (usually the same ones...) chime in about how it's going to be the BIGGEST WORLD-CHANGING NEWS!!!!
And every time, the information that was so important turns out to be a nothingburger.
Rather than being such a smug know it all, you should open your mind and go and read last year’s Schumer-Rounds amendment, written by the office of the Senate Majority Leader (so implicitly endorsed by the Biden White House) and sponsored and passed on a bipartisan basis, with the approval of Senate Gang of 8 leaders.
They are privy to much that we are not and thought it a priority to try and pass what must count as the most bizarre bill in US democratic history. Why? Then watch Schumer’s speech on the floor after Mike Turner and Mike Rogers killed it in House Committee, for confirmation of how high passions ran.
There is more than one answer to the question of wtf is going but it amazes me how unfascinated you are by the question. If the accusation was an equivalently sized criminal conspiracy in govt about any other area of public policy I suspect your interest level would differ.
I think part of the reason is that it has become an article of faith that UAP/UFO issues are for crazies, and that that cultural framing is very hard to overcome, particularly in a very often statistically-focused community like PB.
But recent political developments on UAP's, with the level of senior admissions of uncertainty, don't bear this out; this simply has yet to filter through to most of the media or wider public, though, because the social stigma on it, and worry of mockery, is still strong.
Get back to us when there's an Identified Flying Object.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I'm the opposite, as I am increasingly hopeful it will not pass - I think it seems very rushed procedurally, and this is one of the few cases where warnings about slippery slopes need to be taken very seriously, as you really do not want to get this wrong, or fix the details later, even if some numbers of people will suffer in the intervening period.
In what way do you think it is rushed? I think it's a conversation society needs to have and am glad Starmer is making it a free vote. I hope we can get through this debate without it going all post-truth, and people can make their points and make the law better, if indeed it does pass.
I have not seen a reason why the bill details could only be published this close in to a critical voting moment. The basic details at least could have been more widely disseminated even if the finalised text was still being worked on. MPs can be expected to put a lot of things through on the nod, but a free vote on a matter this consequential and personal it is asking a lot for them to wrestle all the arguments and factors together so quickly. And many of those points had to wait until now, because the practicalities and safeguards need to be known before discussing them.
And I agree it is a conversation society needs to have - but if the present parliament were not to vote to proceed with the bill that in no way prevents society continuing to have that conversation, so it happens either way. A legislative conversation is not the only means of conversation. Nor does it require that it be another 10 years before the matter were reconsidered.
Every few months, a poster breathlessly comments about NEW AND IMPORTANT INFORMATION about ALIENS or UFOs.
And a couple of other posters (usually the same ones...) chime in about how it's going to be the BIGGEST WORLD-CHANGING NEWS!!!!
And every time, the information that was so important turns out to be a nothingburger.
Rather than being such a smug know it all, you should open your mind and go and read last year’s Schumer-Rounds amendment, written by the office of the Senate Majority Leader (so implicitly endorsed by the Biden White House) and sponsored and passed on a bipartisan basis, with the approval of Senate Gang of 8 leaders.
They are privy to much that we are not and thought it a priority to try and pass what must count as the most bizarre bill in US democratic history. Why? Then watch Schumer’s speech on the floor after Mike Turner and Mike Rogers killed it in House Committee, for confirmation of how high passions ran.
There is more than one answer to the question of wtf is going but it amazes me how unfascinated you are by the question. If the accusation was an equivalently sized criminal conspiracy in govt about any other area of public policy I suspect your interest level would differ.
i refer the honourable gentleman to my previous post.
I am very fascinated by the question of alien life. The concept of life elsewhere is fascinating, and will be world-changing if it is ever found. But that life is more likely to be microbial in the lunar or martian regolith, or deep in the ice of a Jovian moon, than it is to be buzzing the American military or anally probing farmers from Hicksville.
But the fact that people seem to want to believe so badly is also fascinating. Especially when they continually make themselves look like fools when nothing happens or is revealed.
There is a vast amount of science in exobiology and the search for life or intelligent life elsewhere. But this is hype is not about science; it is about belief.
"A report detailing his "horrific" beatings of teenaged boys was presented to some Church leaders in 1982. But the recipients of that report "participated in an active cover-up" to prevent its findings, including that crimes had been committed, coming to light, the Makin review said."
I'd be more surprised if a report found that there hadn't been active cover ups of such things. It's entirely expected in fact. Which may be an unfair characterisation of the organisation, the few major examples colouring our view of the whole, but it will take a long time for that perception to change.
My main (un)surprise was that this was thirty years ago, and my assumption that this behaviour had continued over all those decades.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I'm the opposite, as I am increasingly hopeful it will not pass - I think it seems very rushed procedurally, and this is one of the few cases where warnings about slippery slopes need to be taken very seriously, as you really do not want to get this wrong, or fix the details later, even if some numbers of people will suffer in the intervening period.
If will be years and years before this comes back if this isn't passed. MPs will spend months in committee after this reading.
The first is probable, but not guaranteed, especially if the moral arguments gain significant ground in public and parliamentary opinion and the objections are broadly practical and procedural. And several years is not that long a time when making major changes of such significance anyway. I don't a 'it's now or in 10 years' is a compelling reason to set aside concerns, if people have them.
As for the committee process, certainly bills can be significantly improved upon through that process, and many concerns will be able to be addressed, perhaps a great many. Which makes it less defensible that details have not been available much sooner, since there would have been more time for people to reassure themselves of their views on the principle of the bill, and that other concerns they have can adequately be dealt with through the committee process (or that it is likely to be, based on what they think MPs in general will permit).
With very little time to discuss or consider the details, things that they might have thought could be overcome could actually now hold things up, as they are less sure that the bill can be appropriately amended through the approval process.
And a lot more parliamentary time really should be needed. Private member bills can and have done some major changes, but as noted this is something where a real conversation is needed.
Why shouldn't MPs have that major conversation now? Perhaps they'll agree to move it forward but stop it later if issues are not addressed, but if they had a long conversation and thought it best not to move forward now, there's no need to send it on on the assumption it could be fixed.
If most object on the moral argument there would be no point, if most object on technical grounds ther is a point.
Apparently the Harris campaign paid various celebrities for their endorsements lol. Is that usual ? I mean I know celebs endorse various people but normally it's for free because they believe in that side of the argument (Pretty sure the Democrats have never paid Springsteen for instance and he always endorses them) - just wild that campaign funds were spent on endorsements - $10M for Beyonce apparently !
Wouldn't you expect it the other way round? Person x endorses campaign y and makes a donation to the campaign to help it.
“Ask not what you can do for the cause. Ask what the cause can do for you.”
A strong contrast with Musk who risked his own money and reputation.
Last I heard is that he was worth over 450 billion dollars and given the presumed outcome from backing the right side in the election may become a trillionaire, the risk was not as great to him as is thought.
The Democrats would have exacted retribution if they had won.
Do you mean like jailing a criminal for his crimes? What 'retribution'! The fiends!
Wow, you think they would have put Musk in prison? Perhaps they could have had him extradited to the UK so that Starmer could have him banged up over the riots.
You know to whom he was referring. If you have misremembered, can I help? We have a former and future President who was a draft dodger, an adjudicated rapist, a multiple bankrupt, a convicted felon, stole state secrets and attempted a coup.
Perhaps the best outcome would be for this bill to fail, and the Government to spend a year drafting something sensible. Risk of long-grass-chucking, of course.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I'm the opposite, as I am increasingly hopeful it will not pass - I think it seems very rushed procedurally, and this is one of the few cases where warnings about slippery slopes need to be taken very seriously, as you really do not want to get this wrong, or fix the details later, even if some numbers of people will suffer in the intervening period.
Rushed in what way? It doesn't seem so very different to David Steel's private member's bill which became the Abortion Act 1967. And the Sexual Offences Act 1967 started life as a Ten Minute Rule bill!
Every few months, a poster breathlessly comments about NEW AND IMPORTANT INFORMATION about ALIENS or UFOs.
And a couple of other posters (usually the same ones...) chime in about how it's going to be the BIGGEST WORLD-CHANGING NEWS!!!!
And every time, the information that was so important turns out to be a nothingburger.
Rather than being such a smug know it all, you should open your mind and go and read last year’s Schumer-Rounds amendment, written by the office of the Senate Majority Leader (so implicitly endorsed by the Biden White House) and sponsored and passed on a bipartisan basis, with the approval of Senate Gang of 8 leaders.
They are privy to much that we are not and thought it a priority to try and pass what must count as the most bizarre bill in US democratic history. Why? Then watch Schumer’s speech on the floor after Mike Turner and Mike Rogers killed it in House Committee, for confirmation of how high passions ran.
There is more than one answer to the question of wtf is going but it amazes me how unfascinated you are by the question. If the accusation was an equivalently sized criminal conspiracy in govt about any other area of public policy I suspect your interest level would differ.
i refer the honourable gentleman to my previous post.
I am very fascinated by the question of alien life. The concept of life elsewhere is fascinating, and will be world-changing if it is ever found. But that life is more likely to be microbial in the lunar or martian regolith, or deep in the ice of a Jovian moon, than it is to be buzzing the American military or anally probing farmers from Hicksville.
But the fact that people seem to want to believe so badly is also fascinating. Especially when they continually make themselves look like fools when nothing happens or is revealed.
There is a vast amount of science in exobiology and the search for life or intelligent life elsewhere. But this is hype is not about science; it is about belief.
The current wave of interest hasn't come from a new religious movement, but from the U.S. navy and Pentagin issuing bizarre videos in around 2017 that it publicly declared not being able to understand.
@Leon can we find consensus that above 18 if you want surgery you can for trans issues?
Are you also happy that if people want to be called “she” they can be? What about for kids?
Where do you stand on gender?
I think we all agree there are two sexes.
I think have a third category for trans people where they can be protected. What do you think?
With the counter that any adult facilitating in the mutilation of genitals or healthy breast tissue for reasons of gender confusion on anyone under 18 will be prosecuted and imprisoned.
Have we found consensus?
Yes. Now about speech codes. If someone cuts of their penis they don’t become a woman and they aren’t entitled they access areas that are women only for purposes of safety/privacy/modesty/petsonsl nor into those areas that are women only for the purposes of fairness such as sport.
Much of this should be s matter for governing bodies not the government, however the government need to clarify that these bodies can choose what they want, but don’t make the decision because you have misinterpreted the equality and some activists are trying to pressure you.
Every few months, a poster breathlessly comments about NEW AND IMPORTANT INFORMATION about ALIENS or UFOs.
And a couple of other posters (usually the same ones...) chime in about how it's going to be the BIGGEST WORLD-CHANGING NEWS!!!!
And every time, the information that was so important turns out to be a nothingburger.
Rather than being such a smug know it all, you should open your mind and go and read last year’s Schumer-Rounds amendment, written by the office of the Senate Majority Leader (so implicitly endorsed by the Biden White House) and sponsored and passed on a bipartisan basis, with the approval of Senate Gang of 8 leaders.
They are privy to much that we are not and thought it a priority to try and pass what must count as the most bizarre bill in US democratic history. Why? Then watch Schumer’s speech on the floor after Mike Turner and Mike Rogers killed it in House Committee, for confirmation of how high passions ran.
There is more than one answer to the question of wtf is going but it amazes me how unfascinated you are by the question. If the accusation was an equivalently sized criminal conspiracy in govt about any other area of public policy I suspect your interest level would differ.
i refer the honourable gentleman to my previous post.
I am very fascinated by the question of alien life. The concept of life elsewhere is fascinating, and will be world-changing if it is ever found. But that life is more likely to be microbial in the lunar or martian regolith, or deep in the ice of a Jovian moon, than it is to be buzzing the American military or anally probing farmers from Hicksville.
