(1) Antisemitism was a very real issue. It was not a smear. (2) The party failed to deal with it. Before 2018 they did almost nothing. (3) From 2015 Blairites plotted against Labour. They wanted the party defeated.
And (3) was a factor contributing to (2).
And now the left will conspire against Labour.. where's my popcorn.
How would this have caused more PPE to be manufactured?
If, as looks highly likely, less PPE is available in Britain in a couple of weeks’ time than would have been the case if the government had not refused to join this scheme because of Europhobic dogma, it is almost certain that people will die as a result. The people responsible for that decision should be prosecuted.
You'd be the one squealing loudest of all when it was civil servants who get prosecuted...
Not at all. Anyone responsible for this decision needs to face the consequences of it.
Not noticing too many Leavers speaking up for the need to secure whatever PPE Britain can by whatever means it can. Here’s your opportunity.
But perhaps the visceral hatred of the EU extends to the point of refusing PPE from it even if it would save lives.
More a complete lack of belief that any product would actually have come the UK's way. The only evidence I have seen so far is of countries looking after their own. Where you see hatred, others might see cynicism, maybe realism - that the EU would say "They've left - fuck 'em. Give the kit to our people."
Ah, the deranged paranoia of the true Europhobe. When that’s all you’ve got left, the padded cell awaits you.
It is an entirely sensible strategy to use Uk based resources to kick start new sources of PPE, tests, ventilators etc.
a) Smaller logistics chains. b) Lower risk from transportation "issues" c) Higher level of oversight d) Patriotic boost to productivity. e) Complete control over supply once established.
A far better use of resources in the long battle ahead than getting a small slice of a one off delivery from China via the EU.
An alternative explanation is that Britain actually has a comparatively strong capacity to manufacture PPE and ventilators, and the 'EU procurement scheme' was a means of allowing smaller countries who lacked this capacity to share in its fruits. It would explain why the EU was so keen to allow Britain to join the scheme, despite their previous inflexible stances on cherry-picking aspects of EU membership, and why the government has provided so many contradictory reasons as to why it chose not to. If this proves to be true, no doubt Alistair will switch from blaming the government for letting British subjects die due to Europhobic dogma to blaming the government for letting EU subjects die due to Europhobic dogma.
AM believed that there were no strawberries in the supermarkets in the summer of 2018.
He has a long standing derangement on this subject.
I’m afraid a citation is needed for that claim.
(Spoiler: you won’t find it.)
Yet you know its true.
There was a reason I gave a daily Tesco strawberry score in 2018.
Go looking. You won’t find a citation for what you claimed.
It’s not my fault if you misread what I actually wrote.
I'm enjoying the seamless transition of the Brexit extremists from "fruit picking problems are fake news" to "hurrah that we have no strawberries".
I fear you have become the mirror image of the ideologues you condemn - whereas they might oppose any connections with the EU you oppose anything they do and so support joining any EU scheme.
Whereas to my mind the sensible strategy is one of help and co-operation where possible but detachment if necessary.
I would also somewhat doubt whether there are that many ideologues in government and whether they have much effect on the great inertial mass of statist bureaucracy in any case.
Who are those who think Covid-19 is being overstated? Even of those who think that the economic loss is too great to sustain the lockdown much longer, those who are going "meh" to the virus and its deaths are surely a tiny subset.
Twitter has been awash with people posting about 5 year and 10 averages and how we were below the line and there is no huge ramp up of deaths and how the daily numbers were wrong and gave a totally false impression etc etc. They kept being posted on here
That they were using lagged numbers (the ONS data set or the NHS England dataset) was always very, very conspicuous.
Now their favourite data set, the weekly ONS figures has started showing a big spike and it is still a week behind!
I hope you’re not thinking anyone will be surprised by today’s big spike?!
Using "All Deaths" stats YoY is probably about the best metric right now, with all the uncertainty over 'died from' and 'died with', and hospital vs outside deaths.
Few people are dead more than a day before it gets officially recorded, as opposed to more detailed enquiries about what might be the causes of death.
Am I reading this correctly? c. 4500 extra deaths in a single week?
More like 6000, I think.
This is not inconsistent with the expectation of around 50,000 deaths in this wave.
4500 looks like a not bad distance from the average of the other years at first glance.
I count 3965 deaths in the hospital deaths (the daily announced COVID19 deaths) 30th March - 5th April, by the way.
Boris is the new Blairite champion of the soft Left. He has turned from villain to hero. First he savages Margaret Thatcher's individualistic (aka totally selfish) view about society. Then he issues a heartfelt paean to the NHS, championing it as everything that is great about this country.
Marvellous man. The new Tony Blair.
No, he is still a mendacious shyster with no personal morality and giant sense of entitlement. His brush with death doesn't change that. The sycophancy is nauseating.
"a mendacious shyster with no personal morality and giant sense of entitlement"
How has that shown itself since he has been elected PM with a majority of 80?
Dying in a ditch (or not) over the extension.
Freeloading Christmas holiday in Mustique
Not obeying his own social distancing rules.
Moving his pregnant mistress into Downing St.
The Leopard hasn't changed his spots.
Your last one is an odd inclusion with the others. Why care about his personal life? No one can be under the illusion some great politicians and people were not the best behaved personally and some horrible people have been.
Boris provides ammunition enough through his politics.
If you wanted to mention Carrie, a better question might be how she has suddenly materialised at Chequers.
Still, Robert Jenrick must be more relaxed now -- he faced calls to resign over apparently breaking the rules against moving to second (or third, in his case) homes. Every cloud...
It may be that Downing Street has not yet been fully "deep cleaned". Chequers makes sense. Boris has been declared free of Covid-19. After displaying some symptoms, I presume Carrie has been declared free of it too.
You REALLY think there's a story here beyond low-grade Boris bashing for Boris bashing's sake?
Who is bashing Boris? Boris being at Chequers is one thing since he is straight out of hospital, though Carrie is another. However, the political significance of this is, as stated, that it makes Jenrick look a lot safer just as his story was unravelling.
Given that Boris is still recovering, I presume that he would be required to isolate for x more days?
If nothing else - can you get into the No. 10 flat without passing through a chunk of the rest of the building?
Perhaps Foxy could comment?
Boris is fine (or fine-ish). Carrie is questionable. The significance of Carrie's travelling to Chequers being that Jenrick, who looked like he was in trouble over his journey to his second or third house against government advice, is probably now safe because to sack him would invite questions closer to home.
Using "All Deaths" stats YoY is probably about the best metric right now, with all the uncertainty over 'died from' and 'died with', and hospital vs outside deaths.
Few people are dead more than a day before it gets officially recorded, as opposed to more detailed enquiries about what might be the causes of death.
Am I reading this correctly? c. 4500 extra deaths in a single week?
That's what it looks like to me. Which, encouragingly, is not all that far from what the figures for the first week of April show for UK deaths on Worldometers. Which implies that there isn't a massive iceberg of extra deaths not being picked up as there was in e.g. Bergamo. As against that, there is a bit of a lag to the figures on Worldometers, so I'll downplay the encouragement a notch. But still. Also as against that, these clearly aren't people who would have died this week anyway. But many of them would have died this year or next. If (big if) the situation gets back to normal by late summer, I would expect to see a small counter-correction later in the year due to people who have died 6-9 months earlier than their time.
I'd expect to see a massive uptick in weeks fourteen and fifteen of deaths above average. But what I'm taking from this is that the figures we're seeing for Covid deaths are not too far short of accurate.
MPs have signed a demand which would leave the party literally bankrupt. There isn't the need for further discussion. Remove the whip from them all. They brought the fight, no point trying to obfuscate around it.
Why are you such an angry man? Can you not conceive why a wing of Labour is so distressed to find that their close running campaigns were neutered by senior administrators. Tranches of funding used with no oversight, and favoured MPs given preferential access to money. There is even evidence of campaign data not being provided to those on the ground. This had a real effect on the 2017 campaign.
Can you not see that this is systemic nepotism and it will cost the entity the trust of a significant percentage of its dues paying members?
Your partisan comments on this site suggest that you see this as a war and you will not be happy until these MPs are removed. IMO this makes you no different from the Momentumites calling for mandatory reselection. You are the worst kind of party man, one that can only view the issue through their own prism and refuse to accept that labour will have a left wing element. No doubt, you will again leave the party when it won't conform to your blinkered sectarianism.
I'd describe it as mournful rather than angry. You appear to have taken this "report" as a given. Wasn't my experience on the ground as a CLP key organiser in 2017. And remember that these traitors made a gain of 30 seats. Once they were removed and replaced by loyalists they lost 60 seats. The allegation is that these officers were incompetent...
As for my partisan comments and "worst kind of party man" can I ask which party? I was a LibDem for 6 months until last Wednesday. Of course Labour will have a "left wing" - it is a left wing party.
Using "All Deaths" stats YoY is probably about the best metric right now, with all the uncertainty over 'died from' and 'died with', and hospital vs outside deaths.
Few people are dead more than a day before it gets officially recorded, as opposed to more detailed enquiries about what might be the causes of death.
Am I reading this correctly? c. 4500 extra deaths in a single week?
More like 6000, I think.
This is not inconsistent with the expectation of around 50,000 deaths in this wave.
4500 looks like a not bad distance from the average of the other years at first glance.
I count 3965 deaths in the hospital deaths (the daily announced COVID19 deaths) 30th March - 5th April, by the way.
I think you're misreading the scale. This year's week to 3 April is above 16,000. Most of the other bars are below 10,000.
Using "All Deaths" stats YoY is probably about the best metric right now, with all the uncertainty over 'died from' and 'died with', and hospital vs outside deaths.
Few people are dead more than a day before it gets officially recorded, as opposed to more detailed enquiries about what might be the causes of death.
Am I reading this correctly? c. 4500 extra deaths in a single week?
More like 6000, I think.
This is not inconsistent with the expectation of around 50,000 deaths in this wave.
4500 looks like a not bad distance from the average of the other years at first glance.
I count 3965 deaths in the hospital deaths (the daily announced COVID19 deaths) 30th March - 5th April, by the way.
Different levels of lag at lay, though. The daily figures are hospitals only, and delayed by around 3 days on average. The ONS figures include all deaths, and are lagged by probably around a week - but I think there's a requirement to register within two weeks, so so there won't still be reporting coming through a month later (as there is with some of the NHS figures).
As far as I can tell, the hospital death rate from Covid-19 in the relevant period for the graph was running at about 500 per day (3500 per week, say). Roughly double that to include the non-hospital deaths, and maybe knock off a bit to account for fewer road deaths etc. Looks more or less consistent with the c. 6k excess deaths shown.
Current run rate for the daily reported figures is more like 850 per day (accounting for reporting lag), so I would expect the spike to be more like 10-12k excess deaths in two weeks' time.
Keeping things under 20k already looks gone. Under 50k should probably be the target for wave, now, although to be honest there's basically sod all* we can do to affect it at this point.
*Edit: at the macro level, I mean (due to momentum). At the micro level, obviously individuals can affect things, and not running out of PPE gear would make a difference at some point.
Only a few pages in on Google if you know the right search term, and yes it's already on BitTorrent. Most 'mainstream' sites such as Reddit and Scribd have pulled it though, and no doubt legal pressure is being applied to those still hosting it.
I'm saving my copy for a very rainy day. Which in the sandpit might be around December! There's a large Netflix queue that's much more important to work through in the meantime.
It's fascinating if you are interested in the nitty gritty of backroom politics. It's written quite fluently and includes lots of unvarnished dashed off comms by various players in the saga. So you start reading and just keep on going, breaking off only to attend to the essentials.
"Citing this large body of research, more than 240 scientists who have published peer-reviewed research on the biologic and health effects of nonionizing electromagnetic fields (EMF) signed the International EMF Scientist Appeal, which calls for stronger exposure limits. The appeal makes the following assertions:
“Numerous recent scientific publications have shown that EMF affects living organisms at levels well below most international and national guidelines. Effects include increased cancer risk, cellular stress, increase in harmful free radicals, genetic damages, structural and functional changes of the reproductive system, learning and memory deficits, neurological disorders, and negative impacts on general well-being in humans. Damage goes well beyond the human race, as there is growing evidence of harmful effects to both plant and animal life.”
The scientists who signed this appeal arguably constitute the majority of experts on the effects of nonionizing radiation. They have published more than 2,000 papers and letters on EMF in professional journals."
5g is more likely than not to be carcinogenic.
Had a look at that. Some fascinating conclusions being reached from the literature they cite as supportive of their claim.
