Anyway, next year in March and April the government wants to send lots of strangers to peoples’ doors as part of the census. I know because a family member was asked if they would like to do this job.
Yes, really. In the middle of a pandemic, halfway through a vaccination programme (if all goes well) we are meant to open our doors to strangers and those working on this are supposed to put themselves at risk.
WTAF?!
They can knock on the door and then step back 8-10 feet before it is opened, if they need to do it in person as will be the case to a degree. Among other precautions I am sure they can take.
Censuses are important so the risk ratio must reflect that, and the difficulties not insurmountable. This is exactly the kind of unreasonable criticism that undermines the valid criticism elsewhere on procurement and so on. What criticism might afford to the idea is not in 'WTAF' territory.
Spur of the moment decision is up there with the testing my eye sight...you know wasn't organized well in advance at all, booking a venue, security, inviting guests, etc.
Chinese diplomats seem to be fond of the North Korean style of punchy rhetoric and overt threats, made worse because they are much more able to back it up.
Well, point one, they have come to their senses (see the mistake/not mistake polling), point two this is one of those I've jumped off a hundred storey building, I've fallen ninety storeys without issue sort of situations, and point three you are simply losing when you stop making it about how well your project is going and start making it all about the attitude of your opponents to how well your project is going.
The only poll that matters is elections and we had one not twelve months ago. It was decisive and went the way I wanted not you.
The way you wanted because you have so little understanding of the consequences of any of the things you want.
I voted tory btw.
Yeah, yeah - for five years now we've been debating Brexit and we keep getting told that we don't understand it and it will be a disaster. But its been voted for again and again despite the threats.
Its time to pull back the curtain and get on with it. If you're right and its a disaster there is another election in four years time and Sir Keir Starmer can pledge to change course. If its not then you can eat your words.
I appreciate your vote but that doesn't change what the manifesto promised and I still want it to be honoured.
Bancel imagines that the Moderna vaccine, given its high efficacy against both mild and severe disease, will have the most impact if given to people at the greatest risk from SARS-CoV-2. “Give it to healthcare workers, give it to the elderly, give it to people with diabetes, overweight, heart disease,” he says. “A 25 year old healthy man? Give him another vaccine.”
Yes, that sounds fine. We should be running two vaccine programmes simultaneously, one with the Pfizer vaccine for those mentioned run during the week and one for working age people with the AZ vaccine run on weekends from school halls and other non-specialised venues. We could vaccinate 2-3m of each group per week for a total of 5-6m per week.
If the AZ vaccine has got very high efficacy in the young then that's who should get it, but given we're going to start taking delivery of it in the next few days it means we should run a specific programme for under 55s. Keeping it in the fridge and waiting for the Pfizer vaccine to run out doesn't make any sense.
I agree with all of that except the weekend element.
Surely we can and should run both vaccine programmes simultaneously. No reason on a Monday for instance we can't be vaccinating people using both the Pfizer vaccine and the AZ vaccine. Especially if the vaccines are being distributed through different channels.
Distribution should be going out seven days a week for both programmes. As fast as it gets manufactured we should be distributing it as fast as possible.
It's more due to a staffing issue and working age people needing to be able to go and get jabbed and suitable venues to distribute the AZ vaccine, using school halls on the weekend is very convenient as they have all of the necessary infrastructure for vaccinations (at least the AZ one) because kids already get vaccinated at school for other diseases.
Additionally using healthcare services for vaccinations all 7 days during the week poses significant capacity issues for everything else people need to see medical staff for.
The comment is fair, but the attached picture... Trumpian. And pinning the Tweet, inflammatory.
I know about the row. It absolutely should get the twitter fake news tag at the very least, if that is the game we now play in regards politicians putting out dangerous false or misleading info.
And Rob Ford similarly doesn't reflect on the polling on those who think Brexit a mistake - currently around 50%, along with a large slice of don't knows. I would guess it's at least possible that a slug of economic discomfort might have some impact on the latter category.
It is possible to believe Brexit is a mistake and that it should be carried out. For some, democracy trumps economics.
But if the outcome of implementing a democratically made decision turned out to be very different to the expectations that people had when making the decision, would that not be grounds for reconsidering that decision? Must all such decisions be implemented, no matter how terrible and unanticipated the consequences of doing so?
We had a general election not less than a year ago which was seen as a 'second reconsideration'.
Trump performed more Airstrikes in 3 years than Obama did over 8.
This pernicious myth that he de-escalated American intervention abroad is parroted with zero thought or research on here.
True. Obama was not a hawk by any stretch. With Trump I think there is genuine relief that a guy so clearly unstable and devoid of a moral core did not start WW3. And since "success = performance - expectations" this can manifest as praise. But, gosh, low bar.
And Rob Ford similarly doesn't reflect on the polling on those who think Brexit a mistake - currently around 50%, along with a large slice of don't knows. I would guess it's at least possible that a slug of economic discomfort might have some impact on the latter category.
It is possible to believe Brexit is a mistake and that it should be carried out. For some, democracy trumps economics.
A lot of people may now think it a mistake but it's already happened of course, myself included, and it's not immediately apparent that immediate reversal would be a good thing and it's not on the cards anyway for at the very least several years and likely beyond. So the 'was it a mistake' question is good to know but it's unclear how that will transfer to a desire for specific reactions eg closer alignment etc. Unless you have another GE for a reconsideration of the response to Brexit like as slackbladder notes we essentially had one around reconsidering Brexit, options are limited.
@Philip_Thompson seems to be suggesting that these "middlemen" were making our PPE but they weren't, were they? They were simply acting as middlemen as the name suggests.
They should certainly have been able to make a profit if they created avenues to PPE that we would otherwise not have had access to, but not millions of pounds of profit. That's just disaster capitalism.
Defending such behaviour is beyond the pale.
Why not millions of pounds of profit?