But the fact that people seem to want to believe so badly is also fascinating. Especially when they continually make themselves look like fools when nothing happens or is revealed.
There is a vast amount of science in exobiology and the search for life or intelligent life elsewhere. But this is hype is not about science; it is about belief.
I agree entirely.
I do rather wonder if the US military has recovered something or other at some point that is alien. Most likely some tiny scrap of a pedestrian nature. After all it is likely that that there are lots of people out there, and it's likely that that's been the case for a long while. Foolish people have wars - wars involve bullets shot - if you do that in space they're going to go someplace. So... if an alien bullet had arrived on earth - not so surprising. My hunch therefore is that the first evidence of ET will be millions of years out of date, and it'll be a bullet.
Every few months, a poster breathlessly comments about NEW AND IMPORTANT INFORMATION about ALIENS or UFOs.
And a couple of other posters (usually the same ones...) chime in about how it's going to be the BIGGEST WORLD-CHANGING NEWS!!!!
And every time, the information that was so important turns out to be a nothingburger.
Rather than being such a smug know it all, you should open your mind and go and read last year’s Schumer-Rounds amendment, written by the office of the Senate Majority Leader (so implicitly endorsed by the Biden White House) and sponsored and passed on a bipartisan basis, with the approval of Senate Gang of 8 leaders.
They are privy to much that we are not and thought it a priority to try and pass what must count as the most bizarre bill in US democratic history. Why? Then watch Schumer’s speech on the floor after Mike Turner and Mike Rogers killed it in House Committee, for confirmation of how high passions ran.
There is more than one answer to the question of wtf is going but it amazes me how unfascinated you are by the question. If the accusation was an equivalently sized criminal conspiracy in govt about any other area of public policy I suspect your interest level would differ.
I think part of the reason is that it has become an article of faith that UAP/UFO issues are for crazies, and that that cultural framing is very hard to overcome, particularly in a very often statistically-focused community like PB.
But recent political developments on UAP's, with the level of senior admissions of uncertainty, don't bear this out; this simply has yet to filter through to most of the media or wider public, though, because the social stigma on it, and worry of mockery, is still strong.
The reflexive mockery on here by some is absurd when you read the crystal clear statements by a broad range of some of the most senior politicians and officials in America over the last five years. Many of whom are now on the record. Maybe they’re making it up? But why? They’re not just saying there are things in the sky, they’re saying on the record that there’s a long standing criminal conspiracy to expropriate govt funds and assets, and to use intimidation and threats of violence to maintain omertà. And no one here is even interested!
If there really is something to tell, I expect there is room for several years more of comfy denial yet. The advocates such as Nell and also the fine print of the UAP Disclosure Act, talk in terms of a controlled process, with public disclosure coming after political and academic disclosure (circa 2030). One of tomorrow’s witnesses (former rear admiral Gallaudet) called it right this week, don’t expect much out of the Executive while geopol risk is so elevated.
Rep. Mike Waltz, Trump's likely NATSEC advisor, in an interview last week:
"Enforce the actual energy sanctions on Russia...I think that will get Putin to the table. We have leverage, like taking the handcuffs off of the long-range weapons we provided Ukraine as well."
We will see.
So far, there's nothing other than a couple of names to suggest what Trump might, or might not do, once in office.
In the meantime, Europe (some of it at least) is starting to do what it ought to have done sooner.
Europe delivered nearly 1,000,000 artillery shells to Ukraine this year, and aims to deliver another half million rounds by January, per the EU's Josep Borrell.
To put that into perspective: Russia has been firing 60,000 to 70,000 artillery shells per day in the past. It's apparently slowed down a great deal recently (lack of shells? lack of tubes?)
But Russia is making 3,000,000 a year, or over 8,000 a day, and they are also getting many from North Korea.
It may have shells. It can't replace the artillery tubes though. Of which it has now lost over 20,000 in Ukraine.
Russia still has an artillery advantage, and Russian artillery is by far the greatest source of Ukrainian casualties, and why the Russians have been able to make incremental advances this year.
At the start of the war there were lots of confident assertions about how the stronger economies of the West were going to crush Russia under a tidal wave of weapons production. That. Hasn't. Happened.
All of these self-deluding reassurances about how the deficit isn't so bad, and greater Ukrainian accuracy makes up the shortfall are really dangerous. They fool ourselves into thinking that the West is doing okay, when it is actually failing Ukraine by not providing enough ammunition.
Those "confident assertions" were based on the then reasonable assumption that the West would actually give Ukraine what it needed. Sadly, as you say, we have utterly failed to do so. We may not be fighting this war but we are certainly losing it.
Every few months, a poster breathlessly comments about NEW AND IMPORTANT INFORMATION about ALIENS or UFOs.
And a couple of other posters (usually the same ones...) chime in about how it's going to be the BIGGEST WORLD-CHANGING NEWS!!!!
And every time, the information that was so important turns out to be a nothingburger.
Rather than being such a smug know it all, you should open your mind and go and read last year’s Schumer-Rounds amendment, written by the office of the Senate Majority Leader (so implicitly endorsed by the Biden White House) and sponsored and passed on a bipartisan basis, with the approval of Senate Gang of 8 leaders.
They are privy to much that we are not and thought it a priority to try and pass what must count as the most bizarre bill in US democratic history. Why? Then watch Schumer’s speech on the floor after Mike Turner and Mike Rogers killed it in House Committee, for confirmation of how high passions ran.
There is more than one answer to the question of wtf is going but it amazes me how unfascinated you are by the question. If the accusation was an equivalently sized criminal conspiracy in govt about any other area of public policy I suspect your interest level would differ.
I think part of the reason is that it has become an article of faith that UAP/UFO issues are for crazies, and that that cultural framing is very hard to overcome, particularly in a very often statistically-focused community like PB.
But recent political developments on UAP's, with the level of senior admissions of uncertainty, don't bear this out; this simply has yet to filter through to most of the media or wider public, though, because the social stigma on it, and worry of mockery, is still strong.
The reflexive mockery on here by some is absurd when you read the crystal clear statements by a broad range of some of the most senior politicians and officials in America over the last five years. Many of whom are now on the record. Maybe they’re making it up? But why? They’re not just saying there are things in the sky, they’re saying on the record that there’s a long standing criminal conspiracy to expropriate govt funds and assets, and to use intimidation and threats of violence to maintain omertà. And no one here is even interested!
If there really is something to tell, I expect there is room for several years more of comfy denial yet. The advocates such as Nell and also the fine print of the UAP Disclosure Act, talk in terms of a controlled process, with public disclosure coming after political and academic disclosure (circa 2030). One of tomorrow’s witnesses (former rear admiral Gallaudet) called it right this week, don’t expect much out of the Executive while geopol risk is so elevated.
The reflexive mockery on here is well deserved.
And I shall continue in that manner until the glorious day when something is definitively revealed.
Every few months, a poster breathlessly comments about NEW AND IMPORTANT INFORMATION about ALIENS or UFOs.
And a couple of other posters (usually the same ones...) chime in about how it's going to be the BIGGEST WORLD-CHANGING NEWS!!!!
And every time, the information that was so important turns out to be a nothingburger.
Rather than being such a smug know it all, you should open your mind and go and read last year’s Schumer-Rounds amendment, written by the office of the Senate Majority Leader (so implicitly endorsed by the Biden White House) and sponsored and passed on a bipartisan basis, with the approval of Senate Gang of 8 leaders.
They are privy to much that we are not and thought it a priority to try and pass what must count as the most bizarre bill in US democratic history. Why? Then watch Schumer’s speech on the floor after Mike Turner and Mike Rogers killed it in House Committee, for confirmation of how high passions ran.
There is more than one answer to the question of wtf is going but it amazes me how unfascinated you are by the question. If the accusation was an equivalently sized criminal conspiracy in govt about any other area of public policy I suspect your interest level would differ.
i refer the honourable gentleman to my previous post.
I am very fascinated by the question of alien life. The concept of life elsewhere is fascinating, and will be world-changing if it is ever found. But that life is more likely to be microbial in the lunar or martian regolith, or deep in the ice of a Jovian moon, than it is to be buzzing the American military or anally probing farmers from Hicksville.
But the fact that people seem to want to believe so badly is also fascinating. Especially when they continually make themselves look like fools when nothing happens or is revealed.
There is a vast amount of science in exobiology and the search for life or intelligent life elsewhere. But this is hype is not about science; it is about belief.
The current wave of interest hasn't come from a new religious movement, but from the U.S. navy and Pentagin issuing bizarre videos in around 2017 that it publicly declared not being able to understand.
Before that I heard very little for a long time.
Then you weren't reading the right forums. Or wrong, depending on your viewpoint.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I'm the opposite, as I am increasingly hopeful it will not pass - I think it seems very rushed procedurally, and this is one of the few cases where warnings about slippery slopes need to be taken very seriously, as you really do not want to get this wrong, or fix the details later, even if some numbers of people will suffer in the intervening period.
Rushed in what way? It doesn't seem so very different to David Steel's private member's bill which became the Abortion Act 1967. And the Sexual Offences Act 1967 started life as a Ten Minute Rule bill!
Major decisions can, have, and will start as private member bills. I don't disavow it as a route for legislation. Without knowing the details and complexities of those acts - as opposed to significance, which is inarguable - I cannot speak as how equivalent they really are to this one, and from what I've read there are plenty, which regardless of method of introduction I think deseve more parliamentary time at the earlier stages to make sure MPs do want to spend future parliamentary time on revising the details.
I would rather hold more of the conversation earlier, than push forward right away on the assumption details can be sorted out later. If MPs don't think they can, now, then it saves a lot of time. If they think it is a worthy bill that, like any bill, has issues, then absolutely they should proceed. But they have little time to debate that point.
Step 2) If yields have gone up since banks last changed their fixed rates, the next change in mortgage price will be an increase. And vice versa.
Step 3) Has there been any other economic event that might make banks more reluctant to lend to consumers? E.g. recession. If so, add to the spread to government bonds.
Probably not worth people concerning themselves with the detail of what drives government bond yields. Lots of things, both in the UK and overseas.
For two year mortgages, repeat with the 2-year gilt.
"A report detailing his "horrific" beatings of teenaged boys was presented to some Church leaders in 1982. But the recipients of that report "participated in an active cover-up" to prevent its findings, including that crimes had been committed, coming to light, the Makin review said."
I'd be more surprised if a report found that there hadn't been active cover ups of such things. It's entirely expected in fact. Which may be an unfair characterisation of the organisation, the few major examples colouring our view of the whole, but it will take a long time for that perception to change.
If the Senior Management Team of an organisation consistently behaves in a certain manner, it is entirely fair to characterise the organisation by that behaviour.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I'm the opposite, as I am increasingly hopeful it will not pass - I think it seems very rushed procedurally, and this is one of the few cases where warnings about slippery slopes need to be taken very seriously, as you really do not want to get this wrong, or fix the details later, even if some numbers of people will suffer in the intervening period.
In what way do you think it is rushed? I think it's a conversation society needs to have and am glad Starmer is making it a free vote. I hope we can get through this debate without it going all post-truth, and people can make their points and make the law better, if indeed it does pass.
I have not seen a reason why the bill details could only be published this close in to a critical voting moment. The basic details at least could have been more widely disseminated even if the finalised text was still being worked on. MPs can be expected to put a lot of things through on the nod, but a free vote on a matter this consequential and personal it is asking a lot for them to wrestle all the arguments and factors together so quickly. And many of those points had to wait until now, because the practicalities and safeguards need to be known before discussing them.
And I agree it is a conversation society needs to have - but if the present parliament were not to vote to proceed with the bill that in no way prevents society continuing to have that conversation, so it happens either way. A legislative conversation is not the only means of conversation. Nor does it require that it be another 10 years before the matter were reconsidered.
