Incoming article from the Guardian claiming the government is fatist over claiming links between size and coronavirus.
One imagines that, if there's one place in the country where this disease feels less like a horror movie and more like all our Christmases come at once, it's Graun Towers. This illness picks on non-white people, old and sick people, obese people, poor people. It's very nearly every -ist and -phobic rolled into one: they only need evidence that it massacres transexuals and they've got the complete set. And that's before we get to the outright deification of the NHS, and the Government having to hose down the economy with hundreds of billions in borrowed money, prop up half the entire private sector with state aid, and possibly be left to contemplate vast tax rises and a universal basic income further down the line.
Their underwear must be so sticky from all those orgasms that they need industrial strength solvent to help peel it off.
Maybe they have got "the complete set". Transexuals have had their genital mutilation surgeries postponed due to covid.
The public sector didn't deliver. If was just PHE labs, they barely increased testing or capacity. It was the decision to finally get the private sector involved that massively expanded this.
And for all the criticism over spinning to get it over the line, not doubt massoive increase, unlike Scotland and Wales, who nobody seems to be criticising.
Wales promised 5k tests a day, then just gave up after a week.
Incoming article from the Guardian claiming the government is fatist over claiming links between size and coronavirus.
One imagines that, if there's one place in the country where this disease feels less like a horror movie and more like all our Christmases come at once, it's Graun Towers. This illness picks on non-white people, old and sick people, obese people, poor people. It's very nearly every -ist and -phobic rolled into one: they only need evidence that it massacres transexuals and they've got the complete set. And that's before we get to the outright deification of the NHS, and the Government having to hose down the economy with hundreds of billions in borrowed money, prop up half the entire private sector with state aid, and possibly be left to contemplate vast tax rises and a universal basic income further down the line.
Their underwear must be so sticky from all those orgasms that they need industrial strength solvent to help peel it off.
And don't forget the regulation, the bullying, the shame facing of those not clapping loud enough, the petty bureaucracy of it all. Just catnip.
Oh God yes, the bloody clapping. Having to justify to people why you won't open the front door and stand outside banging a frying pan with a wooden spoon and making wailing noises every Thursday at 8pm. Cos if you don't emote loudly and publicly enough it means you DON'T CARE, and are therefore a heartless Tory deserving of a slow, painful and lingering death.
I've had to argue the toss with my own mother over the stupid bloody clapping. One more thing about the present miserable situation I'll be glad to see the back of, whichever month/year it's finally over.
In Scotland clapping is now being accused of being a Tory thing. I don't think this sense of togetherness of the peoples of the entire UK has been welcomed in some quarters. Makes me a bit ambivalent.
There is a huge market out there for guys 40-70 who want to buy smart, top quality yet slightly edgy clothing.
And they should be discouraged in that enterprise as much as possible. If you can't wear a standard classic cut or afford the expensive bespoke alternative, go straight to beige poly cotton and velcro strap shoes.
My particular bugbear du jour is vividly patterned shirts with even more vividly patterned contrasting lining on the inners of collars and cuffs, usually top 2 buttons undone and straining over a medicine ball belly. Clarkson is a bit of a one for that type of thing.
Almost as bad as those v neck sweaters with a sewn-in insert of a shirt collar; I hope everyone agrees that they were the sperm of Satan.
They are horriffic.
I feel more sympathy for the older man who wants to wear loud shirts then you do though. Nobody wants to become invisible as they age.
I'm just happy that we are so easily able to solve all the problems of our former colony. I'm sure many regret we let it go in the first place.
Oh wait. They took it from us. And currently their administration is a reflection of a great many Americans. Just as ours is.
It's not Trump it's the American people and they are entitled to elect whoever they damn well want. Assured, perhaps, that the smug Brits will be there with them. To criticise and make snide observations.
Edit: God bless America.
If American hadn't declared independence, where would it have ended up?
Obviously, self-governance would have continued to be a thing (as it was to an extent even at the point of revolution, and in all other settler colonies) so I'm inclined to think it'd have been a much bigger and richer Canada.
However, what would its size and boundaries have been? How would it have developed?
No-one knows.
Being under the yoke it would have suffered similar fate to Scotland, being held back and treated like crap whilst being milked dry..
Which is the opposite of what actually happened after the Union. Scotland led the way intellectually, scientifically and in empire building and more than matched England industrially.
Funny the way certain narratives can emerge.
What actually happened was that the cream of Scottish society was extracted to run colonial possessions whilst the poor were used to fill the British army to garrison the holdings. The Treasure that flowed back went to the London treasury not Scotland.
For all that the Scots 'ran' the Empire the betterment did not go proportionally to Scotland. Scotland was drained to power the empire.
Yes, all those Scottish officers forced unwillingly to go and serve in the British army over two centuries. You can do a sensible class based analysis of where wealth was distributed for the whole of the UK but a nationalistic grudge viewpoint is nonsense historically. All nationalisms are sustained by myths but the Scottish Nationalism that exists today is a modern concoction based on a total denial of Scottish history. Modern Scotland evolved within the union. Scottish nationalism must be the only variety that denies some of the greatest triumphs of its nation - because they took place under the hated union.
I really can't agree. There has been a great revival of interest in Scottish history over the last few decades in aprallel with the rise of interest in independence. One only need look at bookshops, or a run of the National to find articles about the triumps, as you put it, as well as the mess-ups - it's all history to be remembered and commemorated - but not celebrated.
That latter contrast is perhaps the root of the difference I find most striking between mainstream Scottish nationalism (or rather self-determinationism) and British/English nationalism (as manifest in the last few years most obviously) is the former's almost complete omission of historical references in public discourse. You just don't get Ms Sturgeon going on about Saltires and the claymore, for instance, or the Clearances lowland or otherwise. But just look at almost any speech by Mr Johnson - or Mr Cameron before him. It's all Somme, Agincourt, WW2, WW2 again, Spitfires, Blitz spirit etc. etc. It's a very, very noticeable difference. One is very much looking to the future, but what is one to make of the other?
If test, track and trace is going to be successful, we cant have Scotland and Wales just not testing, unless we are going to build borders and shut them off.
Wales has a big hotspot if CV in Cardiff, yet they are still doing bugger all testing
There is a huge market out there for guys 40-70 who want to buy smart, top quality yet slightly edgy clothing.
And they should be discouraged in that enterprise as much as possible. If you can't wear a standard classic cut or afford the expensive bespoke alternative, go straight to beige poly cotton and velcro strap shoes.
My particular bugbear du jour is vividly patterned shirts with even more vividly patterned contrasting lining on the inners of collars and cuffs, usually top 2 buttons undone and straining over a medicine ball belly. Clarkson is a bit of a one for that type of thing.
Almost as bad as those v neck sweaters with a sewn-in insert of a shirt collar; I hope everyone agrees that they were the sperm of Satan.
They are horriffic.
I feel more sympathy for the older man who wants to wear loud shirts then you do though. Nobody wants to become invisible as they age.
Incoming article from the Guardian claiming the government is fatist over claiming links between size and coronavirus.
One imagines that, if there's one place in the country where this disease feels less like a horror movie and more like all our Christmases come at once, it's Graun Towers. This illness picks on non-white people, old and sick people, obese people, poor people. It's very nearly every -ist and -phobic rolled into one: they only need evidence that it massacres transexuals and they've got the complete set. And that's before we get to the outright deification of the NHS, and the Government having to hose down the economy with hundreds of billions in borrowed money, prop up half the entire private sector with state aid, and possibly be left to contemplate vast tax rises and a universal basic income further down the line.
Their underwear must be so sticky from all those orgasms that they need industrial strength solvent to help peel it off.
And don't forget the regulation, the bullying, the shame facing of those not clapping loud enough, the petty bureaucracy of it all. Just catnip.
Oh God yes, the bloody clapping. Having to justify to people why you won't open the front door and stand outside banging a frying pan with a wooden spoon and making wailing noises every Thursday at 8pm. Cos if you don't emote loudly and publicly enough it means you DON'T CARE, and are therefore a heartless Tory deserving of a slow, painful and lingering death.
I've had to argue the toss with my own mother over the stupid bloody clapping. One more thing about the present miserable situation I'll be glad to see the back of, whichever month/year it's finally over.
In Scotland clapping is now being accused of being a Tory thing. I don't think this sense of togetherness of the peoples of the entire UK has been welcomed in some quarters. Makes me a bit ambivalent.
Presumably the attempt to turn it into a clap for Boris [sic] did not help.
I'm just happy that we are so easily able to solve all the problems of our former colony. I'm sure many regret we let it go in the first place.
Oh wait. They took it from us. And currently their administration is a reflection of a great many Americans. Just as ours is.
It's not Trump it's the American people and they are entitled to elect whoever they damn well want. Assured, perhaps, that the smug Brits will be there with them. To criticise and make snide observations.
Edit: God bless America.
If American hadn't declared independence, where would it have ended up?
Obviously, self-governance would have continued to be a thing (as it was to an extent even at the point of revolution, and in all other settler colonies) so I'm inclined to think it'd have been a much bigger and richer Canada.
However, what would its size and boundaries have been? How would it have developed?
No-one knows.
Being under the yoke it would have suffered similar fate to Scotland, being held back and treated like crap whilst being milked dry..
Which is the opposite of what actually happened after the Union. Scotland led the way intellectually, scientifically and in empire building and more than matched England industrially.
Funny the way certain narratives can emerge.
What actually happened was that the cream of Scottish society was extracted to run colonial possessions whilst the poor were used to fill the British army to garrison the holdings. The Treasure that flowed back went to the London treasury not Scotland.
For all that the Scots 'ran' the Empire the betterment did not go proportionally to Scotland. Scotland was drained to power the empire.
Yes, all those Scottish officers forced unwillingly to go and serve in the British army over two centuries. You can do a sensible class based analysis of where wealth was distributed for the whole of the UK but a nationalistic grudge viewpoint is nonsense historically. All nationalisms are sustained by myths but the Scottish Nationalism that exists today is a modern concoction based on a total denial of Scottish history. Modern Scotland evolved within the union. Scottish nationalism must be the only variety that denies some of the greatest triumphs of its nation - because they took place under the hated union.
