Misleading to say that more people consider Keir Starmer likeable than do Boris Johnson.
The question was "to what extent do you agree that xxx xxx is likeable"
40% said they agreed with that statement for Boris, and 40% said so for Starmer (although more said they "strongly agreed" for Boris so he edges it)
The don't know/don't cares were 23% for Boris and 39% for Starmer.
Boris is considered "brave" by more people (35/30), yet the net score favours Starmer. Nonsense if you are using it to think about who might win more votes!
I don't think it's the net score that matters, but the positives. Ed Miliband was more likeable than Nigel Farage, but was a less successful leader of his party
If two mates were on the pull, and walked into a bar where one was considered attractive by 40% , ugly by 40% and 20% had no opinion, they would be better off than the other being considered attractive by 30% ugly by 28% with 42% not caring, despite the net score favouring the latter
That does depend on there being no correlation between not caring or knowing and not voting.
And not caring and having sex I suppose.
Isam is assuming that voting is like making love to a beautiful woman.
Not sure it is myself. It's not your civic duty to make love to a beautiful woman.
Although Starmer is popular, Johnson's ratings are still pretty good. Hence, he's preferred as PM, and the Conservatives lead.
GE tomorrow - Cons by 50 seats.
I'm always fairly sceptical about that line when there so obviously isn't going to be an election tomorrow (and almost certainly isn't until 2024 as the Government has a large majority).
Of course a party would always prefer to be a few points ahead in the polls than a few behind, and thus have the comfort blanket of "if there was an election tomorrow..." But at this point in the electoral cycle, I think a party would probably prefer the strong leadership ratings (which might not YET translate to party support but represents a receptive audience) than a slight lead but with poor ratings.
Remember Miliband's Labour led for long periods 2010-15 without ever really convincing people he was a credible prospective PM (and he ultimately fell short mainly for that reason).
It's really hard to say in a world where doors aren't being knocked on etc. But it does feel as if there are a lot of people with positive views about Starmer who are not yet sold on Labour but are willing to have a conversation about it for the first time in a while.
Yes - no GE tomorrow and I'm glad there isn't. Time should work for Labour and against the Cons.
Dominic Cummings is recruiting a new team of crack data scientists who will soon prove the silent (because unpolled) majority supports Boris. This is, after all, how Brexit was won.
Oh no, imagine the horror of governments making decisions based on data and science.
Much better to just ask all the PPE and liberal arts graduates how they *feel* about any given subject.
Cummings knows nothing about science. He uses pseudo scientific cliches to dress up his opinions and justify his ideological schemes.
They’re recruiting actual scientists.
You can recruit all the 'actual' you want but if they are managed by a control freak with a specific world view who demands totally loyalty, zero dissent and enforced group think then you aren't going to get decent answers.
The one campaign where we know he used data scientists he unexpectedly won.
That does suggest he works well with them or has an ability to spot patterns no one else sees. I suspect the former
Unexpectedly won? The side that regularly polled ahead over the previous decade. That posted regular poll leads during the campaign period. That had the majority of the press on its side?
That one?
Unexpectedly?
The one where bettors made a lot of money by betting against the political consensus. Yep.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing my friend
It's not hindsight to observe that most of the polling in the lead up to referendum day indicated that Leave would win.
And yet, somehow, it came as a shock to the political and media classes.
Expectations are not necessarily aligned with facts.
And it is *precisely* hindsight to say “oh but it was obvious” and pick out the data that proves it
It was obvious. That the political and media class missed it is not a huge surprise. The privileged elites that control this country are not exactly tuned in. They seem to be missing what is going on in Scotland currently, too.
It came as a surprise to me. I thought we'd get close, something like 46-48%, but I thought Remain would edge it.
2015 saw a huge shift towards Remain in polling. Granted, the MORI poll showing Remain ahead by 44% was an outlier, but there were a lot showing Remain ahead 20 - 25%. The lead narrowed in 2016, but Leave only moved ahead about three weeks before the vote, and then the polls swung back to Remain in the last week. I expected the status quo to prevail.
Leave didn't go odds on to win until the votes were in, and were 10/1 or bigger on the day. That makes it more unexpected than expected to me
To most people it was not a surprise - it was a SHOCK.
That is a pretty poor video in terms of psephological accuracy.It begins with the 2019 election outcome using the UK figures before going on to consider the latest Yougov poll which is expressed in GB terms. All other polls are then totally ignored. Seriously misleading.
On topic and a point I made on David's Saturday thread. A plurality of voters don't care whether Johnson is competent, has the nation's interests at heart, is principled etc. As long as that's the case, he and not Starmer will be PM.
Voters are making choices. They are choosing the charlatan. And it seems they know he is such.
Spot on. Let's stop giving the public an easy ride. They need to grow up.
It's the classic left-wing response - those nasty voters going blue.
It's the classic response of somebody who cares about this country and despairs of the dumbing down of its politics.
There's a word of difference between understanding why the public are making the choices they are, and figuring out how to persuade them to make different choices, and petulantly whining that the public are idiots who don't know what is good for them.
Starmer seems like he is attempting the former. I suspect many others are still indulging in the latter, because it makes them feel better as it is not then their fault for being unpersuasive.
As for despairing at the dumbing down of politics, I'm pretty sure all parties peddle unreaslistically simple and easy solutions to things, so I don't think anyone is in a position to throw stones at dumbing things down.
Perhaps I'm a hopeless idealist but when it comes to the dumbing down of politics - the fact of which I think is close to undeniable - I am not content to always be just shrugging my shoulders and saying "Oh well, that's how it is these days." If everyone does that it will only get worse. Some of the vox pops are so depressing. I want the public to wise up and take things a bit more seriously. I can't see how expressing that fervent hope is petulant. Maybe it's always been like this - I'm open to that notion - but I strongly sense not. And in any case this is now and now is what's most important.
I think it has always been like this. I've observed it for many years though vox pop have become more popular in recent years. I always tune out for vox pop. They irritate me so much. Yet very occasionally you get a pearl of wisdom.
Most popular chat in the UK is about football and gossip - in contrast to say most pubs in ireland where you can have a decent political argument.
I don't think YOU can change it. You can try talking politics in a UK pub but the response is likely to be "boring" or aggressive.
It's the culture. Perhaps if the soaps included decent political discussions. 'Til Death Do Us Part used to feature some fascinating political discussions.
It's odd. Being "apolitical" is generally deemed a positive thing. To me it totally isn't - it's a character flaw - but others don't see it that way. When people say "I'm not really into politics" it's usually with an air of self-congratulation. Offered in the same spirit as "When I have any spare time I love to bake a cake."
That's interesting.
A tension with the "community organising" idea that was one of the Ed Milliband great hopes, in that it would have a political dimension?
Excellent news imo . Totally not needed at this stage .
According to the Guardian wearing a mask in public is now mandatory in 120 countries. Having done sod all about it for months Boris's merry men have decided to leave it to the common sense of the British public. What could possibly go wrong?
I trust the common sense of the British people.
I really hope that is meant to be ironic.
Yeah I got attacked for saying the public are morons (which I thought was actually pretty fair, I didn't say any particular voting group was full of morons, just on the whole people are) but you look at some of the things people do and you have to find it difficult to conclude otherwise.
OT the wildely-trailed programme about the 13-year-old girl who did the sums to prove Spitfires and Hurricanes needed eight machine guns rather than the four originally planned was disappointing: a rambling, repetitive and heavily padded half hour badly in need of editing down to ten minutes that actually told the story.
BBC News Channel today, Sunday 12th July at 10:30am and 4:30pm.
Yep, the BBC really seem to have the bit between their teeth on that one. The maths of four .303 Brownings (a fairly weedy offensive weapon) v. eight doesn't seem that complicated, even with eight mgs RAF pilots reported problems in destroying the enemy. The 109Es they were flying against had either four mgs or two mgs & two cannons, there doesn't seem to be any conclusive evidence that they suffered for it.
In a spasm of insomnia I caught a weird BBC World Service programme called The People's Plane, apparently an 11 (!) part series on the Spitfire. After them saying the Spit as the world's fastest and most powerful fighter made a decisive difference in the BoB shooting down Luftwaffe aircraft with its six machine guns, I kinda gave up.
The Spitfire appears to have become a semi-religious fetish object (Vera Lynn funeral, Colonel Tom flypast, Thank U NHS guff) for the Anglo-British tribe, Dom's probably factored the BoB flight into his strategising: reach for the sky voters, rather than look at the mess of pottage that you sold your vote for.
I genuinely believe that England is in the grip of some sort of mass psychosis of which the 1940sisation of everything is just one manifestation.
Something in this.
About a no deal Brexit -
"We stood alone in 1940. We can do it again."
Heard that all over. It really brought home to me what we were dealing with. How useless the normal sort of arguments were going to be.
For a change, I'll start my verbal rambling on topic.
I like Starmer - perhaps more accurately, I don't dislike him. He's affable, personable and I'd probably enjoy a socially-distanced coffee or other beverage with him.
The point is, unlike Corbyn, I'm prepared to listen to what he has to say. I may not like it but I'm prepared to give him a fair hearing. I'm less worried about the "fellow travellers" than some - Blair had "fellow travellers" like Corbyn, McDonnell and others but it didn't stop him winning three elections so that's a red herring (pun intended).
The second part of the question is whether Labour are a credible alternative Government. As of now, they aren't but they don't have to be. I think Dodds looks weak at SCoE but any SCoE would have problems facing a Chancellor who is dishing out free money to all and sundry. The problem Dodds has is to come up with an alternative - the credible option, to question the long term value of borrowing and racking up the debt and deficit is open to the LDs but not to Labour.
Thus we have the two main high spending social democratic parties fighting a never ending Dutch auction to see who can increase the debt burden for future generations the more - it's one way of doing things I suppose.
Giving people free money whether it be in the form of furlough payments or tax cuts, will always be popular but it never ends well because at some point the tap gets turned off.
Misleading to say that more people consider Keir Starmer likeable than do Boris Johnson.
The question was "to what extent do you agree that xxx xxx is likeable"
40% said they agreed with that statement for Boris, and 40% said so for Starmer (although more said they "strongly agreed" for Boris so he edges it)
The don't know/don't cares were 23% for Boris and 39% for Starmer.
Boris is considered "brave" by more people (35/30), yet the net score favours Starmer. Nonsense if you are using it to think about who might win more votes!