What percentage of trade being a profit is OK to you? Hypothetically someone invests in creating a plant that manufacturers PPE and gets a contract for say over £100mn with 98% going to total costs and a 2% margin then is that acceptable or unacceptable in your eyes?
WHO are you talking about? We're talking about middlemen, not about people investing in factories. Which is it?
We are not talking about middlemen primarily.
We have gone from 99% imported to 30% imported. That is a dramatic transformation.
As for those engaged in the import business, that has costs too of course it does. And when we were 99% imported of course we needed to import some.
Foxy is criticising middlemen. Not factory owners in the UK. You've completely moved the goalposts.
No I've not as the transformation that has happened in the last few months has been going from 99% imported (pre existing circumstances) which will inevitably involve what you term "middle men" to 30% imported.
How do you propose cutting out middle men and getting the goods from China to the UK? Teleportation spells? Magic portals? Wishful thinking?
If said "middlemen" provided a freight forwarding or logistics service then they could have been paid a nominal sum to cover their costs. War profiteering is wrong. Disaster profiteering is wrong. It's really as simple as that.
I wonder how much was profit and how much went in 'inducements'.
It might be that the government knew what it would take to get hold of the goods but weren't prepared to do it themselves. Plausible deniability and all that.
It didn't help that legitimate British companies had their production lines commandeered by the Chinese government.
And the French requisitioned goods too.
If inducements were the price needed to get a hold of the goods and we couldn't get them without paying that price then what alternative was there exactly?
I see a lot of whinging, not so many productive alternatives.
I don't disagree. We could have done everything properly and had no PPE, which would have been much worse.
Those arguing for a bigger stockpiles are forgetting that there was even a furore over the re-certification of old stock. We'd have to have had an active stockpile where stuff was thrown out regularly.
No, we just needed the stockpile to be properly managed, so the shorter dated stuff is issued regularly, and replenished with long dated stock. Basic supplies management rally.
@Philip_Thompson seems to be suggesting that these "middlemen" were making our PPE but they weren't, were they? They were simply acting as middlemen as the name suggests.
They should certainly have been able to make a profit if they created avenues to PPE that we would otherwise not have had access to, but not millions of pounds of profit. That's just disaster capitalism.
Defending such behaviour is beyond the pale.
Why not millions of pounds of profit?
What percentage of trade being a profit is OK to you? Hypothetically someone invests in creating a plant that manufacturers PPE and gets a contract for say over £100mn with 98% going to total costs and a 2% margin then is that acceptable or unacceptable in your eyes?
Except that isn't even close to what's being objected to. Which is no bid contracts for middlemen, effectively backed with the credit of the UK government, and margins around 25%.
If those middlemen have been able to supply goods at the price quoted then job done. Why didn't others go in quoting 25% less if it was so easy?
Which takes us back to the business of preferential access.
And also to the point that you don't want anyone to look into any of this.
@Philip has no idea of the corruption which almost inevitably accompanies the use of “intermediaries” or “introducers”. Plus he is confused between an importer who provides a useful service to the provider and buyer and someone who doesn’t but simply claims a large fee for doing nothing. There is also the confusion between a profit margin earned by the manufacturer of goods which are in short supply and a “fee” paid to an introducer which is not the same thing at all.
Scrutiny is essential but is something which no-one in this government (or their cheerleaders and fans) seem to want.
Corruption exists in other countries, yes I get that. Your point being?
If the only way of getting a hold of requisitioned goods is to pay a fee to someone holding them then do you pay the fee or let doctors and nurses die from a lack of PPE?
I have little doubt that some of those who imported the goods paid a bribe to those holding goods to sell it to them so they could sell it to the NHS. Those who did that have provided a necessary service in securing the goods. Simply wishing away the fact that other nations requisitioned everything doesn't make it go away.
Maybe those in China or elsewhere who received the bribes or inducements to sell to us should be investigated and prosecuted - by the Chinese. Paying it shouldn't be condemned it was a needed part of business under the circumstances.
I know you choose to ignore this but if people in Britain pay bribes or cause bribes to be paid abroad, they commit a criminal offence. See the Bribery Act.
Still, silly me - we have a government that thinks laws don’t matter, that breaking the law in a “specific and limited” way is fine.
So how “limited” and “specific” do you think such law-breaking will remain?
It depends, how long will we be in a state of national emergency?
During an emergency breaking a few eggs may be necessary. Yes facilitation payments abroad is a bribe and thus if someone pays them to release PPE during a pandemic that we would otherwise go without then is prosecuting that in the public interest? The DPP has always had a right under public interest determinations to turn a blind eye to breaches of the law that serve the public interest.
And Rob Ford similarly doesn't reflect on the polling on those who think Brexit a mistake - currently around 50%, along with a large slice of don't knows. I would guess it's at least possible that a slug of economic discomfort might have some impact on the latter category.
It is possible to believe Brexit is a mistake and that it should be carried out. For some, democracy trumps economics.
But if the outcome of implementing a democratically made decision turned out to be very different to the expectations that people had when making the decision, would that not be grounds for reconsidering that decision? Must all such decisions be implemented, no matter how terrible and unanticipated the consequences of doing so?
Mm. We appear to have democratically elected a Conservative government which has pursued policies which are anything but.
Politically it seemed widely supported as people wanted firebreaks in other areas, but it should not have been seen as ruling out future repetitions or similarly harsh measures, which were always a possibility.
The pandemic has tested government politicians immensely and some things could not be mitigated and others will have been mitigated incorrectly but understandably given what was known at the time so we cannot be too harsh on some issues, but many politicians have not been great at looking ahead at possibilities.
We really need a Commissar to determine what constitutes a substantial meal.
I suggest Nicholas Soames.
NOT Jacob Rees-Mogg.
No you surely want someone who doesn't eat very much and considers a packet of crisps as a full meal. We're actually just figuring out the logistics of this, not clear to us whether you can keep ordering drinks as long as you have some food on your plate or if you need to order a full meal with every drink. We're hoping for the former.