It's only a first reading? It's basically just an intro. Plenty of time for it to be amended or rejected. In practice failure to pass at this stage is closing the conversation. Labour have lots of stuff to get on within this parliament. It's been decades we've known the problems with current system...
The overt support for the democrats from the Labour party will likely come to be regarded as a catastrophic misjudgement. It just seems like they didn't factor in the possibility that Trump would win and they would need to deal with the aftermath, even though Trump was always the favourite. Even now they keep on digging themselves in to bigger and bigger problems. The comments by Sadiq Khan are extremely unwise, he is part of the governing party and not the opposition, and London includes people who have a different view to him. It just seems that Labour are not a serious party of government despite Starmers attempts to present otherwise. It is a new world and they will get destroyed.
Every few months, a poster breathlessly comments about NEW AND IMPORTANT INFORMATION about ALIENS or UFOs.
And a couple of other posters (usually the same ones...) chime in about how it's going to be the BIGGEST WORLD-CHANGING NEWS!!!!
And every time, the information that was so important turns out to be a nothingburger.
Rather than being such a smug know it all, you should open your mind and go and read last year’s Schumer-Rounds amendment, written by the office of the Senate Majority Leader (so implicitly endorsed by the Biden White House) and sponsored and passed on a bipartisan basis, with the approval of Senate Gang of 8 leaders.
They are privy to much that we are not and thought it a priority to try and pass what must count as the most bizarre bill in US democratic history. Why? Then watch Schumer’s speech on the floor after Mike Turner and Mike Rogers killed it in House Committee, for confirmation of how high passions ran.
There is more than one answer to the question of wtf is going but it amazes me how unfascinated you are by the question. If the accusation was an equivalently sized criminal conspiracy in govt about any other area of public policy I suspect your interest level would differ.
i refer the honourable gentleman to my previous post.
I am very fascinated by the question of alien life. The concept of life elsewhere is fascinating, and will be world-changing if it is ever found. But that life is more likely to be microbial in the lunar or martian regolith, or deep in the ice of a Jovian moon, than it is to be buzzing the American military or anally probing farmers from Hicksville.
But the fact that people seem to want to believe so badly is also fascinating. Especially when they continually make themselves look like fools when nothing happens or is revealed.
There is a vast amount of science in exobiology and the search for life or intelligent life elsewhere. But this is hype is not about science; it is about belief.
The current wave of interest hasn't come from a new religious movement, but from the U.S. navy and Pentagin issuing bizarre videos in around 2017 that it publicly declared not being able to understand.
Before that I heard very little for a long time.
Then you weren't reading the right forums. Or wrong, depending on your viewpoint.
Every few months, a poster breathlessly comments about NEW AND IMPORTANT INFORMATION about ALIENS or UFOs.
And a couple of other posters (usually the same ones...) chime in about how it's going to be the BIGGEST WORLD-CHANGING NEWS!!!!
And every time, the information that was so important turns out to be a nothingburger.
Rather than being such a smug know it all, you should open your mind and go and read last year’s Schumer-Rounds amendment, written by the office of the Senate Majority Leader (so implicitly endorsed by the Biden White House) and sponsored and passed on a bipartisan basis, with the approval of Senate Gang of 8 leaders.
They are privy to much that we are not and thought it a priority to try and pass what must count as the most bizarre bill in US democratic history. Why? Then watch Schumer’s speech on the floor after Mike Turner and Mike Rogers killed it in House Committee, for confirmation of how high passions ran.
There is more than one answer to the question of wtf is going but it amazes me how unfascinated you are by the question. If the accusation was an equivalently sized criminal conspiracy in govt about any other area of public policy I suspect your interest level would differ.
i refer the honourable gentleman to my previous post.
I am very fascinated by the question of alien life. The concept of life elsewhere is fascinating, and will be world-changing if it is ever found. But that life is more likely to be microbial in the lunar or martian regolith, or deep in the ice of a Jovian moon, than it is to be buzzing the American military or anally probing farmers from Hicksville.
But the fact that people seem to want to believe so badly is also fascinating. Especially when they continually make themselves look like fools when nothing happens or is revealed.
There is a vast amount of science in exobiology and the search for life or intelligent life elsewhere. But this is hype is not about science; it is about belief.
The current wave of interest hasn't come from a new religious movement, but from the U.S. navy and Pentagin issuing bizarre videos in around 2017 that it publicly declared not being able to understand.
Before that I heard very little for a long time.
Then you weren't reading the right forums. Or wrong, depending on your viewpoint.
I would say that, to put it a bit more accurately, U.S. politicians weren't getting public declarations of uncertainty from their own institutions on this until five years ago.
That's the only reason that they're trying to investigate more often, and that public interest is increasing, although starting from a modest base.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I'm the opposite, as I am increasingly hopeful it will not pass - I think it seems very rushed procedurally, and this is one of the few cases where warnings about slippery slopes need to be taken very seriously, as you really do not want to get this wrong, or fix the details later, even if some numbers of people will suffer in the intervening period.
In what way do you think it is rushed? I think it's a conversation society needs to have and am glad Starmer is making it a free vote. I hope we can get through this debate without it going all post-truth, and people can make their points and make the law better, if indeed it does pass.
I have not seen a reason why the bill details could only be published this close in to a critical voting moment. The basic details at least could have been more widely disseminated even if the finalised text was still being worked on. MPs can be expected to put a lot of things through on the nod, but a free vote on a matter this consequential and personal it is asking a lot for them to wrestle all the arguments and factors together so quickly. And many of those points had to wait until now, because the practicalities and safeguards need to be known before discussing them.
And I agree it is a conversation society needs to have - but if the present parliament were not to vote to proceed with the bill that in no way prevents society continuing to have that conversation, so it happens either way. A legislative conversation is not the only means of conversation. Nor does it require that it be another 10 years before the matter were reconsidered.
It's only a first reading? It's basically just an intro. Plenty of time for it to be amended or rejected. In practice failure to pass at this stage is closing the conversation. Labour have lots of stuff to get on within this parliament. It's been decades we've known the problems with current system...
I disagree it is closing the conversation. If there is public and parliamentary support for the principle then it will be revived, and quickly too. The idea it's now or (essentially) never therefore is a mischaracterisation. The societal conversation continues, and if it is in broad support the legislative conversation will not wait as long as people fear.
And I agree it's an intro. But if people don't have enough time to consider even an intro things don't have to automatically proceeed. That's why we have that process in the first place, surely, for MPs to decide if even the barebones of a bill are worth taking forward and spending their time on?
This one might be. But it also might not be.
It's not as though not moving forward is unfair in some way because things can always be fixed later.
And if some MPs are arguing they need more time to consider the issues even at first reading, then that is the future route to take - make sure they get that time, so they cannot claim that as a reason for not proceeding.
@Leon can we find consensus that above 18 if you want surgery you can for trans issues?
Are you also happy that if people want to be called “she” they can be? What about for kids?
Where do you stand on gender?
I think we all agree there are two sexes.
I think have a third category for trans people where they can be protected. What do you think?
With the counter that any adult facilitating in the mutilation of genitals or healthy breast tissue for reasons of gender confusion on anyone under 18 will be prosecuted and imprisoned.
Have we found consensus?
Yes. Now about speech codes. If someone cuts of their penis they don’t become a woman and they aren’t entitled they access areas that are women only for purposes of safety/privacy/modesty/petsonsl nor into those areas that are women only for the purposes of fairness such as sport.
Much of this should be s matter for governing bodies not the government, however the government need to clarify that these bodies can choose what they want, but don’t make the decision because you have misinterpreted the equality and some activists are trying to pressure you.
What a load of bollocks. Literally.
As an experiment I think it would be very fun to make you visibly trans and throw you in the men's bogs and see how you get on.
The overt support for the democrats from the Labour party will likely come to be regarded as a catastrophic misjudgement. It just seems like they didn't factor in the possibility that Trump would win and they would need to deal with the aftermath, even though Trump was always the favourite. Even now they keep on digging themselves in to bigger and bigger problems. The comments by Sadiq Khan are extremely unwise, he is part of the governing party and not the opposition, and London includes people who have a different view to him. It just seems that Labour are not a serious party of government despite Starmers attempts to present otherwise. It is a new world and they will get destroyed.
One of the benefits of being mayor even of a city as significant as London is that you can mouth off a lot more flexibly than people in the legislature.
Issues in the US election: Few Democrats had anything to say about the problem of synthetic opioids. That's understandable, because so many Democrats in big cities are of the "tune in, turn on" persuasion.
But synthetic opioids are our biggest public health problem, and the main reason US life expectancy began to decline in the last year or two of the Obama administration.
Opioids are a much bigger problem in the USA than other western countries. I wonder why that is.
The American Pain Foundation: which was a "not for profit" entirely funded by US pharmaceutical companies that produced research and pressured doctors to prescribe more opiates.
There are - I'm sure - "charities" that are net negatives to the sum of human happiness. But I doubt many come close to the American Pain Foundation for evil inflicted on the world.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I'm the opposite, as I am increasingly hopeful it will not pass - I think it seems very rushed procedurally, and this is one of the few cases where warnings about slippery slopes need to be taken very seriously, as you really do not want to get this wrong, or fix the details later, even if some numbers of people will suffer in the intervening period.
Rushed in what way? It doesn't seem so very different to David Steel's private member's bill which became the Abortion Act 1967. And the Sexual Offences Act 1967 started life as a Ten Minute Rule bill!
Major decisions can, have, and will start as private member bills. I don't disavow it as a route for legislation. Without knowing the details and complexities of those acts - as opposed to significance, which is inarguable - I cannot speak as how equivalent they really are to this one, and from what I've read there are plenty, which regardless of method of introduction I think deseve more parliamentary time at the earlier stages to make sure MPs do want to spend future parliamentary time on revising the details.
I would rather hold more of the conversation earlier, than push forward right away on the assumption details can be sorted out later. If MPs don't think they can, now, then it saves a lot of time. If they think it is a worthy bill that, like any bill, has issues, then absolutely they should proceed. But they have little time to debate that point.
The alternative might be to hold an Inquiry of some description beforehand, with the legislation then being introduced to endorse whatever recommendations it eventually makes.
That route doesn't have a particularly happy history in the UK - eg. most of the 1957 Wolfenden Report's recommendations were endorsed by a number of separate bills in 1958-1960, but not all of them passed (notably the decriminalisation of male homosexuality), with the net result being arguably more repressive than it had been before.
The Citizen's Assemblies used by Ireland might suggest a model which we could follow, but their constitutional model is quite different. We emphasise parliamentary sovereignty (with the Commons being pre-eminent within that) to a much greater degree, and I suspect that Brexit has diminished the appetite for those who may have been tempted to change that.
Apparently the Harris campaign paid various celebrities for their endorsements lol. Is that usual ? I mean I know celebs endorse various people but normally it's for free because they believe in that side of the argument (Pretty sure the Democrats have never paid Springsteen for instance and he always endorses them) - just wild that campaign funds were spent on endorsements - $10M for Beyonce apparently !
Wouldn't you expect it the other way round? Person x endorses campaign y and makes a donation to the campaign to help it.
“Ask not what you can do for the cause. Ask what the cause can do for you.”
A strong contrast with Musk who risked his own money and reputation.
Last I heard is that he was worth over 450 billion dollars and given the presumed outcome from backing the right side in the election may become a trillionaire, the risk was not as great to him as is thought.
The Democrats would have exacted retribution if they had won.
Do you mean like jailing a criminal for his crimes? What 'retribution'! The fiends!
Wow, you think they would have put Musk in prison? Perhaps they could have had him extradited to the UK so that Starmer could have him banged up over the riots.