"Therefore, RF-EMF has preventive effects against AD-like pathology in advanced AD mice with a high expression of AB, which suggests that RF-EMF can have a beneficial influence on AD. [NB: AD is Alzheimer's Disease]"
"Current evidence indicates that exposure at levels that are found in the environment (in urban areas and near base stations) may particularly alter the receptor organs to orient in the magnetic field of the earth. These results could have important implications for migratory birds and insects, especially in urban areas, but could also apply to birds and insects in natural and protected areas where there are powerful base station emitters of radiofrequencies." [But - we know that some animals have magnetic sensitivity, so being aware that they could be messed up by radio transmitters is well known and not indicative of any cancer-causing in humans]
"To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to assess the electromagnetic interference in home blood glucose monitors. It can be concluded that electromagnetic interference from mobile phones has an adverse effect on the accuracy of home blood glucose monitors. We suggest that mobile phones should be used at least 50 cm away from home blood glucose monitors." [Okay, yes, we know that electrical equipment can mutually interfere. We'll keep phones 50cm away from blood glucose monitors...]
"The observed stability of brain cancer incidence in Australia between 1982 and 2012 in all age groups except in those over 70 years compared to increasing modelled expected estimates, suggests that the observed increases in brain cancer incidence in the older age group are unlikely to be related to mobile phone use" [Sorry - my error, I accidentally clicked on one that they had as not for support]
"Thus, the classification of RF as possibly carcinogenic to humans in group 2B was not supported by genotoxicity-based mechanistic evidence." [This was a meta-analysis of 88 other analyses that didn't have sufficient statistical strength on their own, and included most of the ones that they cite as "possibly supportive" but with too small samples]
"Results showed that IEI-EMF participants reported lower levels of well-being during real compared to sham exposure during open provocation, but not during double-blind trials. Additionally, participants reported lower levels of well-being during high compared to low load trials and this did not interact with radiofrequency-EMF exposure. These findings are consistent with a growing body of literature indicating there is no causal relationship between short-term exposure to EMFs and subjective well-being in members of the public whether or not they report perceived sensitivity to EMFs." {Sorry, I found this one amusing]
Using "All Deaths" stats YoY is probably about the best metric right now, with all the uncertainty over 'died from' and 'died with', and hospital vs outside deaths.
Few people are dead more than a day before it gets officially recorded, as opposed to more detailed enquiries about what might be the causes of death.
Am I reading this correctly? c. 4500 extra deaths in a single week?
That's what it looks like to me. Which, encouragingly, is not all that far from what the figures for the first week of April show for UK deaths on Worldometers. Which implies that there isn't a massive iceberg of extra deaths not being picked up as there was in e.g. Bergamo. As against that, there is a bit of a lag to the figures on Worldometers, so I'll downplay the encouragement a notch. But still. Also as against that, these clearly aren't people who would have died this week anyway. But many of them would have died this year or next. If (big if) the situation gets back to normal by late summer, I would expect to see a small counter-correction later in the year due to people who have died 6-9 months earlier than their time.
I'd expect to see a massive uptick in weeks fourteen and fifteen of deaths above average. But what I'm taking from this is that the figures we're seeing for Covid deaths are not too far short of accurate.
How would this have caused more PPE to be manufactured?
If, as looks highly likely, less PPE is available in Britain in a couple of weeks’ time than would have been the case if the government had not refused to join this scheme because of Europhobic dogma, it is almost certain that people will die as a result. The people responsible for that decision should be prosecuted.
You'd be the one squealing loudest of all when it was civil servants who get prosecuted...
Not at all. Anyone responsible for this decision needs to face the consequences of it.
Not noticing too many Leavers speaking up for the need to secure whatever PPE Britain can by whatever means it can. Here’s your opportunity.
But perhaps the visceral hatred of the EU extends to the point of refusing PPE from it even if it would save lives.
More a complete lack of belief that any product would actually have come the UK's way. The only evidence I have seen so far is of countries looking after their own. Where you see hatred, others might see cynicism, maybe realism - that the EU would say "They've left - fuck 'em. Give the kit to our people."
Ah, the deranged paranoia of the true Europhobe. When that’s all you’ve got left, the padded cell awaits you.
It is an entirely sensible strategy to use Uk based resources to kick start new sources of PPE, tests, ventilators etc.
a) Smaller logistics chains. b) Lower risk from transportation "issues" c) Higher level of oversight d) Patriotic boost to productivity. e) Complete control over supply once established.
A far better use of resources in the long battle ahead than getting a small slice of a one off delivery from China via the EU.
An alternative explanation is that Britain actually has a comparatively strong capacity to manufacture PPE and ventilators, and the 'EU procurement scheme' was a means of allowing smaller countries who lacked this capacity to share in its fruits. It would explain why the EU was so keen to allow Britain to join the scheme, despite their previous inflexible stances on cherry-picking aspects of EU membership, and why the government has provided so many contradictory reasons as to why it chose not to. If this proves to be true, no doubt Alistair will switch from blaming the government for letting British subjects die due to Europhobic dogma to blaming the government for letting EU subjects die due to Europhobic dogma.
AM believed that there were no strawberries in the supermarkets in the summer of 2018.
He has a long standing derangement on this subject.
I’m afraid a citation is needed for that claim.
(Spoiler: you won’t find it.)
Yet you know its true.
There was a reason I gave a daily Tesco strawberry score in 2018.
Go looking. You won’t find a citation for what you claimed.
It’s not my fault if you misread what I actually wrote.
I'm enjoying the seamless transition of the Brexit extremists from "fruit picking problems are fake news" to "hurrah that we have no strawberries".
I fear you have become the mirror image of the ideologues you condemn - whereas they might oppose any connections with the EU you oppose anything they do and so support joining any EU scheme.
Whereas to my mind the sensible strategy is one of help and co-operation where possible but detachment if necessary.
I would also somewhat doubt whether there are that many ideologues in government and whether they have much effect on the great inertial mass of statist bureaucracy in any case.
That's Emilie Oldknow level of quoting.
Thanks for the compliment
But my last point is something which I am concerned about - how much is bureaucratic inertia damaging action.
I suspect it has played a part re PPE, testing, border control and perhaps also for new ventilator suppliers.
I see Guido thinks he has discovered a likely candidate for compiling the Labour report....in its metadata.
I'm not saying the inference is wrong, but a lot of my docs seem to have a different "author" - where I've worked from an older document, sometimes several times over.
George Orwell was a left-wing libertarian. Are there any well-known and/or influential left-wing libertarians in the Labour Party today? I can't think of any.
Using "All Deaths" stats YoY is probably about the best metric right now, with all the uncertainty over 'died from' and 'died with', and hospital vs outside deaths.
Few people are dead more than a day before it gets officially recorded, as opposed to more detailed enquiries about what might be the causes of death.
Am I reading this correctly? c. 4500 extra deaths in a single week?
That's what it looks like to me. Which, encouragingly, is not all that far from what the figures for the first week of April show for UK deaths on Worldometers. Which implies that there isn't a massive iceberg of extra deaths not being picked up as there was in e.g. Bergamo. As against that, there is a bit of a lag to the figures on Worldometers, so I'll downplay the encouragement a notch. But still. Also as against that, these clearly aren't people who would have died this week anyway. But many of them would have died this year or next. If (big if) the situation gets back to normal by late summer, I would expect to see a small counter-correction later in the year due to people who have died 6-9 months earlier than their time.
I'd expect to see a massive uptick in weeks fourteen and fifteen of deaths above average. But what I'm taking from this is that the figures we're seeing for Covid deaths are not too far short of accurate.
And now the left will conspire against Labour.. where's my popcorn.
I don't think so, apart from a few obsessives. The left will prefer a Labour government to a Tory one. Many on the Blairite wing could not say the same in 17 and 19. This is a key difference between now and then.
Using "All Deaths" stats YoY is probably about the best metric right now, with all the uncertainty over 'died from' and 'died with', and hospital vs outside deaths.
Few people are dead more than a day before it gets officially recorded, as opposed to more detailed enquiries about what might be the causes of death.
Am I reading this correctly? c. 4500 extra deaths in a single week?
That's what it looks like to me.
????
The figure for this year is 16,387. You think the other years are just under 12,000 on average? More than half of them are under 10,000.
How would this have caused more PPE to be manufactured?
If, as looks highly likely, less PPE is available in Britain in a couple of weeks’ time than would have been the case if the government had not refused to join this scheme because of Europhobic dogma, it is almost certain that people will die as a result. The people responsible for that decision should be prosecuted.
You'd be the one squealing loudest of all when it was civil servants who get prosecuted...
Not at all. Anyone responsible for this decision needs to face the consequences of it.
Not noticing too many Leavers speaking up for the need to secure whatever PPE Britain can by whatever means it can. Here’s your opportunity.
But perhaps the visceral hatred of the EU extends to the point of refusing PPE from it even if it would save lives.
More a complete lack of belief that any product would actually have come the UK's way. The only evidence I have seen so far is of countries looking after their own. Where you see hatred, others might see cynicism, maybe realism - that the EU would say "They've left - fuck 'em. Give the kit to our people."
Ah, the deranged paranoia of the true Europhobe. When that’s all you’ve got left, the padded cell awaits you.
It is an entirely sensible strategy to use Uk based resources to kick start new sources of PPE, tests, ventilators etc.
a) Smaller logistics chains. b) Lower risk from transportation "issues" c) Higher level of oversight d) Patriotic boost to productivity. e) Complete control over supply once established.
A far better use of resources in the long battle ahead than getting a small slice of a one off delivery from China via the EU.
An alternative explanation is that Britain actually has a comparatively strong capacity to manufacture PPE and ventilators, and the 'EU procurement scheme' was a means of allowing smaller countries who lacked this capacity to share in its fruits. It would explain why the EU was so keen to allow Britain to join the scheme, despite their previous inflexible stances on cherry-picking aspects of EU membership, and why the government has provided so many contradictory reasons as to why it chose not to. If this proves to be true, no doubt Alistair will switch from blaming the government for letting British subjects die due to Europhobic dogma to blaming the government for letting EU subjects die due to Europhobic dogma.
AM believed that there were no strawberries in the supermarkets in the summer of 2018.
He has a long standing derangement on this subject.
I’m afraid a citation is needed for that claim.
(Spoiler: you won’t find it.)
Yet you know its true.
There was a reason I gave a daily Tesco strawberry score in 2018.
Go looking. You won’t find a citation for what you claimed.
It’s not my fault if you misread what I actually wrote.
I'm enjoying the seamless transition of the Brexit extremists from "fruit picking problems are fake news" to "hurrah that we have no strawberries".
I fear you have become the mirror image of the ideologues you condemn - whereas they might oppose any connections with the EU you oppose anything they do and so support joining any EU scheme.
Whereas to my mind the sensible strategy is one of help and co-operation where possible but detachment if necessary.
I would also somewhat doubt whether there are that many ideologues in government and whether they have much effect on the great inertial mass of statist bureaucracy in any case.
That's Emilie Oldknow level of quoting.
Thanks for the compliment
But my last point is something which I am concerned about - how much is bureaucratic inertia damaging action.
I suspect it has played a part re PPE, testing, border control and perhaps also for new ventilator suppliers.
The story related in the book Piece of Cake, about an RAF fighter squadron being denied spares at the start of the Battle of Britain, was based on true story.
They didn't have the paperwork to request spares, because the'd lost that in France. Along with the paperwork to get more paperwork.
Using "All Deaths" stats YoY is probably about the best metric right now, with all the uncertainty over 'died from' and 'died with', and hospital vs outside deaths.
Few people are dead more than a day before it gets officially recorded, as opposed to more detailed enquiries about what might be the causes of death.
Am I reading this correctly? c. 4500 extra deaths in a single week?
That's what it looks like to me. Which, encouragingly, is not all that far from what the figures for the first week of April show for UK deaths on Worldometers. Which implies that there isn't a massive iceberg of extra deaths not being picked up as there was in e.g. Bergamo. As against that, there is a bit of a lag to the figures on Worldometers, so I'll downplay the encouragement a notch. But still. Also as against that, these clearly aren't people who would have died this week anyway. But many of them would have died this year or next. If (big if) the situation gets back to normal by late summer, I would expect to see a small counter-correction later in the year due to people who have died 6-9 months earlier than their time.
I'd expect to see a massive uptick in weeks fourteen and fifteen of deaths above average. But what I'm taking from this is that the figures we're seeing for Covid deaths are not too far short of accurate.
How would this have caused more PPE to be manufactured?
If, as looks highly likely, less PPE is available in Britain in a couple of weeks’ time than would have been the case if the government had not refused to join this scheme because of Europhobic dogma, it is almost certain that people will die as a result. The people responsible for that decision should be prosecuted.
You'd be the one squealing loudest of all when it was civil servants who get prosecuted...
Not at all. Anyone responsible for this decision needs to face the consequences of it.
Not noticing too many Leavers speaking up for the need to secure whatever PPE Britain can by whatever means it can. Here’s your opportunity.
But perhaps the visceral hatred of the EU extends to the point of refusing PPE from it even if it would save lives.
More a complete lack of belief that any product would actually have come the UK's way. The only evidence I have seen so far is of countries looking after their own. Where you see hatred, others might see cynicism, maybe realism - that the EU would say "They've left - fuck 'em. Give the kit to our people."
