On topic, it’s a provocative piece but I think the idea of a two term president standing for the vice-presidency would be squelched by the Supreme Court even if the beneficiary would be a Republican. Their loyalty is ideological, not personal.
It looks like Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin plus Florida are again the key swing states that will decide if Trump is re elected or if Biden joins Reagan as only the second candidate in 100 years to beat an incumbent president after only 1 term of his party in the White House.
If Trump is re elected he might try to continue in power on the bottom of a ticket headed by VP Pence in 2024 but I cannot see it winning, after 8 years of a Republican administration voters would almost certainly be looking for a change with a young, charismatic Democrat like Joe Kennedy III or Pete Buttigieg likely to be favourite to win
Reading this pretty awful story about Kate Garraway's husband, it does make me wonder if Boris Johnson has also been physically irreperably damaged. Clearly he wasn't as ill as Derek but he still doesn't look well to me.
Certainly, the one area where I had felt confident Boris would be at his strongest was at the Despatch Box for PMQs on account of his sheer intelligence and mental agility, but he does seem to have been really struggling recently at this weekly encounter. Possibly he is still suffering from his recent illness but he definitely needs to up his game and soon.
Johnson seems to have had the fairly typical slow post virus recovery syndrome, but was never a good parliamentarian. His style makes for an entertaining after dinner speaker or panel show host. Nothing more.
I am not entirely sure his after dinner speaking is as positively legendary as he would have us believe.
Jeremy Vine regales a story of attending an event with Johnson, who turning up late, checked with Vine the nature of the event. Vine recalls that without notes Johnson delivered a faultless presentation. Vine was suitably impressed. The following year Vine and Johnson attended a completely different event. According to Vine, Johnson delivered the same presentation almost verbatim as he had the previous year.
It is now 57 days since the coal fired power stations were switched off.
Given this is the best time of year for solar and probably wind as well, plus a collapse in the demand for power, my suspicion is that they will not be turned on again until October.
I wonder a bit actually whether they will ever be turned on again. Most of them were due to shut over the next two years anyway, and they’re not the sort of facility that takes kindly to being mothballed.
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our electricity, renewables 28% and domestic nuclear 20%, the balance coming from biomass, hydro, France and pumped storage. THis has cut carbon dioxide emissions from around 452g/kWh in 2009 to just 146g/kWh on average now - it has dipped as low as 43g/kWh on some very sunny, windy days.
So, progress, with the usual caveats and reservations.
That is an impressive drop of 68% - why have we not heard more about this over the last 10 years. Unalloyed good news. Epic communication fail.
It’s getting close to the levels that Aber had when I was a student there - and most of our electricity came from hydropower. It was described as a ridiculously green town, indeed one of the greenest in Europe, at the time, and yet we’re now getting very close to the whole country being at that level.
If David Cameron’s premiership was ultimately not a great success, he should certainly take satisfaction from the way his government oversaw so many changes to the energy mix that as recently as 2010 seemed utterly impossible.
Ahem.
Under the Coalition, the Dept of Energy and Climate change was an LD ministry, firstly under Chris Huhne, then Ed Davey. The Department was abolished in 2016.
Sigh. Was Joe really the best the Democrats could put up?
Well, they'd have been better going with KLOBUCHAR, but there's a lot to be said for Biden. The main argument that Trump might win in November is that he's very effective at attacking. Biden is a great candidate to run against that, because the voters are very familiar with him and like him, which is why nothing has really stuck at this point. If they'd gone for someone less well-known Trump would have a lot more scope to tell a story about them before they had a chance to tell their own.
I know he's old, but in the US they don't seem to care much about that, and the idea that he's got dementia wouldn't set Trump up well for a debate since Biden has been practicing all year and can follow an argument and make coherent points, and Trump can't.
Trump’s problem with attacking Biden’s mental faculties is that even a cursory glance at Trump’s twitter feed raises very serious questions over his own mental state.
But as we have seen from Trump rallies lots are too stupid to make that correlation.
Just look at the birther issue. They won't accept the evidence shown to them that Obama was born in the US. When the same nutty arguments they use to dismiss the evidence is put for therefore showing Trump might not be American then the response is 'Why would you say that?' and they have a puzzled look on their face.
Simply put Obama in Kenyan and Trump is American regardless of the evidence or lack of for either. Similarly Biden is senile and any evidence that Trump maybe a few sandwiches short of a picnic is inconceivable nonsense.
That gets Trump to 30%, but he needs more like 45%, for instance non-ideological voters who think he's good with the economy because he's a businessman.
America increasingly resembles a 70/80s dystopian sci-fi. I keep expecting to see Robocop or Snake Plisken pop up at any minute.
As Trump's America continues to degenerate, the closer the parallels to the fictional disintegration of the US political system that Margaret Attwood set out in "The Handmaid's Tale". It would be a simple matter for her to issue a slightly revised version in which the events that led to the Republic of Gideon came about quasi constitutionally on the back of an extended Trump presidency in which he's succeeded by religious extremists, all aided by sycophants and a pliant Supreme Court prepared to set aside constitutional checks and balances, rather than by the less plausible route of an armed coup by religious extremists.
Only about 25% of Americans are evangelical Christians.
They are not going to succeed in a coup to gain power if 75% of Americans oppose them and nor would they support doing it by force anyway, to ban abortion again and end gay marriage they would want to achieve it at the ballot box or through the appointment of very conservative Supreme Court justices
Reading this pretty awful story about Kate Garraway's husband, it does make me wonder if Boris Johnson has also been physically irreperably damaged. Clearly he wasn't as ill as Derek but he still doesn't look well to me.
Certainly, the one area where I had felt confident Boris would be at his strongest was at the Despatch Box for PMQs on account of his sheer intelligence and mental agility, but he does seem to have been really struggling recently at this weekly encounter. Possibly he is still suffering from his recent illness but he definitely needs to up his game and soon.
Johnson seems to have had the fairly typical slow post virus recovery syndrome, but was never a good parliamentarian. His style makes for an entertaining after dinner speaker or panel show host. Nothing more.
I am not entirely sure his after dinner speaking is as positively legendary as he would have us believe.
Jeremy Vine regales a story of attending an event with Johnson, who turning up late, checked with Vine the nature of the event. Vine recalls that without notes Johnson delivered a faultless presentation. Vine was suitably impressed. The following year Vine and Johnson attended a completely different event. According to Vine, Johnson delivered the same presentation almost verbatim as he had the previous year.
Yes, like any comedian, Johnsons technique is to reuse his material. It works until the material is overexposed.
It is now 57 days since the coal fired power stations were switched off.
Given this is the best time of year for solar and probably wind as well, plus a collapse in the demand for power, my suspicion is that they will not be turned on again until October.
I wonder a bit actually whether they will ever be turned on again. Most of them were due to shut over the next two years anyway, and they’re not the sort of facility that takes kindly to being mothballed.
