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  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,862

    @ydoethur I love it. I am however slightly concerned that after reading that out to my girlfriend, she’s suddenly become very interested in the marriage idea.

    Who is she thinking of marrying?
    The taxi driver.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,421

    felix said:

    felix said:

    Odd this hasn't had more play on here - this is the real prize when it come to liberating Britain from onerous pieces of international law:

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8726733/Boris-Johnson-opt-major-European-human-rights-laws.html

    We literally spent hours last night discussing it but ok
    The impending culture war with your human rights lawyer of a leader will be absolutely glorious :smile:
    Oh just stop trolling you useless waste of space. You contribute absolutely nothing to this site.
    Oh dear - maybe you'd like him 'cancelled'?
    I’ve told the odious little troll what I think of him, and have left it at that. The only person talking about “cancel culture” is you.
    Why is it necessary to be so unpleasant and nasty and personal with your comments?
    Probably his emotional incapacity to deal with points of view other than his own.
    Now *that* is funny.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,413
    Sir Graham Brady not happy with new rules. Nor with no vote on them.
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483

    alex_ said:

    alex_ said:

    Barnesian said:

    Barnesian said:

    Barnesian said:

    Barnesian said:

    Barnesian said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    The Lord Chancellor believes there are acceptable ways of breaking the rule of law. Get your head around that.
    https://twitter.com/iainmartin1/status/1305066526718996482

    Surely you believe that (there are acceptable ways to break the law) to be correct?

    The thing that is extremely odd and unusual, is that this is a law that was recently put in place by the same government and was the headline of their manifesto.

    Getting your head around that is much harder.

    There are no acceptable ways to break the rule of law, in my view. Once a government rejects the rule of law, it sets the country on a very dangerous road.

    Breaking the speed limit on empty roads to take someone dying to hospital?

    That is breaking the law, not rejecting the rule of law.

    If the government changes the law then the rule of law has been preserved.
    We’ve already has this discussion Phillip. The rule of law includes compliance with international law and Parliament cannot unilaterally change international law.
    This QC disagrees and shares my line of thinking: https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/no-boris-is-not-breaching-the-rule-of-law-here-s-why

    Has a court ever ruled on whether Parliament can within rule of law operate this way?

    Fully functioning democracies have an independent judiciary to uphold the rule of law. The UK's judiciary does not have the ability to do that unless the government allows it. The government will not allow it.

    We have all been sold a tremendous dummy by being persuaded to focus on this nebulous concept of "the rule of law" when the question is the brutally simple one, should governments act honourably and stand by their word? If Mozambique said it would do something in a treaty with the UK, and then that it had changed its mind, I don't see anyone being impressed by learned Mozambiquean counsel boring on about the validity of the move in Mozambique law.

    PS The use of here's why" in a headline is an infallible c--t indicator.
    People are entitled to change their minds. It is a u-turn, u-turns happen.

    When facts change I change my mind. What do you do, sir?
    You agree a bet you think you are going to win. You lose. The facts have changed. So you renege on it. That's realpolitik. That is a power play that you think you can get away with.

    Do you think that is wise? Do you think that it is OK?
    No, absolutely not. That's completely different.
    You said, in defence of Johnson
    "People are entitled to change their minds. It is a u-turn, u-turns happen.

    When facts change I change my mind. What do you do, sir?"


    I showed you with a practical example, close to home, the implication of that line of argument.

    You said "No, absolutely not." You felt, in that example, the disgust most of us feel with Johnson's behaviour. Does that help you see it from our point of view? At heart, it is a moral question, not a legal one.
    The two are not comparable.

    Changing the law is not comparable to defaulting on a debt. The comparable thing would be eg a sovereign debt default which is not something the UK has ever done or that I would support.
    It is not about changing the law. It is about defaulting on an agreement. Changing the law is a smokescreen that you are hiding behind. It is about defaulting on an agreement.

    That is immoral in betting or in international relations. If morality doesn't concern you, it is also extremely unwise. You may get a short term benefit but at the cost of much greater long term pain.

    In Phil's world it would be morally acceptable for the Spanish to tear up the Treaty of Utrecht and to march into Gibraltar.

    In Phil's world if the Spanish thought they could get away with tearing up the Treaty of Utrecht and marching into Gibraltar they would.

