> > > > To me this is wrong. > > IIRC they justified it by saying that deaf culture would otherwise be lost and they thought it was something with value.<
++++++
I think it is rather grim. The proper understanding of disability turned into the strange fetishising of disability. Disturbing.
> @ydoethur said: > No , it's not OK at all - but frankly I would expect someone in his position to know the difference and to have checked out the figures before making such a comment. > > Clearly you don't know much about Lord Adonis. > > And to be frank, as it was a difference of a mere 0.5% and technically he was comparing the whole of the UK to the whole of Germany, I don't see that it's vital anyway.
OK - but he said 'Britain' - and Labour does not compete in Northern Ireland.
> @MarkHopkins said: > FWIW Israël is how you spell the country in French. > > Unfortunatement, je ne comprends pas le français > > > Wot? Oi we speak Inglish on ere. > > > > Alla ni'n siarad Cymraeg nos ma? Am newid. > > > Iawn. Ond dim ond os ydych chi'n addo pleidleisio dros TBP.
> No , it's not OK at all - but frankly I would expect someone in his position to know the difference and to have checked out the figures before making such a comment.
>
> Clearly you don't know much about Lord Adonis.
>
> And to be frank, as it was a difference of a mere 0.5% and technically he was comparing the whole of the UK to the whole of Germany, I don't see that it's vital anyway.
OK - but he said 'Britain' - and Labour does not compete in Northern Ireland.
I think that was just lazy shorthand, which is rather typical of him.
Incidentally I'm assuming the SPD compete in all 16 Länder, but I don't know that for sure.
> @ydoethur said: > Well there we are. I get that they were desperate for a baby and this was a tragic situation. Yet I can't help feeling this is a horrible cruelty, visited upon an innocent child. The baby could have been born with all its senses. They could have asked a friendly able male to simply provide sperm. > > To me this is wrong. > > Hereditary deafness hasn't prevented me from being a successful singer, pianist, organist and conductor over the last 29 years. > > Do not assume that what you would consider to be a curse is a curse to everyone who has it. > > (As a teacher, it's also very helpful sometimes to be strategically deaf.)<
++++
Good to hear that perspective. I salute your achievement, very sincerely. And of course - Beethoven!
But - and I know this is a very difficult question - would you go as far as the women parents in question, and deliberately "engineer" the conception of a deaf child?
Feel free to ignore me. Your life is your life and I clearly have no obvious right to an answer.
> @ydoethur said: > > @ydoethur said: > > > No , it's not OK at all - but frankly I would expect someone in his position to know the difference and to have checked out the figures before making such a comment. > > > > > > Clearly you don't know much about Lord Adonis. > > > > > > And to be frank, as it was a difference of a mere 0.5% and technically he was comparing the whole of the UK to the whole of Germany, I don't see that it's vital anyway. > > > > OK - but he said 'Britain' - and Labour does not compete in Northern Ireland. > > I think that was just lazy shorthand, which is rather typical of him. > > Incidentally I'm assuming the SPD compete in all 16 Länder, but I don't know that for sure.
> @Richard_Tyndall said: > > @Byronic said: > > > @Richard_Tyndall said: > > > > > > > > > > > > Personally I would have been a lot more receptive to this posting if your examples after homosexuality had been intelligence, empathy, athleticism etc instead of all being things we consider defects. Perhaps not a conscious decision by you but certainly at least enlightening about your subconscious attitude to homosexuality < > > > > ++++ > > > > Don't be a TOTAL dick. I do not consider homosexuality a defect. I am pointing out that there are LOTS of people who DO. e.g. most of the Islamic world, many Catholics, certain Jamaican rappers, and so on and so forth. > > > > No one considers high intelligence a defect, or significant athleticism, etc. > > > > This is pb.com at its most tedious. And pedantic. And pointless. Shut up. > > Um no. All the examples you gave were of defects. It is perfectly reasonable from the context and content of your posting to assume that you therefore held that view. If you want to avoid such an interpretation I would suggest you consider what you post rather than jump on somebody when they highlight it. In the context I would suggest it is you who are being a total dick - to use your own delightful phrase.
I think the issue is that Sean, hushmabigmouf, Byronic is assuming an intelligent readership for his posts. Over 50% of your posts, including this one, are of the form "Your argument says more about you personally than about [subject of argument]" - a formula for converting a not ad hominem argument into an ad hominem argument - which is not a thing intelligent people do, or not more than once in a blue moon.*
*Qualification added to nullify any tediously self-referential claim that I am doing it here.
Good to hear that perspective. I salute your achievement, very sincerely. And of course - Beethoven!
But - and I know this is a very difficult question - would you go as far as the women parents in question, and deliberately "engineer" the conception of a deaf child?
Feel free to ignore me. Your life is your life and I clearly have no obvious right to an answer.
Given that if they were able to conceive a child naturally it would presumably also be deaf, why are you saying that they should have a child that is able to hear?
Your reasoning would appear ultimately to lead to full-on eugenics where things regarded as imperfections should be weeded out. And that I am certainly opposed to. I think you are at the top of a very slippery slope, and I would caution you not to step onto it.
So there's a suspicion that recently the Tory Party has been subject to significant entryism by Leave.EU supporters wanting to vote for the most Brexity candidate in the election.
But with the rise of BXP, and thoughts that they could actually be successful in General Elections and wipe out the Conservative Party, might some of them actually think that they might like to vote for the least Brexity candidate who won't present a challenge to the new political force...? The one who (they think) will be a vote repellent?
> @alex. said: > So there's a suspicion that recently the Tory Party has been subject to significant entryism by Leave.EU supporters wanting to vote for the most Brexity candidate in the election. > > But with the rise of BXP, and thoughts that they could actually be successful in General Elections and wipe out the Conservative Party, might some of them actually think that they might like to vote for the least Brexity candidate who won't present a challenge to the new political force...? The one who (they think) will be a vote repellent?
> @Ishmael_Z said: > > @Richard_Tyndall said: > > > @Byronic said: > > > > @Richard_Tyndall said: > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Personally I would have been a lot more receptive to this posting if your examples after homosexuality had been intelligence, empathy, athleticism etc instead of all being things we consider defects. Perhaps not a conscious decision by you but certainly at least enlightening about your subconscious attitude to homosexuality < > > > > > > ++++ > > > > > > Don't be a TOTAL dick. I do not consider homosexuality a defect. I am pointing out that there are LOTS of people who DO. e.g. most of the Islamic world, many Catholics, certain Jamaican rappers, and so on and so forth. > > > > > > No one considers high intelligence a defect, or significant athleticism, etc. > > > > > > This is pb.com at its most tedious. And pedantic. And pointless. Shut up. > > > > Um no. All the examples you gave were of defects. It is perfectly reasonable from the context and content of your posting to assume that you therefore held that view. If you want to avoid such an interpretation I would suggest you consider what you post rather than jump on somebody when they highlight it. In the context I would suggest it is you who are being a total dick - to use your own delightful phrase. > > I think the issue is that Sean, hushmabigmouf, Byronic is assuming an intelligent readership for his posts. Over 50% of your posts, including this one, are of the form "Your argument says more about you personally than about [subject of argument]" - a formula for converting a not ad hominem argument into an ad hominem argument - which is not a thing intelligent people do, or not more than once in a blue moon.* > > *Qualification added to nullify any tediously self-referential claim that I am doing it here.
Don't worry you are not tedious. You are just a fuckwit. But then we have known that for a long time.
> @algarkirk said: > > @algarkirk said: > > > Apropos of the 'up to 20 candidates issue';,it would be nice if Jesse Norman ran because then along with Rory Stewart there would be two decent, sensible, thoughtful, intelligent, statesmanlike candidates to share bottom place in this Eatanswill bearpit of an election. > > > > A doctor of philosophy - in philosophy - in the parliamentary Conservative Party? > > > > I suppose a familiarity with philosophy could be quite useful in getting through the day, if you're a Tory MP. > > I think it's time we gave a try to having a PM with intellectual/cultural hinterland. I wonder if we missed a trick by not having Roy Jenkins, Denis Healey, Ken Clarke when we had the chance. A PM who actually read, understood and wrote (beautifully) books about Adam Smith and Burke would be a nice change. Stewart and Norman would still come bottom with the party in its current terminal state.
Clinton was extremely well-read, and I think Obama too. Churchill certainly gave that impression, but not sure I can think of another PM. Michael Foot, I assume, if we include opposition leaders. Gaitskell, maybe?
> > I think the issue is that Sean, hushmabigmouf, Byronic is assuming an intelligent readership for his posts. Over 50% of your posts, including this one, are of the form "Your argument says more about you personally than about [subject of argument]" - a formula for converting a not ad hominem argument into an ad hominem argument - which is not a thing intelligent people do, or not more than once in a blue moon.* > > *Qualification added to nullify any tediously self-referential claim that I am doing it here.<
+++++
Thankyou for that.Though I assure you I really am not SeanT. Again I can refer you to the PB mods, if you like.
I am maybe flattered by the comparison, or maybe not. He could be witty - if a bit deranged, and a self-confessed alcoholic IIRC? - I follow him and Tim and TSE on Twitter - go through his Followers and you will find me, in Richmond, complete with avatar. If you really, really want to. Anyway I see he has just tweeted this, which is quite amusing in the light of today's news:
> @TheScreamingEagles said: > Hi TSE -- you should have been here last night -- we were all watching a football match that BT streamed live on Youtube. > > A big shout out to Spurs, they were magnificent as were their fans. > > Spurs are where we were last year, after losing the Champions League final we went and backed Jurgen Klopp and spent £176 million improving the squad and look at us today. > > Daniel Levy needs to get his chequebook out and back Poch.
He does... But im not holding my breath... You also didn't let any big names leave... Not sure we will manage that either...
> > Oh sure, loud in the defence of their right to express eccentric and even offensive opinions.
> >
> > But we don't have to defend the opinions. Let's be loud in our ridicule of the opinions.<
>
> +++++
>
> Widdecombe is an odd fish, but I think she has been slightly mis-represented here. She's not saying gayness is a disease (I don't think). Her phrasing is nonetheless clumsy. She seems to have been old and silly ever since she entered politics, somehow.
"Wrongful" was apparently the word she used (for "homosexual acts") in a parliamentary debate on civil partnerships in 2004.
Surely there can't be any doubt she thinks gayness is undesirable and people would be better off without it?
Why someone who has never had sex should think she has anything useful or interesting to say about other peoples’ sexuality is a mystery.
But it is people like her implying or saying that people like my son are somehow a problem, a defect to be cured or whatever, which makes the life he and other gay people live harder than it otherwise should be. They have to justify their existence, their desires, their yearning - like all of us - to love and be loved. They have to fight just to be, just to be left alone to live life in whatever way they want.
And I am not having it - it is my flesh and blood she is harming or insulting with her idiocies and unkindnesses. This sort of thoughtless bigotry is not just aimed at gay people but at all of us, whose sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, friends, colleagues they are. Harm them, attack them, insult them, deride them - and you do it to me, to all of us. We are all minorities somewhere, in some way.
I feel very strongly about this - as I am sure those who have read some of my postings and headers on this will realise - because it’s personal and because this is about the sort of people we are and how we treat those around us.
“Do as you would be done by.” Wise words. And words which those who cloak their bigotry in religion should ponder.
Clinton was extremely well-read, and I think Obama too. Churchill certainly gave that impression, but not sure I can think of another PM. Michael Foot, I assume, if we include opposition leaders. Gaitskell, maybe?
Macmillan.
Also Balfour, going back quite a long way, whose hobby was writing philosophy books.
> @justin124 said: > > @ydoethur said: > > Wrong! Labour polled 14.1% in GB. The 13.6% figure relates to the UK. > > > > Oh well, that's OK then. Thank goodness they didn't get less than the 15.8% of the SPD...oh. > > No , it's not OK at all - but frankly I would expect someone in his position to know the difference and to have checked out the figures before making such a comment.
Straws - you are always grasping at straws as labour continue their inevitable decline under Corbyn and his malign cronies
Well there we are. I get that they were desperate for a baby and this was a tragic situation. Yet I can't help feeling this is a horrible cruelty, visited upon an innocent child. The baby could have been born with all its senses. They could have asked a friendly able male to simply provide sperm.