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our electricity, renewables 28% and domestic nuclear 20%, the balance coming from biomass, hydro, France and pumped storage. THis has cut carbon dioxide emissions from around 452g/kWh in 2009 to just 146g/kWh on average now - it has dipped as low as 43g/kWh on some very sunny, windy days.
So, progress, with the usual caveats and reservations.
That is an impressive drop of 68% - why have we not heard more about this over the last 10 years. Unalloyed good news. Epic communication fail.
It’s getting close to the levels that Aber had when I was a student there - and most of our electricity came from hydropower. It was described as a ridiculously green town, indeed one of the greenest in Europe, at the time, and yet we’re now getting very close to the whole country being at that level.
If David Cameron’s premiership was ultimately not a great success, he should certainly take satisfaction from the way his government oversaw so many changes to the energy mix that as recently as 2010 seemed utterly impossible.
Ahem.
Under the Coalition, the Dept of Energy and Climate change was an LD ministry, firstly under Chris Huhne, then Ed Davey. The Department was abolished in 2016.
I said ‘his government.’ Not his party.
And it should also be noted that the steep reduction in and recent abolition of the feed in tariff for domestic solar was a serious mis-step.
Interesting header subject. I wouldn't put it past trump to want to go for a third term, if nothing else beating Obamas length in office would be prize enough for trump.
Cant see the Russian style VP switch issue working though, once Pence is nominated for president why would he stick to his end of the bargain and stand down for trump. Just fire trump from his campaign and its done with.
I certainly agree on the coming campaign: Trump is going to try and hammer Biden over his health and frailty. That and China. It is going to the most brutal, dirty and depressing campaign in US history.
Will Biden follows Michelle's edict "When they go low, we go high"?
Or will he go it in low and dirty. " Donald - your twitter feed is public evidence of your fragile mental health. Everyone can see it. You are a clear and present danger."
Why is the latter going low and dirty? Aren't candidates allowed to state the truth? Low and dirty is when you start making things up.
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
It is now 57 days since the coal fired power stations were switched off.
Given this is the best time of year for solar and probably wind as well, plus a collapse in the demand for power, my suspicion is that they will not be turned on again until October.
I wonder a bit actually whether they will ever be turned on again. Most of them were due to shut over the next two years anyway, and they’re not the sort of facility that takes kindly to being mothballed.
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our electricity, renewables 28% and domestic nuclear 20%, the balance coming from biomass, hydro, France and pumped storage. THis has cut carbon dioxide emissions from around 452g/kWh in 2009 to just 146g/kWh on average now - it has dipped as low as 43g/kWh on some very sunny, windy days.
So, progress, with the usual caveats and reservations.
That is an impressive drop of 68% - why have we not heard more about this over the last 10 years. Unalloyed good news. Epic communication fail.
It’s getting close to the levels that Aber had when I was a student there - and most of our electricity came from hydropower. It was described as a ridiculously green town, indeed one of the greenest in Europe, at the time, and yet we’re now getting very close to the whole country being at that level.
If David Cameron’s premiership was ultimately not a great success, he should certainly take satisfaction from the way his government oversaw so many changes to the energy mix that as recently as 2010 seemed utterly impossible.
Ahem.
Under the Coalition, the Dept of Energy and Climate change was an LD ministry, firstly under Chris Huhne, then Ed Davey. The Department was abolished in 2016.
I said ‘his government.’ Not his party.
And it should also be noted that the abolition of the feed in tariff for domestic solar was a serious mis-step.
Yes, and while I realise the electoral damage done to the party by the Coalition, in several important areas the country was changed substantially for the better by the LDs being in government.
Ed Davey struggles to get attention, but was an extremely capable minister.
I am not sure that he is the right person for the next stage, but have enormous respect for his abilities.
It is now 57 days since the coal fired power stations were switched off.
Given this is the best time of year for solar and probably wind as well, plus a collapse in the demand for power, my suspicion is that they will not be turned on again until October.
I wonder a bit actually whether they will ever be turned on again. Most of them were due to shut over the next two years anyway, and they’re not the sort of facility that takes kindly to being mothballed.
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our electricity, renewables 28% and domestic nuclear 20%, the balance coming from biomass, hydro, France and pumped storage. THis has cut carbon dioxide emissions from around 452g/kWh in 2009 to just 146g/kWh on average now - it has dipped as low as 43g/kWh on some very sunny, windy days.
So, progress, with the usual caveats and reservations.
That is an impressive drop of 68% - why have we not heard more about this over the last 10 years. Unalloyed good news. Epic communication fail.
It’s getting close to the levels that Aber had when I was a student there - and most of our electricity came from hydropower. It was described as a ridiculously green town, indeed one of the greenest in Europe, at the time, and yet we’re now getting very close to the whole country being at that level.
If David Cameron’s premiership was ultimately not a great success, he should certainly take satisfaction from the way his government oversaw so many changes to the energy mix that as recently as 2010 seemed utterly impossible.
Ahem.
Under the Coalition, the Dept of Energy and Climate change was an LD ministry, firstly under Chris Huhne, then Ed Davey. The Department was abolished in 2016.
I said ‘his government.’ Not his party.
And it should also be noted that the steep reduction in and recent abolition of the feed in tariff for domestic solar was a serious mis-step.
Solar panels are now so much cheaper than they were that the feed in tariff is not really needed I think.
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our energy,
A third of our electricity.
Sorry, yes. Early morning brain fade. Thank you for the correction.
Most magnanimous of you!
I have actually, in light of that comment, been trying to find out what percentage of the UK’s energy mix was provided by electricity last month. Direct gas use will probably have been very low given the temperatures and offices, restaurants and pubs being shut. I imagine oil is also very substantially down. However, it’s proving tough to find the figures. Does anyone know where they are (or indeed, if they’ve been collated yet)?
I don't know about current use but you can get annual figures from the link below. From memory, electricity accounts for around 17% of consumed energy.
Sigh. Was Joe really the best the Democrats could put up?
Well, they'd have been better going with KLOBUCHAR, but there's a lot to be said for Biden. The main argument that Trump might win in November is that he's very effective at attacking. Biden is a great candidate to run against that, because the voters are very familiar with him and like him, which is why nothing has really stuck at this point. If they'd gone for someone less well-known Trump would have a lot more scope to tell a story about them before they had a chance to tell their own.
I know he's old, but in the US they don't seem to care much about that, and the idea that he's got dementia wouldn't set Trump up well for a debate since Biden has been practicing all year and can follow an argument and make coherent points, and Trump can't.
Trump’s problem with attacking Biden’s mental faculties is that even a cursory glance at Trump’s twitter feed raises very serious questions over his own mental state.
But as we have seen from Trump rallies lots are too stupid to make that correlation.
Just look at the birther issue. They won't accept the evidence shown to them that Obama was born in the US. When the same nutty arguments they use to dismiss the evidence is put for therefore showing Trump might not be American then the response is 'Why would you say that?' and they have a puzzled look on their face.
