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  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    Pulpstar said:

    I'm trying and failing to work out how this line of attack from Trump could conceivably be a good idea

    https://twitter.com/CNNPolitics/status/1304480336013922309

    As with Philip's post below there seems to be a set of people who know that people will simply believe what is posted if it's posted often enough (and then repeated by others as fact)
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 37,603
    dixiedean said:

    MaxPB said:

    kamski said:

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    Weirdly the same lack of outrage of Macron buddying up to Trump even more than Boris, rolling out the biggest of big red carpets....When he does it, it is all about international diplomacy, when Boris does it, it is because he loves everything about the Donald.
    There is just zero coverage of French politics compared to US politics full stop.

    People here know about also rans (barely-rans more like) in the contest to become the opposition party presidential candidate for an election months away, but who is the current French prime minister?
    No one cares who the French PM is, it's like asking who the senate leader is in the US. Everyone knows Macron and the excuses that the British media don't have any French speakers is laughable. The fact of the matter is that the media outrage will never exist for virtuous nations, it will only be for evil ones like the UK (and US) despite France and Macron having as crap a time of it as the UK and Boris.
    So you're outraged that the UK media is more outraged about the pandemic in the UK than in France?
    I'm bloody furious we don't get 25 minutes a day on Ecuador.
    No just that we're supposed to accept this narrative of the UK being the shittest in the world at absolutely everything and European countries being amazing is extremely grating. Some European countries have had a good crisis, most haven't and some have had truly atrocious ones. The media in the UK likes to pretend that the UK stands alone in Europe as some kind of disorganised mess and advertises it to the world as a fact. The facts are completely different, all countries have had varying degrees of crapness and disorganisation but in those comparisons it is never mentioned, the UK stands alone as crapest, that's the narrative.
  • In depressing news, top of the pile in our CLP's nominations for the NEC was....


    Laura Pidcock


    They've not gone away, you know.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,851

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    Weirdly the same lack of outrage of Macron buddying up to Trump even more than Boris, rolling out the biggest of big red carpets....When he does it, it is all about international diplomacy, when Boris does it, it is because he loves everything about the Donald.
    I hated Macron sucking up to Trump. Just that it's worse when it's your own country doing it. That's all it is. No doubt Macron gets more grief in

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    Weirdly the same lack of outrage of Macron buddying up to Trump even more than Boris, rolling out the biggest of big red carpets....When he does it, it is all about international diplomacy, when Boris does it, it is because he loves everything about the Donald.
    I hate to see Emmanuel sucking up to Trump but it's worse when it's your own country and that's why I hate it even more when Johnson or the Queen do it. No doubt Manny gets more grief in France than Johnson does so it all balances out.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 66,758

    In depressing news, top of the pile in our CLP's nominations for the NEC was....


    Laura Pidcock


    They've not gone away, you know.

    What is she doing these days? Anything useful or is she just doing a Leadsom impression?
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,084
    edited September 2020

    MaxPB said:

    kamski said:

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    Weirdly the same lack of outrage of Macron buddying up to Trump even more than Boris, rolling out the biggest of big red carpets....When he does it, it is all about international diplomacy, when Boris does it, it is because he loves everything about the Donald.
    There is just zero coverage of French politics compared to US politics full stop.

    People here know about also rans (barely-rans more like) in the contest to become the opposition party presidential candidate for an election months away, but who is the current French prime minister?
    No one cares who the French PM is, it's like asking who the senate leader is in the US. Everyone knows Macron and the excuses that the British media don't have any French speakers is laughable. The fact of the matter is that the media outrage will never exist for virtuous nations, it will only be for evil ones like the UK (and US) despite France and Macron having as crap a time of it as the UK and Boris.
    The French are shit, we all know that, it is like saying water is wet.

    I suppose not everyone is as much of a Francophile as I am.
    In Saint Quentin on Monday, the effort they were making in the town square and pedestrianised area was considerable, with a cordoned mask compulsory area (compliance about 90%), and manned tables about the place making people sanitise their hands. If you just visited the town square it all looked very orderly and efficient.

    Thing was, in the early evening I took the dog for a walk outside of the centre, and as soon as you left the cordon all the masks disappeared (usage dropped to about 10%), and the streetside bars and cafes were all packed with people.

    It seemed as if they just didn’t want you to catch it in the town square.
  • BluestBlueBluestBlue Posts: 4,556
    dixiedean said:

    MaxPB said:

    kamski said:

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    Weirdly the same lack of outrage of Macron buddying up to Trump even more than Boris, rolling out the biggest of big red carpets....When he does it, it is all about international diplomacy, when Boris does it, it is because he loves everything about the Donald.
    There is just zero coverage of French politics compared to US politics full stop.

    People here know about also rans (barely-rans more like) in the contest to become the opposition party presidential candidate for an election months away, but who is the current French prime minister?
    No one cares who the French PM is, it's like asking who the senate leader is in the US. Everyone knows Macron and the excuses that the British media don't have any French speakers is laughable. The fact of the matter is that the media outrage will never exist for virtuous nations, it will only be for evil ones like the UK (and US) despite France and Macron having as crap a time of it as the UK and Boris.
    So you're outraged that the UK media is more outraged about the pandemic in the UK than in France?
    I'm bloody furious we don't get 25 minutes a day on Ecuador.
    You should - Ecuador (and Brazil) are likely to overtake our death rate per capita within days. Chile and Bolivia have already done so within the last 24 hours.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    ydoethur said:

    I may have found a worse topping on pizza than pineapple.

    Sultanas!

    S-U-L-T-A-N-A-S.

    Fecking sultanas, the world has gone mad.

    No boss, you misheard. I did not say I had a grape idea.
    I suppose that is currantly the best pun in the thread, but I plan on raisin the standard.
  • MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    For years the British media has had an obsession with the US, and the minutiae of its politics, to the detriment of any reporting of European politics. The fascination with Trump has only accelerated the trend.

    Your example is no different, not part of a left-wing Covid conspiracy, though no less wrong for that.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 66,758
    IshmaelZ said:

    ydoethur said:

    I may have found a worse topping on pizza than pineapple.

    Sultanas!

    S-U-L-T-A-N-A-S.

    Fecking sultanas, the world has gone mad.

    No boss, you misheard. I did not say I had a grape idea.
    I suppose that is currantly the best pun in the thread, but I plan on raisin the standard.
    That fig-ers.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,774
    Pulpstar said:

    I'm trying and failing to work out how this line of attack from Trump could conceivably be a good idea

    https://twitter.com/CNNPolitics/status/1304480336013922309

    President Trump doesn't care what's true and what isn't, only what he thinks will work.

    If he thinks the path to reelection is saying that he'll protect Obamacare, while Biden will destroy it, then that's what he'll say.

    It's very depressing.
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483

    dixiedean said:

    MaxPB said:

    kamski said:

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    Weirdly the same lack of outrage of Macron buddying up to Trump even more than Boris, rolling out the biggest of big red carpets....When he does it, it is all about international diplomacy, when Boris does it, it is because he loves everything about the Donald.
    There is just zero coverage of French politics compared to US politics full stop.

    People here know about also rans (barely-rans more like) in the contest to become the opposition party presidential candidate for an election months away, but who is the current French prime minister?
    No one cares who the French PM is, it's like asking who the senate leader is in the US. Everyone knows Macron and the excuses that the British media don't have any French speakers is laughable. The fact of the matter is that the media outrage will never exist for virtuous nations, it will only be for evil ones like the UK (and US) despite France and Macron having as crap a time of it as the UK and Boris.
    So you're outraged that the UK media is more outraged about the pandemic in the UK than in France?
    I'm bloody furious we don't get 25 minutes a day on Ecuador.
    You should - Ecuador (and Brazil) are likely to overtake our death rate per capita within days. Chile and Bolivia have already done so within the last 24 hours.
    Oh good let’s have a few third world countries go out of control so we can drop down the league table, sick
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,840
    MaxPB said:

    dixiedean said:

    MaxPB said:

    kamski said:

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    Weirdly the same lack of outrage of Macron buddying up to Trump even more than Boris, rolling out the biggest of big red carpets....When he does it, it is all about international diplomacy, when Boris does it, it is because he loves everything about the Donald.
    There is just zero coverage of French politics compared to US politics full stop.

    People here know about also rans (barely-rans more like) in the contest to become the opposition party presidential candidate for an election months away, but who is the current French prime minister?
    No one cares who the French PM is, it's like asking who the senate leader is in the US. Everyone knows Macron and the excuses that the British media don't have any French speakers is laughable. The fact of the matter is that the media outrage will never exist for virtuous nations, it will only be for evil ones like the UK (and US) despite France and Macron having as crap a time of it as the UK and Boris.
    So you're outraged that the UK media is more outraged about the pandemic in the UK than in France?
    I'm bloody furious we don't get 25 minutes a day on Ecuador.
    No just that we're supposed to accept this narrative of the UK being the shittest in the world at absolutely everything and European countries being amazing is extremely grating. Some European countries have had a good crisis, most haven't and some have had truly atrocious ones. The media in the UK likes to pretend that the UK stands alone in Europe as some kind of disorganised mess and advertises it to the world as a fact. The facts are completely different, all countries have had varying degrees of crapness and disorganisation but in those comparisons it is never mentioned, the UK stands alone as crapest, that's the narrative.
    Would that "media" include the Telegraph, Express, Sun, Mail, Spectator, Spiked, Times Radio, etc?
    Or just the bits of it you don't like?
    Because from where I sit, a stream of pro-Boris, pro-Brexit cheerleading is the only thing keeping the whole house of cards up.
    But each to their own.
  • RobDRobD Posts: 58,941
    nichomar said:

    dixiedean said:

    MaxPB said:

    kamski said:

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    Weirdly the same lack of outrage of Macron buddying up to Trump even more than Boris, rolling out the biggest of big red carpets....When he does it, it is all about international diplomacy, when Boris does it, it is because he loves everything about the Donald.
    There is just zero coverage of French politics compared to US politics full stop.

    People here know about also rans (barely-rans more like) in the contest to become the opposition party presidential candidate for an election months away, but who is the current French prime minister?
    No one cares who the French PM is, it's like asking who the senate leader is in the US. Everyone knows Macron and the excuses that the British media don't have any French speakers is laughable. The fact of the matter is that the media outrage will never exist for virtuous nations, it will only be for evil ones like the UK (and US) despite France and Macron having as crap a time of it as the UK and Boris.
    So you're outraged that the UK media is more outraged about the pandemic in the UK than in France?
    I'm bloody furious we don't get 25 minutes a day on Ecuador.
    You should - Ecuador (and Brazil) are likely to overtake our death rate per capita within days. Chile and Bolivia have already done so within the last 24 hours.
    Oh good let’s have a few third world countries go out of control so we can drop down the league table, sick
    So OK to say the UK is worst in the world/europe, but not okay to say the same of other countries?
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 66,758
    edited September 2020
    Are people really having a contest about ‘my country’s Covid-19 response led to fewer deaths than your country’s?’
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 37,603
    rcs1000 said:

    Pulpstar said:

    I'm trying and failing to work out how this line of attack from Trump could conceivably be a good idea

    https://twitter.com/CNNPolitics/status/1304480336013922309

    President Trump doesn't care what's true and what isn't, only what he thinks will work.

    If he thinks the path to reelection is saying that he'll protect Obamacare, while Biden will destroy it, then that's what he'll say.

