Howdy, Stranger!

It looks like you're new here. Sign in or register to get started.

Undefined discussion subject.

12346»

Comments

  • SandyRentoolSandyRentool Posts: 22,036
    DougSeal said:

    rcs1000 said:

    ydoethur said:

    Anyway in reply to my comment earlier there clearly are some Leave voting conservative Conservatives on this site but it seems to be just a few.

    Considering people regularly call this a conservative site there doesn't seem to be an abundance of Leave voting conservative Conservatives.

    My view - for which I have no hard evidence - is that the commentators are a lot less partisan and particularly a lot less conservative than it was the start, but the reputation it had built up over the first 6/7 years still lingers.

    Quite a number of reasons for that, including deaths, retirements, changes of view, bannings which tend to affect the hard right disproportionately because they get carried away fastest. But I think also the political upheaval has weakened the hold of the conservatives on their supporters, the likes of TSE and Morris Dancer (or me for that matter) while Labour were already pretty well at rock bottom so those that stayed are not going anywhere (Rochdale Pioneers being a notable exception).

    I could be totally wrong, but that’s my impression.
    I think we also tend to skim over the posts of those we agree with, and fixate on those we disagree with.

    This results in us seeing the site as being much more "hostile" than it is.

    (Of course, you also need to look not just at the number of posters, but the number of posts. @HYUFD has almost 80,000 posts, for example.)
    And every one of them is sheer quality.
    And backed up by polling data.
  • RobDRobD Posts: 59,935
    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,222

    Andrew Adonis criticising Biden's vacant response to Floyd.

    Tricky for Biden, this. Very tricky. ...

    Loving the idea of Adonis holding the fate of the US in his hands...
  • justin124justin124 Posts: 11,527
    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,600
    The media keeps telling us that life is going to completely change. Meanwhile, people queue up to enter Ikea.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52874615
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,421
    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    Goering also of course escaped execution - admittedly by committing suicide.
  • RobDRobD Posts: 59,935
    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,766
    Scott_xP said:
    Well, I know what I can see on the video, so the officials can piss off.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,421
    This, however, is why this is the most awesome forum on the net. Where else can somebody discuss political positioning, employment law and whether Bush and Blair were more guilty than Goering - all in the space of an hour?
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,766
    Andy_JS said:

    The media keeps telling us that life is going to completely change. Meanwhile, people queue up to enter Ikea.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52874615

    Utterly bonkers.
  • AlistairAlistair Posts: 23,670

    Andrew Adonis criticising Biden's vacant response to Floyd.

    Tricky for Biden, this. Very tricky.

    Needs the black vote en bloc, doesn't want to scare the horses in the suburbs.

    Andrew Adonis doesn't know what the fuck he is talking about.

    Biden has been all over this - meeting protestors on the street, talking to faith leaders, etc. The full works.

  • contrariancontrarian Posts: 5,818
    stodge said:

    They are advocating using the armed forces against their own countrymen. That's astonishing.

    I remember the outrage when Polish troops shot Solidarity strikers in 1981 - when the point comes when a Government feels it has to turn its own troops on its own people a line has been crossed.

    I've only seen bits of America - the chasm between wealth and poverty is frightening. I found San Francisco intimidating with pan handlers on every corner. It's different in Vegas - the poor and the dispossessed are usually out of sight but if you look Downtown in the early morning you'll see them.

    MY experience of the restaurants is this - the servers (waiters/waitresses) are often white, very polite and eager to please. If you spend $120 on dinner they'll expect a $20 tip so make sure you've done well at the tables.

    Then you have the people who set the tables and clear way the plates - generally hispanic. They move fast, avoid eye contact - their place in the hierarchy is clear.

    The guests in the hotels come from all over the world but the weekend visitors are more often from the culturally conservative states. One evening Mrs Stodge and I had returned from dinner and got into the lift when this man rushed in and started lighting up his cigar in the lift.

    We must have looked appalled - he was not exactly confrontational but perplexed until he heard my British accent at which point he became apologetic and said he understood "you do things different over there". That's America - I don't pretend to understand it, I don't think anyone does - the Americans included.
    Work took me to the offices of investment banks in Manhattan before corona. What you notice is that almost all the guys on reception, doing security, checking your id etc are black.

    Once you are up in the lift and in the office, I'd kind of describe it as anything but black. White, Asian, Indian subcontinent and combinations thereof. But very few blacks.

    Tip: Do not ask for a white coffee in Manhattan. I did, and twice the black person serving me seemed to think I was asking for a coffee for a white person.

    They do not seem to have that expression for coffee with milk!
  • stodgestodge Posts: 13,898
    Andy_JS said:

    The media keeps telling us that life is going to completely change. Meanwhile, people queue up to enter Ikea.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52874615

    I don't know what point you are trying to make. Nobody ever said people wouldn't stop trying to improve their homes or enjoying Swedish meatballs.

