His further comment was that Europe was not in a position to replace the assistance given by the US because none of us had adequate Air power or logistics. Which, he commented, reflected very badly on our defence priorities in recent decades.
There's been an unfortunate tendency in Europe to neglect the boring bits that actually make a military work. Transport aircraft, supply ships, ammunition stockpiles and the like. The upshot is availability rates that are shockingly low even in peacetime, hence that period a few years ago where Germany had no submarines or fighters available for deployment.
If Trump forces a 'peace' in Ukraine, Russia will go away and build up again safe in the knowledge that European politicians will take a peace deal as an excuse to quietly dump increases in defence spending. So their militaries will be in the same position as now, unable to sustain a war beyond 4-6 months because of shortages of ammo and parts, lack of airlift capacity, etc.
Fixing this will be expensive - forget 2.5% of GPD, we're taking 4% or more and a decade of work given the lead times on much of the required hardware.
Two big problems: first, Governments don't want to spend the money (because there are no votes in defence); second, no country in Europe is big enough to build a spectrum of capabilities remotely close to that of the United States, so it needs a whole group of committed and reliable allies to make the required level of investment. If the UK elected to rebuild itself as a naval power and helped to pay for it by economising on the army, which would be a logical use of our finite resources, then a large flotilla of capable submarines and destroyers would still be of only limited use without Germany, for example, fielding a load of tanks.
We need everyone to pull their weight, not just a collection of frightened states around the Baltic Sea. The prospects for this happening do not look encouraging. The UK would need to find £30bn a year extra just to bring its military budget up to the American standard in terms of percentage of GDP; most of NATO would need to make larger proportional increases than that, which was a legitimate Trump gripe from last time around that largely remains unfixed. Where are they going to find that much money except through deeply unpopular tax rises and/or cuts to social expenditure?
We much prefer to give public sector workers enormous pensions.
And far better holiday entitlement too. Something when they whinge about their pay comparing it to the private sector they singularly omit to mention.
Employers contribution to the local govt scheme is around 19%, the NHS is over 25% (cannot quite remember what the figure was on my wifes latest statement but it was over 25%).
By employer they, of course, mean us the taxpayer. Their pension is final salary too. Private sector (thanks Gordon) get to take their chances with a DC scheme.
I get, as a contribution, and it is not bad for private sector, 9%.
He's so impressive. I can scarcely imagine the level of stress, the fear as Trump got in, the withdrawal of aid and then military support, the personal physical danger. Through it all, a brave face and unashamed practical diplomacy.
I hope he survives. There can be few figures in history who can match his fortitude. Mandela, Churchill? He is right up there with the greats IMO.
I recently lisrened to this book. Great on Ukranian Russian history and the rise of Zelensky from star of a satirical comedy show to President.
Possibly the best ever takedown of the US “Deep State”, vindication for what DOGE are doing, and confirmation that USAID was basically the CIA doing what the CIA were told not to do for the last couple of decades.
Warning: this video features Joe Rogan and Mike Benz, and is 202 minutes long.
It turns out that Rory Stewart’s wife’s charity was also getting millions from USAID.
Yes, that's how foreign aid often works. You give money to a charity to do charitable work.
And it’s totally incidental that these charities appear to be vastly overpopulated with close relatives of the politicians involved in the funding decisions.
There needs to be a British DOGE.
Your anti corruption credentials will be sorely tested these coming years as a Trump and Musk supporter.
I’m not a Trump supporter, but I’m absolutely a Musk supporter. Every Western country is going to have to deal with a line-item audit of their spending at some point.
If so isn't it better to have forensic accountants doing the audit than teenage coding internship?
Use shorter words. You're talking to someone who is a Musk fan.
Possibly the best ever takedown of the US “Deep State”, vindication for what DOGE are doing, and confirmation that USAID was basically the CIA doing what the CIA were told not to do for the last couple of decades.
Warning: this video features Joe Rogan and Mike Benz, and is 202 minutes long.
It turns out that Rory Stewart’s wife’s charity was also getting millions from USAID.
Yes, that's how foreign aid often works. You give money to a charity to do charitable work.
And it’s totally incidental that these charities appear to be vastly overpopulated with close relatives of the politicians involved in the funding decisions.
There needs to be a British DOGE.
Your anti corruption credentials will be sorely tested these coming years as a Trump and Musk supporter.
I’m not a Trump supporter, but I’m absolutely a Musk supporter. Every Western country is going to have to deal with a line-item audit of their spending at some point.
Musk doesn't work for the US government or US people, he works for Musk.
No, he works directly for the elected President.
Tell me, what do you think of Trump's actions towards Ukraine?
What *actions* specifically? Not words, actions.
The action of cutting USAID support to Ukraine.
The action of talking to Putin and not Zelenskyy about the future of Ukraine.
Of blaming Ukraine "not a great war for them to get into".
Yeah, which idiot decided to set up their state next to Russia ? Just careless.
Which idiot decided to set up their state next to Mexican drug cartels?