Simply put Obama in Kenyan and Trump is American regardless of the evidence or lack of for either. Similarly Biden is senile and any evidence that Trump maybe a few sandwiches short of a picnic is inconceivable nonsense.
That gets Trump to 30%, but he needs more like 45%, for instance non-ideological voters who think he's good with the economy because he's a businessman.
I agree. I just scares me the number of people who are idiots.
I also find it shocking the high percentage of men who support him.
Trump is a 74 year male, clinically obese, with probable heart disease and suspicions about mental health and dementia. Bear those things in mind when making comment on the likelihood of him being around in 2024, and beyond.
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
Robust though. I can see him making 90+.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
It is now 57 days since the coal fired power stations were switched off.
Given this is the best time of year for solar and probably wind as well, plus a collapse in the demand for power, my suspicion is that they will not be turned on again until October.
I wonder a bit actually whether they will ever be turned on again. Most of them were due to shut over the next two years anyway, and they’re not the sort of facility that takes kindly to being mothballed.
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our electricity, renewables 28% and domestic nuclear 20%, the balance coming from biomass, hydro, France and pumped storage. THis has cut carbon dioxide emissions from around 452g/kWh in 2009 to just 146g/kWh on average now - it has dipped as low as 43g/kWh on some very sunny, windy days.
So, progress, with the usual caveats and reservations.
That is an impressive drop of 68% - why have we not heard more about this over the last 10 years. Unalloyed good news. Epic communication fail.
It’s getting close to the levels that Aber had when I was a student there - and most of our electricity came from hydropower. It was described as a ridiculously green town, indeed one of the greenest in Europe, at the time, and yet we’re now getting very close to the whole country being at that level.
If David Cameron’s premiership was ultimately not a great success, he should certainly take satisfaction from the way his government oversaw so many changes to the energy mix that as recently as 2010 seemed utterly impossible.
Ahem.
Under the Coalition, the Dept of Energy and Climate change was an LD ministry, firstly under Chris Huhne, then Ed Davey. The Department was abolished in 2016.
I said ‘his government.’ Not his party.
And it should also be noted that the steep reduction in and recent abolition of the feed in tariff for domestic solar was a serious mis-step.
Solar panels are now so much cheaper than they were that the feed in tariff is not really needed I think.
“The developers Wirsol Energy and Hive Energy say it’s safe. They maintain the subsidy-free project will be one of the lowest-cost power generators in the UK and will bring local councils £1m every year that it is running. In 2015, the government controversially announced it would phase out subsidies from solar power, to a howl of protest from the industry. But the cost of solar panels has tumbled by two thirds since 2010.“
Edit: why does it say subsidies FROM solar power, rather than to?
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our energy,
A third of our electricity.
Sorry, yes. Early morning brain fade. Thank you for the correction.
Most magnanimous of you!
I have actually, in light of that comment, been trying to find out what percentage of the UK’s energy mix was provided by electricity last month. Direct gas use will probably have been very low given the temperatures and offices, restaurants and pubs being shut. I imagine oil is also very substantially down. However, it’s proving tough to find the figures. Does anyone know where they are (or indeed, if they’ve been collated yet)?
I don't know about current use but you can get annual figures from the link below. From memory, electricity accounts for around 17% of consumed energy.
It is now 57 days since the coal fired power stations were switched off.
Given this is the best time of year for solar and probably wind as well, plus a collapse in the demand for power, my suspicion is that they will not be turned on again until October.
I wonder a bit actually whether they will ever be turned on again. Most of them were due to shut over the next two years anyway, and they’re not the sort of facility that takes kindly to being mothballed.
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our electricity, renewables 28% and domestic nuclear 20%, the balance coming from biomass, hydro, France and pumped storage. THis has cut carbon dioxide emissions from around 452g/kWh in 2009 to just 146g/kWh on average now - it has dipped as low as 43g/kWh on some very sunny, windy days.
So, progress, with the usual caveats and reservations.
That is an impressive drop of 68% - why have we not heard more about this over the last 10 years. Unalloyed good news. Epic communication fail.
It’s getting close to the levels that Aber had when I was a student there - and most of our electricity came from hydropower. It was described as a ridiculously green town, indeed one of the greenest in Europe, at the time, and yet we’re now getting very close to the whole country being at that level.
If David Cameron’s premiership was ultimately not a great success, he should certainly take satisfaction from the way his government oversaw so many changes to the energy mix that as recently as 2010 seemed utterly impossible.
Ahem.
Under the Coalition, the Dept of Energy and Climate change was an LD ministry, firstly under Chris Huhne, then Ed Davey. The Department was abolished in 2016.
I said ‘his government.’ Not his party.
And it should also be noted that the steep reduction in and recent abolition of the feed in tariff for domestic solar was a serious mis-step.
Solar panels are now so much cheaper than they were that the feed in tariff is not really needed I think.
Our solar panels are producing more than ever, no doubt due to the good weather, but we receive feed in tariffs and the return on the capital with these tariffs and energy savings is around 11%
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our energy,
A third of our electricity.
Sorry, yes. Early morning brain fade. Thank you for the correction.
Most magnanimous of you!
I have actually, in light of that comment, been trying to find out what percentage of the UK’s energy mix was provided by electricity last month. Direct gas use will probably have been very low given the temperatures and offices, restaurants and pubs being shut. I imagine oil is also very substantially down. However, it’s proving tough to find the figures. Does anyone know where they are (or indeed, if they’ve been collated yet)?
I don't know about current use but you can get annual figures from the link below. From memory, electricity accounts for around 17% of consumed energy.
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
I am 76, maybe AD will catch me out as well but at least I have not destroyed my country
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
Robust though. I can see him making 90+.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
Isn't Barron one of the forgotten children? Don Jnr. for sure is the heir apparent and by the sound of it equally unpleasant.
It looks like Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin plus Florida are again the key swing states that will decide if Trump is re elected or if Biden joins Reagan as only the second candidate in 100 years to beat an incumbent president after only 1 term of his party in the White House.
If Trump is re elected he might try to continue in power on the bottom of a ticket headed by VP Pence in 2024 but I cannot see it winning, after 8 years of a Republican administration voters would almost certainly be looking for a change with a young, charismatic Democrat like Joe Kennedy III or Pete Buttigieg likely to be favourite to win
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
Robust though. I can see him making 90+.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
Robust though. I can see him making 90+.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
You are speaking rubbish.
The Tories only replace leaders when they are behind in the polls e.g. Thatcher in 1990 or IDS in 2003 or they lost the general election and refused to go e.g. Heath in 1975.
The Tories are still ahead in the polls and Boris won the last general election
Big mistake. They should look at happened to Met officers who tried this in London.
It's a power play that can embolden.
It didn't stop the violence against them a few hours later.
Disagreed.
I disagree.
If the police want to join in with the protestors then they can quietly march with them.
