Thinking about why those politicians who the public consider to have personality (Thatcher, Cameron, Blair, Boris) beat those who they don't (Foot, Brown, Miliband, Howard, Starmer) even when the latter lead on more "important" attributes...
In the mid term polls the public are telling politicans whether they consider them to be doing a good job. Incumbents tend to be blamed for things going badly, rightly or wrongly, and LotOs have a free hit as they can aftertime and criticise, so they lead on various things. When the Election campaigns start, however, leaders have to become salesmen for their manifestos, and maybe that is why the less charismatic types struggle to turn their earnest/popular policies into election winning formulas. Maybe it is why Tories do better than Labour too; in a relative way they are selling optimism vs less glamorous pragmatism, the chance to get rich vs the chance for everyone to be equally average - it is an easier sell
(by the way, Thatcher didn't lead Kinnock on personality always, in the manner that Cameron and Boris do their opposition, but when it came to campaign time she went miles clear)
Thatcher only fought one election against Kinnock - ie 1987. The Tory lead was firmly established before election was called and actually declined in the course of the campaign.
Thinking about why those politicians who the public consider to have personality (Thatcher, Cameron, Blair, Boris) beat those who they don't (Foot, Brown, Miliband, Howard, Starmer) even when the latter lead on more "important" attributes...
In the mid term polls the public are telling politicans whether they consider them to be doing a good job. Incumbents tend to be blamed for things going badly, rightly or wrongly, and LotOs have a free hit as they can aftertime and criticise, so they lead on various things. When the Elections campaigns start, however, leaders have to become salesmen for their manifestos, and maybe that is why the less charismatic types struggle to turn their earnest/popular policies into election winning formulas. Maybe it is why Tories do better than Labour too; in a relative way they are selling optimism vs less glamorous pragmatism, the chance to get rich vs the chance for everyone to be equally average - it is an easier sell
(by the way, Thatcher didn't lead Kinnock on personality always, in the manner that Cameron and Boris do their opposition, but when it came to campaign time she went miles clear)
Though not always eg Attlee beat Churchill in 1945 and 1950 and Heath beat Wilson in 1970 and Major beat Kinnock in 1992 and May beat Corbyn (just) in 2017 and all were duller than their opponents
May threw away a humongous lead from campaign start to Election day, in part because of her poor personality ratings. It was really a win for Corbyn. I think personality is more important now than it was in the distant past, when politicians were less media savvy
May still won 55 seats more than Corbyn did in 2017.
TV was also well under way in both 1970 and 1992 but Heath and Major still won, what connected them and May was they were able to present themselves as more centrist and fiscally competent than their opponents despite their dullness. The equally dull John Howard won 4 elections in Australia again by presenting himself as fiscally competent, same with the very dull Angela Merkel in Germany.
So yes charisma does normally win but not always if the charismatic leader is less centrist than their opponent and not trusted on the economy or if the dull leader is leading his party after a long period out of power and at a time when there was a mood for change as was the case for Attlee in 1945 and for Hollande in France in 2012 when he beat Sarkozy and maybe for Starmer in 2024
You make a very good point about Angela Merkel. She's hardly a laugh a minute, but has been in power for 15 years.
Maybe German voters value competence, consistency and integrity more than we do.
I think Germans had enough of charismatic leaders after WW2, though the charismatic Schroder beat the dull Stoiber in 2002 and almost beat Merkel in 2005
I'm afraid Philip you showed your lack of honesty in your objectivity when you had spent several months attacking Labour's economic policies from 2001 onwards as overspending and then did a complete U-turn as soon as Johnson started doing the same thing
Sorry that is bovine manure.
I opposed Brown increasing the deficit 2001 onwards before the recession. I have never attacked Brown for the deficit increasing during the recession. I attacked Brown for what he did 2001-2007, not for what he did 2007-08.
Unless you think there is no recession or economic crisis the response this year is not the same thing as 2001.
Not to the best of my knowledge...
Come on be fair. Even you in your claim made clear my objection was what he had done from 2001 onwards.
The issue was 2001 to 2007 for me, not 2007 to 2008. Spending during a crisis is a necessity, there are some automatic stabilisers precisely for that reason. That is why destroying the budget before the crash like Brown did from 2001 onwards is so utterly unforgiveable, because it leaves you nowhere to go when the next inevitable crisis hits.
People act like Brown would have been fine were it not for the Financial Crisis. My point is, was and always has been that recessions happen. If it wasn't the Financial Crisis it would have been something else. Something eventually happens. You can not abolish busts.
Brown's issue was he hubristically claimed he had abolished busts and so spent accordingly.
Usual mixture of Brownaphobic abuse facilitated by ladybird economics. You talk as if there is some precisely predictable up and down "cycle" whereby one can see a downturn on the horizon and start squirreling away money to use when it hits. The truth is there is nothing predictable about the macro economy apart from there will be ups and there will be downs and there will be flats. Annual growth can go up up down flat up down flat. Or it might go up down up down flat up down up up up and away in my beautiful balloon. Or then again possibly flat flat up down up down flat down down deeper and down. Etc. The point is, we are always before a crash and we are always before a boom. We are always after both of these things too. The shape of the curve can be predicted with great accuracy, don't get me wrong, but only in retrospect.