    In Phil's world what defends Gibraltar from that is the threat of the military not the threat of lawyers.
    So in Phil's world, what defends him when welshing on a bet is his heavies? Not a world I share.
    Self-respect. A debt is a debt and that is inviolable.

    The law is the law and that can be changed.
    An agreement is an agreement.
    Debts should be paid.

    Agreements don't last forever.
    If you're going to break an agreement made in good faith between Sovereign Governments you would at least expect one of the following to be in place, if not several, to at least provide some sort of justification/cover

    1) Different Government to the original signatory
    2) Manifesto/electoral commitment to reject the agreement and certainly the absence of a manifesto commitment to uphold it!
    3) Facts to come to light which weren't available at the signing of the original agreement
    4) The full provisions of the agreement to have actually come into force
    5) mutual consent to make changes to the environment
    6) incompatability with pre-existing laws
    7) (i'm getting desperate here) reasonable passage of time

    What is even more outrageous about all this is that the UK Government isn't even seeking to repudiate the agreement in total and withdraw from it. Which would be legal if unwise. It expects the Agreement to still stand in law, to retain such benefits of that agreement as they exist (such as access to the Single Market for Northern Irish businesses*) and presumably to reserve the right to seek enforcement of its provisions should the other party to the agreement not uphold it. Whilst utterly rejecting the right of the EU to seek enforcement or penalty of the UK's unilateral breaking of clauses and UK responsibilities contained therein.

    I look forward to the EU implementing unilateral amendments to bits they don't like on their side. Perhaps increasing the financial cost to the UK of the treaty (after all the NI is getting access to the Single Market for free!). Or rewriting of whatever other provision they see fit to maintain the integrity of their border that was supposed to be guaranteed by the UK in the Irish Sea.


    *astonishingly this morning Tory fatheads like Hannan are arguing that access to the single market rebadged as "NI being subject to EU regulatory framework" are a burden that we should repudiate as well!
    The British government's argument is #3 on your list.

    We are being told that the EU will not only impose tariffs on goods moving from Great Britain to Northern Ireland, but that they might actually stop the transport of food products from GB to NI.

    I have to say that we never seriously believed that the EU would be willing to use a treaty, negotiated in good faith, to blockade one part of the UK, to cut it off, or that they would actually threaten to destroy the economic and territorial integrity of the UK. This was for the very good reason that any such barrier, any such tariffs or division, would be completely contrary to the letter and the spirit of the Good Friday Agreement.

    By actively undermining the Union of our country, such an interpretation would seriously endanger peace and stability in Northern Ireland. This interpretation cannot have been the real intention of those who framed the protocol (it certainly wasn't ours) – and it is therefore vital that we close that option down.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/09/12/make-eu-take-theirthreats-table-pass-bill/
    And it's absolute nonsense and Government propaganda. They have made no such threat.
    Whats more the NI Haulage industry has been screaming about the UK imposed border and its impacts on their literal viability. UK supermarkets are similarly saying they won't ship foodstuffs if the paperwork is going to be onerous chaos.

    It isn't the EU threatening food blockade, it is the UK. Because in 110 days time all food imports and exports will rely on the functioning of the Goods Vehicle Movement Service - a massive software suite that doesn't yet exist or even is being built. That in turn will rely on the human infrastructure of customs officials not hired, of standards officials not hired, and of everyone in the industry from manufacturer to importer to haulier to wholesaler having a clear set of guidelines to work to. In 110 days.

    The EU isn't saying this. The UK is. In 110 days the truck driver is personally liable for the data on his vehicle's Kent Access Permit being correct of he gets a £300 fine. That the KAP, the system that generates the KAP, the system that compiles the data to go onto a KAP, the truck parks, the officials etc etc etc do not exist yet is not Michael Barnier's fault.

    Its Michael Gove's fault.