You know to whom he was referring. If you have misremembered, can I help? We have a former and future President who was a draft dodger, an adjudicated rapist, a multiple bankrupt, a convicted felon, stole state secrets and attempted a coup.
Give your head a wobble.
And even though all of that was rattled off against him thousands if not millions of times during the campaign, he still won.
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Every few months, a poster breathlessly comments about NEW AND IMPORTANT INFORMATION about ALIENS or UFOs.
And a couple of other posters (usually the same ones...) chime in about how it's going to be the BIGGEST WORLD-CHANGING NEWS!!!!
And every time, the information that was so important turns out to be a nothingburger.
Rather than being such a smug know it all, you should open your mind and go and read last year’s Schumer-Rounds amendment, written by the office of the Senate Majority Leader (so implicitly endorsed by the Biden White House) and sponsored and passed on a bipartisan basis, with the approval of Senate Gang of 8 leaders.
They are privy to much that we are not and thought it a priority to try and pass what must count as the most bizarre bill in US democratic history. Why? Then watch Schumer’s speech on the floor after Mike Turner and Mike Rogers killed it in House Committee, for confirmation of how high passions ran.
There is more than one answer to the question of wtf is going but it amazes me how unfascinated you are by the question. If the accusation was an equivalently sized criminal conspiracy in govt about any other area of public policy I suspect your interest level would differ.
i refer the honourable gentleman to my previous post.
I am very fascinated by the question of alien life. The concept of life elsewhere is fascinating, and will be world-changing if it is ever found. But that life is more likely to be microbial in the lunar or martian regolith, or deep in the ice of a Jovian moon, than it is to be buzzing the American military or anally probing farmers from Hicksville.
But the fact that people seem to want to believe so badly is also fascinating. Especially when they continually make themselves look like fools when nothing happens or is revealed.
There is a vast amount of science in exobiology and the search for life or intelligent life elsewhere. But this is hype is not about science; it is about belief.
Forget all that. You are someone who claims to care a great deal about national security. But you have absolutely nothing to say about the pentagon formally confirming that they are often not in control of some of the most sensitive areas of controlled airspace.
Ask yourself honestly why it is that you haven’t properly engaged with that admission? On the record they have said there are multiple cases that are not recording artefacts and that are not US tech, and that display superior capability. Doesnt that worry you? As Rubio so eloquently put it several years ago now, we’d better hope they’re not Russian or Chinese.
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Might have been Asimov - certainly in the later Foundation books it was stated to be very rare for a planet the size of earth to have a single moon of such a proportion as ours.
(Whether it is all that rare I have no idea, it has only been recently we've been able to detect exoplanets and exomoons would be even harder)
Apparently the Harris campaign paid various celebrities for their endorsements lol. Is that usual ? I mean I know celebs endorse various people but normally it's for free because they believe in that side of the argument (Pretty sure the Democrats have never paid Springsteen for instance and he always endorses them) - just wild that campaign funds were spent on endorsements - $10M for Beyonce apparently !
Wouldn't you expect it the other way round? Person x endorses campaign y and makes a donation to the campaign to help it.
“Ask not what you can do for the cause. Ask what the cause can do for you.”
A strong contrast with Musk who risked his own money and reputation.
Last I heard is that he was worth over 450 billion dollars and given the presumed outcome from backing the right side in the election may become a trillionaire, the risk was not as great to him as is thought.
The Democrats would have exacted retribution if they had won.
Do you mean like jailing a criminal for his crimes? What 'retribution'! The fiends!
Wow, you think they would have put Musk in prison? Perhaps they could have had him extradited to the UK so that Starmer could have him banged up over the riots.
You know to whom he was referring. If you have misremembered, can I help? We have a former and future President who was a draft dodger, an adjudicated rapist, a multiple bankrupt, a convicted felon, stole state secrets and attempted a coup.
Give your head a wobble.
And even though all of that was rattled off against him thousands if not millions of times during the campaign, he still won.
That doesn't make him any less guilty. The man is a moral vacuum, perhaps that is why is so adept at selling snake oil.
The overt support for the democrats from the Labour party will likely come to be regarded as a catastrophic misjudgement. It just seems like they didn't factor in the possibility that Trump would win and they would need to deal with the aftermath, even though Trump was always the favourite. Even now they keep on digging themselves in to bigger and bigger problems. The comments by Sadiq Khan are extremely unwise, he is part of the governing party and not the opposition, and London includes people who have a different view to him. It just seems that Labour are not a serious party of government despite Starmers attempts to present otherwise. It is a new world and they will get destroyed.
I hate this govt as much as the next man. But I do remember similar noises from the prior Mayor of London and his westminster colleagues prior to 2016. Trump is a man that seems to understand there’s what you say and there’s what you do. His ego is.no doubt enjoying the diplomatic toadying to make up for the sins, rather than readying himself to be vindictive.
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Amusing no doubt, but I'd not spend my intergalactic dollars to see that. In space after all, you can positions yourself easily at a spot whereby anything roundish eclipses the most mighty of stars. So that it happens on a planet's surface - does it matter?
"A report detailing his "horrific" beatings of teenaged boys was presented to some Church leaders in 1982. But the recipients of that report "participated in an active cover-up" to prevent its findings, including that crimes had been committed, coming to light, the Makin review said."
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Amusing no doubt, but I'd not spend my intergalactic dollars to see that. In space after all, you can positions yourself easily at a spot whereby anything roundish eclipses the most mighty of stars. So that it happens on a planet's surface - does it matter?
Depends how well the intragalatic travel agency sold the idea, like people selling 'authentic' experiences which basically mean something boring or rougher than needed.
The next Archbishop of Canterbury not being a woman.
Woman: I donate £150 to a charity of your choice. Man: You donate £100 to Wheels for Wellbeing.
Caveat: bet cancelled if the makeup of the Crown Nominations Commission is changed, or the Position (ie job role) of ABC changed.
(Bit of Context: 6 out of the 16 Lords Spiritual are now women.)
Any takers?
No bet... How about one on 'The next appointed ABC is not currently (as at 12-Nov-24) a serving Diocesan Bishop in the Church of England?'
(History would say that's where they come from - I'm suggesting otherwise for clarity)
The only archbishop who wasn't a Diocesan Bishop was Welby and that was obvious on his appointment to +Durham...
Rowan Williams was Archbishop of Wales, not a CoE bishop
Given that the ArchBish is head of the world-wide Anglican communion, would an overseas appointment be a possibility?
Potentially. Theoretically they only need to be an Anglican - so an overseas appointment from somewhere else in the Anglican Communion is possible (and enable Archbishop Rowan to get the job from the Church in Wales). However, (at the moment) as Archbish they are automatically a Privy Counsellor (the highest one in seniority I believe) and so I believe that they technically need to be a citizen of a 'Dominion State' (ie where the King is Head of State) in order to swear loyalty to the Crown. This brings Canada, Australia, New Zealand into play.
Since no one's biting, my thought is that the need to be acceptable to the wider Communion is in my Judgement a reason why the next ABC is unlikely to be a woman this time.
That's why I considered odds against to be a decent judgement.
Indeed... and why I for one am not biting.
For reference - the people that will be choosing consist of the following:
1 Chair (usually a long-standing parliamentarian with strong church links. I would imagine someone like Dame Caroline Spelman) 2 Bishops (usually Archbishop of York and someone from Canterbury province - I would imagine it will be York and the Bishop of either London or Winchester unless any of them think that might get the job and thus stand down) 6 'Central' Members - these are the people that have been involved in selecting other Diocesan bishops recently. Likely to be 4 'conservative' and 2 'liberal' - but it's not that straightforward 5 'Anglican Communion' Members - representing the rest of the Anglican Communion, they are new (previously there was 1, rather than the 5 we have now) 3 Canterbury Diocese members - selected by the local Diocese of Canterbury (for whom the Archbishop is also the local bishop)
That gets you to 17 people. You need an active positive vote from two-thirds (ie 12 people) - which means that 6 people acting in concert can block.
Given the rule about blocking - you would think that the likely successor to be someone who might not engender lots of positivity - but about whom there is little that can be said against them... (You can see this in the recent appointments - those bishops recently appointed as new Diocesans tend to be those that have kept their heads down somewhat, rather than those that have been more outspoken and forthright).
For this reason - I am unconvinced that it will be any of those that are currently listed as likely candidates (Gulli Francis-Dehqani, Bp of Chelmsford; Mark Tanner, Bp of Chester; Martyn Snow, Bp of Leicester; Graham Usher, Bp of Norwich, Paul Williams, Bp of Southall and Nottingham) - but equally I think that they will be wary of someone untested in a Diocesan role - so the possibility of an overseas appointment seems interesting if there is anyone that fits the bill and can be persuaded that it is the right calling)
Give it to Andrew Watson - Bishop of a Guildford as he was a victim of John Smyrh as a boy so would be a fantastic triumph over Smyth and his evil.
The Bishop of Guildford, Andrew Watson is a victim of Smyth; he has been a bishop since 2008. So a question, which I hope can be fully answered, arises as to when he, as an adult in a responsible position, blew the whistle on what he knew. (And assuming he did, why did the ABoC know nothing until 2013?).
Smyth did not die until 2018, so it was not merely a historic matter.
This matter leaves some questions, and lots more than this one.
That’s unfair. A victim does not have the obligation to report that others do: they have a personal interest at stake
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Amusing no doubt, but I'd not spend my intergalactic dollars to see that. In space after all, you can positions yourself easily at a spot whereby anything roundish eclipses the most mighty of stars. So that it happens on a planet's surface - does it matter?
Depends how well the intragalatic travel agency sold the idea, like people selling 'authentic' experiences which basically mean something boring or rougher than needed.
Well that'll teach you! I'm sure she was at heart a lovely girl.
Every few months, a poster breathlessly comments about NEW AND IMPORTANT INFORMATION about ALIENS or UFOs.
And a couple of other posters (usually the same ones...) chime in about how it's going to be the BIGGEST WORLD-CHANGING NEWS!!!!
And every time, the information that was so important turns out to be a nothingburger.
Rather than being such a smug know it all, you should open your mind and go and read last year’s Schumer-Rounds amendment, written by the office of the Senate Majority Leader (so implicitly endorsed by the Biden White House) and sponsored and passed on a bipartisan basis, with the approval of Senate Gang of 8 leaders.
They are privy to much that we are not and thought it a priority to try and pass what must count as the most bizarre bill in US democratic history. Why? Then watch Schumer’s speech on the floor after Mike Turner and Mike Rogers killed it in House Committee, for confirmation of how high passions ran.
There is more than one answer to the question of wtf is going but it amazes me how unfascinated you are by the question. If the accusation was an equivalently sized criminal conspiracy in govt about any other area of public policy I suspect your interest level would differ.
i refer the honourable gentleman to my previous post.
I am very fascinated by the question of alien life. The concept of life elsewhere is fascinating, and will be world-changing if it is ever found. But that life is more likely to be microbial in the lunar or martian regolith, or deep in the ice of a Jovian moon, than it is to be buzzing the American military or anally probing farmers from Hicksville.
But the fact that people seem to want to believe so badly is also fascinating. Especially when they continually make themselves look like fools when nothing happens or is revealed.
There is a vast amount of science in exobiology and the search for life or intelligent life elsewhere. But this is hype is not about science; it is about belief.
Forget all that. You are someone who claims to care a great deal about national security. But you have absolutely nothing to say about the pentagon formally confirming that they are often not in control of some of the most sensitive areas of controlled airspace.
Ask yourself honestly why it is that you haven’t properly engaged with that admission? On the record they have said there are multiple cases that are not recording artefacts and that are not US tech, and that display superior capability. Doesnt that worry you? As Rubio so eloquently put it several years ago now, we’d better hope they’re not Russian or Chinese.