Everyone knew we were in a boom. Overheating was a word in frequent usage.
Then Ed Balls announced they had abolished boom and bust.
And the Guardian started running angry articles claiming that anyone who questioned the exploding derivatives market was talking the country down.
We had all the signs
- Someone high in government finance announces that this boom will go on forever - Any idiot could make money in the market - People were denouncing the naysayers.
The relational move at that point was a switch from CDO to gold.
That the City was out of control was indeed blindingly obvious. But my general point is that the macro-economic curve is not even remotely predictable beyond a short window. So this idea of saving "in the good times" to spend in the bad is bollocks. You do not have the requisite knowledge unless you are looking backwards. You can know where you were on the curve, but never where you are on it. Where you are is always on the edge of it, i.e. it is not yet a curve. So what you should do is not play god - just live within your means, spend what you raise and no more unless there are exceptional circumstances such as wars pandemics, or crumbling schools and hospitals.
On the curent 538 national polling average using Universal Swing I have Biden beating Trump in Georgia by 0.04%. About 989 votes.
If you are using 538, why are you applying a universal swing. 538 show their modelled estimates state by state. GA is Trump 50.7% to Biden 48.5% vote share, which they simulate as a 0.64 probability that Trump wins that state.
This NE lockdown. Apparently whilst its illegal to meet your friends in your own garden, its legal to meet them in a pub beer garden. Just make sure that if its a pub where you have to pass through the building to get to the beer garden that you don't pass through together, as that's illegal.
Simple common sense guidance.
Same issue there's been all year, there will always be edge cases in any restrictions. The alternative is to have no restrictions at all, or a total and complete lockdown, any shade of grey will always have a "but what about ..."
How is this an edge case? Can't meet in a private garden or the park because people need to stop mixing. But you can meet down t'pub because people need to stop mixing unless someone can make money off it. Not inside of course - you are only allowed to mingle with strangers and not your friends.
These new rules. The police who are supposed to enforce it don't know. Government ministers don't know. The PM not only doesn't know them but guesses and gets them reversed. Even if you read them correctly there are so many gaping holes and contradictions. You really need to stop dancing on that pinhead trying to defend them.
FFS....head, desk, thud, thud...it is repeating exactly the same mistake as emptying hospitals out.
Bloody 3rd rate management of a 3rd rate poly.
That's what I thought.
We should close down all the former polys, I mean would anyone really miss them?
University should be solely for the academically gifted.
I sympathise, but there are over 2 million at university at any given time. Maybe the academically gifted are half a million of those. What are you going to do with the remaining 1.5 million I wonder? Not enough jobs to go round, especially at the moment.
I know - open up the former polys as new polys!
Give them apprenticeships, level 5 higher apprentices earn more over their lifetime than all graduates on average except those who attended Oxbridge and Russell Group universities
A pedant would tell you that the University of Cambridge and the dump are members of the Russell Group, so your comment 'Oxbridge and Russell Group universities' is a horrendous tautology.
Though Oxbridge graduates earn slighly more, £1.79 million over a lifetime to £1.6 million for graduates of other Russell Group universities.
A few very highly paid jobs like commercial barristers for example are effectively restricted to Oxbridge graduates
One day you will drowned in your own spurious statistics!
I'm afraid Philip you showed your lack of honesty in your objectivity when you had spent several months attacking Labour's economic policies from 2001 onwards as overspending and then did a complete U-turn as soon as Johnson started doing the same thing
Sorry that is bovine manure.
I opposed Brown increasing the deficit 2001 onwards before the recession. I have never attacked Brown for the deficit increasing during the recession. I attacked Brown for what he did 2001-2007, not for what he did 2007-08.
Unless you think there is no recession or economic crisis the response this year is not the same thing as 2001.
Not to the best of my knowledge...
Come on be fair. Even you in your claim made clear my objection was what he had done from 2001 onwards.
The issue was 2001 to 2007 for me, not 2007 to 2008. Spending during a crisis is a necessity, there are some automatic stabilisers precisely for that reason. That is why destroying the budget before the crash like Brown did from 2001 onwards is so utterly unforgiveable, because it leaves you nowhere to go when the next inevitable crisis hits.
People act like Brown would have been fine were it not for the Financial Crisis. My point is, was and always has been that recessions happen. If it wasn't the Financial Crisis it would have been something else. Something eventually happens. You can not abolish busts.
Brown's issue was he hubristically claimed he had abolished busts and so spent accordingly.
Usual mixture of Brownaphobic abuse facilitated by ladybird economics. You talk as if there is some precisely predictable up and down "cycle" whereby one can see a downturn on the horizon and start squirreling away money to use when it hits. The truth is there is nothing predictable about the macro economy apart from there will be ups and there will be downs and there will be flats. Annual growth can go up up down flat up down flat. Or it might go up down up down flat up down up up up and away in my beautiful balloon. Or then again possibly flat flat up down up down flat down down deeper and down. Etc. The point is, we are always before a crash and we are always before a boom. We are always after both of these things too. The shape of the curve can be predicted with great accuracy, don't get me wrong, but only in retrospect.