Speaking of nationalist myths, a persistent British nationalist/Unionist myth appears to simultaneously believe that Scotland benefited and still benefits hugely from being part of the Union, and yet among smallish, well educated European nations with developed & diverse industries, substantial natural resources and stable civic polities, is uniquely ill suited to independence. Even smarter Unionists seem unable to square this circle in their own heads, let alone to my satisfaction.
It doesn't seem to be impossible to conceive of an incredibly successful symbiote that is nonetheless not optimally suited to independent existence...
Today is World Naked Gardening Day. (No, I don’t know why either.)
Do you know the most depressing thing for me - on top of everything else? Despite being surrounded by the most beautiful countryside (and, now 3 ewes and their lambs who have taken residence outside our front door) and despite the glorious weather and having all the time in the world to garden I have NO ACTUAL GARDEN.
None. It is unbelievably depressing, the sort of cosmically bad joke at my expense which makes me believe in a malicious God tormenting humans just for the sheer hell of it.
I could buy a few pots and stick some plants in them but that is not proper gardening. If only the bloody landlord had laid down earth rather than bloody slate chippings I could be creating something beautiful and worthwhile and even growing my own food.
But no - I stare at sheep who eat, sleep and walk round the hills - and realise that I am now living the life of a sheep.
Pots can be great. Start a sempervivum collection.
I know, I love them and succulents of all kinds. I have loads in London.
I just want to see my ferns unfurling, the bright green of euphorbia wulfenii, the deliciously warm orange of euphorbia Fireglow against dark leaves, the geums poking though the earth, my roses bursting into bud and soon flowers, the scent from my evergreen jasmine, the scent of my pelargonium Attar of Roses filling the conservatory as the windows are opened (Son No 1 says it is glorious and you don’t get scent through a screen, I can tell you), the honey smell from euphorbia mellifera, the purple alliums set against Ballerina tulips, the fresh greenness of spring leaves, that sense of the earth rebounding and springing into life, the bees, the sheer sensuality of gardens: sight and sound and smell and yes the feel of leaves and petals and earth. It is so joyful and hopeful and healing. And I miss it.
This is what gets me about this. It should be a good news story, yet the Govt have turned it in to something else, with everyone thinking 'What else are you spinning or even lying about'. Only the most partisan would be going ' well you missed the 100,000 figure' so what was the point.
The numbers were good. Just announce them: We have tested x today and what is more we have got the postal testing up and running with y sent out' This is with both x & y being large numbers.
Exactly - an object lesson in how to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Or, alternatively, one in the transience and meaninglessness of non-stories obsessed over in the 24-hour rolling news cycle.
Provided that the number of tests continues to increase, virtually everyone will have forgotten that the original target existed by this time next week.
There is a huge market out there for guys 40-70 who want to buy smart, top quality yet slightly edgy clothing.
And they should be discouraged in that enterprise as much as possible. If you can't wear a standard classic cut or afford the expensive bespoke alternative, go straight to beige poly cotton and velcro strap shoes.
My particular bugbear du jour is vividly patterned shirts with even more vividly patterned contrasting lining on the inners of collars and cuffs, usually top 2 buttons undone and straining over a medicine ball belly. Clarkson is a bit of a one for that type of thing.
Almost as bad as those v neck sweaters with a sewn-in insert of a shirt collar; I hope everyone agrees that they were the sperm of Satan.
They are horriffic.
I feel more sympathy for the older man who wants to wear loud shirts then you do though. Nobody wants to become invisible as they age.
Why do people keep quoting this guy? He continuously claims all sorts of "exclusives", but never rarely any evidence and most stories turn out to be horseshit.
There is a huge market out there for guys 40-70 who want to buy smart, top quality yet slightly edgy clothing.
And they should be discouraged in that enterprise as much as possible. If you can't wear a standard classic cut or afford the expensive bespoke alternative, go straight to beige poly cotton and velcro strap shoes.
My particular bugbear du jour is vividly patterned shirts with even more vividly patterned contrasting lining on the inners of collars and cuffs, usually top 2 buttons undone and straining over a medicine ball belly. Clarkson is a bit of a one for that type of thing.
Almost as bad as those v neck sweaters with a sewn-in insert of a shirt collar; I hope everyone agrees that they were the sperm of Satan.
They are horriffic.
I feel more sympathy for the older man who wants to wear loud shirts then you do though. Nobody wants to become invisible as they age.
The public sector didn't deliver. If was just PHE labs, they barely increased testing or capacity. It was the decision to finally get the private sector involved that massively expanded this.
And for all the criticism over spinning to get it over the line, not doubt massoive increase, unlike Scotland and Wales, who nobody seems to be criticising.
Wales promised 5k tests a day, then just gave up after a week.
Funny, I thought Scotland and Wales were being 'massoively' criticised on here.
I'm just happy that we are so easily able to solve all the problems of our former colony. I'm sure many regret we let it go in the first place.
Oh wait. They took it from us. And currently their administration is a reflection of a great many Americans. Just as ours is.
It's not Trump it's the American people and they are entitled to elect whoever they damn well want. Assured, perhaps, that the smug Brits will be there with them. To criticise and make snide observations.
Edit: God bless America.
If American hadn't declared independence, where would it have ended up?
Obviously, self-governance would have continued to be a thing (as it was to an extent even at the point of revolution, and in all other settler colonies) so I'm inclined to think it'd have been a much bigger and richer Canada.
However, what would its size and boundaries have been? How would it have developed?
No-one knows.
Being under the yoke it would have suffered similar fate to Scotland, being held back and treated like crap whilst being milked dry..
Which is the opposite of what actually happened after the Union. Scotland led the way intellectually, scientifically and in empire building and more than matched England industrially.
Funny the way certain narratives can emerge.
What actually happened was that the cream of Scottish society was extracted to run colonial possessions whilst the poor were used to fill the British army to garrison the holdings. The Treasure that flowed back went to the London treasury not Scotland.
For all that the Scots 'ran' the Empire the betterment did not go proportionally to Scotland. Scotland was drained to power the empire.
Yes, all those Scottish officers forced unwillingly to go and serve in the British army over two centuries. You can do a sensible class based analysis of where wealth was distributed for the whole of the UK but a nationalistic grudge viewpoint is nonsense historically. All nationalisms are sustained by myths but the Scottish Nationalism that exists today is a modern concoction based on a total denial of Scottish history. Modern Scotland evolved within the union. Scottish nationalism must be the only variety that denies some of the greatest triumphs of its nation - because they took place under the hated union.
Speaking of nationalist myths, a persistent British nationalist/Unionist myth appears to simultaneously believe that Scotland benefited and still benefits hugely from being part of the Union, and yet among smallish, well educated European nations with developed & diverse industries, substantial natural resources and stable civic polities, is uniquely ill suited to independence. Even smarter Unionists seem unable to square this circle in their own heads, let alone to my satisfaction.
Yet the SNP felt the need to base their case on ridiculously inflated oil prices - go figure.
I think I'll wait for a smarter Unionist to turn up.
The public sector didn't deliver. If was just PHE labs, they barely increased testing or capacity. It was the decision to finally get the private sector involved that massively expanded this.
And for all the criticism over spinning to get it over the line, not doubt massoive increase, unlike Scotland and Wales, who nobody seems to be criticising.
Wales promised 5k tests a day, then just gave up after a week.
Funny, I thought Scotland and Wales were being 'massoively' criticised on here.
Worth noting that that doesn't mean there isn't a problem with our political media. I've stopped watching the news habitually and much of the crisis coverage has been very poor (the u-turn accusations when the Government did exactly what it said it would over a lockdown, for example).
It'd be interesting to know what impact such tactics have.
Why do people keep quoting this guy? He continuously claims all sorts of "exclusives", but never rarely any evidence and most stories turn out to be horseshit.
The public sector didn't deliver. If was just PHE labs, they barely increased testing or capacity. It was the decision to finally get the private sector involved that massively expanded this.
And for all the criticism over spinning to get it over the line, not doubt massoive increase, unlike Scotland and Wales, who nobody seems to be criticising.
Wales promised 5k tests a day, then just gave up after a week.
Funny, I thought Scotland and Wales were being 'massoively' criticised on here.
I mean in the media? Have they challenged the Scottish and Welsh governments over their piss poor record on testing in the way they have the UK government?
The public sector didn't deliver. If was just PHE labs, they barely increased testing or capacity. It was the decision to finally get the private sector involved that massively expanded this.
And for all the criticism over spinning to get it over the line, not doubt massoive increase, unlike Scotland and Wales, who nobody seems to be criticising.
Wales promised 5k tests a day, then just gave up after a week.
The private sector involvement barely gets a mention, it's as if the left don't know.
Same thing with the German healthcare system, the MSM were all over the fact that they are doing better than us. Then when they realised how it is funded they suddenly kept quiet
They are each mehn's shirts with emphasis on the meh. M&S is the place to go.
I have to disagree. M&S is a f*cking disaster these days for shirts. Great if you want tailored, skinny, slim or extra slim fit, but if you want 'normal' fit forget it.
Plus they don't even put the shirts in collar size order on the stores these days.
Charles Tyrwhitt provide a great service imo, especially if you pick up one of their '4 shirts for' offers which I always do.
All of the buyers at M&S should have been fired years ago. They are clueless.
There is a huge market out there for guys 40-70 who want to buy smart, top quality yet slightly edgy clothing. In "wiry", "stout", "stocky" and "barrel-chested" fittings. These are people with money but nowhere obvious to spend it on their clothes.
I'm just happy that we are so easily able to solve all the problems of our former colony. I'm sure many regret we let it go in the first place.
Oh wait. They took it from us. And currently their administration is a reflection of a great many Americans. Just as ours is.
It's not Trump it's the American people and they are entitled to elect whoever they damn well want. Assured, perhaps, that the smug Brits will be there with them. To criticise and make snide observations.
Edit: God bless America.
If American hadn't declared independence, where would it have ended up?
Obviously, self-governance would have continued to be a thing (as it was to an extent even at the point of revolution, and in all other settler colonies) so I'm inclined to think it'd have been a much bigger and richer Canada.
However, what would its size and boundaries have been? How would it have developed?
No-one knows.
Being under the yoke it would have suffered similar fate to Scotland, being held back and treated like crap whilst being milked dry..
