I liked the thing where after he sold McAfee Anti-virus to Intel, they announced they were going to drop the McAfee brand because of its bad associations with John McAfee, and he replied that he was going to change his name to avoid being associated with the terrible software that Intel were now marketing as McAfee Anti-virus.
I liked the thing where after he sold McAfee Anti-virus to Intel, they announced they were going to drop the McAfee brand because of its bad associations with John McAfee, and he replied that he was going to change his name to avoid being associated with the terrible software that Intel were now marketing as McAfee Anti-virus.
I saw a documentary on him. Based on what was presented, the murder case against him looked strong. At very least, he is certifiably paranoid.
Lots of Union flags on show in Edinburgh to day for the Queen
Which makes this even funnier
@JamieRoss7: I see #The45 are actually buying little saltire stickers to put over the "butcher's apron" on their driving licences. http://t.co/06XK9ckUUZ
It seems odd they have chosen the name "the 45". Are they so ignorant of Scottish history they do not know the connotations of what that description means? Or are they just ignorant enough to not realise what a ridiculous cause putting Bonnie Prince Charlie, a joke of a monarch, on the throne was?
"I'm strongly in favour of allowing asylum seekers to work and to earn... whilst their applications are being processed"
I can't see this happening in the UK but if it is part of the EU plan in the states without an opt-out, it would be a terrible decision: thousands of people are dying (and I say that with no hyperbole) because they think they will have a chance of a better life in Europe, even if they are aware an asylum application is likely to fail. A policy that expressly gives, say, primarily economic migrants from Gambia or Senegal or Albania or Pakistan a stronger chance of getting what they want, is going to incentivise more people to pay more money to more really quite vile criminal gangs to come here, and in doing so to take more risks with their own lives and quite possibly the lives of their children. Moreover, by overloading the capacity of EU states to deal with migrant numbers, greater waves of economic migration under the aegis of the laws for asylum will only divert resources away from genuine refugees.
I don't have a problem with politicians doing compassion, but someone as experienced as Juncker must surely be aware that public policy has second-order effects, and that these effects can outweigh the benefits that the policy had in mind.
Also, if Germany or some other depopulating European state thinks its population needs a boost, and it would like to cherry-pick the most resourceful and tenacious workers the world wants to throw at it, then that's fine by me. Even if those workers gain the right to live in the UK once they gain German and hence EU citizenship, the question of who Germany allows to gain citizenship is that country's problem. But if that's what they intend to do, then they should be building proper legal channels with the capacity to process the numbers they require. It might even help them cherry-pick better.
In much more important news, the John Lewis builders have finally left my flat, and my new kitchen is finished.
Oh my word. Carved granite worktop, crimson glass splashbacks. SEXY. My kitchen is SEXY.
Um. Sorry, but ... that all sounds rather ... well ... retro.
To me, anyway.
No, trust me, it's gorgeous. The builder was just proudly taking photos. It's all sleek and modern and the sparkling red glass is LUXURIOUS. I want to sleep in my kitchen. Fuck it, I want to sleep WITH my kitchen.
You are using the words "sexy" and "John Lewis" in the same sentence. Any minute now, you will start gardening and refusing to go out on Friday night because Monty Don is on the tele. Welcome to middle age!
O/T Chuka Umunna was complaining on the BBC about the tone of the leadership election. This wouldn't be the same Chuka Umunna who accused the Labour Party of behaving like a 'petulant child who has been told you can't have the sweeties in the sweet shop'?! http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-33561504
Even the left are starting to brick it that Corbyn is going to win. Long, thoughtful, piece, but very funny too.
We're now three days away from the result of the Labour leadership election, and as you may or may not have heard, Jeremy Corbyn is the runaway favourite.
There's a sense in which all this is bloody marvellous. Well-heeled columnists and dinner-party commentators, let alone the moribund Labour Right, have no idea how desperate the situation has become. Corbyn's supporters – even the worst of them – understand it all too well. This, in many cases, will be why they are prepared to overlook the things they overlook. All that hope and anger, all that deep frustrated longing for something good, projected onto those snow-white whiskers...
And then there's a sense in which all this is bloody petrifying. Jeremy Corbyn? Are you fucking serious?
In much more important news, the John Lewis builders have finally left my flat, and my new kitchen is finished.
Oh my word. Carved granite worktop, crimson glass splashbacks. SEXY. My kitchen is SEXY.