    It's very depressing.
    It's just such a massive lie, Trump has tried to dismantle Obamacare completely for 4 years. I don't understand how anyone can believe the bullshit.
  • TheScreamingEaglesTheScreamingEagles Posts: 113,969
    edited September 2020
    Anti lockdown/Covid deniers really are idiots, and they are falling out.

    The brother of Jeremy Corbyn is being blamed for a feud in the ranks of Britain’s coronavirus deniers and conspiracy theorists.

    Leading figures in a movement that rejects vaccines, masks and lockdowns include Piers Corbyn, 73, an alternative weather forecaster, and David Icke, 68, the conspiracy theorist who holds that world events are being determined by shape-shifting reptilians.

    The pair are at odds with organisers of rival resistance rallies at Trafalgar Square.

    Facebook has banned a 40,000-strong discussion group which was supporting both events as social media companies struggle to contain the rising tide of coronavirus conspiracies. Matt Hancock, the health secretary, has attacked the “pernicious lies” of anti-vaccination activists and has taken up the issue of misleading posts with Facebook’s Sir Nick Clegg.

    Feelings are running high over a protest labelled We Do Not Consent on Saturday September 26 where Piers Corbyn and Icke, 68, will lead the call for non-violent civil resistance before parliament decides whether to renew the six-month old coronavirus powers.


    Mark Steele, 59, an anti-5G campaigner, has warned supporters that London will be locked down on Monday September 21 forcing the Corbyn rally to be cancelled.

    Instead he is backing a protest called Resist and Act for Freedom on September 19 hosted by Kate Shemirani, 55, a nurse and anti-5G campaigner who has compared vaccines to gas chambers and the Holocaust. She has been suspended from the nursing register.

    Piers Corbyn, in an internecine struggle reminiscent of his younger brother Jeremy’s decades of obscure disputes on the margins of the Left, has denounced Mrs Shemirani’s gathering.

    Accusing its organisers of “fake news used to divide Our Movement”, he told his 37,000 Twitter followers: “Claims there’s a Lockdown September 21 are baseless. We would anyway defy any Lockdown & still Rally September 26, just before MPs vote.

    “David Icke + Piers Corbyn are both speaking September 26 Rally + NOT involved with the divisive September 19 event.”


    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/piers-corbyn-blamed-for-split-among-coronavirus-deniers-hq3lm333c
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,712
    edited September 2020
    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905

    HYUFD said:

    Mask wearing Spain new cases today 12183. Non mask wearing Sweden new cases today 201. Who has the best policy ?

    Mask wearing South Korea new cases today 176
    How is that relevant, I am talking about Europe. Has anyone else noticed that when Governments extend forced mask wearing within 2 weeks their cases double. As an example look at France. Governments will require 2 masks to be worn soon. They are like a compulsive gambler following the martingale system. As a gambler runs out of money they will soon run out of areas where masks have to be worn as if they continue with these mad mask wearing policies cases will continue to rise. It will be masks in bed soon!
    I would imagine that forced mask wearing everywhere won't be too long in coming, on the following grounds:

    1. As cases and hospitalisations continue to rise - which the boffins seem to fear is a racing certainty, given the forthcoming arrival of the winter snot-and-coughing season - the Government will panic more and more, and look for further things to do
    2. Business closures won't happen first. I fear that the ultimate destination - at a guess by some point in November - will be Lockdown plus schools, but they won't render the furlough scheme pointless and shove unemployment up to about 12 million until they've run out of other options
    3. Therefore, the initial round of ultimately futile interventions will consist of masks everywhere, no direct social interaction with anybody outside your own household, no weddings, no funerals (bodies will be buried or burnt without ceremony,) but you'll still be allowed to go to the pub to medicate your depression by drinking yourself to death, because the economy
    4. Only when all of the above fails to work will businesses start to be salami sliced and the final collapse initiated

    This may save some some people dying of Covid in the short term, but eventually most of us will be killed by hypothermia, starvation, or from being hunted for food by post-apocalyptic biker gangs.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,774

    I've seen reports the EU are threatening now to block food exports by not listing us as a safe country to export to them.

    If they do we should repeal the Withdrawal Agreement completely and stop all money payments to them from that. The billions we agreed to pay were to be paid out over years weren't they?

    The Withdrawal Agreement ceases to exist in the event of us passing the Internal Markets Bill.
  • ydoethur said:

    Are people really having a contest about ‘my country’s Covid-19 response led to fewer deaths than your country’s?’

    Worse, they are having a contest about 'my country's Covid-19 response led to less deaths than your country’s?
  • LadyGLadyG Posts: 2,221
    fpt on Brown and Cameron


    ****

    Same goes for Cameron. He comes over, in his memoirs, as rather naive, anxious, and tentative. And prone to major unforced errors. There is no effortless Etonian self confidence. He sounds over-promoted. As indeed he was.

    The ideal UK government of the last ten years would have been George Osborne working with Peter Mandelson, with maybe Boris Johnson or pre-Iraq Blair as a token frontman,

    If we are allowed Scots I'd bring in Alex Salmond and Ruth Davidson as well.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,712

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    First, Macron is right wing, not left, and second any media outrage in the French media will be in French so does not get covered over here. The reason we have so much American news is that American news channels broadcast it in English.
    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.
    Macron is basically a Cleggite Liberal
  • LadyGLadyG Posts: 2,221
    fpt on Bruno Waterfield

    ***


    He's one of the best commentators on Brexit. Not identifiably Leave or Remain. Happy to criticise both sides, very heavily. He's been harsh on UK incompetence, but he is equally harsh on the many horrific flaws of the EU.

    I probably trust him more than any other Brexit "expert". Someone like David Allen Green is as ludicrously biased as John Redwood from the other angle.
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483

    Anti lockdown/Covid deniers really are idiots, and they are falling out.

    The brother of Jeremy Corbyn is being blamed for a feud in the ranks of Britain’s coronavirus deniers and conspiracy theorists.

    Leading figures in a movement that rejects vaccines, masks and lockdowns include Piers Corbyn, 73, an alternative weather forecaster, and David Icke, 68, the conspiracy theorist who holds that world events are being determined by shape-shifting reptilians.

    The pair are at odds with organisers of rival resistance rallies at Trafalgar Square.

    Facebook has banned a 40,000-strong discussion group which was supporting both events as social media companies struggle to contain the rising tide of coronavirus conspiracies. Matt Hancock, the health secretary, has attacked the “pernicious lies” of anti-vaccination activists and has taken up the issue of misleading posts with Facebook’s Sir Nick Clegg.

    Feelings are running high over a protest labelled We Do Not Consent on Saturday September 26 where Piers Corbyn and Icke, 68, will lead the call for non-violent civil resistance before parliament decides whether to renew the six-month old coronavirus powers.


    Mark Steele, 59, an anti-5G campaigner, has warned supporters that London will be locked down on Monday September 21 forcing the Corbyn rally to be cancelled.

    Instead he is backing a protest called Resist and Act for Freedom on September 19 hosted by Kate Shemirani, 55, a nurse and anti-5G campaigner who has compared vaccines to gas chambers and the Holocaust. She has been suspended from the nursing register.

    Piers Corbyn, in an internecine struggle reminiscent of his younger brother Jeremy’s decades of obscure disputes on the margins of the Left, has denounced Mrs Shemirani’s gathering.

    Accusing its organisers of “fake news used to divide Our Movement”, he told his 37,000 Twitter followers: “Claims there’s a Lockdown September 21 are baseless. We would anyway defy any Lockdown & still Rally September 26, just before MPs vote.

    “David Icke + Piers Corbyn are both speaking September 26 Rally + NOT involved with the divisive September 19 event.”


    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/piers-corbyn-blamed-for-split-among-coronavirus-deniers-hq3lm333c

    This is a new comedy show pre release trial,isn’t it?
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905
    ydoethur said:

    Are people really having a contest about ‘my country’s Covid-19 response led to fewer deaths than your country’s?’

    Haven't you noticed yet?! It's been going on since the Spring.
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483
    RobD said:

    nichomar said:

    dixiedean said:

    MaxPB said:

    kamski said:

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    Weirdly the same lack of outrage of Macron buddying up to Trump even more than Boris, rolling out the biggest of big red carpets....When he does it, it is all about international diplomacy, when Boris does it, it is because he loves everything about the Donald.
    There is just zero coverage of French politics compared to US politics full stop.

    People here know about also rans (barely-rans more like) in the contest to become the opposition party presidential candidate for an election months away, but who is the current French prime minister?
    No one cares who the French PM is, it's like asking who the senate leader is in the US. Everyone knows Macron and the excuses that the British media don't have any French speakers is laughable. The fact of the matter is that the media outrage will never exist for virtuous nations, it will only be for evil ones like the UK (and US) despite France and Macron having as crap a time of it as the UK and Boris.
    So you're outraged that the UK media is more outraged about the pandemic in the UK than in France?
    I'm bloody furious we don't get 25 minutes a day on Ecuador.
    You should - Ecuador (and Brazil) are likely to overtake our death rate per capita within days. Chile and Bolivia have already done so within the last 24 hours.
    Oh good let’s have a few third world countries go out of control so we can drop down the league table, sick
    So OK to say the UK is worst in the world/europe, but not okay to say the same of other countries?
    I just think it’s sick to make it appear like a contest.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 66,758
    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
  • OmniumOmnium Posts: 9,688
    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Parallels with Obama.

  • ...
    Instead he is backing a protest called Resist and Act for Freedom on September 19 hosted by Kate Shemirani, 55, a nurse and anti-5G campaigner who has compared vaccines to gas chambers and the Holocaust. She has been suspended from the nursing register.
    ...

    It takes a very unusual type of nurse to be an anti-vaccine nutjob.
  • eek said:

    I've seen reports the EU are threatening now to block food exports by not listing us as a safe country to export to them.

    If they do we should repeal the Withdrawal Agreement completely and stop all money payments to them from that. The billions we agreed to pay were to be paid out over years weren't they?

    Could you provide links to go with your comments - it's incredibly hard to work out what is fact and what is fantasy at the moment...
    I saw it elsewhere and Richard Nabavi was discussing it too. Can't find a good link, here's the Mail, my apologies I don't like the Mail or the Sun as a paper so would not normally link to them.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8721645/Gordon-Brown-blasts-Boris-Johnson-Brexit-plans.html
  • LadyGLadyG Posts: 2,221
    isam said:

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    "Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? "

    In the French media? We only get to see the bits on here where a left wing foreign paper is slagging off our Govt (its usually prefaced with "This is what the whole of France/Germany/Italy think of us", when its the equivalent of The Guardian criticising a Right Winger)
    Macron saw a boost from his initial handling of Coronavirus, but now he's stuck again.

    Most french presidents are unpopular, it should be noted, but they foten still scrape a second term. But Macron should be worried, if the 2nd wave is bad

    https://twitter.com/pollofpolls_EU/status/1300362855531925504?s=20
  • rcs1000 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Mask wearing Spain new cases today 12183. Non mask wearing Sweden new cases today 201. Who has the best policy ?

    Mask wearing South Korea new cases today 176
    How is that relevant, I am talking about Europe. Has anyone else noticed that when Governments extend forced mask wearing within 2 weeks their cases double. As an example look at France. Governments will require 2 masks to be worn soon. They are like a compulsive gambler following the martingale system. As a gambler runs out of money they will soon run out of areas where masks have to be worn as if they continue with these mad mask wearing policies cases will continue to rise. It will be masks in bed soon!
    Is it because the DNA of South Koreans and Japanese is different to Europeans?
    Rather than just taking the piss why dont you give your theory as to why the more mask wearing in Europe is enforced the quicker the cases rise? There is no enforced mask wearing in Sweden and cases are falling.