    No Deal means everything stops. Remember that.
    Facts are wasted on many.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 42,226
    nichomar said:

    kinabalu said:

    ydoethur said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    but Keir Starmer is very bland, a metropolitan human rights lawyer (elite)

    In what sense is Johnson not part of the metropolitan elite?
    He doesn’t deserve to be in the intellectual elite?
    Palpably true but we should cut him some slack because longcovid might be responsible for this. The virus is known to have some odd symptoms and it's possible that "turns people into blustering buffoons with the morals of an alley cat and the attention span of a mosquito" is one of them.
    He was like that before his infection.
    Well, yes. So maybe that's what it does sometimes, which would be more interesting. It takes what you are and intensifies it. So let's hope Toby stays safe this winter.
  • TheuniondivvieTheuniondivvie Posts: 41,999
    edited September 2020

    felix said:

    felix said:

    Odd this hasn't had more play on here - this is the real prize when it come to liberating Britain from onerous pieces of international law:

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8726733/Boris-Johnson-opt-major-European-human-rights-laws.html

    We literally spent hours last night discussing it but ok
    The impending culture war with your human rights lawyer of a leader will be absolutely glorious :smile:
    Oh just stop trolling you useless waste of space. You contribute absolutely nothing to this site.
    Oh dear - maybe you'd like him 'cancelled'?
    I’ve told the odious little troll what I think of him, and have left it at that. The only person talking about “cancel culture” is you.
    Why is it necessary to be so unpleasant and nasty and personal with your comments?
    Gallowgate has form for this. I know my opinions on here are controversial and I get a great deal of brickbats , but I expect them to be answered by counter arguments and not insults.

    Gallowgate has a particular penchant for using pejorative terms for people with learning difficulties, which I find really offensive.
    But none of us have the right not to be offended (© numerous commentators of the right), so we are where we are.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,468
    The only contributions @BluestBlue makes are attempts to wind up “remoaners”. That is it. He is a troll plain and simple - his political beliefs are irrelevant.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,862
    The only surprising thing about that from Bairstow is that he finally got a bit of bat on something.
  • contrariancontrarian Posts: 5,818

    felix said:

    felix said:

    Odd this hasn't had more play on here - this is the real prize when it come to liberating Britain from onerous pieces of international law:

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8726733/Boris-Johnson-opt-major-European-human-rights-laws.html

    We literally spent hours last night discussing it but ok
    The impending culture war with your human rights lawyer of a leader will be absolutely glorious :smile:
    Oh just stop trolling you useless waste of space. You contribute absolutely nothing to this site.
    Oh dear - maybe you'd like him 'cancelled'?
    I’ve told the odious little troll what I think of him, and have left it at that. The only person talking about “cancel culture” is you.
    Why is it necessary to be so unpleasant and nasty and personal with your comments?
    Gallowgate has form for this. I know my opinions on here are controversial and I get a great deal of brickbats , but I expect them to be answered by counter arguments and not insults.

    Gallowgate has a particular penchant for using pejorative terms for people with learning difficulties, which I find really offensive.
    But none of us have the right not to be offended (© numerous commentators of the right), so we are where we are.
    I am never really offended by opinions, but I don;t like repeated personal insults like (and I quote) 'moron, moron, moron'

    Moron is a pejorative term for a personal with learning difficulties, and I think its an offensive word that people should not use in discourse at all.
  • BluestBlueBluestBlue Posts: 4,556

    The only contributions @BluestBlue makes are attempts to wind up “remoaners”. That is it. He is a troll plain and simple - his political beliefs are irrelevant.


    I wish I could remember many of your incredibly tedious contributions, but I did enjoy it when you had a long disquisition about how awesome Saudi Arabia were and definitely the right people to own an English football team, and then presumed to lecture others on issues of morality...
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,468

    The only contributions @BluestBlue makes are attempts to wind up “remoaners”. That is it. He is a troll plain and simple - his political beliefs are irrelevant.


    I wish I could remember many of your incredibly tedious contributions, but I did enjoy it when you had a long disquisition about how awesome Saudi Arabia were and definitely the right people to own an English football team, and then presumed to lecture others on issues of morality...
    As usual you’re just making up rubbish. It’s not even worth engaging with.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 42,226
    edited September 2020

    https://www.independent.co.uk/us-election-2020/bernie-sanders-biden-trump-2020-election-aoc-polls-b433909.html

    Sorry but hasn;'t Bernie seen the polls....?

    hasn't he read the sages on PB...?

    another effing Trump booster.....