I don't think it's the net score that matters, but the positives. Ed Miliband was more likeable than Nigel Farage, but was a less successful leader of his party
If two mates were on the pull, and walked into a bar where one was considered attractive by 40% , ugly by 40% and 20% had no opinion, they would be better off than the other being considered attractive by 30% ugly by 28% with 42% not caring, despite the net score favouring the latter
That does depend on there being no correlation between not caring or knowing and not voting.
And not caring and having sex I suppose.
Isam is assuming that voting is like making love to a beautiful woman.
Not sure it is myself. It's not your civic duty to make love to a beautiful woman.
Speak for yourself!
☺ - CIVIC duty.
L’etat c’est moi?
You can try that line but she'll probably be unimpressed.
Labour actually does better in current Tory seats than former Labour ones
I sense this could be a problem. Having "got Brexit done" will the RedWallers come back to a Corbyn free, moderate Labour? I'd like to think so but I'm not sure. For 2 reasons. (1) A switch like that is a big investment and human nature is to want your choices validated. (2) I think Johnson is a positive attraction for many of them.
Opinium's data from two weeks ago rather contradicts this. It suggested a 10.5% swing to Labour in seats lost to the Tories in 2019 compared with a 4% swing across GB as a whole. However, in both cases subsamples need to be treated with caution.
Excellent news imo . Totally not needed at this stage .
According to the Guardian wearing a mask in public is now mandatory in 120 countries. Having done sod all about it for months Boris's merry men have decided to leave it to the common sense of the British public. What could possibly go wrong?
I trust the common sense of the British people.
I really hope that is meant to be ironic.
Yeah I got attacked for saying the public are morons (which I thought was actually pretty fair, I didn't say any particular voting group was full of morons, just on the whole people are) but you look at some of the things people do and you have to find it difficult to conclude otherwise.
On topic and a point I made on David's Saturday thread. A plurality of voters don't care whether Johnson is competent, has the nation's interests at heart, is principled etc. As long as that's the case, he and not Starmer will be PM.
Voters are making choices. They are choosing the charlatan. And it seems they know he is such.
Spot on. Let's stop giving the public an easy ride. They need to grow up.
It's the classic left-wing response - those nasty voters going blue.
It's the classic response of somebody who cares about this country and despairs of the dumbing down of its politics.
There's a word of difference between understanding why the public are making the choices they are, and figuring out how to persuade them to make different choices, and petulantly whining that the public are idiots who don't know what is good for them.
Starmer seems like he is attempting the former. I suspect many others are still indulging in the latter, because it makes them feel better as it is not then their fault for being unpersuasive.
As for despairing at the dumbing down of politics, I'm pretty sure all parties peddle unreaslistically simple and easy solutions to things, so I don't think anyone is in a position to throw stones at dumbing things down.
Perhaps I'm a hopeless idealist but when it comes to the dumbing down of politics - the fact of which I think is close to undeniable - I am not content to always be just shrugging my shoulders and saying "Oh well, that's how it is these days." If everyone does that it will only get worse. Some of the vox pops are so depressing. I want the public to wise up and take things a bit more seriously. I can't see how expressing that fervent hope is petulant. Maybe it's always been like this - I'm open to that notion - but I strongly sense not. And in any case this is now and now is what's most important.
I think it has always been like this. I've observed it for many years though vox pop have become more popular in recent years. I always tune out for vox pop. They irritate me so much. Yet very occasionally you get a pearl of wisdom.
Most popular chat in the UK is about football and gossip - in contrast to say most pubs in ireland where you can have a decent political argument.
I don't think YOU can change it. You can try talking politics in a UK pub but the response is likely to be "boring" or aggressive.
It's the culture. Perhaps if the soaps included decent political discussions. 'Til Death Do Us Part used to feature some fascinating political discussions.
It's odd. Being "apolitical" is generally deemed a positive thing. To me it totally isn't - it's a character flaw - but others don't see it that way. When people say "I'm not really into politics" it's usually with an air of self-congratulation. Offered in the same spirit as "When I have any spare time I love to bake a cake."
That's interesting.
A tension with the "community organising" idea that was one of the Ed Milliband great hopes, in that it would have a political dimension?
Many tories believe they are not political it’s only the others that ruin things by turning them political. It’s actually a way of saying we’re right whilst making out the opposition are the trouble makers.
On topic and a point I made on David's Saturday thread. A plurality of voters don't care whether Johnson is competent, has the nation's interests at heart, is principled etc. As long as that's the case, he and not Starmer will be PM.
Voters are making choices. They are choosing the charlatan. And it seems they know he is such.
Spot on. Let's stop giving the public an easy ride. They need to grow up.
It's the classic left-wing response - those nasty voters going blue.
It's the classic response of somebody who cares about this country and despairs of the dumbing down of its politics.
There's a word of difference between understanding why the public are making the choices they are, and figuring out how to persuade them to make different choices, and petulantly whining that the public are idiots who don't know what is good for them.
Starmer seems like he is attempting the former. I suspect many others are still indulging in the latter, because it makes them feel better as it is not then their fault for being unpersuasive.
As for despairing at the dumbing down of politics, I'm pretty sure all parties peddle unreaslistically simple and easy solutions to things, so I don't think anyone is in a position to throw stones at dumbing things down.
Perhaps I'm a hopeless idealist but when it comes to the dumbing down of politics - the fact of which I think is close to undeniable - I am not content to always be just shrugging my shoulders and saying "Oh well, that's how it is these days." If everyone does that it will only get worse. Some of the vox pops are so depressing. I want the public to wise up and take things a bit more seriously. I can't see how expressing that fervent hope is petulant. Maybe it's always been like this - I'm open to that notion - but I strongly sense not. And in any case this is now and now is what's most important.
I think it has always been like this. I've observed it for many years though vox pop have become more popular in recent years. I always tune out for vox pop. They irritate me so much. Yet very occasionally you get a pearl of wisdom.
Most popular chat in the UK is about football and gossip - in contrast to say most pubs in ireland where you can have a decent political argument.
I don't think YOU can change it. You can try talking politics in a UK pub but the response is likely to be "boring" or aggressive.
It's the culture. Perhaps if the soaps included decent political discussions. 'Til Death Do Us Part used to feature some fascinating political discussions.
It's odd. Being "apolitical" is generally deemed a positive thing. To me it totally isn't - it's a character flaw - but others don't see it that way. When people say "I'm not really into politics" it's usually with an air of self-congratulation. Offered in the same spirit as "When I have any spare time I love to bake a cake."
That's interesting.
A tension with the "community organising" idea that was one of the Ed Milliband great hopes, in that it would have a political dimension?
Many tories believe they are not political it’s only the others that ruin things by turning them political. It’s actually a way of saying we’re right whilst making out the opposition are the trouble makers.
There is a general belief that politics makes things grubby. The concept behind the community organisation ideas is to get people to work together on specific, local issues which have general support.
On topic and a point I made on David's Saturday thread. A plurality of voters don't care whether Johnson is competent, has the nation's interests at heart, is principled etc. As long as that's the case, he and not Starmer will be PM.
Voters are making choices. They are choosing the charlatan. And it seems they know he is such.
Spot on. Let's stop giving the public an easy ride. They need to grow up.
It's the classic left-wing response - those nasty voters going blue.
It's the classic response of somebody who cares about this country and despairs of the dumbing down of its politics.
There's a word of difference between understanding why the public are making the choices they are, and figuring out how to persuade them to make different choices, and petulantly whining that the public are idiots who don't know what is good for them.
Starmer seems like he is attempting the former. I suspect many others are still indulging in the latter, because it makes them feel better as it is not then their fault for being unpersuasive.
As for despairing at the dumbing down of politics, I'm pretty sure all parties peddle unreaslistically simple and easy solutions to things, so I don't think anyone is in a position to throw stones at dumbing things down.
Perhaps I'm a hopeless idealist but when it comes to the dumbing down of politics - the fact of which I think is close to undeniable - I am not content to always be just shrugging my shoulders and saying "Oh well, that's how it is these days." If everyone does that it will only get worse. Some of the vox pops are so depressing. I want the public to wise up and take things a bit more seriously. I can't see how expressing that fervent hope is petulant. Maybe it's always been like this - I'm open to that notion - but I strongly sense not. And in any case this is now and now is what's most important.
I think it has always been like this. I've observed it for many years though vox pop have become more popular in recent years. I always tune out for vox pop. They irritate me so much. Yet very occasionally you get a pearl of wisdom.
Most popular chat in the UK is about football and gossip - in contrast to say most pubs in ireland where you can have a decent political argument.
I don't think YOU can change it. You can try talking politics in a UK pub but the response is likely to be "boring" or aggressive.
It's the culture. Perhaps if the soaps included decent political discussions. 'Til Death Do Us Part used to feature some fascinating political discussions.
It's odd. Being "apolitical" is generally deemed a positive thing. To me it totally isn't - it's a character flaw - but others don't see it that way. When people say "I'm not really into politics" it's usually with an air of self-congratulation. Offered in the same spirit as "When I have any spare time I love to bake a cake."
That's interesting.
A tension with the "community organising" idea that was one of the Ed Milliband great hopes, in that it would have a political dimension?
Yes. If it's charitable work that's fine. But if it smacks of something political you'd have to be careful how you talk about it. And to whom. Not in polite company.
Andalusia has registered three new outbreaks, two in Malaga and one in Almería, so that the active outbreaks amount to 19, with 349 infected, 51 more affected, according to data from the Ministry of Health. The three new outbreaks are located in the Malaga district of capital, with seven infected, in Guadalhorce (5) and in the west of Almería (5). There is another outbreak that has been active for several days in the west of Almería that experiences a significant rise, since in the last 24 hours it has gone from 17 to 42 infected. The number also grows in that of Belicena (Granada), since 45 are infected in this outbreak linked to a wake (+5), and in another of the Malaga Guadalhorce, with four more cases, reaching thirteen. On the last day there have been no deaths or new ICU admission, although there are two hospitalizations.
Is this level of detail being published in the UK?
On topic and a point I made on David's Saturday thread. A plurality of voters don't care whether Johnson is competent, has the nation's interests at heart, is principled etc. As long as that's the case, he and not Starmer will be PM.
Voters are making choices. They are choosing the charlatan. And it seems they know he is such.
Spot on. Let's stop giving the public an easy ride. They need to grow up.