I think its incredibly insecure to see joining in with kneeling, which everyone in the protest is doing, to show white subservient to black.
That's like saying if one person salutes you, then you salute back, you're in a racial power play.
No it isn't. Such a salute would be one of mutual respect.
Your analogy would work if both sides were bending knees to each other but that's not what's happening here.
It's intended to perceptions of assumed racial hierarchies by inverting them.
I don't think that's constructive and risks reinforcing divides rather than breaking them down.
The protestors are kneeling too, its symbolic, no more a power play than clapping or any other symbolism.
Joining in with kneeling is joining in with the symbolism, not reversing it.
If the Police kneel its them recognising that black lives matter, which shouldn't be a difficult thing for them to do.
Sorry Philip, I'm not with you on this. I have seen protesters kneeling, yes (like NFL during the US national anthem) but what's worried me though is police officers kneeling to protesters who were shouting at them to do so, as the BBC news and Twitter clips showed.
I'm afraid that's a form of intimidation, particularly when it's clear what happened to some police officers who were injured subsequently who were in no way culpable for what happened in the USA. They were just attacking the uniform.
I understand why some might want to do that - as a sign of support, in which they can see no harm, and to try and calm the crowd - but it's different to clapping (a show of appreciation) or other forms of symbolism (although possibly the raised fist is another example).
Why? Because kneeling is a formal act of submission, a recognition of authority and a demonstration of fealty. It's a power statement, and one that has ramifications, particularly when those who do it are entrusted with exercising power to defend the law on behalf of the public.
Let me be clear: I think the US police has serious problems with its unions and its culture - witness the 57 officers who resigned en-masse yesterday because two of their colleagues who slammed an elderly man to the ground and gave him a very serious head wound were suspended. It's a closed shop. They are always the victims and never own anything. And they have been using excessive force for a long time, and are still doing it today in countering the protests. There are also plenty of racist officers within its ranks.
I deplore all that, and there are still some examples of this in our society too (although not the same extent) and that must be rooted out. But, I think it's dangerous to introduce power-based gesture politics to those in authority. I'm also very uncomfortable with the sweeping claims being made along racial lines by many at present of white privilege and black oppression: the truth is far more complicated than that. It ends up weaponising racism as a tool of anti-racism and polarising people between the outraged and the self-righteous.
How that gets us to a place where race is no longer an issue and we live in peace, I struggle to see.
My view is that off-duty police officers should quietly march together with the protesters. They should talk to them, hug them, eat with them and be with them: show peaceful togetherness and fellowship.
But, bending knees either which way, particularly when this appears to be expected far more when it's along racial lines?
No. I wouldn't do it, and I wouldn't expect them to either.
Sigh. Was Joe really the best the Democrats could put up?
Well, they'd have been better going with KLOBUCHAR, but there's a lot to be said for Biden. The main argument that Trump might win in November is that he's very effective at attacking. Biden is a great candidate to run against that, because the voters are very familiar with him and like him, which is why nothing has really stuck at this point. If they'd gone for someone less well-known Trump would have a lot more scope to tell a story about them before they had a chance to tell their own.
I know he's old, but in the US they don't seem to care much about that, and the idea that he's got dementia wouldn't set Trump up well for a debate since Biden has been practicing all year and can follow an argument and make coherent points, and Trump can't.
Trump’s problem with attacking Biden’s mental faculties is that even a cursory glance at Trump’s twitter feed raises very serious questions over his own mental state.
But as we have seen from Trump rallies lots are too stupid to make that correlation.
Just look at the birther issue. They won't accept the evidence shown to them that Obama was born in the US. When the same nutty arguments they use to dismiss the evidence is put for therefore showing Trump might not be American then the response is 'Why would you say that?' and they have a puzzled look on their face.
Simply put Obama in Kenyan and Trump is American regardless of the evidence or lack of for either. Similarly Biden is senile and any evidence that Trump maybe a few sandwiches short of a picnic is inconceivable nonsense.
That gets Trump to 30%, but he needs more like 45%, for instance non-ideological voters who think he's good with the economy because he's a businessman.
I agree. I just scares me the number of people who are idiots.
I also find it shocking the high percentage of men who support him.
63% of white men in America voted for Trump in 2016
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
Robust though. I can see him making 90+.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
I am 76, maybe AD will catch me out as well but at least I have not destroyed my country
I hope it doesn’t catch you out for many years yet, Big-G.
Equally, you are not trying to do one of the most stressful and demanding jobs in the world.
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
You are speaking rubbish.
The Tories only replace leaders when they are behind in the polls e.g. Thatcher in 1990 or IDS in 2003 or they lost the general election and refused to go e.g. Heath in 1975.
The Tories are still ahead in the polls and Boris won the last general election
The fact you seem to be unable to see what is in plain sight is rather sad really
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our energy,
A third of our electricity.
Sorry, yes. Early morning brain fade. Thank you for the correction.
Most magnanimous of you!
I have actually, in light of that comment, been trying to find out what percentage of the UK’s energy mix was provided by electricity last month. Direct gas use will probably have been very low given the temperatures and offices, restaurants and pubs being shut. I imagine oil is also very substantially down. However, it’s proving tough to find the figures. Does anyone know where they are (or indeed, if they’ve been collated yet)?
I don't know about current use but you can get annual figures from the link below. From memory, electricity accounts for around 17% of consumed energy.
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
Indeed.
I see BoZo is barely ahead of Shapps, Truss or JRM.
It is now 57 days since the coal fired power stations were switched off.
Given this is the best time of year for solar and probably wind as well, plus a collapse in the demand for power, my suspicion is that they will not be turned on again until October.
I wonder a bit actually whether they will ever be turned on again. Most of them were due to shut over the next two years anyway, and they’re not the sort of facility that takes kindly to being mothballed.
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our electricity, renewables 28% and domestic nuclear 20%, the balance coming from biomass, hydro, France and pumped storage. THis has cut carbon dioxide emissions from around 452g/kWh in 2009 to just 146g/kWh on average now - it has dipped as low as 43g/kWh on some very sunny, windy days.
So, progress, with the usual caveats and reservations.
That is an impressive drop of 68% - why have we not heard more about this over the last 10 years. Unalloyed good news. Epic communication fail.
We have heard a lot but its never good enough until it gets to zero apparently.
A lot of it is bound up in political ideology, of course.
Consider this: if we did get to net zero and the bulk of the population were still happily eating meat, would PETA and vegans currently using climate-change as their principle argument pack their bags?
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
I am 76, maybe AD will catch me out as well but at least I have not destroyed my country
I hope it doesn’t catch you out for many years yet, Big-G.
Equally, you are not trying to do one of the most stressful and demanding jobs in the world.
Indeed, but rest assured I would not destroy my country
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
I am 76, maybe AD will catch me out as well but at least I have not destroyed my country
I hope it doesn’t catch you out for many years yet, Big-G.
