How are we not involved when we permit B52s to fly to bomb Iran from Fairford and Diego Garcia, have active RAF missions in the theatre taking down missiles, sending warships to the area, and in discussions over the straights of Hormuz
Italy and Spain however can claim they are not involved as they have banned all use of their bases and air space by the US
You've been told why a zillion times.
The definition between bombing civilian areas and clearly defined military installations.
If you can't grasp that you have a limited iq.
You clearly have an advanced iq.
You are just spinning political crap therefore to deliberately mislead
The modern day political right.
Tell a lie often enough to con the intellectually challenged.
Do you think the Iranians think we are involved or not? Simple question.
@NickPalmer has observed in the past that people choose their vote much more via vibe than by totting up a balance sheet of policies and cooly comparing to other parties.
Indeed. Two points to support that
The recent movement by @RochdalePioneers from the LDs, based on the personalities of Cons
The frequently-noted failure of "deliverism": the belief that if a set of popular policies is enacted successfully then the voter will reward them. Biden thought that and it didn't work. Starmer (well, those who write his thoughts for him: I've just given up totally) also "thinks" that and given the polls that isn't working either.
Yes, vibe. I think much of the surge in support for Polanski and his Greens is from people sick to the back teeth of the main parties (ex LD) pandering to the reactionary Little Englander tendencies of a certain type of voter. It's been a theme for years. Flags, too many immigrants, soft touch for foreigners, lol @ climate change, charity begins at home, what about our veterans, health and safety gone mad, war on woke, we want our country back, etc. They got their Brexit (and empowered Johnson to deliver it) and now they have their very own party in Reform. That's fine, it's democracy, but there are lots of people who want to kickback against all of this stuff. "Fuck off Farage" is a big part of the statement being made.
Are you Paul Mason? You’re almost as fruitlessly repetitive and have been on a similar journey from Jezzaism to whatever jellyfish entity Starmer embodies. Don”t think he’s ever said he’d vote Reform to stymy the Greens yet, but who knows how the kaleidoscope will shake out.
That's a bit unfair. I don't think Horse was ever Jezzaist. He's always favoured Labour overall but has always been willing to criticise them and/or praise other parties. I'd say he'd been pretty consistent.
He was also a massive lockdown proponent who now believes we should never have locked down. I recall endless "Lockdown NOW" posts.
Parents of a 2 and 5 year old trialling social media hour limits for a major trial.
Mother commented along the lines of.
Kids were OK for a day itr so but then we could not control the tantrums and unruly behaviour.
WTAF
Have these fuckwits no idea if parenting, of discipline of tough love.
Have they not heard of a simple 2 letter word.
NO
Grounding
Taking away of perks
Sending to Riim
Dare I say it, an occasional Smack
Or should we insist every teenager has to have a formal grounding in Parenting Skills to be allowed to procreate.
This is a creeping incidiius move to ANARCHY
God your parenting sounds more deluded than your politics.
I have a 3 year old and a 6 year old that are well behaved for their age. No need for any smacking, grounding or the like. You just need to enforce boundaries calmly and consistently. And not lose your temper.
The government guidance to minimise screen time and avoid addictive apps or games is a good one. For various reasons parents can find it hard in practice but it's a worthy goal and will improve development and behaviour at a societal level.
If he did smack a child here in Wales he would have committed a criminal act
Well, not zero. The video specifically opposes the racism and division that so much of our politics is about. It speaks for our common humanity.
@NickPalmer has observed in the past that people choose their vote much more via vibe than by totting up a balance sheet of policies and cooly comparing to other parties.
They ask themselves "is this a party that matches my values? Is this a party that gets my issues and will speak for me?"
That is how Polanski is doing so well. The message is a very positive one, of hope, and one unafraid to speak for pluralism and modern Britain. This is a unique approach in current politics.
Really?
At the Spring Conference the Greens are voting on a motion opposing the government's proposals to fight racism and anti-semitism in the NHS. Who's that positive and hopeful for? Racists and anti-semites presumably. It's certainly representative of a very unpleasant aspect of modern Britain - the way anti-semitism has become embedded in once respectable organisations and professions.
Polanski has also refused to condemn members of the public going from door to door canvassing for a boycott of Israel and its goods, and noting down those who disagree. He did not understand why this might seem frightening and sinister to Jewish people. And no this is not like normal political canvassing.
Nor has he condemned his deputy, Mothin Ali, who attacked a Jewish university chaplain, forcing him to go into hiding and whose wife received rape threats. Ali recently attended a demonstration protesting against attacks on the Iranian regime which has slaughtered tens of thousands of its citizens, is executing children as young as 14, rapes women prisoners as a matter of course and did this so violently to two nurses who helped those wounded by the regime that they lost part of their intestines and, in one case, their uterus.
Perhaps this is what some have called the Green Party’s “fresh new ideas”. To this jaded eye, they rather resemble some older, very sour ideas, whose impact on ordinary people is well-described in Sally Carson’s novel “Crooked Cross”, written in the 1930’s after her time in Germany. She wrote that as a warning, not a manual to be followed.
As you should know. You recommended it.
It isn't anti-semitic to oppose the Israeli government or boycott Israeli goods.
If someone specifically boycotts Israeli goods but not goods from any other country it would suggest they are anti-semitic.
I'm still unclear as to whether it's antisemitic to conflate all Jews with the state of Israel, or antisemitic to draw attention to Jews who are citizens of other countries strongly identifying with the state of Israel. All very confusing.
It's definitely anti-semitic to attack Jews who oppose the policies of the Israeli govt because they are Jews people opposed to the policies of the Israeli govt. Which renders most supporters of the current Israeli govt anti-semitic.
The rest needs a bit more clarification. We could start with some non-edge cases... 1) Settlers who attack and murder Palestinians and Bedouins because they want their land (with the excuse that their God granted it to them). Is there unanimity that it's OK to criticise them without being classed anti-semitic?
I think the safe thing to do is to avert one’s eyes from the settler movement and pretend you haven’t noticed it. Even noticing can be antisemitic nowadays.
The settler movement is the main thing puts Israel in the dock for me. I get that Israelis feel under constant threat, surrounded by enemies on all sides. But this isn't their land.
Well some of them have been talking, Smotrich even being quoted, about seizing all of Lebanon south of the Litani river.
The outcomes from the Gulf blockade are starting to look very bad - oil and gas shortages, fertilizer and so food shortages, computer chip shortages, high inflation in the next two years. This could mean that eventually a military solution will have to be considered, with a ground occupation of Iran.
This might not necessarily be US led, as India, China, and many other countries will have their own reasons to be concerned. We appear to be heading into World War III, in the sense that if the blockage continues it will have worldwide effects and it could lead to a world war.
I am reliably informed there are fuel issues in Thailand, eg shortage of diesel. Not serious, but concerning (as opposed to alarming!)
Given nothing is getting through the Strait I would be making sure you family has got what it needs now. Best to have a full tank then discovering an issue later
My sister bought a BMW i3 yesterday - she was going to get something like it sometime this year as a runaround for nursery/shops etc and ended up just finding and getting one this week in case there are restrictions on petrol at some stage. Made sense to move it up, if nothing bad happens then it’s not a problem as she would be doing it at some point this year and if fuel is short then she will be laughing. So prepared for the worst but without having to do anything silly.
If she’s doing it anyway probably makes sense now. There’s a risk the prices will go up for new and second hand cars as happened during Covid.
Labour and Tories are a combined 39% for most seats. It would be a pretty seismic change if we had a new party as the official opposition, let alone most seats, so backing both Labour and Tories in this market for most seats feels like it should be value - except that I don't think Reform's recent decline is fated to continue.
The people of Britain seem to be pretty discontented, and when the inflation following Trump's war hits, their rage is going to be incandescent.
There’s going to be a shortage of helium critical for hospital MRI machines and for manufacturing advanced chips like those from NVIDIA Corp after damage to a major gas facility in Qatar, Bloomberg reports.
Fees will also rise. Suppliers are prioritising healthcare.
I'm told the chip/disk shortage, partly due to a buy up by cloud providers, partly due to the helium shortage has put up disk array costs by around 50% in the last month, with 80% expected to be incoming shortly.
And for those that don't know, the helium shortage relates to the reduction in the production of natural gas. Helium occurs as the result of radiative decay n the earth and gets trapped in the natural gas formations as it makes its way up. So nearly all Helium used is captured from natural gas.
This will affect a range of industries. Not just party balloons.
Oxford Instruments was doing some good work with high temperature (liquid nitrogen temperature) superconductors. I wonder where they have got to, by now?
Not to market yet. Its the dream really - N2 you can grab from the air. Helium not so much.
Yeah. Though I hear that some groups are getting close to getting a material that you can actually manufacture in quantity that can be both high temp superconducting and take/make serious Teslas of field.
The outcomes from the Gulf blockade are starting to look very bad - oil and gas shortages, fertilizer and so food shortages, computer chip shortages, high inflation in the next two years. This could mean that eventually a military solution will have to be considered, with a ground occupation of Iran.
This might not necessarily be US led, as India, China, and many other countries will have their own reasons to be concerned. We appear to be heading into World War III, in the sense that if the blockage continues it will have worldwide effects and it could lead to a world war.
I am reliably informed there are fuel issues in Thailand, eg shortage of diesel. Not serious, but concerning (as opposed to alarming!)
Given nothing is getting through the Strait I would be making sure you family has got what it needs now. Best to have a full tank then discovering an issue later
My sister bought a BMW i3 yesterday - she was going to get something like it sometime this year as a runaround for nursery/shops etc and ended up just finding and getting one this week in case there are restrictions on petrol at some stage. Made sense to move it up, if nothing bad happens then it’s not a problem as she would be doing it at some point this year and if fuel is short then she will be laughing. So prepared for the worst but without having to do anything silly.
"Voting Tory will cause your wife to have bigger breasts and increase your chances of owning a BMW M3." - Boris, 2005.
Labour and Tories are a combined 39% for most seats. It would be a pretty seismic change if we had a new party as the official opposition, let alone most seats, so backing both Labour and Tories in this market for most seats feels like it should be value - except that I don't think Reform's recent decline is fated to continue.
The people of Britain seem to be pretty discontented, and when the inflation following Trump's war hits, their rage is going to be incandescent.
Which is why the Govt needs to bang home at every possible occasion that the inflation is the fault of Trump and to pin Farage to Trump.