Um. Sorry, but ... that all sounds rather ... well ... retro.
To me, anyway.
No, trust me, it's gorgeous. The builder was just proudly taking photos. It's all sleek and modern and the sparkling red glass is LUXURIOUS. I want to sleep in my kitchen. Fuck it, I want to sleep WITH my kitchen.
You are using the words "sexy" and "John Lewis" in the same sentence. Any minute now, you will start gardening and refusing to go out on Friday night because Monty Don is on the tele. Welcome to middle age!
Nothing wrong with gardening, as my mum would tell you!
ofc more people are saying they will vote Out. Same reason for the SNP landslide. They are safe in the referendum IN result and can now focus on agitating for more devolved powers to Scotlandshire. They do this by seeming to warn Westminster that they are on the verge of leaving.
All quite explicable; if there were another referendum tomorrow there would be another IN vote.
But that doesn't make any sense - 2 years out from the IndyRef, when everything was very, very safe, support for Indy was sub 35%.
It rose as we got closer to the Referendum and now you are saying it makes sense for it to rise as we get further away. You are basically saying that support for Indy can only got up.
I am saying that once it is safe to do so (ie there is no chance of it happening), support for independence increases as a lever on Westminster to devolve more powers.
Equally, who better to fight for Scotland than the SNP, once there is no chance of them taking Scotland out of the Union, ie post a NO vote in the referendum.
But it was only possible to do a deal with (most of) the extremists when they were themselves willing to give sufficient ground to make a deal involving all sides viable. Britain could have done all the listening it like in the 1970s and 1980s and it wouldn't have made any difference. Indeed, it could well have signalled that the government was willing to concede significant ground and that the armed campaign was winning. Ultimately, Britain only did deals with the Irish extremists when one side came to the conclusion that it wasn't worth continuing with the fight if there was a reasonable political deal on the table. Under Lloyd George, it was the UK government that buckled; in the 1990s, it was the republicans.
Where terrorists have limited political ends, talks may be possible. Where their aims are either much more ambitious, or where they would impose an unjust settlement, or where there is no willingness to compromise, talks will not only not be possible but would be unwise. Where war is politics by other means then it is still politics, and politics holds a means to a solution. Where it isn't - where its aim is outright conquest, for example - the fire has to be met with fire.
Yes, I agree, and one can't rule out the necessity of war. One purpose of allowing extremists an opportunity to talk is to find out whether they've reached the point where a discussion at official level is worthwhile. If we take the Middle East, clearly the Palestinian Authority is open to a deal, and equally clearly ISIS is not and fighting them is the only option other than surrender. Whether, say, Hamas or the Taliban are up for one is something that isn't all that clear (it does look as though a deal will eventually be done with the latter).
For Governments to talk to extremists whose rigidity is uncertain may well send the wrong message, as you say. For backbenchers to do so is potentially useful, as it enables governments to listen to what they're saying to Westerners before deciding whether it's worth engaging with them.
The risk is that giving the extremists a platform may seem to come close to endorsing them, so it's better to have a public record of meeting extremists from all sides if one wants to get into this business. But it's not wrong in itself, and of course they may sometimes have a genuine grievance that can and should be addressed (Bloody Sunday, for instance).
Chuka is one of the big losers of this leadership contest.
Oh I don’t know, he had the sense to withdraw from the LL contest and thus shield himself from what is probably the biggest political cluster in the past 50 years. Credit where it’s due.
A shame the "Borders" Railways doesn't actually reach the, er, Border!
But it passes through the county called Scottish Borders. Until it's rebuilt through to Carlisle and civilisation, that'll have to do.
If you get a chance, get up there. Melrose Abbey is superb, and the triple peaks of the Eildon Hills are superb.
Yes I would love to that line! I last went to Scotland 3 years ago, up the East Coast via Edinburgh to Leuchars, then bus to St Andrews.
I'm probably not going to get a chance until next summer at the earliest. I'm secretly hoping the young 'un gets into trains, so I'll have an excuse to take him on trips. If not, my neighbour's three year old is really into trains, so I'll take him instead.
But if you do, perhaps you should roll it into a trip in which you take in the superlative Fort William line, followed by a steam trip to Mallaig. If you're really adventurous, take a ferry across to Inverie (*) and have a drink at the Old Forge.
It'd be a trip to remember.
(*) If you're really adventurous, walk around from Mallaig to Inverie, which includes, to my mind, the hardest seven miles of the entire coast of Britain. I think it took me five hours to do seven miles. But it was worth it.