It's the classic left-wing response - those nasty voters going blue.
It's the classic response of somebody who cares about this country and despairs of the dumbing down of its politics.
There's a word of difference between understanding why the public are making the choices they are, and figuring out how to persuade them to make different choices, and petulantly whining that the public are idiots who don't know what is good for them.
Starmer seems like he is attempting the former. I suspect many others are still indulging in the latter, because it makes them feel better as it is not then their fault for being unpersuasive.
As for despairing at the dumbing down of politics, I'm pretty sure all parties peddle unreaslistically simple and easy solutions to things, so I don't think anyone is in a position to throw stones at dumbing things down.
Perhaps I'm a hopeless idealist but when it comes to the dumbing down of politics - the fact of which I think is close to undeniable - I am not content to always be just shrugging my shoulders and saying "Oh well, that's how it is these days." If everyone does that it will only get worse. Some of the vox pops are so depressing. I want the public to wise up and take things a bit more seriously. I can't see how expressing that fervent hope is petulant. Maybe it's always been like this - I'm open to that notion - but I strongly sense not. And in any case this is now and now is what's most important.
I think it has always been like this. I've observed it for many years though vox pop have become more popular in recent years. I always tune out for vox pop. They irritate me so much. Yet very occasionally you get a pearl of wisdom.
Most popular chat in the UK is about football and gossip - in contrast to say most pubs in ireland where you can have a decent political argument.
I don't think YOU can change it. You can try talking politics in a UK pub but the response is likely to be "boring" or aggressive.
It's the culture. Perhaps if the soaps included decent political discussions. 'Til Death Do Us Part used to feature some fascinating political discussions.
It's odd. Being "apolitical" is generally deemed a positive thing. To me it totally isn't - it's a character flaw - but others don't see it that way. When people say "I'm not really into politics" it's usually with an air of self-congratulation. Offered in the same spirit as "When I have any spare time I love to bake a cake."
Many people who claim to be apolitical are anything but. At the start of the lockdown, an "apolitical" relative of mine was holding forth on the wonderful job that Boris was doing in keeping up the nation's spirits. When I ventured my opinion that some of his decisions hadn't been optimal - in particular, the delay in implementing the lockdown - I was immediately accused of being political and told that nobody wants to talk about that. Some of those who claim to be apolitical simply don't want to hear their opinions challenged.
Misleading to say that more people consider Keir Starmer likeable than do Boris Johnson.
The question was "to what extent do you agree that xxx xxx is likeable"
40% said they agreed with that statement for Boris, and 40% said so for Starmer (although more said they "strongly agreed" for Boris so he edges it)
The don't know/don't cares were 23% for Boris and 39% for Starmer.
Boris is considered "brave" by more people (35/30), yet the net score favours Starmer. Nonsense if you are using it to think about who might win more votes!
I don't think it's the net score that matters, but the positives. Ed Miliband was more likeable than Nigel Farage, but was a less successful leader of his party
If two mates were on the pull, and walked into a bar where one was considered attractive by 40% , ugly by 40% and 20% had no opinion, they would be better off than the other being considered attractive by 30% ugly by 28% with 42% not caring, despite the net score favouring the latter
That does depend on there being no correlation between not caring or knowing and not voting.
And not caring and having sex I suppose.
Isam is assuming that voting is like making love to a beautiful woman.
Not sure it is myself. It's not your civic duty to make love to a beautiful woman.
Speak for yourself!
☺ - CIVIC duty.
L’etat c’est moi?
You can try that line but she'll probably be unimpressed.
On topic and a point I made on David's Saturday thread. A plurality of voters don't care whether Johnson is competent, has the nation's interests at heart, is principled etc. As long as that's the case, he and not Starmer will be PM.
Voters are making choices. They are choosing the charlatan. And it seems they know he is such.
Spot on. Let's stop giving the public an easy ride. They need to grow up.
It's the classic left-wing response - those nasty voters going blue.
It's the classic response of somebody who cares about this country and despairs of the dumbing down of its politics.
There's a word of difference between understanding why the public are making the choices they are, and figuring out how to persuade them to make different choices, and petulantly whining that the public are idiots who don't know what is good for them.
Starmer seems like he is attempting the former. I suspect many others are still indulging in the latter, because it makes them feel better as it is not then their fault for being unpersuasive.
As for despairing at the dumbing down of politics, I'm pretty sure all parties peddle unreaslistically simple and easy solutions to things, so I don't think anyone is in a position to throw stones at dumbing things down.
Perhaps I'm a hopeless idealist but when it comes to the dumbing down of politics - the fact of which I think is close to undeniable - I am not content to always be just shrugging my shoulders and saying "Oh well, that's how it is these days." If everyone does that it will only get worse. Some of the vox pops are so depressing. I want the public to wise up and take things a bit more seriously. I can't see how expressing that fervent hope is petulant. Maybe it's always been like this - I'm open to that notion - but I strongly sense not. And in any case this is now and now is what's most important.
I think it has always been like this. I've observed it for many years though vox pop have become more popular in recent years. I always tune out for vox pop. They irritate me so much. Yet very occasionally you get a pearl of wisdom.
Most popular chat in the UK is about football and gossip - in contrast to say most pubs in ireland where you can have a decent political argument.
I don't think YOU can change it. You can try talking politics in a UK pub but the response is likely to be "boring" or aggressive.
It's the culture. Perhaps if the soaps included decent political discussions. 'Til Death Do Us Part used to feature some fascinating political discussions.
It's odd. Being "apolitical" is generally deemed a positive thing. To me it totally isn't - it's a character flaw - but others don't see it that way. When people say "I'm not really into politics" it's usually with an air of self-congratulation. Offered in the same spirit as "When I have any spare time I love to bake a cake."
That's interesting.
A tension with the "community organising" idea that was one of the Ed Milliband great hopes, in that it would have a political dimension?
Many tories believe they are not political it’s only the others that ruin things by turning them political. It’s actually a way of saying we’re right whilst making out the opposition are the trouble makers.
It is an interesting one, isn't it?
Is a food bank innately political? Or a toy library? Or a benefits' help service? Or for that matter a Trade Union or a Chamber of Commerce?
Andalusia has registered three new outbreaks, two in Malaga and one in Almería, so that the active outbreaks amount to 19, with 349 infected, 51 more affected, according to data from the Ministry of Health. The three new outbreaks are located in the Malaga district of capital, with seven infected, in Guadalhorce (5) and in the west of Almería (5). There is another outbreak that has been active for several days in the west of Almería that experiences a significant rise, since in the last 24 hours it has gone from 17 to 42 infected. The number also grows in that of Belicena (Granada), since 45 are infected in this outbreak linked to a wake (+5), and in another of the Malaga Guadalhorce, with four more cases, reaching thirteen. On the last day there have been no deaths or new ICU admission, although there are two hospitalizations.
Is this level of detail being published in the UK?
On topic and a point I made on David's Saturday thread. A plurality of voters don't care whether Johnson is competent, has the nation's interests at heart, is principled etc. As long as that's the case, he and not Starmer will be PM.
Voters are making choices. They are choosing the charlatan. And it seems they know he is such.
Spot on. Let's stop giving the public an easy ride. They need to grow up.
It's the classic left-wing response - those nasty voters going blue.
It's the classic response of somebody who cares about this country and despairs of the dumbing down of its politics.
There's a word of difference between understanding why the public are making the choices they are, and figuring out how to persuade them to make different choices, and petulantly whining that the public are idiots who don't know what is good for them.
Starmer seems like he is attempting the former. I suspect many others are still indulging in the latter, because it makes them feel better as it is not then their fault for being unpersuasive.
As for despairing at the dumbing down of politics, I'm pretty sure all parties peddle unreaslistically simple and easy solutions to things, so I don't think anyone is in a position to throw stones at dumbing things down.
Perhaps I'm a hopeless idealist but when it comes to the dumbing down of politics - the fact of which I think is close to undeniable - I am not content to always be just shrugging my shoulders and saying "Oh well, that's how it is these days." If everyone does that it will only get worse. Some of the vox pops are so depressing. I want the public to wise up and take things a bit more seriously. I can't see how expressing that fervent hope is petulant. Maybe it's always been like this - I'm open to that notion - but I strongly sense not. And in any case this is now and now is what's most important.
I think it has always been like this. I've observed it for many years though vox pop have become more popular in recent years. I always tune out for vox pop. They irritate me so much. Yet very occasionally you get a pearl of wisdom.
Most popular chat in the UK is about football and gossip - in contrast to say most pubs in ireland where you can have a decent political argument.
I don't think YOU can change it. You can try talking politics in a UK pub but the response is likely to be "boring" or aggressive.
It's the culture. Perhaps if the soaps included decent political discussions. 'Til Death Do Us Part used to feature some fascinating political discussions.
It's odd. Being "apolitical" is generally deemed a positive thing. To me it totally isn't - it's a character flaw - but others don't see it that way. When people say "I'm not really into politics" it's usually with an air of self-congratulation. Offered in the same spirit as "When I have any spare time I love to bake a cake."
That's interesting.
A tension with the "community organising" idea that was one of the Ed Milliband great hopes, in that it would have a political dimension?
Many tories believe they are not political it’s only the others that ruin things by turning them political. It’s actually a way of saying we’re right whilst making out the opposition are the trouble makers.
The old saying was none of the Corporation of London’s Aldermen were party political - they were all conservative
Right, onto the new front-line of the "culture war".
Nothing to do with statues or being "woke", this is the real battle between the Government and an army of new revolutionaries - the home workers.
With an increasing lack of subtlety, Government Ministers are now trying to clamp down on the latest insurrection among the middle classes - the refusal to go back to being office-based commuting, Pret-A-Manger consuming drones.
Yes, I'm sure some on here will warble on about how much they and "everyone they know" are champing at the bit to get back on a cold and wet platform to catch the 7.42 to Waterloo or Euston or to spend an hour each day on the M62 or M25 practising their karaoke while they go nowhere slowly.
I'm not and I don't know anyone who is. The vast amounts companies are spending on re-fitting their office space to accommodate social distancing protocols is now looking like another huge loss as said companies find out the vast majority of their office workers don't want to come back to the office.
Compulsion? No doubt we'll get Alok Sharma popping up to tell us it is our "civic duty" to "march proudly back to the office".