His further comment was that Europe was not in a position to replace the assistance given by the US because none of us had adequate Air power or logistics. Which, he commented, reflected very badly on our defence priorities in recent decades.
There's been an unfortunate tendency in Europe to neglect the boring bits that actually make a military work. Transport aircraft, supply ships, ammunition stockpiles and the like. The upshot is availability rates that are shockingly low even in peacetime, hence that period a few years ago where Germany had no submarines or fighters available for deployment.
If Trump forces a 'peace' in Ukraine, Russia will go away and build up again safe in the knowledge that European politicians will take a peace deal as an excuse to quietly dump increases in defence spending. So their militaries will be in the same position as now, unable to sustain a war beyond 4-6 months because of shortages of ammo and parts, lack of airlift capacity, etc.
Fixing this will be expensive - forget 2.5% of GPD, we're taking 4% or more and a decade of work given the lead times on much of the required hardware.
Two big problems: first, Governments don't want to spend the money (because there are no votes in defence); second, no country in Europe is big enough to build a spectrum of capabilities remotely close to that of the United States, so it needs a whole group of committed and reliable allies to make the required level of investment. If the UK elected to rebuild itself as a naval power and helped to pay for it by economising on the army, which would be a logical use of our finite resources, then a large flotilla of capable submarines and destroyers would still be of only limited use without Germany, for example, fielding a load of tanks.
We need everyone to pull their weight, not just a collection of frightened states around the Baltic Sea. The prospects for this happening do not look encouraging. The UK would need to find £30bn a year extra just to bring its military budget up to the American standard in terms of percentage of GDP; most of NATO would need to make larger proportional increases than that, which was a legitimate Trump gripe from last time around that largely remains unfixed. Where are they going to find that much money except through deeply unpopular tax rises and/or cuts to social expenditure?
We much prefer to give public sector workers enormous pensions.
And far better holiday entitlement too. Something when they whinge about their pay comparing it to the private sector they singularly omit to mention.
Employers contribution to the local govt scheme is around 19%, the NHS is over 25% (cannot quite remember what the figure was on my wifes latest statement but it was over 25%).
By employer they, of course, mean us the taxpayer. Their pension is final salary too. Private sector (thanks Gordon) get to take their chances with a DC scheme.
I get, as a contribution, and it is not bad for private sector, 9%.
Yes, I do get 30 days holiday per year, but I also have worked weekends on call, with no time off in lieu for my entire career, on top of a 5 day week.
Possibly the best ever takedown of the US “Deep State”, vindication for what DOGE are doing, and confirmation that USAID was basically the CIA doing what the CIA were told not to do for the last couple of decades.
Warning: this video features Joe Rogan and Mike Benz, and is 202 minutes long.
It turns out that Rory Stewart’s wife’s charity was also getting millions from USAID.
Yes, that's how foreign aid often works. You give money to a charity to do charitable work.
And it’s totally incidental that these charities appear to be vastly overpopulated with close relatives of the politicians involved in the funding decisions.
There needs to be a British DOGE.
Your anti corruption credentials will be sorely tested these coming years as a Trump and Musk supporter.
I’m not a Trump supporter, but I’m absolutely a Musk supporter. Every Western country is going to have to deal with a line-item audit of their spending at some point.
Musk doesn't work for the US government or US people, he works for Musk.
No, he works directly for the elected President.
Tell me, what do you think of Trump's actions towards Ukraine?
What *actions* specifically? Not words, actions.
The action of cutting USAID support to Ukraine.
The action of talking to Putin and not Zelenskyy about the future of Ukraine.
Of blaming Ukraine "not a great war for them to get into".
Yeah, which idiot decided to set up their state next to Russia ? Just careless.
Which idiot decided to set up their state next to Mexican drug cartels?
Possibly the best ever takedown of the US “Deep State”, vindication for what DOGE are doing, and confirmation that USAID was basically the CIA doing what the CIA were told not to do for the last couple of decades.
Warning: this video features Joe Rogan and Mike Benz, and is 202 minutes long.
It turns out that Rory Stewart’s wife’s charity was also getting millions from USAID.
Yes, that's how foreign aid often works. You give money to a charity to do charitable work.
And it’s totally incidental that these charities appear to be vastly overpopulated with close relatives of the politicians involved in the funding decisions.
There needs to be a British DOGE.
Your anti corruption credentials will be sorely tested these coming years as a Trump and Musk supporter.
I’m not a Trump supporter, but I’m absolutely a Musk supporter. Every Western country is going to have to deal with a line-item audit of their spending at some point.
Musk doesn't work for the US government or US people, he works for Musk.
No, he works directly for the elected President.
Tell me, what do you think of Trump's actions towards Ukraine?
What *actions* specifically? Not words, actions.
The action of cutting USAID support to Ukraine.
The action of talking to Putin and not Zelenskyy about the future of Ukraine.
Of blaming Ukraine "not a great war for them to get into".
Yeah, which idiot decided to set up their state next to Russia ? Just careless.
Which idiot decided to set up their state next to Mexican drug cartels?
Whereas the map of Europe proves that God is an Englishman.