    The American left lost the battle for the Dem nomination thus many of them will secretly be hoping Biden loses. It makes sense too for Bernie to warn that Biden will lose unless he tacks left. That way if Biden does lose (although of course he won't) Bernie will be on the record with the warning and will be able to more credibly say the party should have gone with him (Bernie) and should go that way next time. There is lots of this going on on the left. See also Michael Moore. Similar motivations there except with him there's also an eye on profile and film sales. Human nature.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,468

    felix said:

    felix said:

    Odd this hasn't had more play on here - this is the real prize when it come to liberating Britain from onerous pieces of international law:

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8726733/Boris-Johnson-opt-major-European-human-rights-laws.html

    We literally spent hours last night discussing it but ok
    The impending culture war with your human rights lawyer of a leader will be absolutely glorious :smile:
    Oh just stop trolling you useless waste of space. You contribute absolutely nothing to this site.
    Oh dear - maybe you'd like him 'cancelled'?
    I’ve told the odious little troll what I think of him, and have left it at that. The only person talking about “cancel culture” is you.
    Why is it necessary to be so unpleasant and nasty and personal with your comments?
    Gallowgate has form for this. I know my opinions on here are controversial and I get a great deal of brickbats , but I expect them to be answered by counter arguments and not insults.

    Gallowgate has a particular penchant for using pejorative terms for people with learning difficulties, which I find really offensive.
    But none of us have the right not to be offended (© numerous commentators of the right), so we are where we are.
    I am never really offended by opinions, but I don;t like repeated personal insults like (and I quote) 'moron, moron, moron'

    Moron is a pejorative term for a personal with learning difficulties, and I think its an offensive word that people should not use in discourse at all.
    You must be a hell of a snowflake if you’re offended by the word “moron”.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830

    felix said:

    felix said:

    Odd this hasn't had more play on here - this is the real prize when it come to liberating Britain from onerous pieces of international law:

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8726733/Boris-Johnson-opt-major-European-human-rights-laws.html

    We literally spent hours last night discussing it but ok
    The impending culture war with your human rights lawyer of a leader will be absolutely glorious :smile:
    Oh just stop trolling you useless waste of space. You contribute absolutely nothing to this site.
    Oh dear - maybe you'd like him 'cancelled'?
    I’ve told the odious little troll what I think of him, and have left it at that. The only person talking about “cancel culture” is you.
    Why is it necessary to be so unpleasant and nasty and personal with your comments?
    Gallowgate has form for this. I know my opinions on here are controversial and I get a great deal of brickbats , but I expect them to be answered by counter arguments and not insults.

    Gallowgate has a particular penchant for using pejorative terms for people with learning difficulties, which I find really offensive.
    You flatter yourself with "controversial" when you mean "wrong."

    There's two valid ways of being a contrarian: one is as an investment strategy where you aren't really taking a position on true/false issues, just on where you are in a cyclical process, and one is as a ploy as a commentator where you take the minority position on every issue as it comes up, as clickbait. You seem to have started life being wrong on one particular issue - Sweden I think it was - and stuck doggedly to being wrong on a strictly limited number of issues. The username amounts to a false advertisement, in addition to giving rise to coarse ribaldry - for which I personally have no time whatever - on the lines of "I hadn't come across the name Rarian before."
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830

    felix said:

    felix said:

    Odd this hasn't had more play on here - this is the real prize when it come to liberating Britain from onerous pieces of international law:

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8726733/Boris-Johnson-opt-major-European-human-rights-laws.html

    We literally spent hours last night discussing it but ok
    The impending culture war with your human rights lawyer of a leader will be absolutely glorious :smile:
    Oh just stop trolling you useless waste of space. You contribute absolutely nothing to this site.
    Oh dear - maybe you'd like him 'cancelled'?
    I’ve told the odious little troll what I think of him, and have left it at that. The only person talking about “cancel culture” is you.
    Why is it necessary to be so unpleasant and nasty and personal with your comments?
    Gallowgate has form for this. I know my opinions on here are controversial and I get a great deal of brickbats , but I expect them to be answered by counter arguments and not insults.