Well, not zero. The video specifically opposes the racism and division that so much of our politics is about. It speaks for our common humanity.
@NickPalmer has observed in the past that people choose their vote much more via vibe than by totting up a balance sheet of policies and cooly comparing to other parties.
They ask themselves "is this a party that matches my values? Is this a party that gets my issues and will speak for me?"
That is how Polanski is doing so well. The message is a very positive one, of hope, and one unafraid to speak for pluralism and modern Britain. This is a unique approach in current politics.
Really?
At the Spring Conference the Greens are voting on a motion opposing the government's proposals to fight racism and anti-semitism in the NHS. Who's that positive and hopeful for? Racists and anti-semites presumably. It's certainly representative of a very unpleasant aspect of modern Britain - the way anti-semitism has become embedded in once respectable organisations and professions.
Polanski has also refused to condemn members of the public going from door to door canvassing for a boycott of Israel and its goods, and noting down those who disagree. He did not understand why this might seem frightening and sinister to Jewish people. And no this is not like normal political canvassing.
Nor has he condemned his deputy, Mothin Ali, who attacked a Jewish university chaplain, forcing him to go into hiding and whose wife received rape threats. Ali recently attended a demonstration protesting against attacks on the Iranian regime which has slaughtered tens of thousands of its citizens, is executing children as young as 14, rapes women prisoners as a matter of course and did this so violently to two nurses who helped those wounded by the regime that they lost part of their intestines and, in one case, their uterus.
Perhaps this is what some have called the Green Party’s “fresh new ideas”. To this jaded eye, they rather resemble some older, very sour ideas, whose impact on ordinary people is well-described in Sally Carson’s novel “Crooked Cross”, written in the 1930’s after her time in Germany. She wrote that as a warning, not a manual to be followed.
As you should know. You recommended it.
It isn't anti-semitic to oppose the Israeli government or boycott Israeli goods.
If someone specifically boycotts Israeli goods but not goods from any other country it would suggest they are anti-semitic.
I'm still unclear as to whether it's antisemitic to conflate all Jews with the state of Israel, or antisemitic to draw attention to Jews who are citizens of other countries strongly identifying with the state of Israel. All very confusing.
It's definitely anti-semitic to attack Jews who oppose the policies of the Israeli govt because they are Jews people opposed to the policies of the Israeli govt. Which renders most supporters of the current Israeli govt anti-semitic.
The rest needs a bit more clarification. We could start with some non-edge cases... 1) Settlers who attack and murder Palestinians and Bedouins because they want their land (with the excuse that their God granted it to them). Is there unanimity that it's OK to criticise them without being classed anti-semitic?
I think the safe thing to do is to avert one’s eyes from the settler movement and pretend you haven’t noticed it. Even noticing can be antisemitic nowadays.
The settler movement is the main thing puts Israel in the dock for me. I get that Israelis feel under constant threat, surrounded by enemies on all sides. But this isn't their land.
Well some of them have been talking, Smotrich even being quoted, about seizing all of Lebanon south of the Litani river.
It's not clear to me how you can persuade the Israelis to settle for a peace agreement that falls short of Ever Greater Israel, without weakening them sufficiently that you embolden those in the vicinity who would like to destroy Israel and expel all the Jews.
Ever Greater Israel isn't a stable settlement because, like with all Empires, there are always barbarians across the border who need pacifying. There will always be pressure to keep expanding in pursuit of an elusive security.
Labour and Tories are a combined 39% for most seats. It would be a pretty seismic change if we had a new party as the official opposition, let alone most seats, so backing both Labour and Tories in this market for most seats feels like it should be value - except that I don't think Reform's recent decline is fated to continue.
The people of Britain seem to be pretty discontented, and when the inflation following Trump's war hits, their rage is going to be incandescent.
Which is why the Govt needs to bang home at every possible occasion that the inflation is the fault of Trump and to pin Farage to Trump.
Unfortunately as Johnson found out with covid and the war in Ukraine it is the government that carries the can, fairly or unfairly
Labour and Tories are a combined 39% for most seats. It would be a pretty seismic change if we had a new party as the official opposition, let alone most seats, so backing both Labour and Tories in this market for most seats feels like it should be value - except that I don't think Reform's recent decline is fated to continue.
The people of Britain seem to be pretty discontented, and when the inflation following Trump's war hits, their rage is going to be incandescent.
Which is why the Govt needs to bang home at every possible occasion that the inflation is the fault of Trump and to pin Farage to Trump.
Definitely have to try, yes. Doesn't usually work, blaming external factors, but maybe this time, with Trump and his antics such a dominating media presence, there's more chance it will.
There’s going to be a shortage of helium critical for hospital MRI machines and for manufacturing advanced chips like those from NVIDIA Corp after damage to a major gas facility in Qatar, Bloomberg reports.
Fees will also rise. Suppliers are prioritising healthcare.
Which suppliers ? In any event, TSMC, Samsung, SK Hynix etc have reserves that should be OK through to June/July (better than earlier estimates which failed to account for them recycling the He they use with 70-80% efficiency).
Healthcare is probably less well covered.
And also in any event, if gas supplies are not restored by the summer, MRIs will be the least of our worries.
I like to keep an eye on the local by-elections and as others may have stated last night was notable.
The Cons won 3 of 4 - their best night in a long time. Now they were strong favorites for all three - including the LD-held one - and not winning any should have set alarm bells ringing. None the less the Cons won all three and really quite comfortably. Another little sign the Con decline seems to have bottomed out. They will still lose Councillors in 2026 but perhaps not as brutally as in 2025.
Lab ran a VERY strong candidate in a traditionally rock-solid Scunthorpe ward and were crushed by Reform. That tells me that the wave that is approaching defending Lab Councillors in May will probably be a tsunami comparable to 2025. Reform will not necessarily be the beneficiaries everywhere, probably will not be, but if anyone doubted Lab's performance in May will be disastrous then this single result should be enough to convince them.
Are you Paul Mason? You’re almost as fruitlessly repetitive and have been on a similar journey from Jezzaism to whatever jellyfish entity Starmer embodies. Don”t think he’s ever said he’d vote Reform to stymy the Greens yet, but who knows how the kaleidoscope will shake out.
That's a bit unfair. I don't think Horse was ever Jezzaist. He's always favoured Labour overall but has always been willing to criticise them and/or praise other parties. I'd say he'd been pretty consistent.
He was also a massive lockdown proponent who now believes we should never have locked down. I recall endless "Lockdown NOW" posts.
You are being extremely disingenuous.
I supported lockdown very strongly and would have supported more.
But this was on the basis we were protecting the elderly and there would be - I thought - some rebalancing after.
In fact things went even more towards them. On that basis it is now something I oppose because it was completely unfair. All that money spent on some elderly people and young people get mental health crisis not paid for, education debt, massive taxes. And elderly get another bung.
If I’d known it would have resulted like this, I’d have been against the whole thing.
Now with the knowledge I have, I’d have let them die. End of story.
Labour and Tories are a combined 39% for most seats. It would be a pretty seismic change if we had a new party as the official opposition, let alone most seats, so backing both Labour and Tories in this market for most seats feels like it should be value - except that I don't think Reform's recent decline is fated to continue.
The people of Britain seem to be pretty discontented, and when the inflation following Trump's war hits, their rage is going to be incandescent.
Which is why the Govt needs to bang home at every possible occasion that the inflation is the fault of Trump and to pin Farage to Trump.
Unfortunately as Johnson found out with covid and the war in Ukraine it is the government that carries the can, fairly or unfairly
An interesting concept. Do you think he would have lasted, given his proclivities, if Covid and Ukraine hadn't happened?
The outcomes from the Gulf blockade are starting to look very bad - oil and gas shortages, fertilizer and so food shortages, computer chip shortages, high inflation in the next two years. This could mean that eventually a military solution will have to be considered, with a ground occupation of Iran.
This might not necessarily be US led, as India, China, and many other countries will have their own reasons to be concerned. We appear to be heading into World War III, in the sense that if the blockage continues it will have worldwide effects and it could lead to a world war.
Or - it could unite the world into pounding Iran into a thick paste.
I see Reform UK Scotland have just lost their FIFTH parliamentary candidate in a week. Seem to be averaging about one a day. Obviously a triumph of their much-lauded (by them) "improved" vetting procedure.
Labour and Tories are a combined 39% for most seats. It would be a pretty seismic change if we had a new party as the official opposition, let alone most seats, so backing both Labour and Tories in this market for most seats feels like it should be value - except that I don't think Reform's recent decline is fated to continue.
The people of Britain seem to be pretty discontented, and when the inflation following Trump's war hits, their rage is going to be incandescent.
Which is why the Govt needs to bang home at every possible occasion that the inflation is the fault of Trump and to pin Farage to Trump.
Strategic Lunacy, so probably exactly what Starmer and Reeves would / will do.
Just suppose there is some sort of resolution to the Iran situation and anything which reduces the death toll of young kids from 30k to about 0 must be a positive then Trump with all his very real faults is in the "good guys" box as far as that is concerned.
THe global price of oil falls back to somewhere between where it was and where it is. You can already hear Starmer and Reeves taking the credit. DOH
Labour and Tories are a combined 39% for most seats. It would be a pretty seismic change if we had a new party as the official opposition, let alone most seats, so backing both Labour and Tories in this market for most seats feels like it should be value - except that I don't think Reform's recent decline is fated to continue.
The people of Britain seem to be pretty discontented, and when the inflation following Trump's war hits, their rage is going to be incandescent.
Which is why the Govt needs to bang home at every possible occasion that the inflation is the fault of Trump and to pin Farage to Trump.
Unfortunately as Johnson found out with covid and the war in Ukraine it is the government that carries the can, fairly or unfairly
Johnson only lost his popularity after the scandals came to light.
Labour and Tories are a combined 39% for most seats. It would be a pretty seismic change if we had a new party as the official opposition, let alone most seats, so backing both Labour and Tories in this market for most seats feels like it should be value - except that I don't think Reform's recent decline is fated to continue.
The people of Britain seem to be pretty discontented, and when the inflation following Trump's war hits, their rage is going to be incandescent.
Which is why the Govt needs to bang home at every possible occasion that the inflation is the fault of Trump and to pin Farage to Trump.
Unfortunately as Johnson found out with covid and the war in Ukraine it is the government that carries the can, fairly or unfairly
Hard to say. Johnson was brought down by Partygate when there were several better reasons to bring him down.