There are plenty of people who can find plenty of reasons to justify NOT going back to an office and none of them care that much about the state of the commercial property market (but then they probably don't give as much to the Conservative Party as some of those may do in the commercial property business, I wouldn't know).
It's a change - a seismic change - and a thoughtful Government would, instead of trying to put a lid on that change, would consider the implications which were many and not all of them negative by any means.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Andalusia has registered three new outbreaks, two in Malaga and one in Almería, so that the active outbreaks amount to 19, with 349 infected, 51 more affected, according to data from the Ministry of Health. The three new outbreaks are located in the Malaga district of capital, with seven infected, in Guadalhorce (5) and in the west of Almería (5). There is another outbreak that has been active for several days in the west of Almería that experiences a significant rise, since in the last 24 hours it has gone from 17 to 42 infected. The number also grows in that of Belicena (Granada), since 45 are infected in this outbreak linked to a wake (+5), and in another of the Malaga Guadalhorce, with four more cases, reaching thirteen. On the last day there have been no deaths or new ICU admission, although there are two hospitalizations.
Is this level of detail being published in the UK?
Cases down to low level local authority.
Yes some good information but can that be translated into specific outbreaks with known cause, I see the Hereford one has been. If the source is known tracing and quarantine should be much easier.
Right, onto the new front-line of the "culture war".
Nothing to do with statues or being "woke", this is the real battle between the Government and an army of new revolutionaries - the home workers.
With an increasing lack of subtlety, Government Ministers are now trying to clamp down on the latest insurrection among the middle classes - the refusal to go back to being office-based commuting, Pret-A-Manger consuming drones.
Yes, I'm sure some on here will warble on about how much they and "everyone they know" are champing at the bit to get back on a cold and wet platform to catch the 7.42 to Waterloo or Euston or to spend an hour each day on the M62 or M25 practising their karaoke while they go nowhere slowly.
I'm not and I don't know anyone who is. The vast amounts companies are spending on re-fitting their office space to accommodate social distancing protocols is now looking like another huge loss as said companies find out the vast majority of their office workers don't want to come back to the office.
Compulsion? No doubt we'll get Alok Sharma popping up to tell us it is our "civic duty" to "march proudly back to the office".
There are plenty of people who can find plenty of reasons to justify NOT going back to an office and none of them care that much about the state of the commercial property market (but then they probably don't give as much to the Conservative Party as some of those may do in the commercial property business, I wouldn't know).
It's a change - a seismic change - and a thoughtful Government would, instead of trying to put a lid on that change, would consider the implications which were many and not all of them negative by any means.
I wonder what the effect on GDP would be if office workers had the same level of output but never went to the office.
I would guess GDP would be lower which governments would hate.
Of course there is a difference between GDP and wealth creation let alone GDP and quality of life.
For a change, I'll start my verbal rambling on topic.
I like Starmer - perhaps more accurately, I don't dislike him. He's affable, personable and I'd probably enjoy a socially-distanced coffee or other beverage with him.
The point is, unlike Corbyn, I'm prepared to listen to what he has to say. I may not like it but I'm prepared to give him a fair hearing. I'm less worried about the "fellow travellers" than some - Blair had "fellow travellers" like Corbyn, McDonnell and others but it didn't stop him winning three elections so that's a red herring (pun intended).
The second part of the question is whether Labour are a credible alternative Government. As of now, they aren't but they don't have to be. I think Dodds looks weak at SCoE but any SCoE would have problems facing a Chancellor who is dishing out free money to all and sundry. The problem Dodds has is to come up with an alternative - the credible option, to question the long term value of borrowing and racking up the debt and deficit is open to the LDs but not to Labour.
Thus we have the two main high spending social democratic parties fighting a never ending Dutch auction to see who can increase the debt burden for future generations the more - it's one way of doing things I suppose.
Giving people free money whether it be in the form of furlough payments or tax cuts, will always be popular but it never ends well because at some point the tap gets turned off.
Corbyn got 40% at a GE, people were listening to him.
On topic and a point I made on David's Saturday thread. A plurality of voters don't care whether Johnson is competent, has the nation's interests at heart, is principled etc. As long as that's the case, he and not Starmer will be PM.
Voters are making choices. They are choosing the charlatan. And it seems they know he is such.
Spot on. Let's stop giving the public an easy ride. They need to grow up.
It's the classic left-wing response - those nasty voters going blue.
It's the classic response of somebody who cares about this country and despairs of the dumbing down of its politics.
There's a word of difference between understanding why the public are making the choices they are, and figuring out how to persuade them to make different choices, and petulantly whining that the public are idiots who don't know what is good for them.
Starmer seems like he is attempting the former. I suspect many others are still indulging in the latter, because it makes them feel better as it is not then their fault for being unpersuasive.
As for despairing at the dumbing down of politics, I'm pretty sure all parties peddle unreaslistically simple and easy solutions to things, so I don't think anyone is in a position to throw stones at dumbing things down.
Perhaps I'm a hopeless idealist but when it comes to the dumbing down of politics - the fact of which I think is close to undeniable - I am not content to always be just shrugging my shoulders and saying "Oh well, that's how it is these days." If everyone does that it will only get worse. Some of the vox pops are so depressing. I want the public to wise up and take things a bit more seriously. I can't see how expressing that fervent hope is petulant. Maybe it's always been like this - I'm open to that notion - but I strongly sense not. And in any case this is now and now is what's most important.
I think it has always been like this. I've observed it for many years though vox pop have become more popular in recent years. I always tune out for vox pop. They irritate me so much. Yet very occasionally you get a pearl of wisdom.
Most popular chat in the UK is about football and gossip - in contrast to say most pubs in ireland where you can have a decent political argument.
I don't think YOU can change it. You can try talking politics in a UK pub but the response is likely to be "boring" or aggressive.
It's the culture. Perhaps if the soaps included decent political discussions. 'Til Death Do Us Part used to feature some fascinating political discussions.
It's odd. Being "apolitical" is generally deemed a positive thing. To me it totally isn't - it's a character flaw - but others don't see it that way. When people say "I'm not really into politics" it's usually with an air of self-congratulation. Offered in the same spirit as "When I have any spare time I love to bake a cake."
That's interesting.
A tension with the "community organising" idea that was one of the Ed Milliband great hopes, in that it would have a political dimension?
Many tories believe they are not political it’s only the others that ruin things by turning them political. It’s actually a way of saying we’re right whilst making out the opposition are the trouble makers.
It is an interesting one, isn't it?
Is a food bank innately political? Or a toy library? Or a benefits' help service? Or for that matter a Trade Union or a Chamber of Commerce?
Or is the test actually "party political"?
A food bank is not political. The fact that they exist is highly political.
On topic and a point I made on David's Saturday thread. A plurality of voters don't care whether Johnson is competent, has the nation's interests at heart, is principled etc. As long as that's the case, he and not Starmer will be PM.
Voters are making choices. They are choosing the charlatan. And it seems they know he is such.
Spot on. Let's stop giving the public an easy ride. They need to grow up.
It's the classic left-wing response - those nasty voters going blue.
It's the classic response of somebody who cares about this country and despairs of the dumbing down of its politics.
There's a word of difference between understanding why the public are making the choices they are, and figuring out how to persuade them to make different choices, and petulantly whining that the public are idiots who don't know what is good for them.
Starmer seems like he is attempting the former. I suspect many others are still indulging in the latter, because it makes them feel better as it is not then their fault for being unpersuasive.
As for despairing at the dumbing down of politics, I'm pretty sure all parties peddle unreaslistically simple and easy solutions to things, so I don't think anyone is in a position to throw stones at dumbing things down.
Perhaps I'm a hopeless idealist but when it comes to the dumbing down of politics - the fact of which I think is close to undeniable - I am not content to always be just shrugging my shoulders and saying "Oh well, that's how it is these days." If everyone does that it will only get worse. Some of the vox pops are so depressing. I want the public to wise up and take things a bit more seriously. I can't see how expressing that fervent hope is petulant. Maybe it's always been like this - I'm open to that notion - but I strongly sense not. And in any case this is now and now is what's most important.
I think it has always been like this. I've observed it for many years though vox pop have become more popular in recent years. I always tune out for vox pop. They irritate me so much. Yet very occasionally you get a pearl of wisdom.
Most popular chat in the UK is about football and gossip - in contrast to say most pubs in ireland where you can have a decent political argument.
I don't think YOU can change it. You can try talking politics in a UK pub but the response is likely to be "boring" or aggressive.
It's the culture. Perhaps if the soaps included decent political discussions. 'Til Death Do Us Part used to feature some fascinating political discussions.
It's odd. Being "apolitical" is generally deemed a positive thing. To me it totally isn't - it's a character flaw - but others don't see it that way. When people say "I'm not really into politics" it's usually with an air of self-congratulation. Offered in the same spirit as "When I have any spare time I love to bake a cake."
Many people who claim to be apolitical are anything but. At the start of the lockdown, an "apolitical" relative of mine was holding forth on the wonderful job that Boris was doing in keeping up the nation's spirits. When I ventured my opinion that some of his decisions hadn't been optimal - in particular, the delay in implementing the lockdown - I was immediately accused of being political and told that nobody wants to talk about that. Some of those who claim to be apolitical simply don't want to hear their opinions challenged.
Absolutely. There is plenty of that. Getting "all political" = not drinking the Johnson kool aid.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
So a U turn from Starmer.
And now he has to wear a mask or he's a 'do as I say not as I do' hypocrite as well.
Right, onto the new front-line of the "culture war".
Nothing to do with statues or being "woke", this is the real battle between the Government and an army of new revolutionaries - the home workers.
With an increasing lack of subtlety, Government Ministers are now trying to clamp down on the latest insurrection among the middle classes - the refusal to go back to being office-based commuting, Pret-A-Manger consuming drones.
Yes, I'm sure some on here will warble on about how much they and "everyone they know" are champing at the bit to get back on a cold and wet platform to catch the 7.42 to Waterloo or Euston or to spend an hour each day on the M62 or M25 practising their karaoke while they go nowhere slowly.
I'm not and I don't know anyone who is. The vast amounts companies are spending on re-fitting their office space to accommodate social distancing protocols is now looking like another huge loss as said companies find out the vast majority of their office workers don't want to come back to the office.
Compulsion? No doubt we'll get Alok Sharma popping up to tell us it is our "civic duty" to "march proudly back to the office".