To me this is wrong.
Hereditary deafness hasn't prevented me from being a successful singer, pianist, organist and conductor over the last 29 years.
Do not assume that what you would consider to be a curse is a curse to everyone who has it.
(As a teacher, it's also very helpful sometimes to be strategically deaf.)
On topic; do you think that charging candidates for the leadership election a decent-sized deposit against getting 30 votes (that's around 10% of the electorate) in the first round might thin the selection down? I had in mind half a year's ministerial salary (or a couple of speeches for Boris).
> > Apropos of the 'up to 20 candidates issue';,it would be nice if Jesse Norman ran because then along with Rory Stewart there would be two decent, sensible, thoughtful, intelligent, statesmanlike candidates to share bottom place in this Eatanswill bearpit of an election.
>
>
>
> A doctor of philosophy - in philosophy - in the parliamentary Conservative Party?
>
>
>
> I suppose a familiarity with philosophy could be quite useful in getting through the day, if you're a Tory MP.
>
> I think it's time we gave a try to having a PM with intellectual/cultural hinterland. I wonder if we missed a trick by not having Roy Jenkins, Denis Healey, Ken Clarke when we had the chance. A PM who actually read, understood and wrote (beautifully) books about Adam Smith and Burke would be a nice change. Stewart and Norman would still come bottom with the party in its current terminal state.
Clinton was extremely well-read, and I think Obama too. Churchill certainly gave that impression, but not sure I can think of another PM. Michael Foot, I assume, if we include opposition leaders. Gaitskell, maybe?
Much as I hate to say it, Thatcher was intelligent, both in street smarts and academic qualifications. Wilson was a honorary President of the RSS. Attlee, Eden, Macmillan and Douglas-Home were successful in professions that didn't require academic smarts. Major clawed his way up the old-fashioned way via the banking exams (I really like him!). Blair was a lawyer and Cameron was PPE, and politeness prevents me from describing those professions. In common with the Conservative Party, I have forgotten that May exists.
Well there we are. I get that they were desperate for a baby and this was a tragic situation. Yet I can't help feeling this is a horrible cruelty, visited upon an innocent child. The baby could have been born with all its senses. They could have asked a friendly able male to simply provide sperm.
To me this is wrong.
Hereditary deafness hasn't prevented me from being a successful singer, pianist, organist and conductor over the last 29 years.
Do not assume that what you would consider to be a curse is a curse to everyone who has it.
(As a teacher, it's also very helpful sometimes to be strategically deaf.)
Essential in a parent too, sometimes!
I wouldn't know, of course. Uncles just don't get the same grief!
And with that, I am off to bed. I wish everyone a peaceful night's rest.
> @ydoethur said: > Good to hear that perspective. I salute your achievement, very sincerely. And of course - Beethoven! > > But - and I know this is a very difficult question - would you go as far as the women parents in question, and deliberately "engineer" the conception of a deaf child? > > Feel free to ignore me. Your life is your life and I clearly have no obvious right to an answer. > > Given that if they were able to conceive a child naturally it would presumably also be deaf, why are you saying that they should have a child that is able to hear? > > Your reasoning would appear ultimately to lead to full-on eugenics where things regarded as imperfections should be weeded out. And that I am certainly opposed to. I think you are at the top of a very slippery slope, and I would caution you not to step onto it.<
++++
Thankyou. You didn't have to answer and I appreciate it.
Yes I totally get that I teeter at the top of a ski slope called eugenics, and the finish line is exclusive, Nazi-like breeding of blue eyed blondes with superhuman skills (which is obviously wrong), and yet I can't help objecting to the idea of deliberately conceiving a child with a serious disability, when there is the option of having a fully able child (as seems to be the case with this lesbian couple - it is hard to tell from the report).
Whatever we think now it is slightly academic. Science is not there yet, to greet us at the airport with the cold hard facts. But it soon will be. And we will have to resolve this terrible dilemma, one way or the other.
Well there we are. I get that they were desperate for a baby and this was a tragic situation. Yet I can't help feeling this is a horrible cruelty, visited upon an innocent child. The baby could have been born with all its senses. They could have asked a friendly able male to simply provide sperm.
To me this is wrong.
Hereditary deafness hasn't prevented me from being a successful singer, pianist, organist and conductor over the last 29 years.
Do not assume that what you would consider to be a curse is a curse to everyone who has it.
(As a teacher, it's also very helpful sometimes to be strategically deaf.)
Essential in a parent too, sometimes!
I wouldn't know, of course. Uncles just don't get the same grief!
And with that, I am off to bed. I wish everyone a peaceful night's rest.
> Much as I hate to say it, Thatcher was intelligent, both in street smarts and academic qualifications. Wilson was a honorary President of the RSS. Attlee, Eden, Macmillan and Douglas-Home were successful in professions that didn't require academic smarts. Major clawed his way up the old-fashioned way via the banking exams (I really like him!). Blair was a lawyer and Cameron was PPE, and politeness prevents me from describing those professions. In common with the Conservative Party, I have forgotten that May exists.
Cameron would have benefited from being a lawyer. His fatal flaw was a repeated failure to ask himself the question that any good lawyer is always asking, which is: What if I am wrong/this witness does not give the answer I expect him to give/the Court finds against me?
> @justin124 said: > > @ydoethur said: > > No , it's not OK at all - but frankly I would expect someone in his position to know the difference and to have checked out the figures before making such a comment. > > > > Clearly you don't know much about Lord Adonis. > > > > And to be frank, as it was a difference of a mere 0.5% and technically he was comparing the whole of the UK to the whole of Germany, I don't see that it's vital anyway. > > OK - but he said 'Britain' - and Labour does not compete in Northern Ireland.
> @NickPalmer said: > > @algarkirk said: > > > @algarkirk said: > > > > > Apropos of the 'up to 20 candidates issue';,it would be nice if Jesse Norman ran because then along with Rory Stewart there would be two decent, sensible, thoughtful, intelligent, statesmanlike candidates to share bottom place in this Eatanswill bearpit of an election. > > > > > > > > A doctor of philosophy - in philosophy - in the parliamentary Conservative Party? > > > > > > > > I suppose a familiarity with philosophy could be quite useful in getting through the day, if you're a Tory MP. > > > > I think it's time we gave a try to having a PM with intellectual/cultural hinterland. I wonder if we missed a trick by not having Roy Jenkins, Denis Healey, Ken Clarke when we had the chance. A PM who actually read, understood and wrote (beautifully) books about Adam Smith and Burke would be a nice change. Stewart and Norman would still come bottom with the party in its current terminal state. > > Clinton was extremely well-read, and I think Obama too. Churchill certainly gave that impression, but not sure I can think of another PM. Michael Foot, I assume, if we include opposition leaders. Gaitskell, maybe?
Macmillan read Trollope in the No 10 garden in his spare time.
Boris has written books on ancient Rome, William Hague wrote an excellent biography of Pitt as Roy Jenkins did of Gladstone and Churchill
> > And I am not having it - it is my flesh and blood she is harming or insulting with her idiocies and unkindnesses. This sort of thoughtless bigotry is not just aimed at gay people but at all of us, whose sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, friends, colleagues they are. Harm them, attack them, insult them, deride them - and you do it to me, to all of us. We are all minorities somewhere, in some way. > > I feel very strongly about this - as I am sure those who have read some of my postings and headers on this will realise - because it’s personal and because this is about the sort of people we are and how we treat those around us. > > “Do as you would be done by.” Wise words. And words which those who cloak their bigotry in religion should ponder.<
++++
I'm with you! It's just that many others aren't. Including most of the Islamic world, and much, still, of the Catholic world.
It would help if they understood that gayness is a natural part of the human and animal kingdom - just like being heterosexual, or hungry, or having fins, fur, or a taste for fancy seafood. Gayness is a biological fact and represented in many animal species. Including ours. In zoology it is thought to bestow an evolutionary benefit on the species.
But focus on the positive. I see the agitators at Anderton Primary School have finally been told to get lost. That is belated but it is welcome.
> @Cyclefree said: > > @Byronic said: > > > > @Chris said: > > > > > > > Oh sure, loud in the defence of their right to express eccentric and even offensive opinions. > > > > > > > > But we don't have to defend the opinions. Let's be loud in our ridicule of the opinions.< > > > > > > +++++ > > > > > > Widdecombe is an odd fish, but I think she has been slightly mis-represented here. She's not saying gayness is a disease (I don't think). Her phrasing is nonetheless clumsy. She seems to have been old and silly ever since she entered politics, somehow. > > > > "Wrongful" was apparently the word she used (for "homosexual acts") in a parliamentary debate on civil partnerships in 2004. > > > > Surely there can't be any doubt she thinks gayness is undesirable and people would be better off without it? > > Why someone who has never had sex should think she has anything useful or interesting to say about other peoples’ sexuality is a mystery. > > But it is people like her implying or saying that people like my son are somehow a problem, a defect to be cured or whatever, which makes the life he and other gay people live harder than it otherwise should be. They have to justify their existence, their desires, their yearning - like all of us - to love and be loved. They have to fight just to be, just to be left alone to live life in whatever way they want. > > And I am not having it - it is my flesh and blood she is harming or insulting with her idiocies and unkindnesses. This sort of thoughtless bigotry is not just aimed at gay people but at all of us, whose sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, friends, colleagues they are. Harm them, attack them, insult them, deride them - and you do it to me, to all of us. We are all minorities somewhere, in some way. > > I feel very strongly about this - as I am sure those who have read some of my postings and headers on this will realise - because it’s personal and because this is about the sort of people we are and how we treat those around us. > > “Do as you would be done by.” Wise words. And words which those who cloak their bigotry in religion should ponder.
I'm sorry to say I think the bigotry often arises from religion and they try to cloak it in something else.
So many of the opponents of same-sex marriage were either Roman Catholics or evangelical Christians, and yet it was so rare for them to say they were against it on religious grounds. They always had some excuse that made it sound a little less like trying to impose their own religious beliefs on the rest of us. Particularly the soi-disant liberals.
> @Ishmael_Z said: > > @viewcode said: > > > Much as I hate to say it, Thatcher was intelligent, both in street smarts and academic qualifications. Wilson was a honorary President of the RSS. Attlee, Eden, Macmillan and Douglas-Home were successful in professions that didn't require academic smarts. Major clawed his way up the old-fashioned way via the banking exams (I really like him!). Blair was a lawyer and Cameron was PPE, and politeness prevents me from describing those professions. In common with the Conservative Party, I have forgotten that May exists. > > Cameron would have benefited from being a lawyer. His fatal flaw was a repeated failure to ask himself the question that any good lawyer is always asking, which is: What if I am wrong/this witness does not give the answer I expect him to give/the Court finds against me? >
A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum.
> @HYUFD said: > > @NickPalmer said: > > > @algarkirk said: > > > > @algarkirk said: > > > > > > > Apropos of the 'up to 20 candidates issue';,it would be nice if Jesse Norman ran because then along with Rory Stewart there would be two decent, sensible, thoughtful, intelligent, statesmanlike candidates to share bottom place in this Eatanswill bearpit of an election. > > > > > > > > > > > > A doctor of philosophy - in philosophy - in the parliamentary Conservative Party? > > > > > > > > > > > > I suppose a familiarity with philosophy could be quite useful in getting through the day, if you're a Tory MP. > > > > > > I think it's time we gave a try to having a PM with intellectual/cultural hinterland. I wonder if we missed a trick by not having Roy Jenkins, Denis Healey, Ken Clarke when we had the chance. A PM who actually read, understood and wrote (beautifully) books about Adam Smith and Burke would be a nice change. Stewart and Norman would still come bottom with the party in its current terminal state. > > > > Clinton was extremely well-read, and I think Obama too. Churchill certainly gave that impression, but not sure I can think of another PM. Michael Foot, I assume, if we include opposition leaders. Gaitskell, maybe? > > Macmillan read Trollope in the No 10 garden in his spare time. > > Boris has written books on ancient Rome, William Hague wrote an excellent biography of Pitt as Roy Jenkins did of Gladstone and Churchill >
Tony Blair was a great admirer of Sir Walter Scott.
> > A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. <
++++++
Very very true. Sadly.