Equally, you are not trying to do one of the most stressful and demanding jobs in the world.
I am not sure Trump is 'trying' particularly hard!
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
Robust though. I can see him making 90+.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
Isn't Barron one of the forgotten children? Don Jnr. for sure is the heir apparent and by the sound of it equally unpleasant.
We certainly do not want Don Jnr. But thankfully I think they would skip a generation. A good analogy would be with our royal family where Donald is the Queen, Jnr is Prince Charles and Barron is Prince William.
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
I am 76, maybe AD will catch me out as well but at least I have not destroyed my country
I hope it doesn’t catch you out for many years yet, Big-G.
Equally, you are not trying to do one of the most stressful and demanding jobs in the world.
Indeed, but rest assured I would not destroy my country
No, but you’re a decent and intelligent human being.
Reading this pretty awful story about Kate Garraway's husband, it does make me wonder if Boris Johnson has also been physically irreperably damaged. Clearly he wasn't as ill as Derek but he still doesn't look well to me.
Certainly, the one area where I had felt confident Boris would be at his strongest was at the Despatch Box for PMQs on account of his sheer intelligence and mental agility, but he does seem to have been really struggling recently at this weekly encounter. Possibly he is still suffering from his recent illness but he definitely needs to up his game and soon.
Johnson seems to have had the fairly typical slow post virus recovery syndrome, but was never a good parliamentarian. His style makes for an entertaining after dinner speaker or panel show host. Nothing more.
I am not entirely sure his after dinner speaking is as positively legendary as he would have us believe.
Jeremy Vine regales a story of attending an event with Johnson, who turning up late, checked with Vine the nature of the event. Vine recalls that without notes Johnson delivered a faultless presentation. Vine was suitably impressed. The following year Vine and Johnson attended a completely different event. According to Vine, Johnson delivered the same presentation almost verbatim as he had the previous year.
Why’s that a criticism?
It suggests laziness (or efficiency) but he was paid to give an entertaining evening speech on those two occasions and he did so. It just happened that there was an overlap in the audience
It is now 57 days since the coal fired power stations were switched off.
Given this is the best time of year for solar and probably wind as well, plus a collapse in the demand for power, my suspicion is that they will not be turned on again until October.
I wonder a bit actually whether they will ever be turned on again. Most of them were due to shut over the next two years anyway, and they’re not the sort of facility that takes kindly to being mothballed.
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our electricity, renewables 28% and domestic nuclear 20%, the balance coming from biomass, hydro, France and pumped storage. THis has cut carbon dioxide emissions from around 452g/kWh in 2009 to just 146g/kWh on average now - it has dipped as low as 43g/kWh on some very sunny, windy days.
So, progress, with the usual caveats and reservations.
That is an impressive drop of 68% - why have we not heard more about this over the last 10 years. Unalloyed good news. Epic communication fail.
We have heard a lot but its never good enough until it gets to zero apparently.
A significant minority on the right spent years telling us renewables didn’t work, even today their suspicious of it and dislike wind farms.
But that was probably driven by nimbyism dressed up as other objections.
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
You are speaking rubbish.
The Tories only replace leaders when they are behind in the polls e.g. Thatcher in 1990 or IDS in 2003 or they lost the general election and refused to go e.g. Heath in 1975.
The Tories are still ahead in the polls and Boris won the last general election
The fact you seem to be unable to see what is in plain sight is rather sad really
Nothing to see, as long as the Tories lead on voting intention Boris can remain Tory leader and PM for decades if he wants
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
Indeed.
I see BoZo is barely ahead of Shapps, Truss or JRM.
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
Robust though. I can see him making 90+.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
You sound like the person who was printing Chelsea 2024 banners in 2016...
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
Robust though. I can see him making 90+.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
Isn't Barron one of the forgotten children? Don Jnr. for sure is the heir apparent and by the sound of it equally unpleasant.
We certainly do not want Don Jnr. But thankfully I think they would skip a generation. A good analogy would be with our royal family where Donald is the Queen, Jnr is Prince Charles and Barron is Prince William.
I am still going with Don Jnr. Should that transpire, we really will be in the cart as Don Jnr. makes Don Snr. by comparison, seem like Mother Theresa.
Sigh. Was Joe really the best the Democrats could put up?
Well, they'd have been better going with KLOBUCHAR, but there's a lot to be said for Biden. The main argument that Trump might win in November is that he's very effective at attacking. Biden is a great candidate to run against that, because the voters are very familiar with him and like him, which is why nothing has really stuck at this point. If they'd gone for someone less well-known Trump would have a lot more scope to tell a story about them before they had a chance to tell their own.
I know he's old, but in the US they don't seem to care much about that, and the idea that he's got dementia wouldn't set Trump up well for a debate since Biden has been practicing all year and can follow an argument and make coherent points, and Trump can't.
Biden also instantly represents a better America. No need to introduce himself or where he is coming from, the public know him.
Hopefully enough will realise that it is him or the end of the Republic in any shape that is recognizable.
I'm not optimistic.
All places have national pride but Americans seem to have a high proportion for whom belief in the destiny of the nation and sanctity of it's constitution and institutions is unshakeable.
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
I am 76, maybe AD will catch me out as well but at least I have not destroyed my country
Don't be so modest; you made a small contribution by voting for Johnson.
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
Indeed.
I see BoZo is barely ahead of Shapps, Truss or JRM.
90% of the names on there I’ve never heard of so I couldn’t have a view on them for the wider population it’s probably 95%. As for Sunak, he’s yet to actually deliver anything which has been tested by time as a success. To jump on his bandwagon now could leave many with mud on their faces in the future.
“If Trump wants three terms, they’re there to be had.”
Unmitigated nonsense.
This is the weakest Herdson conclusion I’ve ever read. I realise that header writers have to attract attention and push some buttons, but it is always best to avoid complete, unqualified piffle.
I disagree. He expresses my own beliefs about the situation extremely well, and gives some justification for them. I’d add the perennial complaisance of people to those in power; were he to win, I think the scenario, or something like it, entirely possible.
Like Foxy, though, I think he’s far more likely to lose in November (allowing for some concern about attempts to manipulate the ballot).
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
Robust though. I can see him making 90+.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
Barron seems polite and sensible
He must take after his mother.
His mother, who married Donald Trump?
For wealth and security, yes. It was a contractual arrangement
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
You are speaking rubbish.
The Tories only replace leaders when they are behind in the polls e.g. Thatcher in 1990 or IDS in 2003 or they lost the general election and refused to go e.g. Heath in 1975.
The Tories are still ahead in the polls and Boris won the last general election
The fact you seem to be unable to see what is in plain sight is rather sad really
Nothing to see, as long as the Tories lead on voting intention Boris can remain Tory leader and PM for decades if he wants
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
Indeed.
I see BoZo is barely ahead of Shapps, Truss or JRM.
The mystery is why are Raab and Shapps so high.
