Categories
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Monday’s front pages are now coming through
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Monday’s front pages are now coming through
Click refresh every so often to load more of them.
0
This discussion has been closed.
Comments
This is really helpful and very much appreciated.
The new comments system is settling down well but, as discussed, it will add to our regular outgoings.
Just because an issue is only a small part of the whole, does not mean that it is therefore not worth tackling.
I don't have an opinion on this housing idea yet, but it's the same logic as those who want to cut the International Aid budget - it is only a tiny part of the budget, and axing it will not amount to all that much compared to what needs doing, but it would still achieve a definite cut, and perhaps signal the right intent (though I disagree on that idea)
If you want to watch both rugby codes, that looks like a hell of a channel. I'd pay for it if it was on here!
What is the alternative? That politicians should not be challenged at all? When else might politicians have done anything, if not in the past?
Mair did not even attempt to "challenge" Johnson. A challenge invites a response. Mair neither wanted nor would have allowed the facts of each allegation to be established nor did he ever intend to give Johnson a fair right of reply.
Even if Boris had tried to state the facts, he would have been interrupted dismissively and a new allegation made or another diversionary tactic deployed.
It is interview theatre designed to "entertain" rather than an interrogatory attempt to determine truth.
The techniques Mair deployed were in the same class as tim's smearing on pb.
They are the symptoms of corruption and decomposition.
Time to put these old dogs out of their misery. tim and Mair stand forward, please. The firing squad is ready.
Is it only Conservative politicians who must not be questioned, or all of them?
You are supposing a lot about how Mair would have reacted unfairly or improperly had Boris not waffled so ineffectively; surely we should only judge Mair by what he did, not on what you are predicting he would have done. It's adding extra motivations and context to what did occur, without any way of proving it true.
To my mind each of the points raised prior to the 'nasty piece of work' line are legitimate questions to pursue, and aggressively if needs be as they are embarrasing and anyone, particularly politicians who require a good image, would waffle on; the only question mark is how he decided to phrase it, in using the words about Boris being a nasty piece of work, which does seem to have been done so purely for the headline and tagline for the interview.
Perhaps that is unprofessional, or unreasonable, but the crux of the matter is Boris does have embarrasing skeletons in his closet - most on here would already be aware of most of them - and he dealt with them being brought up pretty badly. Even accounting for lack of time to fully explicate himself, he could have done a lot better and not come across as weaselly and evasive.
I'm curious as to what Ed M has done to make you think he'll do a better job. I mean, I'm coming around to hoping he will at least be more competent, even if I won't always agree with his policies (as they continue to emerge), and he seems bland and inoffensive enough, as well as controlled enough, to avoid cocking things up as much as Cameron, but I'm still very wary of outright celebrating the end of the Cameron ministry at this stage.
You forgot to quote the section of Tim Montgomerie's blog article that is really worrying you.
Luckily I am here to help.
We're now into phase three of Cameronism. Plan A for deficit reduction is on the back burner and plan B(eer) for re-election is underway. And, you know what - despite the collapse in party membership, the defection of the centre right press and the splintering of the Tory vote - it might even work. So long as Ed Miliband and Ed Balls lead the Opposition enough Britons may hold on to nurse for fear of something even worse.
Kids eat them so quickly that I doubt they notice what is on the box.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/christian-easter-eggs-fail-to-crack-open-supermarkets-8547592.html
Darling: [The government are] way off track, none of their plans are stacking up, they’re losing credibility. We need to have a compelling alternative. There is one, and I will be helping my colleagues do that. But at the moment, for the next 18 months, you know where I am.
http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2013/03/will-you-replace-ed-balls-the-question-alistair-darling-wont-answer/
Business as usual, then.
What does Kerry or the USA think Iraq would do ? How are the Americans so poor in their knowledge of geo-politics ? The rest of the world do not think the way Yanks think they should. The Americans should realise that they are not as important as they think they are.
FPT - Thanks, and you've now cost me £10 a month ;-)
Maybe I should donate to PB tomorrow as a result.
Our understanding was that it has just got underway.
However, Cypriot spokesman Nikos Christodoulides just tweeted that ANOTHER round of talks has begun between the Cypriot president and the heads of the European Commission and the European Council."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2013/mar/24/eurozone-crisis-cyprus-bailout-eurogroup-meeting
@DPJHodges: Unless I'm missing something even Alan Rusbridger is now saying he's not prepared to sign up to a Royal Charter yet.