    We are at a position now in mask logic which is similar to a football team losing 10-0 and Gary Neville saying that the way that team defended is the best in the league.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 37,603
    nichomar said:

    RobD said:

    nichomar said:

    dixiedean said:

    MaxPB said:

    kamski said:

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    Weirdly the same lack of outrage of Macron buddying up to Trump even more than Boris, rolling out the biggest of big red carpets....When he does it, it is all about international diplomacy, when Boris does it, it is because he loves everything about the Donald.
    There is just zero coverage of French politics compared to US politics full stop.

    People here know about also rans (barely-rans more like) in the contest to become the opposition party presidential candidate for an election months away, but who is the current French prime minister?
    No one cares who the French PM is, it's like asking who the senate leader is in the US. Everyone knows Macron and the excuses that the British media don't have any French speakers is laughable. The fact of the matter is that the media outrage will never exist for virtuous nations, it will only be for evil ones like the UK (and US) despite France and Macron having as crap a time of it as the UK and Boris.
    So you're outraged that the UK media is more outraged about the pandemic in the UK than in France?
    I'm bloody furious we don't get 25 minutes a day on Ecuador.
    You should - Ecuador (and Brazil) are likely to overtake our death rate per capita within days. Chile and Bolivia have already done so within the last 24 hours.
    Oh good let’s have a few third world countries go out of control so we can drop down the league table, sick
    So OK to say the UK is worst in the world/europe, but not okay to say the same of other countries?
    I just think it’s sick to make it appear like a contest.
    I actually agree with this, the issue is that it's the liberal UK media that wants to push the narrative that the UK is the shittest at everything, do you agree that 1 - it's not true, and 2 - it's not a competition?
  • AlistairAlistair Posts: 23,670
    Pulpstar said:

    I'm trying and failing to work out how this line of attack from Trump could conceivably be a good idea

    https://twitter.com/CNNPolitics/status/1304480336013922309

    The Trump admin is currently supporting a Supreme Court case to render Obamacare unconstitutional.
  • MaxPB said:

    I actually agree with this, the issue is that it's the liberal UK media that wants to push the narrative that the UK is the shittest at everything, do you agree that 1 - it's not true, and 2 - it's not a competition?

    https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/status/1304486723133595652

  • ...
    Instead he is backing a protest called Resist and Act for Freedom on September 19 hosted by Kate Shemirani, 55, a nurse and anti-5G campaigner who has compared vaccines to gas chambers and the Holocaust. She has been suspended from the nursing register.
    ...

    It takes a very unusual type of nurse to be an anti-vaccine nutjob.
    She's something special.

    She has been suspended by the Nursing and Midwifery Council, which is investigating her statements about the supposed dangers of vaccines and 5G technology.

    Ms Shemirani’s notoriety as the most outspoken of British antivaxxers has grown, with 21,000 followers on Twitter, up from 7,000 in August. Her Facebook site, which had 14,000 followers, has now been removed.

    A spokesman for Facebook told The Times it had banned her “for repeatedly violating our policies against harmful misinformation”.

    Ms Shemirani has been suspended for 18 months by the NMC to avoid the risk of harm to the public. At her interim regulatory hearing in July she was represented by Mark Steele, a rabid campaigner against 5G phone masts.

    At the hearing, Ms Shemirani and Mr Steele appeared outraged that the panel did not want to hear their antivaccine and 5G “facts”. Mr Steele accused the NMC of being complicit in genocide.

  • LadyGLadyG Posts: 2,221

    ydoethur said:

    THe only group currently more useless, craven, incompetent and confused than the cabinet are England’s batsmen.

    Discuss.

    Throughout the summer England have continually tested the "down to the last possible" partnership to dig them out of trouble.
    England's cricket team has been superbly entertaining this summer (and mostly victorious). We should be proud of them, and thankful FOR them.

    Cricket has gained hugely from the virus (weirdly). Football is unwatchable without a crowd but cricket is still compelling.
  • OmniumOmnium Posts: 9,688
    MaxPB said:

    nichomar said:

    RobD said:

    nichomar said:

    dixiedean said:

    MaxPB said:

    kamski said:

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    Weirdly the same lack of outrage of Macron buddying up to Trump even more than Boris, rolling out the biggest of big red carpets....When he does it, it is all about international diplomacy, when Boris does it, it is because he loves everything about the Donald.
    There is just zero coverage of French politics compared to US politics full stop.

    People here know about also rans (barely-rans more like) in the contest to become the opposition party presidential candidate for an election months away, but who is the current French prime minister?
    No one cares who the French PM is, it's like asking who the senate leader is in the US. Everyone knows Macron and the excuses that the British media don't have any French speakers is laughable. The fact of the matter is that the media outrage will never exist for virtuous nations, it will only be for evil ones like the UK (and US) despite France and Macron having as crap a time of it as the UK and Boris.
    So you're outraged that the UK media is more outraged about the pandemic in the UK than in France?
    I'm bloody furious we don't get 25 minutes a day on Ecuador.
    You should - Ecuador (and Brazil) are likely to overtake our death rate per capita within days. Chile and Bolivia have already done so within the last 24 hours.
    Oh good let’s have a few third world countries go out of control so we can drop down the league table, sick
    So OK to say the UK is worst in the world/europe, but not okay to say the same of other countries?
    I just think it’s sick to make it appear like a contest.
    I actually agree with this, the issue is that it's the liberal UK media that wants to push the narrative that the UK is the shittest at everything, do you agree that 1 - it's not true, and 2 - it's not a competition?
    They can't now cry wolf when they want to either. The UK seeking to betray is a pretty huge story - none of the media have the slightest traction on it because they've blown their chances.
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483
    MaxPB said:

    nichomar said:

    RobD said:

    nichomar said:

    dixiedean said:

    MaxPB said:

    kamski said:

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    Weirdly the same lack of outrage of Macron buddying up to Trump even more than Boris, rolling out the biggest of big red carpets....When he does it, it is all about international diplomacy, when Boris does it, it is because he loves everything about the Donald.
    There is just zero coverage of French politics compared to US politics full stop.

    People here know about also rans (barely-rans more like) in the contest to become the opposition party presidential candidate for an election months away, but who is the current French prime minister?
    No one cares who the French PM is, it's like asking who the senate leader is in the US. Everyone knows Macron and the excuses that the British media don't have any French speakers is laughable. The fact of the matter is that the media outrage will never exist for virtuous nations, it will only be for evil ones like the UK (and US) despite France and Macron having as crap a time of it as the UK and Boris.
    So you're outraged that the UK media is more outraged about the pandemic in the UK than in France?
    I'm bloody furious we don't get 25 minutes a day on Ecuador.
    You should - Ecuador (and Brazil) are likely to overtake our death rate per capita within days. Chile and Bolivia have already done so within the last 24 hours.
    Oh good let’s have a few third world countries go out of control so we can drop down the league table, sick
    So OK to say the UK is worst in the world/europe, but not okay to say the same of other countries?
    I just think it’s sick to make it appear like a contest.
    I actually agree with this, the issue is that it's the liberal UK media that wants to push the narrative that the UK is the shittest at everything, do you agree that 1 - it's not true, and 2 - it's not a competition?
    I think reporting of bare figures fails to recognize that each country to a lesser or greater extent is different. Their governments are of different constructs, their health services have developed differently, their social norms are different and their resources can be dramatically different. Without context the figures are meaningless.
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483

    rcs1000 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Mask wearing Spain new cases today 12183. Non mask wearing Sweden new cases today 201. Who has the best policy ?

    Mask wearing South Korea new cases today 176
    How is that relevant, I am talking about Europe. Has anyone else noticed that when Governments extend forced mask wearing within 2 weeks their cases double. As an example look at France. Governments will require 2 masks to be worn soon. They are like a compulsive gambler following the martingale system. As a gambler runs out of money they will soon run out of areas where masks have to be worn as if they continue with these mad mask wearing policies cases will continue to rise. It will be masks in bed soon!
    Is it because the DNA of South Koreans and Japanese is different to Europeans?
    Rather than just taking the piss why dont you give your theory as to why the more mask wearing in Europe is enforced the quicker the cases rise? There is no enforced mask wearing in Sweden and cases are falling.

    We are at a position now in mask logic which is similar to a football team losing 10-0 and Gary Neville saying that the way that team defended is the best in the league.
    Mandating mask wearing after the cases rise is shutting the door after half the horses have already escaped, if people had worn them from the outset the increases would be dramatically lower.
  • nico679nico679 Posts: 4,534
    rcs1000 said:

    I've seen reports the EU are threatening now to block food exports by not listing us as a safe country to export to them.

    If they do we should repeal the Withdrawal Agreement completely and stop all money payments to them from that. The billions we agreed to pay were to be paid out over years weren't they?

    The Withdrawal Agreement ceases to exist in the event of us passing the Internal Markets Bill.
    True some Leavers seem happy for the UK to break its treaty obligations but then seem to have an issue with the EU not being entirely happy with that !
  • ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Because however bad Macron is, the alternative is fascism.
  • rcs1000 said:

    I've seen reports the EU are threatening now to block food exports by not listing us as a safe country to export to them.

    If they do we should repeal the Withdrawal Agreement completely and stop all money payments to them from that. The billions we agreed to pay were to be paid out over years weren't they?

    The Withdrawal Agreement ceases to exist in the event of us passing the Internal Markets Bill.
    So all other obligations like the obligation to pay them billions fall away too?

    I'm finding that doubtful.
  • LadyGLadyG Posts: 2,221

    Alistair said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    I may have found a worse topping on pizza than pineapple.

    Sultanas!

    S-U-L-T-A-N-A-S.

    Fecking sultanas, the world has gone mad.

    Just think of it as Peshwari naan and eat it with curry. The problem with pizza is not the toppings, it's the pizza. Bread for people who find breadmaking too difficult.
    That's not true of proper Naples or Rome pizzas. The ones which have a base like bad bread (i.e. any pizza in the US, and nearly all here) are not doing it right.
    The best pizza I have ever eaten was Keste in New York. Owned by a immigrant from Naples with the pizza oven shipped over.
    I can well believe that.
    Nah. The best pizza in the world - cliche of cliches - comes from its birthplace, the backstreets of old Naples. Maybe the Spanish Quarters, maybe by the station, with the hookers.

    Anyway, watch where the locals queue for their evening pizza. Join the queue. It will move quickly. If it is the real deal it will come wrapped in a cone, in paper, and be just dough, plain tomato, local mozarrella, fresh basil, and scalding hot.

    Let it cool for a few minutes, wander to the nearest piazza. Eat with a friend and a shared bottle of Campanian red on the steps of a crumbling Baroque fountain. Sublimity.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797

    eek said:

    I've seen reports the EU are threatening now to block food exports by not listing us as a safe country to export to them.

    If they do we should repeal the Withdrawal Agreement completely and stop all money payments to them from that. The billions we agreed to pay were to be paid out over years weren't they?

    Could you provide links to go with your comments - it's incredibly hard to work out what is fact and what is fantasy at the moment...
    I saw it elsewhere and Richard Nabavi was discussing it too. Can't find a good link, here's the Mail, my apologies I don't like the Mail or the Sun as a paper so would not normally link to them.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8721645/Gordon-Brown-blasts-Boris-Johnson-Brexit-plans.html
    That'll do as a link - and it doesn't surprise me - as it's clear cut. Why should the EU allow exports if we don't have a deal. One consequence of not having a deal is that the EU doesn't need to accept any exports from us..
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483
    LadyG said:

    Alistair said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    I may have found a worse topping on pizza than pineapple.