    The big change is queuing an hour and a half to enter a store or did that little nugget pass you by?
  • AlistairAlistair Posts: 23,670
    Scott_xP said:
    Oh god, not the monospaced font bullshit. Please save us from this. I had enough of this shit in 2016.
  • AlistairAlistair Posts: 23,670
    Scott_xP said:
    Oh god, not the monospaced font bullshit. Please save us from this. I had enough of this shit in 2016.
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905
    Andy_JS said:

    The media keeps telling us that life is going to completely change. Meanwhile, people queue up to enter Ikea.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52874615

    It will change when the mass unemployment really kicks off.

    Anyway, I saw these reports of gigantic queues outside Ikea this morning. It's incomprehensible. Why were that many people that desperate to get into Ikea? Is MDF the new bog roll or something? The mind boggles...
  • justin124justin124 Posts: 11,527
    edited June 2020
    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anschluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,600
    stodge said:

    Andy_JS said:

    The media keeps telling us that life is going to completely change. Meanwhile, people queue up to enter Ikea.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52874615

    I don't know what point you are trying to make. Nobody ever said people wouldn't stop trying to improve their homes or enjoying Swedish meatballs.

    The big change is queuing an hour and a half to enter a store or did that little nugget pass you by?
    People are supposed to be becoming less materialistic, doing more shopping from home, etc. That's what we keep hearing from the media.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,600

    Andy_JS said:

    The media keeps telling us that life is going to completely change. Meanwhile, people queue up to enter Ikea.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52874615

    Utterly bonkers.
    I'm not criticising people who go to Ikea. It's the difference between reality and the narrative the media are pushing that life is "never going to be the same again."
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,608

    @stodge have you not got the memo? The Conservatives don't care about the deficit anymore. That’s so 2010.

    Well, we're not in 2010 any more, Toto.....
  • RobDRobD Posts: 59,935
    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anscluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    He was found guilty of both charges 1 and 2:

    Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
    Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace

    Have Blair and Bush been found similarly guilty?
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    stodge said:

    They are advocating using the armed forces against their own countrymen. That's astonishing.

    I remember the outrage when Polish troops shot Solidarity strikers in 1981 - when the point comes when a Government feels it has to turn its own troops on its own people a line has been crossed.

    I've only seen bits of America - the chasm between wealth and poverty is frightening. I found San Francisco intimidating with pan handlers on every corner. It's different in Vegas - the poor and the dispossessed are usually out of sight but if you look Downtown in the early morning you'll see them.

    MY experience of the restaurants is this - the servers (waiters/waitresses) are often white, very polite and eager to please. If you spend $120 on dinner they'll expect a $20 tip so make sure you've done well at the tables.

    Then you have the people who set the tables and clear way the plates - generally hispanic. They move fast, avoid eye contact - their place in the hierarchy is clear.

    The guests in the hotels come from all over the world but the weekend visitors are more often from the culturally conservative states. One evening Mrs Stodge and I had returned from dinner and got into the lift when this man rushed in and started lighting up his cigar in the lift.

    We must have looked appalled - he was not exactly confrontational but perplexed until he heard my British accent at which point he became apologetic and said he understood "you do things different over there". That's America - I don't pretend to understand it, I don't think anyone does - the Americans included.
    Work took me to the offices of investment banks in Manhattan before corona. What you notice is that almost all the guys on reception, doing security, checking your id etc are black.

    Once you are up in the lift and in the office, I'd kind of describe it as anything but black. White, Asian, Indian subcontinent and combinations thereof. But very few blacks.

    Tip: Do not ask for a white coffee in Manhattan. I did, and twice the black person serving me seemed to think I was asking for a coffee for a white person.

    They do not seem to have that expression for coffee with milk!
    I wonder what they consider a flat white to be?
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,468

    Andy_JS said:

    The media keeps telling us that life is going to completely change. Meanwhile, people queue up to enter Ikea.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52874615

    It will change when the mass unemployment really kicks off.

    Anyway, I saw these reports of gigantic queues outside Ikea this morning. It's incomprehensible. Why were that many people that desperate to get into Ikea? Is MDF the new bog roll or something? The mind boggles...
    People are bored. Who can blame them?
  • justin124justin124 Posts: 11,527
    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anscluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    He was found guilty of both charges 1 and 2:

    Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
    Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace

    Have Blair and Bush been found similarly guilty?
    Surprise ! Surprise ! - because the political will or means has not been there to bring them to trial. Hypocrisy, humbug and double standards have reigned supreme.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,421
    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anschluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    On Count 1, as he was in charge of the four year plan designed to prepare the German economy for war by the mid-1940s at the latest, it seems fair enough.