@Philip_Thompson seems to be suggesting that these "middlemen" were making our PPE but they weren't, were they? They were simply acting as middlemen as the name suggests.
They should certainly have been able to make a profit if they created avenues to PPE that we would otherwise not have had access to, but not millions of pounds of profit. That's just disaster capitalism.
Defending such behaviour is beyond the pale.
Why not millions of pounds of profit?
What percentage of trade being a profit is OK to you? Hypothetically someone invests in creating a plant that manufacturers PPE and gets a contract for say over £100mn with 98% going to total costs and a 2% margin then is that acceptable or unacceptable in your eyes?
WHO are you talking about? We're talking about middlemen, not about people investing in factories. Which is it?
We are not talking about middlemen primarily.
We have gone from 99% imported to 30% imported. That is a dramatic transformation.
As for those engaged in the import business, that has costs too of course it does. And when we were 99% imported of course we needed to import some.
Foxy is criticising middlemen. Not factory owners in the UK. You've completely moved the goalposts.
No I've not as the transformation that has happened in the last few months has been going from 99% imported (pre existing circumstances) which will inevitably involve what you term "middle men" to 30% imported.
How do you propose cutting out middle men and getting the goods from China to the UK? Teleportation spells? Magic portals? Wishful thinking?
If said "middlemen" provided a freight forwarding or logistics service then they could have been paid a nominal sum to cover their costs. War profiteering is wrong. Disaster profiteering is wrong. It's really as simple as that.
I wonder how much was profit and how much went in 'inducements'.
It might be that the government knew what it would take to get hold of the goods but weren't prepared to do it themselves. Plausible deniability and all that.
It didn't help that legitimate British companies had their production lines commandeered by the Chinese government.
And the French requisitioned goods too.
If inducements were the price needed to get a hold of the goods and we couldn't get them without paying that price then what alternative was there exactly?
I see a lot of whinging, not so many productive alternatives.
I don't disagree. We could have done everything properly and had no PPE, which would have been much worse.
Those arguing for a bigger stockpiles are forgetting that there was even a furore over the re-certification of old stock. We'd have to have had an active stockpile where stuff was thrown out regularly.
No, we just needed the stockpile to be properly managed, so the shorter dated stuff is issued regularly, and replenished with long dated stock. Basic supplies management rally.
How long of a stockpile do you think there should be? Weeks? Months? Years?
And Rob Ford similarly doesn't reflect on the polling on those who think Brexit a mistake - currently around 50%, along with a large slice of don't knows. I would guess it's at least possible that a slug of economic discomfort might have some impact on the latter category.
It is possible to believe Brexit is a mistake and that it should be carried out. For some, democracy trumps economics.
But if the outcome of implementing a democratically made decision turned out to be very different to the expectations that people had when making the decision, would that not be grounds for reconsidering that decision? Must all such decisions be implemented, no matter how terrible and unanticipated the consequences of doing so?
Mm. We appear to have democratically elected a Conservative government which has pursued policies which are anything but.
It's policies seem broadly in line with what they said they would do, with adjustments or reversals due to Covid. Is the objection that they don't match their name then? As many a party has that issue.
Politically it seemed widely supported as people wanted firebreaks in other areas, but it should not have been seen as ruling out future repetitions or similarly harsh measures, which were always a possibility.
The pandemic has tested government politicians immensely and some things could not be mitigated and others will have been mitigated incorrectly but understandably given what was known at the time so we cannot be too harsh on some issues, but many politicians have not been great at looking ahead at possibilities.
Of course it is / was supported as it sounded like an easy option. 2 weeks of restrictions, extra week for kids over half term. Bish bash bosh covid sorted. Except it is a fantasy based on massively flawed modelling.
Its like saying only eat 500 calories a day for 2 weeks and you will have a 6 pack and you can go back to eating what you like, or you can grind for months living on 2000 calories and working out for 6 days a week and you with see slow progress towards it.
Nobody really wants to hear it is the later that you have to do.
My wife received her supply of Vitamin D from Scottish Government today. Great service all handled with little fuss, one text and delivered.
That's good to hear. Vitamin D supplements can be tricky, in the sense that they only provide the precursors for Vitamin D (as it's a hormone I think) so your body is meant to produce it. I've never tried them, but I am very interested in 'super mushrooms' as a source of vitamin D - these are mushrooms that have been stored in UV light. https://www.sainsburys.co.uk/gol-ui/product/mushrooms/sainsburys-white-super-mushrooms-300g
If your wife is a mushroom fan, definitely worth a try, probably more absorbable than supplements, and just a bit pricier than normal mushrooms.
And Rob Ford similarly doesn't reflect on the polling on those who think Brexit a mistake - currently around 50%, along with a large slice of don't knows. I would guess it's at least possible that a slug of economic discomfort might have some impact on the latter category.
It is possible to believe Brexit is a mistake and that it should be carried out. For some, democracy trumps economics.
But if the outcome of implementing a democratically made decision turned out to be very different to the expectations that people had when making the decision, would that not be grounds for reconsidering that decision? Must all such decisions be implemented, no matter how terrible and unanticipated the consequences of doing so?
Mm. We appear to have democratically elected a Conservative government which has pursued policies which are anything but.
It's policies seem broadly in line with what they said they would do, with adjustments or reversals due to Covid. Is the objection that they don't match their name then? As many a party has that issue.
Perhaps yes. Many backbenchers seem not to have noticed their manifesto was far removed from what has been broadly understood to be "Conservative" for the past 40 years. Hence the present unrest and discontent.
And Rob Ford similarly doesn't reflect on the polling on those who think Brexit a mistake - currently around 50%, along with a large slice of don't knows. I would guess it's at least possible that a slug of economic discomfort might have some impact on the latter category.