I do claim that I care a great deal about national security.
Because I do.
But I don't see these as being the slam-dunk admissions you seem to think they are.
Extraordinary claims ("intelligent alien life is here and buzzing us!") requires extraordinary evidence. The 'evidence' we currently have is laughable, though in many ways intriguing.
The next Archbishop of Canterbury not being a woman.
Woman: I donate £150 to a charity of your choice. Man: You donate £100 to Wheels for Wellbeing.
Caveat: bet cancelled if the makeup of the Crown Nominations Commission is changed, or the Position (ie job role) of ABC changed.
(Bit of Context: 6 out of the 16 Lords Spiritual are now women.)
Any takers?
No bet... How about one on 'The next appointed ABC is not currently (as at 12-Nov-24) a serving Diocesan Bishop in the Church of England?'
(History would say that's where they come from - I'm suggesting otherwise for clarity)
The only archbishop who wasn't a Diocesan Bishop was Welby and that was obvious on his appointment to +Durham...
Rowan Williams was Archbishop of Wales, not a CoE bishop
Given that the ArchBish is head of the world-wide Anglican communion, would an overseas appointment be a possibility?
Potentially. Theoretically they only need to be an Anglican - so an overseas appointment from somewhere else in the Anglican Communion is possible (and enable Archbishop Rowan to get the job from the Church in Wales). However, (at the moment) as Archbish they are automatically a Privy Counsellor (the highest one in seniority I believe) and so I believe that they technically need to be a citizen of a 'Dominion State' (ie where the King is Head of State) in order to swear loyalty to the Crown. This brings Canada, Australia, New Zealand into play.
Since no one's biting, my thought is that the need to be acceptable to the wider Communion is in my Judgement a reason why the next ABC is unlikely to be a woman this time.
That's why I considered odds against to be a decent judgement.
Indeed... and why I for one am not biting.
For reference - the people that will be choosing consist of the following:
1 Chair (usually a long-standing parliamentarian with strong church links. I would imagine someone like Dame Caroline Spelman) 2 Bishops (usually Archbishop of York and someone from Canterbury province - I would imagine it will be York and the Bishop of either London or Winchester unless any of them think that might get the job and thus stand down) 6 'Central' Members - these are the people that have been involved in selecting other Diocesan bishops recently. Likely to be 4 'conservative' and 2 'liberal' - but it's not that straightforward 5 'Anglican Communion' Members - representing the rest of the Anglican Communion, they are new (previously there was 1, rather than the 5 we have now) 3 Canterbury Diocese members - selected by the local Diocese of Canterbury (for whom the Archbishop is also the local bishop)
That gets you to 17 people. You need an active positive vote from two-thirds (ie 12 people) - which means that 6 people acting in concert can block.
Given the rule about blocking - you would think that the likely successor to be someone who might not engender lots of positivity - but about whom there is little that can be said against them... (You can see this in the recent appointments - those bishops recently appointed as new Diocesans tend to be those that have kept their heads down somewhat, rather than those that have been more outspoken and forthright).
For this reason - I am unconvinced that it will be any of those that are currently listed as likely candidates (Gulli Francis-Dehqani, Bp of Chelmsford; Mark Tanner, Bp of Chester; Martyn Snow, Bp of Leicester; Graham Usher, Bp of Norwich, Paul Williams, Bp of Southall and Nottingham) - but equally I think that they will be wary of someone untested in a Diocesan role - so the possibility of an overseas appointment seems interesting if there is anyone that fits the bill and can be persuaded that it is the right calling)
Give it to Andrew Watson - Bishop of a Guildford as he was a victim of John Smyrh as a boy so would be a fantastic triumph over Smyth and his evil.
Probably a bit too old- he's 63 now, and the convention has been to do about a ten year stint with a retirement age of 70.
There are 42 dioceses- 41 if you discount Canterbury, 42 if you count the Bishop of Dover as effectively a diocesan. At the moment, six are vacant. It's probably not that long a longlist.
DYOR, but if I enter the fray betting wise I would look carefully at Usher; and Hartley as a longer priced outsider who distinguished herself by going out on her own yesterday. (Re women candidates, no-one thought a female Bishop of London was thinkable, but they were all wrong).
If I could choose the winner: Sam Wells of St Martin in the Fields stands out a mile.
WIll we see a return to Biblical absolutism with Usher? 4004BC. A Tuesday in May. Just after lunch.
Apparently the Harris campaign paid various celebrities for their endorsements lol. Is that usual ? I mean I know celebs endorse various people but normally it's for free because they believe in that side of the argument (Pretty sure the Democrats have never paid Springsteen for instance and he always endorses them) - just wild that campaign funds were spent on endorsements - $10M for Beyonce apparently !
Wouldn't you expect it the other way round? Person x endorses campaign y and makes a donation to the campaign to help it.
“Ask not what you can do for the cause. Ask what the cause can do for you.”
A strong contrast with Musk who risked his own money and reputation.
Last I heard is that he was worth over 450 billion dollars and given the presumed outcome from backing the right side in the election may become a trillionaire, the risk was not as great to him as is thought.
The Democrats would have exacted retribution if they had won.
Nonsense. Trump wins -> govt contracts, favourable white House. Trump loses -> Dems respect rule of law, Musk is fine.
The Dems don't respect the rule of law. See "sanctuary cities" for details.
There is nothing illegal about Sanctuary cities. The legal position is that it is up to Feral law enforcement to enact Federal law and there is no rquirement for State or local law enforcement to assist. In addition there is nothing illegal about having policies that help migrants within a city or State. Indeed this is why the only policy Trump was able to pursue against Sanctuary cities was cutting them off from Federal aid - an action that was itself declared illegal by a Federal judge. Ironic given your argument.
The next Archbishop of Canterbury not being a woman.
Woman: I donate £150 to a charity of your choice. Man: You donate £100 to Wheels for Wellbeing.
Caveat: bet cancelled if the makeup of the Crown Nominations Commission is changed, or the Position (ie job role) of ABC changed.
(Bit of Context: 6 out of the 16 Lords Spiritual are now women.)
Any takers?
No bet... How about one on 'The next appointed ABC is not currently (as at 12-Nov-24) a serving Diocesan Bishop in the Church of England?'
(History would say that's where they come from - I'm suggesting otherwise for clarity)
The only archbishop who wasn't a Diocesan Bishop was Welby and that was obvious on his appointment to +Durham...
Rowan Williams was Archbishop of Wales, not a CoE bishop
Given that the ArchBish is head of the world-wide Anglican communion, would an overseas appointment be a possibility?
Potentially. Theoretically they only need to be an Anglican - so an overseas appointment from somewhere else in the Anglican Communion is possible (and enable Archbishop Rowan to get the job from the Church in Wales). However, (at the moment) as Archbish they are automatically a Privy Counsellor (the highest one in seniority I believe) and so I believe that they technically need to be a citizen of a 'Dominion State' (ie where the King is Head of State) in order to swear loyalty to the Crown. This brings Canada, Australia, New Zealand into play.
Since no one's biting, my thought is that the need to be acceptable to the wider Communion is in my Judgement a reason why the next ABC is unlikely to be a woman this time.
That's why I considered odds against to be a decent judgement.
Indeed... and why I for one am not biting.
For reference - the people that will be choosing consist of the following:
1 Chair (usually a long-standing parliamentarian with strong church links. I would imagine someone like Dame Caroline Spelman) 2 Bishops (usually Archbishop of York and someone from Canterbury province - I would imagine it will be York and the Bishop of either London or Winchester unless any of them think that might get the job and thus stand down) 6 'Central' Members - these are the people that have been involved in selecting other Diocesan bishops recently. Likely to be 4 'conservative' and 2 'liberal' - but it's not that straightforward 5 'Anglican Communion' Members - representing the rest of the Anglican Communion, they are new (previously there was 1, rather than the 5 we have now) 3 Canterbury Diocese members - selected by the local Diocese of Canterbury (for whom the Archbishop is also the local bishop)
That gets you to 17 people. You need an active positive vote from two-thirds (ie 12 people) - which means that 6 people acting in concert can block.
Given the rule about blocking - you would think that the likely successor to be someone who might not engender lots of positivity - but about whom there is little that can be said against them... (You can see this in the recent appointments - those bishops recently appointed as new Diocesans tend to be those that have kept their heads down somewhat, rather than those that have been more outspoken and forthright).
For this reason - I am unconvinced that it will be any of those that are currently listed as likely candidates (Gulli Francis-Dehqani, Bp of Chelmsford; Mark Tanner, Bp of Chester; Martyn Snow, Bp of Leicester; Graham Usher, Bp of Norwich, Paul Williams, Bp of Southall and Nottingham) - but equally I think that they will be wary of someone untested in a Diocesan role - so the possibility of an overseas appointment seems interesting if there is anyone that fits the bill and can be persuaded that it is the right calling)
Give it to Andrew Watson - Bishop of a Guildford as he was a victim of John Smyrh as a boy so would be a fantastic triumph over Smyth and his evil.
Probably a bit too old- he's 63 now, and the convention has been to do about a ten year stint with a retirement age of 70.
There are 42 dioceses- 41 if you discount Canterbury, 42 if you count the Bishop of Dover as effectively a diocesan. At the moment, six are vacant. It's probably not that long a longlist.
DYOR, but if I enter the fray betting wise I would look carefully at Usher; and Hartley as a longer priced outsider who distinguished herself by going out on her own yesterday. (Re women candidates, no-one thought a female Bishop of London was thinkable, but they were all wrong).
If I could choose the winner: Sam Wells of St Martin in the Fields stands out a mile.
WIll we see a return to Biblical absolutism with Usher? 4004BC. A Tuesday in May. Just after lunch.
Perhaps the best outcome would be for this bill to fail, and the Government to spend a year drafting something sensible. Risk of long-grass-chucking, of course.
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Might have been Asimov - certainly in the later Foundation books it was stated to be very rare for a planet the size of earth to have a single moon of such a proportion as ours.
(Whether it is all that rare I have no idea, it has only been recently we've been able to detect exoplanets and exomoons would be even harder)
My personal solution to the fermi paradox is that even with a "Goldilocks" planet, significant tides are really rare. You need a huge moon and the principal planet not to become one-face to the moon. In the solar system only Hyperion is not one-face as a moon. Tides are a wonderful way to speed evolution.
The next Archbishop of Canterbury not being a woman.
Woman: I donate £150 to a charity of your choice. Man: You donate £100 to Wheels for Wellbeing.
Caveat: bet cancelled if the makeup of the Crown Nominations Commission is changed, or the Position (ie job role) of ABC changed.
(Bit of Context: 6 out of the 16 Lords Spiritual are now women.)
Any takers?
No bet... How about one on 'The next appointed ABC is not currently (as at 12-Nov-24) a serving Diocesan Bishop in the Church of England?'
(History would say that's where they come from - I'm suggesting otherwise for clarity)
The only archbishop who wasn't a Diocesan Bishop was Welby and that was obvious on his appointment to +Durham...
Rowan Williams was Archbishop of Wales, not a CoE bishop
Given that the ArchBish is head of the world-wide Anglican communion, would an overseas appointment be a possibility?
Potentially. Theoretically they only need to be an Anglican - so an overseas appointment from somewhere else in the Anglican Communion is possible (and enable Archbishop Rowan to get the job from the Church in Wales). However, (at the moment) as Archbish they are automatically a Privy Counsellor (the highest one in seniority I believe) and so I believe that they technically need to be a citizen of a 'Dominion State' (ie where the King is Head of State) in order to swear loyalty to the Crown. This brings Canada, Australia, New Zealand into play.