Shapps has been much better recently but Raab is colourless
Reading this pretty awful story about Kate Garraway's husband, it does make me wonder if Boris Johnson has also been physically irreperably damaged. Clearly he wasn't as ill as Derek but he still doesn't look well to me.
Certainly, the one area where I had felt confident Boris would be at his strongest was at the Despatch Box for PMQs on account of his sheer intelligence and mental agility, but he does seem to have been really struggling recently at this weekly encounter. Possibly he is still suffering from his recent illness but he definitely needs to up his game and soon.
Johnson seems to have had the fairly typical slow post virus recovery syndrome, but was never a good parliamentarian. His style makes for an entertaining after dinner speaker or panel show host. Nothing more.
I am not entirely sure his after dinner speaking is as positively legendary as he would have us believe.
Jeremy Vine regales a story of attending an event with Johnson, who turning up late, checked with Vine the nature of the event. Vine recalls that without notes Johnson delivered a faultless presentation. Vine was suitably impressed. The following year Vine and Johnson attended a completely different event. According to Vine, Johnson delivered the same presentation almost verbatim as he had the previous year.
Why’s that a criticism?
It suggests laziness (or efficiency) but he was paid to give an entertaining evening speech on those two occasions and he did so. It just happened that there was an overlap in the audience
I wasn't suggesting it wasn't value for money, unless of course one had paid to attend both events. I was alluding to the point that Johnson may just be a one trick pony.
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
I am 76, maybe AD will catch me out as well but at least I have not destroyed my country
Don't be so modest; you made a small contribution by voting for Johnson.
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
Indeed.
I see BoZo is barely ahead of Shapps, Truss or JRM.
The mystery is why are Raab and Shapps so high.
I have little time for Shapps because of his history, but he has performed well in the media during this crisis and on more than one occasion has been given a hospital pass by being the spokesman dealing with the media that day.
On topic, it’s a provocative piece but I think the idea of a two term president standing for the vice-presidency would be squelched by the Supreme Court even if the beneficiary would be a Republican. Their loyalty is ideological, not personal.
It is now 57 days since the coal fired power stations were switched off.
Given this is the best time of year for solar and probably wind as well, plus a collapse in the demand for power, my suspicion is that they will not be turned on again until October.
I wonder a bit actually whether they will ever be turned on again. Most of them were due to shut over the next two years anyway, and they’re not the sort of facility that takes kindly to being mothballed.
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our electricity, renewables 28% and domestic nuclear 20%, the balance coming from biomass, hydro, France and pumped storage. THis has cut carbon dioxide emissions from around 452g/kWh in 2009 to just 146g/kWh on average now - it has dipped as low as 43g/kWh on some very sunny, windy days.
So, progress, with the usual caveats and reservations.
That is an impressive drop of 68% - why have we not heard more about this over the last 10 years. Unalloyed good news. Epic communication fail.
It’s getting close to the levels that Aber had when I was a student there - and most of our electricity came from hydropower. It was described as a ridiculously green town, indeed one of the greenest in Europe, at the time, and yet we’re now getting very close to the whole country being at that level.
If David Cameron’s premiership was ultimately not a great success, he should certainly take satisfaction from the way his government oversaw so many changes to the energy mix that as recently as 2010 seemed utterly impossible.
Ahem.
Under the Coalition, the Dept of Energy and Climate change was an LD ministry, firstly under Chris Huhne, then Ed Davey. The Department was abolished in 2016.
It was a coalition ministry in a coalition government. They share the plaudits and share the criticisms as far as I'm concerned, I think its amazingly petty when the LDs get no credit for their role in government and amazingly petty when they try to claim sole credit for something undertaken during it. Cameron can claim credit for things happening under his premiership, but as the lead figure in that area Davey could certainly push to take a larger share.
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
Indeed.
I see BoZo is barely ahead of Shapps, Truss or JRM.
The mystery is why are Raab and Shapps so high.
Shapps has been much better recently but Raab is colourless
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
Robust though. I can see him making 90+.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
Isn't Barron one of the forgotten children? Don Jnr. for sure is the heir apparent and by the sound of it equally unpleasant.
We certainly do not want Don Jnr. But thankfully I think they would skip a generation. A good analogy would be with our royal family where Donald is the Queen, Jnr is Prince Charles and Barron is Prince William.
I am still going with Don Jnr. Should that transpire, we really will be in the cart as Don Jnr. makes Don Snr. by comparison, seem like Mother Theresa.
Just as petty and vicious but without even being entertaining?
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
A neighbour of mine, who is American, said the other day that she hates Trump so much that she actually wants him to catch covid.
On topic, it’s a provocative piece but I think the idea of a two term president standing for the vice-presidency would be squelched by the Supreme Court even if the beneficiary would be a Republican. Their loyalty is ideological, not personal.
It is now 57 days since the coal fired power stations were switched off.
Given this is the best time of year for solar and probably wind as well, plus a collapse in the demand for power, my suspicion is that they will not be turned on again until October.
I wonder a bit actually whether they will ever be turned on again. Most of them were due to shut over the next two years anyway, and they’re not the sort of facility that takes kindly to being mothballed.
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our electricity, renewables 28% and domestic nuclear 20%, the balance coming from biomass, hydro, France and pumped storage. THis has cut carbon dioxide emissions from around 452g/kWh in 2009 to just 146g/kWh on average now - it has dipped as low as 43g/kWh on some very sunny, windy days.
So, progress, with the usual caveats and reservations.
That is an impressive drop of 68% - why have we not heard more about this over the last 10 years. Unalloyed good news. Epic communication fail.
We have heard a lot but its never good enough until it gets to zero apparently.
A lot of it is bound up in political ideology, of course.
Consider this: if we did get to net zero and the bulk of the population were still happily eating meat, would PETA and vegans currently using climate-change as their principle argument pack their bags?
No, they'd switch their argument.
Of course there are many other environmental issues besides Co2 production. The meat industry is quite responsible for a lot of habitat erosion, water usage, water pollution etc.
I am troubled by the inevitably vast quantities of plastic discarded in PPE at the hospital. Not everything is environmentally improving at the moment.
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
Indeed.
I see BoZo is barely ahead of Shapps, Truss or JRM.
The quality of that list makes me worry that they have omitted Incitatus by mistake.
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
Robust though. I can see him making 90+.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
Barron seems polite and sensible
Yes. But by the age of 35 he will have grown out of that. He will be ready to lead the family. I see Donald having a heart attack at the age of 94 in a rose garden next to the clubhouse at Largo. Poignantly, a small grandchild will giggle, thinking grandpa is playacting. Which he isn't. He's dead. But in the last few months he has imparted all his knowledge to his youngest son and so he dies a happy and contented man.