OK, I take the cursor to the top RH corner and a "star" appears. Great, what do I do next ?
000
The French are well wary over this one though they they will probably put some more troops in, at least for evacuation purposes.
And in The Times
OK, I take the cursor to the top RH corner and a "star" appears. Great, what do I do next ?</blockquote>
Click on it and it says 'edit'</blockquote>
Thanks. Found it. "Edited" and then when I went to post the edited comments it said it could not find the "discussion".
Then, I gave up !
Test
I hope that makes sense. Am dreadful at explaining computer stuff.
It cuts both ways !
"It seems incredible, but new research concludes that Bangladesh – and others of the world's poorest countries – will have eradicated extreme poverty within 20 years. And already the proportion of the world's people living on less than $1.25 a day has been cut in half since 1990. In my Daily Telegraph column this week I describe one of the great underreported stories of our time."
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/geoffreylean/100208755/perhaps-the-poor-will-not-always-be-with-us-after-all/
Well said. I have a great deal of sympathy for the people of Cyprus from the distressing reports we've seen, and the tough choices demanded of them, not least because I fear our own economy is a hell of a lot worse than our leaders want to admit, but some comments from the Cypriots give the impression they do not want to accept a genuine assessment of how much of this is their own fault, and how much it is reasonable they pay.
Of course, we'd all react the same way in that situation, but the argument presented by some shell shocked Cypriots seems to be 'We're in trouble now, it's unfair we're being forced into tough choices and are being made to pay...but we won't talk about how we got into trouble'. Like it's a natural disaster they had no part in.
President Nicos Anastasides told international lenders that their proposal to saddle the Bank of Cyprus with some €9 billion in emergency liquidity assistance owed by the Popular Bank to the European Central Bank, effectively meant the lender’s closure in six months, the Cyprus News Agency (CNA) reported.
“I table one proposal, you don’t accept it; I table another, same thing. What else do you want me to do? Do you want to force me to resign? If that’s what you want, let me know,” CNA quoted Anastasiades as telling international lenders.
Apparently the official Eurogroup meeting has not long kicked off.
When you compound 6% every year for 25 years, it begins to have effect.
Even the cricket team is improving !
"It is another feature of democratic regimes that they are instinctively uncomfortable with imperial pretensions; so they seek the moral high ground, like a mountaineer who just keeps climbing higher when he’s lost in the fog. We British liked to think that we were bringing civilisation and the rule of law to our colonies. The Americans have tended to deny an imperial role altogether and talk about safeguarding democracy.
Now it is the Germans’ turn to exercise an imperium. "
One thing that has become more noticable in the past year is the openness from which the true powerplayers of Europe have been calling the shots. After all, the great powers of Europe are broadly the same as they have been for a very long time, and everyone's always known who the big players are as a result in the EU, but it does feel like those powers, us included, are being more obvious about such things in recent years.
We may be in a hard position ourselves, and a long way from our peak, no one would dispute that, but despite the naysayers Britain is still significant in the world (if not to the same degree - heck, even the USA is not as significant as it used to be, while still holding primacy), and we and other powers are seeming more demanding now.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/cyprus/9948545/Southern-Europe-lies-prostrate-before-the-German-imperium.html
Even though the wages are still very poor by international standards, these women previously would have been at the mercy of men in the society and not all had the welfare of "their" women at heart.
These two sectors have empowered Bangladeshi women like never before. The Bangladeshi per capita income in 2012 on a PPP basis is close to $2000. Still very low but in a different level than 20 years ago.
No confirmation yet in main stream media. May just be rumour.
https://twitter.com/russian_market/status/315961653059543041/photo/1
Does not look from photo as if it is a major incident.
Very reassuring.
As an NFL fan, where every stadium holds 85-90,000 people, it's somewhat nostalgic to see these tiny little stadiums with corrugated metal roofs and seats for a couple thousand folks at max.
It reminds me of my days in 'the jungle' at Castleford or Wakefield Trinity in Eddie Waring times.
Bank of Cyprus and Cyprus Popular Bank to be restructured. 40% haircut for depositors over 100K. Eurozone Finance Ministers meeting finally to get under way.
Is this all rumour or real?
Stay tuned.