Since no one's biting, my thought is that the need to be acceptable to the wider Communion is in my Judgement a reason why the next ABC is unlikely to be a woman this time.
That's why I considered odds against to be a decent judgement.
Indeed... and why I for one am not biting.
For reference - the people that will be choosing consist of the following:
1 Chair (usually a long-standing parliamentarian with strong church links. I would imagine someone like Dame Caroline Spelman) 2 Bishops (usually Archbishop of York and someone from Canterbury province - I would imagine it will be York and the Bishop of either London or Winchester unless any of them think that might get the job and thus stand down) 6 'Central' Members - these are the people that have been involved in selecting other Diocesan bishops recently. Likely to be 4 'conservative' and 2 'liberal' - but it's not that straightforward 5 'Anglican Communion' Members - representing the rest of the Anglican Communion, they are new (previously there was 1, rather than the 5 we have now) 3 Canterbury Diocese members - selected by the local Diocese of Canterbury (for whom the Archbishop is also the local bishop)
That gets you to 17 people. You need an active positive vote from two-thirds (ie 12 people) - which means that 6 people acting in concert can block.
Given the rule about blocking - you would think that the likely successor to be someone who might not engender lots of positivity - but about whom there is little that can be said against them... (You can see this in the recent appointments - those bishops recently appointed as new Diocesans tend to be those that have kept their heads down somewhat, rather than those that have been more outspoken and forthright).
For this reason - I am unconvinced that it will be any of those that are currently listed as likely candidates (Gulli Francis-Dehqani, Bp of Chelmsford; Mark Tanner, Bp of Chester; Martyn Snow, Bp of Leicester; Graham Usher, Bp of Norwich, Paul Williams, Bp of Southall and Nottingham) - but equally I think that they will be wary of someone untested in a Diocesan role - so the possibility of an overseas appointment seems interesting if there is anyone that fits the bill and can be persuaded that it is the right calling)
Give it to Andrew Watson - Bishop of a Guildford as he was a victim of John Smyrh as a boy so would be a fantastic triumph over Smyth and his evil.
The Bishop of Guildford, Andrew Watson is a victim of Smyth; he has been a bishop since 2008. So a question, which I hope can be fully answered, arises as to when he, as an adult in a responsible position, blew the whistle on what he knew. (And assuming he did, why did the ABoC know nothing until 2013?).
Smyth did not die until 2018, so it was not merely a historic matter.
This matter leaves some questions, and lots more than this one.
That’s unfair. A victim does not have the obligation to report that others do: they have a personal interest at stake
When did Teresa May give the instruction to the police to take all reports of abuse seriously? That was in response to the allegations against senior politicians that turned out to be bollocks - but as a side effect caused Rotherham etc to come out.
Well quite. But are there any non-twat bishops? There may be but I'm not aware of any. I think the chances of getting some brilliant and sparkling individuals into this particular role are limited.
The Bishop of Norwich and the Bishop of Chelmsford are both intelligent and capable and would do a good job as Archbishop of Canterbury.
The Bishop of Newcastle would be the radical choice but as Heseltine found the person who starts the process to remove the leader rarely wears the Crown
A bishop has said she experienced "coercive language" from two of the most senior figures in the Church of England.
Bishop of Newcastle Helen-Ann Hartley has published a letter she received from the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby and the Archbishop of York Stephen Cottrell which she said indicated "a complete lack of awareness of how power dynamics operate in the life of the church".
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Might have been Asimov - certainly in the later Foundation books it was stated to be very rare for a planet the size of earth to have a single moon of such a proportion as ours.
(Whether it is all that rare I have no idea, it has only been recently we've been able to detect exoplanets and exomoons would be even harder)
My personal solution to the fermi paradox is that even with a "Goldilocks" planet, significant tides are really rare. You need a huge moon and the principal planet not to become one-face to the moon. In the solar system only Hyperion is not one-face as a moon. Tides are a wonderful way to speed evolution.
I quite like this point. However Scotland has big tides.
"A report detailing his "horrific" beatings of teenaged boys was presented to some Church leaders in 1982. But the recipients of that report "participated in an active cover-up" to prevent its findings, including that crimes had been committed, coming to light, the Makin review said."
Jonathan Ashworth has told senior Labour Party figures he has yet to make up his mind about whether he will apply for the open position of Archbishop of Canterbury.
He is asking for details regarding pay and benefits as well as assurances that he wouldn't be up against any of these anti genocide types
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Might have been Asimov - certainly in the later Foundation books it was stated to be very rare for a planet the size of earth to have a single moon of such a proportion as ours.
(Whether it is all that rare I have no idea, it has only been recently we've been able to detect exoplanets and exomoons would be even harder)
My personal solution to the fermi paradox is that even with a "Goldilocks" planet, significant tides are really rare. You need a huge moon and the principal planet not to become one-face to the moon. In the solar system only Hyperion is not one-face as a moon. Tides are a wonderful way to speed evolution.
You also need just the right amount of liquid on the surface - enough to slosh around but not a global ocean.
Perhaps the best outcome would be for this bill to fail, and the Government to spend a year drafting something sensible. Risk of long-grass-chucking, of course.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I'm the opposite, as I am increasingly hopeful it will not pass - I think it seems very rushed procedurally, and this is one of the few cases where warnings about slippery slopes need to be taken very seriously, as you really do not want to get this wrong, or fix the details later, even if some numbers of people will suffer in the intervening period.
In what way do you think it is rushed? I think it's a conversation society needs to have and am glad Starmer is making it a free vote. I hope we can get through this debate without it going all post-truth, and people can make their points and make the law better, if indeed it does pass.
I have not seen a reason why the bill details could only be published this close in to a critical voting moment. The basic details at least could have been more widely disseminated even if the finalised text was still being worked on. MPs can be expected to put a lot of things through on the nod, but a free vote on a matter this consequential and personal it is asking a lot for them to wrestle all the arguments and factors together so quickly. And many of those points had to wait until now, because the practicalities and safeguards need to be known before discussing them.
And I agree it is a conversation society needs to have - but if the present parliament were not to vote to proceed with the bill that in no way prevents society continuing to have that conversation, so it happens either way. A legislative conversation is not the only means of conversation. Nor does it require that it be another 10 years before the matter were reconsidered.
It's only a first reading? It's basically just an intro. Plenty of time for it to be amended or rejected. In practice failure to pass at this stage is closing the conversation. Labour have lots of stuff to get on within this parliament. It's been decades we've known the problems with current system...
I am a supporter of the principle of assisted dying. The problem with the bill (SFAICS) is that it leaves out cases of critical difficulty - the very ones the SC has sympathised with but said it is a matter for parliament.
The bill covers those expected to have 6 months or less to live. It seems not to cover the far worse (thankfully rare I think) cases which are the recurring nightmare: where life is utterly intolerable and unsupportable from objective and subjective standpoints, but the condition may be extended for decades. Some cases are such that they cannot self administer substances anyway.
As the bill does not allow for the most extreme cases of all, I think it needs improving.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I would certainly vote against. Any controls would inevitably get watered down over the years and I think coercion is too big a risk the way our society works. You often hear the argument that the death penalty for murderers is unacceptable due to the risk of falsely executing just one innocent person. Ironically enough it’s often the same groups that argue that who make the case for voluntary euthanasia. But let’s see what our democracy decides.
Will be interesting to see what 650MPs decide, no doubt with considerable input from constituents. A shame we can’t make everything a vote of conscience really.
Execution is forced.
Euthanasia is by choice.
I'd have absolutely zero qualms with a prisoner with a life sentence being euthanised if that's what they choose.
I have no problems with people choosing the end of their own life. It's their life, they should be free to do as they choose.
It is the state killing them I have a problem with.
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Might have been Asimov - certainly in the later Foundation books it was stated to be very rare for a planet the size of earth to have a single moon of such a proportion as ours.
(Whether it is all that rare I have no idea, it has only been recently we've been able to detect exoplanets and exomoons would be even harder)
My personal solution to the fermi paradox is that even with a "Goldilocks" planet, significant tides are really rare. You need a huge moon and the principal planet not to become one-face to the moon. In the solar system only Hyperion is not one-face as a moon. Tides are a wonderful way to speed evolution.
I don't know if theyre anything like as rare, but the earth's polar magnetism, and its tilt of rotation to orbit giving us seasons, could both also be crucial to life developing
Perhaps the best outcome would be for this bill to fail, and the Government to spend a year drafting something sensible. Risk of long-grass-chucking, of course.
But Sir Keir made a promise to Esther Rantzen….
Thats Life
Well, That's end of Life, anyway.
As long as it isn't compulsory to have that brass band tune in one's funeral.
A bishop has said she experienced "coercive language" from two of the most senior figures in the Church of England.
Bishop of Newcastle Helen-Ann Hartley has published a letter she received from the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby and the Archbishop of York Stephen Cottrell which she said indicated "a complete lack of awareness of how power dynamics operate in the life of the church".
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Might have been Asimov - certainly in the later Foundation books it was stated to be very rare for a planet the size of earth to have a single moon of such a proportion as ours.
(Whether it is all that rare I have no idea, it has only been recently we've been able to detect exoplanets and exomoons would be even harder)
My personal solution to the fermi paradox is that even with a "Goldilocks" planet, significant tides are really rare. You need a huge moon and the principal planet not to become one-face to the moon. In the solar system only Hyperion is not one-face as a moon. Tides are a wonderful way to speed evolution.
There is an initial difficulty with the Fermi paradox: There is no naturalistic account in existence of how any sort of reproducing life began in the first place, so there is no data in existence on which to base any assumptions about its frequency.
Furthermore, since Earth is (let is assume!) a decent and fertile ground for this to occur, obviously, it is actually significant that there is no evidence that it has occurred more than once here.
Perhaps the best outcome would be for this bill to fail, and the Government to spend a year drafting something sensible. Risk of long-grass-chucking, of course.
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Might have been Asimov - certainly in the later Foundation books it was stated to be very rare for a planet the size of earth to have a single moon of such a proportion as ours.
(Whether it is all that rare I have no idea, it has only been recently we've been able to detect exoplanets and exomoons would be even harder)
My personal solution to the fermi paradox is that even with a "Goldilocks" planet, significant tides are really rare. You need a huge moon and the principal planet not to become one-face to the moon. In the solar system only Hyperion is not one-face as a moon. Tides are a wonderful way to speed evolution.
I don't know if theyre anything like as rare, but the earth's polar magnetism, and its tilt of rotation to orbit giving us seasons, could both also be crucial to life developing
If you reverse the Fermi paradox you simply have to conclude we've been damned lucky somewhere. For all his faults Musk is right in that getting off just the one planet de-risks us.
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Might have been Asimov - certainly in the later Foundation books it was stated to be very rare for a planet the size of earth to have a single moon of such a proportion as ours.
(Whether it is all that rare I have no idea, it has only been recently we've been able to detect exoplanets and exomoons would be even harder)
My personal solution to the fermi paradox is that even with a "Goldilocks" planet, significant tides are really rare. You need a huge moon and the principal planet not to become one-face to the moon. In the solar system only Hyperion is not one-face as a moon. Tides are a wonderful way to speed evolution.
I don't know if theyre anything like as rare, but the earth's polar magnetism, and its tilt of rotation to orbit giving us seasons, could both also be crucial to life developing
Absolutely. It's way beyond my astronomical pay grade, but I'd suspect that the tilt is a major reason we are not one-face to the moon. Seems less likely to lock on when we are 23 degrees off centre.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I'm the opposite, as I am increasingly hopeful it will not pass - I think it seems very rushed procedurally, and this is one of the few cases where warnings about slippery slopes need to be taken very seriously, as you really do not want to get this wrong, or fix the details later, even if some numbers of people will suffer in the intervening period.