You can't know when the next recession will be, of course that is true, which is precisely why you should in the words of the Boy Scouts/Scar from the Lion King you should always Be Prepared.
After a recession there will always be a deficit that needs to be put right and it may take years to do so. Once it has been you should be ever vigilant and prepared for the next one. There was no way of knowing that a recession would hit in 2007, that is true, but what was knowable (unless you were the hubristic Brown and Balls) was that a recession would come.
By 2001 the last recession was in 1993, it was due already by 2001. What is remarkable is not that a recession happened in 2007 but that it took 14 years from 1993 to 2007 for one to happen, that is an unusually long cycle.
Given there was no budget deficit by 2000, smashing the deficit out from 2001 onwards until 2007 was utterly reckless and irresponsible.
This NE lockdown. Apparently whilst its illegal to meet your friends in your own garden, its legal to meet them in a pub beer garden. Just make sure that if its a pub where you have to pass through the building to get to the beer garden that you don't pass through together, as that's illegal.
Simple common sense guidance.
Same issue there's been all year, there will always be edge cases in any restrictions. The alternative is to have no restrictions at all, or a total and complete lockdown, any shade of grey will always have a "but what about ..."
How is this an edge case? Can't meet in a private garden or the park because people need to stop mixing. But you can meet down t'pub because people need to stop mixing unless someone can make money off it. Not inside of course - you are only allowed to mingle with strangers and not your friends.
These new rules. The police who are supposed to enforce it don't know. Government ministers don't know. The PM not only doesn't know them but guesses and gets them reversed. Even if you read them correctly there are so many gaping holes and contradictions. You really need to stop dancing on that pinhead trying to defend them.
Where does it say it is illegal to meet in a park, but legal in the beer garden?
If it is illegal to meet in a park but legal in a beer garden that would be odd, but that isn't what you said. You objected to it being illegal at home or indoors in the pub but not in the beer garden. That is an edge case. Parks would I think be subject to the same restrictions as the beer garden.
I'm afraid Philip you showed your lack of honesty in your objectivity when you had spent several months attacking Labour's economic policies from 2001 onwards as overspending and then did a complete U-turn as soon as Johnson started doing the same thing
Sorry that is bovine manure.
I opposed Brown increasing the deficit 2001 onwards before the recession. I have never attacked Brown for the deficit increasing during the recession. I attacked Brown for what he did 2001-2007, not for what he did 2007-08.
Unless you think there is no recession or economic crisis the response this year is not the same thing as 2001.
Not to the best of my knowledge...
Come on be fair. Even you in your claim made clear my objection was what he had done from 2001 onwards.
The issue was 2001 to 2007 for me, not 2007 to 2008. Spending during a crisis is a necessity, there are some automatic stabilisers precisely for that reason. That is why destroying the budget before the crash like Brown did from 2001 onwards is so utterly unforgiveable, because it leaves you nowhere to go when the next inevitable crisis hits.
People act like Brown would have been fine were it not for the Financial Crisis. My point is, was and always has been that recessions happen. If it wasn't the Financial Crisis it would have been something else. Something eventually happens. You can not abolish busts.
Brown's issue was he hubristically claimed he had abolished busts and so spent accordingly.
Usual mixture of Brownaphobic abuse facilitated by ladybird economics. You talk as if there is some precisely predictable up and down "cycle" whereby one can see a downturn on the horizon and start squirreling away money to use when it hits. The truth is there is nothing predictable about the macro economy apart from there will be ups and there will be downs and there will be flats. Annual growth can go up up down flat up down flat. Or it might go up down up down flat up down up up up and away in my beautiful balloon. Or then again possibly flat flat up down up down flat down down deeper and down. Etc. The point is, we are always before a crash and we are always before a boom. We are always after both of these things too. The shape of the curve can be predicted with great accuracy, don't get me wrong, but only in retrospect.
Everyone knew we were in a boom. Overheating was a word in frequent usage.
Then Ed Balls announced they had abolished boom and bust.
And the Guardian started running angry articles claiming that anyone who questioned the exploding derivatives market was talking the country down.
We had all the signs
- Someone high in government finance announces that this boom will go on forever - Any idiot could make money in the market - People were denouncing the naysayers.
The relational move at that point was a switch from CDO to gold.
That the City was out of control was indeed blindingly obvious. But my general point is that the macro-economic curve is not even remotely predictable beyond a short window. So this idea of saving "in the good times" to spend in the bad is bollocks. You do not have the requisite knowledge unless you are looking backwards. You can know where you were on the curve, but never where you are on it. Where you are is always on the edge of it, i.e. it is not yet a curve. So what you should do is not play god - just live within your means, spend what you raise and no more unless there are exceptional circumstances such as wars pandemics, or crumbling schools and hospitals.
Of course you can know where you are in the curve!
We know whether we are in recession or not. If we are not, that is the growth time so act appropriately, pay reduce the deficit from the last one and get prepared for the next one. We knew we were not in recession in 2001-2007 at the time, it did not take hindsight to know that.