'A woman who defrauded more than £23,000 in benefits, claiming she was too ill to go outside, was caught surfing and ziplining in Mexico.
Catherine Wieland, 33, claimed she suffered anxiety so crippling she was housebound but the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) found evidence of her surfing in Cancun and visiting Thorpe Park three times.
Wieland, from Goring-by-Sea, West Sussex, claimed tens of thousands of pounds in Personal Independence Payments (Pip) over more than two years, spending the money on manicures, tanning sessions and trips to a private Harley Street dentist.
It sounds like someone grassed her up rather than detective work by the DWP's Miss Marples.
No real penalty aside from needing to repay benefits and some minor embarrassment at the check-out if there is anyone left reading the local paper. And how will she repay benefits from no income?
How are we not involved when we permit B52s to fly to bomb Iran from Fairford and Diego Garcia, have active RAF missions in the theatre taking down missiles, sending warships to the area, and in discussions over the straights of Hormuz
Italy and Spain however can claim they are not involved as they have banned all use of their bases and air space by the US
Well, not zero. The video specifically opposes the racism and division that so much of our politics is about. It speaks for our common humanity.
@NickPalmer has observed in the past that people choose their vote much more via vibe than by totting up a balance sheet of policies and cooly comparing to other parties.
They ask themselves "is this a party that matches my values? Is this a party that gets my issues and will speak for me?"
That is how Polanski is doing so well. The message is a very positive one, of hope, and one unafraid to speak for pluralism and modern Britain. This is a unique approach in current politics.
Really?
At the Spring Conference the Greens are voting on a motion opposing the government's proposals to fight racism and anti-semitism in the NHS. Who's that positive and hopeful for? Racists and anti-semites presumably. It's certainly representative of a very unpleasant aspect of modern Britain - the way anti-semitism has become embedded in once respectable organisations and professions.
Polanski has also refused to condemn members of the public going from door to door canvassing for a boycott of Israel and its goods, and noting down those who disagree. He did not understand why this might seem frightening and sinister to Jewish people. And no this is not like normal political canvassing.
Nor has he condemned his deputy, Mothin Ali, who attacked a Jewish university chaplain, forcing him to go into hiding and whose wife received rape threats. Ali recently attended a demonstration protesting against attacks on the Iranian regime which has slaughtered tens of thousands of its citizens, is executing children as young as 14, rapes women prisoners as a matter of course and did this so violently to two nurses who helped those wounded by the regime that they lost part of their intestines and, in one case, their uterus.
Perhaps this is what some have called the Green Party’s “fresh new ideas”. To this jaded eye, they rather resemble some older, very sour ideas, whose impact on ordinary people is well-described in Sally Carson’s novel “Crooked Cross”, written in the 1930’s after her time in Germany. She wrote that as a warning, not a manual to be followed.
As you should know. You recommended it.
I concur entirely. I'm afraid you are wasting your time with the pb blokes however. They just don't wanna know.
It is of course possible that "the government's proposals to fight racism and anti-semitism in the NHS" are actually shit, won't work and will have unintended consequences. Cyclefree hasn't said what they are. Nor what Mothin Ali said about the chaplain.
Mothin Ali criticized the Chaplain, an IDF reservist, for going to Israel to serve in the IDF after October 7th.
Are you Paul Mason? You’re almost as fruitlessly repetitive and have been on a similar journey from Jezzaism to whatever jellyfish entity Starmer embodies. Don”t think he’s ever said he’d vote Reform to stymy the Greens yet, but who knows how the kaleidoscope will shake out.
That's a bit unfair. I don't think Horse was ever Jezzaist. He's always favoured Labour overall but has always been willing to criticise them and/or praise other parties. I'd say he'd been pretty consistent.
He was also a massive lockdown proponent who now believes we should never have locked down. I recall endless "Lockdown NOW" posts.
You are being extremely disingenuous.
I supported lockdown very strongly and would have supported more.
But this was on the basis we were protecting the elderly and there would be - I thought - some rebalancing after.
In fact things went even more towards them. On that basis it is now something I oppose because it was completely unfair. All that money spent on some elderly people and young people get mental health crisis not paid for, education debt, massive taxes. And elderly get another bung.
If I’d known it would have resulted like this, I’d have been against the whole thing.
Now with the knowledge I have, I’d have let them die. End of story.
Very Dickensian. The deserving and the undeserving. With you as the judge, jury and executioner.
And we all know that had the Government done that you would have been on here for ever more accusing them all of being murderers.
I see Reform UK Scotland have just lost their FIFTH parliamentary candidate in a week. Seem to be averaging about one a day. Obviously a triumph of their much-lauded (by them) "improved" vetting procedure.
I see Reform UK Scotland have just lost their FIFTH parliamentary candidate in a week. Seem to be averaging about one a day. Obviously a triumph of their much-lauded (by them) "improved" vetting procedure.
I have just had a man at my front door canvassing for Reform in the local elections. He was wearing a track suit and a baseball cap with Reform written on it. He made the Green Party's Hannah the Plumber look smartly-dressed.
Trump Land, otherwise known as Gilead, becomes ever more surreal. The DoJ have fought a case on behalf of ICE for over a year on the basis that all of their deportations were regulated and conducted in compliance with a memorandum entitled Civil Immigration Enforcement Actions in or Near Courthouses, dated May 27, 2025. Now they have "corrected" this by saying this never applied to Immigration Courts: https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.646893/gov.uscourts.nysd.646893.77.0.pdf
The consequence is that many of the hearings will need to be reargued. The attorneys seek to excuse themselves by saying that the attorneys for ICE lied to them.
That's amazing. Despite your preamble, I thought that picture was Corbyn when I clicked on the link.
Isn't it incredible?
I also presumed it was Corbyn, indeed I was about to move on. to another article, vaguely wondering why the Guardian had a big pic of Corbz in an article about B Bragg Esq, and then I looked again
Bragg has moprhed into a Jezbollah doppelganger. I guess he's leaning into it, with the cap and donkey jacket, but still. Wow
Are you Paul Mason? You’re almost as fruitlessly repetitive and have been on a similar journey from Jezzaism to whatever jellyfish entity Starmer embodies. Don”t think he’s ever said he’d vote Reform to stymy the Greens yet, but who knows how the kaleidoscope will shake out.
That's a bit unfair. I don't think Horse was ever Jezzaist. He's always favoured Labour overall but has always been willing to criticise them and/or praise other parties. I'd say he'd been pretty consistent.
He was also a massive lockdown proponent who now believes we should never have locked down. I recall endless "Lockdown NOW" posts.
You are being extremely disingenuous.
I supported lockdown very strongly and would have supported more.
But this was on the basis we were protecting the elderly and there would be - I thought - some rebalancing after.
In fact things went even more towards them. On that basis it is now something I oppose because it was completely unfair. All that money spent on some elderly people and young people get mental health crisis not paid for, education debt, massive taxes. And elderly get another bung.
If I’d known it would have resulted like this, I’d have been against the whole thing.
Now with the knowledge I have, I’d have let them die. End of story.
Very Dickensian. The deserving and the undeserving. With you as the judge, jury and executioner.
And we all know that had the Government done that you would have been on here for ever more accusing them all of being murderers.
I can tell you with all honesty Richard if the known outcome had been the continued existence of the triple lock and so on, I’d have been fully supportive of letting nature take its course.
Are you Paul Mason? You’re almost as fruitlessly repetitive and have been on a similar journey from Jezzaism to whatever jellyfish entity Starmer embodies. Don”t think he’s ever said he’d vote Reform to stymy the Greens yet, but who knows how the kaleidoscope will shake out.
That's a bit unfair. I don't think Horse was ever Jezzaist. He's always favoured Labour overall but has always been willing to criticise them and/or praise other parties. I'd say he'd been pretty consistent.
He was also a massive lockdown proponent who now believes we should never have locked down. I recall endless "Lockdown NOW" posts.
You are being extremely disingenuous.
I supported lockdown very strongly and would have supported more.
But this was on the basis we were protecting the elderly and there would be - I thought - some rebalancing after.
In fact things went even more towards them. On that basis it is now something I oppose because it was completely unfair. All that money spent on some elderly people and young people get mental health crisis not paid for, education debt, massive taxes. And elderly get another bung.
If I’d known it would have resulted like this, I’d have been against the whole thing.
Now with the knowledge I have, I’d have let them die. End of story.
My morality does not require people to be grateful if I save their life. Satisfaction in the deed itself.
Let’s hope for your sake you don’t come to resemble old green teeth d’Annunzio. That Speccie portrait of your stalker shows signs of him going that way.
d'Annunzio had his first sex with a lesbian at the age of 70, and she was 19. In the morning he dismissed her from his bed, then breakfasted on champagne and tiny marmalade cakes
Are you Paul Mason? You’re almost as fruitlessly repetitive and have been on a similar journey from Jezzaism to whatever jellyfish entity Starmer embodies. Don”t think he’s ever said he’d vote Reform to stymy the Greens yet, but who knows how the kaleidoscope will shake out.
That's a bit unfair. I don't think Horse was ever Jezzaist. He's always favoured Labour overall but has always been willing to criticise them and/or praise other parties. I'd say he'd been pretty consistent.
He was also a massive lockdown proponent who now believes we should never have locked down. I recall endless "Lockdown NOW" posts.
You are being extremely disingenuous.
I supported lockdown very strongly and would have supported more.
But this was on the basis we were protecting the elderly and there would be - I thought - some rebalancing after.
In fact things went even more towards them. On that basis it is now something I oppose because it was completely unfair. All that money spent on some elderly people and young people get mental health crisis not paid for, education debt, massive taxes. And elderly get another bung.
If I’d known it would have resulted like this, I’d have been against the whole thing.
Now with the knowledge I have, I’d have let them die. End of story.
My morality does not require people to be grateful if I save their life. Satisfaction in the deed itself.
If you sincerely sat down and tried to design the ugliest building in the history of architecture, you'd be hard pushed to beat that. It is so bad it has gone beyond so-bad-it-is-good into a deeper realm of Satanic and demonical ugliness, designed to demoralise by its mere presence
How the F did Obama sign off on it? What happened?
Are you Paul Mason? You’re almost as fruitlessly repetitive and have been on a similar journey from Jezzaism to whatever jellyfish entity Starmer embodies. Don”t think he’s ever said he’d vote Reform to stymy the Greens yet, but who knows how the kaleidoscope will shake out.