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
Robust though. I can see him making 90+.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
Barron seems polite and sensible
Yes. But by the age of 35 he will have grown out of that. He will be ready to lead the family. I see Donald having a heart attack at the age of 94 in a rose garden next to the clubhouse at Largo. Poignantly, a small grandchild will giggle, thinking grandpa is playacting. Which he isn't. He's dead. But in the last few months he has imparted all his knowledge to his youngest son and so he dies a happy and contented man.
In which case America will in effect have become a monarchy again not a Republic
It is now 57 days since the coal fired power stations were switched off.
Given this is the best time of year for solar and probably wind as well, plus a collapse in the demand for power, my suspicion is that they will not be turned on again until October.
I wonder a bit actually whether they will ever be turned on again. Most of them were due to shut over the next two years anyway, and they’re not the sort of facility that takes kindly to being mothballed.
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our electricity, renewables 28% and domestic nuclear 20%, the balance coming from biomass, hydro, France and pumped storage. THis has cut carbon dioxide emissions from around 452g/kWh in 2009 to just 146g/kWh on average now - it has dipped as low as 43g/kWh on some very sunny, windy days.
So, progress, with the usual caveats and reservations.
That is an impressive drop of 68% - why have we not heard more about this over the last 10 years. Unalloyed good news. Epic communication fail.
We have heard a lot but its never good enough until it gets to zero apparently.
A lot of it is bound up in political ideology, of course.
Consider this: if we did get to net zero and the bulk of the population were still happily eating meat, would PETA and vegans currently using climate-change as their principle argument pack their bags?
No, they'd switch their argument.
Of course there are many other environmental issues besides Co2 production. The meat industry is quite responsible for a lot of habitat erosion, water usage, water pollution etc.
I am troubled by the inevitably vast quantities of plastic discarded in PPE at the hospital. Not everything is environmentally improving at the moment.
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Er, 6 months after an enormous victory and without even waiting to see if he can rebound? No.
I'm no fan of Boris but I think the party can let him at least attempt to turn his personal ratings around. I mean the preposterously high Tory leads are gone but they're not exactly in awful territory yet
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
You are speaking rubbish.
The Tories only replace leaders when they are behind in the polls e.g. Thatcher in 1990 or IDS in 2003 or they lost the general election and refused to go e.g. Heath in 1975.
The Tories are still ahead in the polls and Boris won the last general election
The fact you seem to be unable to see what is in plain sight is rather sad really
Nothing to see, as long as the Tories lead on voting intention Boris can remain Tory leader and PM for decades if he wants
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
A neighbour of mine, who is American, said the other day that she hates Trump so much that she actually wants him to catch covid.
Too much?
I think that is quite restrained, Stocky, to be honest.
Yes, he has to survive another two months until 20th August before Betfair pays out but 1.05 on this (a 5% return on your money in less than 3 months) is as close to free money as you get.
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
Indeed.
I see BoZo is barely ahead of Shapps, Truss or JRM.
The quality of that list makes me worry that they have omitted Incitatus by mistake.
Perhaps one of them is nicknamed incitatus. Who do we think fulfills the same role?
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Given the Tories still have a comfortable poll lead of course not and you omitted to mention Boris still has a +63% rating with ConHome readers
Blind loyalty rather than realistic recognition Boris has lost huge support for his mishandling of Cummings and his obvious continuing health issues even with his party
He is becoming a liability
Indeed.
I see BoZo is barely ahead of Shapps, Truss or JRM.
The mystery is why are Raab and Shapps so high.
I have little time for Shapps because of his history, but he has performed well in the media during this crisis and on more than one occasion has been given a hospital pass by being the spokesman dealing with the media that day.
Shapps has been an effective minister; an effective partisan who stiffed Khan over TfL; by some accounts, he played a leading role in getting Boris elected to succeed Theresa May. He gets things done. His problem is he lacks gravitas because he looks about 12; maybe that can be changed.
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
Er, 6 months after an enormous victory and without even waiting to see if he can rebound? No.
I'm no fan of Boris but I think the party can let him at least attempt to turn his personal ratings around. I mean the preposterously high Tory leads are gone but they're not exactly in awful territory yet
He is a shadow of himself and self destructed over Cummings
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
I am 76, maybe AD will catch me out as well but at least I have not destroyed my country
Don't be so modest; you made a small contribution by voting for Johnson.
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
Robust though. I can see him making 90+.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
Barron seems polite and sensible
Yes. But by the age of 35 he will have grown out of that. He will be ready to lead the family. I see Donald having a heart attack at the age of 94 in a rose garden next to the clubhouse at Largo. Poignantly, a small grandchild will giggle, thinking grandpa is playacting. Which he isn't. He's dead. But in the last few months he has imparted all his knowledge to his youngest son and so he dies a happy and contented man.
In which case America will in effect have become a monarchy again not a Republic
Boris drops 20 points in ConHome survey to fourth behind Sunak, Gove, and Raab
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
My nose tells me that Sunak would win MPs and also a membership vote.
Gove and Raab would be clear also-rans.
If a vacancy did arise Sunak will hope to be John Major rather than David Miliband
More likely the new Blair
Very unlikely, Blair took his party from opposition into power after 18 years out of office.
Sunak would be taking over as PM after over a decade of his party in power
Sunak v. Starmer would be an interesting contest.
Honestly don't know who would win that one.
Could be Major v Kinnock 1992.
It would only likely happen if Boris went to WTO terms Brexit which proved as unpopular as the poll tax was for Thatcher and Sunak took over promising to do a FTA deal with the EU and accepting some single market alignment as Major replaced the poll tax with council tax
Very interesting thread about that persistent but now reducing [edit] discrepancy between documented Covid-19 deaths and excess deaths over normal in England -
It is now 57 days since the coal fired power stations were switched off.
Given this is the best time of year for solar and probably wind as well, plus a collapse in the demand for power, my suspicion is that they will not be turned on again until October.
I wonder a bit actually whether they will ever be turned on again. Most of them were due to shut over the next two years anyway, and they’re not the sort of facility that takes kindly to being mothballed.
At the moment, on average gas is providing around a third of our electricity, renewables 28% and domestic nuclear 20%, the balance coming from biomass, hydro, France and pumped storage. THis has cut carbon dioxide emissions from around 452g/kWh in 2009 to just 146g/kWh on average now - it has dipped as low as 43g/kWh on some very sunny, windy days.
So, progress, with the usual caveats and reservations.
That is an impressive drop of 68% - why have we not heard more about this over the last 10 years. Unalloyed good news. Epic communication fail.
We have heard a lot but its never good enough until it gets to zero apparently.
A lot of it is bound up in political ideology, of course.
Consider this: if we did get to net zero and the bulk of the population were still happily eating meat, would PETA and vegans currently using climate-change as their principle argument pack their bags?
No, they'd switch their argument.
Of course there are many other environmental issues besides Co2 production. The meat industry is quite responsible for a lot of habitat erosion, water usage, water pollution etc.
I am troubled by the inevitably vast quantities of plastic discarded in PPE at the hospital. Not everything is environmentally improving at the moment.