    Gallowgate has a particular penchant for using pejorative terms for people with learning difficulties, which I find really offensive.
    But none of us have the right not to be offended (© numerous commentators of the right), so we are where we are.
    I am never really offended by opinions, but I don;t like repeated personal insults like (and I quote) 'moron, moron, moron'

    Moron is a pejorative term for a personal with learning difficulties, and I think its an offensive word that people should not use in discourse at all.
    No it isn't, it means nothing more or less than "stupid."
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    kinabalu said:

    https://www.independent.co.uk/us-election-2020/bernie-sanders-biden-trump-2020-election-aoc-polls-b433909.html

    Sorry but hasn;'t Bernie seen the polls....?

    hasn't he read the sages on PB...?

    another effing Trump booster.....

    The American left lost the battle for the Dem nomination thus many of them will secretly be hoping Biden loses. It makes sense too for Bernie to warn that Biden will lose unless he tacks left. That way if Biden does lose (although of course he won't) Bernie will be on the record with the warning and will be able to more credibly say the party should have gone with him (Bernie) and should go that way next time. There is lots of this going on on the left. See also Michael Moore. Similar motivations there except with him there's also an eye on profile and film sales. Human nature.
    I don’t think it’s just that Kinablu (and yes you’ll accuse me of Trumperism). There is a lot of unease about the fact that the Democrats are doing more virtual campaigning whilst the Republicans go door to door and it’s not just the leftists saying that. There seems to be a lot of unease about the why Biden is conducting his campaign

    (Cue “but the national polls...”)
  • Because streamed plays are rubbish. There's a reason television series and films are not made by pointing a single camera at a stage set.
  • ChrisChris Posts: 11,751
    It's easy to mock, but I think the world would be a better place if no one broke the law when they thought it was unacceptable.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,108
    edited September 2020

    Because streamed plays are rubbish. There's a reason television series and films are not made by pointing a single camera at a stage set.
    You could say the same about gigs, but lots of bands are doing them and making them work i.e. not just a single camera.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 48,719

    The only contributions @BluestBlue makes are attempts to wind up “remoaners”. That is it. He is a troll plain and simple - his political beliefs are irrelevant.


    I wish I could remember many of your incredibly tedious contributions, but I did enjoy it when you had a long disquisition about how awesome Saudi Arabia were and definitely the right people to own an English football team, and then presumed to lecture others on issues of morality...
    Good performance by the Toon last night. I expected them to be a shambles after the summer.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,421
    It's any way you like as long as you think you have a good excuse.

    Like say, needing an eye test.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,108
    edited September 2020
    England will be 2-0 down in the cricket....
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 42,226
    MrEd said:

    kinabalu said:

    https://www.independent.co.uk/us-election-2020/bernie-sanders-biden-trump-2020-election-aoc-polls-b433909.html

    Sorry but hasn;'t Bernie seen the polls....?

    hasn't he read the sages on PB...?

    another effing Trump booster.....

    The American left lost the battle for the Dem nomination thus many of them will secretly be hoping Biden loses. It makes sense too for Bernie to warn that Biden will lose unless he tacks left. That way if Biden does lose (although of course he won't) Bernie will be on the record with the warning and will be able to more credibly say the party should have gone with him (Bernie) and should go that way next time. There is lots of this going on on the left. See also Michael Moore. Similar motivations there except with him there's also an eye on profile and film sales. Human nature.
    I don’t think it’s just that Kinablu (and yes you’ll accuse me of Trumperism). There is a lot of unease about the fact that the Democrats are doing more virtual campaigning whilst the Republicans go door to door and it’s not just the leftists saying that. There seems to be a lot of unease about the why Biden is conducting his campaign

    (Cue “but the national polls...”)
    There is a lot of that going on with the Left, though, trust me. And I'm sorry but I do have to parrot the bracketed bit. If the polls start to show Trump making real inroads into the Biden lead I will admit some serious WH2020 worry into my headspace but until then ...
  • AlistairAlistair Posts: 23,670
    Bloomberg to spend his $100 million for Biden solely and completely in Florida.
  • ChrisChris Posts: 11,751
    kinabalu said:

    nichomar said:

    kinabalu said:

    ydoethur said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    but Keir Starmer is very bland, a metropolitan human rights lawyer (elite)

    In what sense is Johnson not part of the metropolitan elite?
    He doesn’t deserve to be in the intellectual elite?
    Palpably true but we should cut him some slack because longcovid might be responsible for this. The virus is known to have some odd symptoms and it's possible that "turns people into blustering buffoons with the morals of an alley cat and the attention span of a mosquito" is one of them.
    He was like that before his infection.
    Well, yes. So maybe that's what it does sometimes, which would be more interesting. It takes what you are and intensifies it. So let's hope Toby stays safe this winter.
    Hmm. Dominic Cummings? Jair Bolsonaro? Novak Djokovic?
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,468
    Alistair said:

    Bloomberg to spend his $100 million for Biden solely and completely in Florida.

