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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » The Russia Report doesn’t look like a damp squib
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » The Russia Report doesn’t look like a damp squib
So now we have got ten months late the document and the headline in the Times report “Downing Street failed to protect EU referendum, says Russia report” sets out the political challenge for ministers only five months before the EU transition period comes to an end.
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"..... the efforts that Johnson made to try to impede the publication of the document highlights even more its importance. If there was nothing to hide why did he go to such lengths to defer publication?"
This is a great pity, because stripped of the partisan mud-slinging, there's actually a serious report here which highlights some serious shortcomings in the intelligence services and in successive governments' responses to the increasingly sinister direction which Russia has taken. It's not helped by the fact that Boris and Raab seem to be taking a Trump-like attitude to it, guaranteeing that nothing will be done. Governance in the UK is not going to improve until we get rid of this lot.
I do not like the conflation of a trading relationship with Brexit. We left the EU months ago, that is not up for debate.
Is he thinking of litigation?
I'm not saying they will find evidence (and I don't think it impacted the result anyway) but I don't see how he can be so certain.
Nice metaphor too. Its apparent dependence on three key persons certainly doesn't presage the sort of redundancy and toughness you'd want, like GRP, of a proper government.
Ultimately though it was British voters that put crosses on the ballot paper. Democracy does not exclude the thick, or the manipulated. Whether or not we were manipulated, it is no ones fault but our own.
More MIGs for the dear old RAF to chase around the skies eh?
Maybe his lawyers are checking
To have a duplicate, meaningless, and onerous set of regulations was always the Brexiters' aim.
So that we can say we have our own standards.
That bonkers.
It is up to the electorate to sift through the information and act as they see fit.
The alternative is an almighty range of banning, censorship and legal wrangles after the fact that will prove very little and open the door to censorship, which would be a big negative.
In the end you have to trust the electorate, which may or may not be a good thing.
The report did, I think, say that the paper based voting system was robust against interference. That may be a sign that low tech is in some areas the best solution.
Sozza but I don't get the fuss over the Russian "interference" Even the bloke on R5 couldn't explain what actually they might have done apart from, er, reinforcing existing beliefs.
If it's an allegation of lies and disinformation, well there are plenty here to do that job - otherwise known as electioneering and politics.
It is all that keeps the Russia state afloat. Germany and similar nations in Europe are reliant upon his gas and Putin is reliant upon their cash. It is them who have a symbiotic nature.
The UK is not Russia's friend with or without Brexit. We aren't using his gas and we are world leaders now at wind farms and other alternative energy to move our own energy production away from gas.
If you want to hurt Putin then support offshore wind and alternatives like maybe tidal lagoons etc - that is the real issue at stake for Putin.
This is why I've found this idea of setting our own standards and our own requirements very odd since day one, as anyone we trade with will be deciding that.
You can't seriously tell me the EU are going to accept our standards, we're a tiny island.
Buying political influence, donations to parties.
Cambridge Analytica by some link
Troll farms
And other nefarious activities that may or may not be real.
However, the allegations that conservative and labour peers have not been above criticism is of concern
If we want to trade with the EU then exports will have to follow their standards.
If we want to trade with the USA then exports will have to follow their standards.
If we want to trade with Japan then exports will have to follow their standards.
If any of them want to trade with us then their exports will have to follow our standards.
Exports don't have to follow domestic standards of the nation that produces them, they need to follow the standards of the nation they are being exported to. Changes of spec are entirely possible.
It doesn't matter if the EU accepts our standards or not. Our "tiny island" can set whatever standards that suit us and all imports must follow our standards. If we have reason to diverge from CE then fine that suits us.
As an example have a look at left-hand-drive versus right-hand-drive vehicles. In the UK our cars are different and always have been different to "standard" European cars. No reason that can't be true in other industries too.
Putin really is the living embodiment of Dr Johnson's comment about patriotism being the last refuge of the scoundrel.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/david-cameron/8757576/David-Cameron-tells-Russian-hosts-KGB-tried-to-recruit-me-but-I-failed-the-test.html
A world without gas should be our geopolitical aim. Even forgetting environmental reasons, eliminating gas is geopolitically a great thing for us. It removes the cash cow that so many of our geopolitical enemies rely upon.
The Sixty Symbols video channel features Nottingham University physicists explaining physics in entertaining fashion. They were asked here, who is your favourite scientist? No spoilers but Paul Dirac does get a mention. ETA ok the Youtube screenshot might include a spoiler.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-Q0wEIG3E0
I was just wondering what would happen if something that is currently in the standard because it suits us were removed because no one else wants it.
I think the PSBR is a dodgy metric as I think it includes LAs etc who should be able to borrow in their own right and excludes PFI and other dodges.
The BIG metric used to the the Balance of Payments which is much more important. It shows whether we are paying our way as a country. It used to be quoted all the time and we all waited for the latest estimate. Will the IMF have to step in? The PSBR was hardly mentioned.
The Balance of Payments was demoted by the Tories because of the embarrassment of continually having to sell the family silver to make ends meet, which is still going on. PSBR suited them and particularly the Treasury as it was an instrument of Control. Brown liked it for that reason too. It was also a stick with which to beat Labour (as we have seen here today).