"I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister".
Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite.
> @Byronic said: > > @anothernick said: > > > > > A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. < > > ++++++ > > Very very true. Sadly. > > "I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister". > > Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite. > Cameron was actually quite good on the domestic front, he was less successful abroad, see Libya and Syria but no Blair style Iraq disaster, his mistake was calling an EU referendum without preparing for a possible Leave vote
Why someone who has never had sex should think she has anything useful or interesting to say about other peoples’ sexuality is a mystery.
But it is people like her implying or saying that people like my son are somehow a problem, a defect to be cured or whatever, which makes the life he and other gay people live harder than it otherwise should be. They have to justify their existence, their desires, their yearning - like all of us - to love and be loved. They have to fight just to be, just to be left alone to live life in whatever way they want.
And I am not having it - it is my flesh and blood she is harming or insulting with her idiocies and unkindnesses. This sort of thoughtless bigotry is not just aimed at gay people but at all of us, whose sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, friends, colleagues they are. Harm them, attack them, insult them, deride them - and you do it to me, to all of us. We are all minorities somewhere, in some way.
I feel very strongly about this - as I am sure those who have read some of my postings and headers on this will realise - because it’s personal and because this is about the sort of people we are and how we treat those around us.
“Do as you would be done by.” Wise words. And words which those who cloak their bigotry in religion should ponder.
Not for the first time, I am in complete agreement with you on this.
> @Chris said: > > @Cyclefree said: > > > @Byronic said: > > > > > > @Chris said: > > > > > > > > > > > Oh sure, loud in the defence of their right to express eccentric and even offensive opinions. > > > > > > > > > > > > But we don't have to defend the opinions. Let's be loud in our ridicule of the opinions.< > > > > > > > > > > +++++ > > > > > > > > > > Widdecombe is an odd fish, but I think she has been slightly mis-represented here. She's not saying gayness is a disease (I don't think). Her phrasing is nonetheless clumsy. She seems to have been old and silly ever since she entered politics, somehow. > > > > > > > > "Wrongful" was apparently the word she used (for "homosexual acts") in a parliamentary debate on civil partnerships in 2004. > > > > > > > > Surely there can't be any doubt she thinks gayness is undesirable and people would be better off without it? > > > > Why someone who has never had sex should think she has anything useful or interesting to say about other peoples’ sexuality is a mystery. > > > > But it is people like her implying or saying that people like my son are somehow a problem, a defect to be cue should be. They have to justify their existence, their desires, their yearning - like all of us - to love and be loved. They have to fight just to be, just to be left alone to live life in whatever way they want. > > > > And I am not having it - it is my flesh and blood she is harming or insulting with her idiocies and unkindnesses. This sort of thoughtless bigotry is not just aimed at gay people but at all of us, whose sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, friends, colleagues they are. Harm them, attack them, insult them, deride them - and you do it to me, to all of us. We are all minorities somewhere, in some way. > > > > I feel very strongly about this - as I am sure those who have read some of my postings and headers on this will realise - because it’s personal and because this is about the sort of people we are and how we treat those around us. > > > > “Do as you would be done by.” Wise words. And words which those who cloak their bigotry in religion should ponder. > > I'm sorry to say I think the bigotry often arises from religion and they try to cloak it in something else. > > So many of the opponents of same-sex marriage were either Roman Catholics or evangelical Christians, and yet it was so rare for them to say they were against it on religious grounds. They always had some excuse that made it sound a little less like trying to impose their own religious beliefs on the rest of us. Particularly the soi-disant liberals. > >
Plus orthodox Jews and Muslims and Hindus too, however there is no reason why gay marriage in secular law can remain separate from marriage in a religious setting as legally it still is
Related question: has any western democracy ever undergone such a perilous decline in leaders, as we have recently endured?
Thatcher > Major > Blair (Iraq) > Brown > Cameron (lost referendum) > T May.
On this basis, in about ten years time we can expect our prime minister to be a blind and homeless drunk with anger management issues, sleeping in a car park on the outskirts of Swansea, trying to attack any individual voters who come near.
> @Chris said: > > @HYUFD said: > > > @NickPalmer said: > > > > @algarkirk said: > > > > > @algarkirk said: > > > > > > > > > Apropos of the 'up to 20 candidates issue';,it would be nice if Jesse Norman ran because then along with Rory Stewart there would be two decent, sensible, thoughtful, intelligent, statesmanlike candidates to share bottom place in this Eatanswill bearpit of an election. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > A doctor of philosophy - in philosophy - in the parliamentary Conservative Party? > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > I suppose a familiarity with philosophy could be quite useful in getting through the day, if you're a Tory MP. > > > > > > > > I think it's time we gave a try to having a PM with intellectual/cultural hinterland. I wonder if we missed a trick by not having Roy Jenkins, Denis Healey, Ken Clarke when we had the chance. A PM who actually read, understood and wrote (beautifully) books about Adam Smith and Burke would be a nice change. Stewart and Norman would still come bottom with the party in its current terminal state. > > > > > > Clinton was extremely well-read, and I think Obama too. Churchill certainly gave that impression, but not sure I can think of another PM. Michael Foot, I assume, if we include opposition leaders. Gaitskell, maybe? > > > > Macmillan read Trollope in the No 10 garden in his spare time. > > > > Boris has written books on ancient Rome, William Hague wrote an excellent biography of Pitt as Roy Jenkins did of Gladstone and Churchill > > > > Tony Blair was a great admirer of Sir Walter Scott.
Well I can imagine Ivanhoe was an inspiration for him
> Hi TSE -- you should have been here last night -- we were all watching a football match that BT streamed live on Youtube.
>
> A big shout out to Spurs, they were magnificent as were their fans.
>
> Spurs are where we were last year, after losing the Champions League final we went and backed Jurgen Klopp and spent £176 million improving the squad and look at us today.
>
> Daniel Levy needs to get his chequebook out and back Poch.
He does... But im not holding my breath... You also didn't let any big names leave... Not sure we will manage that either...
18 months ago we sold our best player, we used the funds to improve the team, finished with 97pts the next season, and went to two CL finals in a row, winning one.
> @Byronic said: > > @anothernick said: > > > > > A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. < > > ++++++ > > Very very true. Sadly. > > "I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister". > > Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite. >
He understood that the Tory headbangers were a threat to both country and party but he could not be bothered to take them on, he hoped the electorate would do it for him. Like his predecessors as Tory leader he failed to challenge his party - the Tories have not had a leader who took them out of their comfort zone since Thatcher.
Clinton was extremely well-read, and I think Obama too. Churchill certainly gave that impression, but not sure I can think of another PM. Michael Foot, I assume, if we include opposition leaders. Gaitskell, maybe?
Macmillan.
Also Balfour, going back quite a long way, whose hobby was writing philosophy books.
> @Black_Rook said: > If Conservative MPs adopted the Single Transferable Vote for their leadership election and simply ranked all the candidates, they could arrive at their final two in one round of voting. This would save a lot of dicking about.
I think they enjoy the dicking about part.
But I think they'd have just as much fun getting down to the last few candidates if they did the whole thing in one day.
> @HYUFD said: > > @Byronic said: > > > @anothernick said: > > > > > > > > A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. < > > > > ++++++ > > > > Very very true. Sadly. > > > > "I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister". > > > > Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite. > > > Cameron was actually quite good on the domestic front, he was less successful abroad, see Libya and Syria but no Blair style Iraq disaster, his mistake was calling an EU referendum without preparing for a possible Leave vote >
I don't blame him for that, and apart from timing and the inaction of Jezza it couldhave been one despite decades of anti european propaganda in the press.
The lack of preparedness issue is really down to Leavers themselves, who 3 years on still lack a plan.
> @HYUFD said: > > @Chris said: > > > @HYUFD said: > > > > @NickPalmer said: > > > > > @algarkirk said: > > > > > > @algarkirk said: > > > > > > > > > > > Apropos of the 'up to 20 candidates issue';,it would be nice if Jesse Norman ran because then along with Rory Stewart there would be two decent, sensible, thoughtful, intelligent, statesmanlike candidates to share bottom place in this Eatanswill bearpit of an election. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > A doctor of philosophy - in philosophy - in the parliamentary Conservative Party? > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > I suppose a familiarity with philosophy could be quite useful in getting through the day, if you're a Tory MP. > > > > > > > > > > I think it's time we gave a try to having a PM with intellectual/cultural hinterland. I wonder if we missed a trick by not having Roy Jenkins, Denis Healey, Ken Clarke when we had the chance. A PM who actually read, understood and wrote (beautifully) books about Adam Smith and Burke would be a nice change. Stewart and Norman would still come bottom with the party in its current terminal state. > > > > > > > > Clinton was extremely well-read, and I think Obama too. Churchill certainly gave that impression, but not sure I can think of another PM. Michael Foot, I assume, if we include opposition leaders. Gaitskell, maybe? > > > > > > Macmillan read Trollope in the No 10 garden in his spare time. > > > > > > Boris has written books on ancient Rome, William Hague wrote an excellent biography of Pitt as Roy Jenkins did of Gladstone and Churchill > > > > > > > Tony Blair was a great admirer of Sir Walter Scott. > > Well I can imagine Ivanhoe was an inspiration for him
Actually, yes, I said that because I remembered hearing him say that Ivanhoe was his favourite book.
Who knows what influence that story of everyday Crusading folk may have had on him?
> @Nigelb said: > Why someone who has never had sex should think she has anything useful or interesting to say about other peoples’ sexuality is a mystery. > > But it is people like her implying or saying that people like my son are somehow a problem, a defect to be cured or whatever, which makes the life he and other gay people live harder than it otherwise should be. They have to justify their existence, their desires, their yearning - like all of us - to love and be loved. They have to fight just to be, just to be left alone to live life in whatever way they want. > > And I am not having it - it is my flesh and blood she is harming or insulting with her idiocies and unkindnesses. This sort of thoughtless bigotry is not just aimed at gay people but at all of us, whose sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, friends, colleagues they are. Harm them, attack them, insult them, deride them - and you do it to me, to all of us. We are all minorities somewhere, in some way. > > I feel very strongly about this - as I am sure those who have read some of my postings and headers on this will realise - because it’s personal and because this is about the sort of people we are and how we treat those around us. > > “Do as you would be done by.” Wise words. And words which those who cloak their bigotry in religion should ponder. > > Not for the first time, I am in complete agreement with you on this.
> @edmundintokyo said: > > @Black_Rook said: > > If Conservative MPs adopted the Single Transferable Vote for their leadership election and simply ranked all the candidates, they could arrive at their final two in one round of voting. This would save a lot of dicking about. > > I think they enjoy the dicking about part. > > But I think they'd have just as much fun getting down to the last few candidates if they did the whole thing in one day.
Surely that is an AV system not STV.
The advantage of serial votes is that there is no need to guess at placings and who will be left.
> I feel very strongly about this - as I am sure those who have read some of my postings and headers on this will realise - because it’s personal and because this is about the sort of people we are and how we treat those around us.
>
> “Do as you would be done by.” Wise words. And words which those who cloak their bigotry in religion should ponder.
I'm sorry to say I think the bigotry often arises from religion and they try to cloak it in something else.
So many of the opponents of same-sex marriage were either Roman Catholics or evangelical Christians, and yet it was so rare for them to say they were against it on religious grounds. They always had some excuse that made it sound a little less like trying to impose their own religious beliefs on the rest of us. Particularly the soi-disant liberals.
I know. But as I have said before I think they have misunderstood the basic tenets of the religion they claim to profess. You will look long and hard for any comment by Jesus on gay people.
I don’t know whether there is some inherent dislike of homosexuality which has been built on by religion or the other way around but I don’t care. To me there is no basis in decency or morality or love to treat or talk about gay people in the way that too many people, including too many religious people do.
Religion at its best should be about helping you improve yourself in some way, about giving you a conscience, a still, small voice that asks you to think not just: “Can I do this? But should I?”. It’s about helping others, particularly the marginalised, not about hating or disliking others or forcing them into unhappiness. At its best, this is what it should be. But sadly, it too often isn’t this. It shames religions. So while I consider myself a Catholic I part company with the Church on this. The Church is simply wrong in its understanding of human sexuality or, in my view, of Jesus’s teachings.