That's a bit unfair. I don't think Horse was ever Jezzaist. He's always favoured Labour overall but has always been willing to criticise them and/or praise other parties. I'd say he'd been pretty consistent.
He was also a massive lockdown proponent who now believes we should never have locked down. I recall endless "Lockdown NOW" posts.
You are being extremely disingenuous.
I supported lockdown very strongly and would have supported more.
But this was on the basis we were protecting the elderly and there would be - I thought - some rebalancing after.
In fact things went even more towards them. On that basis it is now something I oppose because it was completely unfair. All that money spent on some elderly people and young people get mental health crisis not paid for, education debt, massive taxes. And elderly get another bung.
If I’d known it would have resulted like this, I’d have been against the whole thing.
Now with the knowledge I have, I’d have let them die. End of story.
My morality does not require people to be grateful if I save their life. Satisfaction in the deed itself.
The deed did not justify the end result.
The triple lock and the question of whether to sacrifice the elderly (and many others) to Covid are entirely separate issues. One should not influence the other.
Are you Paul Mason? You’re almost as fruitlessly repetitive and have been on a similar journey from Jezzaism to whatever jellyfish entity Starmer embodies. Don”t think he’s ever said he’d vote Reform to stymy the Greens yet, but who knows how the kaleidoscope will shake out.
That's a bit unfair. I don't think Horse was ever Jezzaist. He's always favoured Labour overall but has always been willing to criticise them and/or praise other parties. I'd say he'd been pretty consistent.
He was also a massive lockdown proponent who now believes we should never have locked down. I recall endless "Lockdown NOW" posts.
You are being extremely disingenuous.
I supported lockdown very strongly and would have supported more.
But this was on the basis we were protecting the elderly and there would be - I thought - some rebalancing after.
In fact things went even more towards them. On that basis it is now something I oppose because it was completely unfair. All that money spent on some elderly people and young people get mental health crisis not paid for, education debt, massive taxes. And elderly get another bung.
If I’d known it would have resulted like this, I’d have been against the whole thing.
Now with the knowledge I have, I’d have let them die. End of story.
I don't think I am being disingenuous. I don't recall you ever saying "Lockdown now, and then later make sure the young get looked after". Its fine to change position. I have more issue with the counterfactual of no lockdown. The NHS would have been overwhelmed. People having heart attacks or strokes turned away when care could have saved them. And it would have been impossible in the climate we have where everyone was loudly shouting for more restrictions. ("Close nightclubs forever").
There are definitely arguments to be had about later, when vaccines had been rolled out to the most at risk. I think we were too cautious. But not to be too partisan, Starmer was one of the worst for this. Whether he genuinely believed it or was using it just to attack the government, I have no idea. He gave the impression that we would still be having restrictions NOW, such was his ardour and zeal.
If you sincerely sat down and tried to design the ugliest building in the history of architecture, you'd be hard pushed to beat that. It is so bad it has gone beyond so-bad-it-is-good into a deeper realm of Satanic and demonical ugliness, designed to demoralise by its mere presence
How the F did Obama sign off on it? What happened?
Maybe he did it to ensure Trump wouldn’t co-opt it and rename it the Trump Obama Library. If it’s not neo classical with gold bits he won’t be interested.
If you sincerely sat down and tried to design the ugliest building in the history of architecture, you'd be hard pushed to beat that. It is so bad it has gone beyond so-bad-it-is-good into a deeper realm of Satanic and demonical ugliness, designed to demoralise by its mere presence
How the F did Obama sign off on it? What happened?
Maybe he did it to ensure Trump wouldn’t co-opt it and rename it the Trump Obama Library. If it’s not neo classical with gold bits he won’t be interested.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
1. He yields to Iran. He calls a peace, and tries to pretend it's what he always wanted. But he's now so invested in this nightmare (a bit like Putin in Ukraine) it's very hard for him to withdraw. It will absolutely look like defeat and surrender. That's not how the Donald Behaves. He WINS, BIGLY
2. So what does winning bigly look like, how does he get the Straits open? There's no way he can invade and conquer Iran, it's all mountains, there's 90 million people, it's much bigger and tougher than Vietnam, and look how Vietnam turned out. Look how Iraq turned out
Tactically, I think he only has one option, limited ground operations to seize those crucial islands and maybe the Iranian coast near the Straits (dangerous but do-able?) - plus intense bombing of Iran, pulverising it into submission at the same time. Ergo, quite possibly nukes
Are you Paul Mason? You’re almost as fruitlessly repetitive and have been on a similar journey from Jezzaism to whatever jellyfish entity Starmer embodies. Don”t think he’s ever said he’d vote Reform to stymy the Greens yet, but who knows how the kaleidoscope will shake out.
That's a bit unfair. I don't think Horse was ever Jezzaist. He's always favoured Labour overall but has always been willing to criticise them and/or praise other parties. I'd say he'd been pretty consistent.
He was also a massive lockdown proponent who now believes we should never have locked down. I recall endless "Lockdown NOW" posts.
You are being extremely disingenuous.
I supported lockdown very strongly and would have supported more.
But this was on the basis we were protecting the elderly and there would be - I thought - some rebalancing after.
In fact things went even more towards them. On that basis it is now something I oppose because it was completely unfair. All that money spent on some elderly people and young people get mental health crisis not paid for, education debt, massive taxes. And elderly get another bung.
If I’d known it would have resulted like this, I’d have been against the whole thing.
Now with the knowledge I have, I’d have let them die. End of story.
My morality does not require people to be grateful if I save their life. Satisfaction in the deed itself.
The deed did not justify the end result.
The triple lock and the question of whether to sacrifice the elderly (and many others) to Covid are entirely separate issues. One should not influence the other.
They didn’t deserve our lives being put on hold for the end result. I’m afraid I simply disagree.
If you sincerely sat down and tried to design the ugliest building in the history of architecture, you'd be hard pushed to beat that. It is so bad it has gone beyond so-bad-it-is-good into a deeper realm of Satanic and demonical ugliness, designed to demoralise by its mere presence
How the F did Obama sign off on it? What happened?
Maybe he did it to ensure Trump wouldn’t co-opt it and rename it the Trump Obama Library. If it’s not neo classical with gold bits he won’t be interested.
lol, yes that's pretty bad. But you could argue that it has a certain symmetrical monumentality, plus this is an example of form following function - it had to be windowless and a bit stark:
"33 Thomas Street (also known as the AT&T Long Lines Building) is a 550-foot-tall (170 m) windowless skyscraper in the Tribeca neighborhood of Lower Manhattan in New York City, New York, United States. It stands on the east side of Church Street, between Thomas Street and Worth Street.
Designed in the Brutalist architectural style, it is a telephone exchange or wire center building which contained three major 4ESS switches for interexchange carrier services (used for long distance calling), as well as a number of other switches used for competitive local exchange carrier services. However, it is not used for incumbent local exchange carrier services, and is not a central office. Its CLLI code is NYCMNYBW.
It has been reported that the building is used as a National Security Agency (NSA) mass surveillance facility."
By contrast, the Obama Center could have looked like anything - there was no functional need to use this grim, foreboding, windowless neo-Brutalist style. No need for its awkward angles and loathsome drabness
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
1. He yields to Iran. He calls a peace, and tries to pretend it's what he always wanted. But he's now so invested in this nightmare (a bit like Putin in Ukraine) it's very hard for him to withdraw. It will absolutely look like defeat and surrender. That's not how the Donald Behaves. He WINS, BIGLY
2. So what does winning bigly look like, how does he get the Straits open? There's no way he can invade and conquer Iran, it's all mountains, there's 90 million people, it's much bigger and tougher than Vietnam, and look how Vietnam turned out. Look how Iraq turned out
Tactically, I think he only has one option, limited ground operations to seize those crucial islands and maybe the Iranian coast near the Straits (dangerous but do-able?) - plus intense bombing of Iran, pulverising it into submission at the same time. Ergo, quite possibly nukes
I think this merits a...
BRACE
Judging by what I've read the Saudis have come to the conclusion that, given where we are, the only option is to double-down. No doubt, Netanyahu is fully on board - what he's always wanted.
SCOOP!!! -- The United States can only determine with certainty that it has destroyed about a third of Iran's vast missile arsenal. The status of around another third is less clear but bombings likely damaged, destroyed or buried those missiles in underground tunnels and bunkers, according to the U.S. intelligence, our sources say.
Are you Paul Mason? You’re almost as fruitlessly repetitive and have been on a similar journey from Jezzaism to whatever jellyfish entity Starmer embodies. Don”t think he’s ever said he’d vote Reform to stymy the Greens yet, but who knows how the kaleidoscope will shake out.
That's a bit unfair. I don't think Horse was ever Jezzaist. He's always favoured Labour overall but has always been willing to criticise them and/or praise other parties. I'd say he'd been pretty consistent.
He was also a massive lockdown proponent who now believes we should never have locked down. I recall endless "Lockdown NOW" posts.
You are being extremely disingenuous.
I supported lockdown very strongly and would have supported more.
But this was on the basis we were protecting the elderly and there would be - I thought - some rebalancing after.
In fact things went even more towards them. On that basis it is now something I oppose because it was completely unfair. All that money spent on some elderly people and young people get mental health crisis not paid for, education debt, massive taxes. And elderly get another bung.
If I’d known it would have resulted like this, I’d have been against the whole thing.
Now with the knowledge I have, I’d have let them die. End of story.
I don't think I am being disingenuous. I don't recall you ever saying "Lockdown now, and then later make sure the young get looked after". Its fine to change position. I have more issue with the counterfactual of no lockdown. The NHS would have been overwhelmed. People having heart attacks or strokes turned away when care could have saved them. And it would have been impossible in the climate we have where everyone was loudly shouting for more restrictions. ("Close nightclubs forever").
There are definitely arguments to be had about later, when vaccines had been rolled out to the most at risk. I think we were too cautious. But not to be too partisan, Starmer was one of the worst for this. Whether he genuinely believed it or was using it just to attack the government, I have no idea. He gave the impression that we would still be having restrictions NOW, such was his ardour and zeal.
I have changed position and I’ve explained why.
The NHS melting down and everything else had no impact on me. None of this stuff impacted me at all. But at the time I felt it right because we were giving up something and there would be some rebalancing or natural evening result at the end. But we got given massive taxes and the elderly got another bung.