It is possible to believe Brexit is a mistake and that it should be carried out. For some, democracy trumps economics.
Many of us Remoaners would accept that without demur.
Do Leavers also accept that a 52/48 win did not justify leaving without regard to the views of those who wished to remain? Personally I would have thought that even if the vote had gone 90/10 to Leave, the Government would still have had an obligation to negotiate the best possible deal on leaving. It is after all obliged to do its best for the whole country, and not just its supporters.
Anyway it's an ill wind that brings no good. I see that the closer we get to the reality of Brexit, the less popular it becomes. No Deal would certainly be worse than a Negotiated Deal in the short term, but you never know. In the long run if we all learned that voting for Stupid has bad consequences it may serve us all better in future.
You can't be half pregnant sometimes, how do you want to reflect the views of those who wished to remain considering both leavers and remainers said that leaving would mean leaving the Single Market? That is the one thing that united Cameron, Osborne, Clegg, Corbyn, Gove and Johnson during the referendum, every single one of them said that.
The government is seeking a deal but we can't guarantee one. If the EU won't compromise we have to be willing to countenance no deal, or we can't negotiate.
Politically it seemed widely supported as people wanted firebreaks in other areas, but it should not have been seen as ruling out future repetitions or similarly harsh measures, which were always a possibility.
The pandemic has tested government politicians immensely and some things could not be mitigated and others will have been mitigated incorrectly but understandably given what was known at the time so we cannot be too harsh on some issues, but many politicians have not been great at looking ahead at possibilities.
Of course it is / was supported as it sounded like an easy option. 2 weeks of restrictions, extra week for kids over half term. Bish bash bosh covid sorted. Except it is a fantasy based on massively flawed modelling.
I cannot say I have reviewed the modelling but I can believe that is the case, but my point was really that it is understandable if the wrong decision is made particularly when politically and publicly it is supported, but that the error is compounded by declaring it would be that and no more and that is far less excusable as an error since it should be abundantly clear you shouldn't rule things out, or appear to rule things out.
Whilst it is mealy mouthed and unhelpful at times, even Boris has usually been like 'We really hope not to do X' which might well give people the wrong impression, but is still less of a surprise if you then have to do X.
@Philip_Thompson seems to be suggesting that these "middlemen" were making our PPE but they weren't, were they? They were simply acting as middlemen as the name suggests.
They should certainly have been able to make a profit if they created avenues to PPE that we would otherwise not have had access to, but not millions of pounds of profit. That's just disaster capitalism.
Defending such behaviour is beyond the pale.
Why not millions of pounds of profit?
What percentage of trade being a profit is OK to you? Hypothetically someone invests in creating a plant that manufacturers PPE and gets a contract for say over £100mn with 98% going to total costs and a 2% margin then is that acceptable or unacceptable in your eyes?
Except that isn't even close to what's being objected to. Which is no bid contracts for middlemen, effectively backed with the credit of the UK government, and margins around 25%.
If those middlemen have been able to supply goods at the price quoted then job done. Why didn't others go in quoting 25% less if it was so easy?
Which takes us back to the business of preferential access.
And also to the point that you don't want anyone to look into any of this.
@Philip has no idea of the corruption which almost inevitably accompanies the use of “intermediaries” or “introducers”. Plus he is confused between an importer who provides a useful service to the provider and buyer and someone who doesn’t but simply claims a large fee for doing nothing. There is also the confusion between a profit margin earned by the manufacturer of goods which are in short supply and a “fee” paid to an introducer which is not the same thing at all.
Scrutiny is essential but is something which no-one in this government (or their cheerleaders and fans) seem to want.
Corruption exists in other countries, yes I get that. Your point being?
If the only way of getting a hold of requisitioned goods is to pay a fee to someone holding them then do you pay the fee or let doctors and nurses die from a lack of PPE?
I have little doubt that some of those who imported the goods paid a bribe to those holding goods to sell it to them so they could sell it to the NHS. Those who did that have provided a necessary service in securing the goods. Simply wishing away the fact that other nations requisitioned everything doesn't make it go away.
Maybe those in China or elsewhere who received the bribes or inducements to sell to us should be investigated and prosecuted - by the Chinese. Paying it shouldn't be condemned it was a needed part of business under the circumstances.
I know you choose to ignore this but if people in Britain pay bribes or cause bribes to be paid abroad, they commit a criminal offence. See the Bribery Act.
Still, silly me - we have a government that thinks laws don’t matter, that breaking the law in a “specific and limited” way is fine.
So how “limited” and “specific” do you think such law-breaking will remain?
It depends, how long will we be in a state of national emergency?
During an emergency breaking a few eggs may be necessary. Yes facilitation payments abroad is a bribe and thus if someone pays them to release PPE during a pandemic that we would otherwise go without then is prosecuting that in the public interest? The DPP has always had a right under public interest determinations to turn a blind eye to breaches of the law that serve the public interest.
Indeed. If following the letter of every regulation during an emergency meant that not enough PPE was obtained and people died as a result, would the legal fetishists consider that a moral triumph? I doubt most people would.
And Rob Ford similarly doesn't reflect on the polling on those who think Brexit a mistake - currently around 50%, along with a large slice of don't knows. I would guess it's at least possible that a slug of economic discomfort might have some impact on the latter category.
It is possible to believe Brexit is a mistake and that it should be carried out. For some, democracy trumps economics.
Many of us Remoaners would accept that without demur.
Do Leavers also accept that a 52/48 win did not justify leaving without regard to the views of those who wished to remain? Personally I would have thought that even if the vote had gone 90/10 to Leave, the Government would still have had an obligation to negotiate the best possible deal on leaving. It is after all obliged to do its best for the whole country, and not just its supporters.
Anyway it's an ill wind that brings no good. I see that the closer we get to the reality of Brexit, the less popular it becomes. No Deal would certainly be worse than a Negotiated Deal in the short term, but you never know. In the long run if we all learned that voting for Stupid has bad consequences it may serve us all better in future.