    Sounds like a good use of the money.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 48,719
    Leicester City has a rather makeshift defence today. West Brom to win, both teams to score at 6.5 looks good to me.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,222

    Barnesian said:

    Barnesian said:

    Barnesian said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    The Lord Chancellor believes there are acceptable ways of breaking the rule of law. Get your head around that.
    https://twitter.com/iainmartin1/status/1305066526718996482

    Surely you believe that (there are acceptable ways to break the law) to be correct?

    The thing that is extremely odd and unusual, is that this is a law that was recently put in place by the same government and was the headline of their manifesto.

    Getting your head around that is much harder.

    There are no acceptable ways to break the rule of law, in my view. Once a government rejects the rule of law, it sets the country on a very dangerous road.

    Breaking the speed limit on empty roads to take someone dying to hospital?

    That is breaking the law, not rejecting the rule of law.

    If the government changes the law then the rule of law has been preserved.
    We’ve already has this discussion Phillip. The rule of law includes compliance with international law and Parliament cannot unilaterally change international law.
    This QC disagrees and shares my line of thinking: https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/no-boris-is-not-breaching-the-rule-of-law-here-s-why

    Has a court ever ruled on whether Parliament can within rule of law operate this way?

    Fully functioning democracies have an independent judiciary to uphold the rule of law. The UK's judiciary does not have the ability to do that unless the government allows it. The government will not allow it.

    We have all been sold a tremendous dummy by being persuaded to focus on this nebulous concept of "the rule of law" when the question is the brutally simple one, should governments act honourably and stand by their word? If Mozambique said it would do something in a treaty with the UK, and then that it had changed its mind, I don't see anyone being impressed by learned Mozambiquean counsel boring on about the validity of the move in Mozambique law.

    PS The use of here's why" in a headline is an infallible c--t indicator.
    People are entitled to change their minds. It is a u-turn, u-turns happen.

    When facts change I change my mind. What do you do, sir?
    You agree a bet you think you are going to win. You lose. The facts have changed. So you renege on it. That's realpolitik. That is a power play that you think you can get away with.

    Do you think that is wise? Do you think that it is OK?
    No, absolutely not. That's completely different.
    You said, in defence of Johnson
    "People are entitled to change their minds. It is a u-turn, u-turns happen.

    When facts change I change my mind. What do you do, sir?"


    I showed you with a practical example, close to home, the implication of that line of argument.

    You said "No, absolutely not." You felt, in that example, the disgust most of us feel with Johnson's behaviour. Does that help you see it from our point of view? At heart, it is a moral question, not a legal one.
    The two are not comparable.

    Changing the law is not comparable to defaulting on a debt. The comparable thing would be eg a sovereign debt default which is not something the UK has ever done or that I would support.
    It is not about changing the law. It is about defaulting on an agreement. Changing the law is a smokescreen that you are hiding behind. It is about defaulting on an agreement.

    That is immoral in betting or in international relations. If morality doesn't concern you, it is also extremely unwise. You may get a short term benefit but at the cost of much greater long term pain.

    In Phil's world it would be morally acceptable for the Spanish to tear up the Treaty of Utrecht and to march into Gibraltar.

    In Phil's world if the Spanish thought they could get away with tearing up the Treaty of Utrecht and marching into Gibraltar they would.

    In Phil's world what defends Gibraltar from that is the threat of the military not the threat of lawyers.

    Yep, we get that. You do not believe in international law.

    I do. It is subordinate to national law. If national law and international law do not conflict then both should be enforced, if national law and international law are in conflict then obviously one of them needs to take priority.
    Nobody is talking about enforcement locally. Of course domestic law trumps international law domestically. That’s how our system works.

    However none of that is relevant.