    Sultanas!

    S-U-L-T-A-N-A-S.

    Fecking sultanas, the world has gone mad.

    Just think of it as Peshwari naan and eat it with curry. The problem with pizza is not the toppings, it's the pizza. Bread for people who find breadmaking too difficult.
    That's not true of proper Naples or Rome pizzas. The ones which have a base like bad bread (i.e. any pizza in the US, and nearly all here) are not doing it right.
    The best pizza I have ever eaten was Keste in New York. Owned by a immigrant from Naples with the pizza oven shipped over.
    I can well believe that.
    Nah. The best pizza in the world - cliche of cliches - comes from its birthplace, the backstreets of old Naples. Maybe the Spanish Quarters, maybe by the station, with the hookers.

    Anyway, watch where the locals queue for their evening pizza. Join the queue. It will move quickly. If it is the real deal it will come wrapped in a cone, in paper, and be just dough, plain tomato, local mozarrella, fresh basil, and scalding hot.

    Let it cool for a few minutes, wander to the nearest piazza. Eat with a friend and a shared bottle of Campanian red on the steps of a crumbling Baroque fountain. Sublimity.
    Whilst socially distancing I hope.
  • rcs1000 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Mask wearing Spain new cases today 12183. Non mask wearing Sweden new cases today 201. Who has the best policy ?

    Mask wearing South Korea new cases today 176
    How is that relevant, I am talking about Europe. Has anyone else noticed that when Governments extend forced mask wearing within 2 weeks their cases double. As an example look at France. Governments will require 2 masks to be worn soon. They are like a compulsive gambler following the martingale system. As a gambler runs out of money they will soon run out of areas where masks have to be worn as if they continue with these mad mask wearing policies cases will continue to rise. It will be masks in bed soon!
    Is it because the DNA of South Koreans and Japanese is different to Europeans?
    Rather than just taking the piss why dont you give your theory as to why the more mask wearing in Europe is enforced the quicker the cases rise? There is no enforced mask wearing in Sweden and cases are falling.

    We are at a position now in mask logic which is similar to a football team losing 10-0 and Gary Neville saying that the way that team defended is the best in the league.
    Sorry but this is complete garbage. Everyone knew there was a second wave on the way which is why countries have moved towards enforced mask wearing to try and limit the damage.

    Your argument makes as much sense as saying that me putting on suntan lotion makes a hot day.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797

    rcs1000 said:

    I've seen reports the EU are threatening now to block food exports by not listing us as a safe country to export to them.

    If they do we should repeal the Withdrawal Agreement completely and stop all money payments to them from that. The billions we agreed to pay were to be paid out over years weren't they?

    The Withdrawal Agreement ceases to exist in the event of us passing the Internal Markets Bill.
    So all other obligations like the obligation to pay them billions fall away too?

    I'm finding that doubtful.
    If we aren't paying the EU the money they are expecting I can't see us successfully exporting anything to them.
  • nico679nico679 Posts: 4,534
    Johnson is now going back to his divisive playbook . Just when the country might have been moving on from the divisions of the last 4 years. His comments tonight are just the beginning and I expect will only get worse.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,774

    rcs1000 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Mask wearing Spain new cases today 12183. Non mask wearing Sweden new cases today 201. Who has the best policy ?

    Mask wearing South Korea new cases today 176
    How is that relevant, I am talking about Europe. Has anyone else noticed that when Governments extend forced mask wearing within 2 weeks their cases double. As an example look at France. Governments will require 2 masks to be worn soon. They are like a compulsive gambler following the martingale system. As a gambler runs out of money they will soon run out of areas where masks have to be worn as if they continue with these mad mask wearing policies cases will continue to rise. It will be masks in bed soon!
    Is it because the DNA of South Koreans and Japanese is different to Europeans?
    Rather than just taking the piss why dont you give your theory as to why the more mask wearing in Europe is enforced the quicker the cases rise? There is no enforced mask wearing in Sweden and cases are falling.

    We are at a position now in mask logic which is similar to a football team losing 10-0 and Gary Neville saying that the way that team defended is the best in the league.
    Take a step back.

    There is a long lag between R rising and cases rising. Not only that, but the number of new cases is a combination of R and the existing number of infected people.

    So, a place that goes from 10,000 new cases to 8,000 is actually doing really well, while somewhere that goes from 10 to 20 is doing really badly. Therefore, looking at absolute numbers tells you nothing about R without knowing the reference case level.

    If you are infected with CV19 today, it will probably be a week before you become infectious, and then another week before you start to feel unwell. You are most infectious before you even think about getting a test. Then - particularly in the US - there's a big delay between having a test, and getting results.

    The consequence of this is that when we look at case loads of 3,000 a day in the UK, we're actually looking at increases in R that started six to eight weeks ago in the UK.

    Mask wearing regulations are a response to rising R. The problem is that the long time lag between R rising and case numbers moving makes it look like it's the masks causing the increase in cases.

    There is now a massive amount of empirical evidence for the effectiveness of masks, from the micro (the study of the two infected hairdressers who did not pass the virus on to a single customer) to the macro (this or this or this).
  • MaxPB said:

    nichomar said:

    RobD said:

    nichomar said:

    dixiedean said:

    MaxPB said:

    kamski said:

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    Weirdly the same lack of outrage of Macron buddying up to Trump even more than Boris, rolling out the biggest of big red carpets....When he does it, it is all about international diplomacy, when Boris does it, it is because he loves everything about the Donald.
    There is just zero coverage of French politics compared to US politics full stop.

    People here know about also rans (barely-rans more like) in the contest to become the opposition party presidential candidate for an election months away, but who is the current French prime minister?
    No one cares who the French PM is, it's like asking who the senate leader is in the US. Everyone knows Macron and the excuses that the British media don't have any French speakers is laughable. The fact of the matter is that the media outrage will never exist for virtuous nations, it will only be for evil ones like the UK (and US) despite France and Macron having as crap a time of it as the UK and Boris.
    So you're outraged that the UK media is more outraged about the pandemic in the UK than in France?
    I'm bloody furious we don't get 25 minutes a day on Ecuador.
    You should - Ecuador (and Brazil) are likely to overtake our death rate per capita within days. Chile and Bolivia have already done so within the last 24 hours.
    Oh good let’s have a few third world countries go out of control so we can drop down the league table, sick
    So OK to say the UK is worst in the world/europe, but not okay to say the same of other countries?
    I just think it’s sick to make it appear like a contest.
    I actually agree with this, the issue is that it's the liberal UK media that wants to push the narrative that the UK is the shittest at everything, do you agree that 1 - it's not true, and 2 - it's not a competition?
    I dont know why you see a left wing conspiracy behind everything. All mainstream media, right, centre or left are doing this because league tables sell and readers like them. Its how they stay mainstream. And plenty of posters on here, right, centre and left were posting and comparing league tables all through spring.

    It is not a competition, the UK is not best or worst at much, let alone everything, because there are over 200 countries so its rare for any country to be best or worst at something. And most of the covid league tables take no or little account of either varying circumstances by country, and/or varying counting accuracy and methods by country.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,772
    England are not making a game of this. Miles off the rate. Way too many dot balls. Disappointing
  • stodgestodge Posts: 12,745
    LadyG said:


    Nah. The best pizza in the world - cliche of cliches - comes from its birthplace, the backstreets of old Naples. Maybe the Spanish Quarters, maybe by the station, with the hookers.

    Anyway, watch where the locals queue for their evening pizza. Join the queue. It will move quickly. If it is the real deal it will come wrapped in a cone, in paper, and be just dough, plain tomato, local mozarrella, fresh basil, and scalding hot.

    Let it cool for a few minutes, wander to the nearest piazza. Eat with a friend and a shared bottle of Campanian red on the steps of a crumbling Baroque fountain. Sublimity.

    Better yet, try the Pizza Fritta at a local place if you want the authentic Neapolitian pizza experience.

  • LadyGLadyG Posts: 2,221
    Omnium said:

    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Parallels with Obama.
    To be fair to Macron, his reforms were and are beginning to bear fruit. French universities are improving their global ranking, the number of French start-ups went through the roof about a year ago.

    He's a bit like Boris. Just very very unlucky that he's now encountering a virus that would fuck any leadership, especially one founded on newness, change and hope. Instead they will be known for masks, rules and GDP decline. At least for the next year or two.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,774
    LadyG said:

    Omnium said:

    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Parallels with Obama.
    To be fair to Macron, his reforms were and are beginning to bear fruit. French universities are improving their global ranking, the number of French start-ups went through the roof about a year ago.

    He's a bit like Boris. Just very very unlucky that he's now encountering a virus that would fuck any leadership, especially one founded on newness, change and hope. Instead they will be known for masks, rules and GDP decline. At least for the next year or two.
    In terms of domestic reform he's been OK. He's been less shit than Sarkozy or Hollande, but I'm not convinced that's that high a bar.

    His response to CV19 has been pretty poor.
  • LadyGLadyG Posts: 2,221
    DavidL said:

    England are not making a game of this. Miles off the rate. Way too many dot balls. Disappointing

    If they win it would be the best successful run chase in ODI Old Traff history.

    They are giving it a go. If this partnership take us to 200 without loss we have a chance.
  • stodgestodge Posts: 12,745
    MaxPB said:


    I actually agree with this, the issue is that it's the liberal UK media that wants to push the narrative that the UK is the shittest at everything, do you agree that 1 - it's not true, and 2 - it's not a competition?

    I'm no fan of uncritical adulation of all things British to be fair but there's plenty of positive news across the media.

    IF we are genuinely not as good in some areas in a thing shouldn't that be reported or mentioned more to perhaps force some improvement or ask why things are bad in the name of accountability?

  • stodgestodge Posts: 12,745
    LadyG said:

    ydoethur said:

    THe only group currently more useless, craven, incompetent and confused than the cabinet are England’s batsmen.

    Discuss.

    Throughout the summer England have continually tested the "down to the last possible" partnership to dig them out of trouble.
    England's cricket team has been superbly entertaining this summer (and mostly victorious). We should be proud of them, and thankful FOR them.

    Cricket has gained hugely from the virus (weirdly). Football is unwatchable without a crowd but cricket is still compelling.
    It's been a fantastic summer of horse racing - some great performances and a lot of free-to-air coverage on ITV.

    Yes, there's a palpable lack of atmosphere at the tracks but watching that on tv, as most people do in fairness, it's still been very entertaining and racing got going on June 1st so got a start on other sports.
  • LadyGLadyG Posts: 2,221
    rcs1000 said:

    LadyG said:

    Omnium said:

    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Parallels with Obama.
    To be fair to Macron, his reforms were and are beginning to bear fruit. French universities are improving their global ranking, the number of French start-ups went through the roof about a year ago.

    He's a bit like Boris. Just very very unlucky that he's now encountering a virus that would fuck any leadership, especially one founded on newness, change and hope. Instead they will be known for masks, rules and GDP decline. At least for the next year or two.
    In terms of domestic reform he's been OK. He's been less shit than Sarkozy or Hollande, but I'm not convinced that's that high a bar.

    His response to CV19 has been pretty poor.
    His swanning around the Eastern Med telling Lebanon what to do, and how to solve the Greek-Turkish war, even as his country sinks into the worst 2nd wave in Europe, would especially piss me off, as a voter.

    But I am not French. Maybe they like that,
  • LadyGLadyG Posts: 2,221
    Ok we're done. Bairstow gone
  • LadyG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    LadyG said:

    Omnium said:

    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Parallels with Obama.
    To be fair to Macron, his reforms were and are beginning to bear fruit. French universities are improving their global ranking, the number of French start-ups went through the roof about a year ago.

