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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » How Cameron’s view on the referendum could be decisive
Look at how Cameron's view will be absolutely crucial in the EU referendum. If he says REMAIN it'll be decisive pic.twitter.com/VAKLvzbpr7
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If, say, Boris rejected the deal and campaigned to Leave, that could negate any recommendation from Cameron.
My company doesn't let us claim for lunch, but we can claim for a drink. A colleague tried to claim a cup of soup as a drink - it was refused as soup is classed as food. #cupasoupgate
It would have to be pretty darn amazing to convince me at this point, but even if your interpretation is correct, is it even really that big a deal that plenty of people would trust the view of a party leader on the outcome of a political renegotiation? There are oodles of people on all sides of the spectrum who will go with what a party leader says.
It'll get the Tories rallying behind Dave even more.
As David Maxwell Fyfe put it Loyalty is the Tory party's secret weapon.
It always seemed a much more sensible - and cheaper to administrate - system of expenses for simple trips.
If you were entertaining clients, then another system kicked in. Although it was a few years ago, it was surprising how far you could make twenty quid spread.
Seriously, what is the big deal? We might regard it as stupid to rely so heavily, seemingly, on the view of a single person, but people make decisions for stupid reasons all the time, they are allowed to do that. Out system even relies on it, given we presumably want silly posters and brief leaflets to sway people (as well as shore up a party vote) and deciding on the basis of that amount and type of info is objectively silly too.
Government energy policies 'will increase CO2 emissions'
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-34767194
Andy Murray drops f-bomb after ball girl accidentally hurls ball at him
http://bit.ly/1HrjZ3t
And more importantly lower energy bills. Win all round.
When the time comes people will dig out what Cameron said he wanted from these negotiations and what sort of relationship with the EU. They will compare them with what he has achieved and will, I am sure, be recommending.
Personally I'd sooner trust Arthur Daley on the merits of a second hand motor car than Cameron on just about anything. But then I am not a die hard Conservative and I do, still, have a functioning memory.
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2012/06/04/giant-insects-disappeared-thanks-to-falling-oxygen-levels-and-agile-birds/
It's his creation, and people who vote for it trust him, if they didn't they would have voted something else.
If Corbyn would contemplate any other position he too would have carried his party's base with him, because Labour voters trust Corbyn more than their MP's.
As it is it's likely that Cameron's charade of pretending to be undecided, then recommending REMAIN, will prob see us trapped in the EU for a generation
For those of us who don't have a high regard for Tories of any faction watching their mainstream scrapping it out with their extreme right is about the least attractive sight I can remember in politics and more so because the result is so crucial.
IN better quit the patronising threats and come up with some solid coherent reasons why we should stay.
Its almost tempting to vote OUT to watch the establishment cr&p a coconut.
Most people don't care strongly about liberal things, but centrist politicians do and they usually enforce them, because most others have different priorities than to oppose them on issues of little importance to them.
"Who do you blame for the disaster of a fractured Labour Party?"
Ed Miliband
Quite surprised this case is still ongoing:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-surrey-34768403
ISTR he was trying to exploit a loophole (you do not need planning if the structure has stood for x years without complaint) without realising that for this to be the case, the structure must not be deliberately hidden.
The LD are an ex-party, so their opinion matters even less.
So the focus of the debate is within the Conservative party, between it's more liberal leadership and it's more conservative base with UKIP as a guest star.
Net satisfaction with leaders amongst own party supporters
Cameron +75
Farage +85
' No blame for the members who overwhelmingly elected Corbyn? "
How can you blame the members for not choosing one of four candidates who were arguably worse than Ed? If I'd had a vote I too might have gone for the 'lucky dip' candidate
http://jacobinism.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/niqab-notes.html
One small extract may suffice:-
"But veiling is also part of a web of apolitical, cultural and quasi-religious traditions such as honour murder and Female Genital Mutilation designed to entrap women in a position of abject servility. Given the multiplicity of challenges this presents to the defence of human rights, an absolutist opposition to state intervention leaves the State powerless to protect vulnerable women and children within minority communities. ...........