    The relevant points are:

    1) The domestic courts have rules that ministers have an obligation to respect international law (that cannot be changed by Parliament); and

    2) Whether we SHOULD break our treaty commitments. Not whether we CAN, but whether we SHOULD.
    Actually, 1) can be changed by Parliament - but to do so, as in this case (the legislation grants broad powers to ignore some provisions of international treaties we are party to), risks our continued participation in and influence over rules based international arrangements.

    The poison of this bill might be slow acting, but it will be very long lasting.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 42,226
    Chris said:

    kinabalu said:

    nichomar said:

    kinabalu said:

    ydoethur said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    but Keir Starmer is very bland, a metropolitan human rights lawyer (elite)

    In what sense is Johnson not part of the metropolitan elite?
    He doesn’t deserve to be in the intellectual elite?
    Palpably true but we should cut him some slack because longcovid might be responsible for this. The virus is known to have some odd symptoms and it's possible that "turns people into blustering buffoons with the morals of an alley cat and the attention span of a mosquito" is one of them.
    He was like that before his infection.
    Well, yes. So maybe that's what it does sometimes, which would be more interesting. It takes what you are and intensifies it. So let's hope Toby stays safe this winter.
    Hmm. Dominic Cummings? Jair Bolsonaro? Novak Djokovic?
    Yep - I think we might just be onto something here.
  • NEW THREAD

  • Going to be lots of Poppyism reaction this evening in the hand egg if the reaction to this stars QB perfectly reasonable position is anything to go by.

    https://uk.sports.yahoo.com/news/baker-mayfield-changes-mind-anthem-183952283.html
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 42,226
    edited September 2020

    felix said:

    felix said:

    Odd this hasn't had more play on here - this is the real prize when it come to liberating Britain from onerous pieces of international law:

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8726733/Boris-Johnson-opt-major-European-human-rights-laws.html

    We literally spent hours last night discussing it but ok
    The impending culture war with your human rights lawyer of a leader will be absolutely glorious :smile:
    Oh just stop trolling you useless waste of space. You contribute absolutely nothing to this site.
    Oh dear - maybe you'd like him 'cancelled'?
    I’ve told the odious little troll what I think of him, and have left it at that. The only person talking about “cancel culture” is you.
    Why is it necessary to be so unpleasant and nasty and personal with your comments?
    Gallowgate has form for this. I know my opinions on here are controversial and I get a great deal of brickbats , but I expect them to be answered by counter arguments and not insults.

    Gallowgate has a particular penchant for using pejorative terms for people with learning difficulties, which I find really offensive.
    But none of us have the right not to be offended (© numerous commentators of the right), so we are where we are.
    I am never really offended by opinions, but I don;t like repeated personal insults like (and I quote) 'moron, moron, moron'

    Moron is a pejorative term for a personal with learning difficulties, and I think its an offensive word that people should not use in discourse at all.
    Oh do stop it you person in the bottom quartile of intelligence as measured by ability to follow or express a logical argument of any nuance or complexity.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 42,226
    "I agree with Mr Hannan."

    This is the verbal equivalent of wearing hessian shorts or a revolving bow tie.
  • justin124justin124 Posts: 11,527
    Sean_F said:

    I have been thinking about the polling a little more and what intrigues me most is not continuing Red Wall support for the Tories, which I would expect given that once you have convinced yourself to make the leap you are not going to change your mind without very good reason, but the ongoing backing the party gets from a portion of Remainers. I am genuinely interested in knowing what is keeping them onside right now. Surely, it is more than tribalism.

    Back in the day voting Conservative used to be seen as a mark of personal success by certain types of people. It was a theme running through the Margot Leadbeater character in The Good Life, she was posh so she voted Conservative and voting Conservative confirmed she was posh. Not voting Conservative might be seen in these circles as an admission of failure.

    The reality these days however is that the Conservative Party under McMillan or Heath shares very little with Johnson's party except for the name.

    I think it is interesting that people like Richard Nabavi, David Herdson and TSE - who were very loyal, ideologically-driven Tories that accepted the Brexit result and were convinced that it had to be honoured - have walked away from the party under Johnson, but that they do not seem to represent a movement, as such. It's notable that so many very talented individual Tories have deserted the party, but that this has not had much of an impact on its overall vote. That said, these are early days in this Parliament and the consequences of the undeliverable Brexit that Johnson and co have promised are yet to be felt, so maybe the old-style PB Tories are just the vanguard who have spent more time thinking about it than others have up to now.