    As he was the commander of the Luftwaffe, it is also hard to argue he did not bear at least some responsibility for the German attacks on the Netherlands while it was still neutral.
  • DougSealDougSeal Posts: 12,541
    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anscluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    He was found guilty of both charges 1 and 2:

    Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
    Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace

    Have Blair and Bush been found similarly guilty?
    Well, Hitler was never technically found guilty, all we can do is debate what a court would find if a prosecution were brought. Same applies to most discussions of legal transgressions on this site.
  • DougSealDougSeal Posts: 12,541

    stodge said:

    They are advocating using the armed forces against their own countrymen. That's astonishing.

    I remember the outrage when Polish troops shot Solidarity strikers in 1981 - when the point comes when a Government feels it has to turn its own troops on its own people a line has been crossed.

    I've only seen bits of America - the chasm between wealth and poverty is frightening. I found San Francisco intimidating with pan handlers on every corner. It's different in Vegas - the poor and the dispossessed are usually out of sight but if you look Downtown in the early morning you'll see them.

    MY experience of the restaurants is this - the servers (waiters/waitresses) are often white, very polite and eager to please. If you spend $120 on dinner they'll expect a $20 tip so make sure you've done well at the tables.

    Then you have the people who set the tables and clear way the plates - generally hispanic. They move fast, avoid eye contact - their place in the hierarchy is clear.

    The guests in the hotels come from all over the world but the weekend visitors are more often from the culturally conservative states. One evening Mrs Stodge and I had returned from dinner and got into the lift when this man rushed in and started lighting up his cigar in the lift.

    We must have looked appalled - he was not exactly confrontational but perplexed until he heard my British accent at which point he became apologetic and said he understood "you do things different over there". That's America - I don't pretend to understand it, I don't think anyone does - the Americans included.
    Work took me to the offices of investment banks in Manhattan before corona. What you notice is that almost all the guys on reception, doing security, checking your id etc are black.

    Once you are up in the lift and in the office, I'd kind of describe it as anything but black. White, Asian, Indian subcontinent and combinations thereof. But very few blacks.

    Tip: Do not ask for a white coffee in Manhattan. I did, and twice the black person serving me seemed to think I was asking for a coffee for a white person.

    They do not seem to have that expression for coffee with milk!
    I wonder what they consider a flat white to be?
    A flat white is a flat white but they call a Royale With Cheese a “Quarter Pounder”
  • contrariancontrarian Posts: 5,818

    stodge said:

    They are advocating using the armed forces against their own countrymen. That's astonishing.

    I remember the outrage when Polish troops shot Solidarity strikers in 1981 - when the point comes when a Government feels it has to turn its own troops on its own people a line has been crossed.

    I've only seen bits of America - the chasm between wealth and poverty is frightening. I found San Francisco intimidating with pan handlers on every corner. It's different in Vegas - the poor and the dispossessed are usually out of sight but if you look Downtown in the early morning you'll see them.

    MY experience of the restaurants is this - the servers (waiters/waitresses) are often white, very polite and eager to please. If you spend $120 on dinner they'll expect a $20 tip so make sure you've done well at the tables.

    Then you have the people who set the tables and clear way the plates - generally hispanic. They move fast, avoid eye contact - their place in the hierarchy is clear.

    The guests in the hotels come from all over the world but the weekend visitors are more often from the culturally conservative states. One evening Mrs Stodge and I had returned from dinner and got into the lift when this man rushed in and started lighting up his cigar in the lift.

    We must have looked appalled - he was not exactly confrontational but perplexed until he heard my British accent at which point he became apologetic and said he understood "you do things different over there". That's America - I don't pretend to understand it, I don't think anyone does - the Americans included.
    Work took me to the offices of investment banks in Manhattan before corona. What you notice is that almost all the guys on reception, doing security, checking your id etc are black.

    Once you are up in the lift and in the office, I'd kind of describe it as anything but black. White, Asian, Indian subcontinent and combinations thereof. But very few blacks.

    Tip: Do not ask for a white coffee in Manhattan. I did, and twice the black person serving me seemed to think I was asking for a coffee for a white person.

    They do not seem to have that expression for coffee with milk!
    I wonder what they consider a flat white to be?
    Yeh I never worked that out. But on two separate occassions the person serving me did seem to be a bit affronted when I asked for a 'white Americano!'

    Mortifying.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,421
    DougSeal said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anscluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    He was found guilty of both charges 1 and 2:

    Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
    Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace

    Have Blair and Bush been found similarly guilty?
    Well, Hitler was never technically found guilty, all we can do is debate what a court would find if a prosecution were brought. Same applies to most discussions of legal transgressions on this site.
    Although Bormann was still found guilty even though he was dead at the time.