Which is the opposite of what actually happened after the Union. Scotland led the way intellectually, scientifically and in empire building and more than matched England industrially.
Funny the way certain narratives can emerge.
What actually happened was that the cream of Scottish society was extracted to run colonial possessions whilst the poor were used to fill the British army to garrison the holdings. The Treasure that flowed back went to the London treasury not Scotland.
For all that the Scots 'ran' the Empire the betterment did not go proportionally to Scotland. Scotland was drained to power the empire.
Yes, all those Scottish officers forced unwillingly to go and serve in the British army over two centuries. You can do a sensible class based analysis of where wealth was distributed for the whole of the UK but a nationalistic grudge viewpoint is nonsense historically. All nationalisms are sustained by myths but the Scottish Nationalism that exists today is a modern concoction based on a total denial of Scottish history. Modern Scotland evolved within the union. Scottish nationalism must be the only variety that denies some of the greatest triumphs of its nation - because they took place under the hated union.
Speaking of nationalist myths, a persistent British nationalist/Unionist myth appears to simultaneously believe that Scotland benefited and still benefits hugely from being part of the Union, and yet among smallish, well educated European nations with developed & diverse industries, substantial natural resources and stable civic polities, is uniquely ill suited to independence. Even smarter Unionists seem unable to square this circle in their own heads, let alone to my satisfaction.
It doesn't seem to be impossible to conceive of an incredibly successful symbiote that is nonetheless not optimally suited to independent existence...
Och, dinnae panic, I'm (almost) sure England would be fine.
There is a huge market out there for guys 40-70 who want to buy smart, top quality yet slightly edgy clothing.
And they should be discouraged in that enterprise as much as possible. If you can't wear a standard classic cut or afford the expensive bespoke alternative, go straight to beige poly cotton and velcro strap shoes.
My particular bugbear du jour is vividly patterned shirts with even more vividly patterned contrasting lining on the inners of collars and cuffs, usually top 2 buttons undone and straining over a medicine ball belly. Clarkson is a bit of a one for that type of thing.
Almost as bad as those v neck sweaters with a sewn-in insert of a shirt collar; I hope everyone agrees that they were the sperm of Satan.
They are horriffic.
I feel more sympathy for the older man who wants to wear loud shirts then you do though. Nobody wants to become invisible as they age.
Someone we know moonlighting as Sean perhaps sean thomas knox @thomasknox · 4m So here’s a thing. In late January I became obsessed with Corona after a personal brush. Read everything. By mid Feb I was convinced a pandemic/lockdown was coming our way. So I ordered my first masks. See below. If I could see this coming in mid-Feb, why couldn’t the government?
This is a silly argument as well. I bought my first N95 masks in late January (and have the Amazon records to prove it!), then set about spending a fairly obscene amount of money to make sure that my family and I were essentially equipped for siege.
Whilst it would of course have been wonderful for the Government to have shown equivalent foresight and proactivity, I'm in no way surprised or even disappointed that they didn't. There's a reason why 'moving at the speed of government' exists as an expression and not in a complimentary sense. It's one of the philosophical reasons why I'm a conservative and a libertarian - the individual will in many cases be able to act more quickly, flexibly, and intelligently in their own interests that any government could.
Plus governments quite rightly have to look at the big picture, balancing individual outcomes versus those of the country as a whole. An epidemiologist or an economist who thinks in terms of the survival of an individual as opposed to that of thousands or millions is simply not doing their job properly - they're like the planners in Dr. Strangelove who consult books called 'Global Casualties in Megadeaths'.
TL;DR: Governments generally do no fail to adequately care for the individual because they are evil or incompetent (though they may be both): they fail to do so _because they are governments_.
In late January this was obviously likely to be about the survival of at least tens and possibly hundreds of thousands of individuals. Looks pretty big picture stuff to me.
Why? No other epidemic for a hundred years had been so. Be very wary of using the word "obviously".
Asian flu 33,000, Hong Kong flu 80,000, HIV? A new infectious disease is either a mass phenomenon or it's a nothingburger, so I don't see how the highly dubious claim that government is not about individuals applies.
Has the government response been similar in all cases?
I have no idea, but if individuals as diverse as eadric, BB and mysticrose were all buying masks the government probably should have been too. Plague like famine and war is inherently a big picture thing, and we don't expect individuals in time of war to procure their own tanks and guns and launch bespoke offensives. There is such a thing as society.
You're not saying Bluestblue is one of SeanT's too? Christ alive, the man is a menace.
That would be pretty Byronic...
Fruit of that MysticRose As of that rose the stem The root whence mystery ever flows The babe magnet of Camden.
This is what gets me about this. It should be a good news story, yet the Govt have turned it in to something else, with everyone thinking 'What else are you spinning or even lying about'. Only the most partisan would be going ' well you missed the 100,000 figure' so what was the point. The numbers were good. Just announce them: We have tested x today and what is more we have got the postal testing up and running with y sent out' This is with both x & y being large numbers.
Exactly - an object lesson in how to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Or, alternatively, one in the transience and meaninglessness of non-stories obsessed over in the 24-hour rolling news cycle. Provided that the number of tests continues to increase, virtually everyone will have forgotten that the original target existed by this time next week.
Except that people will remember that it is yet another example of the Conservatives making up figures in order to snatch a quick headline, and then failing to live up to their boasts.
The government campaign to deal with Covid is constantly being undermined by the untrustworthy Conservative politicians.
The public sector didn't deliver. If was just PHE labs, they barely increased testing or capacity. It was the decision to finally get the private sector involved that massively expanded this.
And for all the criticism over spinning to get it over the line, not doubt massoive increase, unlike Scotland and Wales, who nobody seems to be criticising.
Wales promised 5k tests a day, then just gave up after a week.
Funny, I thought Scotland and Wales were being 'massoively' criticised on here.
I mean in the media? Have they challenged the Scottish and Welsh governments over their piss poor record on testing in the way they have the UK government?
Plenty in the Scottish media if you'd bothered to check. Of course unlike here they had to work with the real figures.
The public sector didn't deliver. If was just PHE labs, they barely increased testing or capacity. It was the decision to finally get the private sector involved that massively expanded this.
And for all the criticism over spinning to get it over the line, not doubt massoive increase, unlike Scotland and Wales, who nobody seems to be criticising.
Wales promised 5k tests a day, then just gave up after a week.
The private sector involvement barely gets a mention, it's as if the left don't know.
Same thing with the German healthcare system, the MSM were all over the fact that they are doing better than us. Then when they realised how it is funded they suddenly kept quiet
And of course in Germany, their gold standard test was produced by a private lab (which PHE wouldn't buy, insisting on taking another 3 weeks to develop our own copy)...and the testing regime in Germany is public / private partnership...again something PHE wouldn't entertain.
This check your own temperature thing, isnt it a bit late by the time you start to display one as you have been spreading for days by then...and not everybody does.
Seems about as pointless as the nothing to declare bit at the airport.
This check your own temperature thing, isnt it a bit late by the time you start to display one as you have been spreading for days by then...and not everybody does.
Seems about as pointless as the nothing to declare bit at the airport.
Itd does catch those trying to sneak in. But in any case if all are quarantined that issue doesn't arise.
I'm just happy that we are so easily able to solve all the problems of our former colony. I'm sure many regret we let it go in the first place.
Oh wait. They took it from us. And currently their administration is a reflection of a great many Americans. Just as ours is.
It's not Trump it's the American people and they are entitled to elect whoever they damn well want. Assured, perhaps, that the smug Brits will be there with them. To criticise and make snide observations.
Edit: God bless America.
If American hadn't declared independence, where would it have ended up?
Obviously, self-governance would have continued to be a thing (as it was to an extent even at the point of revolution, and in all other settler colonies) so I'm inclined to think it'd have been a much bigger and richer Canada.
However, what would its size and boundaries have been? How would it have developed?
No-one knows.
Being under the yoke it would have suffered similar fate to Scotland, being held back and treated like crap whilst being milked dry..
Which is the opposite of what actually happened after the Union. Scotland led the way intellectually, scientifically and in empire building and more than matched England industrially.
Funny the way certain narratives can emerge.
What actually happened was that the cream of Scottish society was extracted to run colonial possessions whilst the poor were used to fill the British army to garrison the holdings. The Treasure that flowed back went to the London treasury not Scotland.
For all that the Scots 'ran' the Empire the betterment did not go proportionally to Scotland. Scotland was drained to power the empire.
Yes, all those Scottish officers forced unwillingly to go and serve in the British army over two centuries. You can do a sensible class based analysis of where wealth was distributed for the whole of the UK but a nationalistic grudge viewpoint is nonsense historically. All nationalisms are sustained by myths but the Scottish Nationalism that exists today is a modern concoction based on a total denial of Scottish history. Modern Scotland evolved within the union. Scottish nationalism must be the only variety that denies some of the greatest triumphs of its nation - because they took place under the hated union.
Speaking of nationalist myths, a persistent British nationalist/Unionist myth appears to simultaneously believe that Scotland benefited and still benefits hugely from being part of the Union, and yet among smallish, well educated European nations with developed & diverse industries, substantial natural resources and stable civic polities, is uniquely ill suited to independence. Even smarter Unionists seem unable to square this circle in their own heads, let alone to my satisfaction.
I am sorry that you are not satisfied Divvy but I may just have to live with that.
Scotland could survive as an independent country, of course it could. But would its people have a better life, would we cope with something like this virus as well, would our young have the same breadth of opportunities? I really don't see how an independent Scotland, particularly one using Sterling, would have been able to match the furlough scheme, the grants, the guaranteed loans etc. A Scotland with its own currency would have been flotsam on the current markets with highly unpredictable results.
An independent Scotland today would be significantly poorer with less well funded public services, a serious trade deficit and limited prospects of improving our standard of living going forward. For some that is a price worth paying and the argument that we might eventually find a sense of common purpose and thrive is not to be dismissed out of hand but why on earth would we take that risk? Its bordering on irrational.
The SNP need to focus on our economy, on our education system, on our infrastructure, on business development and create a country that is indeed viable, that would indeed thrive on its own. Instead their obsession with constitutional matters and the uncertaintly that creates means the situation gets worse and worse. They are a menace.