Possibly an arrogant view but one I have come to because of my personal experiences.
Not sure why people are so certain that Ann Widdecombe has never had sex. She may have announced that but if so I missed it. Otherwise, my strong sense is that she HAS had sex and lots of it. She was on Strictly Come Dancing remember.
> @anothernick said: > > @Byronic said: > > > @anothernick said: > > > > > > > > A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. < > > > > ++++++ > > > > Very very true. Sadly. > > > > "I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister". > > > > Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite. > > > > He understood that the Tory headbangers were a threat to both country and party but he could not be bothered to take them on, he hoped the electorate would do it for him. Like his predecessors as Tory leader he failed to challenge his party - the Tories have not had a leader who took them out of their comfort zone since Thatcher.
He did on gay marriage, more money for the NHS, climate change etc.
In any case you could also say Labour have not had a leader who has taken them out of their 'comfort zone' since Blair.
However that assumes that the only government worth having is a fiscally conservative and socially liberal one in the mould of Blairite New Labour and the Cameroons which would ignore large numbers of voters who are economically left or socially conservative or both as seen by the emergence of Corbyn and the Brexit Party
Not sure why people are so certain that Ann Widdecombe has never had sex. She may have announced that but if so I missed it. Otherwise, my strong sense is that she HAS had sex and lots of it. She was on Strictly Come Dancing remember.
She told us a few years ago. Her chosen vice is drink. (Not that I think of sex as a vice, you understand.)
Lansman in the usual fashion of away day visitors doesn't realise that the actual point is that the right-wing Labour msps are a bit rubbish, the Corbynista loyalist msps are a bit rubbish and those in between are a bit rubbish. Until that (admittedly fairly intractable) situation is addressed, they'll continue their factional blame game unto oblivion.
> @HYUFD said: > > @anothernick said: > > > @Byronic said: > > > > @anothernick said: > > > > > > > > > > > A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. < > > > > > > ++++++ > > > > > > Very very true. Sadly. > > > > > > "I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister". > > > > > > Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite. > > > > > > > He understood that the Tory headbangers were a threat to both country and party but he could not be bothered to take them on, he hoped the electorate would do it for him. Like his predecessors as Tory leader he failed to challenge his party - the Tories have not had a leader who took them out of their comfort zone since Thatcher. > > He did on gay marriage, more money for the NHS, climate change etc. > > In any case you could also say Labour have not had a leader who has taken them out of their 'comfort zone' since Blair. > > However that assumes that the only government worth having is a fiscally conservative and socially liberal one in the mould of Blairite New Labour and the Cameroons which would ignore large numbers of voters who are economically left or socially conservative or both as seen by the emergence of Corbyn and the Brexit Party
More money for the NHS?! Spending on health rose more slowly during the coalition years than at any time since the NHS was founded. The deterioration in the service is very obvious - in my area of London it takes a month to get a routine GP appointment, Saturday appointments are no longer available and the wait for hospital tests is lengthening. And we now learn that the doctor patient ratio is worsening and life expectancy has started to decline for the first time since the war.
> @Nigelb said: > Perhaps he’s just a fan of Hymns Ancient and Modern ? > https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/O_Come,_O_Come,_Emmanuel > > I've never seen it with an umlaut there and I've got a number of versions back to 1922. > > You do of course have to sing it as three syllables otherwise the slurring for the diphthong makes it (a) flat and (b) slow. > > Precisely. > I just thought it mildly amusing that the old bigot utilises the same prissy diaeresis as the New Yorker magazine.
In Hebrew, which is totally phonetic, the word "Israel" is spelled in such a way as to be pronounced with three syllables, so, Galloway's use of a diphthong is not technically incorrect, though not general usage in the English speaking world
> @kinabalu said: > Not sure why people are so certain that Ann Widdecombe has never had sex. She may have announced that but if so I missed it. Otherwise, my strong sense is that she HAS had sex and lots of it. She was on Strictly Come Dancing remember.
She has I believe threatened to sue anyone who says she is not still a virgin
Rory in comparison with the rest is at least a head and shoulders better. I guess that means he doesn't win which is a pity. The rest -that I've heard of -are pitiful
> @anothernick said: > > @HYUFD said: > > > @anothernick said: > > > > @Byronic said: > > > > > @anothernick said: > > > > > > > > > > > > > > A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. < > > > > > > > > ++++++ > > > > > > > > Very very true. Sadly. > > > > > > > > "I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister". > > > > > > > > Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite. > > > > > > > > > > He understood that the Tory headbangers were a threat to both country and party but he could not be bothered to take them on, he hoped the electorate would do it for him. Like his predecessors as Tory leader he failed to challenge his party - the Tories have not had a leader who took them out of their comfort zone since Thatcher. > > > > He did on gay marriage, more money for the NHS, climate change etc. > > > > In any case you could also say Labour have not had a leader who has taken them out of their 'comfort zone' since Blair. > > > > However that assumes that the only government worth having is a fiscally conservative and socially liberal one in the mould of Blairite New Labour and the Cameroons which would ignore large numbers of voters who are economically left or socially conservative or both as seen by the emergence of Corbyn and the Brexit Party > > More money for the NHS?! Spending on health rose more slowly during the coalition years than at any time since the NHS was founded. The deterioration in the service is very obvious - in my area of London it takes a month to get a routine GP appointment, Saturday appointments are no longer available and the wait for hospital tests is lengthening. And we now learn that the doctor patient ratio is worsening and life expectancy has started to decline for the first time since the war.
NHS spending was ringfenced and rose throughout the Cameron years while other departments were cut to rectify the deep deficit left in 2010 and of course you ignored the introduction of gay marriage under Cameron and the extra funds for overseas aid and the climate change reduction emissions cuts much of his party were opposed to
> @Ishmael_Z said: > > @Richard_Tyndall said: > > > Don't worry you are not tedious. You are just a fuckwit. But then we have known that for a long time. > > Well, no, the tedious person would be the person making the claim, not me, wouldn't it, now? > > Your inability to grasp a point as straightforward as that says a lot about you.
I grasped it perfectly well. I was simply reapplying it to a fuckwit.
By which, just to be completely clear since you seem to be having trouble with this concept, I mean you.
So the US wants access to the NHS in any trade deal. What a shock !
The UK is going to be screwed in any trade deal. The right wing press will continue to suck upto the nutjob in the WH even as his own advisers have made it clear that the UK out of the EU will be desperate for any deal so will be easy meat for the USA.
> @kinabalu said: > Not sure why people are so certain that Ann Widdecombe has never had sex. She may have announced that but if so I missed it. Otherwise, my strong sense is that she HAS had sex and lots of it. She was on Strictly Come Dancing remember.
I once read a modern language version of the bible cover to cover and I regret to inform you of the following passage from the OT which very much stuck in my memory. It's an exact quote -
"A man must not lay down with another man. God hates that."
> @kinabalu said: > @ Cyclefree > > I once read a modern language version of the bible cover to cover and I regret to inform you of the following passage from the OT which very much stuck in my memory. It's an exact quote - > > "A man must not lay down with another man. God hates that." > > Not much wriggle room there. > > 😊
It may have said the first sentence, it did not say the latter as far as I recall.
Pride, sloth, envy, gluttony, adultery etc are also recorded as sins in the bible and as Jesus said 'let he who is without sin cast the first stone'
> @Byronic said: > Related question: has any western democracy ever undergone such a perilous decline in leaders, as we have recently endured? > > Thatcher > Major > Blair (Iraq) > Brown > Cameron (lost referendum) > T May. > > On this basis, in about ten years time we can expect our prime minister to be a blind and homeless drunk with anger management issues, sleeping in a car park on the outskirts of Swansea, trying to attack any individual voters who come near. > > Good night.
I think they've all been abysmal since Attlee, but I'm aware that this is a minority opinion.
Like many of my generation, I hold a special disregard for Thatcher, and think that most of the UK's structural issues can be traced back to her reworking of the country and its ways, but bloody hell she would run rings round any of these current Tory fools and knaves.
> @kinabalu said: > @ Cyclefree > > I once read a modern language version of the bible cover to cover and I regret to inform you of the following passage from the OT which very much stuck in my memory. It's an exact quote - > > "A man must not lay down with another man. God hates that." > > Not much wriggle room there. > > 😊
If you read the whole thing you must have noticed that something significant happens about 600 years after that bit, of particular relevance since Cyclefree specifically referenced "Jesus's teachings".
> @oldpolitics said: > > @kinabalu said: > > @ Cyclefree > > > > I once read a modern language version of the bible cover to cover and I regret to inform you of the following passage from the OT which very much stuck in my memory. It's an exact quote - > > > > "A man must not lay down with another man. God hates that." > > > > Not much wriggle room there. > > > > 😊 > > If you read the whole thing you must have noticed that something significant happens about 600 years after that bit, of particular relevance since Cyclefree specifically referenced "Jesus's teachings".
Good stuff from Mike Hancock on the Irish border. He makes the what should be self evident point, that hasn't occurred to any of his rivals, which is that no Irish border solution will work without the buy-in of those that live on the border. He somewhat ruins his considered plan for the Irish border by wanting to put a time limit on any solution. He's also vague about his Brexit trade policy and what is the point of it all. The remaining two proposals are the easy ones. Nevertheless Brexit plans don't get better than this.
> @Mango said: > > @Byronic said: > > Related question: has any western democracy ever undergone such a perilous decline in leaders, as we have recently endured? > > > > Thatcher > Major > Blair (Iraq) > Brown > Cameron (lost referendum) > T May. > > > > On this basis, in about ten years time we can expect our prime minister to be a blind and homeless drunk with anger management issues, sleeping in a car park on the outskirts of Swansea, trying to attack any individual voters who come near. > > > > Good night. > > I think they've all been abysmal since Attlee, but I'm aware that this is a minority opinion. > > Like many of my generation, I hold a special disregard for Thatcher, and think that most of the UK's structural issues can be traced back to her reworking of the country and its ways, but bloody hell she would run rings round any of these current Tory fools and knaves.
The electorate gets the leaders it deserves, however given current world leaders include Maduro, Putin, Bolsonaro, Orban, Jong Un, Trump and likely soon enough Salvini we could get a lot worse
> @Ishmael_Z said: , I have forgotten that May exists. > > Cameron would have benefited from being a lawyer. His fatal flaw was a repeated failure to ask himself the question that any good lawyer is always asking, which is: What if I am wrong/this witness does not give the answer I expect him to give/the Court finds against me? > Swiss policy on referendums (the publicly-intiated kind, as oppose to the wilder popular initiatives) is to try to focus on questions where all the alternative answers are acceptable. I remember one in Basel about a new bridge. Did we want it to be grand, with a rise in tax to pay for it? To fit in with the surroundings and look weathered? To be as cheap as possible? etc. The authorities didn't really mind which we preferred - they were perfectly happy to do any of them. But people felt engaged, and talked fondly of "our new bridge". That's how referendums should work...
> @kinabalu said: > @ Cyclefree > > I once read a modern language version of the bible cover to cover and I regret to inform you of the following passage from the OT which very much stuck in my memory. It's an exact quote - > > "A man must not lay down with another man. God hates that." > > Not much wriggle room there. > > 😊
That's from the bit where it also says you can't eat ham sandwiches or prawns, or drive a car on a Saturday. Usually regarded as superseded by subsequent teachings.
I once read a modern language version of the bible cover to cover and I regret to inform you of the following passage from the OT which very much stuck in my memory. It's an exact quote -
"A man must not lay down with another man. God hates that."
HOWEVER - we should recognise that Miss Widdecombe also explicitly does NOT call for gay people to be savagely murdered by being thrown off the tops of tall buildings or strung up from cranes. Unlike Jeremy Corbyn's friends (Hamas) or his ex-employers (the Iranian theocracy.)
Therefore, in my league table of gay-bashing infamy, the Blackpool Canary ranks several divisions below the leader of the nation's largest political mass movement (and, by extension, both the Labour Party as a whole and all those who continue to serve it and to agitate for his election as leader of the country.) Relative to him, she's actually pretty harmless.
Yes those who promote Gay rights and don't want invasions of Middle Eastern countries are definitely more homophobic than homophobic nutters who rant about gays and promote close alliances with countries like Saudi Arabia...