    (Yes, I know his precise fate remained disputed until much later.)
  • RobDRobD Posts: 59,935
    DougSeal said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anscluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    He was found guilty of both charges 1 and 2:

    Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
    Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace

    Have Blair and Bush been found similarly guilty?
    Well, Hitler was never technically found guilty, all we can do is debate what a court would find if a prosecution were brought. Same applies to most discussions of legal transgressions on this site.
    Do you seriously believe Blair and Bush should/would be sentenced to death for the Iraq war?
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    On the topic of American not understanding what white coffee is, I have a friend who was at a corporate meal at a restaurant in America and he asked the waiter for "white pepper" - and got admonished afterwards for it as inappropriate racism. "Why do you have to mention color" to use the misspelt American version.

    The idea that black pepper and white pepper are different seemed immaterial.

    For a very racist society there is an apparent aversion to even mentioning colours even when relevant.
  • ClassicDomClassicDom Posts: 19
    edited June 2020
    stodge said:

    They are advocating using the armed forces against their own countrymen. That's astonishing.

    I remember the outrage when Polish troops shot Solidarity strikers in 1981 - when the point comes when a Government feels it has to turn its own troops on its own people a line has been crossed.

    I've only seen bits of America - the chasm between wealth and poverty is frightening. I found San Francisco intimidating with pan handlers on every corner. It's different in Vegas - the poor and the dispossessed are usually out of sight but if you look Downtown in the early morning you'll see them.

    MY experience of the restaurants is this - the servers (waiters/waitresses) are often white, very polite and eager to please. If you spend $120 on dinner they'll expect a $20 tip so make sure you've done well at the tables.

    Then you have the people who set the tables and clear way the plates - generally hispanic. They move fast, avoid eye contact - their place in the hierarchy is clear.

    The guests in the hotels come from all over the world but the weekend visitors are more often from the culturally conservative states. One evening Mrs Stodge and I had returned from dinner and got into the lift when this man rushed in and started lighting up his cigar in the lift.

    We must have looked appalled - he was not exactly confrontational but perplexed until he heard my British accent at which point he became apologetic and said he understood "you do things different over there". That's America - I don't pretend to understand it, I don't think anyone does - the Americans included.
    The USA is almost certainly one of the greatest nations on earth. Ive worked, studied and holidayed over there, some states I wouldnt want to be anywhere near. But give me a nice rural middle America state any day to pretty much anywhere else on the planet. The kind of state new yorkers and californians fly over and dont look down.

    I just wish they could get their act together with affordable healthcare.
  • RobDRobD Posts: 59,935
    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anscluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    He was found guilty of both charges 1 and 2:

    Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
    Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace

    Have Blair and Bush been found similarly guilty?
    Surprise ! Surprise ! - because the political will or means has not been there to bring them to trial. Hypocrisy, humbug and double standards have reigned supreme.
    LOL. I dunno, perhaps it has something to do with them not being in the same league as Goering when it comes to war crimes?
  • SandyRentoolSandyRentool Posts: 22,036
    stodge said:

    Andy_JS said:

    The media keeps telling us that life is going to completely change. Meanwhile, people queue up to enter Ikea.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52874615

    I don't know what point you are trying to make. Nobody ever said people wouldn't stop trying to improve their homes or enjoying Swedish meatballs.

    The big change is queuing an hour and a half to enter a store or did that little nugget pass you by?
    How come Ikea got to open today? Not exactly a car showroom.

    Mind, they were ahead of the game with their bloody annoying one way system.
  • DougSealDougSeal Posts: 12,541

    stodge said:

    They are advocating using the armed forces against their own countrymen. That's astonishing.

    I remember the outrage when Polish troops shot Solidarity strikers in 1981 - when the point comes when a Government feels it has to turn its own troops on its own people a line has been crossed.

    I've only seen bits of America - the chasm between wealth and poverty is frightening. I found San Francisco intimidating with pan handlers on every corner. It's different in Vegas - the poor and the dispossessed are usually out of sight but if you look Downtown in the early morning you'll see them.

    MY experience of the restaurants is this - the servers (waiters/waitresses) are often white, very polite and eager to please. If you spend $120 on dinner they'll expect a $20 tip so make sure you've done well at the tables.

    Then you have the people who set the tables and clear way the plates - generally hispanic. They move fast, avoid eye contact - their place in the hierarchy is clear.

    The guests in the hotels come from all over the world but the weekend visitors are more often from the culturally conservative states. One evening Mrs Stodge and I had returned from dinner and got into the lift when this man rushed in and started lighting up his cigar in the lift.

    We must have looked appalled - he was not exactly confrontational but perplexed until he heard my British accent at which point he became apologetic and said he understood "you do things different over there". That's America - I don't pretend to understand it, I don't think anyone does - the Americans included.
    Work took me to the offices of investment banks in Manhattan before corona. What you notice is that almost all the guys on reception, doing security, checking your id etc are black.

    Once you are up in the lift and in the office, I'd kind of describe it as anything but black. White, Asian, Indian subcontinent and combinations thereof. But very few blacks.