You can't be half pregnant sometimes, how do you want to reflect the views of those who wished to remain considering both leavers and remainers said that leaving would mean leaving the Single Market? That is the one thing that united Cameron, Osborne, Clegg, Corbyn, Gove and Johnson during the referendum, every single one of them said that.
The government is seeking a deal but we can't guarantee one. If the EU won't compromise we have to be willing to countenance no deal, or we can't negotiate.
@Peter_the_Punter , the saying 'It's an ill wind that blows nobody any good' means just about the opposite of your intended meaning, just FYI.
@Philip_Thompson seems to be suggesting that these "middlemen" were making our PPE but they weren't, were they? They were simply acting as middlemen as the name suggests.
They should certainly have been able to make a profit if they created avenues to PPE that we would otherwise not have had access to, but not millions of pounds of profit. That's just disaster capitalism.
Defending such behaviour is beyond the pale.
Why not millions of pounds of profit?
What percentage of trade being a profit is OK to you? Hypothetically someone invests in creating a plant that manufacturers PPE and gets a contract for say over £100mn with 98% going to total costs and a 2% margin then is that acceptable or unacceptable in your eyes?
WHO are you talking about? We're talking about middlemen, not about people investing in factories. Which is it?
We are not talking about middlemen primarily.
We have gone from 99% imported to 30% imported. That is a dramatic transformation.
As for those engaged in the import business, that has costs too of course it does. And when we were 99% imported of course we needed to import some.
Foxy is criticising middlemen. Not factory owners in the UK. You've completely moved the goalposts.
No I've not as the transformation that has happened in the last few months has been going from 99% imported (pre existing circumstances) which will inevitably involve what you term "middle men" to 30% imported.
How do you propose cutting out middle men and getting the goods from China to the UK? Teleportation spells? Magic portals? Wishful thinking?
If said "middlemen" provided a freight forwarding or logistics service then they could have been paid a nominal sum to cover their costs. War profiteering is wrong. Disaster profiteering is wrong. It's really as simple as that.
I wonder how much was profit and how much went in 'inducements'.
It might be that the government knew what it would take to get hold of the goods but weren't prepared to do it themselves. Plausible deniability and all that.
It didn't help that legitimate British companies had their production lines commandeered by the Chinese government.
And the French requisitioned goods too.
If inducements were the price needed to get a hold of the goods and we couldn't get them without paying that price then what alternative was there exactly?
I see a lot of whinging, not so many productive alternatives.
I don't disagree. We could have done everything properly and had no PPE, which would have been much worse.
Those arguing for a bigger stockpiles are forgetting that there was even a furore over the re-certification of old stock. We'd have to have had an active stockpile where stuff was thrown out regularly.
No, we just needed the stockpile to be properly managed, so the shorter dated stuff is issued regularly, and replenished with long dated stock. Basic supplies management rally.
Is there sufficient turnover of PPE when there isn't a pandemic to be able to maintain enough stocks? How much more are we using now than in the past? If it double the normal rate then we could have stashed a year's supply, ten times the normal rate and it just wouldn't work.
I suspect we might have had a bigger stockpile if the government had anticipated that supplies would be cut off in the way they were. Lessons learned on that front, I hope.
And Rob Ford similarly doesn't reflect on the polling on those who think Brexit a mistake - currently around 50%, along with a large slice of don't knows. I would guess it's at least possible that a slug of economic discomfort might have some impact on the latter category.
It is possible to believe Brexit is a mistake and that it should be carried out. For some, democracy trumps economics.
But if the outcome of implementing a democratically made decision turned out to be very different to the expectations that people had when making the decision, would that not be grounds for reconsidering that decision? Must all such decisions be implemented, no matter how terrible and unanticipated the consequences of doing so?
We had a general election not less than a year ago which was seen as a 'second reconsideration'.
Trump performed more Airstrikes in 3 years than Obama did over 8.
This pernicious myth that he de-escalated American intervention abroad is parroted with zero thought or research on here.
As is the myth that Obama was successful in foreign policy. Some of you need to do your own research.
Trump's airstrikes had a clear aim. Hit hard, negotiate from a position of strength and then get out. Obama's foreign policy interventions were muddled exercises.
And Rob Ford similarly doesn't reflect on the polling on those who think Brexit a mistake - currently around 50%, along with a large slice of don't knows. I would guess it's at least possible that a slug of economic discomfort might have some impact on the latter category.
It is possible to believe Brexit is a mistake and that it should be carried out. For some, democracy trumps economics.
It is of course possible and was the right view, but the only way to Brexit now would be to rejoin first. We have left already, what we are discussing now is the future relationship not Brexit.
Well, point one, they have come to their senses (see the mistake/not mistake polling), point two this is one of those I've jumped off a hundred storey building, I've fallen ninety storeys without issue sort of situations, and point three you are simply losing when you stop making it about how well your project is going and start making it all about the attitude of your opponents to how well your project is going.
The only poll that matters is elections and we had one not twelve months ago. It was decisive and went the way I wanted not you.
The way you wanted because you have so little understanding of the consequences of any of the things you want.
I voted tory btw.
Yeah, yeah - for five years now we've been debating Brexit and we keep getting told that we don't understand it and it will be a disaster. But its been voted for again and again despite the threats.
Its time to pull back the curtain and get on with it. If you're right and its a disaster there is another election in four years time and Sir Keir Starmer can pledge to change course. If its not then you can eat your words.
I appreciate your vote but that doesn't change what the manifesto promised and I still want it to be honoured.
"I appreciate your vote." You aren't Boris fucking Johnson (unless you are, of course), and I increasingly wonder whether you at all times realise that.