His further comment was that Europe was not in a position to replace the assistance given by the US because none of us had adequate Air power or logistics. Which, he commented, reflected very badly on our defence priorities in recent decades.
There's been an unfortunate tendency in Europe to neglect the boring bits that actually make a military work. Transport aircraft, supply ships, ammunition stockpiles and the like. The upshot is availability rates that are shockingly low even in peacetime, hence that period a few years ago where Germany had no submarines or fighters available for deployment.
If Trump forces a 'peace' in Ukraine, Russia will go away and build up again safe in the knowledge that European politicians will take a peace deal as an excuse to quietly dump increases in defence spending. So their militaries will be in the same position as now, unable to sustain a war beyond 4-6 months because of shortages of ammo and parts, lack of airlift capacity, etc.
Fixing this will be expensive - forget 2.5% of GPD, we're taking 4% or more and a decade of work given the lead times on much of the required hardware.
Two big problems: first, Governments don't want to spend the money (because there are no votes in defence); second, no country in Europe is big enough to build a spectrum of capabilities remotely close to that of the United States, so it needs a whole group of committed and reliable allies to make the required level of investment. If the UK elected to rebuild itself as a naval power and helped to pay for it by economising on the army, which would be a logical use of our finite resources, then a large flotilla of capable submarines and destroyers would still be of only limited use without Germany, for example, fielding a load of tanks.
We need everyone to pull their weight, not just a collection of frightened states around the Baltic Sea. The prospects for this happening do not look encouraging. The UK would need to find £30bn a year extra just to bring its military budget up to the American standard in terms of percentage of GDP; most of NATO would need to make larger proportional increases than that, which was a legitimate Trump gripe from last time around that largely remains unfixed. Where are they going to find that much money except through deeply unpopular tax rises and/or cuts to social expenditure?
There is an additional problem too. We cannot recruit or retain people in our Armed Forces, even in their depleted state.
Doubling our forces personnel count is more than a financial issue.
Possibly the best ever takedown of the US “Deep State”, vindication for what DOGE are doing, and confirmation that USAID was basically the CIA doing what the CIA were told not to do for the last couple of decades.
Warning: this video features Joe Rogan and Mike Benz, and is 202 minutes long.
It turns out that Rory Stewart’s wife’s charity was also getting millions from USAID.
Yes, that's how foreign aid often works. You give money to a charity to do charitable work.
And it’s totally incidental that these charities appear to be vastly overpopulated with close relatives of the politicians involved in the funding decisions.
There needs to be a British DOGE.
Your anti corruption credentials will be sorely tested these coming years as a Trump and Musk supporter.
I’m not a Trump supporter, but I’m absolutely a Musk supporter. Every Western country is going to have to deal with a line-item audit of their spending at some point.
Musk doesn't work for the US government or US people, he works for Musk.
No, he works directly for the elected President.
Tell me, what do you think of Trump's actions towards Ukraine?
What *actions* specifically? Not words, actions.
The action of cutting USAID support to Ukraine.
The action of talking to Putin and not Zelenskyy about the future of Ukraine.
Of blaming Ukraine "not a great war for them to get into".
Yeah, which idiot decided to set up their state next to Russia ? Just careless.
Which idiot decided to set up their state next to Mexican drug cartels?
Whereas the map of Europe proves that God is an Englishman.
Not sure that the Irish, Welsh or Scots would agree.
His further comment was that Europe was not in a position to replace the assistance given by the US because none of us had adequate Air power or logistics. Which, he commented, reflected very badly on our defence priorities in recent decades.
There's been an unfortunate tendency in Europe to neglect the boring bits that actually make a military work. Transport aircraft, supply ships, ammunition stockpiles and the like. The upshot is availability rates that are shockingly low even in peacetime, hence that period a few years ago where Germany had no submarines or fighters available for deployment.
If Trump forces a 'peace' in Ukraine, Russia will go away and build up again safe in the knowledge that European politicians will take a peace deal as an excuse to quietly dump increases in defence spending. So their militaries will be in the same position as now, unable to sustain a war beyond 4-6 months because of shortages of ammo and parts, lack of airlift capacity, etc.
Fixing this will be expensive - forget 2.5% of GPD, we're taking 4% or more and a decade of work given the lead times on much of the required hardware.
While I agree. It's also worth pointing out that it has suited the Americans up to now to do the heavy lifting because it gave them control. Now, very obviously, that has changed. And all of us are going to have to make sacrifices - at a personal level - if we want to prevent Putin dominating Europe.
Taxes are going to have to go up. Borrowing too. Not only here, but everywhere. This is not just about politicians rising to the moment, it is about all of us doing so. We have spent decades rightly lionising the sacrifices made by our forebears during WW2. Let' see if we are prepared to accept a fraction of the hardship they went through to keep our country and continent safe from fascist aggression.
Possibly the best ever takedown of the US “Deep State”, vindication for what DOGE are doing, and confirmation that USAID was basically the CIA doing what the CIA were told not to do for the last couple of decades.
Warning: this video features Joe Rogan and Mike Benz, and is 202 minutes long.