    He's a bit like Boris. Just very very unlucky that he's now encountering a virus that would fuck any leadership, especially one founded on newness, change and hope. Instead they will be known for masks, rules and GDP decline. At least for the next year or two.
    In terms of domestic reform he's been OK. He's been less shit than Sarkozy or Hollande, but I'm not convinced that's that high a bar.

    His response to CV19 has been pretty poor.
    His swanning around the Eastern Med telling Lebanon what to do, and how to solve the Greek-Turkish war, even as his country sinks into the worst 2nd wave in Europe, would especially piss me off, as a voter.

    But I am not French. Maybe they like that,
    Of course they like it. The French delusions about their continued importance are almost on a par with the English.
  • LadyG said:

    Alistair said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    I may have found a worse topping on pizza than pineapple.

    Sultanas!

    S-U-L-T-A-N-A-S.

    Fecking sultanas, the world has gone mad.

    Just think of it as Peshwari naan and eat it with curry. The problem with pizza is not the toppings, it's the pizza. Bread for people who find breadmaking too difficult.
    That's not true of proper Naples or Rome pizzas. The ones which have a base like bad bread (i.e. any pizza in the US, and nearly all here) are not doing it right.
    The best pizza I have ever eaten was Keste in New York. Owned by a immigrant from Naples with the pizza oven shipped over.
    I can well believe that.
    Nah. The best pizza in the world - cliche of cliches - comes from its birthplace, the backstreets of old Naples. Maybe the Spanish Quarters, maybe by the station, with the hookers.

    Anyway, watch where the locals queue for their evening pizza. Join the queue. It will move quickly. If it is the real deal it will come wrapped in a cone, in paper, and be just dough, plain tomato, local mozarrella, fresh basil, and scalding hot.

    Let it cool for a few minutes, wander to the nearest piazza. Eat with a friend and a shared bottle of Campanian red on the steps of a crumbling Baroque fountain. Sublimity.
    Naples certainly has its charms. I remember being propositioned by a whore having just come off the ferry from Capri, having walked from Capri to Anacapri. I was footsore, tired and dusty. She was nothing to write home about either.

    I was slightly disappointed by Neapolitan pizza, although I admit I didn't try the street food variety. I recall my best meal was a pile of lamb chops washed down with the house red. There are some brilliant local red wine varieties we never see in the UK.

    The worst pizza I recall having ever eaten was in Ravenna. Which makes sense when you accept that Italian food is regional. It was worth it for the Byzantine mosaics, though.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,774
    edited September 2020

    LadyG said:

    Alistair said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    I may have found a worse topping on pizza than pineapple.

    Sultanas!

    S-U-L-T-A-N-A-S.

    Fecking sultanas, the world has gone mad.

    Just think of it as Peshwari naan and eat it with curry. The problem with pizza is not the toppings, it's the pizza. Bread for people who find breadmaking too difficult.
    That's not true of proper Naples or Rome pizzas. The ones which have a base like bad bread (i.e. any pizza in the US, and nearly all here) are not doing it right.
    The best pizza I have ever eaten was Keste in New York. Owned by a immigrant from Naples with the pizza oven shipped over.
    I can well believe that.
    Nah. The best pizza in the world - cliche of cliches - comes from its birthplace, the backstreets of old Naples. Maybe the Spanish Quarters, maybe by the station, with the hookers.

    Anyway, watch where the locals queue for their evening pizza. Join the queue. It will move quickly. If it is the real deal it will come wrapped in a cone, in paper, and be just dough, plain tomato, local mozarrella, fresh basil, and scalding hot.

    Let it cool for a few minutes, wander to the nearest piazza. Eat with a friend and a shared bottle of Campanian red on the steps of a crumbling Baroque fountain. Sublimity.
    Naples certainly has its charms. I remember being propositioned by a whore having just come off the ferry from Capri, having walked from Capri to Anacapri. I was footsore, tired and dusty. She was nothing to write home about either.

    I was slightly disappointed by Neapolitan pizza, although I admit I didn't try the street food variety. I recall my best meal was a pile of lamb chops washed down with the house red. There are some brilliant local red wine varieties we never see in the UK.

    The worst pizza I recall having ever eaten was in Ravenna. Which makes sense when you accept that Italian food is regional. It was worth it for the Byzantine mosaics, though.
    How good does a whore have to be before you write home about your experience?
  • FPT: @Philip_Thompson you did say Johnson's deal does not put a border down the Irish Sea.

    You just never can admit you got it wrong when it comes to Johnson
  • LadyGLadyG Posts: 2,221

    LadyG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    LadyG said:

    Omnium said:

    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Parallels with Obama.
    To be fair to Macron, his reforms were and are beginning to bear fruit. French universities are improving their global ranking, the number of French start-ups went through the roof about a year ago.

    He's a bit like Boris. Just very very unlucky that he's now encountering a virus that would fuck any leadership, especially one founded on newness, change and hope. Instead they will be known for masks, rules and GDP decline. At least for the next year or two.
    In terms of domestic reform he's been OK. He's been less shit than Sarkozy or Hollande, but I'm not convinced that's that high a bar.

    His response to CV19 has been pretty poor.
    His swanning around the Eastern Med telling Lebanon what to do, and how to solve the Greek-Turkish war, even as his country sinks into the worst 2nd wave in Europe, would especially piss me off, as a voter.

    But I am not French. Maybe they like that,
    Of course they like it. The French delusions about their continued importance are almost on a par with the English.
    Worse, I think. The English can, at least, sit back, kick off their slippers, and say, Well, what the F, we had the biggest empire in the world and now the entire world speaks English, much of it follows English common law, rules, accountancy, banking, and they nearly all play English sports, and the internet is all in English. Basically, England WON.

    The French were about to win, but then they blew it, now almost no one speaks French, few follow Napoleonic law, and France becomes a very beautiful museum. Hence their particular neuroses.
  • rcs1000 said:

    LadyG said:

    Alistair said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    I may have found a worse topping on pizza than pineapple.

    Sultanas!

    S-U-L-T-A-N-A-S.

    Fecking sultanas, the world has gone mad.

    Just think of it as Peshwari naan and eat it with curry. The problem with pizza is not the toppings, it's the pizza. Bread for people who find breadmaking too difficult.
    That's not true of proper Naples or Rome pizzas. The ones which have a base like bad bread (i.e. any pizza in the US, and nearly all here) are not doing it right.
    The best pizza I have ever eaten was Keste in New York. Owned by a immigrant from Naples with the pizza oven shipped over.
    I can well believe that.
    Nah. The best pizza in the world - cliche of cliches - comes from its birthplace, the backstreets of old Naples. Maybe the Spanish Quarters, maybe by the station, with the hookers.

    Anyway, watch where the locals queue for their evening pizza. Join the queue. It will move quickly. If it is the real deal it will come wrapped in a cone, in paper, and be just dough, plain tomato, local mozarrella, fresh basil, and scalding hot.

    Let it cool for a few minutes, wander to the nearest piazza. Eat with a friend and a shared bottle of Campanian red on the steps of a crumbling Baroque fountain. Sublimity.
    Naples certainly has its charms. I remember being propositioned by a whore having just come off the ferry from Capri, having walked from Capri to Anacapri. I was footsore, tired and dusty. She was nothing to write home about either.

    I was slightly disappointed by Neapolitan pizza, although I admit I didn't try the street food variety. I recall my best meal was a pile of lamb chops washed down with the house red. There are some brilliant local red wine varieties we never see in the UK.

    The worst pizza I recall having ever eaten was in Ravenna. Which makes sense when you accept that Italian food is regional. It was worth it for the Byzantine mosaics, though.
    How good does a whore have to be before you write home about your experience?
    Well there was a fit Ukrainian lady in Vilnius I have been quite open about with my friends
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,772

    LadyG said:

    Alistair said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    I may have found a worse topping on pizza than pineapple.

    Sultanas!

    S-U-L-T-A-N-A-S.

    Fecking sultanas, the world has gone mad.

    Just think of it as Peshwari naan and eat it with curry. The problem with pizza is not the toppings, it's the pizza. Bread for people who find breadmaking too difficult.
    That's not true of proper Naples or Rome pizzas. The ones which have a base like bad bread (i.e. any pizza in the US, and nearly all here) are not doing it right.
    The best pizza I have ever eaten was Keste in New York. Owned by a immigrant from Naples with the pizza oven shipped over.
    I can well believe that.
    Nah. The best pizza in the world - cliche of cliches - comes from its birthplace, the backstreets of old Naples. Maybe the Spanish Quarters, maybe by the station, with the hookers.

    Anyway, watch where the locals queue for their evening pizza. Join the queue. It will move quickly. If it is the real deal it will come wrapped in a cone, in paper, and be just dough, plain tomato, local mozarrella, fresh basil, and scalding hot.

    Let it cool for a few minutes, wander to the nearest piazza. Eat with a friend and a shared bottle of Campanian red on the steps of a crumbling Baroque fountain. Sublimity.
    Naples certainly has its charms. I remember being propositioned by a whore having just come off the ferry from Capri, having walked from Capri to Anacapri. I was footsore, tired and dusty. She was nothing to write home about either.

    I was slightly disappointed by Neapolitan pizza, although I admit I didn't try the street food variety. I recall my best meal was a pile of lamb chops washed down with the house red. There are some brilliant local red wine varieties we never see in the UK.

    The worst pizza I recall having ever eaten was in Ravenna. Which makes sense when you accept that Italian food is regional. It was worth it for the Byzantine mosaics, though.
    Best pizza I have ever had was in Rimmini. Pine log oven. Thin crispy base. Totally ridiculous amount of wine. There with my wife to be about 37 years ago now. God how time passes. She’s still great company though.
  • welshowlwelshowl Posts: 4,460

    MaxPB said:

    In per capita terms France is seeing almost double the number of new cases per day vs the US and with a much, much less rigorous testing regime with far fewer tests per day per capita. Where is the media outrage at Macron for fucking it up so badly, why wasn't the French government prepared for the second wave, what steps are they taking to get to 1m tests per day, what policies does France have wrt schools, universities and socialising? I know about ours, of course but I also know about most of the US just from reading our own media.

    There is a serious lack of scrutiny of left wing government responses to the virus, apparently cuddly lefties can't be bad at these things, only baby eating right wingers are evil and let everyone die of it.

    For years the British media has had an obsession with the US, and the minutiae of its politics, to the detriment of any reporting of European politics. The fascination with Trump has only accelerated the trend.

    Your example is no different, not part of a left-wing Covid conspiracy, though no less wrong for that.
    Well a) it’s the most important country in the West and probably still the world b) the English language makes it accessible to us in a way France, Germany, the Netherlands etc etc never will be.
  • LadyG said:

    LadyG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    LadyG said:

    Omnium said:

    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Parallels with Obama.
    To be fair to Macron, his reforms were and are beginning to bear fruit. French universities are improving their global ranking, the number of French start-ups went through the roof about a year ago.

    He's a bit like Boris. Just very very unlucky that he's now encountering a virus that would fuck any leadership, especially one founded on newness, change and hope. Instead they will be known for masks, rules and GDP decline. At least for the next year or two.
    In terms of domestic reform he's been OK. He's been less shit than Sarkozy or Hollande, but I'm not convinced that's that high a bar.

    His response to CV19 has been pretty poor.
    His swanning around the Eastern Med telling Lebanon what to do, and how to solve the Greek-Turkish war, even as his country sinks into the worst 2nd wave in Europe, would especially piss me off, as a voter.