Once again I think we are failing to use the relatively recent past as a reference point.
Fatigue failure is what does for most governments. Weibull statistics.
If the EU wants to send its goods to us we they will need to accept our standards but in a fight about standards who is reasonably going to win, us a tiny island or a massive market. It's obviously the massive market.
Even if the EU didn't win, what an absolute ballache for any small company. Today you trade with the EU at no difficulty, tomorrow it's different standards for your goods to the UK and different standards to the EU. Unless we have the same standards in which case the whole exercise is pointless.
Not sure that particular cavalry is on the horizon.
Play nicely.
Quite why we'd want to be the only country in the world going backwards to the old fragmented system is anyone's guess, but what is clear is that the rest of the world is unlikely to bother with a UK-only standard. Any UK exporter is going to have to conform to EU and/or US rules; if they also have to conform to UK-specific rules for their home market, they'll be at a competitive disadvantage. And if we don't want accept EU standards, we'll have to pay more for the extra cost and hassle for the manufacturer - if they bother at all.
If we are sending goods to the EU, they will need to comply with EU standards. If we harmonise our standards the whole exercise is pointless, if we don't it's red tape for small businesses who today don't have these problems.
For what reason?
In intelligence the test is not "reasonable doubt", it is likelihood and collateral and in both cases the committee implies that Russian targetting was likely and there are credible reasons to beleive it took place.
In fact it is as close to a smoking gun as you are ever going to get in the world of the spooks.
Jeez.
It means that our exporters know what they have to deal with. They can export to the whole of the EU based on one spec and don't need to mess around with different specs per nation. They can export to almost the whole of the EU with one currency.
But we retain the right to change standards where it is in our own interest. We retain the right to change our currency, our interest rates, have our own QE etc where it is in our interests.
Best of both worlds.
But I also expect that time will not end on 1/1/21. In the future if Europe chooses to change their standards we can choose to adopt their changes or reject them. In the future if the UK chooses to change our own standards then we can do so. We will be in control.
In the future if there is a different spec required due to different standards then manufacturers will cope with that. Just like the cope with our 3 pin plug that isn't used on the continent. Just like the cope with Right Hand Drive vehicles.
Where we might have very different regulations is around labour and environmental standards, or around agriculture.
Not much will differ but if it doesn't differ its moot. If it does differ, its because we've chosen so.
Work on SARS and MERS vaccines was well under way when both viruses were brought into check without needing the vaccines (and the Oxford vaccine owes a lot to work done on MERS vaccination). Animal coronaviruses in the UK have needed vaccines, which have been promptly forthcoming.
This by contrast is what would worry me, if we had not managed to get off those tramlines leading to every closer union:
"The Commission will have powers to raise large funds on the capital markets for the first time and to direct how the spending is allocated, turning this strange hybrid creature into an even more extraordinary institution. Where else in the world does a single unelected body have the ‘right of initiative’ on legislation, and the executive powers of a proto-government, and the spending prerogatives of a parliament, all wrapped in one? It is Caesaropapist, bordering on totalitarian in constitutional terms, mostly unchecked by meaningful parliamentary oversight."
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2020/07/21/europes-750bn-recovery-fund-economic-pop-gun-political-howitzer/
Is it all really worth it?
British red tape for British people.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/14b1jw1EuSpo90_kwZJKiSjHMQ378jFoA/view
Looks like a slightly heavier female weighting as well
Putin is a shit-stirrer, who wants division and paralysis in the West to further his geopolitical aims. That much is clear. But I will read the report before commenting further.
What is unforgivable is our Government delaying its release. There are no excuses.
(Incidentally, I very much doubt it'd have affected GE2019 in any way but that's by the by)
Thank goodness the UK voters were smart enough to say enough is enough and get out.
https://twitter.com/BarrySheerman/status/1285538242826244096
Do the skinny ones tend to vote democrat?
The far more concerning thing is the big donations to the Conservative Party, and indirect links through the UK-based oligarchs that make them. Not that this meaningfully affects policy, of course.
Georgia has also been very aggressive at reducing the number of polling stations in black neighbourhoods, which will probably have a meaningful impact on the result. If you're going to queue for an hour or two to vote, that is effectively a voting tax, as your time is valuable.
I personally think that both GA and AZ will be a stretch for the Democrats, although I expect Mark Kelly to beat out Martha McSally in the Arizona Senate race.
We won't go against the whole rest of the world, like Richard says, but we occasionally might want to take a different tack to the US and the EU.
Provided the cost of compliance isn't meaningfully different, that shouldn't pose a big problem.
Today they announced 112
Yesterday - 30
Seven day average - 38
Note how the much of todays report goes to filling the weekend gap.
Now we've gone the biggest voice against further integration has gone, and it's probable that (a) the core countries will integrate more, while (b) the non-core will find themselves sidelined.
I think this probably increases the survivability of the EU/Eurozone, but makes it increasingly likely that it will be a smaller group of countries.
https://twitter.com/StewartWood/status/1285536726346272769
(assuming elegant touch of sarcasm in last sentence)
A minor difference sure, but as far as I understand everything across the entire country is subject to that whereas that obviously isn't the case in the USA. If Americans want to export their products for sale on Canadian shops they have to comply with that law as far as I understand.