Ah, the deranged paranoia of the true Europhobe. When that’s all you’ve got left, the padded cell awaits you.
It is an entirely sensible strategy to use Uk based resources to kick start new sources of PPE, tests, ventilators etc.
a) Smaller logistics chains. b) Lower risk from transportation "issues" c) Higher level of oversight d) Patriotic boost to productivity. e) Complete control over supply once established.
A far better use of resources in the long battle ahead than getting a small slice of a one off delivery from China via the EU.
An alternative explanation is that Britain actually has a comparatively strong capacity to manufacture PPE and ventilators, and the 'EU procurement scheme' was a means of allowing smaller countries who lacked this capacity to share in its fruits. It would explain why the EU was so keen to allow Britain to join the scheme, despite their previous inflexible stances on cherry-picking aspects of EU membership, and why the government has provided so many contradictory reasons as to why it chose not to. If this proves to be true, no doubt Alistair will switch from blaming the government for letting British subjects die due to Europhobic dogma to blaming the government for letting EU subjects die due to Europhobic dogma.
AM believed that there were no strawberries in the supermarkets in the summer of 2018.
He has a long standing derangement on this subject.
I’m afraid a citation is needed for that claim.
(Spoiler: you won’t find it.)
Yet you know its true.
There was a reason I gave a daily Tesco strawberry score in 2018.
Go looking. You won’t find a citation for what you claimed.
It’s not my fault if you misread what I actually wrote.
I'm enjoying the seamless transition of the Brexit extremists from "fruit picking problems are fake news" to "hurrah that we have no strawberries".
I fear you have become the mirror image of the ideologues you condemn - whereas they might oppose any connections with the EU you oppose anything they do and so support joining any EU scheme.
Whereas to my mind the sensible strategy is one of help and co-operation where possible but detachment if necessary.
I would also somewhat doubt whether there are that many ideologues in government and whether they have much effect on the great inertial mass of statist bureaucracy in any case.
That's Emilie Oldknow level of quoting.
Thanks for the compliment
But my last point is something which I am concerned about - how much is bureaucratic inertia damaging action.
I suspect it has played a part re PPE, testing, border control and perhaps also for new ventilator suppliers.
The story related in the book Piece of Cake, about an RAF fighter squadron being denied spares at the start of the Battle of Britain, was based on true story.
They didn't have the paperwork to request spares, because the'd lost that in France. Along with the paperwork to get more paperwork.
Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few... "He must be talking about our back-pay, then."
I see Guido thinks he has discovered a likely candidate for compiling the Labour report....in its metadata.
I'm not saying the inference is wrong, but a lot of my docs seem to have a different "author" - where I've worked from an older document, sometimes several times over.
So let's call it a best guess...
Yep, the details are likely to be of the person who first created the document. I know that the last proposal I worked on was supposedly written by someone who had left the firm 5 years ago (metadata is something I check and delete when finalising documents, most people don't)
And now the left will conspire against Labour.. where's my popcorn.
I don't think so, apart from a few obsessives. The left will prefer a Labour government to a Tory one. Many on the Blairite wing could not say the same in 17 and 19. This is a key difference between now and then.
Yes, but they see the party led by Starmer as a Tory party, not a Labour party.
So if Starmer wins we get a Tory government, as we had from May 1997 to May 2010.
How would this have caused more PPE to be manufactured?
If, as looks highly likely, less PPE is available in Britain in a couple of weeks’ time than would have been the case if the government had not refused to join this scheme because of Europhobic dogma, it is almost certain that people will die as a result. The people responsible for that decision should be prosecuted.
You'd be the one squealing loudest of all when it was civil servants who get prosecuted...
Not at all. Anyone responsible for this decision needs to face the consequences of it.
Not noticing too many Leavers speaking up for the need to secure whatever PPE Britain can by whatever means it can. Here’s your opportunity.
But perhaps the visceral hatred of the EU extends to the point of refusing PPE from it even if it would save lives.
More a complete lack of belief that any product would actually have come the UK's way. The only evidence I have seen so far is of countries looking after their own. Where you see hatred, others might see cynicism, maybe realism - that the EU would say "They've left - fuck 'em. Give the kit to our people."
Ah, the deranged paranoia of the true Europhobe. When that’s all you’ve got left, the padded cell awaits you.
It is an entirely sensible strategy to use Uk based resources to kick start new sources of PPE, tests, ventilators etc.
a) Smaller logistics chains. b) Lower risk from transportation "issues" c) Higher level of oversight d) Patriotic boost to productivity. e) Complete control over supply once established.
A far better use of resources in the long battle ahead than getting a small slice of a one off delivery from China via the EU.
An alternative explanation is that Britain actually has a comparatively strong capacity to manufacture PPE and ventilators, and the 'EU procurement scheme' was a means of allowing smaller countries who lacked this capacity to share in its fruits. It would explain why the EU was so keen to allow Britain to join the scheme, despite their previous inflexible stances on cherry-picking aspects of EU membership, and why the government has provided so many contradictory reasons as to why it chose not to. If this proves to be true, no doubt Alistair will switch from blaming the government for letting British subjects die due to Europhobic dogma to blaming the government for letting EU subjects die due to Europhobic dogma.
AM believed that there were no strawberries in the supermarkets in the summer of 2018.
He has a long standing derangement on this subject.
I’m afraid a citation is needed for that claim.
(Spoiler: you won’t find it.)
Yet you know its true.
There was a reason I gave a daily Tesco strawberry score in 2018.
Go looking. You won’t find a citation for what you claimed.
It’s not my fault if you misread what I actually wrote.
I'm enjoying the seamless transition of the Brexit extremists from "fruit picking problems are fake news" to "hurrah that we have no strawberries".
I fear you have become the mirror image of the ideologues you condemn - whereas they might oppose any connections with the EU you oppose anything they do and so support joining any EU scheme.
Whereas to my mind the sensible strategy is one of help and co-operation where possible but detachment if necessary.
I would also somewhat doubt whether there are that many ideologues in government and whether they have much effect on the great inertial mass of statist bureaucracy in any case.
That's Emilie Oldknow level of quoting.
Thanks for the compliment
But my last point is something which I am concerned about - how much is bureaucratic inertia damaging action.
I suspect it has played a part re PPE, testing, border control and perhaps also for new ventilator suppliers.
The story related in the book Piece of Cake, about an RAF fighter squadron being denied spares at the start of the Battle of Britain, was based on true story.
They didn't have the paperwork to request spares, because the'd lost that in France. Along with the paperwork to get more paperwork.
Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few... "He must be talking about our back-pay, then."
I had the honour of having lunch with one of the gentlemen who stole the spares. I forgot to ask him a vital question. Did he steal a set of paperwork as well?
Piece of Cake and A Perfect Hero were both repeated on Forces TV earlier in the year. Piece of Cake is more immediate but both are excellent. Really grew to enjoy A Perfect Hero by the end.
How would this have caused more PPE to be manufactured?
If, as looks highly likely, less PPE is available in Britain in a couple of weeks’ time than would have been the case if the government had not refused to join this scheme because of Europhobic dogma, it is almost certain that people will die as a result. The people responsible for that decision should be prosecuted.
You'd be the one squealing loudest of all when it was civil servants who get prosecuted...
Not at all. Anyone responsible for this decision needs to face the consequences of it.
Not noticing too many Leavers speaking up for the need to secure whatever PPE Britain can by whatever means it can. Here’s your opportunity.
But perhaps the visceral hatred of the EU extends to the point of refusing PPE from it even if it would save lives.
More a complete lack of belief that any product would actually have come the UK's way. The only evidence I have seen so far is of countries looking after their own. Where you see hatred, others might see cynicism, maybe realism - that the EU would say "They've left - fuck 'em. Give the kit to our people."
Ah, the deranged paranoia of the true Europhobe. When that’s all you’ve got left, the padded cell awaits you.
I'm showing a damn sight more measured argument than you today Mr. Meeks. Retirement not suiting you, it seems....
Your argument consists of: “those foreigners are filthy hounds”.
Mine points out that the government has, as a matter of dogma, chosen to turn down access to life-saving equipment that it does not have enough of.
The self-radicalisation of Leavers has ratcheted up today. I hadn’t expected the pandemic to be a cue for the death cult to sacrifice victims on the altar of their Europhobia, but here we are.
"The padded cell awaits you"? Ah yes, the imputing of mental illness to people you have lost an argument to. How very Soviet of you.
Stay Get classy, Mr Meeks.
I am so repulsed by his posts today I have decided to step back and go in the garden
His prejeudice and hate has spiralled out of control and frankly it sickens me at a time when we all need to be kinder
I simply do not need to read his bile
I think you're taking our Mr. Meeks too seriously. As a member of the legal profession, what he does in his (you must admit) erudite barbs is a sort of mini 'summing up', which one can imagine him delivering in a wig before a jury. Like a lot of summings up, he often doesn't have much of an underlying argument, and he's using passion and big words to paper over the cracks. I enjoy his posts on that level.
George Orwell was a left-wing libertarian. Are there any well-known and/or influential left-wing libertarians in the Labour Party today? I can't think of any.
I'm not really a fan of retrofitting folk with descriptions post mortem; afaik Orwell described himself as a democratic socialist until his death.
George Orwell was a left-wing libertarian. Are there any well-known and/or influential left-wing libertarians in the Labour Party today? I can't think of any.
There are if "libertarian" means strong on civil liberties and socially liberal. But if it means "small state", I would say very few if any. Indeed was Orwell a small stater? I wasn't aware that he was.
@RochdalePioneers many apols but I have been and am still busy - could you if you have a moment sum up the current issue with Lab as I haven't been following it. Who did what, said what about whom and why does it matter.
The fewer lines the better! I will take a look as soon as I have some time.
You don't have to be Green to be green. Or something.
I'm generally pretty conservative, economically. I welcome economic growth, I'm relaxed about the rich getting richer as long as the poor do too, I'm wary about the extension of the state. But that doesn't mean I don't also place a value on the environment, and see the need for its protection. I lament the economic costs of the lockdown, but welcome the environmental benefits. This feels like the most amazingly verdant spring I can remember. The skies are clear, the birds in full song; traffic is quietened. My wife and daughters feel able to take their exercise by bike - something they never did in normal times due to the levels of traffic. My youngest daughter's lungs no longer rattle when she breathes and hasn't needed an inhaler for over three weeks. It would be interesting to look at trends for deaths due to road traffic. We must have saved thousands and thousands of tonnes of carbon emissions. And the skies! The weather! I don't know to what extent this is linked to lack of aeroplanes (surely it can't be that simple?), but every time the planes are grounded (2001, 2010, 2020) seems to coincide with glorious, cloudless skies. I recognise there is a massive and unsustainable cost to this idyll, but it would be nice to preserve some aspects of it when and if normal life resumes.
I get the impression Rosindell has been slowly becoming less right-wing than he used to be. He was the Young Tory who called for flogging, birching and capital punishment to be re-introduced at the 1993 Conservative Party conference.
Using "All Deaths" stats YoY is probably about the best metric right now, with all the uncertainty over 'died from' and 'died with', and hospital vs outside deaths.
Few people are dead more than a day before it gets officially recorded, as opposed to more detailed enquiries about what might be the causes of death.
Am I reading this correctly? c. 4500 extra deaths in a single week?
That's what it looks like to me. Which, encouragingly, is not all that far from what the figures for the first week of April show for UK deaths on Worldometers. Which implies that there isn't a massive iceberg of extra deaths not being picked up as there was in e.g. Bergamo. As against that, there is a bit of a lag to the figures on Worldometers, so I'll downplay the encouragement a notch. But still. Also as against that, these clearly aren't people who would have died this week anyway. But many of them would have died this year or next. If (big if) the situation gets back to normal by late summer, I would expect to see a small counter-correction later in the year due to people who have died 6-9 months earlier than their time.
I'd expect to see a massive uptick in weeks fourteen and fifteen of deaths above average. But what I'm taking from this is that the figures we're seeing for Covid deaths are not too far short of accurate.
How would this have caused more PPE to be manufactured?
If, as looks highly likely, less PPE is available in Britain in a couple of weeks’ time than would have been the case if the government had not refused to join this scheme because of Europhobic dogma, it is almost certain that people will die as a result. The people responsible for that decision should be prosecuted.
You'd be the one squealing loudest of all when it was civil servants who get prosecuted...
Not at all. Anyone responsible for this decision needs to face the consequences of it.
Not noticing too many Leavers speaking up for the need to secure whatever PPE Britain can by whatever means it can. Here’s your opportunity.
But perhaps the visceral hatred of the EU extends to the point of refusing PPE from it even if it would save lives.
More a complete lack of belief that any product would actually have come the UK's way. The only evidence I have seen so far is of countries looking after their own. Where you see hatred, others might see cynicism, maybe realism - that the EU would say "They've left - fuck 'em. Give the kit to our people."