Recall clapping for nurses, there was some implication that we would finally treat them properly.
I’m happy to say and acknowledge I didn’t say that here but I certainly felt it and had it in my head.
As for Starmer you are entirely correct and I think he was wrong (again in hindsight).
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
1. He yields to Iran. He calls a peace, and tries to pretend it's what he always wanted. But he's now so invested in this nightmare (a bit like Putin in Ukraine) it's very hard for him to withdraw. It will absolutely look like defeat and surrender. That's not how the Donald Behaves. He WINS, BIGLY
2. So what does winning bigly look like, how does he get the Straits open? There's no way he can invade and conquer Iran, it's all mountains, there's 90 million people, it's much bigger and tougher than Vietnam, and look how Vietnam turned out. Look how Iraq turned out
Tactically, I think he only has one option, limited ground operations to seize those crucial islands and maybe the Iranian coast near the Straits (dangerous but do-able?) - plus intense bombing of Iran, pulverising it into submission at the same time. Ergo, quite possibly nukes
I think this merits a...
BRACE
TL;DR - Trump is by far the worst US President EVER!
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
George Osborne of all people is supporting Morgan McSweeney.
The media hysteria is as ridiculous as the curry incident.
That is not a huge surprise, given the Mandelson/Osborne/Deripaska/China pond that they all swim around in. Might have been better for MM if Osborne had kept his trap shut tbh.
George Osborne of all people is supporting Morgan McSweeney.
The media hysteria is as ridiculous as the curry incident.
That is not a huge surprise, given the Mandelson/Osborne/Deripaska/China pond that they all swim around in. Might have been better for MM if Osborne had kept his trap shut tbh.
You know we’ve had our many disagreements but the reason I like you is you always provide an articulate response. And that’s got to be a good thing to come up against opposing viewpoints.
The Obama Library is not the most hideous building in the history of mankind. It is ugly, asymetrical, poorly designed, and an eyesore. It's a counterpart -from the other side of the political spectrum- to Trump's hideous interior design.
But I can think of quite a few buildings that are worse.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
I think nuclear proliferation around the world is inevitable: it's the only way to defend yourself against the Putins, the Netanyahus and the Trumps.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
I like to keep an eye on the local by-elections and as others may have stated last night was notable.
The Cons won 3 of 4 - their best night in a long time. Now they were strong favorites for all three - including the LD-held one - and not winning any should have set alarm bells ringing. None the less the Cons won all three and really quite comfortably. Another little sign the Con decline seems to have bottomed out. They will still lose Councillors in 2026 but perhaps not as brutally as in 2025.
Lab ran a VERY strong candidate in a traditionally rock-solid Scunthorpe ward and were crushed by Reform. That tells me that the wave that is approaching defending Lab Councillors in May will probably be a tsunami comparable to 2025. Reform will not necessarily be the beneficiaries everywhere, probably will not be, but if anyone doubted Lab's performance in May will be disastrous then this single result should be enough to convince them.
My conclusion is that it demonstrates the Tories have managed to avoid an "extinction event" - always a risk, though not a probability - and are still functional as a party in some parts of the country. If Kemi can avoid a meltdown in May then the long game opens up, and it offers a chance of recovery once Nigel departs: Reform really is a party built around him personally.
OTOH, make no mistake, even these by-election results are pretty grim - the voteshare well down, even if they count as holds. There's a huge amount of rebuilding required and the road is long and bumpy.
Trump Land, otherwise known as Gilead, becomes ever more surreal. The DoJ have fought a case on behalf of ICE for over a year on the basis that all of their deportations were regulated and conducted in compliance with a memorandum entitled Civil Immigration Enforcement Actions in or Near Courthouses, dated May 27, 2025. Now they have "corrected" this by saying this never applied to Immigration Courts: https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.646893/gov.uscourts.nysd.646893.77.0.pdf
The consequence is that many of the hearings will need to be reargued. The attorneys seek to excuse themselves by saying that the attorneys for ICE lied to them.
I recall PBers defending the arrest of a judge who sought to stop this.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
Yes, remember there's a third actor here, Israel. And they have nukes
If the USA withdraws, we know that Iran will then race as fast as possible to get The Bomb, to prevent this ever happening again. After October 7, I don't think Israelis give a fuck what the world thinks any more, they just care about survival. An Iranian bomb would be a terrible, existential threat to the entire Jewish state, so I reckon Israel would attempt some kind of first strike, with nukes, hoping to wipe out Iran in one go, and probably hoping that America then reluctantly joins in, to finish the job
It is quite a perilous moment for the world. But very timely for the people remaking "Threads"
The Obama Library is not the most hideous building in the history of mankind. It is ugly, asymetrical, poorly designed, and an eyesore. It's a counterpart -from the other side of the political spectrum- to Trump's hideous interior design.
But I can think of quite a few buildings that are worse.
Go on then, coz I am genuinely struggling. And also I might write about it
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
There's nowhere they could invade from overland and they don't have the ships for an invasion from the Gulf.
And holding the country after they conquer it would require millions of soldiers.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
1. He yields to Iran. He calls a peace, and tries to pretend it's what he always wanted. But he's now so invested in this nightmare (a bit like Putin in Ukraine) it's very hard for him to withdraw. It will absolutely look like defeat and surrender. That's not how the Donald Behaves. He WINS, BIGLY
2. So what does winning bigly look like, how does he get the Straits open? There's no way he can invade and conquer Iran, it's all mountains, there's 90 million people, it's much bigger and tougher than Vietnam, and look how Vietnam turned out. Look how Iraq turned out
Tactically, I think he only has one option, limited ground operations to seize those crucial islands and maybe the Iranian coast near the Straits (dangerous but do-able?) - plus intense bombing of Iran, pulverising it into submission at the same time. Ergo, quite possibly nukes
I think this merits a...
BRACE
Trump won’t ‘get’ the blame, he will be fcking to blame!
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
1. He yields to Iran. He calls a peace, and tries to pretend it's what he always wanted. But he's now so invested in this nightmare (a bit like Putin in Ukraine) it's very hard for him to withdraw. It will absolutely look like defeat and surrender. That's not how the Donald Behaves. He WINS, BIGLY
2. So what does winning bigly look like, how does he get the Straits open? There's no way he can invade and conquer Iran, it's all mountains, there's 90 million people, it's much bigger and tougher than Vietnam, and look how Vietnam turned out. Look how Iraq turned out
Tactically, I think he only has one option, limited ground operations to seize those crucial islands and maybe the Iranian coast near the Straits (dangerous but do-able?) - plus intense bombing of Iran, pulverising it into submission at the same time. Ergo, quite possibly nukes
I think this merits a...
BRACE
That's a pretty dicey option. It would almost guarantee Iran attempting to destroy the Qatar gas production facilities - which are a highly vulnerable target. Nukes would make that more, not less likely.
They'd have a fair chance of succeeding in that attempt.
That result would be the worst of all possible worlds.
"Pulverising into submission" is a great example of question begging.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
1. He yields to Iran. He calls a peace, and tries to pretend it's what he always wanted. But he's now so invested in this nightmare (a bit like Putin in Ukraine) it's very hard for him to withdraw. It will absolutely look like defeat and surrender. That's not how the Donald Behaves. He WINS, BIGLY
2. So what does winning bigly look like, how does he get the Straits open? There's no way he can invade and conquer Iran, it's all mountains, there's 90 million people, it's much bigger and tougher than Vietnam, and look how Vietnam turned out. Look how Iraq turned out
Tactically, I think he only has one option, limited ground operations to seize those crucial islands and maybe the Iranian coast near the Straits (dangerous but do-able?) - plus intense bombing of Iran, pulverising it into submission at the same time. Ergo, quite possibly nukes
I think this merits a...
BRACE
Trump won’t ‘get’ the blame, he will be fcking to blame!
Bit of a side helping of Bibi and the neocons I'd say.
There's no way in the world that the Greens will win more seats than the Tories at the next election.
If that's what punters believe, they're wrong.
That’s a slight misinterpretation of what the betting is on. The betting is on which party wins most seats. Most people in the market don’t think either the Greens or the Tories are going to do that, but we don’t know what those people think in terms of who will more seats out of the Greens and Tories. A small number then think that the Greens will win most seats (which would require them to get more than the Tories) and about the same number think the Tories will win more seats.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
1. He yields to Iran. He calls a peace, and tries to pretend it's what he always wanted. But he's now so invested in this nightmare (a bit like Putin in Ukraine) it's very hard for him to withdraw. It will absolutely look like defeat and surrender. That's not how the Donald Behaves. He WINS, BIGLY
2. So what does winning bigly look like, how does he get the Straits open? There's no way he can invade and conquer Iran, it's all mountains, there's 90 million people, it's much bigger and tougher than Vietnam, and look how Vietnam turned out. Look how Iraq turned out
Tactically, I think he only has one option, limited ground operations to seize those crucial islands and maybe the Iranian coast near the Straits (dangerous but do-able?) - plus intense bombing of Iran, pulverising it into submission at the same time. Ergo, quite possibly nukes
I think this merits a...
BRACE
On 1, there are a few different things to consider.
On the one hand, now that Iran has been provoked into maximum retaliation, and has seen that it has some leverage, it will be motivated to get something in return for its losses (and in the window of time that exists before everyone builds pipelines to bypass the Strait). Is it even possible for Trump to unilaterally end the war at this stage? Iran are quite capable of overplaying their hand, and Israel are also motivated to prolong the war. Ending the war - absent a complete US withdrawal from the Middle East - is harder than it looks.
That said, we've already seen Trump convince his supporters that he won something that he actually lost - the 2020 election. He's already consistently repeating the message that the war is already won, and so if anyone is capable of losing a war, but convincing his voters that he won the war, then it is Trump. "We destroyed Iran's nuclear weapons programme once and for all and so now the Middle East is safe and we can bring American soldiers home. Mission Accomplished." And we have to remember that Trump doesn't particularly care about this stuff anyway. He signed the deal with the Taliban for America's withdrawal and defeat there. He could do it again.
Is it any coincidence that he's trying to push the voter disenfranchisement legislation through Congress at the same time? Maybe the war ends as soon as that becomes law and he doesn't need the distraction.
With Trump it's just very hard to tell. What bits of the crap that he says does he really believe in? What is important to him, and what just sounds good when he says it?