Good stuff from Mike Hancock on the Irish border. He makes the what should be self evident point, that hasn't occurred to any of his rivals, which is that no Irish border solution will work without the buy-in of those that live on the border. He somewhat ruins his considered plan for the Irish border by wanting to put a time limit on any solution. He's also vague about his Brexit trade policy and what is the point of it all. The remaining two proposals are the easy ones. Nevertheless Brexit plans don't get better than this.
Thinking about it. Proposal 4 can be read as "Masterful inactivity on the Irish border"; 5 is "seek" time limit on the Irish border, which we won't get. So Irish backstop it is.
Proposal 3. is FTA because we can't abide rule taking, but we can still do AI. No mention of cars, pharmaceuticals, financial services, agriculture etc. Maybe Hancock wants us to think this is ridiculous. Will we take the rules at all?
> @TheScreamingEagles said: > > @TheScreamingEagles said: > > > Hi TSE -- you should have been here last night -- we were all watching a football match that BT streamed live on Youtube. > > > > > > A big shout out to Spurs, they were magnificent as were their fans. > > > > > > Spurs are where we were last year, after losing the Champions League final we went and backed Jurgen Klopp and spent £176 million improving the squad and look at us today. > > > > > > Daniel Levy needs to get his chequebook out and back Poch. > > > > He does... But im not holding my breath... You also didn't let any big names leave... Not sure we will manage that either... > > 18 months ago we sold our best player, we used the funds to improve the team, finished with 97pts the next season, and went to two CL finals in a row, winning one.
Given we've done that for decades re selling best player, Carrick, berbatov, modric and latterly bale, our past performance with money shows the challenge this time...
> @FF43 said: > > Thinking about it. Proposal 4 can be read as "Masterful inactivity on the Irish border"; 5 is "seek" time limit on the Irish border, which we won't get. So Irish backstop it is. > > Proposal 3. is FTA because we can't abide rule taking, but we can still do AI. No mention of cars, pharmaceuticals, financial services, agriculture etc. Maybe Hancock wants us to think this is ridiculous. Will we take the rules at all?
————-
No reason for Labour or the DUP to vote for it though, so is his real policy a confirmatory vote?
> @NickPalmer said: > Swiss policy on referendums (the publicly-intiated kind, as oppose to the wilder popular initiatives) is to try to focus on questions where all the alternative answers are acceptable. I remember one in Basel about a new bridge. Did we want it to be grand, with a rise in tax to pay for it? To fit in with the surroundings and look weathered? To be as cheap as possible? etc. The authorities didn't really mind which we preferred - they were perfectly happy to do any of them. But people felt engaged, and talked fondly of "our new bridge". That's how referendums should work...
I guess you know this as you used to work in corporate IT but it's also how you want to handle management involvement in anything. Make sure they have plenty of things to decide, and also make sure none of those things actually matter...
> @Sunil_Prasannan said: > @ Cyclefree > > > > I once read a modern language version of the bible cover to cover and I regret to inform you of the following passage from the OT which very much stuck in my memory. It's an exact quote - > > > > "A man must not lay down with another man. God hates that." > > > > Not much wriggle room there. > > > > 😊 > > You mean they can't do it standing up????
Sure it also gives the ok on boning your own daughter? Religion is just another jumped up bunch of self righteous individuals who want to force one to live their life as they see fit.
> @viewcode said: > Macmillan read Trollope in the No 10 garden in his spare time. > > Major was a fan of Anthony Trollope's "A Dance to the Music of Time"
Major certainly liked Trollope but "Dance to the Music of Time" was by Anthony Powell , also an excellent read if you have the stamina for all 12 volumes.
> Thinking about it. Proposal 4 can be read as "Masterful inactivity on the Irish border"; 5 is "seek" time limit on the Irish border, which we won't get. So Irish backstop it is.
>
> Proposal 3. is FTA because we can't abide rule taking, but we can still do AI. No mention of cars, pharmaceuticals, financial services, agriculture etc. Maybe Hancock wants us to think this is ridiculous. Will we take the rules after all?
————-
No reason for Labour or the DUP to vote for it though, so is his real policy a confirmatory vote?
The onion layer peels off... This would seem to imply extension until you can get some kind of agreed policy that includes the WA and doesn't frighten off any of the Brexit stakeholders.
> @HYUFD said: > The electorate gets the leaders it deserves, however given current world leaders include Maduro, Putin, Bolsonaro, Orban, Jong Un, Trump and likely soon enough Salvini we could get a lot worse
Well, under FPTP we never get the leaders we vote for.
Comments
> >
> > To me this is wrong.
>
> IIRC they justified it by saying that deaf culture would otherwise be lost and they thought it was something with value.<
++++++
I think it is rather grim. The proper understanding of disability turned into the strange fetishising of disability. Disturbing.
> No , it's not OK at all - but frankly I would expect someone in his position to know the difference and to have checked out the figures before making such a comment.
>
> Clearly you don't know much about Lord Adonis.
>
> And to be frank, as it was a difference of a mere 0.5% and technically he was comparing the whole of the UK to the whole of Germany, I don't see that it's vital anyway.
OK - but he said 'Britain' - and Labour does not compete in Northern Ireland.
> FWIW Israël is how you spell the country in French.
>
> Unfortunatement, je ne comprends pas le français
>
>
> Wot? Oi we speak Inglish on ere.
>
>
>
> Alla ni'n siarad Cymraeg nos ma? Am newid.
>
>
> Iawn. Ond dim ond os ydych chi'n addo pleidleisio dros TBP.
Que? No hables galés
Incidentally I'm assuming the SPD compete in all 16 Länder, but I don't know that for sure.
> Well there we are. I get that they were desperate for a baby and this was a tragic situation. Yet I can't help feeling this is a horrible cruelty, visited upon an innocent child. The baby could have been born with all its senses. They could have asked a friendly able male to simply provide sperm.
>
> To me this is wrong.
>
> Hereditary deafness hasn't prevented me from being a successful singer, pianist, organist and conductor over the last 29 years.
>
> Do not assume that what you would consider to be a curse is a curse to everyone who has it.
>
> (As a teacher, it's also very helpful sometimes to be strategically deaf.)<
++++
Good to hear that perspective. I salute your achievement, very sincerely. And of course - Beethoven!
But - and I know this is a very difficult question - would you go as far as the women parents in question, and deliberately "engineer" the conception of a deaf child?
Feel free to ignore me. Your life is your life and I clearly have no obvious right to an answer.
> > @ydoethur said:
>
> > No , it's not OK at all - but frankly I would expect someone in his position to know the difference and to have checked out the figures before making such a comment.
>
> >
>
> > Clearly you don't know much about Lord Adonis.
>
> >
>
> > And to be frank, as it was a difference of a mere 0.5% and technically he was comparing the whole of the UK to the whole of Germany, I don't see that it's vital anyway.
>
>
>
> OK - but he said 'Britain' - and Labour does not compete in Northern Ireland.
>
> I think that was just lazy shorthand, which is rather typical of him.
>
> Incidentally I'm assuming the SPD compete in all 16 Länder, but I don't know that for sure.
Yes, they do.
> > @Byronic said:
> > > @Richard_Tyndall said:
> >
> > > >
> > >
> > > Personally I would have been a lot more receptive to this posting if your examples after homosexuality had been intelligence, empathy, athleticism etc instead of all being things we consider defects. Perhaps not a conscious decision by you but certainly at least enlightening about your subconscious attitude to homosexuality <
> >
> > ++++
> >
> > Don't be a TOTAL dick. I do not consider homosexuality a defect. I am pointing out that there are LOTS of people who DO. e.g. most of the Islamic world, many Catholics, certain Jamaican rappers, and so on and so forth.
> >
> > No one considers high intelligence a defect, or significant athleticism, etc.
> >
> > This is pb.com at its most tedious. And pedantic. And pointless. Shut up.
>
> Um no. All the examples you gave were of defects. It is perfectly reasonable from the context and content of your posting to assume that you therefore held that view. If you want to avoid such an interpretation I would suggest you consider what you post rather than jump on somebody when they highlight it. In the context I would suggest it is you who are being a total dick - to use your own delightful phrase.
I think the issue is that Sean, hushmabigmouf, Byronic is assuming an intelligent readership for his posts. Over 50% of your posts, including this one, are of the form "Your argument says more about you personally than about [subject of argument]" - a formula for converting a not ad hominem argument into an ad hominem argument - which is not a thing intelligent people do, or not more than once in a blue moon.*
*Qualification added to nullify any tediously self-referential claim that I am doing it here.
Your reasoning would appear ultimately to lead to full-on eugenics where things regarded as imperfections should be weeded out. And that I am certainly opposed to. I think you are at the top of a very slippery slope, and I would caution you not to step onto it.
But with the rise of BXP, and thoughts that they could actually be successful in General Elections and wipe out the Conservative Party, might some of them actually think that they might like to vote for the least Brexity candidate who won't present a challenge to the new political force...? The one who (they think) will be a vote repellent?
> So there's a suspicion that recently the Tory Party has been subject to significant entryism by Leave.EU supporters wanting to vote for the most Brexity candidate in the election.
>
> But with the rise of BXP, and thoughts that they could actually be successful in General Elections and wipe out the Conservative Party, might some of them actually think that they might like to vote for the least Brexity candidate who won't present a challenge to the new political force...? The one who (they think) will be a vote repellent?
Rory!
Or is it Sam now?
> > @Richard_Tyndall said:
> > > @Byronic said:
> > > > @Richard_Tyndall said:
> > >
> > > > >
> > > >
> > > > Personally I would have been a lot more receptive to this posting if your examples after homosexuality had been intelligence, empathy, athleticism etc instead of all being things we consider defects. Perhaps not a conscious decision by you but certainly at least enlightening about your subconscious attitude to homosexuality <
> > >
> > > ++++
> > >
> > > Don't be a TOTAL dick. I do not consider homosexuality a defect. I am pointing out that there are LOTS of people who DO. e.g. most of the Islamic world, many Catholics, certain Jamaican rappers, and so on and so forth.
> > >
> > > No one considers high intelligence a defect, or significant athleticism, etc.
> > >
> > > This is pb.com at its most tedious. And pedantic. And pointless. Shut up.
> >
> > Um no. All the examples you gave were of defects. It is perfectly reasonable from the context and content of your posting to assume that you therefore held that view. If you want to avoid such an interpretation I would suggest you consider what you post rather than jump on somebody when they highlight it. In the context I would suggest it is you who are being a total dick - to use your own delightful phrase.
>
> I think the issue is that Sean, hushmabigmouf, Byronic is assuming an intelligent readership for his posts. Over 50% of your posts, including this one, are of the form "Your argument says more about you personally than about [subject of argument]" - a formula for converting a not ad hominem argument into an ad hominem argument - which is not a thing intelligent people do, or not more than once in a blue moon.*
>
> *Qualification added to nullify any tediously self-referential claim that I am doing it here.
Don't worry you are not tedious. You are just a fuckwit. But then we have known that for a long time.
> > @algarkirk said:
>
> > Apropos of the 'up to 20 candidates issue';,it would be nice if Jesse Norman ran because then along with Rory Stewart there would be two decent, sensible, thoughtful, intelligent, statesmanlike candidates to share bottom place in this Eatanswill bearpit of an election.
>
>
>
> A doctor of philosophy - in philosophy - in the parliamentary Conservative Party?
>
>
>
> I suppose a familiarity with philosophy could be quite useful in getting through the day, if you're a Tory MP.
>
> I think it's time we gave a try to having a PM with intellectual/cultural hinterland. I wonder if we missed a trick by not having Roy Jenkins, Denis Healey, Ken Clarke when we had the chance. A PM who actually read, understood and wrote (beautifully) books about Adam Smith and Burke would be a nice change. Stewart and Norman would still come bottom with the party in its current terminal state.
Clinton was extremely well-read, and I think Obama too. Churchill certainly gave that impression, but not sure I can think of another PM. Michael Foot, I assume, if we include opposition leaders. Gaitskell, maybe?