    Tip: Do not ask for a white coffee in Manhattan. I did, and twice the black person serving me seemed to think I was asking for a coffee for a white person.

    They do not seem to have that expression for coffee with milk!
    I wonder what they consider a flat white to be?
    Yeh I never worked that out. But on two separate occassions the person serving me did seem to be a bit affronted when I asked for a 'white Americano!'

    Mortifying.
    Flat whites arrived in the States only a couple of years ago. Caused a bit of a stir.

    https://mashable.com/2015/01/07/flat-white/?europe=true
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anscluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    He was found guilty of both charges 1 and 2:

    Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
    Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace

    Have Blair and Bush been found similarly guilty?
    Surprise ! Surprise ! - because the political will or means has not been there to bring them to trial. Hypocrisy, humbug and double standards have reigned supreme.
    LOL. I dunno, perhaps it has something to do with them not being in the same league as Goering when it comes to war crimes?
    How many Iraqis have you had that conversation with?
  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 18,434
    In insane meteorological news the Met Office announce that May 2020 was the sunniest calendar month on record - sunnier than any month of June.

    https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/press-office/news/weather-and-climate/2020/2020-spring-and-may-stats
  • justin124justin124 Posts: 11,527
    ydoethur said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anschluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    On Count 1, as he was in charge of the four year plan designed to prepare the German economy for war by the mid-1940s at the latest, it seems fair enough.

    As he was the commander of the Luftwaffe, it is also hard to argue he did not bear at least some responsibility for the German attacks on the Netherlands while it was still neutral.
    But the drawing up of plans has surely to be distinguished from the political intent to put them into operation. Goering was certainly involved in the Rearmament Programme - though pretty ineffective in his role.I would argue that is very different from having a clear plan to invade other states. Those decisions were made by Hitler alone - generally on a pretty oportunistic basis. Goering certainly carried out the orders given to him , but in doing so he was acting in much the same way as British senior commanders such as Portal, Dowding and Harris. His conviction on Counts1 and 2 reflected the highly political nature of the Nuremburg Trial - the judges knew what was expected of them in 1946.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,119
    Becoming a bit of a pattern....

    Russian forensics expert suffering from coronavirus falls to her death from a window: Fatality follows three similar window falls by Russian doctors linked to Covid-19

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8377329/Russian-forensics-expert-suffering-coronavirus-falls-death-window.html
  • SandyRentoolSandyRentool Posts: 22,036
    DougSeal said:

    stodge said:

    They are advocating using the armed forces against their own countrymen. That's astonishing.

    I remember the outrage when Polish troops shot Solidarity strikers in 1981 - when the point comes when a Government feels it has to turn its own troops on its own people a line has been crossed.

    I've only seen bits of America - the chasm between wealth and poverty is frightening. I found San Francisco intimidating with pan handlers on every corner. It's different in Vegas - the poor and the dispossessed are usually out of sight but if you look Downtown in the early morning you'll see them.

    MY experience of the restaurants is this - the servers (waiters/waitresses) are often white, very polite and eager to please. If you spend $120 on dinner they'll expect a $20 tip so make sure you've done well at the tables.

    Then you have the people who set the tables and clear way the plates - generally hispanic. They move fast, avoid eye contact - their place in the hierarchy is clear.

    The guests in the hotels come from all over the world but the weekend visitors are more often from the culturally conservative states. One evening Mrs Stodge and I had returned from dinner and got into the lift when this man rushed in and started lighting up his cigar in the lift.

    We must have looked appalled - he was not exactly confrontational but perplexed until he heard my British accent at which point he became apologetic and said he understood "you do things different over there". That's America - I don't pretend to understand it, I don't think anyone does - the Americans included.
    Work took me to the offices of investment banks in Manhattan before corona. What you notice is that almost all the guys on reception, doing security, checking your id etc are black.

    Once you are up in the lift and in the office, I'd kind of describe it as anything but black. White, Asian, Indian subcontinent and combinations thereof. But very few blacks.

    Tip: Do not ask for a white coffee in Manhattan. I did, and twice the black person serving me seemed to think I was asking for a coffee for a white person.

    They do not seem to have that expression for coffee with milk!
    I wonder what they consider a flat white to be?
    Yeh I never worked that out. But on two separate occassions the person serving me did seem to be a bit affronted when I asked for a 'white Americano!'

    Mortifying.
    Flat whites arrived in the States only a couple of years ago. Caused a bit of a stir.

    https://mashable.com/2015/01/07/flat-white/?europe=true
    A cappuccino with the incorrect coffee to milk ratio.

    It's not a different drink.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830

    In insane meteorological news the Met Office announce that May 2020 was the sunniest calendar month on record - sunnier than any month of June.

    https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/press-office/news/weather-and-climate/2020/2020-spring-and-may-stats

    After a winter 3 degrees warmer than it should have been. We really are fucked aren't we?