O/T Chuka Umunna was complaining on the BBC about the tone of the leadership election. This wouldn't be the same Chuka Umunna who accused the Labour Party of behaving like a 'petulant child who has been told you can't have the sweeties in the sweet shop'?! http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-33561504
The biggest losers of the campaign are the people who hoped for a credible and electable Labour party to emerge after Ed Miliband's five years in charge and the disastrous defeat in May. To be fair, that may well include Chuka.
But it was only possible to do a deal with (most of) the extremists when they were themselves willing to give sufficient ground to make a deal involving all sides viable. Britain could have done all the listening it like in the 1970s and 1980s and it wouldn't have made any difference. Indeed, it could well have signalled that the government was willing to concede significant ground and that the armed campaign was winning. Ultimately, Britain only did deals with the Irish extremists when one side came to the conclusion that it wasn't worth continuing with the fight if there was a reasonable political deal on the table. Under Lloyd George, it was the UK government that buckled; in the 1990s, it was the republicans.
Where terrorists have limited political ends, talks may be possible. Where their aims are either much more ambitious, or where they would impose an unjust settlement, or where there is no willingness to compromise, talks will not only not be possible but would be unwise. Where war is politics by other means then it is still politics, and politics holds a means to a solution. Where it isn't - where its aim is outright conquest, for example - the fire has to be met with fire.
Yes, I agree, and one can't rule out the necessity of war. One purpose of allowing extremists an opportunity to talk is to find out whether they've reached the point where a discussion at official level is worthwhile. If we take the Middle East, clearly the Palestinian Authority is open to a deal, and equally clearly ISIS is not and fighting them is the only option other than surrender. Whether, say, Hamas or the Taliban are up for one is something that isn't all that clear (it does look as though a deal will eventually be done with the latter).
For Governments to talk to extremists whose rigidity is uncertain may well send the wrong message, as you say. For backbenchers to do so is potentially useful, as it enables governments to listen to what they're saying to Westerners before deciding whether it's worth engaging with them.
The risk is that giving the extremists a platform may seem to come close to endorsing them, so it's better to have a public record of meeting extremists from all sides if one wants to get into this business. But it's not wrong in itself, and of course they may sometimes have a genuine grievance that can and should be addressed (Bloody Sunday, for instance).
I'd agree with all that with the exception that there's no need to give platforms at all. If that's all the extremists are seeking then they can do it themselves and the intermediary is probably being a useful idiot. If they're prepared to work as a trusted middleman behind the scenes and relay messages and points of view between sides that can't talk - and can't be seen to talk - directly, then that's a different matter.
Only two days to go before the Labour Party descends into chaos. If anyone thought that the leadership election was a farce, just you wait folks for the fallout of a Corbyn victory.
I just cannot begin to imagine the ill discipline that will pervade all corners of the party, the cliques and plotters, the back biters and the opportunists, the fatalists and the doom merchants. A mesh of clashing and competing egos under a leader who really has none of the qualities or skills to lead as the party descends into an open, bloody and chaotic civil war.
Only an utterly ruthless post election Corbyn purge of the Blairites, or the quick defenestration of Jez will allow the party to move on in some semblance.
O/T Chuka Umunna was complaining on the BBC about the tone of the leadership election. This wouldn't be the same Chuka Umunna who accused the Labour Party of behaving like a 'petulant child who has been told you can't have the sweeties in the sweet shop'?! http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-33561504
I'm struggling to think of any Labour politician whose reputation has been enhanced by the leadership contest. Maybe Simon Danczuk and Chris Leslie, a bit.
O/T Chuka Umunna was complaining on the BBC about the tone of the leadership election. This wouldn't be the same Chuka Umunna who accused the Labour Party of behaving like a 'petulant child who has been told you can't have the sweeties in the sweet shop'?! http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-33561504
The biggest losers of the campaign are the people who hoped for a credible and electable Labour party to emerge after Ed Miliband's five years in charge and the disastrous defeat in May. To be fair, that may well include Chuka.
Surely, another big loser is Ed Miliband and his reputation.
Like you, I never had a high opinion of him. But, both by overseeing an insane set of leadership election rules and resigning immediately, he has sunk still lower.
Ed has been the worst leader of Labour in recent times. Is there a single worthy & positive accomplishment by which his tenure will be remembered ?