There are plenty of people who can find plenty of reasons to justify NOT going back to an office and none of them care that much about the state of the commercial property market (but then they probably don't give as much to the Conservative Party as some of those may do in the commercial property business, I wouldn't know).
It's a change - a seismic change - and a thoughtful Government would, instead of trying to put a lid on that change, would consider the implications which were many and not all of them negative by any means.
Most of my mates are looking to get back commuting, mainly for the reason that it gives them two hours a day on their own with no boss, wife or kids on their case!
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
So a U turn from Starmer.
And now he has to wear a mask or he's a 'do as I say not as I do' hypocrite as well.
Well think he is saying they should be worn in shops, not pubs. I don't see why the people pulling pints in pubs shouldn't wear them though, I suppose?
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
So a U turn from Starmer.
And now he has to wear a mask or he's a 'do as I say not as I do' hypocrite as well.
Well think he is saying they should be worn in shops, not pubs. I don't see why the people pulling pints in pubs shouldn't wear them though, I suppose?
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
So a U turn from Starmer.
And now he has to wear a mask or he's a 'do as I say not as I do' hypocrite as well.
Well think he is saying they should be worn in shops, not pubs. I don't see why the people pulling pints in pubs shouldn't wear them though, I suppose?
I don't think he was wearing a mask in his haircut photo either.
On topic and a point I made on David's Saturday thread. A plurality of voters don't care whether Johnson is competent, has the nation's interests at heart, is principled etc. As long as that's the case, he and not Starmer will be PM.
Voters are making choices. They are choosing the charlatan. And it seems they know he is such.
Spot on. Let's stop giving the public an easy ride. They need to grow up.
It's the classic left-wing response - those nasty voters going blue.
It's the classic response of somebody who cares about this country and despairs of the dumbing down of its politics.
There's a word of difference between understanding why the public are making the choices they are, and figuring out how to persuade them to make different choices, and petulantly whining that the public are idiots who don't know what is good for them.
Starmer seems like he is attempting the former. I suspect many others are still indulging in the latter, because it makes them feel better as it is not then their fault for being unpersuasive.
As for despairing at the dumbing down of politics, I'm pretty sure all parties peddle unreaslistically simple and easy solutions to things, so I don't think anyone is in a position to throw stones at dumbing things down.
Perhaps I'm a hopeless idealist but when it comes to the dumbing down of politics - the fact of which I think is close to undeniable - I am not content to always be just shrugging my shoulders and saying "Oh well, that's how it is these days." If everyone does that it will only get worse. Some of the vox pops are so depressing. I want the public to wise up and take things a bit more seriously. I can't see how expressing that fervent hope is petulant. Maybe it's always been like this - I'm open to that notion - but I strongly sense not. And in any case this is now and now is what's most important.
I think it has always been like this. I've observed it for many years though vox pop have become more popular in recent years. I always tune out for vox pop. They irritate me so much. Yet very occasionally you get a pearl of wisdom.
Most popular chat in the UK is about football and gossip - in contrast to say most pubs in ireland where you can have a decent political argument.
I don't think YOU can change it. You can try talking politics in a UK pub but the response is likely to be "boring" or aggressive.
It's the culture. Perhaps if the soaps included decent political discussions. 'Til Death Do Us Part used to feature some fascinating political discussions.
It's odd. Being "apolitical" is generally deemed a positive thing. To me it totally isn't - it's a character flaw - but others don't see it that way. When people say "I'm not really into politics" it's usually with an air of self-congratulation. Offered in the same spirit as "When I have any spare time I love to bake a cake."
That's interesting.
A tension with the "community organising" idea that was one of the Ed Milliband great hopes, in that it would have a political dimension?
Many tories believe they are not political it’s only the others that ruin things by turning them political. It’s actually a way of saying we’re right whilst making out the opposition are the trouble makers.
It is an interesting one, isn't it?
Is a food bank innately political? Or a toy library? Or a benefits' help service? Or for that matter a Trade Union or a Chamber of Commerce?
Or is the test actually "party political"?
Some people want to make everything political, so that you can't have a cup of tea without making a political statement according to what type of tea you drink.
Interesting article on Applebaum’s new book: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/jul/12/anne-applebaum-how-my-old-friends-paved-the-way-for-trump-and-brexit ...She is as wary of the commonplace view that supporters of Trump, say, are conformists, who have been brainwashed online or by Fox News. They may be now in some part, but brainwashing does not explain how populist movements begin. Their leaders weren’t from small towns full of abandoned shops and drug-ridden streets. They were metropolitans, with degrees from Oxford in the case of Johnson and Dominic Cummings. The men and women Applebaum knew were not loyal drones but filled with a dark restlessness. They may pose as the tribunes of the common people now but they were members of the intellectual and educated elite willing to launch a war on the rest of the intellectual and educated elite.
Populist activists are outsiders only in that they feel insufficiently rewarded. And their opponents should never underestimate what their self-pitying vanity can make them do.
One of Applebaum’s closest Polish friends, the godmother of one of her children, and a guest at the 1999 party, provided her with the most striking example. She moved from being a comfortable but obscure figure to become a celebrated Warsaw hostess and a confidante to Poland’s new rulers. She signalled her break and opened her prospects for advancement with a call to Applebaum within days of the Smolensk air crash of April 2010. She let her know she was adopting a conspiracy theory that would make future friendship impossible.
Outsiders need to take a deep breath before trying to understand it. Among the dead was Lech Kaczyński, the president of Poland, who controlled the rightwing populist party Law and Justice with his twin brother, Jarosław Kaczyński. The party has grown to dominate Polish politics, and the supposedly independent courts, media and civil service. The flight recorder showed that the pilot had come in too low in thick fog, and that was an end to it. Jarosław Kaczyński and his underlings insist that the Russians were behind the crash, or that political rivals in Warsaw, including Applebaum’s husband, allowed the president to fly in a faulty plane, or that it was an assassination. Repeating the lie was the price of admission to Law and Justice’s ruling circles and the public sector jobs they controlled. As Applebaum noted in the Atlantic magazine: “Sometimes the point isn’t to make people believe a lie – it’s to make people fear the liar.” Acknowledge the liar’s power, and your career takes off without the need to pass exams or to display an elementary level of competence...
Just how fair it is to equate the Brexit project with what’s going on in the US, Poland or Hungary is a matter of debate, but there are some parallels.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Misleading to say that more people consider Keir Starmer likeable than do Boris Johnson.
The question was "to what extent do you agree that xxx xxx is likeable"
40% said they agreed with that statement for Boris, and 40% said so for Starmer (although more said they "strongly agreed" for Boris so he edges it)
The don't know/don't cares were 23% for Boris and 39% for Starmer.
Boris is considered "brave" by more people (35/30), yet the net score favours Starmer. Nonsense if you are using it to think about who might win more votes!
I don't think it's the net score that matters, but the positives. Ed Miliband was more likeable than Nigel Farage, but was a less successful leader of his party
If two mates were on the pull, and walked into a bar where one was considered attractive by 40% , ugly by 40% and 20% had no opinion, they would be better off than the other being considered attractive by 30% ugly by 28% with 42% not caring, despite the net score favouring the latter
That does depend on there being no correlation between not caring or knowing and not voting.
And not caring and having sex I suppose.
Isam is assuming that voting is like making love to a beautiful woman.
Not sure it is myself. It's not your civic duty to make love to a beautiful woman.
Speak for yourself!
☺ - CIVIC duty.
L’etat c’est moi?
You can try that line but she'll probably be unimpressed.
French can be a very romantic language
Yes. But it only works its full magic on someone who doesn't understand it.
I wonder what the effect on GDP would be if office workers had the same level of output but never went to the office.
I would guess GDP would be lower which governments would hate.
Of course there is a difference between GDP and wealth creation let alone GDP and quality of life.
For many (not all and I would stress this), home working is a positive experience. I'd rather have a 120-second commute to the spare room than a 120-minute commute to an office in Surrey.
The fact I'm not spending money on fares on buying coffee or lunch at the local wherever or buying nice shirts and trousers at M&S may be an issue in GDP terms but the money spent on home deliveries or on other online purchases is going into the economy. I think I am more productive - I am less tired and stressed and sleeping better.
Your last paragraph encapsulates so much of the current debate - is it just about how wealthy we are or the quality of life we have? The last few months have perhaps tilted the balance more toward the latter premise - how we live is more important than how much we have and I suspect for many good health has become an even greater priority than material acquisition.
On topic and a point I made on David's Saturday thread. A plurality of voters don't care whether Johnson is competent, has the nation's interests at heart, is principled etc. As long as that's the case, he and not Starmer will be PM.
Voters are making choices. They are choosing the charlatan. And it seems they know he is such.
Spot on. Let's stop giving the public an easy ride. They need to grow up.
It's the classic left-wing response - those nasty voters going blue.
It's the classic response of somebody who cares about this country and despairs of the dumbing down of its politics.
There's a word of difference between understanding why the public are making the choices they are, and figuring out how to persuade them to make different choices, and petulantly whining that the public are idiots who don't know what is good for them.
Starmer seems like he is attempting the former. I suspect many others are still indulging in the latter, because it makes them feel better as it is not then their fault for being unpersuasive.
As for despairing at the dumbing down of politics, I'm pretty sure all parties peddle unreaslistically simple and easy solutions to things, so I don't think anyone is in a position to throw stones at dumbing things down.
Perhaps I'm a hopeless idealist but when it comes to the dumbing down of politics - the fact of which I think is close to undeniable - I am not content to always be just shrugging my shoulders and saying "Oh well, that's how it is these days." If everyone does that it will only get worse. Some of the vox pops are so depressing. I want the public to wise up and take things a bit more seriously. I can't see how expressing that fervent hope is petulant. Maybe it's always been like this - I'm open to that notion - but I strongly sense not. And in any case this is now and now is what's most important.
I think it has always been like this. I've observed it for many years though vox pop have become more popular in recent years. I always tune out for vox pop. They irritate me so much. Yet very occasionally you get a pearl of wisdom.
Most popular chat in the UK is about football and gossip - in contrast to say most pubs in ireland where you can have a decent political argument.
I don't think YOU can change it. You can try talking politics in a UK pub but the response is likely to be "boring" or aggressive.
It's the culture. Perhaps if the soaps included decent political discussions. 'Til Death Do Us Part used to feature some fascinating political discussions.