    Another cockup by the IPCC: you should be able to point to this and say the argument is over, but they got so pissed off with people saying hurr, hurr, hurr, so much for global warming every time it snowed that they decreed that "weather isn't climate" when actually, at this scale, it is.
  • DougSealDougSeal Posts: 12,541
    RobD said:

    DougSeal said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anscluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    He was found guilty of both charges 1 and 2:

    Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
    Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace

    Have Blair and Bush been found similarly guilty?
    Well, Hitler was never technically found guilty, all we can do is debate what a court would find if a prosecution were brought. Same applies to most discussions of legal transgressions on this site.
    Do you seriously believe Blair and Bush should/would be sentenced to death for the Iraq war?
    Of course not. The ICC is unable to hand down the death penalty..
  • justin124justin124 Posts: 11,527
    RobD said:

    DougSeal said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anscluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    He was found guilty of both charges 1 and 2:

    Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
    Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace

    Have Blair and Bush been found similarly guilty?
    Well, Hitler was never technically found guilty, all we can do is debate what a court would find if a prosecution were brought. Same applies to most discussions of legal transgressions on this site.
    Do you seriously believe Blair and Bush should/would be sentenced to death for the Iraq war?
    Were the penalty to be still available and such a Tribunal established with the relevant powers, it is not obvious why both should not share the same fate - in the same way suffered by Saddam Hussein and Bin Laden.
  • justin124justin124 Posts: 11,527
    DougSeal said:

    RobD said:

    DougSeal said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anscluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    He was found guilty of both charges 1 and 2:

    Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
    Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace

    Have Blair and Bush been found similarly guilty?
    Well, Hitler was never technically found guilty, all we can do is debate what a court would find if a prosecution were brought. Same applies to most discussions of legal transgressions on this site.
    Do you seriously believe Blair and Bush should/would be sentenced to death for the Iraq war?
    Of course not. The ICC is unable to hand down the death penalty..
    Indeed - and nowadays the Nazi leaders would not be executed.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    DougSeal said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anscluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    He was found guilty of both charges 1 and 2:

    Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
    Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace

    Have Blair and Bush been found similarly guilty?
    Well, Hitler was never technically found guilty, all we can do is debate what a court would find if a prosecution were brought. Same applies to most discussions of legal transgressions on this site.
    Do you seriously believe Blair and Bush should/would be sentenced to death for the Iraq war?
    Were the penalty to be still available and such a Tribunal established with the relevant powers, it is not obvious why both should not share the same fate - in the same way suffered by Saddam Hussein and Bin Laden.
    Leave it out. We are just talking war crimes here, not extramarital sex.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 123,139
    Nigelb said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    HYUFD said:


    Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory

    For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?

    We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.

    It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
    For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
    That's a little optimistic, HYUFD.

    There's a pub in Tewkesbury called The Ancient Grudge. It is named not after the Civil War, as I once thought, but the decisive battle of the War of the Roses.

    Takes a while for people to get over these things. I imagine in centuries to come avid geeks will re-enact the blog wars fought on this site, dressing up as Remoaners and Leavers to do so.

    I can envisage you as one of their favorite characters, HYUFD. Be proud!
    Which side would ‘HYUFD’ be on?
    He might be the Samuel Pepys of his age...
    I am reading Pepys through lockdown
  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758

    stodge said:

    They are advocating using the armed forces against their own countrymen. That's astonishing.

    I remember the outrage when Polish troops shot Solidarity strikers in 1981 - when the point comes when a Government feels it has to turn its own troops on its own people a line has been crossed.

    I've only seen bits of America - the chasm between wealth and poverty is frightening. I found San Francisco intimidating with pan handlers on every corner. It's different in Vegas - the poor and the dispossessed are usually out of sight but if you look Downtown in the early morning you'll see them.

    MY experience of the restaurants is this - the servers (waiters/waitresses) are often white, very polite and eager to please. If you spend $120 on dinner they'll expect a $20 tip so make sure you've done well at the tables.

    Then you have the people who set the tables and clear way the plates - generally hispanic. They move fast, avoid eye contact - their place in the hierarchy is clear.

    The guests in the hotels come from all over the world but the weekend visitors are more often from the culturally conservative states. One evening Mrs Stodge and I had returned from dinner and got into the lift when this man rushed in and started lighting up his cigar in the lift.

    We must have looked appalled - he was not exactly confrontational but perplexed until he heard my British accent at which point he became apologetic and said he understood "you do things different over there". That's America - I don't pretend to understand it, I don't think anyone does - the Americans included.
    Work took me to the offices of investment banks in Manhattan before corona. What you notice is that almost all the guys on reception, doing security, checking your id etc are black.