Of course, Ed’s record of being the Worst Labour Leader of Modern Times may be offered serious competition by his successor.
Even the left are starting to brick it that Corbyn is going to win. Long, thoughtful, piece, but very funny too.
We're now three days away from the result of the Labour leadership election, and as you may or may not have heard, Jeremy Corbyn is the runaway favourite.
There's a sense in which all this is bloody marvellous. Well-heeled columnists and dinner-party commentators, let alone the moribund Labour Right, have no idea how desperate the situation has become. Corbyn's supporters – even the worst of them – understand it all too well. This, in many cases, will be why they are prepared to overlook the things they overlook. All that hope and anger, all that deep frustrated longing for something good, projected onto those snow-white whiskers...
And then there's a sense in which all this is bloody petrifying. Jeremy Corbyn? Are you fucking serious?
"He doesn't just have skeletons in his closet, he hangs up his shirts in an ossuary"
Loved this:
"I think we all know what the problems are. For instance, I'm not what you'd call a hawk, but please: out there in grainy, hard-bollocked reality, Corbyn's foreign policy would not just leave Britain naked in the conference chamber, but fastened into a gimp mask with a horse-tail dangling out of its arse."
You REALLY need to read that brilliant Taylor Parkes Quietus piece on Corbyn. If you still support Corbyn after that, you have no backbone as well as no brain.
Astonighingly good political journalism. Scathing, biting, poignant - and true.
It's a very interesting piece, not only on Corbyn but on the whole far-left worldview.
Here's another quote from it for people to consider:
Stop The War ran several pieces on their website relating to the Charlie Hebdo murders. They're still there, if you want to read them. “It is a great testament to the enduring humanism of the Muslim population of the world,” says one, “that only a tiny minority resort to such acts in the face of endless provocation.” Well, that's one way of looking at it.
'Only two days to go before the Labour Party descends into chaos. If anyone thought that the leadership election was a farce, just you wait folks for the fallout of a Corbyn victory.'
Even the left are starting to brick it that Corbyn is going to win. Long, thoughtful, piece, but very funny too.
We're now three days away from the result of the Labour leadership election, and as you may or may not have heard, Jeremy Corbyn is the runaway favourite.
There's a sense in which all this is bloody marvellous. Well-heeled columnists and dinner-party commentators, let alone the moribund Labour Right, have no idea how desperate the situation has become. Corbyn's supporters – even the worst of them – understand it all too well. This, in many cases, will be why they are prepared to overlook the things they overlook. All that hope and anger, all that deep frustrated longing for something good, projected onto those snow-white whiskers...
And then there's a sense in which all this is bloody petrifying. Jeremy Corbyn? Are you fucking serious?
In much more important news, the John Lewis builders have finally left my flat, and my new kitchen is finished.
Oh my word. Carved granite worktop, crimson glass splashbacks. SEXY. My kitchen is SEXY.
Um. Sorry, but ... that all sounds rather ... well ... retro.
To me, anyway.
No, trust me, it's gorgeous. The builder was just proudly taking photos. It's all sleek and modern and the sparkling red glass is LUXURIOUS. I want to sleep in my kitchen. Fuck it, I want to sleep WITH my kitchen.
You are using the words "sexy" and "John Lewis" in the same sentence. Any minute now, you will start gardening and refusing to go out on Friday night because Monty Don is on the tele. Welcome to middle age!
Nothing wrong with gardening, as my mum would tell you!
Even the left are starting to brick it that Corbyn is going to win. Long, thoughtful, piece, but very funny too.
We're now three days away from the result of the Labour leadership election, and as you may or may not have heard, Jeremy Corbyn is the runaway favourite.
There's a sense in which all this is bloody marvellous. Well-heeled columnists and dinner-party commentators, let alone the moribund Labour Right, have no idea how desperate the situation has become. Corbyn's supporters – even the worst of them – understand it all too well. This, in many cases, will be why they are prepared to overlook the things they overlook. All that hope and anger, all that deep frustrated longing for something good, projected onto those snow-white whiskers...
And then there's a sense in which all this is bloody petrifying. Jeremy Corbyn? Are you fucking serious?
"He doesn't just have skeletons in his closet, he hangs up his shirts in an ossuary"
Loved this:
"I think we all know what the problems are. For instance, I'm not what you'd call a hawk, but please: out there in grainy, hard-bollocked reality, Corbyn's foreign policy would not just leave Britain naked in the conference chamber, but fastened into a gimp mask with a horse-tail dangling out of its arse."