Well, point one, they have come to their senses (see the mistake/not mistake polling), point two this is one of those I've jumped off a hundred storey building, I've fallen ninety storeys without issue sort of situations, and point three you are simply losing when you stop making it about how well your project is going and start making it all about the attitude of your opponents to how well your project is going.
The only poll that matters is elections and we had one not twelve months ago. It was decisive and went the way I wanted not you.
The way you wanted because you have so little understanding of the consequences of any of the things you want.
I voted tory btw.
I appreciate your vote but that doesn't change what the manifesto promised and I still want it to be honoured.
Good to see that you for one are insisting that we maintain our spending on overseas aid.
@Philip_Thompson seems to be suggesting that these "middlemen" were making our PPE but they weren't, were they? They were simply acting as middlemen as the name suggests.
They should certainly have been able to make a profit if they created avenues to PPE that we would otherwise not have had access to, but not millions of pounds of profit. That's just disaster capitalism.
Defending such behaviour is beyond the pale.
Why not millions of pounds of profit?
What percentage of trade being a profit is OK to you? Hypothetically someone invests in creating a plant that manufacturers PPE and gets a contract for say over £100mn with 98% going to total costs and a 2% margin then is that acceptable or unacceptable in your eyes?
WHO are you talking about? We're talking about middlemen, not about people investing in factories. Which is it?
We are not talking about middlemen primarily.
We have gone from 99% imported to 30% imported. That is a dramatic transformation.
As for those engaged in the import business, that has costs too of course it does. And when we were 99% imported of course we needed to import some.
Foxy is criticising middlemen. Not factory owners in the UK. You've completely moved the goalposts.
No I've not as the transformation that has happened in the last few months has been going from 99% imported (pre existing circumstances) which will inevitably involve what you term "middle men" to 30% imported.
How do you propose cutting out middle men and getting the goods from China to the UK? Teleportation spells? Magic portals? Wishful thinking?
If said "middlemen" provided a freight forwarding or logistics service then they could have been paid a nominal sum to cover their costs. War profiteering is wrong. Disaster profiteering is wrong. It's really as simple as that.
I wonder how much was profit and how much went in 'inducements'.
It might be that the government knew what it would take to get hold of the goods but weren't prepared to do it themselves. Plausible deniability and all that.
It didn't help that legitimate British companies had their production lines commandeered by the Chinese government.
And the French requisitioned goods too.
If inducements were the price needed to get a hold of the goods and we couldn't get them without paying that price then what alternative was there exactly?
I see a lot of whinging, not so many productive alternatives.
I don't disagree. We could have done everything properly and had no PPE, which would have been much worse.
Those arguing for a bigger stockpiles are forgetting that there was even a furore over the re-certification of old stock. We'd have to have had an active stockpile where stuff was thrown out regularly.
No, we just needed the stockpile to be properly managed, so the shorter dated stuff is issued regularly, and replenished with long dated stock. Basic supplies management rally.
Is there sufficient turnover of PPE when there isn't a pandemic to be able to maintain enough stocks? How much more are we using now than in the past? If it double the normal rate then we could have stashed a year's supply, ten times the normal rate and it just wouldn't work.
I suspect we might have had a bigger stockpile if the government had anticipated that supplies would be cut off in the way they were. Lessons learned on that front, I hope.
At the peak of the pandemic supply jumped by over 50-fold.
Ie in a single week we were consuming an annual supply. In a month we were consuming a four year supply.
If the stockpile was two years supply it would last a fortnight. If it was six months supply it would last 3-4 days.
@Philip_Thompson seems to be suggesting that these "middlemen" were making our PPE but they weren't, were they? They were simply acting as middlemen as the name suggests.
They should certainly have been able to make a profit if they created avenues to PPE that we would otherwise not have had access to, but not millions of pounds of profit. That's just disaster capitalism.
Defending such behaviour is beyond the pale.
Why not millions of pounds of profit?
What percentage of trade being a profit is OK to you? Hypothetically someone invests in creating a plant that manufacturers PPE and gets a contract for say over £100mn with 98% going to total costs and a 2% margin then is that acceptable or unacceptable in your eyes?
Except that isn't even close to what's being objected to. Which is no bid contracts for middlemen, effectively backed with the credit of the UK government, and margins around 25%.
If those middlemen have been able to supply goods at the price quoted then job done. Why didn't others go in quoting 25% less if it was so easy?
Which takes us back to the business of preferential access.
And also to the point that you don't want anyone to look into any of this.
@Philip has no idea of the corruption which almost inevitably accompanies the use of “intermediaries” or “introducers”. Plus he is confused between an importer who provides a useful service to the provider and buyer and someone who doesn’t but simply claims a large fee for doing nothing. There is also the confusion between a profit margin earned by the manufacturer of goods which are in short supply and a “fee” paid to an introducer which is not the same thing at all.
Scrutiny is essential but is something which no-one in this government (or their cheerleaders and fans) seem to want.
Corruption exists in other countries, yes I get that. Your point being?
If the only way of getting a hold of requisitioned goods is to pay a fee to someone holding them then do you pay the fee or let doctors and nurses die from a lack of PPE?
I have little doubt that some of those who imported the goods paid a bribe to those holding goods to sell it to them so they could sell it to the NHS. Those who did that have provided a necessary service in securing the goods. Simply wishing away the fact that other nations requisitioned everything doesn't make it go away.
Maybe those in China or elsewhere who received the bribes or inducements to sell to us should be investigated and prosecuted - by the Chinese. Paying it shouldn't be condemned it was a needed part of business under the circumstances.
I know you choose to ignore this but if people in Britain pay bribes or cause bribes to be paid abroad, they commit a criminal offence. See the Bribery Act.
Still, silly me - we have a government that thinks laws don’t matter, that breaking the law in a “specific and limited” way is fine.
So how “limited” and “specific” do you think such law-breaking will remain?
It depends, how long will we be in a state of national emergency?