It's odd. Being "apolitical" is generally deemed a positive thing. To me it totally isn't - it's a character flaw - but others don't see it that way. When people say "I'm not really into politics" it's usually with an air of self-congratulation. Offered in the same spirit as "When I have any spare time I love to bake a cake."
That's interesting.
A tension with the "community organising" idea that was one of the Ed Milliband great hopes, in that it would have a political dimension?
Many tories believe they are not political it’s only the others that ruin things by turning them political. It’s actually a way of saying we’re right whilst making out the opposition are the trouble makers.
It is an interesting one, isn't it?
Is a food bank innately political? Or a toy library? Or a benefits' help service? Or for that matter a Trade Union or a Chamber of Commerce?
Or is the test actually "party political"?
Some people want to make everything political, so that you can't have a cup of tea without making a political statement according to what type of tea you drink.
When will PB start a news channel? - we had the story this morning, by accident. With a bit of diligence we could have been running it last night.
We were. See my post below in response to the stats you posted, from about 11.30pm last night. So the fact that something special was going on in Herefordshire was spotted, but when I looked there was nothing on Google News to flag up the cause at that point.
Right, onto the new front-line of the "culture war".
Nothing to do with statues or being "woke", this is the real battle between the Government and an army of new revolutionaries - the home workers.
With an increasing lack of subtlety, Government Ministers are now trying to clamp down on the latest insurrection among the middle classes - the refusal to go back to being office-based commuting, Pret-A-Manger consuming drones.
Yes, I'm sure some on here will warble on about how much they and "everyone they know" are champing at the bit to get back on a cold and wet platform to catch the 7.42 to Waterloo or Euston or to spend an hour each day on the M62 or M25 practising their karaoke while they go nowhere slowly.
I'm not and I don't know anyone who is. The vast amounts companies are spending on re-fitting their office space to accommodate social distancing protocols is now looking like another huge loss as said companies find out the vast majority of their office workers don't want to come back to the office.
Compulsion? No doubt we'll get Alok Sharma popping up to tell us it is our "civic duty" to "march proudly back to the office".
There are plenty of people who can find plenty of reasons to justify NOT going back to an office and none of them care that much about the state of the commercial property market (but then they probably don't give as much to the Conservative Party as some of those may do in the commercial property business, I wouldn't know).
It's a change - a seismic change - and a thoughtful Government would, instead of trying to put a lid on that change, would consider the implications which were many and not all of them negative by any means.
Most of my mates are looking to get back commuting, mainly for the reason that it gives them two hours a day on their own with no boss, wife or kids on their case!
Really? Your life is seriously rubbish if you think 2 hours five days a week on public transport always the same route, is preferable to spending that time at or near home.
Right, onto the new front-line of the "culture war".
Nothing to do with statues or being "woke", this is the real battle between the Government and an army of new revolutionaries - the home workers.
With an increasing lack of subtlety, Government Ministers are now trying to clamp down on the latest insurrection among the middle classes - the refusal to go back to being office-based commuting, Pret-A-Manger consuming drones.
Yes, I'm sure some on here will warble on about how much they and "everyone they know" are champing at the bit to get back on a cold and wet platform to catch the 7.42 to Waterloo or Euston or to spend an hour each day on the M62 or M25 practising their karaoke while they go nowhere slowly.
I'm not and I don't know anyone who is. The vast amounts companies are spending on re-fitting their office space to accommodate social distancing protocols is now looking like another huge loss as said companies find out the vast majority of their office workers don't want to come back to the office.
Compulsion? No doubt we'll get Alok Sharma popping up to tell us it is our "civic duty" to "march proudly back to the office".
There are plenty of people who can find plenty of reasons to justify NOT going back to an office and none of them care that much about the state of the commercial property market (but then they probably don't give as much to the Conservative Party as some of those may do in the commercial property business, I wouldn't know).
It's a change - a seismic change - and a thoughtful Government would, instead of trying to put a lid on that change, would consider the implications which were many and not all of them negative by any means.
Most of my mates are looking to get back commuting, mainly for the reason that it gives them two hours a day on their own with no boss, wife or kids on their case!
Really? Your life is seriously rubbish if you think 2 hours five days a week on public transport always the same route, is preferable to spending that time at or near home.
Yeah, that's what they say. I work from home always, and I can see their point, there is no natural time for a bit of a break to listen to a podcast, get some fresh air etc when you step straight from the office into the wife and kids.
I wouldn't say their lives were rubbish at all, they are happy and successful
A longish but v. interesting read (in 2 parts) particularly as some of the players still infect UK politics. A lot of LMs tactics seem very prescient & relevant to today's shitshow, eg people being shutdown/cancelled for telling the 'truth'.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Right, onto the new front-line of the "culture war".
Nothing to do with statues or being "woke", this is the real battle between the Government and an army of new revolutionaries - the home workers.
With an increasing lack of subtlety, Government Ministers are now trying to clamp down on the latest insurrection among the middle classes - the refusal to go back to being office-based commuting, Pret-A-Manger consuming drones.
Yes, I'm sure some on here will warble on about how much they and "everyone they know" are champing at the bit to get back on a cold and wet platform to catch the 7.42 to Waterloo or Euston or to spend an hour each day on the M62 or M25 practising their karaoke while they go nowhere slowly.
I'm not and I don't know anyone who is. The vast amounts companies are spending on re-fitting their office space to accommodate social distancing protocols is now looking like another huge loss as said companies find out the vast majority of their office workers don't want to come back to the office.
Compulsion? No doubt we'll get Alok Sharma popping up to tell us it is our "civic duty" to "march proudly back to the office".
There are plenty of people who can find plenty of reasons to justify NOT going back to an office and none of them care that much about the state of the commercial property market (but then they probably don't give as much to the Conservative Party as some of those may do in the commercial property business, I wouldn't know).
It's a change - a seismic change - and a thoughtful Government would, instead of trying to put a lid on that change, would consider the implications which were many and not all of them negative by any means.
Most of my mates are looking to get back commuting, mainly for the reason that it gives them two hours a day on their own with no boss, wife or kids on their case!
Really? Your life is seriously rubbish if you think 2 hours five days a week on public transport always the same route, is preferable to spending that time at or near home.
Yeah, that's what they say. I work from home always, and I can see their point, there is no natural time for a bit of a break to listen to a podcast, get some fresh air etc when you step straight from the office into the wife and kids.
I wouldn't say their lives were rubbish at all, they are happy and successful
The crucial question is if their workplaced moved so that they could walk to work in about 10 minutes, would they be disappointed? I think that very few people would be.
A longish but v. interesting read (in 2 parts) particularly as some of the players still infect UK politics. A lot of LMs tactics seem very prescient & relevant to today's shitshow, eg people being shutdown/cancelled for telling the 'truth'.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Right, onto the new front-line of the "culture war".
Nothing to do with statues or being "woke", this is the real battle between the Government and an army of new revolutionaries - the home workers.
With an increasing lack of subtlety, Government Ministers are now trying to clamp down on the latest insurrection among the middle classes - the refusal to go back to being office-based commuting, Pret-A-Manger consuming drones.
Yes, I'm sure some on here will warble on about how much they and "everyone they know" are champing at the bit to get back on a cold and wet platform to catch the 7.42 to Waterloo or Euston or to spend an hour each day on the M62 or M25 practising their karaoke while they go nowhere slowly.
I'm not and I don't know anyone who is. The vast amounts companies are spending on re-fitting their office space to accommodate social distancing protocols is now looking like another huge loss as said companies find out the vast majority of their office workers don't want to come back to the office.
Compulsion? No doubt we'll get Alok Sharma popping up to tell us it is our "civic duty" to "march proudly back to the office".
There are plenty of people who can find plenty of reasons to justify NOT going back to an office and none of them care that much about the state of the commercial property market (but then they probably don't give as much to the Conservative Party as some of those may do in the commercial property business, I wouldn't know).
It's a change - a seismic change - and a thoughtful Government would, instead of trying to put a lid on that change, would consider the implications which were many and not all of them negative by any means.
I wonder what the effect on GDP would be if office workers had the same level of output but never went to the office.
I would guess GDP would be lower which governments would hate.
Of course there is a difference between GDP and wealth creation let alone GDP and quality of life.
The difference between a GDP increase and wealth creation is actually quite an interesting concept.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
I'd love to. Not only would he insist on getting every round in, but hed put enough behind the bar for next time and slip you a twenty for a kebab and cab home.
A longish but v. interesting read (in 2 parts) particularly as some of the players still infect UK politics. A lot of LMs tactics seem very prescient & relevant to today's shitshow, eg people being shutdown/cancelled for telling the 'truth'.
Some might saying that it would be an embarrassment for the government if their manifesto was authored by someone who willing wrote for an unrepentant genocide denying publication but what I like about this government is that they went all in on it.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Well I disagree. I can picture myself having a ploughman's in a country pub with Keir Starmer. Once it's safe.
A longish but v. interesting read (in 2 parts) particularly as some of the players still infect UK politics. A lot of LMs tactics seem very prescient & relevant to today's shitshow, eg people being shutdown/cancelled for telling the 'truth'.
Some might saying that it would be an embarrassment for the government if their manifesto was authored by someone who willing wrote for an unrepentant genocide denying publication but what I like about this government is that they went all in on it.
And avowed Marxists. While calling people who oppose them Marxists.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
So a U turn from Starmer.
And now he has to wear a mask or he's a 'do as I say not as I do' hypocrite as well.
Well think he is saying they should be worn in shops, not pubs. I don't see why the people pulling pints in pubs shouldn't wear them though, I suppose?
I thought they had to wear a mask or visor.
It’s a fair point. If Starmer is calling for masks in shops, he really ought to be wearing one in such photo ops.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Do you ever have a good word about SKS ?
SKS will be supporting the correct team at 16:30?
There both mediocre at best at the moment. But I think Arsenal have better future prospects compared to Spurs.Who seem to be going backwards. Also not a great time to open a new stadium.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Do you ever have a good word about SKS ?
SKS will be supporting the correct team at 16:30?
There both mediocre at best at the moment. But I think Arsenal have better future prospects compared to Spurs.Who seem to be going backwards. Also not a great time to open a new stadium.
That's what the "experts" on the Sunday Supplement were saying this morning. Come 18:30, if Spurs have won, then it'll be the other way around.
A longish but v. interesting read (in 2 parts) particularly as some of the players still infect UK politics. A lot of LMs tactics seem very prescient & relevant to today's shitshow, eg people being shutdown/cancelled for telling the 'truth'.