    But I am not French. Maybe they like that,
    Of course they like it. The French delusions about their continued importance are almost on a par with the English.
    Worse, I think. The English can, at least, sit back, kick off their slippers, and say, Well, what the F, we had the biggest empire in the world and now the entire world speaks English, much of it follows English common law, rules, accountancy, banking, and they nearly all play English sports, and the internet is all in English. Basically, England WON.

    The French were about to win, but then they blew it, now almost no one speaks French, few follow Napoleonic law, and France becomes a very beautiful museum. Hence their particular neuroses.
    Thanks for proving my point.
  • FF43FF43 Posts: 15,545
    Hey! Why don't we all agree France and the UK have both been dire in their Covid responses and that Taiwan has got this cracked !? Less than 500 cases in total, 7 deaths, technology that works, support and cooperation from the population. They even throw in a 2% growth rate this year !

    Heck, we could even learn a thing or two
  • nico679nico679 Posts: 4,534

    LadyG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    LadyG said:

    Omnium said:

    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Parallels with Obama.
    To be fair to Macron, his reforms were and are beginning to bear fruit. French universities are improving their global ranking, the number of French start-ups went through the roof about a year ago.

    He's a bit like Boris. Just very very unlucky that he's now encountering a virus that would fuck any leadership, especially one founded on newness, change and hope. Instead they will be known for masks, rules and GDP decline. At least for the next year or two.
    In terms of domestic reform he's been OK. He's been less shit than Sarkozy or Hollande, but I'm not convinced that's that high a bar.

    His response to CV19 has been pretty poor.
    His swanning around the Eastern Med telling Lebanon what to do, and how to solve the Greek-Turkish war, even as his country sinks into the worst 2nd wave in Europe, would especially piss me off, as a voter.

    But I am not French. Maybe they like that,
    Of course they like it. The French delusions about their continued importance are almost on a par with the English.
    But it didn’t extend to leaving the EU so for delusion the UK still wins on that front .
  • FF43 said:

    Hey! Why don't we all agree France and the UK have both been dire in their Covid responses and that Taiwan has got this cracked !? Less than 500 cases in total, 7 deaths, technology that works, support and cooperation from the population. They even throw in a 2% growth rate this year !

    Heck, we could even learn a thing or two

    New Zealand
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,840
    stodge said:

    LadyG said:

    ydoethur said:

    THe only group currently more useless, craven, incompetent and confused than the cabinet are England’s batsmen.

    Discuss.

    Throughout the summer England have continually tested the "down to the last possible" partnership to dig them out of trouble.
    England's cricket team has been superbly entertaining this summer (and mostly victorious). We should be proud of them, and thankful FOR them.

    Cricket has gained hugely from the virus (weirdly). Football is unwatchable without a crowd but cricket is still compelling.
    It's been a fantastic summer of horse racing - some great performances and a lot of free-to-air coverage on ITV.

    Yes, there's a palpable lack of atmosphere at the tracks but watching that on tv, as most people do in fairness, it's still been very entertaining and racing got going on June 1st so got a start on other sports.
    Been interesting to see which sports are diminished by lack of crowds and which haven't.

    Ruined.
    Football, rugby (both), 20 20 cricket. Darts utterly futile.

    Not.
    Racing (horse, car or bike), snooker, test cricket, basketball.

    Any more?
  • nico679 said:

    LadyG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    LadyG said:

    Omnium said:

    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Parallels with Obama.
    To be fair to Macron, his reforms were and are beginning to bear fruit. French universities are improving their global ranking, the number of French start-ups went through the roof about a year ago.

    He's a bit like Boris. Just very very unlucky that he's now encountering a virus that would fuck any leadership, especially one founded on newness, change and hope. Instead they will be known for masks, rules and GDP decline. At least for the next year or two.
    In terms of domestic reform he's been OK. He's been less shit than Sarkozy or Hollande, but I'm not convinced that's that high a bar.

    His response to CV19 has been pretty poor.
    His swanning around the Eastern Med telling Lebanon what to do, and how to solve the Greek-Turkish war, even as his country sinks into the worst 2nd wave in Europe, would especially piss me off, as a voter.

    But I am not French. Maybe they like that,
    Of course they like it. The French delusions about their continued importance are almost on a par with the English.
    But it didn’t extend to leaving the EU so for delusion the UK still wins on that front .
    Yes that was the tie-breaker.
  • FlatlanderFlatlander Posts: 3,853
    edited September 2020

    LadyG said:

    Alistair said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    I may have found a worse topping on pizza than pineapple.

    Sultanas!

    S-U-L-T-A-N-A-S.

    Fecking sultanas, the world has gone mad.

    Just think of it as Peshwari naan and eat it with curry. The problem with pizza is not the toppings, it's the pizza. Bread for people who find breadmaking too difficult.
    That's not true of proper Naples or Rome pizzas. The ones which have a base like bad bread (i.e. any pizza in the US, and nearly all here) are not doing it right.
    The best pizza I have ever eaten was Keste in New York. Owned by a immigrant from Naples with the pizza oven shipped over.
    I can well believe that.
    Nah. The best pizza in the world - cliche of cliches - comes from its birthplace, the backstreets of old Naples. Maybe the Spanish Quarters, maybe by the station, with the hookers.

    Anyway, watch where the locals queue for their evening pizza. Join the queue. It will move quickly. If it is the real deal it will come wrapped in a cone, in paper, and be just dough, plain tomato, local mozarrella, fresh basil, and scalding hot.

    Let it cool for a few minutes, wander to the nearest piazza. Eat with a friend and a shared bottle of Campanian red on the steps of a crumbling Baroque fountain. Sublimity.
    Naples certainly has its charms. I remember being propositioned by a whore having just come off the ferry from Capri, having walked from Capri to Anacapri. I was footsore, tired and dusty. She was nothing to write home about either.

    I was slightly disappointed by Neapolitan pizza, although I admit I didn't try the street food variety. I recall my best meal was a pile of lamb chops washed down with the house red. There are some brilliant local red wine varieties we never see in the UK.

    The worst pizza I recall having ever eaten was in Ravenna. Which makes sense when you accept that Italian food is regional. It was worth it for the Byzantine mosaics, though.
    You've obviously never ordered a pizza in the land of Freeeeeeeeeeeedom.

    I was served a deep fried pizza base (plus toppings) by a takeaway in Invereray once. As I'd been on a hill all day I managed to eat half, but I really can't recommend it unless you like greasy cardboard.

    It didn't actually specify fried on the menu. I suppose that was just assumed.
  • DavidL said:

    LadyG said:

    Alistair said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    I may have found a worse topping on pizza than pineapple.

    Sultanas!

    S-U-L-T-A-N-A-S.

    Fecking sultanas, the world has gone mad.

    Just think of it as Peshwari naan and eat it with curry. The problem with pizza is not the toppings, it's the pizza. Bread for people who find breadmaking too difficult.
    That's not true of proper Naples or Rome pizzas. The ones which have a base like bad bread (i.e. any pizza in the US, and nearly all here) are not doing it right.
    The best pizza I have ever eaten was Keste in New York. Owned by a immigrant from Naples with the pizza oven shipped over.
    I can well believe that.
    Nah. The best pizza in the world - cliche of cliches - comes from its birthplace, the backstreets of old Naples. Maybe the Spanish Quarters, maybe by the station, with the hookers.

    Anyway, watch where the locals queue for their evening pizza. Join the queue. It will move quickly. If it is the real deal it will come wrapped in a cone, in paper, and be just dough, plain tomato, local mozarrella, fresh basil, and scalding hot.

    Let it cool for a few minutes, wander to the nearest piazza. Eat with a friend and a shared bottle of Campanian red on the steps of a crumbling Baroque fountain. Sublimity.
    Naples certainly has its charms. I remember being propositioned by a whore having just come off the ferry from Capri, having walked from Capri to Anacapri. I was footsore, tired and dusty. She was nothing to write home about either.

    I was slightly disappointed by Neapolitan pizza, although I admit I didn't try the street food variety. I recall my best meal was a pile of lamb chops washed down with the house red. There are some brilliant local red wine varieties we never see in the UK.

    The worst pizza I recall having ever eaten was in Ravenna. Which makes sense when you accept that Italian food is regional. It was worth it for the Byzantine mosaics, though.
    Best pizza I have ever had was in Rimmini. Pine log oven. Thin crispy base. Totally ridiculous amount of wine. There with my wife to be about 37 years ago now. God how time passes. She’s still great company though.
    It is of course quite possible to get decent pizza in northern Italy, but you need to find a pizzeria run by a Neapolitan, with the right sort of oven
  • BarnesianBarnesian Posts: 7,979
    This virus is a bit like a fart. It hangs in the air as an aerosol rather than dropping to the ground.

    I personally use this analogy to assess the risk in different situations.

    If the person nearest me farted, would I smell it? If yes, I'm at risk if they have the virus. If no, the risk is negligible.

    In a lift, wearing a mask or not, I'd smell a fart.
    In the open air with a gentle breeze blowing, wearing a mask or not, I wouldn't smell a fart from someone walking by at least two metres from me.
    Those are extreme cases.
    But you can apply it eating in a socially distanced restaurant without a mask (OK), or in a socially distanced cinema with a mask (OK), or in a queue at Tescos without a mask (not OK), or in a demo without a mask (not OK) etc.

    Avoid The Fart. Keep Apart.
  • BluestBlueBluestBlue Posts: 4,556
    edited September 2020
    LadyG said:

    LadyG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    LadyG said:

    Omnium said:

    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Parallels with Obama.
    To be fair to Macron, his reforms were and are beginning to bear fruit. French universities are improving their global ranking, the number of French start-ups went through the roof about a year ago.

    He's a bit like Boris. Just very very unlucky that he's now encountering a virus that would fuck any leadership, especially one founded on newness, change and hope. Instead they will be known for masks, rules and GDP decline. At least for the next year or two.
    In terms of domestic reform he's been OK. He's been less shit than Sarkozy or Hollande, but I'm not convinced that's that high a bar.

    His response to CV19 has been pretty poor.
    His swanning around the Eastern Med telling Lebanon what to do, and how to solve the Greek-Turkish war, even as his country sinks into the worst 2nd wave in Europe, would especially piss me off, as a voter.

    But I am not French. Maybe they like that,
    Of course they like it. The French delusions about their continued importance are almost on a par with the English.
    Worse, I think. The English can, at least, sit back, kick off their slippers, and say, Well, what the F, we had the biggest empire in the world and now the entire world speaks English, much of it follows English common law, rules, accountancy, banking, and they nearly all play English sports, and the internet is all in English. Basically, England WON.

    The French were about to win, but then they blew it, now almost no one speaks French, few follow Napoleonic law, and France becomes a very beautiful museum. Hence their particular neuroses.
    Nicely put. Indeed, even after English comprehensively displaced French as the lingua franca, we made sure to retain the term just to rub their noses in it...
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 66,758
    edited September 2020

    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Because however bad Macron is, the alternative is fascism.
    OK, I will concede that’s an unanswerable point.
  • FPT: @Philip_Thompson you did say Johnson's deal does not put a border down the Irish Sea.

    You just never can admit you got it wrong when it comes to Johnson

    It has to be all black or white with you doesn't it?

    Its more grey than that. I said that legally there is no Irish Sea border (NI is legally in the UK's customs territory) so legally the border is at the EU/UK border, but that there were special arrangements for NI that Stormont could vote to end.

    Turns out, which I hadn't thought, that as well Westminster could vote to end the arrangements too.