It turns out that Rory Stewart’s wife’s charity was also getting millions from USAID.
Yes, that's how foreign aid often works. You give money to a charity to do charitable work.
And it’s totally incidental that these charities appear to be vastly overpopulated with close relatives of the politicians involved in the funding decisions.
There needs to be a British DOGE.
Your anti corruption credentials will be sorely tested these coming years as a Trump and Musk supporter.
I’m not a Trump supporter, but I’m absolutely a Musk supporter. Every Western country is going to have to deal with a line-item audit of their spending at some point.
Musk doesn't work for the US government or US people, he works for Musk.
No, he works directly for the elected President.
Tell me, what do you think of Trump's actions towards Ukraine?
What *actions* specifically? Not words, actions.
The action of cutting USAID support to Ukraine.
The action of talking to Putin and not Zelenskyy about the future of Ukraine.
Of blaming Ukraine "not a great war for them to get into".
Yeah, which idiot decided to set up their state next to Russia ? Just careless.
Which idiot decided to set up their state next to Mexican drug cartels?
Whereas the map of Europe proves that God is an Englishman.
Not sure that the Irish, Welsh or Scots would agree.
Possibly the best ever takedown of the US “Deep State”, vindication for what DOGE are doing, and confirmation that USAID was basically the CIA doing what the CIA were told not to do for the last couple of decades.
Warning: this video features Joe Rogan and Mike Benz, and is 202 minutes long.
It turns out that Rory Stewart’s wife’s charity was also getting millions from USAID.
Yes, that's how foreign aid often works. You give money to a charity to do charitable work.
And it’s totally incidental that these charities appear to be vastly overpopulated with close relatives of the politicians involved in the funding decisions.
There needs to be a British DOGE.
Your anti corruption credentials will be sorely tested these coming years as a Trump and Musk supporter.
I’m not a Trump supporter, but I’m absolutely a Musk supporter. Every Western country is going to have to deal with a line-item audit of their spending at some point.
Musk doesn't work for the US government or US people, he works for Musk.
No, he works directly for the elected President.
Tell me, what do you think of Trump's actions towards Ukraine?
What *actions* specifically? Not words, actions.
The action of cutting USAID support to Ukraine.
The action of talking to Putin and not Zelenskyy about the future of Ukraine.
Of blaming Ukraine "not a great war for them to get into".
Yeah, which idiot decided to set up their state next to Russia ? Just careless.
Which idiot decided to set up their state next to Mexican drug cartels?
Whereas the map of Europe proves that God is an Englishman.
His further comment was that Europe was not in a position to replace the assistance given by the US because none of us had adequate Air power or logistics. Which, he commented, reflected very badly on our defence priorities in recent decades.
There's been an unfortunate tendency in Europe to neglect the boring bits that actually make a military work. Transport aircraft, supply ships, ammunition stockpiles and the like. The upshot is availability rates that are shockingly low even in peacetime, hence that period a few years ago where Germany had no submarines or fighters available for deployment.
If Trump forces a 'peace' in Ukraine, Russia will go away and build up again safe in the knowledge that European politicians will take a peace deal as an excuse to quietly dump increases in defence spending. So their militaries will be in the same position as now, unable to sustain a war beyond 4-6 months because of shortages of ammo and parts, lack of airlift capacity, etc.
Fixing this will be expensive - forget 2.5% of GPD, we're taking 4% or more and a decade of work given the lead times on much of the required hardware.
Two big problems: first, Governments don't want to spend the money (because there are no votes in defence); second, no country in Europe is big enough to build a spectrum of capabilities remotely close to that of the United States, so it needs a whole group of committed and reliable allies to make the required level of investment. If the UK elected to rebuild itself as a naval power and helped to pay for it by economising on the army, which would be a logical use of our finite resources, then a large flotilla of capable submarines and destroyers would still be of only limited use without Germany, for example, fielding a load of tanks.
We need everyone to pull their weight, not just a collection of frightened states around the Baltic Sea. The prospects for this happening do not look encouraging. The UK would need to find £30bn a year extra just to bring its military budget up to the American standard in terms of percentage of GDP; most of NATO would need to make larger proportional increases than that, which was a legitimate Trump gripe from last time around that largely remains unfixed. Where are they going to find that much money except through deeply unpopular tax rises and/or cuts to social expenditure?
We much prefer to give public sector workers enormous pensions.
And far better holiday entitlement too. Something when they whinge about their pay comparing it to the private sector they singularly omit to mention.
Employers contribution to the local govt scheme is around 19%, the NHS is over 25% (cannot quite remember what the figure was on my wifes latest statement but it was over 25%).
By employer they, of course, mean us the taxpayer. Their pension is final salary too. Private sector (thanks Gordon) get to take their chances with a DC scheme.
I get, as a contribution, and it is not bad for private sector, 9%.
These conversations always come round to the colossal burden of an ageing society eventually. According to OBR figures from 2023 that I just dug up, spending on public sector pensions was already running at £53bn per year at that point, and will inevitably balloon through the cumulative effects of an ageing population and the luxurious terms of the schemes. But that, in turn, is but a small fraction of total expenditure on the aged, which encompasses half of the adult social care budget, half of the gargantuan NHS budget, and over half of all social security expenditure.