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
1. He yields to Iran. He calls a peace, and tries to pretend it's what he always wanted. But he's now so invested in this nightmare (a bit like Putin in Ukraine) it's very hard for him to withdraw. It will absolutely look like defeat and surrender. That's not how the Donald Behaves. He WINS, BIGLY
2. So what does winning bigly look like, how does he get the Straits open? There's no way he can invade and conquer Iran, it's all mountains, there's 90 million people, it's much bigger and tougher than Vietnam, and look how Vietnam turned out. Look how Iraq turned out
Tactically, I think he only has one option, limited ground operations to seize those crucial islands and maybe the Iranian coast near the Straits (dangerous but do-able?) - plus intense bombing of Iran, pulverising it into submission at the same time. Ergo, quite possibly nukes
I think this merits a...
BRACE
Israel has killed everyone the Americans want to negotiate with, as Trump has mentioned. So if whoever is left, or whoever America is negotiating with, can deliver then Trump can declare victory and the world can move on.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
There's nowhere they could invade from overland and they don't have the ships for an invasion from the Gulf.
And holding the country after they conquer it would require millions of soldiers.
And there's no political support whatsoever.
Apart from that, I agree, it's inevitable.
Agree with all of those points but the alternative is that Iran gets nukes within the next year or so which means even the most unpalatable options are on the table.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
There's nowhere they could invade from overland and they don't have the ships for an invasion from the Gulf.
And holding the country after they conquer it would require millions of soldiers.
And there's no political support whatsoever.
Apart from that, I agree, it's inevitable.
Agree with all of those points but the alternative is that Iran gets nukes within the next year or so which means even the most unpalatable options are on the table.
Slight problem there - all the evidence was that until Israel decided to bomb Iran, Iran were looking at giving the uranium away in return for access to the world markets..
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
There's nowhere they could invade from overland and they don't have the ships for an invasion from the Gulf.
And holding the country after they conquer it would require millions of soldiers.
And there's no political support whatsoever.
Apart from that, I agree, it's inevitable.
They’d have to butter up some allies, but they could perhaps invade from Pakistan and Turkey. But the reality is that the US military clearly aren’t planning for a full scale invasion.
As I wrote earlier in the week, Keir Starmer and his government are taking us all for fools.
Because this is the story that they genuinely want us to swallow: Peter Mandelson resigned in the midst of one of the biggest domestic and international political scandals for a generation.
Downing Street strategised over how to contain the crisis, including how to manage a demand for the publication of the McSweeney/Mandelson emails. A couple of weeks after those strategy sessions, McSweeney's mobile happened to be snatched, and the messages lost for good.
What's more, at the moment of the theft, the police were given the wrong location for the crime. The victim didn't even bother to explain he was the Prime Minister's most senior adviser. Or that the device contained some of the most sensitive information in Government.
Even though the phone contained a tracking device, no attempt was made to monitor it, or identify the location of the phone. No police officers were deployed in pursuit of it. Indeed, the Government's own internal security team did not even bother to liaise with the police in an attempt to secure its recovery.
And despite the fact MPs had passed a specific motion ordering the publication of all messages relating to Peter Mandelson's appointment, this incident was withheld by Keir Starmer from Parliament for over five months. It was withheld from the Press. And was withheld from the British people.
The Prime Minister would have us believe this is all one massive coincidence.
The Obama Library is not the most hideous building in the history of mankind. It is ugly, asymetrical, poorly designed, and an eyesore. It's a counterpart -from the other side of the political spectrum- to Trump's hideous interior design.
But I can think of quite a few buildings that are worse.
Go on then, coz I am genuinely struggling. And also I might write about it
This would be my suggestion. It really offends me because it's on the Thames and in the vicinity of some superb structures such as Tower Bridge.
Will Self on the decline of literacy and the implications for politics.
"We’ve lost 50% of literacy in the last fifteen years. So, that epiphenomenon of writers like me being attacked and abandoned by our friends running scared of social media was part of the progression towards illiteracy and the fundamental inability to morally deliberate, which now characterises our society and which will propel us into authoritarianism, like America. That’s what the book’s about.
"Someone who can’t read a book cannot deliberate, cannot think and cannot conceptualise, and therefore is a threat – particularly humans who, instead of conceptualising in isolation and being able to think inside their own heads, only think through their engagement with others. That’s where fascism gets going, or social movements that depend on a kind of hysterical level of identification. What books and the ability to read books do is present a barrier that prevents you from being able to avoid moral deliberation at some point. He is in an odd generational situation."
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
The Obama Library is not the most hideous building in the history of mankind. It is ugly, asymetrical, poorly designed, and an eyesore. It's a counterpart -from the other side of the political spectrum- to Trump's hideous interior design.
But I can think of quite a few buildings that are worse.
Go on then, coz I am genuinely struggling. And also I might write about it
This would be my suggestion. It really offends me because it's on the Thames and in the vicinity of some superb structures such as Tower Bridge.
I pass by often and it always manages to depress my spirits. There's just no avoiding it.
Yeah, that's one of the worst buildings in London. But I bet it didn't cost $850 million
Why do they have to build these things in this hideous grey colour??? Because its "authentic" to the concrete material or some such Marxist bullshit, probably
I'd also put in a mention for that 70s hotel on Russell Square, the Imperial, which replaced a gorgeous Victorian pile
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
There's nowhere they could invade from overland and they don't have the ships for an invasion from the Gulf.
And holding the country after they conquer it would require millions of soldiers.
And there's no political support whatsoever.
Apart from that, I agree, it's inevitable.
It's the sort of thing that the US could get enmeshed in gradually.
They start with a limited operation to take Kharg island. Holding that is difficult because of drone and missile attacks from the coast. So then there's a push to conduct limited coastal raids to defend the island.
Similarly, you can conceive of a limited operation to take the coast by the Strait of Hormuz, which gradually expands over time.
And/or scenarios to secure the Iranian enriched uranium.
Planning an occupation of the whole country feels impossible, but one limited operation at a time, that fails to bring a resolution, and you might inch your way to it eventually. Just look at how the Vietnam War ramped up over time.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
1. He yields to Iran. He calls a peace, and tries to pretend it's what he always wanted. But he's now so invested in this nightmare (a bit like Putin in Ukraine) it's very hard for him to withdraw. It will absolutely look like defeat and surrender. That's not how the Donald Behaves. He WINS, BIGLY
2. So what does winning bigly look like, how does he get the Straits open? There's no way he can invade and conquer Iran, it's all mountains, there's 90 million people, it's much bigger and tougher than Vietnam, and look how Vietnam turned out. Look how Iraq turned out
Tactically, I think he only has one option, limited ground operations to seize those crucial islands and maybe the Iranian coast near the Straits (dangerous but do-able?) - plus intense bombing of Iran, pulverising it into submission at the same time. Ergo, quite possibly nukes
I think this merits a...
BRACE
That's a pretty dicey option. It would almost guarantee Iran attempting to destroy the Qatar gas production facilities - which are a highly vulnerable target. Nukes would make that more, not less likely.
They'd have a fair chance of succeeding in that attempt.
That result would be the worst of all possible worlds.
"Pulverising into submission" is a great example of question begging.
Fair enough, but then how else does this impasse end? I'd quite like a cheerier alternative, if you have one
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
There's nowhere they could invade from overland and they don't have the ships for an invasion from the Gulf.
And holding the country after they conquer it would require millions of soldiers.
And there's no political support whatsoever.
Apart from that, I agree, it's inevitable.
It's the sort of thing that the US could get enmeshed in gradually.
They start with a limited operation to take Kharg island. Holding that is difficult because of drone and missile attacks from the coast. So then there's a push to conduct limited coastal raids to defend the island.
Similarly, you can conceive of a limited operation to take the coast by the Strait of Hormuz, which gradually expands over time.
And/or scenarios to secure the Iranian enriched uranium.
Planning an occupation of the whole country feels impossible, but one limited operation at a time, that fails to bring a resolution, and you might inch your way to it eventually. Just look at how the Vietnam War ramped up over time.
Trump will TACO out before there any significant US casualties, I suggest.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
There's nowhere they could invade from overland and they don't have the ships for an invasion from the Gulf.
And holding the country after they conquer it would require millions of soldiers.
And there's no political support whatsoever.
Apart from that, I agree, it's inevitable.
Agree with all of those points but the alternative is that Iran gets nukes within the next year or so which means even the most unpalatable options are on the table.
Slight problem there - all the evidence was that until Israel decided to bomb Iran, Iran were looking at giving the uranium away in return for access to the world markets..
Sure, Israel prefers an Iran that's a failed state and doesn't have nuclear weapons, rather than an Iran that is successful and doesn't have nuclear weapons.
But there's no undoing the decision to start the war and the consequences that flow from that. One of which will likely be a renewed determination from Iran that a nuclear weapon is necessary for their deterrence.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
There's nowhere they could invade from overland and they don't have the ships for an invasion from the Gulf.
And holding the country after they conquer it would require millions of soldiers.
And there's no political support whatsoever.
Apart from that, I agree, it's inevitable.
Agree with all of those points but the alternative is that Iran gets nukes within the next year or so which means even the most unpalatable options are on the table.
But what’s the evidence that a nuclear armed Iran would be the first country since 1945 to arbitrarily nuke another neighbouring country rather than like every other nation with nukes see them as a guarantee of their own security? Yes, they’re deranged by religion like almost all of their neighbours, but the US/Israel SMO suggests they’re at least as smart and rational actors as eg Bibi, and way more so than Trump.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
There's nowhere they could invade from overland and they don't have the ships for an invasion from the Gulf.
And holding the country after they conquer it would require millions of soldiers.
And there's no political support whatsoever.
Apart from that, I agree, it's inevitable.
They’d have to butter up some allies, but they could perhaps invade from Pakistan and Turkey. But the reality is that the US military clearly aren’t planning for a full scale invasion.
It wouldn't be a full scale invasion, even Trump isn't that crazy. It would be seizure of a few key assets (like Kharg) PLUS massive aerial force, Is my humble opinion
Are you Paul Mason? You’re almost as fruitlessly repetitive and have been on a similar journey from Jezzaism to whatever jellyfish entity Starmer embodies. Don”t think he’s ever said he’d vote Reform to stymy the Greens yet, but who knows how the kaleidoscope will shake out.
That's a bit unfair. I don't think Horse was ever Jezzaist. He's always favoured Labour overall but has always been willing to criticise them and/or praise other parties. I'd say he'd been pretty consistent.