    Had NI been legally within the EU's customs territory, had there actually been a border down the Irish Sea, it would have been another story.
  • CyclefreeCyclefree Posts: 25,074

    I've seen reports the EU are threatening now to block food exports by not listing us as a safe country to export to them.

    If they do we should repeal the Withdrawal Agreement completely and stop all money payments to them from that. The billions we agreed to pay were to be paid out over years weren't they?

    As usual you don’t understand what No Deal means. If there is No Deal Britain becomes a third party as far as the EU is concerned. Therefore exports can only get into the EU if they comply with the EU’s rules and requirements. If they don’t, they don’t get in. Just the same as any other third country would be treated.
    Tres said:

    Sir Bob O'Neill?

    Chair of the Justice Select Committee.
  • IshmaelZ said:

    rcs1000 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Mask wearing Spain new cases today 12183. Non mask wearing Sweden new cases today 201. Who has the best policy ?

    Mask wearing South Korea new cases today 176
    How is that relevant, I am talking about Europe. Has anyone else noticed that when Governments extend forced mask wearing within 2 weeks their cases double. As an example look at France. Governments will require 2 masks to be worn soon. They are like a compulsive gambler following the martingale system. As a gambler runs out of money they will soon run out of areas where masks have to be worn as if they continue with these mad mask wearing policies cases will continue to rise. It will be masks in bed soon!
    I would imagine that forced mask wearing everywhere won't be too long in coming, on the following grounds:

    1. As cases and hospitalisations continue to rise - which the boffins seem to fear is a racing certainty, given the forthcoming arrival of the winter snot-and-coughing season - the Government will panic more and more, and look for further things to do
    2. Business closures won't happen first. I fear that the ultimate destination - at a guess by some point in November - will be Lockdown plus schools, but they won't render the furlough scheme pointless and shove unemployment up to about 12 million until they've run out of other options
    3. Therefore, the initial round of ultimately futile interventions will consist of masks everywhere, no direct social interaction with anybody outside your own household, no weddings, no funerals (bodies will be buried or burnt without ceremony,) but you'll still be allowed to go to the pub to medicate your depression by drinking yourself to death, because the economy
    4. Only when all of the above fails to work will businesses start to be salami sliced and the final collapse initiated

    This may save some some people dying of Covid in the short term, but eventually most of us will be killed by hypothermia, starvation, or from being hunted for food by post-apocalyptic biker gangs.
    You have to understand, though, that @NerysHughes has seen something that no one else has seen.

    Masks cause CV19.

    So, it wasn't Spain opening up its nightclubs, or people heading off from the UK to Covid hotspots for holidays, or any of those things.

    It was masks.

    Wherever you see masks, you see rising cases. Except, of course, the Far East where widespread wearing of masks seems to result in less Covid.

    Liam: I am thinking of buying a dog, Paddy.
    Paddy: And what breed did you have in mind?
    Liam: Well, maybe a labrador.
    Paddy: A dangerous breed, man! Have you not noticed how many of their owners go blind?
    I dont think masks cause the increases in cases by themselves. They probably add 5-10% extra protection. It is obvious that if you sneeze with a mask on you will spray less. What is causing the increase in cases is peoples behaviour when wearing masks. They think they are invincible. The experience of a supermarket now is radically different to June. We need to take the masks off and go back to being wary of other people. That worked. Wearing masks reduces social distancing so any extra protection they have provided is negated by a higher percentage than they provide. That is why there is an increase in cases. It really is simple. All the real world evidence in Europe shows this is happening. Fortunately we have Sweden where mask wearing is not required and their cases are reducing.

    I remember arguing on here back in April and May that the lockdown was pointless. I was ridiculed for it. Now Carl Heneghan has also stated this.

    I have no doubt that by Christmas top scientists will be agreeing with me.

    Also remember no one believed me when I said that hospitals were empty in May. Tyson said I was spreading fake news.
  • CyclefreeCyclefree Posts: 25,074
    Pulpstar said:

    Interesting header, I expect the MP for Newxastle Under Lyme's priority is pleasing Cummings rather than Cyclefree though.

    But not apparently keeping his promises to the voters in his constituency to whom he promised to act with “honesty and integrity”. In January he told them he was delighted to be voting for the European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Act. How - in compliance with this promise of honesty and integrity - is he going to explain why he will now vote (I assume) to tear that up?
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483

    IshmaelZ said:

    rcs1000 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Mask wearing Spain new cases today 12183. Non mask wearing Sweden new cases today 201. Who has the best policy ?

    Mask wearing South Korea new cases today 176
    How is that relevant, I am talking about Europe. Has anyone else noticed that when Governments extend forced mask wearing within 2 weeks their cases double. As an example look at France. Governments will require 2 masks to be worn soon. They are like a compulsive gambler following the martingale system. As a gambler runs out of money they will soon run out of areas where masks have to be worn as if they continue with these mad mask wearing policies cases will continue to rise. It will be masks in bed soon!
    I would imagine that forced mask wearing everywhere won't be too long in coming, on the following grounds:

    1. As cases and hospitalisations continue to rise - which the boffins seem to fear is a racing certainty, given the forthcoming arrival of the winter snot-and-coughing season - the Government will panic more and more, and look for further things to do
    2. Business closures won't happen first. I fear that the ultimate destination - at a guess by some point in November - will be Lockdown plus schools, but they won't render the furlough scheme pointless and shove unemployment up to about 12 million until they've run out of other options
    3. Therefore, the initial round of ultimately futile interventions will consist of masks everywhere, no direct social interaction with anybody outside your own household, no weddings, no funerals (bodies will be buried or burnt without ceremony,) but you'll still be allowed to go to the pub to medicate your depression by drinking yourself to death, because the economy
    4. Only when all of the above fails to work will businesses start to be salami sliced and the final collapse initiated

    This may save some some people dying of Covid in the short term, but eventually most of us will be killed by hypothermia, starvation, or from being hunted for food by post-apocalyptic biker gangs.
    You have to understand, though, that @NerysHughes has seen something that no one else has seen.

    Masks cause CV19.

    So, it wasn't Spain opening up its nightclubs, or people heading off from the UK to Covid hotspots for holidays, or any of those things.

    It was masks.

    Wherever you see masks, you see rising cases. Except, of course, the Far East where widespread wearing of masks seems to result in less Covid.

    Liam: I am thinking of buying a dog, Paddy.
    Paddy: And what breed did you have in mind?
    Liam: Well, maybe a labrador.
    Paddy: A dangerous breed, man! Have you not noticed how many of their owners go blind?
    I dont think masks cause the increases in cases by themselves. They probably add 5-10% extra protection. It is obvious that if you sneeze with a mask on you will spray less. What is causing the increase in cases is peoples behaviour when wearing masks. They think they are invincible. The experience of a supermarket now is radically different to June. We need to take the masks off and go back to being wary of other people. That worked. Wearing masks reduces social distancing so any extra protection they have provided is negated by a higher percentage than they provide. That is why there is an increase in cases. It really is simple. All the real world evidence in Europe shows this is happening. Fortunately we have Sweden where mask wearing is not required and their cases are reducing.

    I remember arguing on here back in April and May that the lockdown was pointless. I was ridiculed for it. Now Carl Heneghan has also stated this.

    I have no doubt that by Christmas top scientists will be agreeing with me.

    Also remember no one believed me when I said that hospitals were empty in May. Tyson said I was spreading fake news.
    They don’t make you feel invincible, they remind you when you meet people to step back, not hug and kiss and give added protection if foolish enough to go out amongst strangers.
  • Also please dont say that i am the only one who is thinking this. Do you know more than Anders Tegnell?

    https://www.euractiv.com/section/coronavirus/news/sweden-bucks-trend-in-refusing-to-recommend-masks/

  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,840

    IshmaelZ said:

    rcs1000 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Mask wearing Spain new cases today 12183. Non mask wearing Sweden new cases today 201. Who has the best policy ?

    Mask wearing South Korea new cases today 176
    How is that relevant, I am talking about Europe. Has anyone else noticed that when Governments extend forced mask wearing within 2 weeks their cases double. As an example look at France. Governments will require 2 masks to be worn soon. They are like a compulsive gambler following the martingale system. As a gambler runs out of money they will soon run out of areas where masks have to be worn as if they continue with these mad mask wearing policies cases will continue to rise. It will be masks in bed soon!
    I would imagine that forced mask wearing everywhere won't be too long in coming, on the following grounds:

    1. As cases and hospitalisations continue to rise - which the boffins seem to fear is a racing certainty, given the forthcoming arrival of the winter snot-and-coughing season - the Government will panic more and more, and look for further things to do
    2. Business closures won't happen first. I fear that the ultimate destination - at a guess by some point in November - will be Lockdown plus schools, but they won't render the furlough scheme pointless and shove unemployment up to about 12 million until they've run out of other options
    3. Therefore, the initial round of ultimately futile interventions will consist of masks everywhere, no direct social interaction with anybody outside your own household, no weddings, no funerals (bodies will be buried or burnt without ceremony,) but you'll still be allowed to go to the pub to medicate your depression by drinking yourself to death, because the economy
    4. Only when all of the above fails to work will businesses start to be salami sliced and the final collapse initiated

    This may save some some people dying of Covid in the short term, but eventually most of us will be killed by hypothermia, starvation, or from being hunted for food by post-apocalyptic biker gangs.
    You have to understand, though, that @NerysHughes has seen something that no one else has seen.

    Masks cause CV19.

    So, it wasn't Spain opening up its nightclubs, or people heading off from the UK to Covid hotspots for holidays, or any of those things.

    It was masks.

    Wherever you see masks, you see rising cases. Except, of course, the Far East where widespread wearing of masks seems to result in less Covid.

    Liam: I am thinking of buying a dog, Paddy.
    Paddy: And what breed did you have in mind?
    Liam: Well, maybe a labrador.
    Paddy: A dangerous breed, man! Have you not noticed how many of their owners go blind?
    I dont think masks cause the increases in cases by themselves. They probably add 5-10% extra protection. It is obvious that if you sneeze with a mask on you will spray less. What is causing the increase in cases is peoples behaviour when wearing masks. They think they are invincible. The experience of a supermarket now is radically different to June. We need to take the masks off and go back to being wary of other people. That worked. Wearing masks reduces social distancing so any extra protection they have provided is negated by a higher percentage than they provide. That is why there is an increase in cases. It really is simple. All the real world evidence in Europe shows this is happening. Fortunately we have Sweden where mask wearing is not required and their cases are reducing.

    I remember arguing on here back in April and May that the lockdown was pointless. I was ridiculed for it. Now Carl Heneghan has also stated this.

    I have no doubt that by Christmas top scientists will be agreeing with me.

    Also remember no one believed me when I said that hospitals were empty in May. Tyson said I was spreading fake news.
    The trouble was, round here, there was a hard-core minority who wouldn't or couldn't socially distance before masks became ubiquitous. They would come at you from all angles seemingly utterly oblivious.
    Now, at least you can clock the maskless and give them a wide berth.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,774

    IshmaelZ said:

    rcs1000 said:

    HYUFD said:

    Mask wearing Spain new cases today 12183. Non mask wearing Sweden new cases today 201. Who has the best policy ?