Off-topic, but in all this agonising about how to resume the footy, one rather obvious solution appears to have been missed: it's resumed only when safe to do so (with or without crowds), and the season completed (say Sept-Dec). It's then followed by a one-off Coronavirus Cup; format, which would include a possibly extensive round-Robin stage, dependent on time available, to take us up to May. Next season proper kicks off in August 2021. Sorted.
Today is World Naked Gardening Day. (No, I don’t know why either.)
Do you know the most depressing thing for me - on top of everything else? Despite being surrounded by the most beautiful countryside (and, now 3 ewes and their lambs who have taken residence outside our front door) and despite the glorious weather and having all the time in the world to garden I have NO ACTUAL GARDEN.
None. It is unbelievably depressing, the sort of cosmically bad joke at my expense which makes me believe in a malicious God tormenting humans just for the sheer hell of it.
I could buy a few pots and stick some plants in them but that is not proper gardening. If only the bloody landlord had laid down earth rather than bloody slate chippings I could be creating something beautiful and worthwhile and even growing my own food.
But no - I stare at sheep who eat, sleep and walk round the hills - and realise that I am now living the life of a sheep.
Pots can be great. Start a sempervivum collection.
I know, I love them and succulents of all kinds. I have loads in London.
I just want to see my ferns unfurling, the bright green of euphorbia wulfenii, the deliciously warm orange of euphorbia Fireglow against dark leaves, the geums poking though the earth, my roses bursting into bud and soon flowers, the scent from my evergreen jasmine, the scent of my pelargonium Attar of Roses filling the conservatory as the windows are opened (Son No 1 says it is glorious and you don’t get scent through a screen, I can tell you), the honey smell from euphorbia mellifera, the purple alliums set against Ballerina tulips, the fresh greenness of spring leaves, that sense of the earth rebounding and springing into life, the bees, the sheer sensuality of gardens: sight and sound and smell and yes the feel of leaves and petals and earth. It is so joyful and hopeful and healing. And I miss it.
* head on table / begins to weep *
It’s a horribly frustrating situation for you Cyclefree and I’ve every sympathy. But I agree with those upthread. Ask if your landlord would allow you to build a garden. The worst that can happen is he’ll say no in which case you’re no worse off, but if he(?) says yes it would help.
That really is encouraging. We are winning even if we have not yet worked out how to end this.
Wonder what the Care Home one looks like?
As for winning i think we have lost as we are well above the "good outcome" number of deaths already.
Without the lockdown etc we were looking at deaths of roughly 1% of the population, roughly 650K. We are heading towards something short of 50K. Anyone who doesn't regard that as a win is not looking at this objectively.
And if we had locked down a week earlier instead of the nonsense about not going to the pub but the pubs running drinks promotions then the death figure would have been under 20k, the lockdown would have been several weeks shorter and we would be into the track and trace phase by now. 30k additional deaths due to a week of dither.
The theory is that you can make ghetto covid19 tests crazy simple and cheap, just using a saliva instead of sticking a thing up your nose most of the way to your brain. Even if you get a lot of wrong results just isolating the people who tested positive (and you can follow up with a proper PCR test or whatever) will bring the R number way down and everyone can go back to the pub.
I'm just happy that we are so easily able to solve all the problems of our former colony. I'm sure many regret we let it go in the first place.
Oh wait. They took it from us. And currently their administration is a reflection of a great many Americans. Just as ours is.
It's not Trump it's the American people and they are entitled to elect whoever they damn well want. Assured, perhaps, that the smug Brits will be there with them. To criticise and make snide observations.
Edit: God bless America.
If American hadn't declared independence, where would it have ended up?
Obviously, self-governance would have continued to be a thing (as it was to an extent even at the point of revolution, and in all other settler colonies) so I'm inclined to think it'd have been a much bigger and richer Canada.
However, what would its size and boundaries have been? How would it have developed?
No-one knows.
Being under the yoke it would have suffered similar fate to Scotland, being held back and treated like crap whilst being milked dry..
Which is the opposite of what actually happened after the Union. Scotland led the way intellectually, scientifically and in empire building and more than matched England industrially.
Funny the way certain narratives can emerge.
What actually happened was that the cream of Scottish society was extracted to run colonial possessions whilst the poor were used to fill the British army to garrison the holdings. The Treasure that flowed back went to the London treasury not Scotland.
For all that the Scots 'ran' the Empire the betterment did not go proportionally to Scotland. Scotland was drained to power the empire.
Yes, all those Scottish officers forced unwillingly to go and serve in the British army over two centuries. You can do a sensible class based analysis of where wealth was distributed for the whole of the UK but a nationalistic grudge viewpoint is nonsense historically. All nationalisms are sustained by myths but the Scottish Nationalism that exists today is a modern concoction based on a total denial of Scottish history. Modern Scotland evolved within the union. Scottish nationalism must be the only variety that denies some of the greatest triumphs of its nation - because they took place under the hated union.
Speaking of nationalist myths, a persistent British nationalist/Unionist myth appears to simultaneously believe that Scotland benefited and still benefits hugely from being part of the Union, and yet among smallish, well educated European nations with developed & diverse industries, substantial natural resources and stable civic polities, is uniquely ill suited to independence. Even smarter Unionists seem unable to square this circle in their own heads, let alone to my satisfaction.
It doesn't seem to be impossible to conceive of an incredibly successful symbiote that is nonetheless not optimally suited to independent existence...
Och, dinnae panic, I'm (almost) sure England would be fine.
I'm just happy that we are so easily able to solve all the problems of our former colony. I'm sure many regret we let it go in the first place.
Oh wait. They took it from us. And currently their administration is a reflection of a great many Americans. Just as ours is.
It's not Trump it's the American people and they are entitled to elect whoever they damn well want. Assured, perhaps, that the smug Brits will be there with them. To criticise and make snide observations.
Edit: God bless America.
If American hadn't declared independence, where would it have ended up?
Obviously, self-governance would have continued to be a thing (as it was to an extent even at the point of revolution, and in all other settler colonies) so I'm inclined to think it'd have been a much bigger and richer Canada.
However, what would its size and boundaries have been? How would it have developed?
No-one knows.
Being under the yoke it would have suffered similar fate to Scotland, being held back and treated like crap whilst being milked dry..
Which is the opposite of what actually happened after the Union. Scotland led the way intellectually, scientifically and in empire building and more than matched England industrially.
Funny the way certain narratives can emerge.
What actually happened was that the cream of Scottish society was extracted to run colonial possessions whilst the poor were used to fill the British army to garrison the holdings. The Treasure that flowed back went to the London treasury not Scotland.
For all that the Scots 'ran' the Empire the betterment did not go proportionally to Scotland. Scotland was drained to power the empire.
Yes, all those Scottish officers forced unwillingly to go and serve in the British army over two centuries. You can do a sensible class based analysis of where wealth was distributed for the whole of the UK but a nationalistic grudge viewpoint is nonsense historically. All nationalisms are sustained by myths but the Scottish Nationalism that exists today is a modern concoction based on a total denial of Scottish history. Modern Scotland evolved within the union. Scottish nationalism must be the only variety that denies some of the greatest triumphs of its nation - because they took place under the hated union.
Speaking of nationalist myths, a persistent British nationalist/Unionist myth appears to simultaneously believe that Scotland benefited and still benefits hugely from being part of the Union, and yet among smallish, well educated European nations with developed & diverse industries, substantial natural resources and stable civic polities, is uniquely ill suited to independence. Even smarter Unionists seem unable to square this circle in their own heads, let alone to my satisfaction.
I am sorry that you are not satisfied Divvy but I may just have to live with that.
Scotland could survive as an independent country, of course it could. But would its people have a better life, would we cope with something like this virus as well, would our young have the same breadth of opportunities? I really don't see how an independent Scotland, particularly one using Sterling, would have been able to match the furlough scheme, the grants, the guaranteed loans etc. A Scotland with its own currency would have been flotsam on the current markets with highly unpredictable results.
An independent Scotland today would be significantly poorer with less well funded public services, a serious trade deficit and limited prospects of improving our standard of living going forward. For some that is a price worth paying and the argument that we might eventually find a sense of common purpose and thrive is not to be dismissed out of hand but why on earth would we take that risk? Its bordering on irrational.
The SNP need to focus on our economy, on our education system, on our infrastructure, on business development and create a country that is indeed viable, that would indeed thrive on its own. Instead their obsession with constitutional matters and the uncertaintly that creates means the situation gets worse and worse. They are a menace.
Currently I see one party in Scotland that goes on and on and on about Scottish indy and another referendum and it ain't the SNP. Check the skelf in your own ee.
This is what gets me about this. It should be a good news story, yet the Govt have turned it in to something else, with everyone thinking 'What else are you spinning or even lying about'. Only the most partisan would be going ' well you missed the 100,000 figure' so what was the point.
The numbers were good. Just announce them: We have tested x today and what is more we have got the postal testing up and running with y sent out' This is with both x & y being large numbers.
Exactly - an object lesson in how to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Or, alternatively, one in the transience and meaninglessness of non-stories obsessed over in the 24-hour rolling news cycle.
Provided that the number of tests continues to increase, virtually everyone will have forgotten that the original target existed by this time next week.
That too. Whole thing amped up to ludicrous proportions.
As for "targets" I did predict in my usual wise and weary way that this one would be no exception to the general rule - this being that if cooking the books is required to hit it, cooking the books is what will occur.
That really is encouraging. We are winning even if we have not yet worked out how to end this.
Wonder what the Care Home one looks like?
As for winning i think we have lost as we are well above the "good outcome" number of deaths already.
Without the lockdown etc we were looking at deaths of roughly 1% of the population, roughly 650K. We are heading towards something short of 50K. Anyone who doesn't regard that as a win is not looking at this objectively.
And if we had locked down a week earlier instead of the nonsense about not going to the pub but the pubs running drinks promotions then the death figure would have been under 20k, the lockdown would have been several weeks shorter and we would be into the track and trace phase by now. 30k additional deaths due to a week of dither.
I'm just happy that we are so easily able to solve all the problems of our former colony. I'm sure many regret we let it go in the first place.
Oh wait. They took it from us. And currently their administration is a reflection of a great many Americans. Just as ours is.