With taxes on incomes and productive economic activity already where they are, there is no solution to finding huge sums of extra money for essential investment in areas like public infrastructure and defence that does not encompass making elderly benefits stingier, or extracting a lot more money from the elderly in taxes - and the one policy even more unpopular than snatching benefits from granny is going after her house, whether it's ramping up property taxes whilst she's still living there or creaming off a big chunk of the estate after she's been carried out in a box. Is it any wonder we are all, collectively, up the proverbial sans paddle?
On Munich I'm loving the latest mealy mouthed BBC coment "Officers are treating the incident as a suspected attack". Well obviously.
Olaf Scholz has taken a firm line, saying the perpetratory cannot expect to remain in Germany.
Tough talk that.
It's an interesting point though - what do you do in a case like this? Or others? What if you send him back to Afghanistan and he's treated as a hero, given a life of luxury - or, worse, put in charge of a new extremist recruitment/training unit?
Surely you lock him up for an appropriate amount of time in Germany and then boot him out when that's done? Although maybe the appropriate amount of time is life.
It's fine to send people back if the country in question has rule of law etc and jurisdiction to themselves lock him up for life. But in most cases, if the perpetrator is an asylum seeker, that probably cannot be relied on. Even if the current regime obliges - say if this had happened in pre-current-Taliban Afghanistan - the next one might make him foreign secretary.
His further comment was that Europe was not in a position to replace the assistance given by the US because none of us had adequate Air power or logistics. Which, he commented, reflected very badly on our defence priorities in recent decades.
There's been an unfortunate tendency in Europe to neglect the boring bits that actually make a military work. Transport aircraft, supply ships, ammunition stockpiles and the like. The upshot is availability rates that are shockingly low even in peacetime, hence that period a few years ago where Germany had no submarines or fighters available for deployment.
If Trump forces a 'peace' in Ukraine, Russia will go away and build up again safe in the knowledge that European politicians will take a peace deal as an excuse to quietly dump increases in defence spending. So their militaries will be in the same position as now, unable to sustain a war beyond 4-6 months because of shortages of ammo and parts, lack of airlift capacity, etc.
Fixing this will be expensive - forget 2.5% of GPD, we're taking 4% or more and a decade of work given the lead times on much of the required hardware.
Two big problems: first, Governments don't want to spend the money (because there are no votes in defence); second, no country in Europe is big enough to build a spectrum of capabilities remotely close to that of the United States, so it needs a whole group of committed and reliable allies to make the required level of investment. If the UK elected to rebuild itself as a naval power and helped to pay for it by economising on the army, which would be a logical use of our finite resources, then a large flotilla of capable submarines and destroyers would still be of only limited use without Germany, for example, fielding a load of tanks.
We need everyone to pull their weight, not just a collection of frightened states around the Baltic Sea. The prospects for this happening do not look encouraging. The UK would need to find £30bn a year extra just to bring its military budget up to the American standard in terms of percentage of GDP; most of NATO would need to make larger proportional increases than that, which was a legitimate Trump gripe from last time around that largely remains unfixed. Where are they going to find that much money except through deeply unpopular tax rises and/or cuts to social expenditure?
I think there are votes in ensuring our continent is controlled by a murderous fascist. This is not just about protecting Ukraine, it's about safeguarding Europe from an economic and security catastrophe. Just a couple of examples:
(1) if Putin wins in Ukraine, refugee flows from east to west would be like nothing we have seen before.
(2) if he marched Russian troops into a Baltic state, markets across the world would tank.
Either proposition would be far more expensive than the additional defence expenditure needed to prevent then happening.
One thing I think we need to interrogate a lot more is whether Europe is getting value from its military spending. UK + EU spends enough to be the third most powerful military... but do we get value for that?
Doubtless there's huge inefficiency to having so many individual militaries...
His further comment was that Europe was not in a position to replace the assistance given by the US because none of us had adequate Air power or logistics. Which, he commented, reflected very badly on our defence priorities in recent decades.
There's been an unfortunate tendency in Europe to neglect the boring bits that actually make a military work. Transport aircraft, supply ships, ammunition stockpiles and the like. The upshot is availability rates that are shockingly low even in peacetime, hence that period a few years ago where Germany had no submarines or fighters available for deployment.
If Trump forces a 'peace' in Ukraine, Russia will go away and build up again safe in the knowledge that European politicians will take a peace deal as an excuse to quietly dump increases in defence spending. So their militaries will be in the same position as now, unable to sustain a war beyond 4-6 months because of shortages of ammo and parts, lack of airlift capacity, etc.
Fixing this will be expensive - forget 2.5% of GPD, we're taking 4% or more and a decade of work given the lead times on much of the required hardware.