I note that Mick Hume was editor of Spiked till 2007, is still their editor-at-large (whatever that is) and gets regular gigs with Rupert's organs. It's quite entertaining in that piece to see this doughty warrior for truth reduced during the libel trial to wibbling about it being a misunderstanding and not knowing what his case was.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Do you ever have a good word about SKS ?
I don't dislike him, I just think he comes across as boring and nerdy, and that is a major hurdle for someone who wants to become PM from opposition to face. The only PMs we have had recently who were devoid of charisma were Brown and May, and they didn't get there via public vote.
If I had to say a good word for him, I'd probably say he seems like a nice, honest person who means well. I liked Ed Miliband, I was rooting for him, and Starmer is quite similar - I guess the difference is that everyone slaughtered Ed and loves Keir which I don't get at all, so I argue against it - they are the same.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Well I disagree. I can picture myself having a ploughman's in a country pub with Keir Starmer. Once it's safe.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Do you ever have a good word about SKS ?
SKS will be supporting the correct team at 16:30?
There both mediocre at best at the moment. But I think Arsenal have better future prospects compared to Spurs.Who seem to be going backwards. Also not a great time to open a new stadium.
That's what the "experts" on the Sunday Supplement were saying this morning. Come 18:30, if Spurs have won, then it'll be the other way around.
I think Arsenal will win today. However even if they do not their manager seems to me going in the right direction. Whereas Mourino looks past his sell by date to win trophies. Also can not see him bringing on the youngsters, like Poch did.
Decline of humoral responses against SARS-CoV-2 Spike in convalescent individuals https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.09.194639v1 In the absence of effective vaccines and with limited therapeutic options, convalescent plasma is being collected across the globe for potential transfusion to COVID-19 patients. The therapy has been deemed safe and several clinical trials assessing its efficacy are ongoing. While it remains to be formally proven, the presence of neutralizing antibodies is thought to play a positive role in the efficacy of this treatment. Indeed, neutralizing titers of ≥1:160 have been recommended in some convalescent plasma trials for inclusion. Here we performed repeated analyses at one-month interval on 31 convalescent individuals to evaluate how the humoral responses against the SARS-CoV-2 Spike, including neutralization, evolve over time. We observed that receptor-binding domain (RBD)-specific IgG slightly decreased between six and ten weeks after symptoms onset but RBD-specific IgM decreased much more abruptly. Similarly, we observed a significant decrease in the capacity of convalescent plasma to neutralize pseudoparticles bearing SARS-CoV-2 S wild-type or its D614G variant. If neutralization activity proves to be an important factor in the clinical efficacy of convalescent plasma transfer, our results suggest that plasma from convalescent donors should be recovered rapidly after symptoms resolution.
More evidence for a fall off over antibody response over time. I hope that vaccines (many of which utilise a follow up booster shot) will elicit a more durable response.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Do you ever have a good word about SKS ?
SKS will be supporting the correct team at 16:30?
There both mediocre at best at the moment. But I think Arsenal have better future prospects compared to Spurs.Who seem to be going backwards. Also not a great time to open a new stadium.
That's what the "experts" on the Sunday Supplement were saying this morning. Come 18:30, if Spurs have won, then it'll be the other way around.
Whatever the result, I am more than happy to take our players and Arteta over Spurs' current squad and Mourinho.
Ceballos is quality, and the young kids, esp Saka are a breath of fresh air
Spurs in such bad form though that this would be a good time for them to play us, they arent as bad as they have been playing recently surely?
I've heard a lot from Bridgen about Brexit and why we need folk the calibre of Rees-Mogg leading us, I don't remember anything from him about one in eight of the people walking the streets in Leicester East being a slave. Maybe looking in the wrong places.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Do you ever have a good word about SKS ?
SKS will be supporting the correct team at 16:30?
There both mediocre at best at the moment. But I think Arsenal have better future prospects compared to Spurs.Who seem to be going backwards. Also not a great time to open a new stadium.
That's what the "experts" on the Sunday Supplement were saying this morning. Come 18:30, if Spurs have won, then it'll be the other way around.
Whatever the result, I am more than happy to take our players and Arteta over Spurs' current squad and Mourinho.
Ceballos is quality, and the young kids, esp Saka are a breath of fresh air
Spurs in such bad form though that this would be a good time for them to play us, they arent as bad as they have been playing recently surely?
I'm not sure Spurs are in that bad form. Drawing at Bournemouth is pretty poor, but look what happened to Chelsea at Sheff Utd yesterday.
We have improved, winning at Wolves was very impressive. But I'm not very confident today.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Do you ever have a good word about SKS ?
SKS will be supporting the correct team at 16:30?
There both mediocre at best at the moment. But I think Arsenal have better future prospects compared to Spurs.Who seem to be going backwards. Also not a great time to open a new stadium.
That's what the "experts" on the Sunday Supplement were saying this morning. Come 18:30, if Spurs have won, then it'll be the other way around.
Whatever the result, I am more than happy to take our players and Arteta over Spurs' current squad and Mourinho.
Ceballos is quality, and the young kids, esp Saka are a breath of fresh air
Spurs in such bad form though that this would be a good time for them to play us, they arent as bad as they have been playing recently surely?
Longitudinal evaluation and decline of antibody responses in SARS-CoV-2 infection https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.09.20148429v1 Antibody (Ab) responses to SARS-CoV-2 can be detected in most infected individuals 10-15 days following the onset of COVID-19 symptoms. However, due to the recent emergence of this virus in the human population it is not yet known how long these Ab responses will be maintained or whether they will provide protection from re-infection. Using sequential serum samples collected up to 94 days post onset of symptoms (POS) from 65 RT-qPCR confirmed SARS-CoV-2-infected individuals, we show seroconversion in >95% of cases and neutralizing antibody (nAb) responses when sampled beyond 8 days POS. We demonstrate that the magnitude of the nAb response is dependent upon the disease severity, but this does not affect the kinetics of the nAb response. Declining nAb titres were observed during the follow up period. Whilst some individuals with high peak ID50 (>10,000) maintained titres >1,000 at >60 days POS, some with lower peak ID50 had titres approaching baseline within the follow up period. A similar decline in nAb titres was also observed in a cohort of seropositive healthcare workers from Guy′s and St Thomas′ Hospitals. We suggest that this transient nAb response is a feature shared by both a SARS-CoV-2 infection that causes low disease severity and the circulating seasonal coronaviruses that are associated with common colds. This study has important implications when considering widespread serological testing, Ab protection against re-infection with SARS-CoV-2 and the durability of vaccine protection.
I've heard a lot from Bridgen about Brexit and why we need folk the calibre of Rees-Mogg leading us, I don't remember anything from him about one in eight of the people walking the streets in Leicester East being a slave. Maybe looking in the wrong places.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Do you ever have a good word about SKS ?
I don't dislike him, I just think he comes across as boring and nerdy, and that is a major hurdle for someone who wants to become PM from opposition to face. The only PMs we have had recently who were devoid of charisma were Brown and May, and they didn't get there via public vote.
If I had to say a good word for him, I'd probably say he seems like a nice, honest person who means well. I liked Ed Miliband, I was rooting for him, and Starmer is quite similar - I guess the difference is that everyone slaughtered Ed and loves Keir which I don't get at all, so I argue against it - they are the same.
I think many people could see SKS as PM . Whereas they could not with Milliband, Kinnock. English voters especially, seem to like an English barrister as PM, as they did with Blair. I know he could be described as a Scot but was perceived as English.
I've heard a lot from Bridgen about Brexit and why we need folk the calibre of Rees-Mogg leading us, I don't remember anything from him about one in eight of the people walking the streets in Leicester East being a slave. Maybe looking in the wrong places.
I once went to such sweatshop (in a Midlands city, not Leicester). I was there for professional reasons. Never seen anything like it. It was quite a shock and me and the boss had to decide what to do once we had escaped and got back to the office. Tricky.
How old ? If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday! After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
I'd love to. Not only would he insist on getting every round in, but hed put enough behind the bar for next time and slip you a twenty for a kebab and cab home.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
Do you ever have a good word about SKS ?
I don't dislike him, I just think he comes across as boring and nerdy, and that is a major hurdle for someone who wants to become PM from opposition to face. The only PMs we have had recently who were devoid of charisma were Brown and May, and they didn't get there via public vote.
If I had to say a good word for him, I'd probably say he seems like a nice, honest person who means well. I liked Ed Miliband, I was rooting for him, and Starmer is quite similar - I guess the difference is that everyone slaughtered Ed and loves Keir which I don't get at all, so I argue against it - they are the same.
I think many people could see SKS as PM . Whereas they could not with Milliband, Kinnock. English voters especially, seem to like an English barrister as PM, as they did with Blair. I know he could be described as a Scot but was perceived as English.
SKS is reassuring in a way that Corbyn was not.
Or rather the idea of Corbyn as PM was utterly terrifying in a way that obviously not true of Starmer.
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
Monday!
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
Rishi Sunak is boring. Definitely fails the "like to have a few jars with him" test. No way can people imagine themselves having a few jars with Rishi Sunak.
Well, he doesn't drink, but I think he is quite smooth actually - Keir is a proper stiff, he sounds like he is doing an impression of a nerd!
and yet the public don't seem to agree with you. It's almost as if the public are seeing through Johnson's vacuous waffle and looking for a proper leader.
I've heard a lot from Bridgen about Brexit and why we need folk the calibre of Rees-Mogg leading us, I don't remember anything from him about one in eight of the people walking the streets in Leicester East being a slave. Maybe looking in the wrong places.
Because attempting raise it before would have resulted in a charge of racism against him, and a serious attempt to get him thrown out of politics.
See Rotherham et al.
Nick Griffin was and is a racist, I assume your not suggesting that about Bridgen? Do you think that's also a get out clause for the Labour pols that seemed to be getting a wheen of blame from wee Andy?.
as I said earlier, Trump, Bolsarno and Johnson are going to be seen as the 3 biggest failures when the dust finally settles. Seems that populism has a bit of a problem when it it meets reality. Who would have guessed?
Comments
https://twitter.com/PhilipJCollins1/status/1282220543580745729?s=20
Although no doubt there were some who called it.
A tension with the "community organising" idea that was one of the Ed Milliband great hopes, in that it would have a political dimension?