It's not Trump it's the American people and they are entitled to elect whoever they damn well want. Assured, perhaps, that the smug Brits will be there with them. To criticise and make snide observations.
Edit: God bless America.
If American hadn't declared independence, where would it have ended up?
Obviously, self-governance would have continued to be a thing (as it was to an extent even at the point of revolution, and in all other settler colonies) so I'm inclined to think it'd have been a much bigger and richer Canada.
However, what would its size and boundaries have been? How would it have developed?
No-one knows.
Being under the yoke it would have suffered similar fate to Scotland, being held back and treated like crap whilst being milked dry..
Which is the opposite of what actually happened after the Union. Scotland led the way intellectually, scientifically and in empire building and more than matched England industrially.
Funny the way certain narratives can emerge.
What actually happened was that the cream of Scottish society was extracted to run colonial possessions whilst the poor were used to fill the British army to garrison the holdings. The Treasure that flowed back went to the London treasury not Scotland.
For all that the Scots 'ran' the Empire the betterment did not go proportionally to Scotland. Scotland was drained to power the empire.
Yes, all those Scottish officers forced unwillingly to go and serve in the British army over two centuries. You can do a sensible class based analysis of where wealth was distributed for the whole of the UK but a nationalistic grudge viewpoint is nonsense historically. All nationalisms are sustained by myths but the Scottish Nationalism that exists today is a modern concoction based on a total denial of Scottish history. Modern Scotland evolved within the union. Scottish nationalism must be the only variety that denies some of the greatest triumphs of its nation - because they took place under the hated union.
Speaking of nationalist myths, a persistent British nationalist/Unionist myth appears to simultaneously believe that Scotland benefited and still benefits hugely from being part of the Union, and yet among smallish, well educated European nations with developed & diverse industries, substantial natural resources and stable civic polities, is uniquely ill suited to independence. Even smarter Unionists seem unable to square this circle in their own heads, let alone to my satisfaction.
I am sorry that you are not satisfied Divvy but I may just have to live with that.
Scotland could survive as an independent country, of course it could. But would its people have a better life, would we cope with something like this virus as well, would our young have the same breadth of opportunities? I really don't see how an independent Scotland, particularly one using Sterling, would have been able to match the furlough scheme, the grants, the guaranteed loans etc. A Scotland with its own currency would have been flotsam on the current markets with highly unpredictable results.
An independent Scotland today would be significantly poorer with less well funded public services, a serious trade deficit and limited prospects of improving our standard of living going forward. For some that is a price worth paying and the argument that we might eventually find a sense of common purpose and thrive is not to be dismissed out of hand but why on earth would we take that risk? Its bordering on irrational.
The SNP need to focus on our economy, on our education system, on our infrastructure, on business development and create a country that is indeed viable, that would indeed thrive on its own. Instead their obsession with constitutional matters and the uncertaintly that creates means the situation gets worse and worse. They are a menace.
Currently I see one party in Scotland that goes on and and on and on about Scottish indy and and other referendum and it ain't the SNP. Check the skelf in your own ee.
The theory is that you can make ghetto covid19 tests crazy simple and cheap, just using a saliva instead of sticking a thing up your nose most of the way to your brain. Even if you get a lot of wrong results just isolating the people who tested positive (and you can follow up with a proper PCR test or whatever) will bring the R number way down and everyone can go back to the pub.
All those considering naked gardening, beware. My other half, who is prone to malapropisms, is constantly confusing clematis with Chlamydia. Try not to make this mistake.
Joining the other 90% of the planet which either have banned foreigners from arrival absolutely to as a minimum making everyone self-quarantine for 14 days and fining quarantine breakers. Yes, I know "the scientists".....but are all the other countries wrong? For example, Singapore, absolutely no foreigners, residents only with permission if they work in medical fields and all Singaporean arrivals quarantined in government controlled hotels - which they have to pay for if they went abroad after the SG government issued its "no travel" advice.
Off-topic, but in all this agonising about how to resume the footy, one rather obvious solution appears to have been missed: it's resumed only when safe to do so (with or without crowds), and the season completed (say Sept-Dec). It's then followed by a one-off Coronavirus Cup; format, which would include a possibly extensive round-Robin stage, dependent on time available, to take us up to May. Next season proper kicks off in August 2021. Sorted.
I think contracts with broadcasters is driving the EPL motives . Stand to lose a fortune (not just with Sky etc but with worldwide rights holders) if seasons cannot be played this year or next. Football is not really to my taste especially the EPL but its a big earner for this country.
The theory is that you can make ghetto covid19 tests crazy simple and cheap, just using a saliva instead of sticking a thing up your nose most of the way to your brain. Even if you get a lot of wrong results just isolating the people who tested positive (and you can follow up with a proper PCR test or whatever) will bring the R number way down and everyone can go back to the pub.
There has bee recent academic work that has shown saliva tests could well be as accurate method of sample collection.
The problem with the cheap and cheerful tests is not the false positives, it is the false negatives.
I guess the false negatives are a problem if you're still trying to do voluntary-action-driven social distancing by individuals, but maybe in the next phase (next phase but one???) you can rely less on that and more on test+isolate and, if that's not enough, regulating businesses operating high-transmission locations in the same way that they're regulated for food hygiene and elf n safety.
That really is encouraging. We are winning even if we have not yet worked out how to end this.
Wonder what the Care Home one looks like?
As for winning i think we have lost as we are well above the "good outcome" number of deaths already.
Without the lockdown etc we were looking at deaths of roughly 1% of the population, roughly 650K. We are heading towards something short of 50K. Anyone who doesn't regard that as a win is not looking at this objectively.
And if we had locked down a week earlier instead of the nonsense about not going to the pub but the pubs running drinks promotions then the death figure would have been under 20k, the lockdown would have been several weeks shorter and we would be into the track and trace phase by now. 30k additional deaths due to a week of dither.
Hindsight alert klaxon...
We had already locked down and were shouting at the TV every evening when Bozo didn't get on and announce it.
By the time we locked down, around 100,000 people were being infected each day.
I'm just happy that we are so easily able to solve all the problems of our former colony. I'm sure many regret we let it go in the first place.
Oh wait. They took it from us. And currently their administration is a reflection of a great many Americans. Just as ours is.
It's not Trump it's the American people and they are entitled to elect whoever they damn well want. Assured, perhaps, that the smug Brits will be there with them. To criticise and make snide observations.
Edit: God bless America.
If American hadn't declared independence, where would it have ended up?
Obviously, self-governance would have continued to be a thing (as it was to an extent even at the point of revolution, and in all other settler colonies) so I'm inclined to think it'd have been a much bigger and richer Canada.
However, what would its size and boundaries have been? How would it have developed?
No-one knows.
Being under the yoke it would have suffered similar fate to Scotland, being held back and treated like crap whilst being milked dry..
Which is the opposite of what actually happened after the Union. Scotland led the way intellectually, scientifically and in empire building and more than matched England industrially.
Funny the way certain narratives can emerge.
What actually happened was that the cream of Scottish society was extracted to run colonial possessions whilst the poor were used to fill the British army to garrison the holdings. The Treasure that flowed back went to the London treasury not Scotland.
For all that the Scots 'ran' the Empire the betterment did not go proportionally to Scotland. Scotland was drained to power the empire.
Yes, all those Scottish officers forced unwillingly to go and serve in the British army over two centuries. You can do a sensible class based analysis of where wealth was distributed for the whole of the UK but a nationalistic grudge viewpoint is nonsense historically. All nationalisms are sustained by myths but the Scottish Nationalism that exists today is a modern concoction based on a total denial of Scottish history. Modern Scotland evolved within the union. Scottish nationalism must be the only variety that denies some of the greatest triumphs of its nation - because they took place under the hated union.
Speaking of nationalist myths, a persistent British nationalist/Unionist myth appears to simultaneously believe that Scotland benefited and still benefits hugely from being part of the Union, and yet among smallish, well educated European nations with developed & diverse industries, substantial natural resources and stable civic polities, is uniquely ill suited to independence. Even smarter Unionists seem unable to square this circle in their own heads, let alone to my satisfaction.
I am sorry that you are not satisfied Divvy but I may just have to live with that.
Scotland could survive as an independent country, of course it could. But would its people have a better life, would we cope with something like this virus as well, would our young have the same breadth of opportunities? I really don't see how an independent Scotland, particularly one using Sterling, would have been able to match the furlough scheme, the grants, the guaranteed loans etc. A Scotland with its own currency would have been flotsam on the current markets with highly unpredictable results.
An independent Scotland today would be significantly poorer with less well funded public services, a serious trade deficit and limited prospects of improving our standard of living going forward. For some that is a price worth paying and the argument that we might eventually find a sense of common purpose and thrive is not to be dismissed out of hand but why on earth would we take that risk? Its bordering on irrational.
The SNP need to focus on our economy, on our education system, on our infrastructure, on business development and create a country that is indeed viable, that would indeed thrive on its own. Instead their obsession with constitutional matters and the uncertaintly that creates means the situation gets worse and worse. They are a menace.
Currently I see one party in Scotland that goes on and and on and on about Scottish indy and and other referendum and it ain't the SNP. Check the skelf in your own ee.
The SNP doesn't go on and on about independence?
Compared to the No Surrender To a Second Referendum Party? The SNP barely mention it in comparison.
All those considering naked gardening, beware. My other half, who is prone to malapropisms, is constantly confusing clematis with Chlamydia. Try not to make this mistake.
That enquiry at the garden centre about how best to get his clematis treated has become legend...
That really is encouraging. We are winning even if we have not yet worked out how to end this.
Wonder what the Care Home one looks like?
As for winning i think we have lost as we are well above the "good outcome" number of deaths already.
Without the lockdown etc we were looking at deaths of roughly 1% of the population, roughly 650K. We are heading towards something short of 50K. Anyone who doesn't regard that as a win is not looking at this objectively.
And if we had locked down a week earlier instead of the nonsense about not going to the pub but the pubs running drinks promotions then the death figure would have been under 20k, the lockdown would have been several weeks shorter and we would be into the track and trace phase by now. 30k additional deaths due to a week of dither.
We did this yesterday. I am reluctant to do it again. We cannot do track and trace until we had adequate testing capacity. That arrived this week. We cannot do track and trace without adequate isolation capacity. That arrived with the Nightingale hospitals. We cannot do track and trace without some form of app, at least in Cities. That is still awaited.