Two big problems: first, Governments don't want to spend the money (because there are no votes in defence); second, no country in Europe is big enough to build a spectrum of capabilities remotely close to that of the United States, so it needs a whole group of committed and reliable allies to make the required level of investment. If the UK elected to rebuild itself as a naval power and helped to pay for it by economising on the army, which would be a logical use of our finite resources, then a large flotilla of capable submarines and destroyers would still be of only limited use without Germany, for example, fielding a load of tanks.
We need everyone to pull their weight, not just a collection of frightened states around the Baltic Sea. The prospects for this happening do not look encouraging. The UK would need to find £30bn a year extra just to bring its military budget up to the American standard in terms of percentage of GDP; most of NATO would need to make larger proportional increases than that, which was a legitimate Trump gripe from last time around that largely remains unfixed. Where are they going to find that much money except through deeply unpopular tax rises and/or cuts to social expenditure?
I think there are votes in ensuring our continent is controlled by a murderous fascist. This is not just about protecting Ukraine, it's about safeguarding Europe from an economic and security catastrophe. Just a couple of examples:
(1) if Putin wins in Ukraine, refugee flows from east to west would be like nothing we have seen before.
(2) if he marched Russian troops into a Baltic state, markets across the world would tank.
Either proposition would be far more expensive than the additional defence expenditure needed to prevent then happening.
I agree, but the voters won't until something like that actually happens, by which point it will be far too late.
Possibly the best ever takedown of the US “Deep State”, vindication for what DOGE are doing, and confirmation that USAID was basically the CIA doing what the CIA were told not to do for the last couple of decades.
Warning: this video features Joe Rogan and Mike Benz, and is 202 minutes long.
It turns out that Rory Stewart’s wife’s charity was also getting millions from USAID.
Yes, that's how foreign aid often works. You give money to a charity to do charitable work.
And it’s totally incidental that these charities appear to be vastly overpopulated with close relatives of the politicians involved in the funding decisions.
There needs to be a British DOGE.
Your anti corruption credentials will be sorely tested these coming years as a Trump and Musk supporter.
I’m not a Trump supporter, but I’m absolutely a Musk supporter. Every Western country is going to have to deal with a line-item audit of their spending at some point.
Musk doesn't work for the US government or US people, he works for Musk.
No, he works directly for the elected President.
Tell me, what do you think of Trump's actions towards Ukraine?
What *actions* specifically? Not words, actions.
The action of cutting USAID support to Ukraine.
The action of talking to Putin and not Zelenskyy about the future of Ukraine.
Of blaming Ukraine "not a great war for them to get into".
Yeah, which idiot decided to set up their state next to Russia ? Just careless.
Which idiot decided to set up their state next to Mexican drug cartels?
Whereas the map of Europe proves that God is an Englishman.
Not sure that the Irish, Welsh or Scots would agree.
Reading the BBC about Reeves brings something to mind that I've thought a lot about. One quote "most of the first decade of her career at the Bank of England". And then "I spent the best part of a decade as an economist at the Bank of England." Are either of those phrases actually that innacurate?
I muse on the meaning of 'most'. And also the common use of decimate.
I propose that the common use of the two words is out of line with the dictionary definition. Decimate is to reduce by 10 % (from the barbaric Roman punishment meted out to poorly performing units). Yet common use would suggest a far higher loss than 10%.
Similarly when I here 'most' (as in for example 'most people love pineapple on pizza') I think of 80-90% of people when the reality is it can mean 52%. As in 52% of those who voted voted for Brexit. Yet to say most people voted for Brexit feels wrong.
I can't be the only one thinking this.
Yes "most" implies by a distance. To me it does anyway.
Your Party Right or Wrong eh?
I really thought you were a bit brighter than this @kinabalu . When the most impartial (some would say left leaning) broadcaster uncovers more examples of exaggeration and lies on her CV, and now the possibility of expenses wrongdoing and you still mindlessly and uncritically support her?
You are the Labour Party equivalent of HYUFD, or probably worse, a MAGA supporter.
Er, my interpretation of "most" speaks against Reeves. It implies she's overegging.
Have you stopped reading things?
I read pretty thoroughly, and I am reading that you are desperately trying to excuse a liar simply because she wears a red rosette. We now have the suggestion that she was "economic" with her interpretation of expenses rules. This is on top of the hideously inappropriate acceptance of bungs in the form of clothes from a Labour donor.
Not a good look really is it? Very few other walks of life would find this acceptable. Her probity is being proven to be no better, and probably worse, than Boris Johnson.
Surely it is a good thing for an economist to be "economic" with their interpretation of expenses rules.
Possibly the best ever takedown of the US “Deep State”, vindication for what DOGE are doing, and confirmation that USAID was basically the CIA doing what the CIA were told not to do for the last couple of decades.
Warning: this video features Joe Rogan and Mike Benz, and is 202 minutes long.
It turns out that Rory Stewart’s wife’s charity was also getting millions from USAID.
Yes, that's how foreign aid often works. You give money to a charity to do charitable work.
And it’s totally incidental that these charities appear to be vastly overpopulated with close relatives of the politicians involved in the funding decisions.
There needs to be a British DOGE.
Your anti corruption credentials will be sorely tested these coming years as a Trump and Musk supporter.