At some point the liberal has to make a choice between disfiguring surgery and an untreated tumour. The laissez-faire approach to liberty in these circumstances is an act, not of principle, but of moral cowardice. Like the pacifist whose only concern is keeping his own hands free of blood, the liberal only concerned with his own reputation for tolerance ends up complicit in the crimes he ignores."
As far as I am concerned the burqa is the uniform of a particularly intolerant, brutal and fundamentally violent version of Islam which is in effect saying "F*ck you" to the society in which it finds itself. It seeks liberties for itself which it will deny to others and which it will use violence to achieve. A free society should not tolerate such challenges to its basic norms. France has banned the burqa and is a free and civilised society. It is absurd to claim that banning it would turn us into some sort of intolerant authoritarian country. Honestly, liberals here make my blood boil sometimes. They seem to think that being liberal means saying yes to everything even when what is being said yes to is designed to destroy every trace of liberalism. Who was it who said that a liberal can't even take their own side in an argument?
See what Yasmin Alibhai-Brown says about the effect of the burqa on young Asian girls and women in her latest book.
And as for how such norms are arrived at (in response to Mr Jessop's question), how any society determines its norms, what the boundaries of behaviour - in public - are.
I also think Casino Royale makes a very shrewd point about women finding it particularly intolerable - and all my female friends do - possibly because we are sensitive to how women's appearance and dress are used to circumscribe women's characters and lives. It was not that long ago that women who wore short skirts were said to be "asking for" rape. And now we see women covered up on the basis that if they were not so they would be responsible for inciting mens lusts', men presumably being incapable of controlling themselves or of being responsible for their own actions.
Are you sure that's not their average ages?
Prosperity enables countries to cope with climate change. 120 years ago, extreme weather killed thousands of people in the USA. Now it kills dozens. The weather hasn't become less extreme, but a much richer society can protect its people far better
It's a control technique. If you don't follow these rules and pay those taxes then sky will literally fall in.
So do what you are told.
Just asking.
Intelligent people can be incredibly boneheaded, naive and self-confident - lethal in combination. A lot of them voted for Jezbollah.
Much to agree with there. The burqa is an insult to both men (implicitly accusing them of being incapable of seeing or speaking to a woman without wanting to rape her) and to women (implicitly turning wearers into the property of men, and implying that non-wearers are sluts). They are not a neutral garb.
Blairites + Orange Book Liberals + Cameroons = another 30%.
That's the battleground.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/Jeremy_Corbyn/11984636/Its-Corbyn-whos-mounting-a-coup-against-the-constitution-not-the-generals.html
It was always doomed to fail but it was a choice Labour made. Even today, they completely lack a Social Democratic voice advocating a high tax, high welfare economy which works so well in Northern Europe. The choice is between Corbynite communism and Blairite consumerism and neither model has any real value or any real record of success.
Just stick a pin in it, Labour is done. Let it die.
Has there ever been a TV show or film about a gay couple as the protagonists where the fact they are gay, and their struggle for acceptance etc, is not mentioned or important to the plot at all?
Edit: this came to me after reading the sky+ blurb for London Spy, which doesn't mention that the couple are two men! How bizarre! I have the answer to my question
Today's Google Doodle (sadly US only, I think) celebrates Heddy Lamarr, a Holywood actress and beauty who developed (and co-patented) a technology that helped us win the war, and we all use today in our mobile phones.
http://www.google.com/doodles/hedy-lamarrs-101st-birthday
The doodle itself is quite beautiful and worth a watch.
He'll get plenty of cash in hand work off that.
"But veiling is also part of a web of apolitical, cultural and quasi-religious traditions such as honour murder and Female Genital Mutilation designed to entrap women in a position of abject servility."
What a low opinion the writer has for women which I suspect tells you more about his background than the women he writes about. I know l know little of the Muslim rituals at first hand but a lot about the Hasidim which is a sect of ultra orthodox Jews.