He was also a massive lockdown proponent who now believes we should never have locked down. I recall endless "Lockdown NOW" posts.
You are being extremely disingenuous.
I supported lockdown very strongly and would have supported more.
But this was on the basis we were protecting the elderly and there would be - I thought - some rebalancing after.
In fact things went even more towards them. On that basis it is now something I oppose because it was completely unfair. All that money spent on some elderly people and young people get mental health crisis not paid for, education debt, massive taxes. And elderly get another bung.
If I’d known it would have resulted like this, I’d have been against the whole thing.
Now with the knowledge I have, I’d have let them die. End of story.
I don't think I am being disingenuous. I don't recall you ever saying "Lockdown now, and then later make sure the young get looked after". Its fine to change position. I have more issue with the counterfactual of no lockdown. The NHS would have been overwhelmed. People having heart attacks or strokes turned away when care could have saved them. And it would have been impossible in the climate we have where everyone was loudly shouting for more restrictions. ("Close nightclubs forever").
There are definitely arguments to be had about later, when vaccines had been rolled out to the most at risk. I think we were too cautious. But not to be too partisan, Starmer was one of the worst for this. Whether he genuinely believed it or was using it just to attack the government, I have no idea. He gave the impression that we would still be having restrictions NOW, such was his ardour and zeal.
I have changed position and I’ve explained why.
The NHS melting down and everything else had no impact on me. None of this stuff impacted me at all. But at the time I felt it right because we were giving up something and there would be some rebalancing or natural evening result at the end. But we got given massive taxes and the elderly got another bung.
Recall clapping for nurses, there was some implication that we would finally treat them properly.
I’m happy to say and acknowledge I didn’t say that here but I certainly felt it and had it in my head.
As for Starmer you are entirely correct and I think he was wrong (again in hindsight).
BIB - Yes, but it could have. You could have had an accident, fallen off a bike, been hit by a car. A family member or friend may have had something happen. The idea that not locking down was an option is ludicrous. And don't forget that plenty of young people died from covid or had/have long covid. Being young was better but nothing was absolute.
I feel your pain re the elderly. Sadly their voting power doesn't diminish with age (I'd love to see a system where am 18 year old gets the full vote, a 50 year old half and an 80 year old about 20%. ) And so political parties of all flavours pander with the triple lock when they need to address the unfairness of the current system for the young who cannot afford to buy a house in the way that the boomers did, or even that I did (albeit I was given help from a relative).
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
1. He yields to Iran. He calls a peace, and tries to pretend it's what he always wanted. But he's now so invested in this nightmare (a bit like Putin in Ukraine) it's very hard for him to withdraw. It will absolutely look like defeat and surrender. That's not how the Donald Behaves. He WINS, BIGLY
2. So what does winning bigly look like, how does he get the Straits open? There's no way he can invade and conquer Iran, it's all mountains, there's 90 million people, it's much bigger and tougher than Vietnam, and look how Vietnam turned out. Look how Iraq turned out
Tactically, I think he only has one option, limited ground operations to seize those crucial islands and maybe the Iranian coast near the Straits (dangerous but do-able?) - plus intense bombing of Iran, pulverising it into submission at the same time. Ergo, quite possibly nukes
I think this merits a...
BRACE
Israel has killed everyone the Americans want to negotiate with, as Trump has mentioned. So if whoever is left, or whoever America is negotiating with, can deliver then Trump can declare victory and the world can move on.
Trump can't leave this now until the Straits are open for business.
Seems highly likely now that US troops will be told to attempt to take the coast around the Straits and secure it.
I will say again that Trump needs to stop Iranian oil going to Iran's clients, for as long as they threaten the Straits of Hormuz. I agree with people that argue that Iran can afford to wait it out far longer than Trump can, but it is vital to at least appear to equalise the stakes. It appears not to just be me that thinks this:
Distant blockade of oil exports. Iran has continued shipping oil to China throughout the war, so the U.S. Navy should respond by diverting Iranian “shadow tankers” between the Strait of Hormuz and the Strait of Malacca, then impounding and selling their cargo as done in the past with tankers from Venezuela’s “shadow fleet.” These diversions should continue until Iran lifts its restrictions on traffic through Hormuz. Washington should also consider impounding Iranian “shadow fleet” tankers located largely in Asia that serve as floating storage, holding nearly 140 million barrels of oil—though legal, logistical, and financial obstacles might complicate such efforts. Instead, the Trump administration recently approved a Treasury Department short-term general license permitting the temporary sale of Iranian oil currently at sea to keep the prices down, reflecting greater administration concerns about prices than about choking Iran’s revenues.
I don't want to depress people but I've got a baaaaaaad feeling in my Leondamus waters about this whole Iran thingy
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
There is a third way out
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
That won't help either because the current outcome is Iran accelerating their nuclear weapons programme and then we have a bunch of radical Islamists with nukes.
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
There's nowhere they could invade from overland and they don't have the ships for an invasion from the Gulf.
And holding the country after they conquer it would require millions of soldiers.
And there's no political support whatsoever.
Apart from that, I agree, it's inevitable.
Agree with all of those points but the alternative is that Iran gets nukes within the next year or so which means even the most unpalatable options are on the table.
The more unpalatable options are on the table, the more there is an incentive to develop nuclear weapons.
And here's the thing: there are 90 million Iranians/Persians. If Israel and Saudi Arabia have the bomb, how are you plannning on -long-term- stopping them from having it too?
I mean you can -at enormous cost- go in and knock down the government every couple of years. But each time you do it, you increase the incentive for the next government to get the bomb.
I did, upthread. I said the architects of the Turd Building must be relieved that they are no longer responsible for the ugliest architectural eyesore of the 21st century. Obama has rescued them
The jobbie building is still the most ridiculous and insulting, however. In one of the most handsome cities on earth, Edinburgh, they did that. They literally shat on the city. They should all go to jail
Comments
The people of Britain seem to be pretty discontented, and when the inflation following Trump's war hits, their rage is going to be incandescent.
- Boris, 2005.
Ever Greater Israel isn't a stable settlement because, like with all Empires, there are always barbarians across the border who need pacifying. There will always be pressure to keep expanding in pursuit of an elusive security.
In any event, TSMC, Samsung, SK Hynix etc have reserves that should be OK through to June/July (better than earlier estimates which failed to account for them recycling the He they use with 70-80% efficiency).
Healthcare is probably less well covered.
And also in any event, if gas supplies are not restored by the summer, MRIs will be the least of our worries.
The Cons won 3 of 4 - their best night in a long time. Now they were strong favorites for all three - including the LD-held one - and not winning any should have set alarm bells ringing. None the less the Cons won all three and really quite comfortably. Another little sign the Con decline seems to have bottomed out. They will still lose Councillors in 2026 but perhaps not as brutally as in 2025.
Lab ran a VERY strong candidate in a traditionally rock-solid Scunthorpe ward and were crushed by Reform. That tells me that the wave that is approaching defending Lab Councillors in May will probably be a tsunami comparable to 2025. Reform will not necessarily be the beneficiaries everywhere, probably will not be, but if anyone doubted Lab's performance in May will be disastrous then this single result should be enough to convince them.
I supported lockdown very strongly and would have supported more.
But this was on the basis we were protecting the elderly and there would be - I thought - some rebalancing after.
In fact things went even more towards them. On that basis it is now something I oppose because it was completely unfair. All that money spent on some elderly people and young people get mental health crisis not paid for, education debt, massive taxes. And elderly get another bung.
If I’d known it would have resulted like this, I’d have been against the whole thing.
Now with the knowledge I have, I’d have let them die. End of story.
If that's what punters believe, they're wrong.
Lord Offord still in place, though.
https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=1306907791252110&set=a.350185800257652
Just suppose there is some sort of resolution to the Iran situation and anything which reduces the death toll of young kids from 30k to about 0 must be a positive then Trump with all his very real faults is in the "good guys" box as far as that is concerned.
THe global price of oil falls back to somewhere between where it was and where it is. You can already hear Starmer and Reeves taking the credit. DOH
And we all know that had the Government done that you would have been on here for ever more accusing them all of being murderers.
“Mr. Buria told Mr. Driscoll that President Trump would not want to stand next to a Black female officer at military events, the officials said.”
https://bsky.app/profile/chadstanton.blacksky.app/post/3mi27yrnchc2v
Sorry.
Now they have "corrected" this by saying this never applied to Immigration Courts:
https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.646893/gov.uscourts.nysd.646893.77.0.pdf
The consequence is that many of the hearings will need to be reargued. The attorneys seek to excuse themselves by saying that the attorneys for ICE lied to them.
I also presumed it was Corbyn, indeed I was about to move on. to another article, vaguely wondering why the Guardian had a big pic of Corbz in an article about B Bragg Esq, and then I looked again
Bragg has moprhed into a Jezbollah doppelganger. I guess he's leaning into it, with the cap and donkey jacket, but still. Wow
The media hysteria is as ridiculous as the curry incident.
There are worse ways to end up
If you sincerely sat down and tried to design the ugliest building in the history of architecture, you'd be hard pushed to beat that. It is so bad it has gone beyond so-bad-it-is-good into a deeper realm of Satanic and demonical ugliness, designed to demoralise by its mere presence
How the F did Obama sign off on it? What happened?
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/si3_qmxJnfo
Its fine to change position. I have more issue with the counterfactual of no lockdown. The NHS would have been overwhelmed. People having heart attacks or strokes turned away when care could have saved them. And it would have been impossible in the climate we have where everyone was loudly shouting for more restrictions. ("Close nightclubs forever").
There are definitely arguments to be had about later, when vaccines had been rolled out to the most at risk. I think we were too cautious. But not to be too partisan, Starmer was one of the worst for this. Whether he genuinely believed it or was using it just to attack the government, I have no idea. He gave the impression that we would still be having restrictions NOW, such was his ardour and zeal.
In Vale of White Horse and Sevenoaks LDs tactically voting Tory to beat Reform outweighted Tories who went Reform
Stanford (Vale of White Horse) Council By-Election Result:
🌳 CON: 45.9% (+2.5)
🔶 LDM: 27.2% (-17.0)
➡️ RFM: 18.0% (New)
🌍 GRN: 7.9% (-4.5)
🌹 LAB: 1.0% (New)
Conservative GAIN from Liberal Democrat.