    Let's hope so.

    I was disturbed by your assertion last evening that Johnson will at some point in the future call a referendum to restore capital punishment, in order to bolster his flagging popularity. I may be naive, but I am hoping this is a step too far even for Johnson.
    I think it would take a serious war, for the restoration of capital punishment to become a reality. In a WWII situation, no one would object to the execution of traitors or war criminals.
    Not even that would justify restoring capital punishment. Treachery can often be morally justified.Had the Nazis been British rather than German , many Britons would wish to have seen the defeat of their own armed forces. Doubtless there were many in Germany hoping to see their country defeated during World War 2 in the wider interest of common humanity - and such people extended well beyond the obvious vitims of the Nazi regime -eg the Jewish population and communist sympathisers.On a similar basis I had no wish to see the victory of UK and US arms in the 2003 Iraq invasion in that I viewed the attacking forces as being instruments of evil.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,222

    Nigelb said:

    DavidL said:

    Scott_xP said:
    The UK is now carrying out in excess of 200k tests a day: https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/testing

    Given where we were a few months ago this is a remarkable logistical achievement and our testing per million people is, according to Worldometer, second only to Israel in the world for medium to large countries.

    I am driven to conclude that the good doctor has an agenda which may not have a lot to do with health.
    200k effective tests a day would be great - but for a disease where the infectious period is on average 5 days it is pointless giving results 48 hours after a test, there is no value including those, we are just deceiving ourselves.

    Day 1 - Start to feel unwell
    Day 2 - Book a test
    Day 3 - Take Test
    Day 6 - Receive test result
    Day 6 - Also stop being infectious

    A post on here said only 25% of tests were being turned around in 24 hours, I dont know how accurate or reflective that is, but based on that I would be counting effective tests as those done in 24 hours or less, so 25% x 200k = 50k at the moment.
    In reality it is thus:

    Day 1 - Start to feel unwell
    Day 2 - Try to book a test, are unable
    Day 3 - Try to book a test, are unable
    Day 4 - Try to book a test, are unable
    Day 5 - Try to book a test, are unable
    Day 6 - Start to feel better, “oh it’s probably not COVID”
    Day 7 - Infect others
    Isn’t it more along the lines of:

    Day 1 - Get infected.
    Day 2 - infect others
    Day 3 - infect others
    Day 4 - infect others
    Day 5 - infect others; start to develop symptoms
    Day 6 - self-isolate, try to book test, are unable
    Day 7 - self isolate, try to book test, are unable
    Day 8 - self isolate, try to book test, offered one a hundred miles away
    Day 9 - drag yourself a hundred miles (or get driven there by family member, increasing their exposure), take test
    Day 10 - self isolate, await test result
    Day 11 - self isolate, starting to feel better (hopefully) receive test result

    By Day 12, the test result may be of historical benefit only. The pushback against non-symptomatics getting tests seems barking mad to me: it’s the pre-symptomatic period that’s the biggest danger (most people will self-isolate when they get symptoms, and, in any case, will probably not be up to wandering in to work, going to restaurants, getting dragged around the shops, etc). If you have reason to suspect you’ve been exposed but haven’t yet developed symptoms, surely you should be the top priority for testing?
    Correct.
    A mass testing regime which was only 70% accurate, but was used and gave results immediately on your ‘day 1’ would catch a far higher proportion of those who were actually infectious.
    Such technology already exists (& is probably a lot better than 70% sensitive in detecting those actually infectious, as opposed to PCR positive).

    We could probably run a large scale regional trial of it for £100m, not £100bn.
    The idea with contact tracing is that you can do the tracing and testing faster than the virus can spread, and so you can chase the virus and locate where it is and isolate those infectious, and ultimately contacts before they are infectious.

    So your first case might not have a test result until day 10 of the infection, but then you drive that down for contacts, and contacts of contacts, and so on. Unfortunately our test and trace system has never reached that level of capability.
    No, that‘s just wrong.
    The success of contact tracing relies on fast results. There is a mass of data and modelling demonstrating that. Even the best funded and organised contact tracing will miss contacts.
    Catching cases before they are symptomatic, and isolating them, massively cuts the potential number of contacts.
This discussion has been closed.