I'm afraid Philip you showed your lack of honesty in your objectivity when you had spent several months attacking Labour's economic policies from 2001 onwards as overspending and then did a complete U-turn as soon as Johnson started doing the same thing
Sorry that is bovine manure.
I opposed Brown increasing the deficit 2001 onwards before the recession. I have never attacked Brown for the deficit increasing during the recession. I attacked Brown for what he did 2001-2007, not for what he did 2007-08.
Unless you think there is no recession or economic crisis the response this year is not the same thing as 2001.
Not to the best of my knowledge...
Come on be fair. Even you in your claim made clear my objection was what he had done from 2001 onwards.
The issue was 2001 to 2007 for me, not 2007 to 2008. Spending during a crisis is a necessity, there are some automatic stabilisers precisely for that reason. That is why destroying the budget before the crash like Brown did from 2001 onwards is so utterly unforgiveable, because it leaves you nowhere to go when the next inevitable crisis hits.
People act like Brown would have been fine were it not for the Financial Crisis. My point is, was and always has been that recessions happen. If it wasn't the Financial Crisis it would have been something else. Something eventually happens. You can not abolish busts.
Brown's issue was he hubristically claimed he had abolished busts and so spent accordingly.
Usual mixture of Brownaphobic abuse facilitated by ladybird economics. You talk as if there is some precisely predictable up and down "cycle" whereby one can see a downturn on the horizon and start squirreling away money to use when it hits. The truth is there is nothing predictable about the macro economy apart from there will be ups and there will be downs and there will be flats. Annual growth can go up up down flat up down flat. Or it might go up down up down flat up down up up up and away in my beautiful balloon. Or then again possibly flat flat up down up down flat down down deeper and down. Etc. The point is, we are always before a crash and we are always before a boom. We are always after both of these things too. The shape of the curve can be predicted with great accuracy, don't get me wrong, but only in retrospect.
You can't know when the next recession will be, of course that is true, which is precisely why you should in the words of the Boy Scouts/Scar from the Lion King you should always Be Prepared.
After a recession there will always be a deficit that needs to be put right and it may take years to do so. Once it has been you should be ever vigilant and prepared for the next one. There was no way of knowing that a recession would hit in 2007, that is true, but what was knowable (unless you were the hubristic Brown and Balls) was that a recession would come.
By 2001 the last recession was in 1993, it was due already by 2001. What is remarkable is not that a recession happened in 2007 but that it took 14 years from 1993 to 2007 for one to happen, that is an unusually long cycle.
Given there was no budget deficit by 2000, smashing the deficit out from 2001 onwards until 2007 was utterly reckless and irresponsible.
Not really. There was no recession between 1958 and 1974.
In terms of people joining and rejoining, it's not my site, I don't set the rules. Other sites have tough rules on it, others don't.
I just think that if you're going to come on here and be continuously objectionable to people and annoy people just for the sake of it on a daily/weekly basis, people will get tired of it and quickly see who it is.
I've only been here a year and I could spot Sean a mile away. For our long time users it might be very boring.
We've all got into bother on here, including and especially me but I have tried to make amends where it's possible. I've never seen any kind of understanding from Sean or his latest iteration.
I think that you take this board a little too seriously (and quite possibly life as well). I am on here mainly for entertainment as well as education and Sean, in all his iterations, is a highly entertaining writer with a real skill with words. The site would be poorer without him and I see no advantage in making his participation here more difficult. I felt the same about Tim back in the day who could be wickedly funny.
I take life very seriously indeed, I think in the current climate it's essential.
This NE lockdown. Apparently whilst its illegal to meet your friends in your own garden, its legal to meet them in a pub beer garden. Just make sure that if its a pub where you have to pass through the building to get to the beer garden that you don't pass through together, as that's illegal.
Simple common sense guidance.
Same issue there's been all year, there will always be edge cases in any restrictions. The alternative is to have no restrictions at all, or a total and complete lockdown, any shade of grey will always have a "but what about ..."
How is this an edge case? Can't meet in a private garden or the park because people need to stop mixing. But you can meet down t'pub because people need to stop mixing unless someone can make money off it. Not inside of course - you are only allowed to mingle with strangers and not your friends.
These new rules. The police who are supposed to enforce it don't know. Government ministers don't know. The PM not only doesn't know them but guesses and gets them reversed. Even if you read them correctly there are so many gaping holes and contradictions. You really need to stop dancing on that pinhead trying to defend them.
Where does it say it is illegal to meet in a park, but legal in the beer garden?
If it is illegal to meet in a park but legal in a beer garden that would be odd, but that isn't what you said. You objected to it being illegal at home or indoors in the pub but not in the beer garden. That is an edge case. Parks would I think be subject to the same restrictions as the beer garden.
From 00:01 hours tomorrow you *cannot* meet with people outside your own household / bubble except for under a list of exceptions. A pub beer garden is one of the exceptions
Dom's "no comms fuckups" command centre, working a treat...
What is this obsession with finding loopholes. The whole point of the policy is to reduce the number of times you meet other people. How hard is that to understand?