Yes, I agree, and one can't rule out the necessity of war. One purpose of allowing extremists an opportunity to talk is to find out whether they've reached the point where a discussion at official level is worthwhile. If we take the Middle East, clearly the Palestinian Authority is open to a deal, and equally clearly ISIS is not and fighting them is the only option other than surrender. Whether, say, Hamas or the Taliban are up for one is something that isn't all that clear (it does look as though a deal will eventually be done with the latter).
For Governments to talk to extremists whose rigidity is uncertain may well send the wrong message, as you say. For backbenchers to do so is potentially useful, as it enables governments to listen to what they're saying to Westerners before deciding whether it's worth engaging with them.
The risk is that giving the extremists a platform may seem to come close to endorsing them, so it's better to have a public record of meeting extremists from all sides if one wants to get into this business. But it's not wrong in itself, and of course they may sometimes have a genuine grievance that can and should be addressed (Bloody Sunday, for instance).
I'd agree with all that with the exception that there's no need to give platforms at all. If that's all the extremists are seeking then they can do it themselves and the intermediary is probably being a useful idiot. If they're prepared to work as a trusted middleman behind the scenes and relay messages and points of view between sides that can't talk - and can't be seen to talk - directly, then that's a different matter.
One of the biggest lies being perpetrated by the Corbynistas is that in meeting all these extremists he was some sort of one-man FCO-cum-intermediary doing all the dirty work to enable others to reach agreement. Bollocks on a stick. He was giving them a platform and credibility because he agreed with them or just wanted to poke the eyes out of the those who did not like them. Childish gesture politics.
O/T - even after all the craziness of the past couple of months, my favourite moment of the Labour contest is still Mary Creagh's comic turn on Newsnight:
For what it's worth it turns out that the 4 petitioners consist of an SNP, a Green and 2 Labour supporters.
I thought we knew that Calum. Surely the whole thing is just a Nat attempt to extirpate anyone of differing opinions?
I've had the whole thing down as an exercise in elaborate legal trolling since the start - rather like the nationally driven and lead "local" campaigns against fracking (complete with seconded Directors of the Lush Cosmetics company).
You REALLY need to read that brilliant Taylor Parkes Quietus piece on Corbyn. If you still support Corbyn after that, you have no backbone as well as no brain.
Astonighingly good political journalism. Scathing, biting, poignant - and true.
It's a very interesting piece, not only on Corbyn but on the whole far-left worldview.
Here's another quote from it for people to consider:
Stop The War ran several pieces on their website relating to the Charlie Hebdo murders. They're still there, if you want to read them. “It is a great testament to the enduring humanism of the Muslim population of the world,” says one, “that only a tiny minority resort to such acts in the face of endless provocation.” Well, that's one way of looking at it.
Ah yes: the old "it was the victims' fault" trope.
I liked this bit -
"In the end, my Kronstadt came on the 7th of January 2015, when fascists forced their way into the office of a small-circulation satirical paper and killed twelve people, many of them long-time Leftists, lifelong supporters of anti-racist, anti-fascist causes; tireless tormentors of the Right in all its forms. And almost instantly, the Mainstream Radical Left – from a position of near-total ignorance as to what this Charlie Hebdo even was – began to slander the dead, announcing to no one in particular that they were not going to cry for them... before their bodies were even cold. .................. Nothing could shake the Mainstream Radical Left's determination to indulge Islamic radicalism, even as its self-appointed warriors cut their comrades down. Truly, the anti-imperialism of fools."
"It just goes on and on: anyone who can be arsed to look will discover a list of crackpots, Jew-haters and general scumbuckets longer than both your arms. Corbyn seems to think that anti-imperialism is a simple thing: you just seek out some underdogs and slap them on the back. Never mind who or what they are; never mind the dungeons dark and gallows grim these “friends” provide for the secular Left, wherever they find them. Never mind if some of these “anti-imperialists” happen to subscribe to the most imperialist ideology that the world has ever seen. Never mind, never mind.
This stuff will undo him. It may well undo the Labour Party, too. This is not just “muckraking”. And this is not a trivial matter."