During an emergency breaking a few eggs may be necessary. Yes facilitation payments abroad is a bribe and thus if someone pays them to release PPE during a pandemic that we would otherwise go without then is prosecuting that in the public interest? The DPP has always had a right under public interest determinations to turn a blind eye to breaches of the law that serve the public interest.
Indeed. If following the letter of every regulation during an emergency meant that not enough PPE was obtained and people died as a result, would the legal fetishists consider that a moral triumph? I doubt most people would.
I do take the point, and I think some of cyclefree's concerns are presented as more of an issue than they are, but I think the general thrust of them is correct in that you do have to be cautious in these matters, and that while breaking a few eggs may be necessary in an emegency situation (although we generally have emergency provisions for, well, emergencies, so it is not simply no rules in an emergency), it isn't mandatory that we toss the entire basket onto the ground and stomp on them all, as it were.
This far in and even though it is an ongoing situation it is not unreasonable, I think, to take stock of what was decided, how it was decided, how we are still deciding things, and seeing if we can in fact improve things now we have a bit more time to think, and perhaps even fix egregious mistakes.
@Philip_Thompson seems to be suggesting that these "middlemen" were making our PPE but they weren't, were they? They were simply acting as middlemen as the name suggests.
They should certainly have been able to make a profit if they created avenues to PPE that we would otherwise not have had access to, but not millions of pounds of profit. That's just disaster capitalism.
Defending such behaviour is beyond the pale.
Why not millions of pounds of profit?
What percentage of trade being a profit is OK to you? Hypothetically someone invests in creating a plant that manufacturers PPE and gets a contract for say over £100mn with 98% going to total costs and a 2% margin then is that acceptable or unacceptable in your eyes?
WHO are you talking about? We're talking about middlemen, not about people investing in factories. Which is it?
We are not talking about middlemen primarily.
We have gone from 99% imported to 30% imported. That is a dramatic transformation.
As for those engaged in the import business, that has costs too of course it does. And when we were 99% imported of course we needed to import some.
Foxy is criticising middlemen. Not factory owners in the UK. You've completely moved the goalposts.
No I've not as the transformation that has happened in the last few months has been going from 99% imported (pre existing circumstances) which will inevitably involve what you term "middle men" to 30% imported.
How do you propose cutting out middle men and getting the goods from China to the UK? Teleportation spells? Magic portals? Wishful thinking?
If said "middlemen" provided a freight forwarding or logistics service then they could have been paid a nominal sum to cover their costs. War profiteering is wrong. Disaster profiteering is wrong. It's really as simple as that.
I wonder how much was profit and how much went in 'inducements'.
It might be that the government knew what it would take to get hold of the goods but weren't prepared to do it themselves. Plausible deniability and all that.
It didn't help that legitimate British companies had their production lines commandeered by the Chinese government.
And the French requisitioned goods too.
If inducements were the price needed to get a hold of the goods and we couldn't get them without paying that price then what alternative was there exactly?
I see a lot of whinging, not so many productive alternatives.
I don't disagree. We could have done everything properly and had no PPE, which would have been much worse.
Those arguing for a bigger stockpiles are forgetting that there was even a furore over the re-certification of old stock. We'd have to have had an active stockpile where stuff was thrown out regularly.
No, we just needed the stockpile to be properly managed, so the shorter dated stuff is issued regularly, and replenished with long dated stock. Basic supplies management rally.
How long of a stockpile do you think there should be? Weeks? Months? Years?
I would have thought 6 months stock would be about right.
Masks, gowns, gloves, aprons all have long shelf lives and are in routine use, so stock rotation would not result in significant wastage.
Politically it seemed widely supported as people wanted firebreaks in other areas, but it should not have been seen as ruling out future repetitions or similarly harsh measures, which were always a possibility.
The pandemic has tested government politicians immensely and some things could not be mitigated and others will have been mitigated incorrectly but understandably given what was known at the time so we cannot be too harsh on some issues, but many politicians have not been great at looking ahead at possibilities.
Of course it is / was supported as it sounded like an easy option. 2 weeks of restrictions, extra week for kids over half term. Bish bash bosh covid sorted. Except it is a fantasy based on massively flawed modelling.
I cannot say I have reviewed the modelling but I can believe that is the case, but my point was really that it is understandable if the wrong decision is made particularly when politically and publicly it is supported, but that the error is compounded by declaring it would be that and no more and that is far less excusable as an error since it should be abundantly clear you shouldn't rule things out, or appear to rule things out.
Whilst it is mealy mouthed and unhelpful at times, even Boris has usually been like 'We really hope not to do X' which might well give people the wrong impression, but is still less of a surprise if you then have to do X.
Wales compound error was not only declaring this is all we need, but that the whole country could immediately go to effectively to very light restrictions akin to Tier 1 in England. If they had done 2 weeks, then moves to regional tiers and a slowly slowly approach, it might have worked out better. But the problem with that approach is you have to decide on tiers when you still don't know how well you circuit breaker has worked.
Even after a month in England, Witty / Valance were far from 100% how well Englands lockdown had worked.
@Philip_Thompson seems to be suggesting that these "middlemen" were making our PPE but they weren't, were they? They were simply acting as middlemen as the name suggests.
They should certainly have been able to make a profit if they created avenues to PPE that we would otherwise not have had access to, but not millions of pounds of profit. That's just disaster capitalism.
Defending such behaviour is beyond the pale.
Why not millions of pounds of profit?
What percentage of trade being a profit is OK to you? Hypothetically someone invests in creating a plant that manufacturers PPE and gets a contract for say over £100mn with 98% going to total costs and a 2% margin then is that acceptable or unacceptable in your eyes?
WHO are you talking about? We're talking about middlemen, not about people investing in factories. Which is it?
We are not talking about middlemen primarily.
We have gone from 99% imported to 30% imported. That is a dramatic transformation.
As for those engaged in the import business, that has costs too of course it does. And when we were 99% imported of course we needed to import some.