It matters for (at least) two reasons.
1) it isn’t a “loophole” in the sense of a slightly contrived situation only invented to suggest confusion in guidance intended to be simple and easily understood. 2) this is not simply guidance, it is THE LAW. Officially enforceable by significant levels of fines and potential criminal records.
I'm afraid Philip you showed your lack of honesty in your objectivity when you had spent several months attacking Labour's economic policies from 2001 onwards as overspending and then did a complete U-turn as soon as Johnson started doing the same thing
Sorry that is bovine manure.
I opposed Brown increasing the deficit 2001 onwards before the recession. I have never attacked Brown for the deficit increasing during the recession. I attacked Brown for what he did 2001-2007, not for what he did 2007-08.
Unless you think there is no recession or economic crisis the response this year is not the same thing as 2001.
Not to the best of my knowledge...
Come on be fair. Even you in your claim made clear my objection was what he had done from 2001 onwards.
The issue was 2001 to 2007 for me, not 2007 to 2008. Spending during a crisis is a necessity, there are some automatic stabilisers precisely for that reason. That is why destroying the budget before the crash like Brown did from 2001 onwards is so utterly unforgiveable, because it leaves you nowhere to go when the next inevitable crisis hits.
People act like Brown would have been fine were it not for the Financial Crisis. My point is, was and always has been that recessions happen. If it wasn't the Financial Crisis it would have been something else. Something eventually happens. You can not abolish busts.
Brown's issue was he hubristically claimed he had abolished busts and so spent accordingly.
Usual mixture of Brownaphobic abuse facilitated by ladybird economics. You talk as if there is some precisely predictable up and down "cycle" whereby one can see a downturn on the horizon and start squirreling away money to use when it hits. The truth is there is nothing predictable about the macro economy apart from there will be ups and there will be downs and there will be flats. Annual growth can go up up down flat up down flat. Or it might go up down up down flat up down up up up and away in my beautiful balloon. Or then again possibly flat flat up down up down flat down down deeper and down. Etc. The point is, we are always before a crash and we are always before a boom. We are always after both of these things too. The shape of the curve can be predicted with great accuracy, don't get me wrong, but only in retrospect.
You can't know when the next recession will be, of course that is true, which is precisely why you should in the words of the Boy Scouts/Scar from the Lion King you should always Be Prepared.
After a recession there will always be a deficit that needs to be put right and it may take years to do so. Once it has been you should be ever vigilant and prepared for the next one. There was no way of knowing that a recession would hit in 2007, that is true, but what was knowable (unless you were the hubristic Brown and Balls) was that a recession would come.
By 2001 the last recession was in 1993, it was due already by 2001. What is remarkable is not that a recession happened in 2007 but that it took 14 years from 1993 to 2007 for one to happen, that is an unusually long cycle.
Given there was no budget deficit by 2000, smashing the deficit out from 2001 onwards until 2007 was utterly reckless and irresponsible.
Not really. There was no recession between 1958 and 1974.
Which was itself a period of growth known to be noteworthy and unusually long. So again little reason to be surprised there was one come 2007 unless you hubristically believed busts had somehow been eliminated.
This NE lockdown. Apparently whilst its illegal to meet your friends in your own garden, its legal to meet them in a pub beer garden. Just make sure that if its a pub where you have to pass through the building to get to the beer garden that you don't pass through together, as that's illegal.
Simple common sense guidance.
Same issue there's been all year, there will always be edge cases in any restrictions. The alternative is to have no restrictions at all, or a total and complete lockdown, any shade of grey will always have a "but what about ..."
How is this an edge case? Can't meet in a private garden or the park because people need to stop mixing. But you can meet down t'pub because people need to stop mixing unless someone can make money off it. Not inside of course - you are only allowed to mingle with strangers and not your friends.
These new rules. The police who are supposed to enforce it don't know. Government ministers don't know. The PM not only doesn't know them but guesses and gets them reversed. Even if you read them correctly there are so many gaping holes and contradictions. You really need to stop dancing on that pinhead trying to defend them.
Where does it say it is illegal to meet in a park, but legal in the beer garden?
If it is illegal to meet in a park but legal in a beer garden that would be odd, but that isn't what you said. You objected to it being illegal at home or indoors in the pub but not in the beer garden. That is an edge case. Parks would I think be subject to the same restrictions as the beer garden.
From 00:01 hours tomorrow you *cannot* meet with people outside your own household / bubble except for under a list of exceptions. A pub beer garden is one of the exceptions
Sounds clear then.
Do you have the list of exceptions? Are parks not on the list?
This NE lockdown. Apparently whilst its illegal to meet your friends in your own garden, its legal to meet them in a pub beer garden. Just make sure that if its a pub where you have to pass through the building to get to the beer garden that you don't pass through together, as that's illegal.
Simple common sense guidance.
Same issue there's been all year, there will always be edge cases in any restrictions. The alternative is to have no restrictions at all, or a total and complete lockdown, any shade of grey will always have a "but what about ..."
How is this an edge case? Can't meet in a private garden or the park because people need to stop mixing. But you can meet down t'pub because people need to stop mixing unless someone can make money off it. Not inside of course - you are only allowed to mingle with strangers and not your friends.