I’m not a Trump supporter, but I’m absolutely a Musk supporter. Every Western country is going to have to deal with a line-item audit of their spending at some point.
Musk doesn't work for the US government or US people, he works for Musk.
No, he works directly for the elected President.
You think?...
I note State has just ordered $400m worth of Cybertrucks...
Is the cybertruck order an instance of:-
Elon grifting?
the SoS currying favour?
the deep state manufacturing a conflict of interest in order to recuse Musk?
His further comment was that Europe was not in a position to replace the assistance given by the US because none of us had adequate Air power or logistics. Which, he commented, reflected very badly on our defence priorities in recent decades.
There's been an unfortunate tendency in Europe to neglect the boring bits that actually make a military work. Transport aircraft, supply ships, ammunition stockpiles and the like. The upshot is availability rates that are shockingly low even in peacetime, hence that period a few years ago where Germany had no submarines or fighters available for deployment.
If Trump forces a 'peace' in Ukraine, Russia will go away and build up again safe in the knowledge that European politicians will take a peace deal as an excuse to quietly dump increases in defence spending. So their militaries will be in the same position as now, unable to sustain a war beyond 4-6 months because of shortages of ammo and parts, lack of airlift capacity, etc.
Fixing this will be expensive - forget 2.5% of GPD, we're taking 4% or more and a decade of work given the lead times on much of the required hardware.
Two big problems: first, Governments don't want to spend the money (because there are no votes in defence); second, no country in Europe is big enough to build a spectrum of capabilities remotely close to that of the United States, so it needs a whole group of committed and reliable allies to make the required level of investment. If the UK elected to rebuild itself as a naval power and helped to pay for it by economising on the army, which would be a logical use of our finite resources, then a large flotilla of capable submarines and destroyers would still be of only limited use without Germany, for example, fielding a load of tanks.
We need everyone to pull their weight, not just a collection of frightened states around the Baltic Sea. The prospects for this happening do not look encouraging. The UK would need to find £30bn a year extra just to bring its military budget up to the American standard in terms of percentage of GDP; most of NATO would need to make larger proportional increases than that, which was a legitimate Trump gripe from last time around that largely remains unfixed. Where are they going to find that much money except through deeply unpopular tax rises and/or cuts to social expenditure?
We much prefer to give public sector workers enormous pensions.
And far better holiday entitlement too. Something when they whinge about their pay comparing it to the private sector they singularly omit to mention.
Employers contribution to the local govt scheme is around 19%, the NHS is over 25% (cannot quite remember what the figure was on my wifes latest statement but it was over 25%).
By employer they, of course, mean us the taxpayer. Their pension is final salary too. Private sector (thanks Gordon) get to take their chances with a DC scheme.
I get, as a contribution, and it is not bad for private sector, 9%.
Yes, I do get 30 days holiday per year, but I also have worked weekends on call, with no time off in lieu for my entire career, on top of a 5 day week.
I got Time off in Lieu for my on-call time when I worked for the NHS. And I got upgraded six months before I retired. I was very, very lucky. Much better than when worked 'outside'.
His further comment was that Europe was not in a position to replace the assistance given by the US because none of us had adequate Air power or logistics. Which, he commented, reflected very badly on our defence priorities in recent decades.
There's been an unfortunate tendency in Europe to neglect the boring bits that actually make a military work. Transport aircraft, supply ships, ammunition stockpiles and the like. The upshot is availability rates that are shockingly low even in peacetime, hence that period a few years ago where Germany had no submarines or fighters available for deployment.
If Trump forces a 'peace' in Ukraine, Russia will go away and build up again safe in the knowledge that European politicians will take a peace deal as an excuse to quietly dump increases in defence spending. So their militaries will be in the same position as now, unable to sustain a war beyond 4-6 months because of shortages of ammo and parts, lack of airlift capacity, etc.
Fixing this will be expensive - forget 2.5% of GPD, we're taking 4% or more and a decade of work given the lead times on much of the required hardware.
Two big problems: first, Governments don't want to spend the money (because there are no votes in defence); second, no country in Europe is big enough to build a spectrum of capabilities remotely close to that of the United States, so it needs a whole group of committed and reliable allies to make the required level of investment. If the UK elected to rebuild itself as a naval power and helped to pay for it by economising on the army, which would be a logical use of our finite resources, then a large flotilla of capable submarines and destroyers would still be of only limited use without Germany, for example, fielding a load of tanks.
We need everyone to pull their weight, not just a collection of frightened states around the Baltic Sea. The prospects for this happening do not look encouraging. The UK would need to find £30bn a year extra just to bring its military budget up to the American standard in terms of percentage of GDP; most of NATO would need to make larger proportional increases than that, which was a legitimate Trump gripe from last time around that largely remains unfixed. Where are they going to find that much money except through deeply unpopular tax rises and/or cuts to social expenditure?
We much prefer to give public sector workers enormous pensions.
And far better holiday entitlement too. Something when they whinge about their pay comparing it to the private sector they singularly omit to mention.