Greenpeace are opposed to the large solar farm I mentioned above. There is no pleasing some people.
Morning. What a downer of a read. But, yes, if he somehow manages to rig WH2020 and get a 2nd term - which is the only way he can possibly "win" at the polls - Donald Trump would no doubt seek to engineer a 3rd, either in person or by proxy. And then a 4th. And so on. Speaking for myself, the prospect has little appeal.
He will be 78 in 2024. Don’t rule out Anno Domini having some say in matters if he’s re-elected.
I am 76, maybe AD will catch me out as well but at least I have not destroyed my country
Don't be so modest; you made a small contribution by voting for Johnson.
I did not vote for Boris
Corbyn????
I did not vote for either Boris or Hunt but of course I vote conservative
Comments
Using latest Betfair probabilities, I reckon Biden will win 302 ECV.
270 needed .
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mMD5cZIBf7k8YoZcEjxMhmUm489cCPa0u9jgjULa1f0/edit?usp=sharing
Jeremy Vine regales a story of attending an event with Johnson, who turning up late, checked with Vine the nature of the event. Vine recalls that without notes Johnson delivered a faultless presentation. Vine was suitably impressed. The following year Vine and Johnson attended a completely different event. According to Vine, Johnson delivered the same presentation almost verbatim as he had the previous year.
Under the Coalition, the Dept of Energy and Climate change was an LD ministry, firstly under Chris Huhne, then Ed Davey. The Department was abolished in 2016.
They are not going to succeed in a coup to gain power if 75% of Americans oppose them and nor would they support doing it by force anyway, to ban abortion again and end gay marriage they would want to achieve it at the ballot box or through the appointment of very conservative Supreme Court justices
And it should also be noted that the steep reduction in and recent abolition of the feed in tariff for domestic solar was a serious mis-step.
Cant see the Russian style VP switch issue working though, once Pence is nominated for president why would he stick to his end of the bargain and stand down for trump. Just fire trump from his campaign and its done with.
Ed Davey struggles to get attention, but was an extremely capable minister.
I am not sure that he is the right person for the next stage, but have enormous respect for his abilities.
This is from last week: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52841223
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/digest-of-uk-energy-statistics-dukes-2019
I also find it shocking the high percentage of men who support him.
At which point Barron will be in his 30s. And ready.
Time for him to consider standing down and spending time with Carrie and his young son ?
“The developers Wirsol Energy and Hive Energy say it’s safe. They maintain the subsidy-free project will be one of the lowest-cost power generators in the UK and will bring local councils £1m every year that it is running.
In 2015, the government controversially announced it would phase out subsidies from solar power, to a howl of protest from the industry.
But the cost of solar panels has tumbled by two thirds since 2010.“
Edit: why does it say subsidies FROM solar power, rather than to?
He is becoming a liability
The Tories only replace leaders when they are behind in the polls e.g. Thatcher in 1990 or IDS in 2003 or they lost the general election and refused to go e.g. Heath in 1975.
The Tories are still ahead in the polls and Boris won the last general election
I'm afraid that's a form of intimidation, particularly when it's clear what happened to some police officers who were injured subsequently who were in no way culpable for what happened in the USA. They were just attacking the uniform.
I understand why some might want to do that - as a sign of support, in which they can see no harm, and to try and calm the crowd - but it's different to clapping (a show of appreciation) or other forms of symbolism (although possibly the raised fist is another example).
Why? Because kneeling is a formal act of submission, a recognition of authority and a demonstration of fealty. It's a power statement, and one that has ramifications, particularly when those who do it are entrusted with exercising power to defend the law on behalf of the public.
Let me be clear: I think the US police has serious problems with its unions and its culture - witness the 57 officers who resigned en-masse yesterday because two of their colleagues who slammed an elderly man to the ground and gave him a very serious head wound were suspended. It's a closed shop. They are always the victims and never own anything. And they have been using excessive force for a long time, and are still doing it today in countering the protests. There are also plenty of racist officers within its ranks.
I deplore all that, and there are still some examples of this in our society too (although not the same extent) and that must be rooted out. But, I think it's dangerous to introduce power-based gesture politics to those in authority. I'm also very uncomfortable with the sweeping claims being made along racial lines by many at present of white privilege and black oppression: the truth is far more complicated than that. It ends up weaponising racism as a tool of anti-racism and polarising people between the outraged and the self-righteous.
How that gets us to a place where race is no longer an issue and we live in peace, I struggle to see.
My view is that off-duty police officers should quietly march together with the protesters. They should talk to them, hug them, eat with them and be with them: show peaceful togetherness and fellowship.
But, bending knees either which way, particularly when this appears to be expected far more when it's along racial lines?
No. I wouldn't do it, and I wouldn't expect them to either.
Gove and Raab would be clear also-rans.
Blustering, waffling, flailing, detail-light, insufficient grip, doesn't even like the job etc etc.
Equally, you are not trying to do one of the most stressful and demanding jobs in the world.
I’m off for a bit. Have a good morning.
I see BoZo is barely ahead of Shapps, Truss or JRM.
Consider this: if we did get to net zero and the bulk of the population were still happily eating meat, would PETA and vegans currently using climate-change as their principle argument pack their bags?
No, they'd switch their argument.
Trump, however...
TTFN.
That includes Thatcher in 1979 who led on net approval and the Tories led on voting intention even though she trailed Callaghan on preferred PM
It suggests laziness (or efficiency) but he was paid to give an entertaining evening speech on those two occasions and he did so. It just happened that there was an overlap in the audience
He expresses my own beliefs about the situation extremely well, and gives some justification for them. I’d add the perennial complaisance of people to those in power; were he to win, I think the scenario, or something like it, entirely possible.
Like Foxy, though, I think he’s far more likely to lose in November (allowing for some concern about attempts to manipulate the ballot).
Too much?
Sunak would be taking over as PM after over a decade of his party in power
I am troubled by the inevitably vast quantities of plastic discarded in PPE at the hospital. Not everything is environmentally improving at the moment.
Honestly don't know who would win that one.
I'm no fan of Boris but I think the party can let him at least attempt to turn his personal ratings around. I mean the preposterously high Tory leads are gone but they're not exactly in awful territory yet
But perhaps best to leave it there.
I'll have @Big_G_NorthWales - and maybe others - onto me otherwise.
Biden is now the nominee-elect:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-52946789
Yes, he has to survive another two months until 20th August before Betfair pays out but 1.05 on this (a 5% return on your money in less than 3 months) is as close to free money as you get.
DYOR.
Even his party is losing faith in him
It would only likely happen if Boris went to WTO terms Brexit which proved as unpopular as the poll tax was for Thatcher and Sunak took over promising to do a FTA deal with the EU and accepting some single market alignment as Major replaced the poll tax with council tax
https://twitter.com/NickStripe_ONS/status/1268823005305733125