All those considering naked gardening, beware. My other half, who is prone to malapropisms, is constantly confusing clematis with Chlamydia. Try not to make this mistake.
Nettle stings are bad enough on my arms, never mind anywhere else!
On that note, out I go to pull out yet more nettles...
I'm just happy that we are so easily able to solve all the problems of our former colony. I'm sure many regret we let it go in the first place.
Oh wait. They took it from us. And currently their administration is a reflection of a great many Americans. Just as ours is.
It's not Trump it's the American people and they are entitled to elect whoever they damn well want. Assured, perhaps, that the smug Brits will be there with them. To criticise and make snide observations.
Edit: God bless America.
If American hadn't declared independence, where would it have ended up?
Obviously, self-governance would have continued to be a thing (as it was to an extent even at the point of revolution, and in all other settler colonies) so I'm inclined to think it'd have been a much bigger and richer Canada.
However, what would its size and boundaries have been? How would it have developed?
No-one knows.
Being under the yoke it would have suffered similar fate to Scotland, being held back and treated like crap whilst being milked dry..
Which is the opposite of what actually happened after the Union. Scotland led the way intellectually, scientifically and in empire building and more than matched England industrially.
Funny the way certain narratives can emerge.
What actually happened was that the cream of Scottish society was extracted to run colonial possessions whilst the poor were used to fill the British army to garrison the holdings. The Treasure that flowed back went to the London treasury not Scotland.
For all that the Scots 'ran' the Empire the betterment did not go proportionally to Scotland. Scotland was drained to power the empire.
Yes, all those Scottish officers forced unwillingly to go and serve in the British army over two centuries. You can do a sensible class based analysis of where wealth was distributed for the whole of the UK but a nationalistic grudge viewpoint is nonsense historically. All nationalisms are sustained by myths but the Scottish Nationalism that exists today is a modern concoction based on a total denial of Scottish history. Modern Scotland evolved within the union. Scottish nationalism must be the only variety that denies some of the greatest triumphs of its nation - because they took place under the hated union.
Speaking of nationalist myths, a persistent British nationalist/Unionist myth appears to simultaneously believe that Scotland benefited and still benefits hugely from being part of the Union, and yet among smallish, well educated European nations with developed & diverse industries, substantial natural resources and stable civic polities, is uniquely ill suited to independence. Even smarter Unionists seem unable to square this circle in their own heads, let alone to my satisfaction.
I am sorry that you are not satisfied Divvy but I may just have to live with that.
Scotland could survive as an independent country, of course it could. But would its people have a better life, would we cope with something like this virus as well, would our young have the same breadth of opportunities? I really don't see how an independent Scotland, particularly one using Sterling, would have been able to match the furlough scheme, the grants, the guaranteed loans etc. A Scotland with its own currency would have been flotsam on the current markets with highly unpredictable results.
An independent Scotland today would be significantly poorer with less well funded public services, a serious trade deficit and limited prospects of improving our standard of living going forward. For some that is a price worth paying and the argument that we might eventually find a sense of common purpose and thrive is not to be dismissed out of hand but why on earth would we take that risk? Its bordering on irrational.
The SNP need to focus on our economy, on our education system, on our infrastructure, on business development and create a country that is indeed viable, that would indeed thrive on its own. Instead their obsession with constitutional matters and the uncertaintly that creates means the situation gets worse and worse. They are a menace.
Currently I see one party in Scotland that goes on and on and on about Scottish indy and another referendum and it ain't the SNP. Check the skelf in your own ee.
I actually agree that the Tories, and the also rans, need to go beyond no to a second referendum as a policy platform. But it is not true to say that the SNP do not claim that virtually every single thing that happens shows that we would be better off as an independent nation. It is their raison d'etre.
They are each mehn's shirts with emphasis on the meh. M&S is the place to go.
I have to disagree. M&S is a f*cking disaster these days for shirts. Great if you want tailored, skinny, slim or extra slim fit, but if you want 'normal' fit forget it.
Plus they don't even put the shirts in collar size order on the stores these days.
Charles Tyrwhitt provide a great service imo, especially if you pick up one of their '4 shirts for' offers which I always do.
Last week I bought four Charles Tyrwhitt shirts for £20 each. Delivered three days later. Non iron cotton poplin short sleeves. Perfect for your home office.
They look great and aren't bad value.
But they don't last. Build-quality is poor. My Tyrwhitt shirts and suits have never lasted longer than 2 years.
That really is encouraging. We are winning even if we have not yet worked out how to end this.
Wonder what the Care Home one looks like?
As for winning i think we have lost as we are well above the "good outcome" number of deaths already.
Without the lockdown etc we were looking at deaths of roughly 1% of the population, roughly 650K. We are heading towards something short of 50K. Anyone who doesn't regard that as a win is not looking at this objectively.
And if we had locked down a week earlier instead of the nonsense about not going to the pub but the pubs running drinks promotions then the death figure would have been under 20k, the lockdown would have been several weeks shorter and we would be into the track and trace phase by now. 30k additional deaths due to a week of dither.
Are pubgoers more likely to get Covid-19? At risk of upsetting the stereotype police, were pubs really full of fat, BAME coffin-dodgers that have been dying disproportionately?
That really is encouraging. We are winning even if we have not yet worked out how to end this.
Wonder what the Care Home one looks like?
As for winning i think we have lost as we are well above the "good outcome" number of deaths already.
Without the lockdown etc we were looking at deaths of roughly 1% of the population, roughly 650K. We are heading towards something short of 50K. Anyone who doesn't regard that as a win is not looking at this objectively.
And if we had locked down a week earlier instead of the nonsense about not going to the pub but the pubs running drinks promotions then the death figure would have been under 20k, the lockdown would have been several weeks shorter and we would be into the track and trace phase by now. 30k additional deaths due to a week of dither.
Are pubgoers more likely to get Covid-19? At risk of upsetting the stereotype police, were pubs really full of fat, BAME coffin-dodgers that have been dying disproportionately?
I don't know if there's specific pub data but in Japan based on their cluster tracing they're very emphatic that the problem is crowded, badly-ventilated, noisy places with people talking loudly to each other.
That really is encouraging. We are winning even if we have not yet worked out how to end this.
Wonder what the Care Home one looks like?
As for winning i think we have lost as we are well above the "good outcome" number of deaths already.
Without the lockdown etc we were looking at deaths of roughly 1% of the population, roughly 650K. We are heading towards something short of 50K. Anyone who doesn't regard that as a win is not looking at this objectively.
And if we had locked down a week earlier instead of the nonsense about not going to the pub but the pubs running drinks promotions then the death figure would have been under 20k, the lockdown would have been several weeks shorter and we would be into the track and trace phase by now. 30k additional deaths due to a week of dither.
Are pubgoers more likely to get Covid-19? At risk of upsetting the stereotype police, were pubs really full of fat, BAME coffin-dodgers that have been dying disproportionately?
I don't know if there's specific pub data but in Japan based on their cluster tracing they're very emphatic that the problem is crowded, badly-ventilated, noisy places with people talking loudly to each other.
They've found particular clusters associated with bars?
All those considering naked gardening, beware. My other half, who is prone to malapropisms, is constantly confusing clematis with Chlamydia. Try not to make this mistake.
That really is encouraging. We are winning even if we have not yet worked out how to end this.
Wonder what the Care Home one looks like?
As for winning i think we have lost as we are well above the "good outcome" number of deaths already.
Without the lockdown etc we were looking at deaths of roughly 1% of the population, roughly 650K. We are heading towards something short of 50K. Anyone who doesn't regard that as a win is not looking at this objectively.
And if we had locked down a week earlier instead of the nonsense about not going to the pub but the pubs running drinks promotions then the death figure would have been under 20k, the lockdown would have been several weeks shorter and we would be into the track and trace phase by now. 30k additional deaths due to a week of dither.
Are pubgoers more likely to get Covid-19? At risk of upsetting the stereotype police, were pubs really full of fat, BAME coffin-dodgers that have been dying disproportionately?
I don't know if there's specific pub data but in Japan based on their cluster tracing they're very emphatic that the problem is crowded, badly-ventilated, noisy places with people talking loudly to each other.
That makes sense. Virus in saliva in air. I'm not sure when I last saw a crowded pub though, which is probably why so many closed down. Three up the road from me are being redeveloped and a fourth is basically a steakhouse with lager on tap.
All those considering naked gardening, beware. My other half, who is prone to malapropisms, is constantly confusing clematis with Chlamydia. Try not to make this mistake.
All those considering naked gardening, beware. My other half, who is prone to malapropisms, is constantly confusing clematis with Chlamydia. Try not to make this mistake.
Joining the other 90% of the planet which either have banned foreigners from arrival absolutely to as a minimum making everyone self-quarantine for 14 days and fining quarantine breakers. Yes, I know "the scientists".....but are all the other countries wrong? For example, Singapore, absolutely no foreigners, residents only with permission if they work in medical fields and all Singaporean arrivals quarantined in government controlled hotels - which they have to pay for if they went abroad after the SG government issued its "no travel" advice.
It will make sense to do that when the rest of the world is higher risk than the UK is. That's not the case at the minute.
As it stands which is higher risk - a doctor flying in from New Zealand ready and eager to work in the NHS, or a domestic retired person who is ignoring the lockdown rules and going to visit friends and family?
Asthe UK looks to phase out lockdown it will make sense to introduce quarantine regulations then, but only from high risk areas not areas like NZ etc
I'm just happy that we are so easily able to solve all the problems of our former colony. I'm sure many regret we let it go in the first place.
Oh wait. They took it from us. And currently their administration is a reflection of a great many Americans. Just as ours is.
It's not Trump it's the American people and they are entitled to elect whoever they damn well want. Assured, perhaps, that the smug Brits will be there with them. To criticise and make snide observations.
Edit: God bless America.
If American hadn't declared independence, where would it have ended up?
Obviously, self-governance would have continued to be a thing (as it was to an extent even at the point of revolution, and in all other settler colonies) so I'm inclined to think it'd have been a much bigger and richer Canada.
However, what would its size and boundaries have been? How would it have developed?