These new rules. The police who are supposed to enforce it don't know. Government ministers don't know. The PM not only doesn't know them but guesses and gets them reversed. Even if you read them correctly there are so many gaping holes and contradictions. You really need to stop dancing on that pinhead trying to defend them.
Where does it say it is illegal to meet in a park, but legal in the beer garden?
If it is illegal to meet in a park but legal in a beer garden that would be odd, but that isn't what you said. You objected to it being illegal at home or indoors in the pub but not in the beer garden. That is an edge case. Parks would I think be subject to the same restrictions as the beer garden.
I'm afraid Philip you showed your lack of honesty in your objectivity when you had spent several months attacking Labour's economic policies from 2001 onwards as overspending and then did a complete U-turn as soon as Johnson started doing the same thing
Sorry that is bovine manure.
I opposed Brown increasing the deficit 2001 onwards before the recession. I have never attacked Brown for the deficit increasing during the recession. I attacked Brown for what he did 2001-2007, not for what he did 2007-08.
Unless you think there is no recession or economic crisis the response this year is not the same thing as 2001.
Not to the best of my knowledge...
Come on be fair. Even you in your claim made clear my objection was what he had done from 2001 onwards.
The issue was 2001 to 2007 for me, not 2007 to 2008. Spending during a crisis is a necessity, there are some automatic stabilisers precisely for that reason. That is why destroying the budget before the crash like Brown did from 2001 onwards is so utterly unforgiveable, because it leaves you nowhere to go when the next inevitable crisis hits.
People act like Brown would have been fine were it not for the Financial Crisis. My point is, was and always has been that recessions happen. If it wasn't the Financial Crisis it would have been something else. Something eventually happens. You can not abolish busts.
Brown's issue was he hubristically claimed he had abolished busts and so spent accordingly.
Usual mixture of Brownaphobic abuse facilitated by ladybird economics. You talk as if there is some precisely predictable up and down "cycle" whereby one can see a downturn on the horizon and start squirreling away money to use when it hits. The truth is there is nothing predictable about the macro economy apart from there will be ups and there will be downs and there will be flats. Annual growth can go up up down flat up down flat. Or it might go up down up down flat up down up up up and away in my beautiful balloon. Or then again possibly flat flat up down up down flat down down deeper and down. Etc. The point is, we are always before a crash and we are always before a boom. We are always after both of these things too. The shape of the curve can be predicted with great accuracy, don't get me wrong, but only in retrospect.
You can't know when the next recession will be, of course that is true, which is precisely why you should in the words of the Boy Scouts/Scar from the Lion King you should always Be Prepared.
After a recession there will always be a deficit that needs to be put right and it may take years to do so. Once it has been you should be ever vigilant and prepared for the next one. There was no way of knowing that a recession would hit in 2007, that is true, but what was knowable (unless you were the hubristic Brown and Balls) was that a recession would come.
By 2001 the last recession was in 1993, it was due already by 2001. What is remarkable is not that a recession happened in 2007 but that it took 14 years from 1993 to 2007 for one to happen, that is an unusually long cycle.
Given there was no budget deficit by 2000, smashing the deficit out from 2001 onwards until 2007 was utterly reckless and irresponsible.
Not really. There was no recession between 1958 and 1974.
Which was itself a period of growth known to be noteworthy and unusually long. So again little reason to be surprised there was one come 2007 unless you hubristically believed busts had somehow been eliminated.
But how big was the average Budget Deficit as a % of GDP for the period 2001 - 2007?
What we really need is some Sunak v. Starmer head to head polling.
Sunak is a sexy bitch. Starmer is not.
That kind of thing...?
Have you seen Sunak’s ears? They’re weird. And he’s short. Plus for someone so rich why can’t he find trousers long enough for his legs? He looks as if he’s wearing someone else’s school uniform.
Sexy? You must be joking.
I mean he’s better than Johnson or Gove (shudders) but I’d rather curl up with a good book than any of them.
Well you fancy Monty Don so I could have predicted that Rishi would not float your fleet. Have there ever been two guys who look less alike than Rishi Sunak and Monty Don? I don't think so. Not even Hall & Oates.
I fancy Monty Don coming to my garden. Not for anything more. Adam Frost OTOH .....
What we really need is some Sunak v. Starmer head to head polling.
Sunak is a sexy bitch. Starmer is not.
That kind of thing...?
Have you seen Sunak’s ears? They’re weird. And he’s short. Plus for someone so rich why can’t he find trousers long enough for his legs? He looks as if he’s wearing someone else’s school uniform....
I can't speak to the sexiness or otherwise, but the short trouser legs seem to be an Asian style. Watch Korean dramas and you'll see exactly the same thing - and the Koreans are certainly fashion conscious.
It looks daft and ill-dressed. Don’t care what the Koreans think. Being fashion conscious and being well-dressed are not the same thing at all. Very often far apart, in fact.
Dom's "no comms fuckups" command centre, working a treat...
What is this obsession with finding loopholes. The whole point of the policy is to reduce the number of times you meet other people. How hard is that to understand?