    Once you are up in the lift and in the office, I'd kind of describe it as anything but black. White, Asian, Indian subcontinent and combinations thereof. But very few blacks.

    Tip: Do not ask for a white coffee in Manhattan. I did, and twice the black person serving me seemed to think I was asking for a coffee for a white person.

    They do not seem to have that expression for coffee with milk!
    The receptionists/security are usually outsourced services
  • DougSealDougSeal Posts: 12,541
    Scott_xP said:
    Westminster bubble story. Nothing to see here.

    (Did I get that right?)
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    DougSeal said:

    stodge said:

    They are advocating using the armed forces against their own countrymen. That's astonishing.

    I remember the outrage when Polish troops shot Solidarity strikers in 1981 - when the point comes when a Government feels it has to turn its own troops on its own people a line has been crossed.

    I've only seen bits of America - the chasm between wealth and poverty is frightening. I found San Francisco intimidating with pan handlers on every corner. It's different in Vegas - the poor and the dispossessed are usually out of sight but if you look Downtown in the early morning you'll see them.

    MY experience of the restaurants is this - the servers (waiters/waitresses) are often white, very polite and eager to please. If you spend $120 on dinner they'll expect a $20 tip so make sure you've done well at the tables.

    Then you have the people who set the tables and clear way the plates - generally hispanic. They move fast, avoid eye contact - their place in the hierarchy is clear.

    The guests in the hotels come from all over the world but the weekend visitors are more often from the culturally conservative states. One evening Mrs Stodge and I had returned from dinner and got into the lift when this man rushed in and started lighting up his cigar in the lift.

    We must have looked appalled - he was not exactly confrontational but perplexed until he heard my British accent at which point he became apologetic and said he understood "you do things different over there". That's America - I don't pretend to understand it, I don't think anyone does - the Americans included.
    Work took me to the offices of investment banks in Manhattan before corona. What you notice is that almost all the guys on reception, doing security, checking your id etc are black.

    Once you are up in the lift and in the office, I'd kind of describe it as anything but black. White, Asian, Indian subcontinent and combinations thereof. But very few blacks.

    Tip: Do not ask for a white coffee in Manhattan. I did, and twice the black person serving me seemed to think I was asking for a coffee for a white person.

    They do not seem to have that expression for coffee with milk!
    I wonder what they consider a flat white to be?
    Yeh I never worked that out. But on two separate occassions the person serving me did seem to be a bit affronted when I asked for a 'white Americano!'

    Mortifying.
    Flat whites arrived in the States only a couple of years ago. Caused a bit of a stir.

    https://mashable.com/2015/01/07/flat-white/?europe=true
    A cappuccino with the incorrect coffee to milk ratio.

    It's not a different drink.
    I'm not sure how Starbucks makes theirs but in a proper Flat White the milk is not the same as Cappuccino milk.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 123,139

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    HYUFD said:


    Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory

    For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?

    We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.

    It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
    For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
    That's a little optimistic, HYUFD.

    There's a pub in Tewkesbury called The Ancient Grudge. It is named not after the Civil War, as I once thought, but the decisive battle of the War of the Roses.

    Takes a while for people to get over these things. I imagine in centuries to come avid geeks will re-enact the blog wars fought on this site, dressing up as Remoaners and Leavers to do so.

    I can envisage you as one of their favorite characters, HYUFD. Be proud!
    I would be Manchester or Stanley though, changed sides halfway through
  • squareroot2squareroot2 Posts: 6,729
    This thread is a late thread...
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 123,139
    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    Foxy said:



    RobD said:

    justin124 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Alistair said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Sean_F said:

    IanB2 said:

    coach said:

    coach said:

    Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.

    That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters

    That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
    Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.

    The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
    It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
    Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.

    You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?

    You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.

    Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
    That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
    No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
    Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
    Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.

    It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
    That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
    Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents

    Nixon - Criminal
    Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars
    Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes
    Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east.
    Trump - doing ok so far.

    So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
    There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.

    There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
    Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
    Or the Nuremburg judges?
    I don't think WW2 was illegal.
    I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
    I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
    More guilty than Goering? Get a grip!
    Indeed so - Goering was not in favour of the attack on Poland and was not part of any decision making that authorised it.
    He may have done a few other naughty things in his time though.
    That is undeniable but is also a separate issue. There were other Counts in respect of which his conviction was probably deserved. He was also directly involved in the Anscluss with Austria in Spring 1938.
    He was found guilty of both charges 1 and 2:

    Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
    Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace

    Have Blair and Bush been found similarly guilty?
    Goering was of course only put on trial as the allies had invaded Germany and toppled the Nazi regime
  • SandyRentoolSandyRentool Posts: 22,036

    DougSeal said:

    stodge said:

    They are advocating using the armed forces against their own countrymen. That's astonishing.

    I remember the outrage when Polish troops shot Solidarity strikers in 1981 - when the point comes when a Government feels it has to turn its own troops on its own people a line has been crossed.