No-one knows.
Being under the yoke it would have suffered similar fate to Scotland, being held back and treated like crap whilst being milked dry..
Which is the opposite of what actually happened after the Union. Scotland led the way intellectually, scientifically and in empire building and more than matched England industrially.
Funny the way certain narratives can emerge.
What actually happened was that the cream of Scottish society was extracted to run colonial possessions whilst the poor were used to fill the British army to garrison the holdings. The Treasure that flowed back went to the London treasury not Scotland.
For all that the Scots 'ran' the Empire the betterment did not go proportionally to Scotland. Scotland was drained to power the empire.
Yes, all those Scottish officers forced unwillingly to go and serve in the British army over two centuries. You can do a sensible class based analysis of where wealth was distributed for the whole of the UK but a nationalistic grudge viewpoint is nonsense historically. All nationalisms are sustained by myths but the Scottish Nationalism that exists today is a modern concoction based on a total denial of Scottish history. Modern Scotland evolved within the union. Scottish nationalism must be the only variety that denies some of the greatest triumphs of its nation - because they took place under the hated union.
Speaking of nationalist myths, a persistent British nationalist/Unionist myth appears to simultaneously believe that Scotland benefited and still benefits hugely from being part of the Union, and yet among smallish, well educated European nations with developed & diverse industries, substantial natural resources and stable civic polities, is uniquely ill suited to independence. Even smarter Unionists seem unable to square this circle in their own heads, let alone to my satisfaction.
I am sorry that you are not satisfied Divvy but I may just have to live with that.
Scotland could survive as an independent country, of course it could. But would its people have a better life, would we cope with something like this virus as well, would our young have the same breadth of opportunities? I really don't see how an independent Scotland, particularly one using Sterling, would have been able to match the furlough scheme, the grants, the guaranteed loans etc. A Scotland with its own currency would have been flotsam on the current markets with highly unpredictable results.
An independent Scotland today would be significantly poorer with less well funded public services, a serious trade deficit and limited prospects of improving our standard of living going forward. For some that is a price worth paying and the argument that we might eventually find a sense of common purpose and thrive is not to be dismissed out of hand but why on earth would we take that risk? Its bordering on irrational.
The SNP need to focus on our economy, on our education system, on our infrastructure, on business development and create a country that is indeed viable, that would indeed thrive on its own. Instead their obsession with constitutional matters and the uncertaintly that creates means the situation gets worse and worse. They are a menace.
Currently I see one party in Scotland that goes on and on and on about Scottish indy and another referendum and it ain't the SNP. Check the skelf in your own ee.
I actually agree that the Tories, and the also rans, need to go beyond no to a second referendum as a policy platform. But it is not true to say that the SNP do not claim that virtually every single thing that happens shows that we would be better off as an independent nation. It is their raison d'etre.
And as I have said repeatedly to the the point of tediousness, until Unionism, whether it be SCon, SLab or (lol)SLD, puts together a coherent and attractive vision not based on SNPbad, the SNP are the only game in town. On that basis I'd actually say the dire, unimaginative 4th raters that pass for Unionist pols are more to blame than anyone for the state we're in.
I am sure they said the same to NOTW journalists back in the say....
What's the story here? I've clicked on a couple of the twitter feeds listed but cannot see anything apart from someone resigned from the FT.
Mark Di Stefano of the FT joined the video chats of the Indy and the Evening Standard, the ones where furloughs were being announced.
Kinda broke the FT rules on news gathering and possibly the law.
He also then "broke" the news of the furloughs publicly from having been in the video chat claiming "sources" from the Indy had informed him rather than that he'd observed it himself after gatecrashing.
All those considering naked gardening, beware. My other half, who is prone to malapropisms, is constantly confusing clematis with Chlamydia. Try not to make this mistake.
That enquiry at the garden centre about how best to get his clematis treated has become legend...
The trick is to grow clitoria ternatea - difficult to mangle into anything worse.
All those considering naked gardening, beware. My other half, who is prone to malapropisms, is constantly confusing clematis with Chlamydia. Try not to make this mistake.
So how is this retirement malarkey?
I no longer have excuses for not getting things done. This is troubling.
Today is World Naked Gardening Day. (No, I don’t know why either.)
Do you know the most depressing thing for me - on top of everything else? Despite being surrounded by the most beautiful countryside (and, now 3 ewes and their lambs who have taken residence outside our front door) and despite the glorious weather and having all the time in the world to garden I have NO ACTUAL GARDEN.
None. It is unbelievably depressing, the sort of cosmically bad joke at my expense which makes me believe in a malicious God tormenting humans just for the sheer hell of it.
I could buy a few pots and stick some plants in them but that is not proper gardening. If only the bloody landlord had laid down earth rather than bloody slate chippings I could be creating something beautiful and worthwhile and even growing my own food.
But no - I stare at sheep who eat, sleep and walk round the hills - and realise that I am now living the life of a sheep.
Pots can be great. Start a sempervivum collection.
I know, I love them and succulents of all kinds. I have loads in London.
I just want to see my ferns unfurling, the bright green of euphorbia wulfenii, the deliciously warm orange of euphorbia Fireglow against dark leaves, the geums poking though the earth, my roses bursting into bud and soon flowers, the scent from my evergreen jasmine, the scent of my pelargonium Attar of Roses filling the conservatory as the windows are opened (Son No 1 says it is glorious and you don’t get scent through a screen, I can tell you), the honey smell from euphorbia mellifera, the purple alliums set against Ballerina tulips, the fresh greenness of spring leaves, that sense of the earth rebounding and springing into life, the bees, the sheer sensuality of gardens: sight and sound and smell and yes the feel of leaves and petals and earth. It is so joyful and hopeful and healing. And I miss it.
* head on table / begins to weep *
I'm guessing pictures of our gardens won't exactly help....?
I am sure they said the same to NOTW journalists back in the say....
What's the story here? I've clicked on a couple of the twitter feeds listed but cannot see anything apart from someone resigned from the FT.
Mark Di Stefano of the FT joined the video chats of the Indy and the Evening Standard, the ones where furloughs were being announced.
Kinda broke the FT rules on news gathering and possibly the law.
I must admit I don't understand why lots of journalists are defending him on Twitter so much. Surely this is a cut and dried case of stepping way over the line? Makes me worry about how much similar stuff goes on that lots of journos seem to think this is normal and 'anyone would have done it' in his position.
All those considering naked gardening, beware. My other half, who is prone to malapropisms, is constantly confusing clematis with Chlamydia. Try not to make this mistake.
So how is this retirement malarkey?
I no longer have excuses for not getting things done. This is troubling.
Surely writing penetrating thread headers for PB is all the excuse a man can need?
That really is encouraging. We are winning even if we have not yet worked out how to end this.
Wonder what the Care Home one looks like?
As for winning i think we have lost as we are well above the "good outcome" number of deaths already.
Without the lockdown etc we were looking at deaths of roughly 1% of the population, roughly 650K. We are heading towards something short of 50K. Anyone who doesn't regard that as a win is not looking at this objectively.
And if we had locked down a week earlier instead of the nonsense about not going to the pub but the pubs running drinks promotions then the death figure would have been under 20k, the lockdown would have been several weeks shorter and we would be into the track and trace phase by now. 30k additional deaths due to a week of dither.
Are pubgoers more likely to get Covid-19? At risk of upsetting the stereotype police, were pubs really full of fat, BAME coffin-dodgers that have been dying disproportionately?
I don't know if there's specific pub data but in Japan based on their cluster tracing they're very emphatic that the problem is crowded, badly-ventilated, noisy places with people talking loudly to each other.
That makes sense. Virus in saliva in air. I'm not sure when I last saw a crowded pub though, which is probably why so many closed down. Three up the road from me are being redeveloped and a fourth is basically a steakhouse with lager on tap.
And yet, in the Telegraph:
"Ministers have asked the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) to look again at whether people need to stay so far apart, amid growing evidence that coronavirus does not transmit well in the air ."
Personally, it would take a fair chunk of evidence to convince me that this doesn't travel well by air.
I am sure they said the same to NOTW journalists back in the say....
What's the story here? I've clicked on a couple of the twitter feeds listed but cannot see anything apart from someone resigned from the FT.
Mark Di Stefano of the FT joined the video chats of the Indy and the Evening Standard, the ones where furloughs were being announced.
Kinda broke the FT rules on news gathering and possibly the law.
I must admit I don't understand why lots of journalists are defending him on Twitter so much. Surely this is a cut and dried case of stepping way over the line? Makes me worry about how much similar stuff goes on that lots of journos seem to think this is normal and 'anyone would have done it' in his position.
plus ca change
The journalists defending him are those who like his politics and were content to ferociously attack the News of the World, while ignoring the fact the Daily Mirror had been doing the same thing.
I am sure they said the same to NOTW journalists back in the say....
What's the story here? I've clicked on a couple of the twitter feeds listed but cannot see anything apart from someone resigned from the FT.
Mark Di Stefano of the FT joined the video chats of the Indy and the Evening Standard, the ones where furloughs were being announced.
Kinda broke the FT rules on news gathering and possibly the law.
He also then "broke" the news of the furloughs publicly from having been in the video chat claiming "sources" from the Indy had informed him rather than that he'd observed it himself after gatecrashing.
Silly. He should have phoned the journos in the meeting till he found one to confirm.
Meanwhile ... following Sam Bowman's twitter link took me to this paper about keeping business afloat which proposes the same "student loans for business" idea I've suggested here from time to time. https://www.tenentrepreneurs.org/blog/coronavirusukeconomy
I'm just happy that we are so easily able to solve all the problems of our former colony. I'm sure many regret we let it go in the first place.
Oh wait. They took it from us. And currently their administration is a reflection of a great many Americans. Just as ours is.
It's not Trump it's the American people and they are entitled to elect whoever they damn well want. Assured, perhaps, that the smug Brits will be there with them. To criticise and make snide observations.
Edit: God bless America.
If American hadn't declared independence, where would it have ended up?
Obviously, self-governance would have continued to be a thing (as it was to an extent even at the point of revolution, and in all other settler colonies) so I'm inclined to think it'd have been a much bigger and richer Canada.
However, what would its size and boundaries have been? How would it have developed?
No-one knows.