@EfiEfthimiou
Must be crap as a bowler to bowl to what looks more like a 1 day or even 20:20 field. NZ will load up the slips when they bowl no doubt ^^;
Thanks for link.
Amusing interchange of tweets with Reuters Luke Baker reporting that an EU Official claimed "only way to explain Cypriot parliament's behaviour is that Russia has a strong interest in campaign financing".
EU Official is apparently implying that Russia has bribed all Cypriot MPs to vote down its government's agreements with the EU.
Both England and Australia are capable of playing a lot better than they have recently - with any luck, recent efforts will spur both on for a high quality exchange, rather than 2009's 'Let's see who can collapse the most' affair.
Russians, particularly named bankers, are hovering over this deal like vultures.
Timing is all.
Am not standing by the bribery accusations, but it does look as though the Finance Ministers meeting is about to start, following an agreement between Anastadiades and the Troika.
Closure and restructuring of top two banks and 40% haircuts on deposits over 100k euros is being almost universally reported as a done deal.
There is a 24/7 cricket network called Willow Cricket available also - again for $14.95 a month.
As I pay $300 a year for my NFL Sunday Ticket subscription, it's more than enough.
I think they'd be tempted to keep going for a bit, to put it absolutely beyond the realms of possibility, but I think on this occasion they'll declare at lunch - England may be playing poorly all round on this tour, but they have plenty of quality batsmen in their lineup even with Pietersen missing, including several who can bat all day if they can get in, others who can be very stubborn to get out, and even those like Broad who have been doing poorly for a while but do have it within them to stick around.
As England won't be trying to score in good time to reach a big total, focusing on survival, I think NZ will assess the risk of giving too much time and not quite big enough a total, as less than the chance that at least a few of the England batsmen misfire and allow NZ inroads, and that they need to give themselves enough time as they can to take the ten wickets.
Very difficult to glean details but latest tweet from Reuters man in Brussels is:
Luke Baker @LukeReuters 4m
Draft deal would see secured deposits in Laiki moved to Bank of Cyprus and shutting Laiki, sources say. Bank of Cyprus also to be hit
First big reaction on currency markets. Euro leaps half a cent.
See: http://www.livecharts.co.uk/ForexCharts/eurusd.php
From what I can glean from twitter feeds and reading between the lines it looks as though Cyprus Popular Bank will be closed and its deposits will be transferred to Bank of Cyprus. A 40% haircut will then be applied to all deposits over 100 k euros.
As Bank of Cyprus was reported to have 28 billion in euro deposits before the restructuring it does look as though the 40% haircut will deliver the 5.8 bn the Troika were asking for.
There are some other tweets that report the haircut will be limited to BoC deposits so you may be right on its limited scope.
That's because Darling is Scottish, Salmond wants to debate against an upper class Englishman.
I guess it's just the dodgiest banks getting haircuts because the number's so high, unless the EU and IMF reduced their offer in the meantime
Apparently the sticking point in the negotiations has been the Troika insistence that the ECB liquidity financing of 9 billion euros to Cyprus Popular Bank should continue to be serviced by the restructured Bank of Cyprus. I don't know what has been finally agreed on this demand but it is almost certain to have added to Cyprus's overall contribution.
[Edit: ELA financing to Bank of Cyrus is 1 bn so the combined obligation is 10 bn. Latest tweets suggest that full amount remains repayable by Bank of Cyprus].
Draft proposal, presented to euro zone finance ministers for discussion, will involve setting up a "good bank" and a "bad bank" and will mean that Popular Bank of Cyprus, known as Laiki, will be shut down.
Deposits below 100,000 euros in Laiki will be transferred to Bank of Cyprus. Deposits above 100,000 euros, which under EU law are not insured, will be frozen and will be used to resolve debt. It remains unclear how large the write-down on those funds will be.
Considerable by the looks of it.
A lot of Cyprus's problems stem from the German-imposed "solution" to the Greek problem, so the Cypriots might have a point. Cyprus's banks own a lot of Greek bonds which were suddenly worth a lot less. Quite what the Cypriot people were supposed to do about this is unclear.
They could export more, except their main (invisible) export is tourism, and it turns out European tourists are staying at home.
500 is nice number, but they need 10 wickets to win the game. Clock could be against them, esp if they make a slow start. The draw becomes possible. Go early and they can get 125 overs to attack them.