In what way do you think it is rushed? I think it's a conversation society needs to have and am glad Starmer is making it a free vote. I hope we can get through this debate without it going all post-truth, and people can make their points and make the law better, if indeed it does pass.
I have not seen a reason why the bill details could only be published this close in to a critical voting moment. The basic details at least could have been more widely disseminated even if the finalised text was still being worked on. MPs can be expected to put a lot of things through on the nod, but a free vote on a matter this consequential and personal it is asking a lot for them to wrestle all the arguments and factors together so quickly. And many of those points had to wait until now, because the practicalities and safeguards need to be known before discussing them.
And I agree it is a conversation society needs to have - but if the present parliament were not to vote to proceed with the bill that in no way prevents society continuing to have that conversation, so it happens either way. A legislative conversation is not the only means of conversation. Nor does it require that it be another 10 years before the matter were reconsidered.
It's only a first reading? It's basically just an intro. Plenty of time for it to be amended or rejected. In practice failure to pass at this stage is closing the conversation. Labour have lots of stuff to get on within this parliament. It's been decades we've known the problems with current system...
I am a supporter of the principle of assisted dying. The problem with the bill (SFAICS) is that it leaves out cases of critical difficulty - the very ones the SC has sympathised with but said it is a matter for parliament.
The bill covers those expected to have 6 months or less to live. It seems not to cover the far worse (thankfully rare I think) cases which are the recurring nightmare: where life is utterly intolerable and unsupportable from objective and subjective standpoints, but the condition may be extended for decades. Some cases are such that they cannot self administer substances anyway.
As the bill does not allow for the most extreme cases of all, I think it needs improving.
Indeed the Bill is far from perfect but it is better than nothing.
Hopefully the 6 month proviso can be removed as an amendment around second reading, it should not be there and is ridiculous.
The overt support for the democrats from the Labour party will likely come to be regarded as a catastrophic misjudgement. It just seems like they didn't factor in the possibility that Trump would win and they would need to deal with the aftermath, even though Trump was always the favourite. Even now they keep on digging themselves in to bigger and bigger problems. The comments by Sadiq Khan are extremely unwise, he is part of the governing party and not the opposition, and London includes people who have a different view to him. It just seems that Labour are not a serious party of government despite Starmers attempts to present otherwise. It is a new world and they will get destroyed.
I hate this govt as much as the next man. But I do remember similar noises from the prior Mayor of London and his westminster colleagues prior to 2016. Trump is a man that seems to understand there’s what you say and there’s what you do. His ego is.no doubt enjoying the diplomatic toadying to make up for the sins, rather than readying himself to be vindictive.
I think this is partially true, but I just think that outside the leadership, they don't appreciate that Trump is the product of a democracy. Ultimately this outweighs whatever 'rights' are offended by his election.
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Might have been Asimov - certainly in the later Foundation books it was stated to be very rare for a planet the size of earth to have a single moon of such a proportion as ours.
(Whether it is all that rare I have no idea, it has only been recently we've been able to detect exoplanets and exomoons would be even harder)
My personal solution to the fermi paradox is that even with a "Goldilocks" planet, significant tides are really rare. You need a huge moon and the principal planet not to become one-face to the moon. In the solar system only Hyperion is not one-face as a moon. Tides are a wonderful way to speed evolution.
I don't know if theyre anything like as rare, but the earth's polar magnetism, and its tilt of rotation to orbit giving us seasons, could both also be crucial to life developing
Loads of things have been posited. Another interesting one is geology: our mantle is just the right consistency to have an easy amount of tectonics via altering the consistency of the magma. I vaguely remember the magic ingredient being silica, but might be wrong.
Plate tectonics then powers the carbon cycle, regulates temperature, and forms continents.
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Might have been Asimov - certainly in the later Foundation books it was stated to be very rare for a planet the size of earth to have a single moon of such a proportion as ours.
(Whether it is all that rare I have no idea, it has only been recently we've been able to detect exoplanets and exomoons would be even harder)
My personal solution to the fermi paradox is that even with a "Goldilocks" planet, significant tides are really rare. You need a huge moon and the principal planet not to become one-face to the moon. In the solar system only Hyperion is not one-face as a moon. Tides are a wonderful way to speed evolution.
I don't know if theyre anything like as rare, but the earth's polar magnetism, and its tilt of rotation to orbit giving us seasons, could both also be crucial to life developing
If you reverse the Fermi paradox you simply have to conclude we've been damned lucky somewhere. For all his faults Musk is right in that getting off just the one planet de-risks us.
Perhaps he would be right, but it isn't going to happen.
Maybe it is just me but my social media streams full of people saying this will be a disaster and families will just be coercing all over the place.
Very sad to say this - I think it should be passed and made law.
I'm the opposite, as I am increasingly hopeful it will not pass - I think it seems very rushed procedurally, and this is one of the few cases where warnings about slippery slopes need to be taken very seriously, as you really do not want to get this wrong, or fix the details later, even if some numbers of people will suffer in the intervening period.
My view?
A legacy is sweet, and passing sweet, an assisted suicide.
Nothing new under the sun. Lysistrata, performed 411BCE, suggested the same.
This was to end the Peloponnesian War. An Israel/Palestine/Middle east settlement would be a worthy subject for such a strike.
In Lysustrita, though, it was in order to negotiate peace.
This seems to be in order to affirm identity in response to Trumpist identitarianism. Two sets of very, very psychologically unhealthy movements are described in the article.
According to various reports, part of tomorrow hearings are going to be on USO's - unidentified sea objects - that have been reported as tracking submarines with ballistic missiles on.
Elizondo has been unequivocal in his written statement:
“Let me be clear: UAP are real. Advanced technologies not made by our Government – or any other government – are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”
So either he’s opening himself up to perjury in front of congress. Or he’s got cover to continue a bizarre pysop against the US public and body politik for “reasons”. Very strange times.
Edit: or he’s telling the truth and is right of course!
He sounds like he's giving himself a lot of wriggle room there. How many technologies are made by 'the government' - they are made by private defence contractors.
The thing is, if you were ET, and had all sorts of amazing tech, what would you look at on Earth? I think it's hardly likely to be military installations. Nature, great concerts, day-to-day. Not General Plank.
A total eclipse of the sun. Insanely rare even on a galactic scale to have a moon that is almost exactly equal in angular radius to the sun. (Some SF author pointed this out - Adams? Banks?)
Might have been Asimov - certainly in the later Foundation books it was stated to be very rare for a planet the size of earth to have a single moon of such a proportion as ours.
(Whether it is all that rare I have no idea, it has only been recently we've been able to detect exoplanets and exomoons would be even harder)
My personal solution to the fermi paradox is that even with a "Goldilocks" planet, significant tides are really rare. You need a huge moon and the principal planet not to become one-face to the moon. In the solar system only Hyperion is not one-face as a moon. Tides are a wonderful way to speed evolution.
There is an initial difficulty with the Fermi paradox: There is no naturalistic account in existence of how any sort of reproducing life began in the first place, so there is no data in existence on which to base any assumptions about its frequency.
Furthermore, since Earth is (let is assume!) a decent and fertile ground for this to occur, obviously, it is actually significant that there is no evidence that it has occurred more than once here.
Until recently, given our ignorance of other planets, we has a sample of GOLDILOCKS_PLANETS=1, INTELLIGENT_LIFE=1. There was a theory in the 50s? that planets were rare, we've now disproved that. Assuming none of the planets we've observed in the last few years have intelligent life we now have GOLDILOCKS_PLANETS=100?, INTELLIGENT_LIFE=1 and we can estimate the total number of Goldilocks planets in the galaxy as vast. We still ain't seen any other INTELLIGENT_LIFE (pace Leon) so life looks like like it needs more than just a Goldilocks planet. Seems reasonable to consider why Sol-3 is unusual, even among Goldilocks planets.
The next Archbishop of Canterbury not being a woman.
Woman: I donate £150 to a charity of your choice. Man: You donate £100 to Wheels for Wellbeing.
Caveat: bet cancelled if the makeup of the Crown Nominations Commission is changed, or the Position (ie job role) of ABC changed.
(Bit of Context: 6 out of the 16 Lords Spiritual are now women.)
Any takers?
No bet... How about one on 'The next appointed ABC is not currently (as at 12-Nov-24) a serving Diocesan Bishop in the Church of England?'
(History would say that's where they come from - I'm suggesting otherwise for clarity)
The only archbishop who wasn't a Diocesan Bishop was Welby and that was obvious on his appointment to +Durham...
Rowan Williams was Archbishop of Wales, not a CoE bishop
Given that the ArchBish is head of the world-wide Anglican communion, would an overseas appointment be a possibility?
Potentially. Theoretically they only need to be an Anglican - so an overseas appointment from somewhere else in the Anglican Communion is possible (and enable Archbishop Rowan to get the job from the Church in Wales). However, (at the moment) as Archbish they are automatically a Privy Counsellor (the highest one in seniority I believe) and so I believe that they technically need to be a citizen of a 'Dominion State' (ie where the King is Head of State) in order to swear loyalty to the Crown. This brings Canada, Australia, New Zealand into play.
Since no one's biting, my thought is that the need to be acceptable to the wider Communion is in my Judgement a reason why the next ABC is unlikely to be a woman this time.
That's why I considered odds against to be a decent judgement.
Indeed... and why I for one am not biting.
For reference - the people that will be choosing consist of the following:
1 Chair (usually a long-standing parliamentarian with strong church links. I would imagine someone like Dame Caroline Spelman) 2 Bishops (usually Archbishop of York and someone from Canterbury province - I would imagine it will be York and the Bishop of either London or Winchester unless any of them think that might get the job and thus stand down) 6 'Central' Members - these are the people that have been involved in selecting other Diocesan bishops recently. Likely to be 4 'conservative' and 2 'liberal' - but it's not that straightforward 5 'Anglican Communion' Members - representing the rest of the Anglican Communion, they are new (previously there was 1, rather than the 5 we have now) 3 Canterbury Diocese members - selected by the local Diocese of Canterbury (for whom the Archbishop is also the local bishop)
That gets you to 17 people. You need an active positive vote from two-thirds (ie 12 people) - which means that 6 people acting in concert can block.
Given the rule about blocking - you would think that the likely successor to be someone who might not engender lots of positivity - but about whom there is little that can be said against them... (You can see this in the recent appointments - those bishops recently appointed as new Diocesans tend to be those that have kept their heads down somewhat, rather than those that have been more outspoken and forthright).
For this reason - I am unconvinced that it will be any of those that are currently listed as likely candidates (Gulli Francis-Dehqani, Bp of Chelmsford; Mark Tanner, Bp of Chester; Martyn Snow, Bp of Leicester; Graham Usher, Bp of Norwich, Paul Williams, Bp of Southall and Nottingham) - but equally I think that they will be wary of someone untested in a Diocesan role - so the possibility of an overseas appointment seems interesting if there is anyone that fits the bill and can be persuaded that it is the right calling)
Give it to Andrew Watson - Bishop of a Guildford as he was a victim of John Smyrh as a boy so would be a fantastic triumph over Smyth and his evil.
The Bishop of Guildford, Andrew Watson is a victim of Smyth; he has been a bishop since 2008. So a question, which I hope can be fully answered, arises as to when he, as an adult in a responsible position, blew the whistle on what he knew. (And assuming he did, why did the ABoC know nothing until 2013?).
Smyth did not die until 2018, so it was not merely a historic matter.
This matter leaves some questions, and lots more than this one.