    Mask wearing South Korea new cases today 176
    How is that relevant, I am talking about Europe. Has anyone else noticed that when Governments extend forced mask wearing within 2 weeks their cases double. As an example look at France. Governments will require 2 masks to be worn soon. They are like a compulsive gambler following the martingale system. As a gambler runs out of money they will soon run out of areas where masks have to be worn as if they continue with these mad mask wearing policies cases will continue to rise. It will be masks in bed soon!
    I would imagine that forced mask wearing everywhere won't be too long in coming, on the following grounds:

    1. As cases and hospitalisations continue to rise - which the boffins seem to fear is a racing certainty, given the forthcoming arrival of the winter snot-and-coughing season - the Government will panic more and more, and look for further things to do
    2. Business closures won't happen first. I fear that the ultimate destination - at a guess by some point in November - will be Lockdown plus schools, but they won't render the furlough scheme pointless and shove unemployment up to about 12 million until they've run out of other options
    3. Therefore, the initial round of ultimately futile interventions will consist of masks everywhere, no direct social interaction with anybody outside your own household, no weddings, no funerals (bodies will be buried or burnt without ceremony,) but you'll still be allowed to go to the pub to medicate your depression by drinking yourself to death, because the economy
    4. Only when all of the above fails to work will businesses start to be salami sliced and the final collapse initiated

    This may save some some people dying of Covid in the short term, but eventually most of us will be killed by hypothermia, starvation, or from being hunted for food by post-apocalyptic biker gangs.
    You have to understand, though, that @NerysHughes has seen something that no one else has seen.

    Masks cause CV19.

    So, it wasn't Spain opening up its nightclubs, or people heading off from the UK to Covid hotspots for holidays, or any of those things.

    It was masks.

    Wherever you see masks, you see rising cases. Except, of course, the Far East where widespread wearing of masks seems to result in less Covid.

    Liam: I am thinking of buying a dog, Paddy.
    Paddy: And what breed did you have in mind?
    Liam: Well, maybe a labrador.
    Paddy: A dangerous breed, man! Have you not noticed how many of their owners go blind?
    I dont think masks cause the increases in cases by themselves. They probably add 5-10% extra protection. It is obvious that if you sneeze with a mask on you will spray less. What is causing the increase in cases is peoples behaviour when wearing masks. They think they are invincible. The experience of a supermarket now is radically different to June. We need to take the masks off and go back to being wary of other people. That worked. Wearing masks reduces social distancing so any extra protection they have provided is negated by a higher percentage than they provide. That is why there is an increase in cases. It really is simple. All the real world evidence in Europe shows this is happening. Fortunately we have Sweden where mask wearing is not required and their cases are reducing.

    I remember arguing on here back in April and May that the lockdown was pointless. I was ridiculed for it. Now Carl Heneghan has also stated this.

    I have no doubt that by Christmas top scientists will be agreeing with me.

    Also remember no one believed me when I said that hospitals were empty in May. Tyson said I was spreading fake news.
    If you don't think masks increase cases by themselves, why did you bet me that they did?
  • FF43FF43 Posts: 15,545
    LadyG said:

    LadyG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    LadyG said:

    Omnium said:

    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Parallels with Obama.
    To be fair to Macron, his reforms were and are beginning to bear fruit. French universities are improving their global ranking, the number of French start-ups went through the roof about a year ago.

    He's a bit like Boris. Just very very unlucky that he's now encountering a virus that would fuck any leadership, especially one founded on newness, change and hope. Instead they will be known for masks, rules and GDP decline. At least for the next year or two.
    In terms of domestic reform he's been OK. He's been less shit than Sarkozy or Hollande, but I'm not convinced that's that high a bar.

    His response to CV19 has been pretty poor.
    His swanning around the Eastern Med telling Lebanon what to do, and how to solve the Greek-Turkish war, even as his country sinks into the worst 2nd wave in Europe, would especially piss me off, as a voter.

    But I am not French. Maybe they like that,
    Of course they like it. The French delusions about their continued importance are almost on a par with the English.
    Worse, I think. The English can, at least, sit back, kick off their slippers, and say, Well, what the F, we had the biggest empire in the world and now the entire world speaks English, much of it follows English common law, rules, accountancy, banking, and they nearly all play English sports, and the internet is all in English. Basically, England WON.

    The French were about to win, but then they blew it, now almost no one speaks French, few follow Napoleonic law, and France becomes a very beautiful museum. Hence their particular neuroses.
    I don't think it's true that few countries follow Napoleonic law. Almost all countries in Europe and South America do. To the extent "Chinese legal system" is a concept, it's Napoleonic too
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 44,069
    edited September 2020

    LadyG said:

    Alistair said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    I may have found a worse topping on pizza than pineapple.

    Sultanas!

    S-U-L-T-A-N-A-S.

    Fecking sultanas, the world has gone mad.

    Just think of it as Peshwari naan and eat it with curry. The problem with pizza is not the toppings, it's the pizza. Bread for people who find breadmaking too difficult.
    That's not true of proper Naples or Rome pizzas. The ones which have a base like bad bread (i.e. any pizza in the US, and nearly all here) are not doing it right.
    The best pizza I have ever eaten was Keste in New York. Owned by a immigrant from Naples with the pizza oven shipped over.
    I can well believe that.
    Nah. The best pizza in the world - cliche of cliches - comes from its birthplace, the backstreets of old Naples. Maybe the Spanish Quarters, maybe by the station, with the hookers.

    Anyway, watch where the locals queue for their evening pizza. Join the queue. It will move quickly. If it is the real deal it will come wrapped in a cone, in paper, and be just dough, plain tomato, local mozarrella, fresh basil, and scalding hot.

    Let it cool for a few minutes, wander to the nearest piazza. Eat with a friend and a shared bottle of Campanian red on the steps of a crumbling Baroque fountain. Sublimity.
    Naples certainly has its charms. I remember being propositioned by a whore having just come off the ferry from Capri, having walked from Capri to Anacapri. I was footsore, tired and dusty. She was nothing to write home about either.

    I was slightly disappointed by Neapolitan pizza, although I admit I didn't try the street food variety. I recall my best meal was a pile of lamb chops washed down with the house red. There are some brilliant local red wine varieties we never see in the UK.

    The worst pizza I recall having ever eaten was in Ravenna. Which makes sense when you accept that Italian food is regional. It was worth it for the Byzantine mosaics, though.
    You've obviously never ordered a pizza in the land of Freeeeeeeeeeeedom.

    I was served a deep fried pizza base (plus toppings) by a takeaway in Invereray once. As I'd been on a hill all day I managed to eat half, but I really can't recommend it unless you like greasy cardboard.

    It didn't actually specify fried on the menu. I suppose that was just assumed.
    I once had a pizza in Swaziland, cooked by a chef who had only ever seen a picture, didn't know what ingredients to use and didn't have half of the ones he needed*. It was nearly inedible, but still better than the pasta that Fox jr was eating. Of course, being English, we were polite and made an effort to eat it.

    * One of the few ingredients that he had which he recognised and had was pineapple, PB regulars will be appalled/delighted to know.
  • LadyG said:

    LadyG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    LadyG said:

    Omnium said:

    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Parallels with Obama.
    To be fair to Macron, his reforms were and are beginning to bear fruit. French universities are improving their global ranking, the number of French start-ups went through the roof about a year ago.

    He's a bit like Boris. Just very very unlucky that he's now encountering a virus that would fuck any leadership, especially one founded on newness, change and hope. Instead they will be known for masks, rules and GDP decline. At least for the next year or two.
    In terms of domestic reform he's been OK. He's been less shit than Sarkozy or Hollande, but I'm not convinced that's that high a bar.

    His response to CV19 has been pretty poor.
    His swanning around the Eastern Med telling Lebanon what to do, and how to solve the Greek-Turkish war, even as his country sinks into the worst 2nd wave in Europe, would especially piss me off, as a voter.

    But I am not French. Maybe they like that,
    Of course they like it. The French delusions about their continued importance are almost on a par with the English.
    Worse, I think. The English can, at least, sit back, kick off their slippers, and say, Well, what the F, we had the biggest empire in the world and now the entire world speaks English, much of it follows English common law, rules, accountancy, banking, and they nearly all play English sports, and the internet is all in English. Basically, England WON.

    The French were about to win, but then they blew it, now almost no one speaks French, few follow Napoleonic law, and France becomes a very beautiful museum. Hence their particular neuroses.
    Nicely put. Indeed, even after English comprehensively displaced French as the lingua franca, we made sure to retain the term just to rub their noses in it...
    Until China displaces all that.

    The language will probably stay and maybe the sport - but the rest?

    It depends on geopolitics.

    That's why it's so important we end this mutual masturbation on Brexit and move on. The EU and UK were never going to fit together. We need a new relationship and then to work together in a new way.

    The West has bigger fish to fry.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 44,069
    alex_ said:
    Everyone is an armchair epidemiologist now. How hard can it be?
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,084
    FF43 said:

    LadyG said:

    LadyG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    LadyG said:

    Omnium said:

    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Macron who was in the Socialist party is right wing?

    Yeah pull the other one.

    The last polling for the 2022 Presidential election I saw had Macron on 28% leading Le Pen on 25% with Baroin and Melanchon on 12-13%.

    It'll need something remarkable to change this - presumably Macron will run again and if/when it comes to a run off with Marine Le Pen, he will win comfortably.The French centre-right didn't do badly in the recent local elections (nor did the Greens oddly enough) but are making no impression in the Presidential contest.
    Latest French poll for 2022 indeed has Macron 28%, Le Pen 25%, the centre right potential candidates on 6% to 14%, Melenchon on 12% and the Socialist potential candidates on 3% to 5%.

    In the runoff it is Macron 58% Le Pen 42%
    https://harris-interactive.fr/opinion_polls/intentions-de-vote-a-lelection-presidentielle-de-2022-quel-candidat-pour-la-droite-a-2-ans-de-lelection-presidentielle/
    That’s a bit weird, in its own way.

    After all, however you look at his presidency, Macron’s been a complete failure.

    He promised a new politics. He ended up a typical machine politician.

    He promised economic reform. He’s delivered the same old timidity.

    He promised a clean up. His regime is mired in scandals.

    He promised a new deal in Europe. He got Eurobonds in all but name.

    Why would anyone vote to re-elect him? He’s a more articulate version of Johnson or Trump.
    Parallels with Obama.
    To be fair to Macron, his reforms were and are beginning to bear fruit. French universities are improving their global ranking, the number of French start-ups went through the roof about a year ago.

    He's a bit like Boris. Just very very unlucky that he's now encountering a virus that would fuck any leadership, especially one founded on newness, change and hope. Instead they will be known for masks, rules and GDP decline. At least for the next year or two.
    In terms of domestic reform he's been OK. He's been less shit than Sarkozy or Hollande, but I'm not convinced that's that high a bar.

    His response to CV19 has been pretty poor.
    His swanning around the Eastern Med telling Lebanon what to do, and how to solve the Greek-Turkish war, even as his country sinks into the worst 2nd wave in Europe, would especially piss me off, as a voter.

    But I am not French. Maybe they like that,
    Of course they like it. The French delusions about their continued importance are almost on a par with the English.
    Worse, I think. The English can, at least, sit back, kick off their slippers, and say, Well, what the F, we had the biggest empire in the world and now the entire world speaks English, much of it follows English common law, rules, accountancy, banking, and they nearly all play English sports, and the internet is all in English. Basically, England WON.

    The French were about to win, but then they blew it, now almost no one speaks French, few follow Napoleonic law, and France becomes a very beautiful museum. Hence their particular neuroses.
    I don't think it's true that few countries follow Napoleonic law. Almost all countries in Europe and South America do. To the extent "Chinese legal system" is a concept, it's Napoleonic too
    Driving on the wrong side of the road seemed to catch on, as well
This discussion has been closed.