Food bank in Tunbridge Wells launches a delivery service because well-heeled residents of the wealthy town are too embarrassed to queue for handouts
Food bank charity Nourish said move saves people from 'degrading' shame Charity says the well-off residents have 'no idea' about others' deprivation Similar issues in Ascot, where people drive elsewhere to avoid neighbours Nourish, which has 2,300 users, had 25% more referrals last year than 2013
Even the left are starting to brick it that Corbyn is going to win. Long, thoughtful, piece, but very funny too.
We're now three days away from the result of the Labour leadership election, and as you may or may not have heard, Jeremy Corbyn is the runaway favourite.
There's a sense in which all this is bloody marvellous. Well-heeled columnists and dinner-party commentators, let alone the moribund Labour Right, have no idea how desperate the situation has become. Corbyn's supporters – even the worst of them – understand it all too well. This, in many cases, will be why they are prepared to overlook the things they overlook. All that hope and anger, all that deep frustrated longing for something good, projected onto those snow-white whiskers...
And then there's a sense in which all this is bloody petrifying. Jeremy Corbyn? Are you fucking serious?
"He doesn't just have skeletons in his closet, he hangs up his shirts in an ossuary"
Loved this:
"I think we all know what the problems are. For instance, I'm not what you'd call a hawk, but please: out there in grainy, hard-bollocked reality, Corbyn's foreign policy would not just leave Britain naked in the conference chamber, but fastened into a gimp mask with a horse-tail dangling out of its arse."
ofc more people are saying they will vote Out. Same reason for the SNP landslide. They are safe in the referendum IN result and can now focus on agitating for more devolved powers to Scotlandshire. They do this by seeming to warn Westminster that they are on the verge of leaving.
All quite explicable; if there were another referendum tomorrow there would be another IN vote.
Then let's have one and put the whole thing to bed.
well that's precisely what the SNP don't want. And it didn't put it to bed last time. It is a convenient device for the SNP to have and try to hold over Westminster's head. The PM should ignore it.
(Edit: all over the shop with my metaphors, there...)
ofc more people are saying they will vote Out. Same reason for the SNP landslide. They are safe in the referendum IN result and can now focus on agitating for more devolved powers to Scotlandshire. They do this by seeming to warn Westminster that they are on the verge of leaving.
All quite explicable; if there were another referendum tomorrow there would be another IN vote.
Then let's have one and put the whole thing to bed.
Oh feck off. We've only just had one. I would like government business here at Holyrood to focus on running the country. We need to focus on what the SNP are doing and get some form of useful opposition going.
But that is just not going to happen. The SNP are going to win another overall majority next year and that means constitutional issues will dominate. For Scotland that is not good at all. So the country has to decide once and for all what it wants.
The quite noticeable dearth of Butcher's Aprons is quite clear from the pictures in the Mail and elsewhere. They make a nice contrast to the compliant nationalist flagwaving whenever she's out and about in England.
Even Ireland had many more Aprons on show when she was last there.
ofc more people are saying they will vote Out. Same reason for the SNP landslide. They are safe in the referendum IN result and can now focus on agitating for more devolved powers to Scotlandshire. They do this by seeming to warn Westminster that they are on the verge of leaving.
All quite explicable; if there were another referendum tomorrow there would be another IN vote.
Then let's have one and put the whole thing to bed.
well that's precisely what the SNP don't want. And it didn't put it to bed last time. It is a convenient device for the SNP to have and try to hold over Westminster's head. The PM should ignore it.
He shouldn't ignore it. He should give Scotland Full Fiscal autonomy, and Federalism - now.
Just do it. It's what the Scots want, and if they don't get it they will leave, in the end, anyway. It also addresses the WLQ (though there should be some mechanism to allow a Scot in Scotland to become PM) - which is good for England and ruinous for Labour. Win win.
Labour is finished in Scotland, so a federal UK is not really going to make much difference.
Disagree completely. Nothing is forever and this SNP supremacy will assuredly end - perhaps sooner than anyone realises. Perhaps after they get tax raising powers and people finally focus on what they do, rather than what they say.
And when the Nats fall back, as they will, I am pretty sure Labour will return (if the UK still exists, and I think it will). They might not ever achieve 40+ seats again, but 20-30 would be feasible. Federalism prevents Labour from using these MPs to run England.
There are no tax raising powers , it is only allocation of income tax and the same amount is deducted off Barnett so it is NOTHING
Even the left are starting to brick it that Corbyn is going to win. Long, thoughtful, piece, but very funny too.
We're now three days away from the result of the Labour leadership election, and as you may or may not have heard, Jeremy Corbyn is the runaway favourite.