    I've only seen bits of America - the chasm between wealth and poverty is frightening. I found San Francisco intimidating with pan handlers on every corner. It's different in Vegas - the poor and the dispossessed are usually out of sight but if you look Downtown in the early morning you'll see them.

    MY experience of the restaurants is this - the servers (waiters/waitresses) are often white, very polite and eager to please. If you spend $120 on dinner they'll expect a $20 tip so make sure you've done well at the tables.

    Then you have the people who set the tables and clear way the plates - generally hispanic. They move fast, avoid eye contact - their place in the hierarchy is clear.

    The guests in the hotels come from all over the world but the weekend visitors are more often from the culturally conservative states. One evening Mrs Stodge and I had returned from dinner and got into the lift when this man rushed in and started lighting up his cigar in the lift.

    We must have looked appalled - he was not exactly confrontational but perplexed until he heard my British accent at which point he became apologetic and said he understood "you do things different over there". That's America - I don't pretend to understand it, I don't think anyone does - the Americans included.
    Work took me to the offices of investment banks in Manhattan before corona. What you notice is that almost all the guys on reception, doing security, checking your id etc are black.

    Once you are up in the lift and in the office, I'd kind of describe it as anything but black. White, Asian, Indian subcontinent and combinations thereof. But very few blacks.

    Tip: Do not ask for a white coffee in Manhattan. I did, and twice the black person serving me seemed to think I was asking for a coffee for a white person.

    They do not seem to have that expression for coffee with milk!
    I wonder what they consider a flat white to be?
    Yeh I never worked that out. But on two separate occassions the person serving me did seem to be a bit affronted when I asked for a 'white Americano!'

    Mortifying.
    Flat whites arrived in the States only a couple of years ago. Caused a bit of a stir.

    https://mashable.com/2015/01/07/flat-white/?europe=true
    A cappuccino with the incorrect coffee to milk ratio.

    It's not a different drink.
    I'm not sure how Starbucks makes theirs but in a proper Flat White the milk is not the same as Cappuccino milk.
    Kangaroo milk?
  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758
    DougSeal said:

    Scott_xP said:
    Westminster bubble story. Nothing to see here.

    (Did I get that right?)
    There is an issue with reporting political opponents to the police for advantage

    Jenrick has made a decision a few weeks after he sat at the same table as one of the developers at a fundraising dinner. He claims that they brought it up and he said it would be inappropriate to discuss.

    In generating the headline “police investigate” the political damage is done regardless of the truth of the matter.

    There should be an alternative route to check if there is even a primary facia case before involving the police
  • Sunil_PrasannanSunil_Prasannan Posts: 51,878

    Becoming a bit of a pattern....

    Russian forensics expert suffering from coronavirus falls to her death from a window: Fatality follows three similar window falls by Russian doctors linked to Covid-19

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8377329/Russian-forensics-expert-suffering-coronavirus-falls-death-window.html

    Coincidentally, just reading about the German Occupation of Serbia, and the local collaborationist leader, General Nedic, also "committed suicide" after the war - by falling out of a window in 1946.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milan_Nedić
  • eristdooferistdoof Posts: 5,065
    stodge said:

    They are advocating using the armed forces against their own countrymen. That's astonishing.

    I remember the outrage when Polish troops shot Solidarity strikers in 1981 - when the point comes when a Government feels it has to turn its own troops on its own people a line has been crossed.

    I've only seen bits of America - the chasm between wealth and poverty is frightening. I found San Francisco intimidating with pan handlers on every corner. It's different in Vegas - the poor and the dispossessed are usually out of sight but if you look Downtown in the early morning you'll see them.

    MY experience of the restaurants is this - the servers (waiters/waitresses) are often white, very polite and eager to please. If you spend $120 on dinner they'll expect a $20 tip so make sure you've done well at the tables.

    Then you have the people who set the tables and clear way the plates - generally hispanic. They move fast, avoid eye contact - their place in the hierarchy is clear.

    The guests in the hotels come from all over the world but the weekend visitors are more often from the culturally conservative states. One evening Mrs Stodge and I had returned from dinner and got into the lift when this man rushed in and started lighting up his cigar in the lift.

    We must have looked appalled - he was not exactly confrontational but perplexed until he heard my British accent at which point he became apologetic and said he understood "you do things different over there". That's America - I don't pretend to understand it, I don't think anyone does - the Americans included.
    The outrage in Poland was not just because of the military crackdown, but especially because many of the soldiers in Polish uniforms could speak Russian but not Polish.
  • MangoMango Posts: 1,019



    Galloway is a brilliant orator but a thoroughly vile human being. Of course he was right about Iraq.

    It wasn't a particularly difficult call, was it? I got it right, as did millions of others. And all without saluting anybody's indefatigability.
This discussion has been closed.