>
> I think the issue is that Sean, hushmabigmouf, Byronic is assuming an intelligent readership for his posts. Over 50% of your posts, including this one, are of the form "Your argument says more about you personally than about [subject of argument]" - a formula for converting a not ad hominem argument into an ad hominem argument - which is not a thing intelligent people do, or not more than once in a blue moon.*
>
> *Qualification added to nullify any tediously self-referential claim that I am doing it here.<
+++++
Thankyou for that.Though I assure you I really am not SeanT. Again I can refer you to the PB mods, if you like.
I am maybe flattered by the comparison, or maybe not. He could be witty - if a bit deranged, and a self-confessed alcoholic IIRC? - I follow him and Tim and TSE on Twitter - go through his Followers and you will find me, in Richmond, complete with avatar. If you really, really want to. Anyway I see he has just tweeted this, which is quite amusing in the light of today's news:
https://twitter.com/thomasknox/status/1135271471134195712
His views on Brexit were bollocks, though.
> Hi TSE -- you should have been here last night -- we were all watching a football match that BT streamed live on Youtube.
>
> A big shout out to Spurs, they were magnificent as were their fans.
>
> Spurs are where we were last year, after losing the Champions League final we went and backed Jurgen Klopp and spent £176 million improving the squad and look at us today.
>
> Daniel Levy needs to get his chequebook out and back Poch.
He does... But im not holding my breath... You also didn't let any big names leave... Not sure we will manage that either...
But it is people like her implying or saying that people like my son are somehow a problem, a defect to be cured or whatever, which makes the life he and other gay people live harder than it otherwise should be. They have to justify their existence, their desires, their yearning - like all of us - to love and be loved. They have to fight just to be, just to be left alone to live life in whatever way they want.
And I am not having it - it is my flesh and blood she is harming or insulting with her idiocies and unkindnesses. This sort of thoughtless bigotry is not just aimed at gay people but at all of us, whose sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, friends, colleagues they are. Harm them, attack them, insult them, deride them - and you do it to me, to all of us. We are all minorities somewhere, in some way.
I feel very strongly about this - as I am sure those who have read some of my postings and headers on this will realise - because it’s personal and because this is about the sort of people we are and how we treat those around us.
“Do as you would be done by.” Wise words. And words which those who cloak their bigotry in religion should ponder.
Also Balfour, going back quite a long way, whose hobby was writing philosophy books.
Going further back, Disraeli was an author.
> > @ydoethur said:
> > Wrong! Labour polled 14.1% in GB. The 13.6% figure relates to the UK.
> >
> > Oh well, that's OK then. Thank goodness they didn't get less than the 15.8% of the SPD...oh.
>
> No , it's not OK at all - but frankly I would expect someone in his position to know the difference and to have checked out the figures before making such a comment.
Straws - you are always grasping at straws as labour continue their inevitable decline under Corbyn and his malign cronies
> Don't worry you are not tedious. You are just a fuckwit. But then we have known that for a long time.
Well, no, the tedious person would be the person making the claim, not me, wouldn't it, now?
Your inability to grasp a point as straightforward as that says a lot about you.
And with that, I am off to bed. I wish everyone a peaceful night's rest.
> Good to hear that perspective. I salute your achievement, very sincerely. And of course - Beethoven!
>
> But - and I know this is a very difficult question - would you go as far as the women parents in question, and deliberately "engineer" the conception of a deaf child?
>
> Feel free to ignore me. Your life is your life and I clearly have no obvious right to an answer.
>
> Given that if they were able to conceive a child naturally it would presumably also be deaf, why are you saying that they should have a child that is able to hear?
>
> Your reasoning would appear ultimately to lead to full-on eugenics where things regarded as imperfections should be weeded out. And that I am certainly opposed to. I think you are at the top of a very slippery slope, and I would caution you not to step onto it.<
++++
Thankyou. You didn't have to answer and I appreciate it.
Yes I totally get that I teeter at the top of a ski slope called eugenics, and the finish line is exclusive, Nazi-like breeding of blue eyed blondes with superhuman skills (which is obviously wrong), and yet I can't help objecting to the idea of deliberately conceiving a child with a serious disability, when there is the option of having a fully able child (as seems to be the case with this lesbian couple - it is hard to tell from the report).
Whatever we think now it is slightly academic. Science is not there yet, to greet us at the airport with the cold hard facts. But it soon will be. And we will have to resolve this terrible dilemma, one way or the other.
Nos da.
> Much as I hate to say it, Thatcher was intelligent, both in street smarts and academic qualifications. Wilson was a honorary President of the RSS. Attlee, Eden, Macmillan and Douglas-Home were successful in professions that didn't require academic smarts. Major clawed his way up the old-fashioned way via the banking exams (I really like him!). Blair was a lawyer and Cameron was PPE, and politeness prevents me from describing those professions. In common with the Conservative Party, I have forgotten that May exists.
Cameron would have benefited from being a lawyer. His fatal flaw was a repeated failure to ask himself the question that any good lawyer is always asking, which is: What if I am wrong/this witness does not give the answer I expect him to give/the Court finds against me?
> > @ydoethur said:
> > No , it's not OK at all - but frankly I would expect someone in his position to know the difference and to have checked out the figures before making such a comment.
> >
> > Clearly you don't know much about Lord Adonis.
> >
> > And to be frank, as it was a difference of a mere 0.5% and technically he was comparing the whole of the UK to the whole of Germany, I don't see that it's vital anyway.
>
> OK - but he said 'Britain' - and Labour does not compete in Northern Ireland.
Northern Ireland is in the UK but not Britain
> > @algarkirk said:
> > > @algarkirk said:
> >
> > > Apropos of the 'up to 20 candidates issue';,it would be nice if Jesse Norman ran because then along with Rory Stewart there would be two decent, sensible, thoughtful, intelligent, statesmanlike candidates to share bottom place in this Eatanswill bearpit of an election.
> >
> >
> >
> > A doctor of philosophy - in philosophy - in the parliamentary Conservative Party?
> >
> >
> >
> > I suppose a familiarity with philosophy could be quite useful in getting through the day, if you're a Tory MP.
> >
> > I think it's time we gave a try to having a PM with intellectual/cultural hinterland. I wonder if we missed a trick by not having Roy Jenkins, Denis Healey, Ken Clarke when we had the chance. A PM who actually read, understood and wrote (beautifully) books about Adam Smith and Burke would be a nice change. Stewart and Norman would still come bottom with the party in its current terminal state.
>
> Clinton was extremely well-read, and I think Obama too. Churchill certainly gave that impression, but not sure I can think of another PM. Michael Foot, I assume, if we include opposition leaders. Gaitskell, maybe?
Macmillan read Trollope in the No 10 garden in his spare time.
Boris has written books on ancient Rome, William Hague wrote an excellent biography of Pitt as Roy Jenkins did of Gladstone and Churchill
>
> And I am not having it - it is my flesh and blood she is harming or insulting with her idiocies and unkindnesses. This sort of thoughtless bigotry is not just aimed at gay people but at all of us, whose sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, friends, colleagues they are. Harm them, attack them, insult them, deride them - and you do it to me, to all of us. We are all minorities somewhere, in some way.
>
> I feel very strongly about this - as I am sure those who have read some of my postings and headers on this will realise - because it’s personal and because this is about the sort of people we are and how we treat those around us.
>
> “Do as you would be done by.” Wise words. And words which those who cloak their bigotry in religion should ponder.<
++++
I'm with you! It's just that many others aren't. Including most of the Islamic world, and much, still, of the Catholic world.
It would help if they understood that gayness is a natural part of the human and animal kingdom - just like being heterosexual, or hungry, or having fins, fur, or a taste for fancy seafood. Gayness is a biological fact and represented in many animal species. Including ours. In zoology it is thought to bestow an evolutionary benefit on the species.
But focus on the positive. I see the agitators at Anderton Primary School have finally been told to get lost. That is belated but it is welcome.
I just thought it mildly amusing that the old bigot utilises the same prissy diaeresis as the New Yorker magazine.
> > @Byronic said:
>
> > > @Chris said:
>
> >
>
> > > Oh sure, loud in the defence of their right to express eccentric and even offensive opinions.
>
> > >
>
> > > But we don't have to defend the opinions. Let's be loud in our ridicule of the opinions.<
>
> >
>
> > +++++
>
> >
>
> > Widdecombe is an odd fish, but I think she has been slightly mis-represented here. She's not saying gayness is a disease (I don't think). Her phrasing is nonetheless clumsy. She seems to have been old and silly ever since she entered politics, somehow.
>
>
>
> "Wrongful" was apparently the word she used (for "homosexual acts") in a parliamentary debate on civil partnerships in 2004.
>
>
>
> Surely there can't be any doubt she thinks gayness is undesirable and people would be better off without it?
>
> Why someone who has never had sex should think she has anything useful or interesting to say about other peoples’ sexuality is a mystery.
>
> But it is people like her implying or saying that people like my son are somehow a problem, a defect to be cured or whatever, which makes the life he and other gay people live harder than it otherwise should be. They have to justify their existence, their desires, their yearning - like all of us - to love and be loved. They have to fight just to be, just to be left alone to live life in whatever way they want.
>
> And I am not having it - it is my flesh and blood she is harming or insulting with her idiocies and unkindnesses. This sort of thoughtless bigotry is not just aimed at gay people but at all of us, whose sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, friends, colleagues they are. Harm them, attack them, insult them, deride them - and you do it to me, to all of us. We are all minorities somewhere, in some way.
>
> I feel very strongly about this - as I am sure those who have read some of my postings and headers on this will realise - because it’s personal and because this is about the sort of people we are and how we treat those around us.
>
> “Do as you would be done by.” Wise words. And words which those who cloak their bigotry in religion should ponder.
I'm sorry to say I think the bigotry often arises from religion and they try to cloak it in something else.
So many of the opponents of same-sex marriage were either Roman Catholics or evangelical Christians, and yet it was so rare for them to say they were against it on religious grounds. They always had some excuse that made it sound a little less like trying to impose their own religious beliefs on the rest of us. Particularly the soi-disant liberals.
> > @viewcode said:
>
> > Much as I hate to say it, Thatcher was intelligent, both in street smarts and academic qualifications. Wilson was a honorary President of the RSS. Attlee, Eden, Macmillan and Douglas-Home were successful in professions that didn't require academic smarts. Major clawed his way up the old-fashioned way via the banking exams (I really like him!). Blair was a lawyer and Cameron was PPE, and politeness prevents me from describing those professions. In common with the Conservative Party, I have forgotten that May exists.
>
> Cameron would have benefited from being a lawyer. His fatal flaw was a repeated failure to ask himself the question that any good lawyer is always asking, which is: What if I am wrong/this witness does not give the answer I expect him to give/the Court finds against me?
>
A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum.
> > @NickPalmer said:
> > > @algarkirk said:
> > > > @algarkirk said:
> > >
> > > > Apropos of the 'up to 20 candidates issue';,it would be nice if Jesse Norman ran because then along with Rory Stewart there would be two decent, sensible, thoughtful, intelligent, statesmanlike candidates to share bottom place in this Eatanswill bearpit of an election.
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > A doctor of philosophy - in philosophy - in the parliamentary Conservative Party?
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > I suppose a familiarity with philosophy could be quite useful in getting through the day, if you're a Tory MP.
> > >
> > > I think it's time we gave a try to having a PM with intellectual/cultural hinterland. I wonder if we missed a trick by not having Roy Jenkins, Denis Healey, Ken Clarke when we had the chance. A PM who actually read, understood and wrote (beautifully) books about Adam Smith and Burke would be a nice change. Stewart and Norman would still come bottom with the party in its current terminal state.
> >
> > Clinton was extremely well-read, and I think Obama too. Churchill certainly gave that impression, but not sure I can think of another PM. Michael Foot, I assume, if we include opposition leaders. Gaitskell, maybe?
>
> Macmillan read Trollope in the No 10 garden in his spare time.
>
> Boris has written books on ancient Rome, William Hague wrote an excellent biography of Pitt as Roy Jenkins did of Gladstone and Churchill
>
Tony Blair was a great admirer of Sir Walter Scott.
>
> A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. <
++++++
Very very true. Sadly.
"I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister".
Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite.
> > @anothernick said:
>
> >
> > A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. <
>
> ++++++
>
> Very very true. Sadly.