There's a sense in which all this is bloody marvellous. Well-heeled columnists and dinner-party commentators, let alone the moribund Labour Right, have no idea how desperate the situation has become. Corbyn's supporters – even the worst of them – understand it all too well. This, in many cases, will be why they are prepared to overlook the things they overlook. All that hope and anger, all that deep frustrated longing for something good, projected onto those snow-white whiskers...
And then there's a sense in which all this is bloody petrifying. Jeremy Corbyn? Are you fucking serious?
An excellent article from a lifetime leftie, who pulls out all the stops and see's that in Jezza Corbyn it's all wysiwyg. Trouble is, why oh why didn't Taylor Parks write this piece two or three weeks ago?
Seriously, Scots, you had to know 12 months ago Tory government was possible, even if it did not seem likely, what else has changed that is swaying you?
It was the dumb labour voters imagining they would win that caused it , they were too thick to take in the reality.
Seriously, Scots, you had to know 12 months ago Tory government was possible, even if it did not seem likely, what else has changed that is swaying you?
It was the dumb labour voters imagining they would win that caused it , they were too thick to take in the reality.
Seriously, Scots, you had to know 12 months ago Tory government was possible, even if it did not seem likely, what else has changed that is swaying you?
It was the dumb labour voters imagining they would win that caused it , they were too thick to take in the reality.
Comments
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3227521/The-Queen-Britain-s-longest-reigning-monarch-arrives-open-Scottish-Borders-Railway.html
https://twitter.com/scotlandvotes/status/641581882560368640
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34193568
"I'm strongly in favour of allowing asylum seekers to work and to earn... whilst their applications are being processed"
I can't see this happening in the UK but if it is part of the EU plan in the states without an opt-out, it would be a terrible decision: thousands of people are dying (and I say that with no hyperbole) because they think they will have a chance of a better life in Europe, even if they are aware an asylum application is likely to fail. A policy that expressly gives, say, primarily economic migrants from Gambia or Senegal or Albania or Pakistan a stronger chance of getting what they want, is going to incentivise more people to pay more money to more really quite vile criminal gangs to come here, and in doing so to take more risks with their own lives and quite possibly the lives of their children. Moreover, by overloading the capacity of EU states to deal with migrant numbers, greater waves of economic migration under the aegis of the laws for asylum will only divert resources away from genuine refugees.
I don't have a problem with politicians doing compassion, but someone as experienced as Juncker must surely be aware that public policy has second-order effects, and that these effects can outweigh the benefits that the policy had in mind.
Also, if Germany or some other depopulating European state thinks its population needs a boost, and it would like to cherry-pick the most resourceful and tenacious workers the world wants to throw at it, then that's fine by me. Even if those workers gain the right to live in the UK once they gain German and hence EU citizenship, the question of who Germany allows to gain citizenship is that country's problem. But if that's what they intend to do, then they should be building proper legal channels with the capacity to process the numbers they require. It might even help them cherry-pick better.
If you get a chance, get up there. Melrose Abbey is superb, and the triple peaks of the Eildon Hills are superb.
You are using the words "sexy" and "John Lewis" in the same sentence. Any minute now, you will start gardening and refusing to go out on Friday night because Monty Don is on the tele. Welcome to middle age!
Chuka is one of the big losers of this leadership contest. Major credibility damage. It seems a long time ago since his handheld camera leadership launch video in Swindon. http://www.theguardian.com/politics/video/2015/may/12/chuka-umunna-labour-leadership-swindon-video
Equally, who better to fight for Scotland than the SNP, once there is no chance of them taking Scotland out of the Union, ie post a NO vote in the referendum.
For Governments to talk to extremists whose rigidity is uncertain may well send the wrong message, as you say. For backbenchers to do so is potentially useful, as it enables governments to listen to what they're saying to Westerners before deciding whether it's worth engaging with them.
The risk is that giving the extremists a platform may seem to come close to endorsing them, so it's better to have a public record of meeting extremists from all sides if one wants to get into this business. But it's not wrong in itself, and of course they may sometimes have a genuine grievance that can and should be addressed (Bloody Sunday, for instance).
But if you do, perhaps you should roll it into a trip in which you take in the superlative Fort William line, followed by a steam trip to Mallaig. If you're really adventurous, take a ferry across to Inverie (*) and have a drink at the Old Forge.
It'd be a trip to remember.