Well the media still can't get the basic facts about cases and deaths right after 6 months....
Without a detailed press release detailing exactly what to write, writing a story would involve
- finding the hidden, secret information - adding some of those terrible number things to other number things. They didn't go into journalism to understand science. That is for the geeks - like that stupid guy on the science desk. - they might even have to multiply two of the number things.
To give a simple example of not following the facts
- There is a problem with people providing wrong phone numbers when apply for/getting testing - When filling out online forms, it is standard when important, these days, to check the phone numbers. This is done by sending a text with a code to mobiles, or an automated call to non-text-message numbers (land lines mostly). - This kind of verification is available of the shelf - you buy it as a service from one of several companies. Software that plugs into the software you are writing. - verification was in the original specification for the testing setup - both at the sites and online. - It was removed, and so not implemented, from the specification - Why?
It's genuinely odd that number verification isn't a standard part of the test enrolment. Twilio charge no more than 5c per verification on top of sending an SMS, and I've no doubt that their systems can easily handle the job.
Have to say this is the first time in a while my wife and I are starting to feel isolated from everyone. Our out if town friends are now not having people over and less willing to come to London. There's some we haven't seen for over 6 months except over zoom and it's really started to become quite sad.
I'm seriously wondering how this all ends and if the government will ever decide that life goes on if the vaccines prove ineffective. I don't think Boris has it within him to order everyone go back to normal and live with the consequences of it. To me that means life in the UK is going to be shit for years and shows how dependent we are on a vaccine.
The problem is it seems the majority back lockdown and enforcement
The majority are wrong. A relative of mine commited suicide earlier today, he lived alone and I have no doubt had mental health issues, however, his situation had been made many times worse by the virus measures. I'm not posting this to elicit sympathy, I didn't know him very well, but lockdown is not consequence free as some seem to believe. The spectre of long term unemployment and everything that comes with hangs over the nation and no one is even talking about it.
I am sorry for your loss.
There has been a huge rise in mental health problems since the pandemic began. I'm writing a research paper on this. It is a very serious issue and I would like to see the government do more to ameliorate what is happening, both in terms of getting support to those who already had mental health problems but whose treatment has been disrupted and in terms of many more people suffering from mental health problems. I know there has been some investment, e.g. in digital mental health approaches, but more is needed.
Since the initial lockdown has been relaxed, the proportion reporting mental health problems has remained high. There has been some slight reduction in the numbers, but rates remain well above normal. Countries with differing levels of lockdown show increased mental health problems. That suggests that the rise in mental health problems is not simply a consequence of lockdown: the rise is a consequence of the pandemic more generally, including but not only the concomitant lockdown. I don't think we fully understand the details here and there are probably multiple factors at play, including loss of social contact, fear of disease, financial and employment difficulties, and general disruption.
The best solution is to control and stop the pandemic. If only it were that simple! Fewer restrictions but more cases may not help the population's mental health levels. More lockdown to curb the spread of infections may be the better approach here. Or it may not. I don't think we know quite where the different costs lie: consequences of the lockdown and consequences of the pandemic are difficult to tease apart.
FFS....head, desk, thud, thud...it is repeating exactly the same mistake as emptying hospitals out.
Bloody 3rd rate management of a 3rd rate poly.
That's what I thought.
We should close down all the former polys, I mean would anyone really miss them?
University should be solely for the academically gifted.
I sympathise, but there are over 2 million at university at any given time. Maybe the academically gifted are half a million of those. What are you going to do with the remaining 1.5 million I wonder? Not enough jobs to go round, especially at the moment.
I know - open up the former polys as new polys!
Give them apprenticeships, level 5 higher apprentices earn more over their lifetime than all graduates on average except those who attended Oxbridge and Russell Group universities
A pedant would tell you that the University of Cambridge and the dump are members of the Russell Group, so your comment 'Oxbridge and Russell Group universities' is a horrendous tautology.
Though Oxbridge graduates earn slighly more, £1.79 million over a lifetime to £1.6 million for graduates of other Russell Group universities.
A few very highly paid jobs like commercial barristers for example are effectively restricted to Oxbridge graduates
One day you will drowned in your own spurious statistics!
Is that all they earn? Should have gone to Bradford!
Have to say this is the first time in a while my wife and I are starting to feel isolated from everyone. Our out if town friends are now not having people over and less willing to come to London. There's some we haven't seen for over 6 months except over zoom and it's really started to become quite sad.
I'm seriously wondering how this all ends and if the government will ever decide that life goes on if the vaccines prove ineffective. I don't think Boris has it within him to order everyone go back to normal and live with the consequences of it. To me that means life in the UK is going to be shit for years and shows how dependent we are on a vaccine.
The problem is it seems the majority back lockdown and enforcement
The majority are wrong. A relative of mine commited suicide earlier today, he lived alone and I have no doubt had mental health issues, however, his situation had been made many times worse by the virus measures. I'm not posting this to elicit sympathy, I didn't know him very well, but lockdown is not consequence free as some seem to believe. The spectre of long term unemployment and everything that comes with hangs over the nation and no one is even talking about it.