>
> "I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister".
>
> Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite.
>
Cameron was actually quite good on the domestic front, he was less successful abroad, see Libya and Syria but no Blair style Iraq disaster, his mistake was calling an EU referendum without preparing for a possible Leave vote
> > @Cyclefree said:
> > > @Byronic said:
> >
> > > > @Chris said:
> >
> > >
> >
> > > > Oh sure, loud in the defence of their right to express eccentric and even offensive opinions.
> >
> > > >
> >
> > > > But we don't have to defend the opinions. Let's be loud in our ridicule of the opinions.<
> >
> > >
> >
> > > +++++
> >
> > >
> >
> > > Widdecombe is an odd fish, but I think she has been slightly mis-represented here. She's not saying gayness is a disease (I don't think). Her phrasing is nonetheless clumsy. She seems to have been old and silly ever since she entered politics, somehow.
> >
> >
> >
> > "Wrongful" was apparently the word she used (for "homosexual acts") in a parliamentary debate on civil partnerships in 2004.
> >
> >
> >
> > Surely there can't be any doubt she thinks gayness is undesirable and people would be better off without it?
> >
> > Why someone who has never had sex should think she has anything useful or interesting to say about other peoples’ sexuality is a mystery.
> >
> > But it is people like her implying or saying that people like my son are somehow a problem, a defect to be cue should be. They have to justify their existence, their desires, their yearning - like all of us - to love and be loved. They have to fight just to be, just to be left alone to live life in whatever way they want.
> >
> > And I am not having it - it is my flesh and blood she is harming or insulting with her idiocies and unkindnesses. This sort of thoughtless bigotry is not just aimed at gay people but at all of us, whose sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, friends, colleagues they are. Harm them, attack them, insult them, deride them - and you do it to me, to all of us. We are all minorities somewhere, in some way.
> >
> > I feel very strongly about this - as I am sure those who have read some of my postings and headers on this will realise - because it’s personal and because this is about the sort of people we are and how we treat those around us.
> >
> > “Do as you would be done by.” Wise words. And words which those who cloak their bigotry in religion should ponder.
>
> I'm sorry to say I think the bigotry often arises from religion and they try to cloak it in something else.
>
> So many of the opponents of same-sex marriage were either Roman Catholics or evangelical Christians, and yet it was so rare for them to say they were against it on religious grounds. They always had some excuse that made it sound a little less like trying to impose their own religious beliefs on the rest of us. Particularly the soi-disant liberals.
>
>
Plus orthodox Jews and Muslims and Hindus too, however there is no reason why gay marriage in secular law can remain separate from marriage in a religious setting as legally it still is
Thatcher > Major > Blair (Iraq) > Brown > Cameron (lost referendum) > T May.
On this basis, in about ten years time we can expect our prime minister to be a blind and homeless drunk with anger management issues, sleeping in a car park on the outskirts of Swansea, trying to attack any individual voters who come near.
Good night.
> > @HYUFD said:
> > > @NickPalmer said:
> > > > @algarkirk said:
> > > > > @algarkirk said:
> > > >
> > > > > Apropos of the 'up to 20 candidates issue';,it would be nice if Jesse Norman ran because then along with Rory Stewart there would be two decent, sensible, thoughtful, intelligent, statesmanlike candidates to share bottom place in this Eatanswill bearpit of an election.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > A doctor of philosophy - in philosophy - in the parliamentary Conservative Party?
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > I suppose a familiarity with philosophy could be quite useful in getting through the day, if you're a Tory MP.
> > > >
> > > > I think it's time we gave a try to having a PM with intellectual/cultural hinterland. I wonder if we missed a trick by not having Roy Jenkins, Denis Healey, Ken Clarke when we had the chance. A PM who actually read, understood and wrote (beautifully) books about Adam Smith and Burke would be a nice change. Stewart and Norman would still come bottom with the party in its current terminal state.
> > >
> > > Clinton was extremely well-read, and I think Obama too. Churchill certainly gave that impression, but not sure I can think of another PM. Michael Foot, I assume, if we include opposition leaders. Gaitskell, maybe?
> >
> > Macmillan read Trollope in the No 10 garden in his spare time.
> >
> > Boris has written books on ancient Rome, William Hague wrote an excellent biography of Pitt as Roy Jenkins did of Gladstone and Churchill
> >
>
> Tony Blair was a great admirer of Sir Walter Scott.
Well I can imagine Ivanhoe was an inspiration for him
> > @anothernick said:
>
> >
> > A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. <
>
> ++++++
>
> Very very true. Sadly.
>
> "I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister".
>
> Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite.
>
He understood that the Tory headbangers were a threat to both country and party but he could not be bothered to take them on, he hoped the electorate would do it for him. Like his predecessors as Tory leader he failed to challenge his party - the Tories have not had a leader who took them out of their comfort zone since Thatcher.
> If Conservative MPs adopted the Single Transferable Vote for their leadership election and simply ranked all the candidates, they could arrive at their final two in one round of voting. This would save a lot of dicking about.
I think they enjoy the dicking about part.
But I think they'd have just as much fun getting down to the last few candidates if they did the whole thing in one day.
> > @Byronic said:
> > > @anothernick said:
> >
> > >
> > > A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. <
> >
> > ++++++
> >
> > Very very true. Sadly.
> >
> > "I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister".
> >
> > Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite.
> >
> Cameron was actually quite good on the domestic front, he was less successful abroad, see Libya and Syria but no Blair style Iraq disaster, his mistake was calling an EU referendum without preparing for a possible Leave vote
>
I don't blame him for that, and apart from timing and the inaction of Jezza it couldhave been one despite decades of anti european propaganda in the press.
The lack of preparedness issue is really down to Leavers themselves, who 3 years on still lack a plan.
> > @Chris said:
> > > @HYUFD said:
> > > > @NickPalmer said:
> > > > > @algarkirk said:
> > > > > > @algarkirk said:
> > > > >
> > > > > > Apropos of the 'up to 20 candidates issue';,it would be nice if Jesse Norman ran because then along with Rory Stewart there would be two decent, sensible, thoughtful, intelligent, statesmanlike candidates to share bottom place in this Eatanswill bearpit of an election.
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > A doctor of philosophy - in philosophy - in the parliamentary Conservative Party?
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > I suppose a familiarity with philosophy could be quite useful in getting through the day, if you're a Tory MP.
> > > > >
> > > > > I think it's time we gave a try to having a PM with intellectual/cultural hinterland. I wonder if we missed a trick by not having Roy Jenkins, Denis Healey, Ken Clarke when we had the chance. A PM who actually read, understood and wrote (beautifully) books about Adam Smith and Burke would be a nice change. Stewart and Norman would still come bottom with the party in its current terminal state.
> > > >
> > > > Clinton was extremely well-read, and I think Obama too. Churchill certainly gave that impression, but not sure I can think of another PM. Michael Foot, I assume, if we include opposition leaders. Gaitskell, maybe?
> > >
> > > Macmillan read Trollope in the No 10 garden in his spare time.
> > >
> > > Boris has written books on ancient Rome, William Hague wrote an excellent biography of Pitt as Roy Jenkins did of Gladstone and Churchill
> > >
> >
> > Tony Blair was a great admirer of Sir Walter Scott.
>
> Well I can imagine Ivanhoe was an inspiration for him
Actually, yes, I said that because I remembered hearing him say that Ivanhoe was his favourite book.
Who knows what influence that story of everyday Crusading folk may have had on him?
> Why someone who has never had sex should think she has anything useful or interesting to say about other peoples’ sexuality is a mystery.
>
> But it is people like her implying or saying that people like my son are somehow a problem, a defect to be cured or whatever, which makes the life he and other gay people live harder than it otherwise should be. They have to justify their existence, their desires, their yearning - like all of us - to love and be loved. They have to fight just to be, just to be left alone to live life in whatever way they want.
>
> And I am not having it - it is my flesh and blood she is harming or insulting with her idiocies and unkindnesses. This sort of thoughtless bigotry is not just aimed at gay people but at all of us, whose sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, friends, colleagues they are. Harm them, attack them, insult them, deride them - and you do it to me, to all of us. We are all minorities somewhere, in some way.
>
> I feel very strongly about this - as I am sure those who have read some of my postings and headers on this will realise - because it’s personal and because this is about the sort of people we are and how we treat those around us.
>
> “Do as you would be done by.” Wise words. And words which those who cloak their bigotry in religion should ponder.
>
> Not for the first time, I am in complete agreement with you on this.
And me
> > @Black_Rook said:
> > If Conservative MPs adopted the Single Transferable Vote for their leadership election and simply ranked all the candidates, they could arrive at their final two in one round of voting. This would save a lot of dicking about.
>
> I think they enjoy the dicking about part.
>
> But I think they'd have just as much fun getting down to the last few candidates if they did the whole thing in one day.
Surely that is an AV system not STV.
The advantage of serial votes is that there is no need to guess at placings and who will be left.
I don’t know whether there is some inherent dislike of homosexuality which has been built on by religion or the other way around but I don’t care. To me there is no basis in decency or morality or love to treat or talk about gay people in the way that too many people, including too many religious people do.
Religion at its best should be about helping you improve yourself in some way, about giving you a conscience, a still, small voice that asks you to think not just: “Can I do this? But should I?”. It’s about helping others, particularly the marginalised, not about hating or disliking others or forcing them into unhappiness. At its best, this is what it should be. But sadly, it too often isn’t this. It shames religions. So while I consider myself a Catholic I part company with the Church on this. The Church is simply wrong in its understanding of human sexuality or, in my view, of Jesus’s teachings.
Possibly an arrogant view but one I have come to because of my personal experiences.
> > @Byronic said:
> > > @anothernick said:
> >
> > >
> > > A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. <
> >
> > ++++++
> >
> > Very very true. Sadly.
> >
> > "I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister".
> >
> > Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite.
> >
>
> He understood that the Tory headbangers were a threat to both country and party but he could not be bothered to take them on, he hoped the electorate would do it for him. Like his predecessors as Tory leader he failed to challenge his party - the Tories have not had a leader who took them out of their comfort zone since Thatcher.
He did on gay marriage, more money for the NHS, climate change etc.
In any case you could also say Labour have not had a leader who has taken them out of their 'comfort zone' since Blair.
However that assumes that the only government worth having is a fiscally conservative and socially liberal one in the mould of Blairite New Labour and the Cameroons which would ignore large numbers of voters who are economically left or socially conservative or both as seen by the emergence of Corbyn and the Brexit Party
> https://twitter.com/lisaocarroll/status/1135296663818526720
Very good to be fair
> https://twitter.com/jonlansman/status/1135120814125326336?s=20
Lansman in the usual fashion of away day visitors doesn't realise that the actual point is that the right-wing Labour msps are a bit rubbish, the Corbynista loyalist msps are a bit rubbish and those in between are a bit rubbish. Until that (admittedly fairly intractable) situation is addressed, they'll continue their factional blame game unto oblivion.
> > @Scott_P said:
> > https://twitter.com/lisaocarroll/status/1135296663818526720
>
> Very good to be fair
Rory is an expert on borders.
> > @anothernick said:
> > > @Byronic said:
> > > > @anothernick said:
> > >
> > > >
> > > > A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. <
> > >
> > > ++++++
> > >
> > > Very very true. Sadly.
> > >
> > > "I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister".
> > >
> > > Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite.
> > >
> >
> > He understood that the Tory headbangers were a threat to both country and party but he could not be bothered to take them on, he hoped the electorate would do it for him. Like his predecessors as Tory leader he failed to challenge his party - the Tories have not had a leader who took them out of their comfort zone since Thatcher.
>
> He did on gay marriage, more money for the NHS, climate change etc.
>
> In any case you could also say Labour have not had a leader who has taken them out of their 'comfort zone' since Blair.
>
> However that assumes that the only government worth having is a fiscally conservative and socially liberal one in the mould of Blairite New Labour and the Cameroons which would ignore large numbers of voters who are economically left or socially conservative or both as seen by the emergence of Corbyn and the Brexit Party
More money for the NHS?! Spending on health rose more slowly during the coalition years than at any time since the NHS was founded. The deterioration in the service is very obvious - in my area of London it takes a month to get a routine GP appointment, Saturday appointments are no longer available and the wait for hospital tests is lengthening. And we now learn that the doctor patient ratio is worsening and life expectancy has started to decline for the first time since the war.