(*) If you're really adventurous, walk around from Mallaig to Inverie, which includes, to my mind, the hardest seven miles of the entire coast of Britain. I think it took me five hours to do seven miles. But it was worth it.
http://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/sep/09/bilds-stance-over-alan-kurdi-images-a-typically-bold-move
I can't do Scotland down, my wife is from Glasgow and has a saltire on the front of her car.
Sturgeon needs some fashion tips.
I just cannot begin to imagine the ill discipline that will pervade all corners of the party, the cliques and plotters, the back biters and the opportunists, the fatalists and the doom merchants. A mesh of clashing and competing egos under a leader who really has none of the qualities or skills to lead as the party descends into an open, bloody and chaotic civil war.
Only an utterly ruthless post election Corbyn purge of the Blairites, or the quick defenestration of Jez will allow the party to move on in some semblance.
Like you, I never had a high opinion of him. But, both by overseeing an insane set of leadership election rules and resigning immediately, he has sunk still lower.
Ed has been the worst leader of Labour in recent times. Is there a single worthy & positive accomplishment by which his tenure will be remembered ?
Of course, Ed’s record of being the Worst Labour Leader of Modern Times may be offered serious competition by his successor.
"He doesn't just have skeletons in his closet, he hangs up his shirts in an ossuary"
Loved this:
"I think we all know what the problems are. For instance, I'm not what you'd call a hawk, but please: out there in grainy, hard-bollocked reality, Corbyn's foreign policy would not just leave Britain naked in the conference chamber, but fastened into a gimp mask with a horse-tail dangling out of its arse."
Here's another quote from it for people to consider:
Stop The War ran several pieces on their website relating to the Charlie Hebdo murders. They're still there, if you want to read them. “It is a great testament to the enduring humanism of the Muslim population of the world,” says one, “that only a tiny minority resort to such acts in the face of endless provocation.” Well, that's one way of looking at it.
http://www.gofundme.com/yh3pe7nc
For what it's worth it turns out that the 4 petitioners consist of an SNP, a Green and 2 Labour supporters.
Great, isn't it?
It was in Vogue...
That is a very good article indeed.
No indeed. I'm quite passionate about it.
"I think we all know what the problems are. For instance, I'm not what you'd call a hawk, but please: out there in grainy, hard-bollocked reality, Corbyn's foreign policy would not just leave Britain naked in the conference chamber, but fastened into a gimp mask with a horse-tail dangling out of its arse."
Gimp suit, surely.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1iHNSmHmoA
(That's what happened last time)
Imagine the likes of Chuka and Danczuk on TV, lugubriously mouthing Occupy movement bullsh8t.
Amazing.
New Thread New Thread
I've had the whole thing down as an exercise in elaborate legal trolling since the start - rather like the nationally driven and lead "local" campaigns against fracking (complete with seconded Directors of the Lush Cosmetics company).
Interesting political theatre, though.
I liked this bit -
"In the end, my Kronstadt came on the 7th of January 2015, when fascists forced their way into the office of a small-circulation satirical paper and killed twelve people, many of them long-time Leftists, lifelong supporters of anti-racist, anti-fascist causes; tireless tormentors of the Right in all its forms. And almost instantly, the Mainstream Radical Left – from a position of near-total ignorance as to what this Charlie Hebdo even was – began to slander the dead, announcing to no one in particular that they were not going to cry for them... before their bodies were even cold. .................. Nothing could shake the Mainstream Radical Left's determination to indulge Islamic radicalism, even as its self-appointed warriors cut their comrades down. Truly, the anti-imperialism of fools."
"It just goes on and on: anyone who can be arsed to look will discover a list of crackpots, Jew-haters and general scumbuckets longer than both your arms. Corbyn seems to think that anti-imperialism is a simple thing: you just seek out some underdogs and slap them on the back. Never mind who or what they are; never mind the dungeons dark and gallows grim these “friends” provide for the secular Left, wherever they find them. Never mind if some of these “anti-imperialists” happen to subscribe to the most imperialist ideology that the world has ever seen. Never mind, never mind.
This stuff will undo him. It may well undo the Labour Party, too. This is not just “muckraking”. And this is not a trivial matter."
Even Ireland had many more Aprons on show when she was last there.
An excellent article from a lifetime leftie, who pulls out all the stops and see's that in Jezza Corbyn it's all wysiwyg. Trouble is, why oh why didn't Taylor Parks write this piece two or three weeks ago?