Ah, the deranged paranoia of the true Europhobe. When that’s all you’ve got left, the padded cell awaits you.
It is an entirely sensible strategy to use Uk based resources to kick start new sources of PPE, tests, ventilators etc.
a) Smaller logistics chains. b) Lower risk from transportation "issues" c) Higher level of oversight d) Patriotic boost to productivity. e) Complete control over supply once established.
A far better use of resources in the long battle ahead than getting a small slice of a one off delivery from China via the EU.
An alternative explanation is that Britain actually has a comparatively strong capacity to manufacture PPE and ventilators, and the 'EU procurement scheme' was a means of allowing smaller countries who lacked this capacity to share in its fruits. It would explain why the EU was so keen to allow Britain to join the scheme, despite their previous inflexible stances on cherry-picking aspects of EU membership, and why the government has provided so many contradictory reasons as to why it chose not to. If this proves to be true, no doubt Alistair will switch from blaming the government for letting British subjects die due to Europhobic dogma to blaming the government for letting EU subjects die due to Europhobic dogma.
AM believed that there were no strawberries in the supermarkets in the summer of 2018.
He has a long standing derangement on this subject.
I’m afraid a citation is needed for that claim.
(Spoiler: you won’t find it.)
Yet you know its true.
There was a reason I gave a daily Tesco strawberry score in 2018.
Go looking. You won’t find a citation for what you claimed.
It’s not my fault if you misread what I actually wrote.
I'm enjoying the seamless transition of the Brexit extremists from "fruit picking problems are fake news" to "hurrah that we have no strawberries".
I fear you have become the mirror image of the ideologues you condemn - whereas they might oppose any connections with the EU you oppose anything they do and so support joining any EU scheme.
Whereas to my mind the sensible strategy is one of help and co-operation where possible but detachment if necessary.
I would also somewhat doubt whether there are that many ideologues in government and whether they have much effect on the great inertial mass of statist bureaucracy in any case.
That's Emilie Oldknow level of quoting.
Thanks for the compliment
But my last point is something which I am concerned about - how much is bureaucratic inertia damaging action.
I suspect it has played a part re PPE, testing, border control and perhaps also for new ventilator suppliers.
The story related in the book Piece of Cake, about an RAF fighter squadron being denied spares at the start of the Battle of Britain, was based on true story.
They didn't have the paperwork to request spares, because the'd lost that in France. Along with the paperwork to get more paperwork.
Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few... "He must be talking about our back-pay, then."
That was the case after Trafalgar, as well, wasn't it?
And now the left will conspire against Labour.. where's my popcorn.
I don't think so, apart from a few obsessives. The left will prefer a Labour government to a Tory one. Many on the Blairite wing could not say the same in 17 and 19. This is a key difference between now and then.
Yes, but they see the party led by Starmer as a Tory party, not a Labour party.
So if Starmer wins we get a Tory government, as we had from May 1997 to May 2010.
About a quarter of the membership voted for RLB. My guess would be only a small fraction of that quarter feel as you suggest.
Heard his comments. Shocked. Never liked the guy - unpleasant vibe to him - but had not realized he was an actual dumbo. Probably has to go now. Shame for him, of course, but I think the rest of us will cope. He doesn't do anything that Richard Madeley can't do ten times better.
I am always interested by people who think that science is part of buffet -
"Hmmm.... I'll take a slice of Global Warming, a side of Gloop and for desert some Astrology"
A rather odd view. Do you confine your life's philosophy to the works of a single writer (and presumably from only one time in their life, since writers often change their mind over time)?
Truth is many sided. If you think of it as a statue, not a traffic light, it is perfectly possible to have several different views and angles on the truth, which could even be vigorously opposed, but could be equally true.
Using "All Deaths" stats YoY is probably about the best metric right now, with all the uncertainty over 'died from' and 'died with', and hospital vs outside deaths.
Few people are dead more than a day before it gets officially recorded, as opposed to more detailed enquiries about what might be the causes of death.
Am I reading this correctly? c. 4500 extra deaths in a single week?
More like 6000, I think.
This is not inconsistent with the expectation of around 50,000 deaths in this wave.
4500 looks like a not bad distance from the average of the other years at first glance.
I count 3965 deaths in the hospital deaths (the daily announced COVID19 deaths) 30th March - 5th April, by the way.
A more important figure would be annual deaths Feb 20 to Feb 21.
Will give an indication of how many "extra" deaths were caused by Covid.
MPs have signed a demand which would leave the party literally bankrupt. There isn't the need for further discussion. Remove the whip from them all. They brought the fight, no point trying to obfuscate around it.
Why are you such an angry man? Can you not conceive why a wing of Labour is so distressed to find that their close running campaigns were neutered by senior administrators. Tranches of funding used with no oversight, and favoured MPs given preferential access to money. There is even evidence of campaign data not being provided to those on the ground. This had a real effect on the 2017 campaign.
Can you not see that this is systemic nepotism and it will cost the entity the trust of a significant percentage of its dues paying members?
Your partisan comments on this site suggest that you see this as a war and you will not be happy until these MPs are removed. IMO this makes you no different from the Momentumites calling for mandatory reselection. You are the worst kind of party man, one that can only view the issue through their own prism and refuse to accept that labour will have a left wing element. No doubt, you will again leave the party when it won't conform to your blinkered sectarianism.
I'd describe it as mournful rather than angry. You appear to have taken this "report" as a given. Wasn't my experience on the ground as a CLP key organiser in 2017. And remember that these traitors made a gain of 30 seats. Once they were removed and replaced by loyalists they lost 60 seats. The allegation is that these officers were incompetent...
As for my partisan comments and "worst kind of party man" can I ask which party? I was a LibDem for 6 months until last Wednesday. Of course Labour will have a "left wing" - it is a left wing party.
I'm sorry. I'm a little frustrated so my comment was definitely more of an attack than a critique.
I don't see anyone as a traitor whatever their leanings. I hate to trot out 'broad church' analogy but it is how I view the party. Regarding the report I have skimmed it and have to assume the internal messages are accurately quoted, if nothing else. And they do reflect badly on particular administrators and MPs TW etc.
My frustration with the whole mess is that the left is now seen as not having a fair shot. The Corbyn generation now have a legitimate reason for questioning the party structure as in America with the DNC regarding Sanders. And if anything this will engender further devision under Keir's new management it will be the idea that their ideas and people have been dismissed out of hand by the party machine.
So when I see your comment that these loyal MPs must be expelled I do not think that this punishment reflects the crime. I believe you are using one letter as a pretext to remove a tranche of the party you disagree with and it angers me. Especially as you say you have flitted between the LDs and labour over the years and you now return when your ideas may have the most purchase.
Abbot, Corbyn and their like rode the Blair wave when access to senior party postions was never going to be forthcoming. This aquiesence IMO only works if their policies and politics are not sabotaged when they have power.
You don't have to be Green to be green. Or something.
I'm generally pretty conservative, economically. I welcome economic growth, I'm relaxed about the rich getting richer as long as the poor do too, I'm wary about the extension of the state. But that doesn't mean I don't also place a value on the environment, and see the need for its protection. I lament the economic costs of the lockdown, but welcome the environmental benefits. This feels like the most amazingly verdant spring I can remember. The skies are clear, the birds in full song; traffic is quietened. My wife and daughters feel able to take their exercise by bike - something they never did in normal times due to the levels of traffic. My youngest daughter's lungs no longer rattle when she breathes and hasn't needed an inhaler for over three weeks. It would be interesting to look at trends for deaths due to road traffic. We must have saved thousands and thousands of tonnes of carbon emissions. And the skies! The weather! I don't know to what extent this is linked to lack of aeroplanes (surely it can't be that simple?), but every time the planes are grounded (2001, 2010, 2020) seems to coincide with glorious, cloudless skies. I recognise there is a massive and unsustainable cost to this idyll, but it would be nice to preserve some aspects of it when and if normal life resumes.
Heard his comments. Shocked. Never liked the guy - unpleasant vibe to him - but had not realized he was an actual dumbo. Probably has to go now. Shame for him, of course, but I think the rest of us will cope. He doesn't do anything that Richard Madeley can't do ten times better.
I am always interested by people who think that science is part of buffet -
"Hmmm.... I'll take a slice of Global Warming, a side of Gloop and for desert some Astrology"
A rather odd view. Do you confine your life's philosophy to the works of a single writer (and presumably from only one time in their life, since writers often change their mind over time)?
Truth is many sided. If you think of it as a statue, not a traffic light, it is perfectly possible to have several different views and angles on the truth, which could even be vigorously opposed, but could be equally true.
Global warming is a matter of science and evidence.
Gloop and Astrology are anti-scientific, proven bullshit.
@RochdalePioneers many apols but I have been and am still busy - could you if you have a moment sum up the current issue with Lab as I haven't been following it. Who did what, said what about whom and why does it matter.
The fewer lines the better! I will take a look as soon as I have some time.
TIA!!!
I am not he, but the summary from Sky News website works:
The examples from chat archives published in the document include:
Conversations in 2017 which appear to show senior staff preparing for Tom Watson to become interim leader in anticipation of Mr Corbyn losing the election
Conversations which it is claimed show senior staff hid information from the leader's office about digital spending and contact details for MPs and candidates during the election
Conversations on election night in which the members of the group talk about the need to hide their disappointment that Mr Corbyn had done better than expected and would be unlikely to resign
A discussion about whether the grassroots activist network Momentum could be "proscribed" for being a "party within a party"
A discussion about "unsuspending" a former Labour MP who was critical of Mr Corbyn so they could stand as a candidate in the 2017 election
A discussion about how to prevent Corbyn ally Rebecca Long-Bailey gaining a seat on the party's governing body in 2017
Regular references to corbyn-supporting party staff as "trots"
Conversations between senior staff in Lord McNicol's office in which they refer to former director of communications Seamus Milne as "dracula", and saying he was "spiteful and evil and we should make sure he is never allowed in our Party if it's last thing we do"
Conversations in which the same group refers to Mr Corbyn's former chief of staff Karie Murphy as "medusa", a "crazy woman" and a "bitch face cow" that would "make a good dartboard"
A discussion in which one of the group members expresses their "hope" that a young pro-Corbyn Labour activist, who they acknowledge had mental health problems, "dies in a fire"
The investigation also accuses the former General Secretary Lord McNicol, and other senior figures of providing "false and misleading information" to Jeremy Corbyn's office in relation to the handling of antisemitism complaints, which the report claims meant "the scale of the problem was not appreciated" by the leadership.
The report claims McNicol and staff in the Governance and Legal Unit "provided timetables for the resolution of cases that were never met; falsely claimed to have processed all antisemitism complaints; falsely claimed that most complaints received were not about Labour members and provided highly inaccurate statistics of antisemitism complaints".
@RochdalePioneers many apols but I have been and am still busy - could you if you have a moment sum up the current issue with Lab as I haven't been following it. Who did what, said what about whom and why does it matter.
The fewer lines the better! I will take a look as soon as I have some time.
TIA!!!
1. A very large report is leaked which details various things that cannot legally be shared under data protection laws. Said report was apparently done outside the knowledge of the current leader / deputy leader / various NEC members. 2. Several of the people named and shamed on the report announce their intention to sue the party for libel, engaging the brief who successfully bankrupted the News of the World and Katie Hopkins 3. The information commissioner announces an investigation into the apparent egregious data protection breech 4. The Socialist Campaign Group of MPs issue a demand that the report be "published in full officially by the Labour Party"
How would this have caused more PPE to be manufactured?
If, as looks highly likely, less PPE is available in Britain in a couple of weeks’ time than would have been the case if the government had not refused to join this scheme because of Europhobic dogma, it is almost certain that people will die as a result. The people responsible for that decision should be prosecuted.
You'd be the one squealing loudest of all when it was civil servants who get prosecuted...
Not at all. Anyone responsible for this decision needs to face the consequences of it.
Not noticing too many Leavers speaking up for the need to secure whatever PPE Britain can by whatever means it can. Here’s your opportunity.
But perhaps the visceral hatred of the EU extends to the point of refusing PPE from it even if it would save lives.
More a complete lack of belief that any product would actually have come the UK's way. The only evidence I have seen so far is of countries looking after their own. Where you see hatred, others might see cynicism, maybe realism - that the EU would say "They've left - fuck 'em. Give the kit to our people."
Ah, the deranged paranoia of the true Europhobe. When that’s all you’ve got left, the padded cell awaits you.
It is an entirely sensible strategy to use Uk based resources to kick start new sources of PPE, tests, ventilators etc.
a) Smaller logistics chains. b) Lower risk from transportation "issues" c) Higher level of oversight d) Patriotic boost to productivity. e) Complete control over supply once established.
A far better use of resources in the long battle ahead than getting a small slice of a one off delivery from China via the EU.