> Well lack of sex can drive you to drink. And vice versa I suppose.
Bad news for incels.
> Perhaps he’s just a fan of Hymns Ancient and Modern ?
> https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/O_Come,_O_Come,_Emmanuel
>
> I've never seen it with an umlaut there and I've got a number of versions back to 1922.
>
> You do of course have to sing it as three syllables otherwise the slurring for the diphthong makes it (a) flat and (b) slow.
>
> Precisely.
> I just thought it mildly amusing that the old bigot utilises the same prissy diaeresis as the New Yorker magazine.
In Hebrew, which is totally phonetic, the word "Israel" is spelled in such a way as to be pronounced with three syllables, so, Galloway's use of a diphthong is not technically incorrect, though not general usage in the English speaking world
> Not sure why people are so certain that Ann Widdecombe has never had sex. She may have announced that but if so I missed it. Otherwise, my strong sense is that she HAS had sex and lots of it. She was on Strictly Come Dancing remember.
She has I believe threatened to sue anyone who says she is not still a virgin
> > @Big_G_NorthWales said:
> > > @Scott_P said:
> > > https://twitter.com/lisaocarroll/status/1135296663818526720
> >
> > Very good to be fair
>
> Rory is an expert on borders.
collies?
Night all.
> > @HYUFD said:
> > > @anothernick said:
> > > > @Byronic said:
> > > > > @anothernick said:
> > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > A good lawyer never asks a question to which they do not already know the answer. If only Cameron had followed that maxim before he decided to hold a referendum. <
> > > >
> > > > ++++++
> > > >
> > > > Very very true. Sadly.
> > > >
> > > > "I think I'd be quite good at being Prime Minister".
> > > >
> > > > Christ. It's the "quite good" that gives it away. Faux modesty. Deep down he thought he'd be very good, this is English understatement meets the humblebrag. As it turns out, he was a bloody disaster. And over-estimated himself wildly. He was "quite bad" at being Prime Minister = utterly shite.
> > > >
> > >
> > > He understood that the Tory headbangers were a threat to both country and party but he could not be bothered to take them on, he hoped the electorate would do it for him. Like his predecessors as Tory leader he failed to challenge his party - the Tories have not had a leader who took them out of their comfort zone since Thatcher.
> >
> > He did on gay marriage, more money for the NHS, climate change etc.
> >
> > In any case you could also say Labour have not had a leader who has taken them out of their 'comfort zone' since Blair.
> >
> > However that assumes that the only government worth having is a fiscally conservative and socially liberal one in the mould of Blairite New Labour and the Cameroons which would ignore large numbers of voters who are economically left or socially conservative or both as seen by the emergence of Corbyn and the Brexit Party
>
> More money for the NHS?! Spending on health rose more slowly during the coalition years than at any time since the NHS was founded. The deterioration in the service is very obvious - in my area of London it takes a month to get a routine GP appointment, Saturday appointments are no longer available and the wait for hospital tests is lengthening. And we now learn that the doctor patient ratio is worsening and life expectancy has started to decline for the first time since the war.
NHS spending was ringfenced and rose throughout the Cameron years while other departments were cut to rectify the deep deficit left in 2010 and of course you ignored the introduction of gay marriage under Cameron and the extra funds for overseas aid and the climate change reduction emissions cuts much of his party were opposed to
> > @Richard_Tyndall said:
>
> > Don't worry you are not tedious. You are just a fuckwit. But then we have known that for a long time.
>
> Well, no, the tedious person would be the person making the claim, not me, wouldn't it, now?
>
> Your inability to grasp a point as straightforward as that says a lot about you.
I grasped it perfectly well. I was simply reapplying it to a fuckwit.
By which, just to be completely clear since you seem to be having trouble with this concept, I mean you.
The UK is going to be screwed in any trade deal. The right wing press will continue to suck upto the nutjob in the WH even as his own advisers have made it clear that the UK out of the EU will be desperate for any deal so will be easy meat for the USA.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-48492619
Right decision, I think
> Well lack of sex can drive you to drink. And vice versa I suppose.
>
> I don't drink
Yes but you have trains instead!
> Not sure why people are so certain that Ann Widdecombe has never had sex. She may have announced that but if so I missed it. Otherwise, my strong sense is that she HAS had sex and lots of it. She was on Strictly Come Dancing remember.
No reason not to take the daft old bigot at her own word.
https://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/cbbs-ann-widdecombe-proud-virgin-11795767
"Socialism : Ideas so good that they have to be mandatory"
I once read a modern language version of the bible cover to cover and I regret to inform you of the following passage from the OT which very much stuck in my memory. It's an exact quote -
"A man must not lay down with another man. God hates that."
Not much wriggle room there.
😊
> @ Cyclefree
>
> I once read a modern language version of the bible cover to cover and I regret to inform you of the following passage from the OT which very much stuck in my memory. It's an exact quote -
>
> "A man must not lay down with another man. God hates that."
>
> Not much wriggle room there.
>
> 😊
It may have said the first sentence, it did not say the latter as far as I recall.
Pride, sloth, envy, gluttony, adultery etc are also recorded as sins in the bible and as Jesus said 'let he who is without sin cast the first stone'
> Related question: has any western democracy ever undergone such a perilous decline in leaders, as we have recently endured?
>
> Thatcher > Major > Blair (Iraq) > Brown > Cameron (lost referendum) > T May.
>
> On this basis, in about ten years time we can expect our prime minister to be a blind and homeless drunk with anger management issues, sleeping in a car park on the outskirts of Swansea, trying to attack any individual voters who come near.
>
> Good night.
I think they've all been abysmal since Attlee, but I'm aware that this is a minority opinion.
Like many of my generation, I hold a special disregard for Thatcher, and think that most of the UK's structural issues can be traced back to her reworking of the country and its ways, but bloody hell she would run rings round any of these current Tory fools and knaves.
> @ Cyclefree
>
> I once read a modern language version of the bible cover to cover and I regret to inform you of the following passage from the OT which very much stuck in my memory. It's an exact quote -
>
> "A man must not lay down with another man. God hates that."
>
> Not much wriggle room there.
>
> 😊
If you read the whole thing you must have noticed that something significant happens about 600 years after that bit, of particular relevance since Cyclefree specifically referenced "Jesus's teachings".
> > @kinabalu said:
> > @ Cyclefree
> >
> > I once read a modern language version of the bible cover to cover and I regret to inform you of the following passage from the OT which very much stuck in my memory. It's an exact quote -
> >
> > "A man must not lay down with another man. God hates that."
> >
> > Not much wriggle room there.
> >
> > 😊
>
> If you read the whole thing you must have noticed that something significant happens about 600 years after that bit, of particular relevance since Cyclefree specifically referenced "Jesus's teachings".
Did Jesus talk about homosexuality?
https://twitter.com/MattHancock/status/1135083869257064449
> > @Byronic said:
> > Related question: has any western democracy ever undergone such a perilous decline in leaders, as we have recently endured?
> >
> > Thatcher > Major > Blair (Iraq) > Brown > Cameron (lost referendum) > T May.
> >
> > On this basis, in about ten years time we can expect our prime minister to be a blind and homeless drunk with anger management issues, sleeping in a car park on the outskirts of Swansea, trying to attack any individual voters who come near.
> >
> > Good night.
>
> I think they've all been abysmal since Attlee, but I'm aware that this is a minority opinion.
>
> Like many of my generation, I hold a special disregard for Thatcher, and think that most of the UK's structural issues can be traced back to her reworking of the country and its ways, but bloody hell she would run rings round any of these current Tory fools and knaves.
The electorate gets the leaders it deserves, however given current world leaders include Maduro, Putin, Bolsonaro, Orban, Jong Un, Trump and likely soon enough Salvini we could get a lot worse
, I have forgotten that May exists.
>
> Cameron would have benefited from being a lawyer. His fatal flaw was a repeated failure to ask himself the question that any good lawyer is always asking, which is: What if I am wrong/this witness does not give the answer I expect him to give/the Court finds against me?
>
Swiss policy on referendums (the publicly-intiated kind, as oppose to the wilder popular initiatives) is to try to focus on questions where all the alternative answers are acceptable. I remember one in Basel about a new bridge. Did we want it to be grand, with a rise in tax to pay for it? To fit in with the surroundings and look weathered? To be as cheap as possible? etc. The authorities didn't really mind which we preferred - they were perfectly happy to do any of them. But people felt engaged, and talked fondly of "our new bridge". That's how referendums should work...
> @ Cyclefree
>
> I once read a modern language version of the bible cover to cover and I regret to inform you of the following passage from the OT which very much stuck in my memory. It's an exact quote -
>
> "A man must not lay down with another man. God hates that."
>
> Not much wriggle room there.
>
> 😊
That's from the bit where it also says you can't eat ham sandwiches or prawns, or drive a car on a Saturday. Usually regarded as superseded by subsequent teachings.
Proposal 3. is FTA because we can't abide rule taking, but we can still do AI. No mention of cars, pharmaceuticals, financial services, agriculture etc. Maybe Hancock wants us to think this is ridiculous. Will we take the rules at all?
> > @TheScreamingEagles said:
>
> > Hi TSE -- you should have been here last night -- we were all watching a football match that BT streamed live on Youtube.
>
> >
>
> > A big shout out to Spurs, they were magnificent as were their fans.
>
> >
>
> > Spurs are where we were last year, after losing the Champions League final we went and backed Jurgen Klopp and spent £176 million improving the squad and look at us today.
>
> >
>
> > Daniel Levy needs to get his chequebook out and back Poch.
>
>
>
> He does... But im not holding my breath... You also didn't let any big names leave... Not sure we will manage that either...
>
> 18 months ago we sold our best player, we used the funds to improve the team, finished with 97pts the next season, and went to two CL finals in a row, winning one.
Given we've done that for decades re selling best player, Carrick, berbatov, modric and latterly bale, our past performance with money shows the challenge this time...
>
> Thinking about it. Proposal 4 can be read as "Masterful inactivity on the Irish border"; 5 is "seek" time limit on the Irish border, which we won't get. So Irish backstop it is.
>
> Proposal 3. is FTA because we can't abide rule taking, but we can still do AI. No mention of cars, pharmaceuticals, financial services, agriculture etc. Maybe Hancock wants us to think this is ridiculous. Will we take the rules at all?
————-
No reason for Labour or the DUP to vote for it though, so is his real policy a confirmatory vote?
> Swiss policy on referendums (the publicly-intiated kind, as oppose to the wilder popular initiatives) is to try to focus on questions where all the alternative answers are acceptable. I remember one in Basel about a new bridge. Did we want it to be grand, with a rise in tax to pay for it? To fit in with the surroundings and look weathered? To be as cheap as possible? etc. The authorities didn't really mind which we preferred - they were perfectly happy to do any of them. But people felt engaged, and talked fondly of "our new bridge". That's how referendums should work...
I guess you know this as you used to work in corporate IT but it's also how you want to handle management involvement in anything. Make sure they have plenty of things to decide, and also make sure none of those things actually matter...
> @ Cyclefree
>
>
>
> I once read a modern language version of the bible cover to cover and I regret to inform you of the following passage from the OT which very much stuck in my memory. It's an exact quote -
>
>
>
> "A man must not lay down with another man. God hates that."
>
>
>
> Not much wriggle room there.
>
>
>
> 😊
>
> You mean they can't do it standing up????
Sure it also gives the ok on boning your own daughter?
Religion is just another jumped up bunch of self righteous individuals who want to force one to live their life as they see fit.
> Macmillan read Trollope in the No 10 garden in his spare time.
>
> Major was a fan of Anthony Trollope's "A Dance to the Music of Time"
Major certainly liked Trollope but "Dance to the Music of Time" was by Anthony Powell , also an excellent read if you have the stamina for all 12 volumes.
> The electorate gets the leaders it deserves, however given current world leaders include Maduro, Putin, Bolsonaro, Orban, Jong Un, Trump and likely soon enough Salvini we could get a lot worse
Well, under FPTP we never get the leaders we vote for.
But I agree it is going to get a lot worse.