I am sorry for your loss.
There has been a huge rise in mental health problems since the pandemic began. I'm writing a research paper on this. It is a very serious issue and I would like to see the government do more to ameliorate what is happening, both in terms of getting support to those who already had mental health problems but whose treatment has been disrupted and in terms of many more people suffering from mental health problems. I know there has been some investment, e.g. in digital mental health approaches, but more is needed.
Since the initial lockdown has been relaxed, the proportion reporting mental health problems has remained high. There has been some slight reduction in the numbers, but rates remain well above normal. Countries with differing levels of lockdown show increased mental health problems. That suggests that the rise in mental health problems is not simply a consequence of lockdown: the rise is a consequence of the pandemic more generally, including but not only the concomitant lockdown. I don't think we fully understand the details here and there are probably multiple factors at play, including loss of social contact, fear of disease, financial and employment difficulties, and general disruption.
The best solution is to control and stop the pandemic. If only it were that simple! Fewer restrictions but more cases may not help the population's mental health levels. More lockdown to curb the spread of infections may be the better approach here. Or it may not. I don't think we know quite where the different costs lie: consequences of the lockdown and consequences of the pandemic are difficult to tease apart.
One of the other issues is that people with existing mental health conditions have been abandoned with existing support services closed. See, for instance, this - https://www.ocduk.org/tag/david-veale/ - from Professor Veale in relation to OCD, a condition I know from personal experience is extremely distressing to those suffering from it and frightening to those around the sufferer.
I cannot begin to imagine how hard the last six months have been for sufferers and their families with no end in sight. And the fatality rate - ie suicides - for those with it if they do not get help is high.
Comments
GA is Trump 50.7% to Biden 48.5% vote share, which they simulate as a 0.64 probability that Trump wins that state.
These new rules. The police who are supposed to enforce it don't know. Government ministers don't know. The PM not only doesn't know them but guesses and gets them reversed. Even if you read them correctly there are so many gaping holes and contradictions. You really need to stop dancing on that pinhead trying to defend them.
After a recession there will always be a deficit that needs to be put right and it may take years to do so. Once it has been you should be ever vigilant and prepared for the next one. There was no way of knowing that a recession would hit in 2007, that is true, but what was knowable (unless you were the hubristic Brown and Balls) was that a recession would come.
By 2001 the last recession was in 1993, it was due already by 2001. What is remarkable is not that a recession happened in 2007 but that it took 14 years from 1993 to 2007 for one to happen, that is an unusually long cycle.
Given there was no budget deficit by 2000, smashing the deficit out from 2001 onwards until 2007 was utterly reckless and irresponsible.
If it is illegal to meet in a park but legal in a beer garden that would be odd, but that isn't what you said. You objected to it being illegal at home or indoors in the pub but not in the beer garden. That is an edge case. Parks would I think be subject to the same restrictions as the beer garden.
We know whether we are in recession or not. If we are not, that is the growth time so act appropriately, pay reduce the deficit from the last one and get prepared for the next one. We knew we were not in recession in 2001-2007 at the time, it did not take hindsight to know that.
1) it isn’t a “loophole” in the sense of a slightly contrived situation only invented to suggest confusion in guidance intended to be simple and easily understood.
2) this is not simply guidance, it is THE LAW. Officially enforceable by significant levels of fines and potential criminal records.
Do you have the list of exceptions? Are parks not on the list?
It looks daft and ill-dressed. Don’t care what the Koreans think. Being fashion conscious and being well-dressed are not the same thing at all. Very often far apart, in fact.
There has been a huge rise in mental health problems since the pandemic began. I'm writing a research paper on this. It is a very serious issue and I would like to see the government do more to ameliorate what is happening, both in terms of getting support to those who already had mental health problems but whose treatment has been disrupted and in terms of many more people suffering from mental health problems. I know there has been some investment, e.g. in digital mental health approaches, but more is needed.
Since the initial lockdown has been relaxed, the proportion reporting mental health problems has remained high. There has been some slight reduction in the numbers, but rates remain well above normal. Countries with differing levels of lockdown show increased mental health problems. That suggests that the rise in mental health problems is not simply a consequence of lockdown: the rise is a consequence of the pandemic more generally, including but not only the concomitant lockdown. I don't think we fully understand the details here and there are probably multiple factors at play, including loss of social contact, fear of disease, financial and employment difficulties, and general disruption.
The best solution is to control and stop the pandemic. If only it were that simple! Fewer restrictions but more cases may not help the population's mental health levels. More lockdown to curb the spread of infections may be the better approach here. Or it may not. I don't think we know quite where the different costs lie: consequences of the lockdown and consequences of the pandemic are difficult to tease apart.
up from 437 a week before
up from 292 the week before that
I cannot begin to imagine how hard the last six months have been for sufferers and their families with no end in sight. And the fatality rate - ie suicides - for those with it if they do not get help is high.
There is so much hidden suffering around.
I backed them with a £1 free bet at 26 to be top 3. Think I may've tipped that, but can't remember.
Trying to find the balance of measures is very difficult (not aided by those who stray either into complacency or panic).