An alternative explanation is that Britain actually has a comparatively strong capacity to manufacture PPE and ventilators, and the 'EU procurement scheme' was a means of allowing smaller countries who lacked this capacity to share in its fruits. It would explain why the EU was so keen to allow Britain to join the scheme, despite their previous inflexible stances on cherry-picking aspects of EU membership, and why the government has provided so many contradictory reasons as to why it chose not to. If this proves to be true, no doubt Alistair will switch from blaming the government for letting British subjects die due to Europhobic dogma to blaming the government for letting EU subjects die due to Europhobic dogma.
AM believed that there were no strawberries in the supermarkets in the summer of 2018.
He has a long standing derangement on this subject.
I’m afraid a citation is needed for that claim.
(Spoiler: you won’t find it.)
Yet you know its true.
There was a reason I gave a daily Tesco strawberry score in 2018.
Go looking. You won’t find a citation for what you claimed.
It’s not my fault if you misread what I actually wrote.
I'm enjoying the seamless transition of the Brexit extremists from "fruit picking problems are fake news" to "hurrah that we have no strawberries".
I fear you have become the mirror image of the ideologues you condemn - whereas they might oppose any connections with the EU you oppose anything they do and so support joining any EU scheme.
Whereas to my mind the sensible strategy is one of help and co-operation where possible but detachment if necessary.
I would also somewhat doubt whether there are that many ideologues in government and whether they have much effect on the great inertial mass of statist bureaucracy in any case.
That's Emilie Oldknow level of quoting.
Thanks for the compliment
But my last point is something which I am concerned about - how much is bureaucratic inertia damaging action.
I suspect it has played a part re PPE, testing, border control and perhaps also for new ventilator suppliers.
The story related in the book Piece of Cake, about an RAF fighter squadron being denied spares at the start of the Battle of Britain, was based on true story.
They didn't have the paperwork to request spares, because the'd lost that in France. Along with the paperwork to get more paperwork.
Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few... "He must be talking about our back-pay, then."
That was the case after Trafalgar, as well, wasn't it?
And the Armada.
Then there was the bravest man in history. The civil servant who decided, a few years back, that since some i's were undotted or something, that all the allowances and extra pay for *all* of British Special Forces shouldn't not be paid for a couple of months....
I see Guido thinks he has discovered a likely candidate for compiling the Labour report....in its metadata.
I'm not saying the inference is wrong, but a lot of my docs seem to have a different "author" - where I've worked from an older document, sometimes several times over.
So let's call it a best guess...
Lol. I've accidentally sent out reports before with "author" being someone who left the company before I joined (and occasionally who never even worked on the client team in question). It's a function of "house style" - bad practice to not revert to the template every time, but sometimes necessary to keep formatting that's hard to replicate (mostly due to Word being awful).
Also often the "author" is the junior who sketched out the first draft (sometimes just the structure and paragraph headings) rather than the people who filled out the actual content.
Using "All Deaths" stats YoY is probably about the best metric right now, with all the uncertainty over 'died from' and 'died with', and hospital vs outside deaths.
Few people are dead more than a day before it gets officially recorded, as opposed to more detailed enquiries about what might be the causes of death.
Am I reading this correctly? c. 4500 extra deaths in a single week?
That's what it looks like to me.
????
The figure for this year is 16,387. You think the other years are just under 12,000 on average? More than half of them are under 10,000.
Fair point - my defence is that the numbers on the y axis were too small for these eyes to see.
The iceberg is a little bigger than I had thought. There are some excess deaths showing up in these figures beyond what is reported as Covid deaths. This is probably roughly the sort of levels I was expecting. I will dial back from 'encouraged' to 'relieved it's not worse'. For now.
Using "All Deaths" stats YoY is probably about the best metric right now, with all the uncertainty over 'died from' and 'died with', and hospital vs outside deaths.
Few people are dead more than a day before it gets officially recorded, as opposed to more detailed enquiries about what might be the causes of death.
Am I reading this correctly? c. 4500 extra deaths in a single week?
More like 6000, I think.
This is not inconsistent with the expectation of around 50,000 deaths in this wave.
4500 looks like a not bad distance from the average of the other years at first glance.
I count 3965 deaths in the hospital deaths (the daily announced COVID19 deaths) 30th March - 5th April, by the way.
A more important figure would be annual deaths Feb 20 to Feb 21.
Will give an indication of how many "extra" deaths were caused by Covid.
@RochdalePioneers many apols but I have been and am still busy - could you if you have a moment sum up the current issue with Lab as I haven't been following it. Who did what, said what about whom and why does it matter.
The fewer lines the better! I will take a look as soon as I have some time.
TIA!!!
1. A very large report is leaked which details various things that cannot legally be shared under data protection laws. Said report was apparently done outside the knowledge of the current leader / deputy leader / various NEC members. 2. Several of the people named and shamed on the report announce their intention to sue the party for libel, engaging the brief who successfully bankrupted the News of the World and Katie Hopkins 3. The information commissioner announces an investigation into the apparent egregious data protection breech 4. The Socialist Campaign Group of MPs issue a demand that the report be "published in full officially by the Labour Party"
MPs have signed a demand which would leave the party literally bankrupt. There isn't the need for further discussion. Remove the whip from them all. They brought the fight, no point trying to obfuscate around it.
Why are you such an angry man? Can you not conceive why a wing of Labour is so distressed to find that their close running campaigns were neutered by senior administrators. Tranches of funding used with no oversight, and favoured MPs given preferential access to money. There is even evidence of campaign data not being provided to those on the ground. This had a real effect on the 2017 campaign.
Can you not see that this is systemic nepotism and it will cost the entity the trust of a significant percentage of its dues paying members?
Your partisan comments on this site suggest that you see this as a war and you will not be happy until these MPs are removed. IMO this makes you no different from the Momentumites calling for mandatory reselection. You are the worst kind of party man, one that can only view the issue through their own prism and refuse to accept that labour will have a left wing element. No doubt, you will again leave the party when it won't conform to your blinkered sectarianism.
I'd describe it as mournful rather than angry. You appear to have taken this "report" as a given. Wasn't my experience on the ground as a CLP key organiser in 2017. And remember that these traitors made a gain of 30 seats. Once they were removed and replaced by loyalists they lost 60 seats. The allegation is that these officers were incompetent...
As for my partisan comments and "worst kind of party man" can I ask which party? I was a LibDem for 6 months until last Wednesday. Of course Labour will have a "left wing" - it is a left wing party.
I'm sorry. I'm a little frustrated so my comment was definitely more of an attack than a critique.
I don't see anyone as a traitor whatever their leanings. I hate to trot out 'broad church' analogy but it is how I view the party. Regarding the report I have skimmed it and have to assume the internal messages are accurately quoted, if nothing else. And they do reflect badly on particular administrators and MPs TW etc.
My frustration with the whole mess is that the left is now seen as not having a fair shot. The Corbyn generation now have a legitimate reason for questioning the party structure as in America with the DNC regarding Sanders. And if anything this will engender further devision under Keir's new management it will be the idea that their ideas and people have been dismissed out of hand by the party machine.
So when I see your comment that these loyal MPs must be expelled I do not think that this punishment reflects the crime. I believe you are using one letter as a pretext to remove a tranche of the party you disagree with and it angers me. Especially as you say you have flitted between the LDs and labour over the years and you now return when your ideas may have the most purchase.
Abbot, Corbyn and their like rode the Blair wave when access to senior party postions was never going to be forthcoming. This aquiesence IMO only works if their policies and politics are not sabotaged when they have power.
"it will be the idea that their ideas and people have been dismissed out of hand by the party machine." No, their ideas have been dismissed out of hand by the electorate. By millions of now former Labour voters. Many of whom just voted Tory.
I refer you back to Clause 1. The Labour Party exists to win power. The Corbyn cult cannot do so. Its ideas are an anathema to voters. I dismiss them out of hand because its been proven to destruction that their ideas are counter-factual to the reason for the party to exist.
Heard his comments. Shocked. Never liked the guy - unpleasant vibe to him - but had not realized he was an actual dumbo. Probably has to go now. Shame for him, of course, but I think the rest of us will cope. He doesn't do anything that Richard Madeley can't do ten times better.
I am always interested by people who think that science is part of buffet -
"Hmmm.... I'll take a slice of Global Warming, a side of Gloop and for desert some Astrology"
A rather odd view. Do you confine your life's philosophy to the works of a single writer (and presumably from only one time in their life, since writers often change their mind over time)?
Truth is many sided. If you think of it as a statue, not a traffic light, it is perfectly possible to have several different views and angles on the truth, which could even be vigorously opposed, but could be equally true.
Global warming is a matter of science and evidence.
Gloop and Astrology are anti-scientific, proven bullshit.
I have no idea what Gloop is. As for astrology, I am not a subscriber, but it is perfectly possible that the movement of celestial bodies has a greater impact on the lives of humans than is measurable currently. Or not. If you'd told the scientists of the 18th century that our bodies consisted largely of tiny living cells and organisms you would have attracted derision. It is foolish to believe that science will not reveal more mysteries in the future along similar lines.
@RochdalePioneers many apols but I have been and am still busy - could you if you have a moment sum up the current issue with Lab as I haven't been following it. Who did what, said what about whom and why does it matter.
The fewer lines the better! I will take a look as soon as I have some time.
TIA!!!
I am not he, but the summary from Sky News website works:
The examples from chat archives published in the document include:
Conversations in 2017 which appear to show senior staff preparing for Tom Watson to become interim leader in anticipation of Mr Corbyn losing the election
Conversations which it is claimed show senior staff hid information from the leader's office about digital spending and contact details for MPs and candidates during the election
Conversations on election night in which the members of the group talk about the need to hide their disappointment that Mr Corbyn had done better than expected and would be unlikely to resign
A discussion about whether the grassroots activist network Momentum could be "proscribed" for being a "party within a party"
A discussion about "unsuspending" a former Labour MP who was critical of Mr Corbyn so they could stand as a candidate in the 2017 election
A discussion about how to prevent Corbyn ally Rebecca Long-Bailey gaining a seat on the party's governing body in 2017
Regular references to corbyn-supporting party staff as "trots"
Conversations between senior staff in Lord McNicol's office in which they refer to former director of communications Seamus Milne as "dracula", and saying he was "spiteful and evil and we should make sure he is never allowed in our Party if it's last thing we do"
Conversations in which the same group refers to Mr Corbyn's former chief of staff Karie Murphy as "medusa", a "crazy woman" and a "bitch face cow" that would "make a good dartboard"
A discussion in which one of the group members expresses their "hope" that a young pro-Corbyn Labour activist, who they acknowledge had mental health problems, "dies in a fire"
The investigation also accuses the former General Secretary Lord McNicol, and other senior figures of providing "false and misleading information" to Jeremy Corbyn's office in relation to the handling of antisemitism complaints, which the report claims meant "the scale of the problem was not appreciated" by the leadership.
The report claims McNicol and staff in the Governance and Legal Unit "provided timetables for the resolution of cases that were never met; falsely claimed to have processed all antisemitism complaints; falsely claimed that most complaints received were not about Labour members and provided highly inaccurate statistics of antisemitism complaints".
So it is in effect saying that Jezza, Seaumas, et al were pure as the driven snow just quietly trying to bring their extreme left vision of the world into being and oblivious to any naughty anti-semitism in the Labour Party and they were thwarted behind the scenes by "senior staff"?
MPs or not MPs? Gah - I'm getting dragged in....must...resist...must...
Some very interesting Company’s House activity today regarding the potential Saudi takeover of Newcastle United. Not sure how ready I am to support the richest club in the world?
George Orwell was a left-wing libertarian. Are there any well-known and/or influential left-wing libertarians in the Labour Party today? I can't think of any.
There are if "libertarian" means strong on civil liberties and socially liberal. But if it means "small state", I would say very few if any. Indeed was Orwell a small stater? I wasn't aware that he was.
“That rifle on the wall of the labourer's cottage or working class flat is the symbol of democracy. It is our job to see that it stays there.”
Heard his comments. Shocked. Never liked the guy - unpleasant vibe to him - but had not realized he was an actual dumbo. Probably has to go now. Shame for him, of course, but I think the rest of us will cope. He doesn't do anything that Richard Madeley can't do ten times better.
I am always interested by people who think that science is part of buffet -
"Hmmm.... I'll take a slice of Global Warming, a side of Gloop and for desert some Astrology"
A rather odd view. Do you confine your life's philosophy to the works of a single writer (and presumably from only one time in their life, since writers often change their mind over time)?
Truth is many sided. If you think of it as a statue, not a traffic light, it is perfectly possible to have several different views and angles on the truth, which could even be vigorously opposed, but could be equally true.
Global warming is a matter of science and evidence.
Gloop and Astrology are anti-scientific, proven bullshit.