Changes w/ 2023.
https://x.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/2037326771582849408?s=20
Halstead, Knockholt & Badgers Mount (Sevenoaks) Council By-Election Result:
🌳 CON: 44.2% (-20.7)
➡️ RFM: 29.8% (New)
🔶 LDM: 20.9% (-14.2)
🌍 GRN: 5.1% (New)
Conservative HOLD.
Changes w/ 2023.
https://x.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/2037327448862339391?s=20
In N Lincolnshore Labour tactical votes for the Tories outweighed Tory losses to Reform
Axholme Central (North Lincolnshire) Council By-Election Result:
🌳 CON: 49.2% (-19.6)
➡️ RFM: 35.5% (New)
🌍 GRN: 8.3% (New)
🌹 LAB: 5.5% (-25.7)
🔶 LDM: 1.5% (New)
Conservative HOLD.
Changes w/ 2023.
https://x.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/2037328889333133632?s=20
33 Thomas Street, New York?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/33_Thomas_Street
Trump HAS to get the Straits of Hormuz open ASAP or the world will lurch into an enormous crisis, and he will get the blame. He won't be able to waltz away if millions are starving and Australia returns to the Bronze Age, even as Americans are paying $5000 a gallon during the Midterms
So, what does he do? As I see it, he has two choices, both unpalatable
1. He yields to Iran. He calls a peace, and tries to pretend it's what he always wanted. But he's now so invested in this nightmare (a bit like Putin in Ukraine) it's very hard for him to withdraw. It will absolutely look like defeat and surrender. That's not how the Donald Behaves. He WINS, BIGLY
2. So what does winning bigly look like, how does he get the Straits open? There's no way he can invade and conquer Iran, it's all mountains, there's 90 million people, it's much bigger and tougher than Vietnam, and look how Vietnam turned out. Look how Iraq turned out
Tactically, I think he only has one option, limited ground operations to seize those crucial islands and maybe the Iranian coast near the Straits (dangerous but do-able?) - plus intense bombing of Iran, pulverising it into submission at the same time. Ergo, quite possibly nukes
I think this merits a...
BRACE
"33 Thomas Street (also known as the AT&T Long Lines Building) is a 550-foot-tall (170 m) windowless skyscraper in the Tribeca neighborhood of Lower Manhattan in New York City, New York, United States. It stands on the east side of Church Street, between Thomas Street and Worth Street.
Designed in the Brutalist architectural style, it is a telephone exchange or wire center building which contained three major 4ESS switches for interexchange carrier services (used for long distance calling), as well as a number of other switches used for competitive local exchange carrier services. However, it is not used for incumbent local exchange carrier services, and is not a central office. Its CLLI code is NYCMNYBW.
It has been reported that the building is used as a National Security Agency (NSA) mass surveillance facility."
By contrast, the Obama Center could have looked like anything - there was no functional need to use this grim, foreboding, windowless neo-Brutalist style. No need for its awkward angles and loathsome drabness
And it cost $850 MILLION. Yes
So, yes, BRACE.
(But then you never know with Trump, do you?)
SCOOP!!! -- The United States can only determine with certainty that it has destroyed about a third of Iran's vast missile arsenal.
The status of around another third is less clear but bombings likely damaged, destroyed or buried those missiles in underground tunnels and bunkers, according to the U.S. intelligence, our sources say.
https://x.com/phildstewart/status/2037516163320578051?s=20
The NHS melting down and everything else had no impact on me. None of this stuff impacted me at all. But at the time I felt it right because we were giving up something and there would be some rebalancing or natural evening result at the end. But we got given massive taxes and the elderly got another bung.
Recall clapping for nurses, there was some implication that we would finally treat them properly.
I’m happy to say and acknowledge I didn’t say that here but I certainly felt it and had it in my head.
As for Starmer you are entirely correct and I think he was wrong (again in hindsight).
Trump 'retires due to ill health'
I fear that a ground invasion is going to be the only way out.
But I can think of quite a few buildings that are worse.
This is not a good scenario.
OTOH, make no mistake, even these by-election results are pretty grim - the voteshare well down, even if they count as holds. There's a huge amount of rebuilding required and the road is long and bumpy.
If the USA withdraws, we know that Iran will then race as fast as possible to get The Bomb, to prevent this ever happening again. After October 7, I don't think Israelis give a fuck what the world thinks any more, they just care about survival. An Iranian bomb would be a terrible, existential threat to the entire Jewish state, so I reckon Israel would attempt some kind of first strike, with nukes, hoping to wipe out Iran in one go, and probably hoping that America then reluctantly joins in, to finish the job
It is quite a perilous moment for the world. But very timely for the people remaking "Threads"
Immigration?
And holding the country after they conquer it would require millions of soldiers.
And there's no political support whatsoever.
Apart from that, I agree, it's inevitable.
It would almost guarantee Iran attempting to destroy the Qatar gas production facilities - which are a highly vulnerable target. Nukes would make that more, not less likely.
They'd have a fair chance of succeeding in that attempt.
That result would be the worst of all possible worlds.
"Pulverising into submission" is a great example of question begging.
On the one hand, now that Iran has been provoked into maximum retaliation, and has seen that it has some leverage, it will be motivated to get something in return for its losses (and in the window of time that exists before everyone builds pipelines to bypass the Strait). Is it even possible for Trump to unilaterally end the war at this stage? Iran are quite capable of overplaying their hand, and Israel are also motivated to prolong the war. Ending the war - absent a complete US withdrawal from the Middle East - is harder than it looks.
That said, we've already seen Trump convince his supporters that he won something that he actually lost - the 2020 election. He's already consistently repeating the message that the war is already won, and so if anyone is capable of losing a war, but convincing his voters that he won the war, then it is Trump. "We destroyed Iran's nuclear weapons programme once and for all and so now the Middle East is safe and we can bring American soldiers home. Mission Accomplished." And we have to remember that Trump doesn't particularly care about this stuff anyway. He signed the deal with the Taliban for America's withdrawal and defeat there. He could do it again.
Is it any coincidence that he's trying to push the voter disenfranchisement legislation through Congress at the same time? Maybe the war ends as soon as that becomes law and he doesn't need the distraction.
With Trump it's just very hard to tell. What bits of the crap that he says does he really believe in? What is important to him, and what just sounds good when he says it?
Because this is the story that they genuinely want us to swallow: Peter Mandelson resigned in the midst of one of the biggest domestic and international political scandals for a generation.
Downing Street strategised over how to contain the crisis, including how to manage a demand for the publication of the McSweeney/Mandelson emails. A couple of weeks after those strategy sessions, McSweeney's mobile happened to be snatched, and the messages lost for good.
What's more, at the moment of the theft, the police were given the wrong location for the crime. The victim didn't even bother to explain he was the Prime Minister's most senior adviser. Or that the device contained some of the most sensitive information in Government.
Even though the phone contained a tracking device, no attempt was made to monitor it, or identify the location of the phone. No police officers were deployed in pursuit of it. Indeed, the Government's own internal security team did not even bother to liaise with the police in an attempt to secure its recovery.
And despite the fact MPs had passed a specific motion ordering the publication of all messages relating to Peter Mandelson's appointment, this incident was withheld by Keir Starmer from Parliament for over five months. It was withheld from the Press. And was withheld from the British people.
The Prime Minister would have us believe this is all one massive coincidence.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-15683051/DAN-HODGES-dont-know-happened-Morgan-McSweeneys-missing-phone-day-deflection-deceit-know-certain-Prime-Minister-lying-posterior-it.html?ico=authors_pagination_desktop#
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tower_Hotel,_London
I pass by often and it always manages to depress my spirits. There's just no avoiding it.
"We’ve lost 50% of literacy in the last fifteen years. So, that epiphenomenon of writers like me being attacked and abandoned by our friends running scared of social media was part of the progression towards illiteracy and the fundamental inability to morally deliberate, which now characterises our society and which will propel us into authoritarianism, like America. That’s what the book’s about.
"Someone who can’t read a book cannot deliberate, cannot think and cannot conceptualise, and therefore is a threat – particularly humans who, instead of conceptualising in isolation and being able to think inside their own heads, only think through their engagement with others. That’s where fascism gets going, or social movements that depend on a kind of hysterical level of identification. What books and the ability to read books do is present a barrier that prevents you from being able to avoid moral deliberation at some point. He is in an odd generational situation."
Wonder how many books The Donald has read?
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2021/jul/08/a-great-city-has-been-defaced-why-has-a-poo-emoji-arrived-on-edinburghs-skyline
Why do they have to build these things in this hideous grey colour??? Because its "authentic" to the concrete material or some such Marxist bullshit, probably
I'd also put in a mention for that 70s hotel on Russell Square, the Imperial, which replaced a gorgeous Victorian pile
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_Hotel,_London
Yuk
They start with a limited operation to take Kharg island. Holding that is difficult because of drone and missile attacks from the coast. So then there's a push to conduct limited coastal raids to defend the island.
Similarly, you can conceive of a limited operation to take the coast by the Strait of Hormuz, which gradually expands over time.
And/or scenarios to secure the Iranian enriched uranium.
Planning an occupation of the whole country feels impossible, but one limited operation at a time, that fails to bring a resolution, and you might inch your way to it eventually. Just look at how the Vietnam War ramped up over time.
But there's no undoing the decision to start the war and the consequences that flow from that. One of which will likely be a renewed determination from Iran that a nuclear weapon is necessary for their deterrence.
I feel your pain re the elderly. Sadly their voting power doesn't diminish with age (I'd love to see a system where am 18 year old gets the full vote, a 50 year old half and an 80 year old about 20%. ) And so political parties of all flavours pander with the triple lock when they need to address the unfairness of the current system for the young who cannot afford to buy a house in the way that the boomers did, or even that I did (albeit I was given help from a relative).
Seems highly likely now that US troops will be told to attempt to take the coast around the Straits and secure it.
www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/military-options-reopening-strait-hormuz-limitations-and-imperatives
And here's the thing: there are 90 million Iranians/Persians. If Israel and Saudi Arabia have the bomb, how are you plannning on -long-term- stopping them from having it too?
I mean you can -at enormous cost- go in and knock down the government every couple of years. But each time you do it, you increase the incentive for the next government to get the bomb.
The jobbie building is still the most ridiculous and insulting, however. In one of the most handsome cities on earth, Edinburgh, they did that. They literally shat on the city. They should all go to jail