About a no deal Brexit -
"We stood alone in 1940. We can do it again."
Heard that all over. It really brought home to me what we were dealing with. How useless the normal sort of arguments were going to be.
For a change, I'll start my verbal rambling on topic.
I like Starmer - perhaps more accurately, I don't dislike him. He's affable, personable and I'd probably enjoy a socially-distanced coffee or other beverage with him.
The point is, unlike Corbyn, I'm prepared to listen to what he has to say. I may not like it but I'm prepared to give him a fair hearing. I'm less worried about the "fellow travellers" than some - Blair had "fellow travellers" like Corbyn, McDonnell and others but it didn't stop him winning three elections so that's a red herring (pun intended).
The second part of the question is whether Labour are a credible alternative Government. As of now, they aren't but they don't have to be. I think Dodds looks weak at SCoE but any SCoE would have problems facing a Chancellor who is dishing out free money to all and sundry. The problem Dodds has is to come up with an alternative - the credible option, to question the long term value of borrowing and racking up the debt and deficit is open to the LDs but not to Labour.
Thus we have the two main high spending social democratic parties fighting a never ending Dutch auction to see who can increase the debt burden for future generations the more - it's one way of doing things I suppose.
Giving people free money whether it be in the form of furlough payments or tax cuts, will always be popular but it never ends well because at some point the tap gets turned off.
Headline - 15 - lowest since March, Sunday or not
7 days - 15
Yesterday - 1
If it was taken in the last four months the infection rate was higher and there was even more reason for Starmer to wear a mask.
This tends to upset the tribalists.
When will PB start a news channel? - we had the story this morning, by accident. With a bit of diligence we could have been running it last night.
Is this level of detail being published in the UK?
Is a food bank innately political? Or a toy library? Or a benefits' help service? Or for that matter a Trade Union or a Chamber of Commerce?
Or is the test actually "party political"?
Nothing to do with statues or being "woke", this is the real battle between the Government and an army of new revolutionaries - the home workers.
With an increasing lack of subtlety, Government Ministers are now trying to clamp down on the latest insurrection among the middle classes - the refusal to go back to being office-based commuting, Pret-A-Manger consuming drones.
Yes, I'm sure some on here will warble on about how much they and "everyone they know" are champing at the bit to get back on a cold and wet platform to catch the 7.42 to Waterloo or Euston or to spend an hour each day on the M62 or M25 practising their karaoke while they go nowhere slowly.
I'm not and I don't know anyone who is. The vast amounts companies are spending on re-fitting their office space to accommodate social distancing protocols is now looking like another huge loss as said companies find out the vast majority of their office workers don't want to come back to the office.
Compulsion? No doubt we'll get Alok Sharma popping up to tell us it is our "civic duty" to "march proudly back to the office".
There are plenty of people who can find plenty of reasons to justify NOT going back to an office and none of them care that much about the state of the commercial property market (but then they probably don't give as much to the Conservative Party as some of those may do in the commercial property business, I wouldn't know).
It's a change - a seismic change - and a thoughtful Government would, instead of trying to put a lid on that change, would consider the implications which were many and not all of them negative by any means.
After his PR team told him that people had loved Farage being in a pub on Saturday, and that him posting pics of getting his hair shampooed weren't going to stop people thinking he was boring
I would guess GDP would be lower which governments would hate.
Of course there is a difference between GDP and wealth creation let alone GDP and quality of life.
And now he has to wear a mask or he's a 'do as I say not as I do' hypocrite as well.
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/jul/12/anne-applebaum-how-my-old-friends-paved-the-way-for-trump-and-brexit
...She is as wary of the commonplace view that supporters of Trump, say, are conformists, who have been brainwashed online or by Fox News. They may be now in some part, but brainwashing does not explain how populist movements begin. Their leaders weren’t from small towns full of abandoned shops and drug-ridden streets. They were metropolitans, with degrees from Oxford in the case of Johnson and Dominic Cummings. The men and women Applebaum knew were not loyal drones but filled with a dark restlessness. They may pose as the tribunes of the common people now but they were members of the intellectual and educated elite willing to launch a war on the rest of the intellectual and educated elite.
Populist activists are outsiders only in that they feel insufficiently rewarded. And their opponents should never underestimate what their self-pitying vanity can make them do.
One of Applebaum’s closest Polish friends, the godmother of one of her children, and a guest at the 1999 party, provided her with the most striking example. She moved from being a comfortable but obscure figure to become a celebrated Warsaw hostess and a confidante to Poland’s new rulers. She signalled her break and opened her prospects for advancement with a call to Applebaum within days of the Smolensk air crash of April 2010. She let her know she was adopting a conspiracy theory that would make future friendship impossible.
Outsiders need to take a deep breath before trying to understand it. Among the dead was Lech Kaczyński, the president of Poland, who controlled the rightwing populist party Law and Justice with his twin brother, Jarosław Kaczyński. The party has grown to dominate Polish politics, and the supposedly independent courts, media and civil service. The flight recorder showed that the pilot had come in too low in thick fog, and that was an end to it. Jarosław Kaczyński and his underlings insist that the Russians were behind the crash, or that political rivals in Warsaw, including Applebaum’s husband, allowed the president to fly in a faulty plane, or that it was an assassination. Repeating the lie was the price of admission to Law and Justice’s ruling circles and the public sector jobs they controlled. As Applebaum noted in the Atlantic magazine: “Sometimes the point isn’t to make people believe a lie – it’s to make people fear the liar.” Acknowledge the liar’s power, and your career takes off without the need to pass exams or to display an elementary level of competence...
Just how fair it is to equate the Brexit project with what’s going on in the US, Poland or Hungary is a matter of debate, but there are some parallels.
The fact I'm not spending money on fares on buying coffee or lunch at the local wherever or buying nice shirts and trousers at M&S may be an issue in GDP terms but the money spent on home deliveries or on other online purchases is going into the economy. I think I am more productive - I am less tired and stressed and sleeping better.
Your last paragraph encapsulates so much of the current debate - is it just about how wealthy we are or the quality of life we have? The last few months have perhaps tilted the balance more toward the latter premise - how we live is more important than how much we have and I suspect for many good health has become an even greater priority than material acquisition.
I wouldn't say their lives were rubbish at all, they are happy and successful
https://twitter.com/PeterNimmo1/status/1282019234223136768?s=20
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/12/health/britain-masks-intl-gbr/index.html
While calling people who oppose them Marxists.
If Starmer is calling for masks in shops, he really ought to be wearing one in such photo ops.
But I think Arsenal have better future prospects compared to Spurs.Who seem to be going backwards. Also not a great time to open a new stadium.
https://twitter.com/adamdavidson/status/1282288622134341633
If I had to say a good word for him, I'd probably say he seems like a nice, honest person who means well. I liked Ed Miliband, I was rooting for him, and Starmer is quite similar - I guess the difference is that everyone slaughtered Ed and loves Keir which I don't get at all, so I argue against it - they are the same.
However even if they do not their manager seems to me going in the right direction.
Whereas Mourino looks past his sell by date to win trophies.
Also can not see him bringing on the youngsters, like Poch did.
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.09.194639v1
In the absence of effective vaccines and with limited therapeutic options, convalescent plasma is being collected across the globe for potential transfusion to COVID-19 patients. The therapy has been deemed safe and several clinical trials assessing its efficacy are ongoing. While it remains to be formally proven, the presence of neutralizing antibodies is thought to play a positive role in the efficacy of this treatment. Indeed, neutralizing titers of ≥1:160 have been recommended in some convalescent plasma trials for inclusion. Here we performed repeated analyses at one-month interval on 31 convalescent individuals to evaluate how the humoral responses against the SARS-CoV-2 Spike, including neutralization, evolve over time. We observed that receptor-binding domain (RBD)-specific IgG slightly decreased between six and ten weeks after symptoms onset but RBD-specific IgM decreased much more abruptly. Similarly, we observed a significant decrease in the capacity of convalescent plasma to neutralize pseudoparticles bearing SARS-CoV-2 S wild-type or its D614G variant. If neutralization activity proves to be an important factor in the clinical efficacy of convalescent plasma transfer, our results suggest that plasma from convalescent donors should be recovered rapidly after symptoms resolution.
More evidence for a fall off over antibody response over time.
I hope that vaccines (many of which utilise a follow up booster shot) will elicit a more durable response.
Ceballos is quality, and the young kids, esp Saka are a breath of fresh air
Spurs in such bad form though that this would be a good time for them to play us, they arent as bad as they have been playing recently surely?
https://twitter.com/LBC/status/1282274787012812801?s=20
We have improved, winning at Wolves was very impressive. But I'm not very confident today.
Longitudinal evaluation and decline of antibody responses in SARS-CoV-2 infection
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.09.20148429v1
Antibody (Ab) responses to SARS-CoV-2 can be detected in most infected individuals 10-15 days following the onset of COVID-19 symptoms. However, due to the recent emergence of this virus in the human population it is not yet known how long these Ab responses will be maintained or whether they will provide protection from re-infection. Using sequential serum samples collected up to 94 days post onset of symptoms (POS) from 65 RT-qPCR confirmed SARS-CoV-2-infected individuals, we show seroconversion in >95% of cases and neutralizing antibody (nAb) responses when sampled beyond 8 days POS. We demonstrate that the magnitude of the nAb response is dependent upon the disease severity, but this does not affect the kinetics of the nAb response. Declining nAb titres were observed during the follow up period. Whilst some individuals with high peak ID50 (>10,000) maintained titres >1,000 at >60 days POS, some with lower peak ID50 had titres approaching baseline within the follow up period. A similar decline in nAb titres was also observed in a cohort of seropositive healthcare workers from Guy′s and St Thomas′ Hospitals. We suggest that this transient nAb response is a feature shared by both a SARS-CoV-2 infection that causes low disease severity and the circulating seasonal coronaviruses that are associated with common colds. This study has important implications when considering widespread serological testing, Ab protection against re-infection with SARS-CoV-2 and the durability of vaccine protection.
See Rotherham et al.
Whereas they could not with Milliband, Kinnock.
English voters especially, seem to like an English barrister as PM, as they did with Blair.
I know he could be described as a Scot but was perceived as English.
SKS is reassuring in a way that Corbyn was not.
That was quite a finish to the race.
https://twitter.com/devisridhar/status/1282227952470687745?s=20
I assume she knows the difference.