I have no idea what Gloop is. As for astrology, I am not a subscriber, but it is perfectly possible that the movement of celestial bodies has a greater impact on the lives of humans than is measurable currently. Or not. If you'd told the scientists of the 18th century that our bodies consisted largely of tiny living cells and organisms you would have attracted derision. It is foolish to believe that science will not reveal more mysteries in the future along similar lines.
Even practitioners of Astrology can't give a vaguely coherent reason why it should work.
Some very interesting Company’s House activity today regarding the potential Saudi takeover of Newcastle United. Not sure how ready I am to support the richest club in the world?
I heard Shaun Custis say on TalkSPORT that he'd expect most Newcastle fans to welcome such a takeover.
It would be just typical for Newcastle to be taken over by an oil rich country just as the price of oil plummets!
There are [libertarians in Labour] if "libertarian" means strong on civil liberties and socially liberal.
Libertarian is normally defined as economically liberal and socially liberal. i.e. the government should keep its nose out of the boardroom _and_ the bedroom.
Also, civil liberty advocates tend to be top down, libertarians are more bottom up.
Heard his comments. Shocked. Never liked the guy - unpleasant vibe to him - but had not realized he was an actual dumbo. Probably has to go now. Shame for him, of course, but I think the rest of us will cope. He doesn't do anything that Richard Madeley can't do ten times better.
I am always interested by people who think that science is part of buffet -
"Hmmm.... I'll take a slice of Global Warming, a side of Gloop and for desert some Astrology"
A rather odd view. Do you confine your life's philosophy to the works of a single writer (and presumably from only one time in their life, since writers often change their mind over time)?
Truth is many sided. If you think of it as a statue, not a traffic light, it is perfectly possible to have several different views and angles on the truth, which could even be vigorously opposed, but could be equally true.
Global warming is a matter of science and evidence.
Gloop and Astrology are anti-scientific, proven bullshit.
I have no idea what Gloop is. As for astrology, I am not a subscriber, but it is perfectly possible that the movement of celestial bodies has a greater impact on the lives of humans than is measurable currently. Or not. If you'd told the scientists of the 18th century that our bodies consisted largely of tiny living cells and organisms you would have attracted derision. It is foolish to believe that science will not reveal more mysteries in the future along similar lines.
Even practitioners of Astrology can't give a vaguely coherent reason why it should work.
As for Gloop - Google it.
I have no truck with astrology whatsoever. But it is not far-fetched to suggest that in a part of the world where the change of the seasons has a noticeable effect on people's moods and temperaments that those born at the same time of the year might share certain characteristics. We do recognise that where people are born in the academic year has a measurable impact. This isn't anything I've ever observed personally, but it wouldn't be surprising if it happened. I can't see how the leap from here to horoscope predictions works however.
Heard his comments. Shocked. Never liked the guy - unpleasant vibe to him - but had not realized he was an actual dumbo. Probably has to go now. Shame for him, of course, but I think the rest of us will cope. He doesn't do anything that Richard Madeley can't do ten times better.
I am always interested by people who think that science is part of buffet -
"Hmmm.... I'll take a slice of Global Warming, a side of Gloop and for desert some Astrology"
A rather odd view. Do you confine your life's philosophy to the works of a single writer (and presumably from only one time in their life, since writers often change their mind over time)?
Truth is many sided. If you think of it as a statue, not a traffic light, it is perfectly possible to have several different views and angles on the truth, which could even be vigorously opposed, but could be equally true.
Global warming is a matter of science and evidence.
Gloop and Astrology are anti-scientific, proven bullshit.
I have no idea what Gloop is. As for astrology, I am not a subscriber, but it is perfectly possible that the movement of celestial bodies has a greater impact on the lives of humans than is measurable currently. Or not. If you'd told the scientists of the 18th century that our bodies consisted largely of tiny living cells and organisms you would have attracted derision. It is foolish to believe that science will not reveal more mysteries in the future along similar lines.
Even practitioners of Astrology can't give a vaguely coherent reason why it should work.
As for Gloop - Google it.
But they don't have to. As an example, look at the making of fermented foods like sauerkraut. Incredibly healthy, because they make nutrients more bioavailable, they introduce friendly bacteria into the gut, etc. ect. Our ancestors knew none of this. They were just preserving produce, and knew they felt well when they ate the result. This is 'wisdom' - doing something you don't necessarily understand the mechanics of, because you know it will result in a desirable outcome. I am not saying that applies to astrology, but I am saying we can subscribe to beliefs without knowing the science of how they work. Faith belongs in the same category. You are not rejecting science, you're just accepting of the fact that the science of something is not currently measurable.
George Orwell was a left-wing libertarian. Are there any well-known and/or influential left-wing libertarians in the Labour Party today? I can't think of any.
There are if "libertarian" means strong on civil liberties and socially liberal. But if it means "small state", I would say very few if any. Indeed was Orwell a small stater? I wasn't aware that he was.
To me it means tending to trust ordinary people to do the right thing and make the right decisions, rather than believing they usually ought to defer to those in authority, technical experts and professionals as much as possible. In other words, not being in favour of the idea of living in a technocracy. The current centre-left government in Sweden is proving to be surprisingly libertarian in their decision not to lockdown the country and trusting ordinary people to do the right thing. (It's true their scientific experts made the recommendation, but the government would have had to agree to it as well).
How would this have caused more PPE to be manufactured?
If, as looks highly likely, less PPE is available in Britain in a couple of weeks’ time than would have been the case if the government had not refused to join this scheme because of Europhobic dogma, it is almost certain that people will die as a result. The people responsible for that decision should be prosecuted.
You'd be the one squealing loudest of all when it was civil servants who get prosecuted...
Not at all. Anyone responsible for this decision needs to face the consequences of it.
Not noticing too many Leavers speaking up for the need to secure whatever PPE Britain can by whatever means it can. Here’s your opportunity.
But perhaps the visceral hatred of the EU extends to the point of refusing PPE from it even if it would save lives.
More a complete lack of belief that any product would actually have come the UK's way. The only evidence I have seen so far is of countries looking after their own. Where you see hatred, others might see cynicism, maybe realism - that the EU would say "They've left - fuck 'em. Give the kit to our people."
Ah, the deranged paranoia of the true Europhobe. When that’s all you’ve got left, the padded cell awaits you.
It is an entirely sensible strategy to use Uk based resources to kick start new sources of PPE, tests, ventilators etc.
a) Smaller logistics chains. b) Lower risk from transportation "issues" c) Higher level of oversight d) Patriotic boost to productivity. e) Complete control over supply once established.
A far better use of resources in the long battle ahead than getting a small slice of a one off delivery from China via the EU.
An alternative explanation is that Britain actually has a comparatively strong capacity to manufacture PPE and ventilators, and the 'EU procurement scheme' was a means of allowing smaller countries who lacked this capacity to share in its fruits. It would explain why the EU was so keen to allow Britain to join the scheme, despite their previous inflexible stances on cherry-picking aspects of EU membership, and why the government has provided so many contradictory reasons as to why it chose not to. If this proves to be true, no doubt Alistair will switch from blaming the government for letting British subjects die due to Europhobic dogma to blaming the government for letting EU subjects die due to Europhobic dogma.
AM believed that there were no strawberries in the supermarkets in the summer of 2018.
He has a long standing derangement on this subject.
I’m afraid a citation is needed for that claim.
(Spoiler: you won’t find it.)
Yet you know its true.
There was a reason I gave a daily Tesco strawberry score in 2018.
Go looking. You won’t find a citation for what you claimed.
It’s not my fault if you misread what I actually wrote.
I'm enjoying the seamless transition of the Brexit extremists from "fruit picking problems are fake news" to "hurrah that we have no strawberries".
I fear you have become the mirror image of the ideologues you condemn - whereas they might oppose any connections with the EU you oppose anything they do and so support joining any EU scheme.
Whereas to my mind the sensible strategy is one of help and co-operation where possible but detachment if necessary.
I would also somewhat doubt whether there are that many ideologues in government and whether they have much effect on the great inertial mass of statist bureaucracy in any case.
That's Emilie Oldknow level of quoting.
Thanks for the compliment
But my last point is something which I am concerned about - how much is bureaucratic inertia damaging action.
I suspect it has played a part re PPE, testing, border control and perhaps also for new ventilator suppliers.
The story related in the book Piece of Cake, about an RAF fighter squadron being denied spares at the start of the Battle of Britain, was based on true story.
They didn't have the paperwork to request spares, because the'd lost that in France. Along with the paperwork to get more paperwork.
Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few... "He must be talking about our back-pay, then."
That was the case after Trafalgar, as well, wasn't it?
No.
Battle of Britain the many was 46 million and the few were 3000 pilots. Trafalgar fleet was 27 ships of the line with an average complement of say 600 so say 16,000 defending a population of 10 million. Churchill did not exaggerate.
So it is in effect saying that Jezza, Seaumas, et al were pure as the driven snow just quietly trying to bring their extreme left vision of the world into being and oblivious to any naughty anti-semitism in the Labour Party and they were thwarted behind the scenes by "senior staff"?
MPs or not MPs? Gah - I'm getting dragged in....must...resist...must...
You're welcome, and to answer your question, pretty much. It certainly massively explains why Corbyn was a bit mealy-mouthed in his apologies.
The content of the WhatsApp conversations is truly explosive.
Heard his comments. Shocked. Never liked the guy - unpleasant vibe to him - but had not realized he was an actual dumbo. Probably has to go now. Shame for him, of course, but I think the rest of us will cope. He doesn't do anything that Richard Madeley can't do ten times better.
I am always interested by people who think that science is part of buffet -
"Hmmm.... I'll take a slice of Global Warming, a side of Gloop and for desert some Astrology"
A rather odd view. Do you confine your life's philosophy to the works of a single writer (and presumably from only one time in their life, since writers often change their mind over time)?
Truth is many sided. If you think of it as a statue, not a traffic light, it is perfectly possible to have several different views and angles on the truth, which could even be vigorously opposed, but could be equally true.
Global warming is a matter of science and evidence.
Gloop and Astrology are anti-scientific, proven bullshit.
I have no idea what Gloop is. As for astrology, I am not a subscriber, but it is perfectly possible that the movement of celestial bodies has a greater impact on the lives of humans than is measurable currently. Or not. If you'd told the scientists of the 18th century that our bodies consisted largely of tiny living cells and organisms you would have attracted derision. It is foolish to believe that science will not reveal more mysteries in the future along similar lines.
Even practitioners of Astrology can't give a vaguely coherent reason why it should work.
As for Gloop - Google it.
Might be easier to Gloogle if you called it by its proper name...
I don't want to publicise it by doing so myself, but the above deliberate typo should help. Also it's closely associated with Glwyneth Paltrow.
How would this have caused more PPE to be manufactured?
If, as looks highly likely, less PPE is available in Britain in a couple of weeks’ time than would have been the case if the government had not refused to join this scheme because of Europhobic dogma, it is almost certain that people will die as a result. The people responsible for that decision should be prosecuted.
You'd be the one squealing loudest of all when it was civil servants who get prosecuted...
Not at all. Anyone responsible for this decision needs to face the consequences of it.
Not noticing too many Leavers speaking up for the need to secure whatever PPE Britain can by whatever means it can. Here’s your opportunity.
But perhaps the visceral hatred of the EU extends to the point of refusing PPE from it even if it would save lives.
More a complete lack of belief that any product would actually have come the UK's way. The only evidence I have seen so far is of countries looking after their own. Where you see hatred, others might see cynicism, maybe realism - that the EU would say "They've left - fuck 'em. Give the kit to our people."
Ah, the deranged paranoia of the true Europhobe. When that’s all you’ve got left, the padded cell awaits you.
It is an entirely sensible strategy to use Uk based resources to kick start new sources of PPE, tests, ventilators etc.
a) Smaller logistics chains. b) Lower risk from transportation "issues" c) Higher level of oversight d) Patriotic boost to productivity. e) Complete control over supply once established.
A far better use of resources in the long battle ahead than getting a small slice of a one off delivery from China via the EU.
An alternative explanation is that Britain actually has a comparatively strong capacity to manufacture PPE and ventilators, and the 'EU procurement scheme' was a means of allowing smaller countries who lacked this capacity to share in its fruits. It would explain why the EU was so keen to allow Britain to join the scheme, despite their previous inflexible stances on cherry-picking aspects of EU membership, and why the government has provided so many contradictory reasons as to why it chose not to. If this proves to be true, no doubt Alistair will switch from blaming the government for letting British subjects die due to Europhobic dogma to blaming the government for letting EU subjects die due to Europhobic dogma.
AM believed that there were no strawberries in the supermarkets in the summer of 2018.
He has a long standing derangement on this subject.
I’m afraid a citation is needed for that claim.
(Spoiler: you won’t find it.)
Yet you know its true.
There was a reason I gave a daily Tesco strawberry score in 2018.
Go looking. You won’t find a citation for what you claimed.