Being under the yoke it would have suffered similar fate to Scotland, being held back and treated like crap whilst being milked dry..
Which is the opposite of what actually happened after the Union. Scotland led the way intellectually, scientifically and in empire building and more than matched England industrially.
Funny the way certain narratives can emerge.
What actually happened was that the cream of Scottish society was extracted to run colonial possessions whilst the poor were used to fill the British army to garrison the holdings. The Treasure that flowed back went to the London treasury not Scotland.
For all that the Scots 'ran' the Empire the betterment did not go proportionally to Scotland. Scotland was drained to power the empire.
Yes, all those Scottish officers forced unwillingly to go and serve in the British army over two centuries. You can do a sensible class based analysis of where wealth was distributed for the whole of the UK but a nationalistic grudge viewpoint is nonsense historically. All nationalisms are sustained by myths but the Scottish Nationalism that exists today is a modern concoction based on a total denial of Scottish history. Modern Scotland evolved within the union. Scottish nationalism must be the only variety that denies some of the greatest triumphs of its nation - because they took place under the hated union.
Speaking of nationalist myths, a persistent British nationalist/Unionist myth appears to simultaneously believe that Scotland benefited and still benefits hugely from being part of the Union, and yet among smallish, well educated European nations with developed & diverse industries, substantial natural resources and stable civic polities, is uniquely ill suited to independence. Even smarter Unionists seem unable to square this circle in their own heads, let alone to my satisfaction.
I am sorry that you are not satisfied Divvy but I may just have to live with that.
Scotland could survive as an independent country, of course it could. But would its people have a better life, would we cope with something like this virus as well, would our young have the same breadth of opportunities? I really don't see how an independent Scotland, particularly one using Sterling, would have been able to match the furlough scheme, the grants, the guaranteed loans etc. A Scotland with its own currency would have been flotsam on the current markets with highly unpredictable results.
An independent Scotland today would be significantly poorer with less well funded public services, a serious trade deficit and limited prospects of improving our standard of living going forward. For some that is a price worth paying and the argument that we might eventually find a sense of common purpose and thrive is not to be dismissed out of hand but why on earth would we take that risk? Its bordering on irrational.
The SNP need to focus on our economy, on our education system, on our infrastructure, on business development and create a country that is indeed viable, that would indeed thrive on its own. Instead their obsession with constitutional matters and the uncertaintly that creates means the situation gets worse and worse. They are a menace.
Currently I see one party in Scotland that goes on and on and on about Scottish indy and another referendum and it ain't the SNP. Check the skelf in your own ee.
I actually agree that the Tories, and the also rans, need to go beyond no to a second referendum as a policy platform. But it is not true to say that the SNP do not claim that virtually every single thing that happens shows that we would be better off as an independent nation. It is their raison d'etre.
And as I have said repeatedly to the the point of tediousness, until Unionism, whether it be SCon, SLab or (lol)SLD, puts together a coherent and attractive vision not based on SNPbad, the SNP are the only game in town. On that basis I'd actually say the dire, unimaginative 4th raters that pass for Unionist pols are more to blame than anyone for the state we're in.
Those in government are always more responsible than anyone else. They make the decisions. But Scotland does need a viable choice. I find it frustrating.
I am sure they said the same to NOTW journalists back in the say....
What's the story here? I've clicked on a couple of the twitter feeds listed but cannot see anything apart from someone resigned from the FT.
Mark Di Stefano of the FT joined the video chats of the Indy and the Evening Standard, the ones where furloughs were being announced.
Kinda broke the FT rules on news gathering and possibly the law.
He also then "broke" the news of the furloughs publicly from having been in the video chat claiming "sources" from the Indy had informed him rather than that he'd observed it himself after gatecrashing.
Silly. He should have phoned the journos in the meeting till he found one to confirm.
Meanwhile ... following Sam Bowman's twitter link took me to this paper about keeping business afloat which proposes the same "student loans for business" idea I've suggested here from time to time. https://www.tenentrepreneurs.org/blog/coronavirusukeconomy
All those considering naked gardening, beware. My other half, who is prone to malapropisms, is constantly confusing clematis with Chlamydia. Try not to make this mistake.
So how is this retirement malarkey?
I no longer have excuses for not getting things done. This is troubling.
My father's suggestion for that during retirement.
Get children/grandchildren or a cat or dog.
You can always blame the above for not getting anything done.
Comments
The public sector didn't deliver. If was just PHE labs, they barely increased testing or capacity. It was the decision to finally get the private sector involved that massively expanded this.
And for all the criticism over spinning to get it over the line, not doubt massoive increase, unlike Scotland and Wales, who nobody seems to be criticising.
Wales promised 5k tests a day, then just gave up after a week.
https://twitter.com/nicktolhurst/status/1256521522757410816?s=20
That latter contrast is perhaps the root of the difference I find most striking between mainstream Scottish nationalism (or rather self-determinationism) and British/English nationalism (as manifest in the last few years most obviously) is the former's almost complete omission of historical references in public discourse. You just don't get Ms Sturgeon going on about Saltires and the claymore, for instance, or the Clearances lowland or otherwise. But just look at almost any speech by Mr Johnson - or Mr Cameron before him. It's all Somme, Agincourt, WW2, WW2 again, Spitfires, Blitz spirit etc. etc. It's a very, very noticeable difference. One is very much looking to the future, but what is one to make of the other?
Wales has a big hotspot if CV in Cardiff, yet they are still doing bugger all testing
I just want to see my ferns unfurling, the bright green of euphorbia wulfenii, the deliciously warm orange of euphorbia Fireglow against dark leaves, the geums poking though the earth, my roses bursting into bud and soon flowers, the scent from my evergreen jasmine, the scent of my pelargonium Attar of Roses filling the conservatory as the windows are opened (Son No 1 says it is glorious and you don’t get scent through a screen, I can tell you), the honey smell from euphorbia mellifera, the purple alliums set against Ballerina tulips, the fresh greenness of spring leaves, that sense of the earth rebounding and springing into life, the bees, the sheer sensuality of gardens: sight and sound and smell and yes the feel of leaves and petals and earth. It is so joyful and hopeful and healing. And I miss it.
* head on table / begins to weep *
Provided that the number of tests continues to increase, virtually everyone will have forgotten that the original target existed by this time next week.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/01/health/coronavirus-covid-toe.html
Worth noting that that doesn't mean there isn't a problem with our political media. I've stopped watching the news habitually and much of the crisis coverage has been very poor (the u-turn accusations when the Government did exactly what it said it would over a lockdown, for example).
It'd be interesting to know what impact such tactics have.
Same thing with the German healthcare system, the MSM were all over the fact that they are doing better than us. Then when they realised how it is funded they suddenly kept quiet
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/jan/09/marks-spencer-sales-dented-by-too-many-mince-pies-and-skinny-jeans
As of that rose the stem
The root whence mystery ever flows
The babe magnet of Camden.
The government campaign to deal with Covid is constantly being undermined by the untrustworthy Conservative politicians.
Seems about as pointless as the nothing to declare bit at the airport.
Scotland could survive as an independent country, of course it could. But would its people have a better life, would we cope with something like this virus as well, would our young have the same breadth of opportunities? I really don't see how an independent Scotland, particularly one using Sterling, would have been able to match the furlough scheme, the grants, the guaranteed loans etc. A Scotland with its own currency would have been flotsam on the current markets with highly unpredictable results.
An independent Scotland today would be significantly poorer with less well funded public services, a serious trade deficit and limited prospects of improving our standard of living going forward. For some that is a price worth paying and the argument that we might eventually find a sense of common purpose and thrive is not to be dismissed out of hand but why on earth would we take that risk? Its bordering on irrational.
The SNP need to focus on our economy, on our education system, on our infrastructure, on business development and create a country that is indeed viable, that would indeed thrive on its own. Instead their obsession with constitutional matters and the uncertaintly that creates means the situation gets worse and worse. They are a menace.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/travellers-arriving-in-uk-to-face-quarantine-for-14-days-kndrsm65d
The theory is that you can make ghetto covid19 tests crazy simple and cheap, just using a saliva instead of sticking a thing up your nose most of the way to your brain. Even if you get a lot of wrong results just isolating the people who tested positive (and you can follow up with a proper PCR test or whatever) will bring the R number way down and everyone can go back to the pub.
https://twitter.com/mattyglesias/status/1256535985476775936
https://twitter.com/JesseLehrich/status/1256034440075190273/photo/1
As for "targets" I did predict in my usual wise and weary way that this one would be no exception to the general rule - this being that if cooking the books is required to hit it, cooking the books is what will occur.
The problem with the cheap and cheerful tests is not the false positives, it is the false negatives.
Premier Inn for BA Economy
Doubletree for BA Business Class
Windsor Castle for BA First Class
A tent for Wizzair
'JENNY HJUL: SNP campaign leaflet with no mention of Scottish independence speaks volumes'
https://tinyurl.com/yb8793vr
By the time we locked down, around 100,000 people were being infected each day.
On that note, out I go to pull out yet more nettles...
https://twitter.com/bee_happy_camp/status/1256509687199137792?s=20
"New deaths reported today
UK 739
Spain 281
Italy 269
France 218
Three cheers for Hancock"
from yesterday?
Kinda broke the FT rules on news gathering and possibly the law.
As it stands which is higher risk - a doctor flying in from New Zealand ready and eager to work in the NHS, or a domestic retired person who is ignoring the lockdown rules and going to visit friends and family?
Asthe UK looks to phase out lockdown it will make sense to introduce quarantine regulations then, but only from high risk areas not areas like NZ etc
"Ministers have asked the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) to look again at whether people need to stay so far apart, amid growing evidence that coronavirus does not transmit well in the air ."
Personally, it would take a fair chunk of evidence to convince me that this doesn't travel well by air.
The journalists defending him are those who like his politics and were content to ferociously attack the News of the World, while ignoring the fact the Daily Mirror had been doing the same thing.
Meanwhile ... following Sam Bowman's twitter link took me to this paper about keeping business afloat which proposes the same "student loans for business" idea I've suggested here from time to time.
https://www.tenentrepreneurs.org/blog/coronavirusukeconomy
Get children/grandchildren or a cat or dog.
You can always blame the above for not getting anything done.