That’s unfair. A victim does not have the obligation to report that others do: they have a personal interest at stake
The issue is worth considering with care without rushing to judgment. He was a victim, but also a bishop with the responsibilities for safeguarding that belongs to that office and to everyone with similar responsibilities. The perp was still alive and had been for decades a well known character on the bishop's ecclesiastical/churchmanship scene. A bishop with modern knowledge will know that it is unlikely there was only one victim and that stuff may still be going on. I am not sure that there is no obligation.
Nothing new under the sun. Lysistrata, performed 411BCE, suggested the same.
This was to end the Peloponnesian War. An Israel/Palestine/Middle east settlement would be a worthy subject for such a strike.
If we really want the great and the good to take notice, let the mistresses and prostitutes go on strike...
There is an extremely good episode of In Our Time devoted to the play Lysistrata. I won't try to summarise it here but suffice to say the play seems to have resembled in style and status some of the better Carry On Films.
Comments
Has Russia ever had to cope with Russia sober?
A hundred years ago, the age of criminal responsibility was 8, school leaving age was 14, the age of consent was 16, the age at which one could inherit or buy property was 21, and the voting age for most was 28.
Fifty years ago, the age of criminal responsibility was 10, the school leaving age was 16, the age of consent was variously 16, 17, or 21 depending on your circumstances, the age at which one could buy or inherit property was 18, and the voting age was 18.
Today, the age of criminal responsibility is 12 (in all but the most serious cases), the school leaving age is 18, the age of consent is universally 16, the age at which one can buy property remains at 18, and the voting age is 16 or 18 depending on where you live.
It seems to be that there's always been a lot of fudging involved, and that's probably for the best.
"A report detailing his "horrific" beatings of teenaged boys was presented to some Church leaders in 1982. But the recipients of that report "participated in an active cover-up" to prevent its findings, including that crimes had been committed, coming to light, the Makin review said."
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c5y5l7116g1o
At the start of the war there were lots of confident assertions about how the stronger economies of the West were going to crush Russia under a tidal wave of weapons production. That. Hasn't. Happened.
All of these self-deluding reassurances about how the deficit isn't so bad, and greater Ukrainian accuracy makes up the shortfall are really dangerous. They fool ourselves into thinking that the West is doing okay, when it is actually failing Ukraine by not providing enough ammunition.
I think it's a conversation society needs to have and am glad Starmer is making it a free vote. I hope we can get through this debate without it going all post-truth, and people can make their points and make the law better, if indeed it does pass.
Will be interesting to see what 650MPs decide, no doubt with considerable input from constituents. A shame we can’t make everything a vote of conscience really.
But recent political developments on UAP's, with the level of senior admissions of uncertainty, don't bear this out; this simply has yet to filter through to most of the media or wider public, though, because the social stigma on it, and worry of mockery, is still strong.
And whilst ++Justin failed, and was right to go, there are others who will have a lot more to explain when they meet the One Great Scorer.
More importantly, bother the establishment. The whole rotten lot of them.
And I agree it is a conversation society needs to have - but if the present parliament were not to vote to proceed with the bill that in no way prevents society continuing to have that conversation, so it happens either way. A legislative conversation is not the only means of conversation. Nor does it require that it be another 10 years before the matter were reconsidered.
I am very fascinated by the question of alien life. The concept of life elsewhere is fascinating, and will be world-changing if it is ever found. But that life is more likely to be microbial in the lunar or martian regolith, or deep in the ice of a Jovian moon, than it is to be buzzing the American military or anally probing farmers from Hicksville.
But the fact that people seem to want to believe so badly is also fascinating. Especially when they continually make themselves look like fools when nothing happens or is revealed.
There is a vast amount of science in exobiology and the search for life or intelligent life elsewhere. But this is hype is not about science; it is about belief.
Badenoch 3.45 / 3.55
Farage 5.2 / 5.5
Johnson 10.5 / 15
Reeves 9 / 18
Rayner 18 / 23
Streeting 17 / 30
https://www.betfair.com/exchange/plus/en/politics/uk-next-prime-minister/prime-minister-after-keir-starmer-betting-1.230434795
As for the committee process, certainly bills can be significantly improved upon through that process, and many concerns will be able to be addressed, perhaps a great many. Which makes it less defensible that details have not been available much sooner, since there would have been more time for people to reassure themselves of their views on the principle of the bill, and that other concerns they have can adequately be dealt with through the committee process (or that it is likely to be, based on what they think MPs in general will permit).
With very little time to discuss or consider the details, things that they might have thought could be overcome could actually now hold things up, as they are less sure that the bill can be appropriately amended through the approval process.
And a lot more parliamentary time really should be needed. Private member bills can and have done some major changes, but as noted this is something where a real conversation is needed.
Why shouldn't MPs have that major conversation now? Perhaps they'll agree to move it forward but stop it later if issues are not addressed, but if they had a long conversation and thought it best not to move forward now, there's no need to send it on on the assumption it could be fixed.
If most object on the moral argument there would be no point, if most object on technical grounds ther is a point.
Give your head a wobble.
That means a recount is possible.
You can get 75 on Casey on BF.
Before that I heard very little for a long time.
Much of this should be s matter for governing bodies not the government, however the government need to clarify that these bodies can choose what they want, but don’t make the decision because you have misinterpreted the equality and some activists are trying to pressure you.
I do rather wonder if the US military has recovered something or other at some point that is alien. Most likely some tiny scrap of a pedestrian nature. After all it is likely that that there are lots of people out there, and it's likely that that's been the case for a long while. Foolish people have wars - wars involve bullets shot - if you do that in space they're going to go someplace. So... if an alien bullet had arrived on earth - not so surprising. My hunch therefore is that the first evidence of ET will be millions of years out of date, and it'll be a bullet.
If there really is something to tell, I expect there is room for several years more of comfy denial yet. The advocates such as Nell and also the fine print of the UAP Disclosure Act, talk in terms of a controlled process, with public disclosure coming after political and academic disclosure (circa 2030). One of tomorrow’s witnesses (former rear admiral Gallaudet) called it right this week, don’t expect much out of the Executive while geopol risk is so elevated.
And I shall continue in that manner until the glorious day when something is definitively revealed.
I would rather hold more of the conversation earlier, than push forward right away on the assumption details can be sorted out later. If MPs don't think they can, now, then it saves a lot of time. If they think it is a worthy bill that, like any bill, has issues, then absolutely they should proceed. But they have little time to debate that point.
Step 1) Look at this chart: https://www.marketwatch.com/investing/bond/tmbmkgb-05y. This is the market price for the government borrowing for 5-years.
Step 2) If yields have gone up since banks last changed their fixed rates, the next change in mortgage price will be an increase. And vice versa.
Step 3) Has there been any other economic event that might make banks more reluctant to lend to consumers? E.g. recession. If so, add to the spread to government bonds.
Probably not worth people concerning themselves with the detail of what drives government bond yields. Lots of things, both in the UK and overseas.
For two year mortgages, repeat with the 2-year gilt.
Fish rots from the head etc.
https://www.politico.eu/article/london-mayor-sadiq-khan-blasts-racism-hatred-donald-trump-election-victory/
That's the only reason that they're trying to investigate more often, and that public interest is increasing, although starting from a modest base.
And I agree it's an intro. But if people don't have enough time to consider even an intro things don't have to automatically proceeed. That's why we have that process in the first place, surely, for MPs to decide if even the barebones of a bill are worth taking forward and spending their time on?
This one might be. But it also might not be.
It's not as though not moving forward is unfair in some way because things can always be fixed later.
And if some MPs are arguing they need more time to consider the issues even at first reading, then that is the future route to take - make sure they get that time, so they cannot claim that as a reason for not proceeding.
As an experiment I think it would be very fun to make you visibly trans and throw you in the men's bogs and see how you get on.
Twat.
There are - I'm sure - "charities" that are net negatives to the sum of human happiness. But I doubt many come close to the American Pain Foundation for evil inflicted on the world.
How times are a changing
That route doesn't have a particularly happy history in the UK - eg. most of the 1957 Wolfenden Report's recommendations were endorsed by a number of separate bills in 1958-1960, but not all of them passed (notably the decriminalisation of male homosexuality), with the net result being arguably more repressive than it had been before.
The Citizen's Assemblies used by Ireland might suggest a model which we could follow, but their constitutional model is quite different. We emphasise parliamentary sovereignty (with the Commons being pre-eminent within that) to a much greater degree, and I suspect that Brexit has diminished the appetite for those who may have been tempted to change that.
No offence to @Alanbrooke 👍
Ask yourself honestly why it is that you haven’t properly engaged with that admission? On the record they have said there are multiple cases that are not recording artefacts and that are not US tech, and that display superior capability. Doesnt that worry you? As Rubio so eloquently put it several years ago now, we’d better hope they’re not Russian or Chinese.
(Whether it is all that rare I have no idea, it has only been recently we've been able to detect exoplanets and exomoons would be even harder)
Trump also won by taking over the main US right of centre party not by setting up a rival party to it
(Edit: sorry, couldn't resist)
Because I do.
But I don't see these as being the slam-dunk admissions you seem to think they are.
Extraordinary claims ("intelligent alien life is here and buzzing us!") requires extraordinary evidence. The 'evidence' we currently have is laughable, though in many ways intriguing.
The Bishop of Newcastle would be the radical choice but as Heseltine found the person who starts the process to remove the leader rarely wears the Crown
A bishop has said she experienced "coercive language" from two of the most senior figures in the Church of England.
Bishop of Newcastle Helen-Ann Hartley has published a letter she received from the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby and the Archbishop of York Stephen Cottrell which she said indicated "a complete lack of awareness of how power dynamics operate in the life of the church".
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cj0je7mg8ygo
Was clearing sitting on this to ensure Welby went today.
He is asking for details regarding pay and benefits as well as assurances that he wouldn't be up against any of these anti genocide types
The bill covers those expected to have 6 months or less to live. It seems not to cover the far worse (thankfully rare I think) cases which are the recurring nightmare: where life is utterly intolerable and unsupportable from objective and subjective standpoints, but the condition may be extended for decades. Some cases are such that they cannot self administer substances anyway.
As the bill does not allow for the most extreme cases of all, I think it needs improving.
Euthanasia is by choice.
I'd have absolutely zero qualms with a prisoner with a life sentence being euthanised if that's what they choose.
I have no problems with people choosing the end of their own life. It's their life, they should be free to do as they choose.
It is the state killing them I have a problem with.
What polarised and unhealthy times we're living in.
"Wonen swearing off sex in protest against Trump".
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/nov/12/donald-trump-election-sex-men-misogyny-feminism
As long as it isn't compulsory to have that brass band tune in one's funeral.
Furthermore, since Earth is (let is assume!) a decent and fertile ground for this to occur, obviously, it is actually significant that there is no evidence that it has occurred more than once here.
No, I meant hostages.
https://youtu.be/g5qLcjcJ3UQ?si=gnj6uPObs9-AR8dS
Hopefully the 6 month proviso can be removed as an amendment around second reading, it should not be there and is ridiculous.
Plate tectonics then powers the carbon cycle, regulates temperature, and forms continents.
This was to end the Peloponnesian War. An Israel/Palestine/Middle east settlement would be a worthy subject for such a strike.
A legacy is sweet, and passing sweet, an assisted suicide.
This seems to be in order to affirm identity in response to Trumpist identitarianism. Two sets of very, very psychologically unhealthy movements are described in the article.
I can't believe that Starmer didn't mention them at all in his COP speeches today (PCMIIAW)
Why is us harnessing the enormous resource of tidal power available still not on the agenda?
SKS FANS PLEASE EXPLAIN
Net favourability for major party leaders:
❌ Keir Starmer -33
❌ Kemi Badenoch -20
❌ Ed Davey -7
❌ Nigel Farage -31
Via
@YouGov
, 8-10 Nov
Maybe Aristophanes was a fan of Kenneth Williams.