The women also appear to have a raw deal but to characterize them as being either subservient or in any sense second class citizens couldn't be further from the truth. It's a way of life that they have chosen and which they embrace. Indeed my impression is of many very feisty women and rather wimpish men. How could it be otherwise when they are bringing up 10 or 12 children?
But on the EU I shall make up my own mind.
They could have done with some american flags on the background.
I disagree that the author has a low opinion of women. Rather, it is those who seek to impose it as the norm who have a low opinion of women - and of men too. There is a lot of fear in such a view and, as often happens, those who are fearful often act with violence, explicit or implied.
With Corbyn at least Labour won't lose any more votes, something that was not a guarantee with the other 3.
Until the mid 19C it was very much a minorty choice. And then the British banned it in Egypt (even going around and tearing veils off) on the grounds it subjugated women.
As a result it became extremely popular - but purely as a nationalist symbol of resistance, not anything to do with religion
In some cases, yes. In others women are choosing to do it out of their own free will. I don't want to see such women excluded from society, which is what a ban 'in public' would entail. There is some evidence that the headscarf ban in Turkey has had some fairly evil consequences.
As I've said many times, I don't like burqas or niqabs. But there are many things I don't like, and I'm not sure I should be calling for them to be generally banned. (*) After recent conversations with a friend, arranged marriages are something I'm massively against as the line between 'arranged' and 'forced' can be so thin as to be non-existent - coercion can play a major part into someone saying 'yes'. But banning arranged marriages? No, as people can take part in them of their own free will. With 'forced' marriages, of course, there is no free will.
(The definitions, problems and scale of arranged, coerced and forced marriage should perhaps be talked about more)
The core of the problem is not the burka: it is the pressure from family and friends that 'forces' someone to wear it who would otherwise not. In such cases, it is very similar to forced marriages - the problem is not the victims, but the people doing the forcing. Banning them 'in public' except in certain circumstances (e.g. courts) would just hurt women and do nothing about the core problem.
And would also hurt the women who, out of their own free will, want to wear it.
(*) Girls are a different matter to women; for a whole host of reasons (including health) the wearing of such garb should be illegal until 16 or 18, when the woman is mature enough to make such a decision).
It all depends on your attitude to risk, which is a core skill of gamblers.
The figures may not be applicable to an individual who may have other risk factors, but broadly work out as:
1/100 chance per year of a stroke while in AF.
1/200 chance per year of a stroke while in AF and on Warfarin.
So the number needed to treat to prevent one stroke by the use of warfarin is 200. This can be sold to patients (or Daily Express headline writers) as:
Warfarin halves the chance of a stroke.
Or
You would have to take warfarin for 200 years to prevent yourself having a stroke.
Both statements are equally correct, and it largely depends on what attitude you take to risk and to health that determines the best course of action. Drug companies stress the first one but they would do, wouldn't they?
There are a number of other drugs with considerable side effects that have similar numbers needed to treat, or in other words drugs that are having no benefit for the vast majority of patients.
There is a worked example for statins here:https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_needed_to_treat
Some of the newer drugs have fewer side effects or monitoring required so alter the balance of benefit vs harm. Additionally it is reasonable to suck it and see. If there are no side-effects then even a high NNT may be acceptable to the patient. If it proves to have a lot of side-effects then stopping is not unreasonable.
Note: None of this should be applied without understanding the individual risk via a discussion with a competent doctor!
We have this believe in Britain that the absolute freedom to wear what you want where you want is fundamental to our society.
But to me the mark of a conservative is the ability to take a pragmatic realistic view on any issue, rather than be constrained by dogma.
And, on this, I feel this is something on which we should act for the reasons you describe.
I can see three reasons for wearing a hijab/niqab: (1) you've been forced to do so by your husband/father, backed by either implicit or explicit threats, (2) broader social-cultural pressure means you feel you have to wear one or your life will become difficult (3) you really do want to wear one, in which case you've been brainwashed to have some pretty unhealthy views about men and women through the influence of extreme religious dogma.
None are good.
It's a sign of the subjugation of women, not their free will. The beliefs that lead to it should be confronted.