Employers contribution to the local govt scheme is around 19%, the NHS is over 25% (cannot quite remember what the figure was on my wifes latest statement but it was over 25%).
By employer they, of course, mean us the taxpayer. Their pension is final salary too. Private sector (thanks Gordon) get to take their chances with a DC scheme.
I get, as a contribution, and it is not bad for private sector, 9%.
Yes, I do get 30 days holiday per year, but I also have worked weekends on call, with no time off in lieu for my entire career, on top of a 5 day week.
I got Time off in Lieu for my on-call time when I worked for the NHS. And I got upgraded six months before I retired. I was very, very lucky. Much better than when worked 'outside'.
The employers' contribution to the pension scheme in the public sector isn't ringfenced for that employee, unlike a money-purchase private pension, that 25% is also paying the cost of pensions for current pensioners. A function of increased life expectancy, outsourcing (so fewer paying in) and other factors.
If they said they were banning subsidies on these things, then OK. Free market rulez & all that. But forcing the grid to bury cables? Banning battery storage? Every policy here is going to raise bills, not lower them!
It seems that if you’re pro-development the only party you can reasonably vote for right now (no matter how flawed) is the Labour Party.
Hang on a minute. You (forgive me if I'm recalling this wrongly) have passionately defended 20mph zones on the grounds of safety, as well as ULEZ zones on the grounds of pollution danger. Yet you're happy with a Wild West situation in the setting up of massive battery stations, when one recently caught fire in California, causing skyscraper flames that couldn't be extinguished and despoiling the country for miles around. So do your lot actually give a shit about safety, or is safety just a weapon to be deployed in the defence of your agenda, happily ignored when it suits you?
I haven't seen the original Reform quote so maybe I am being unfair, but the original post just said 'Banning battery storage' so I am relying on that. I hope that is not what Reform are proposing.
Nobody here said they were in favour of unsafe battery storage, they were just commenting upon banning battery storage (safe or otherwise). You brought in the unsafe element to the discussion. All energy production is dangerous and has environmental impacts, particularly when it goes wrong and nuclear, solar, wind, etc, etc tend to have a much better safety and environmental record than traditional energy production. That doesn't mean they don't have any impact or go wrong, sometime spectacularly. You try to mitigate that.
The alternative is no energy production whatsoever.
Then you also haven't seen Reform's justification for their moratorium, which is that they've been unable to establish which agency will be responsible for any safety breaches on these sites and that the overseas builders of these stations will simply conform to their own ideas of safety.
Comments
They announced it, and when people noticed this looks like grift, they changed the announcement
It no longer says Tesla
It now just says electric vehicles. Everyone will be amazed when Tesla win the bid...
Employers contribution to the local govt scheme is around 19%, the NHS is over 25% (cannot quite remember what the figure was on my wifes latest statement but it was over 25%).
By employer they, of course, mean us the taxpayer. Their pension is final salary too. Private sector (thanks Gordon) get to take their chances with a DC scheme.
I get, as a contribution, and it is not bad for private sector, 9%.
Listen to War and Punishment by Mikhail Zygar on Audible. https://www.audible.co.uk/pd/B0BVWL85X3?source_code=ASSOR150021921000V
It's an extraordinary story.
(A wild guess there.)
Doubling our forces personnel count is more than a financial issue.
Taxes are going to have to go up. Borrowing too. Not only here, but everywhere. This is not just about politicians rising to the moment, it is about all of us doing so. We have spent decades rightly lionising the sacrifices made by our forebears during WW2. Let' see if we are prepared to accept a fraction of the hardship they went through to keep our country and continent safe from fascist aggression.
(Runs for cover...)
NEW THREAD
With taxes on incomes and productive economic activity already where they are, there is no solution to finding huge sums of extra money for essential investment in areas like public infrastructure and defence that does not encompass making elderly benefits stingier, or extracting a lot more money from the elderly in taxes - and the one policy even more unpopular than snatching benefits from granny is going after her house, whether it's ramping up property taxes whilst she's still living there or creaming off a big chunk of the estate after she's been carried out in a box. Is it any wonder we are all, collectively, up the proverbial sans paddle?
Surely you lock him up for an appropriate amount of time in Germany and then boot him out when that's done? Although maybe the appropriate amount of time is life.
It's fine to send people back if the country in question has rule of law etc and jurisdiction to themselves lock him up for life. But in most cases, if the perpetrator is an asylum seeker, that probably cannot be relied on. Even if the current regime obliges - say if this had happened in pre-current-Taliban Afghanistan - the next one might make him foreign secretary.
(1) if Putin wins in Ukraine, refugee flows from east to west would be like nothing we have seen before.
(2) if he marched Russian troops into a Baltic state, markets across the world would tank.
Either proposition would be far more expensive than the additional defence expenditure needed to prevent then happening.
Doubtless there's huge inefficiency to having so many individual militaries...
The experiment is a terrible failure and it will be reversed
Drain the swamp! Drain the swamp! Drain the swamp!
I was very, very lucky.
Much better than when worked 'outside'.
It doesn't look great to me:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/17/california-battery-plant-fire-monterey