It’s not my fault if you misread what I actually wrote.
I'm enjoying the seamless transition of the Brexit extremists from "fruit picking problems are fake news" to "hurrah that we have no strawberries".
I fear you have become the mirror image of the ideologues you condemn - whereas they might oppose any connections with the EU you oppose anything they do and so support joining any EU scheme.
Whereas to my mind the sensible strategy is one of help and co-operation where possible but detachment if necessary.
I would also somewhat doubt whether there are that many ideologues in government and whether they have much effect on the great inertial mass of statist bureaucracy in any case.
That's Emilie Oldknow level of quoting.
Thanks for the compliment
But my last point is something which I am concerned about - how much is bureaucratic inertia damaging action.
I suspect it has played a part re PPE, testing, border control and perhaps also for new ventilator suppliers.
The story related in the book Piece of Cake, about an RAF fighter squadron being denied spares at the start of the Battle of Britain, was based on true story.
They didn't have the paperwork to request spares, because the'd lost that in France. Along with the paperwork to get more paperwork.
Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few... "He must be talking about our back-pay, then."
That was the case after Trafalgar, as well, wasn't it?
And the Armada.
Then there was the bravest man in history. The civil servant who decided, a few years back, that since some i's were undotted or something, that all the allowances and extra pay for *all* of British Special Forces shouldn't not be paid for a couple of months....
Probably met with similar abuse to that the sergeant at the depot gave, admittedly to thin air, to the chap who required my one-legged....... as a result of his service in Normandy in 1944 ...... uncle to report for a medical at the time of Suez. Had an artificial leg, but turned up without it and on his crutches to prove a point.
Did records begin in 2010? I don't want to sound flippant - I'm a coronadoommonger, remember - but 'global pandemic leads to worst week for deaths in ten years, just' - doesn't seem that surprising. I don't know why I'm so irritated by Ed Conway here. Possibly because the 'awful' he's trying to make this sound is still right at the top end of my expectations. It will get much worse when we have next week's data. And it's looking like it will still be at the top end of my expectations, and so I will treat what is objectively really awful news as if things are actually going pretty well considering.
I have no truck with astrology whatsoever. But it is not far-fetched to suggest that in a part of the world where the change of the seasons has a noticeable effect on people's moods and temperaments that those born at the same time of the year might share certain characteristics. We do recognise that where people are born in the academic year has a measurable impact. This isn't anything I've ever observed personally, but it wouldn't be surprising if it happened. I can't see how the leap from here to horoscope predictions works however.
Anecdote: My aunt worked with a woman who after five minutes chatting to someone, could predict their star sign with near 100% accuracy.
(I would hypothesise time of year as the influence personally.)
Last week he was demanding everyone uses the NHS England deaths as the gold standard which showed a very different totally flattened curve up to the 27th. Lets check the old curve there now
Of course if I shove the polynomial order up to 6 I can get a flattened curve
As for astrology, I am not a subscriber, but it is perfectly possible that the movement of celestial bodies has a greater impact on the lives of humans than is measurable currently. .
Is it also perfectly possible that person best qualified to interpret this phenomenon is Russell fucking Grant?
As for astrology, I am not a subscriber, but it is perfectly possible that the movement of celestial bodies has a greater impact on the lives of humans than is measurable currently. .
Is it also perfectly possible that person best qualified to interpret this phenomenon is Russell fucking Grant?
So it is in effect saying that Jezza, Seaumas, et al were pure as the driven snow just quietly trying to bring their extreme left vision of the world into being and oblivious to any naughty anti-semitism in the Labour Party and they were thwarted behind the scenes by "senior staff"?
MPs or not MPs? Gah - I'm getting dragged in....must...resist...must...
You're welcome, and to answer your question, pretty much. It certainly massively explains why Corbyn was a bit mealy-mouthed in his apologies.
The content of the WhatsApp conversations is truly explosive.
Thanks again. My appetite is whetted - when I have a moment I will try to look up some of the available info, starting with the Sky piece you linked to.
OT binge-watched the box set of Villains, an ITV series from 1971-ish following escaped bank robbers. Among others, it starred Martin Shaw and Bob Hoskins who of course went on to bigger things.
Anyway, the point is that in one episode, a television was playing in the background showing Rhodes Boyson, before his election to parliament as the Honourable Member for Dotheboys Hall.
Heard his comments. Shocked. Never liked the guy - unpleasant vibe to him - but had not realized he was an actual dumbo. Probably has to go now. Shame for him, of course, but I think the rest of us will cope. He doesn't do anything that Richard Madeley can't do ten times better.
I am always interested by people who think that science is part of buffet -
"Hmmm.... I'll take a slice of Global Warming, a side of Gloop and for desert some Astrology"
A rather odd view. Do you confine your life's philosophy to the works of a single writer (and presumably from only one time in their life, since writers often change their mind over time)?
Truth is many sided. If you think of it as a statue, not a traffic light, it is perfectly possible to have several different views and angles on the truth, which could even be vigorously opposed, but could be equally true.
Global warming is a matter of science and evidence.
Gloop and Astrology are anti-scientific, proven bullshit.
I have no idea what Gloop is. As for astrology, I am not a subscriber, but it is perfectly possible that the movement of celestial bodies has a greater impact on the lives of humans than is measurable currently. Or not. If you'd told the scientists of the 18th century that our bodies consisted largely of tiny living cells and organisms you would have attracted derision. It is foolish to believe that science will not reveal more mysteries in the future along similar lines.
Even practitioners of Astrology can't give a vaguely coherent reason why it should work.
As for Gloop - Google it.
But they don't have to. As an example, look at the making of fermented foods like sauerkraut. Incredibly healthy, because they make nutrients more bioavailable, they introduce friendly bacteria into the gut, etc. ect. Our ancestors knew none of this. They were just preserving produce, and knew they felt well when they ate the result. This is 'wisdom' - doing something you don't necessarily understand the mechanics of, because you know it will result in a desirable outcome. I am not saying that applies to astrology, but I am saying we can subscribe to beliefs without knowing the science of how they work. Faith belongs in the same category. You are not rejecting science, you're just accepting of the fact that the science of something is not currently measurable.
There's a difference between being measurable, and understanding the mechanism by which it works. Or put another way, we can investigate whether it works without needing to think about why it works.
There's nothing stopping astrologers offering testable predictions which we could use to investigate whether they work. They have collectively failed to do so. If they ever manage to, we can then throw some resources into figuring out why all known laws of physics have stopped working.
Fundamentally I am calling for the removal of left wing nutters. The left are calling for the removal of right wing traitors. Both groups want the party to split.
So lets split. The Leader and the right wing traitors can stay as the Labour Party and win elections. The true left socialists can be real Labour or whatever and lose whatever deposits they can crowdfund. Everyone wins.
And the skies! The weather! I don't know to what extent this is linked to lack of aeroplanes (surely it can't be that simple?), but every time the planes are grounded (2001, 2010, 2020) seems to coincide with glorious, cloudless skies. I recognise there is a massive and unsustainable cost to this idyll, but it would be nice to preserve some aspects of it when and if normal life resumes.
Sometimes a coincidence is just a coincidence, but, in the right meteorological conditions, planes can be responsible for a lot of cirrus cloud, which can make an otherwise cloudless day more than a little hazy.
Worth noting that this April is currently vying with the April of the Cambridge's Royal Wedding (2011) to be the warmest in the Central England Temperature record (since 1659) and air traffic was pretty normal in 2011.
As for astrology, I am not a subscriber, but it is perfectly possible that the movement of celestial bodies has a greater impact on the lives of humans than is measurable currently. .
Is it also perfectly possible that person best qualified to interpret this phenomenon is Russell fucking Grant?
Why should I not be surprised that a supporter/believer of Brexit also believes in astrology. Probably believes in fairies, pixies and Father Christmas also. lol.
Some very interesting Company’s House activity today regarding the potential Saudi takeover of Newcastle United. Not sure how ready I am to support the richest club in the world?
I heard Shaun Custis say on TalkSPORT that he'd expect most Newcastle fans to welcome such a takeover.
It would be just typical for Newcastle to be taken over by an oil rich country just as the price of oil plummets!
Oil has gone down in value, OTOH what is Cashley's retail empire worth now ?
Heard his comments. Shocked. Never liked the guy - unpleasant vibe to him - but had not realized he was an actual dumbo. Probably has to go now. Shame for him, of course, but I think the rest of us will cope. He doesn't do anything that Richard Madeley can't do ten times better.
I am always interested by people who think that science is part of buffet -
"Hmmm.... I'll take a slice of Global Warming, a side of Gloop and for desert some Astrology"
A rather odd view. Do you confine your life's philosophy to the works of a single writer (and presumably from only one time in their life, since writers often change their mind over time)?
Truth is many sided. If you think of it as a statue, not a traffic light, it is perfectly possible to have several different views and angles on the truth, which could even be vigorously opposed, but could be equally true.
Global warming is a matter of science and evidence.
Gloop and Astrology are anti-scientific, proven bullshit.
I have no idea what Gloop is. As for astrology, I am not a subscriber, but it is perfectly possible that the movement of celestial bodies has a greater impact on the lives of humans than is measurable currently. Or not. If you'd told the scientists of the 18th century that our bodies consisted largely of tiny living cells and organisms you would have attracted derision. It is foolish to believe that science will not reveal more mysteries in the future along similar lines.
Even practitioners of Astrology can't give a vaguely coherent reason why it should work.
As for Gloop - Google it.
Might be easier to Gloogle if you called it by its proper name...
I don't want to publicise it by doing so myself, but the above deliberate typo should help. Also it's closely associated with Glwyneth Paltrow.
Apparently gloop is 'an interesting mixture with a unique texture to explore and play with. Playing with Gloop is a fabulous sensory and science activity to learn about the concepts of what a solid and liquid is' and can be made with cornflour, water, food dye and a large container. Seems an easier and more agreeable concept to orient one's personal philosophy around than astrology or religion.
Since 1837! -as your earlier post showed. This "since records began" stuff is often very misleading. When the ONS makes a small change to the definition of some series we get this parroted comment even though it is quite reasonable to splice the series to enable longer comparisons.
Heard his comments. Shocked. Never liked the guy - unpleasant vibe to him - but had not realized he was an actual dumbo. Probably has to go now. Shame for him, of course, but I think the rest of us will cope. He doesn't do anything that Richard Madeley can't do ten times better.
I am always interested by people who think that science is part of buffet -
"Hmmm.... I'll take a slice of Global Warming, a side of Gloop and for desert some Astrology"
A rather odd view. Do you confine your life's philosophy to the works of a single writer (and presumably from only one time in their life, since writers often change their mind over time)?
Truth is many sided. If you think of it as a statue, not a traffic light, it is perfectly possible to have several different views and angles on the truth, which could even be vigorously opposed, but could be equally true.
Global warming is a matter of science and evidence.
Gloop and Astrology are anti-scientific, proven bullshit.
I have no idea what Gloop is. As for astrology, I am not a subscriber, but it is perfectly possible that the movement of celestial bodies has a greater impact on the lives of humans than is measurable currently. Or not. If you'd told the scientists of the 18th century that our bodies consisted largely of tiny living cells and organisms you would have attracted derision. It is foolish to believe that science will not reveal more mysteries in the future along similar lines.
Even practitioners of Astrology can't give a vaguely coherent reason why it should work.
As for Gloop - Google it.
But they don't have to. As an example, look at the making of fermented foods like sauerkraut. Incredibly healthy, because they make nutrients more bioavailable, they introduce friendly bacteria into the gut, etc. ect. Our ancestors knew none of this. They were just preserving produce, and knew they felt well when they ate the result. This is 'wisdom' - doing something you don't necessarily understand the mechanics of, because you know it will result in a desirable outcome. I am not saying that applies to astrology, but I am saying we can subscribe to beliefs without knowing the science of how they work. Faith belongs in the same category. You are not rejecting science, you're just accepting of the fact that the science of something is not currently measurable.
There's a difference between being measurable, and understanding the mechanism by which it works. Or put another way, we can investigate whether it works without needing to think about why it works.
There's nothing stopping astrologers offering testable predictions which we could use to investigate whether they work. They have collectively failed to do so. If they ever manage to, we can then throw some resources into figuring out why all known laws of physics have stopped working.
I think it is unrealistic to expect that an objective measure could ever be put into place and be widely accepted.
Comments
I count 3965 deaths in the hospital deaths (the daily announced COVID19 deaths) 30th March - 5th April, by the way.
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/apr/14/the-sun-woman-attraction-to-chandeliers-not-a-sexual-orientation-ipso-says
https://twitter.com/romfordrecorder/status/1249949468235005953?s=21
Which, encouragingly, is not all that far from what the figures for the first week of April show for UK deaths on Worldometers. Which implies that there isn't a massive iceberg of extra deaths not being picked up as there was in e.g. Bergamo.
As against that, there is a bit of a lag to the figures on Worldometers, so I'll downplay the encouragement a notch. But still.
Also as against that, these clearly aren't people who would have died this week anyway. But many of them would have died this year or next. If (big if) the situation gets back to normal by late summer, I would expect to see a small counter-correction later in the year due to people who have died 6-9 months earlier than their time.
I'd expect to see a massive uptick in weeks fourteen and fifteen of deaths above average. But what I'm taking from this is that the figures we're seeing for Covid deaths are not too far short of accurate.
As for my partisan comments and "worst kind of party man" can I ask which party? I was a LibDem for 6 months until last Wednesday. Of course Labour will have a "left wing" - it is a left wing party.
As far as I can tell, the hospital death rate from Covid-19 in the relevant period for the graph was running at about 500 per day (3500 per week, say). Roughly double that to include the non-hospital deaths, and maybe knock off a bit to account for fewer road deaths etc. Looks more or less consistent with the c. 6k excess deaths shown.
Current run rate for the daily reported figures is more like 850 per day (accounting for reporting lag), so I would expect the spike to be more like 10-12k excess deaths in two weeks' time.
Keeping things under 20k already looks gone. Under 50k should probably be the target for wave, now, although to be honest there's basically sod all* we can do to affect it at this point.
*Edit: at the macro level, I mean (due to momentum). At the micro level, obviously individuals can affect things, and not running out of PPE gear would make a difference at some point.
Some fascinating conclusions being reached from the literature they cite as supportive of their claim.
"Therefore, RF-EMF has preventive effects against AD-like pathology in advanced AD mice with a high expression of AB, which suggests that RF-EMF can have a beneficial influence on AD. [NB: AD is Alzheimer's Disease]"
"Current evidence indicates that exposure at levels that are found in the environment (in urban areas and near base stations) may particularly alter the receptor organs to orient in the magnetic field of the earth. These results could have important implications for migratory birds and insects, especially in urban areas, but could also apply to birds and insects in natural and protected areas where there are powerful base station emitters of radiofrequencies." [But - we know that some animals have magnetic sensitivity, so being aware that they could be messed up by radio transmitters is well known and not indicative of any cancer-causing in humans]
"To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to assess the electromagnetic interference in home blood glucose monitors. It can be concluded that electromagnetic interference from mobile phones has an adverse effect on the accuracy of home blood glucose monitors. We suggest that mobile phones should be used at least 50 cm away from home blood glucose monitors." [Okay, yes, we know that electrical equipment can mutually interfere. We'll keep phones 50cm away from blood glucose monitors...]
"The observed stability of brain cancer incidence in Australia between 1982 and 2012 in all age groups except in those over 70 years compared to increasing modelled expected estimates, suggests that the observed increases in brain cancer incidence in the older age group are unlikely to be related to mobile phone use" [Sorry - my error, I accidentally clicked on one that they had as not for support]
"Thus, the classification of RF as possibly carcinogenic to humans in group 2B was not supported by genotoxicity-based mechanistic evidence." [This was a meta-analysis of 88 other analyses that didn't have sufficient statistical strength on their own, and included most of the ones that they cite as "possibly supportive" but with too small samples]
"Results showed that IEI-EMF participants reported lower levels of well-being during real compared to sham exposure during open provocation, but not during double-blind trials. Additionally, participants reported lower levels of well-being during high compared to low load trials and this did not interact with radiofrequency-EMF exposure. These findings are consistent with a growing body of literature indicating there is no causal relationship between short-term exposure to EMFs and subjective well-being in members of the public whether or not they report perceived sensitivity to EMFs." {Sorry, I found this one amusing]
https://twitter.com/EdConwaySky/status/1249986788942323713/photo/1
But my last point is something which I am concerned about - how much is bureaucratic inertia damaging action.
I suspect it has played a part re PPE, testing, border control and perhaps also for new ventilator suppliers.
So let's call it a best guess...
The figure for this year is 16,387. You think the other years are just under 12,000 on average? More than half of them are under 10,000.
They didn't have the paperwork to request spares, because the'd lost that in France. Along with the paperwork to get more paperwork.
NB There may be a "holiday weekend" effect.
"He must be talking about our back-pay, then."
So if Starmer wins we get a Tory government, as we had from May 1997 to May 2010.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-chernobyl-fire-idUSKCN21W0VZ
The fewer lines the better! I will take a look as soon as I have some time.
TIA!!!
I'm generally pretty conservative, economically. I welcome economic growth, I'm relaxed about the rich getting richer as long as the poor do too, I'm wary about the extension of the state. But that doesn't mean I don't also place a value on the environment, and see the need for its protection. I lament the economic costs of the lockdown, but welcome the environmental benefits. This feels like the most amazingly verdant spring I can remember. The skies are clear, the birds in full song; traffic is quietened. My wife and daughters feel able to take their exercise by bike - something they never did in normal times due to the levels of traffic. My youngest daughter's lungs no longer rattle when she breathes and hasn't needed an inhaler for over three weeks. It would be interesting to look at trends for deaths due to road traffic. We must have saved thousands and thousands of tonnes of carbon emissions. And the skies! The weather! I don't know to what extent this is linked to lack of aeroplanes (surely it can't be that simple?), but every time the planes are grounded (2001, 2010, 2020) seems to coincide with glorious, cloudless skies. I recognise there is a massive and unsustainable cost to this idyll, but it would be nice to preserve some aspects of it when and if normal life resumes.
My guess would be only a small fraction of that quarter feel as you suggest.
Truth is many sided. If you think of it as a statue, not a traffic light, it is perfectly possible to have several different views and angles on the truth, which could even be vigorously opposed, but could be equally true.
Will give an indication of how many "extra" deaths were caused by Covid.
I don't see anyone as a traitor whatever their leanings. I hate to trot out 'broad church' analogy but it is how I view the party. Regarding the report I have skimmed it and have to assume the internal messages are accurately quoted, if nothing else. And they do reflect badly on particular administrators and MPs TW etc.
My frustration with the whole mess is that the left is now seen as not having a fair shot. The Corbyn generation now have a legitimate reason for questioning the party structure as in America with the DNC regarding Sanders. And if anything this will engender further devision under Keir's new management it will be the idea that their ideas and people have been dismissed out of hand by the party machine.
So when I see your comment that these loyal MPs must be expelled I do not think that this punishment reflects the crime. I believe you are using one letter as a pretext to remove a tranche of the party you disagree with and it angers me. Especially as you say you have flitted between the LDs and labour over the years and you now return when your ideas may have the most purchase.
Abbot, Corbyn and their like rode the Blair wave when access to senior party postions was never going to be forthcoming. This aquiesence IMO only works if their policies and politics are not sabotaged when they have power.
Gloop and Astrology are anti-scientific, proven bullshit.
https://news.sky.com/story/labour-antisemitism-investigation-will-not-be-sent-to-equality-commission-11972071
The examples from chat archives published in the document include:
Conversations in 2017 which appear to show senior staff preparing for Tom Watson to become interim leader in anticipation of Mr Corbyn losing the election
Conversations which it is claimed show senior staff hid information from the leader's office about digital spending and contact details for MPs and candidates during the election
Conversations on election night in which the members of the group talk about the need to hide their disappointment that Mr Corbyn had done better than expected and would be unlikely to resign
A discussion about whether the grassroots activist network Momentum could be "proscribed" for being a "party within a party"
A discussion about "unsuspending" a former Labour MP who was critical of Mr Corbyn so they could stand as a candidate in the 2017 election
A discussion about how to prevent Corbyn ally Rebecca Long-Bailey gaining a seat on the party's governing body in 2017
Regular references to corbyn-supporting party staff as "trots"
Conversations between senior staff in Lord McNicol's office in which they refer to former director of communications Seamus Milne as "dracula", and saying he was "spiteful and evil and we should make sure he is never allowed in our Party if it's last thing we do"
Conversations in which the same group refers to Mr Corbyn's former chief of staff Karie Murphy as "medusa", a "crazy woman" and a "bitch face cow" that would "make a good dartboard"
A discussion in which one of the group members expresses their "hope" that a young pro-Corbyn Labour activist, who they acknowledge had mental health problems, "dies in a fire"
The investigation also accuses the former General Secretary Lord McNicol, and other senior figures of providing "false and misleading information" to Jeremy Corbyn's office in relation to the handling of antisemitism complaints, which the report claims meant "the scale of the problem was not appreciated" by the leadership.
The report claims McNicol and staff in the Governance and Legal Unit "provided timetables for the resolution of cases that were never met; falsely claimed to have processed all antisemitism complaints; falsely claimed that most complaints received were not about Labour members and provided highly inaccurate statistics of antisemitism complaints".
2. Several of the people named and shamed on the report announce their intention to sue the party for libel, engaging the brief who successfully bankrupted the News of the World and Katie Hopkins
3. The information commissioner announces an investigation into the apparent egregious data protection breech
4. The Socialist Campaign Group of MPs issue a demand that the report be "published in full officially by the Labour Party"
Then there was the bravest man in history. The civil servant who decided, a few years back, that since some i's were undotted or something, that all the allowances and extra pay for *all* of British Special Forces shouldn't not be paid for a couple of months....
Also often the "author" is the junior who sketched out the first draft (sometimes just the structure and paragraph headings) rather than the people who filled out the actual content.
The iceberg is a little bigger than I had thought. There are some excess deaths showing up in these figures beyond what is reported as Covid deaths. This is probably roughly the sort of levels I was expecting. I will dial back from 'encouraged' to 'relieved it's not worse'. For now.
I refer you back to Clause 1. The Labour Party exists to win power. The Corbyn cult cannot do so. Its ideas are an anathema to voters. I dismiss them out of hand because its been proven to destruction that their ideas are counter-factual to the reason for the party to exist.
So it is in effect saying that Jezza, Seaumas, et al were pure as the driven snow just quietly trying to bring their extreme left vision of the world into being and oblivious to any naughty anti-semitism in the Labour Party and they were thwarted behind the scenes by "senior staff"?
MPs or not MPs? Gah - I'm getting dragged in....must...resist...must...
― George Orwell
As for Gloop - Google it.
Unfortunately for the left of Labour, the right of Labour at least won some elections.
It would be just typical for Newcastle to be taken over by an oil rich country just as the price of oil plummets!
Right, that does it. I'm not one for book burning but ...
Also, civil liberty advocates tend to be top down, libertarians are more bottom up.
I can't see how the leap from here to horoscope predictions works however.
https://twitter.com/EdConwaySky/status/1250007002165755905?s=20
Battle of Britain the many was 46 million and the few were 3000 pilots. Trafalgar fleet was 27 ships of the line with an average complement of say 600 so say 16,000 defending a population of 10 million. Churchill did not exaggerate.
You're welcome, and to answer your question, pretty much. It certainly massively explains why Corbyn was a bit mealy-mouthed in his apologies.
The content of the WhatsApp conversations is truly explosive.
I don't want to publicise it by doing so myself, but the above deliberate typo should help. Also it's closely associated with Glwyneth Paltrow.
https://twitter.com/statsgeekclare/status/1250001709889445893?s=21
Had an artificial leg, but turned up without it and on his crutches to prove a point.
I don't want to sound flippant - I'm a coronadoommonger, remember - but 'global pandemic leads to worst week for deaths in ten years, just' - doesn't seem that surprising.
I don't know why I'm so irritated by Ed Conway here. Possibly because the 'awful' he's trying to make this sound is still right at the top end of my expectations.
It will get much worse when we have next week's data. And it's looking like it will still be at the top end of my expectations, and so I will treat what is objectively really awful news as if things are actually going pretty well considering.
(I would hypothesise time of year as the influence personally.)
Last week he was demanding everyone uses the NHS England deaths as the gold standard which showed a very different totally flattened curve up to the 27th. Lets check the old curve there now
Of course if I shove the polynomial order up to 6 I can get a flattened curve
Anyway, the point is that in one episode, a television was playing in the background showing Rhodes Boyson, before his election to parliament as the Honourable Member for Dotheboys Hall.
There's nothing stopping astrologers offering testable predictions which we could use to investigate whether they work. They have collectively failed to do so. If they ever manage to, we can then throw some resources into figuring out why all known laws of physics have stopped working.
So lets split. The Leader and the right wing traitors can stay as the Labour Party and win elections. The true left socialists can be real Labour or whatever and lose whatever deposits they can crowdfund. Everyone wins.
Worth noting that this April is currently vying with the April of the Cambridge's Royal Wedding (2011) to be the warmest in the Central England Temperature record (since 1659) and air traffic was pretty normal in 2011.
So far this year the average Central England Temperature is so warm it is off the chart.
https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadcet/graphs/HadCET_graph_ylybars_uptodate_3.gif
Gulp!
This "since records began" stuff is often very misleading. When the ONS makes a small change to the definition of some series we get this parroted comment even though it is quite reasonable to splice the series to enable longer comparisons.