Foxy is criticising middlemen. Not factory owners in the UK. You've completely moved the goalposts.
No I've not as the transformation that has happened in the last few months has been going from 99% imported (pre existing circumstances) which will inevitably involve what you term "middle men" to 30% imported.
How do you propose cutting out middle men and getting the goods from China to the UK? Teleportation spells? Magic portals? Wishful thinking?
If said "middlemen" provided a freight forwarding or logistics service then they could have been paid a nominal sum to cover their costs. War profiteering is wrong. Disaster profiteering is wrong. It's really as simple as that.
I wonder how much was profit and how much went in 'inducements'.
It might be that the government knew what it would take to get hold of the goods but weren't prepared to do it themselves. Plausible deniability and all that.
It didn't help that legitimate British companies had their production lines commandeered by the Chinese government.
And the French requisitioned goods too.
If inducements were the price needed to get a hold of the goods and we couldn't get them without paying that price then what alternative was there exactly?
I see a lot of whinging, not so many productive alternatives.
I don't disagree. We could have done everything properly and had no PPE, which would have been much worse.
Those arguing for a bigger stockpiles are forgetting that there was even a furore over the re-certification of old stock. We'd have to have had an active stockpile where stuff was thrown out regularly.
No, we just needed the stockpile to be properly managed, so the shorter dated stuff is issued regularly, and replenished with long dated stock. Basic supplies management rally.
How long of a stockpile do you think there should be? Weeks? Months? Years?
I would have thought 6 months stock would be about right.
Masks, gowns, gloves, aprons all have long shelf lives and are in routine use, so stock rotation would not result in significant wastage.
6 months sounds about right to me too.
But 6 months normal supply was enough for about 3-4 days consumption during the pandemic. So what then? 6 months supply gets you to about Thursday, what happens after Thursday?
The entire argument of the "just let us decide our own risk" crowd totally fails to take into account that they're asking to decide everyone else's risk as well. And it's an asymmetric risk profile.
The ones wanting to choose for themselves and others to accept the risk are almost invariably the ones with the least risk. But they almost always look at the "risk of me being infected" and gloss over "the risk of me infecting others," and, in a public health scenario with an infectious pandemic: that is the crucial element.
After all, not one person in the UK (with the possible exception of Allison Pearson) has wanted anyone else to be infected, and no-one who has infected someone else has deliberately done so.
Yet over 5 million people have been infected nevertheless in the UK.
Those who did the infecting have indeed, overwhelmingly been okay. To the tune of 96% or so not needing hospitalisation and 99% or so not dying.
Yet 60,000 people who those infectors managed to infect have gone on to die. Given that most of these were in the higher risk categories, it's highly probable that very few of those 60,000 made the choice to face exposure and risk; instead others made the choice for them - and they ended up dying.
Nearly quarter of a million of the people those infectors did infect have been so sick they were hospitalised. A lot of those needing assistance to merely breathe.
At least a third of a million people face long-term consequences with what has been termed "long covid," many of these suffering organ damage.
Too many of those people infected - the third of a million with long covid, the quarter of a million so sick they were hospitalised, and the 60,000+ dead - had not made a decision to face higher risk.
They had that decision made for them.
By people whose own risk was low, and who did not fully think through the cost to others.
Another excellent post from Andy. Very thought-provoking - deserves a similarly thoughtful response to engage with his view (which is so widely held). So I`ll give it a go.
I`ve said before that lockdown skeptics should avoid tangling with the science and stick to principles only. For example, they should say that they don`t hold anyone else responsible for their own health; one`s own health is one`s own responsibility. This is the elephant in the room. It always has been. The opposition should come from philosophy not from scientific illiteracy, deliberate misinterpretation and mischief. Back in March I said here that at his briefings Johnson should have been flanked by a healthcare scientist, an economist and a philosopher - not just solely the former.
This is the bit I`m struggling with. Andy`s post reveals himself as a strong utilitarian. A moral framework that I don`t hold. I believe that good and bad acts come from intentions not consequences. Therefore you cannot apportion blame to someone who passes on a virus without even knowing that they had it themselves. Andy himself points out that no one has deliberately infected another person with Covid as far as we know (unlike what happened in small numbers with HIV). And, of course, an infection is not imprinted with the signature of the person it came from.
I think people who know me in real life would say that I`m as thoughtful and polite and caring and gentle as they come. But I don`t accept responsibility for other people`s health outside of my closest family. Of course I wish no one ill, but it is not my responsibility. I can`t get away from this. Utilitarians are not going to guilt-trip me into thinking otherwise. We need to stop blaming each other for things. This year has been ugly.
The vaccines are great news. But will they get us out? Only partial I think. The virus will still be present. As far as I know, a vaccine will protect that particular person from symptoms but will not prevent that person from spreading it to others. Covid is not, therefore, going away. And, of course, not everyone will agree to be vaccinated. Social-distancing will still be a thing. Covid will still be here. We still have to learn to live with it. Sorry.
This is bleak outlook - though doesn`t match @Black_Rook levels of bleakness. I`m betting that those holding a utilitarian outlook (which lends itself more to totalitarianism than liberalism I think) who are also risk-averse, and probably financially comfortable in themselves, will still have no intention of learning to live with Covid and will selfishly continue to chide, bully and rebuke the rest of us, who just want to live their lives in the ways we choose in a precious liberal society. For me, the selfishness is on the other side.
If you don`t agree, at least give me the courtesy of being honest.
Thank you for a well thought-out reply, and the up-front compliment.
I have no idea whether or not I am a utilitarian; I'm not really up on moral philosophy. I usually see myself as a liberal: everyone should have the right to pilot their own life in whatever way they can.
But the freedom to swing one's fist ends at someone else's face.
I did highlight that no-one has intentionally infected others. But that others have been infected nevertheless - and at a staggering scale. That actions, in a global pandemic, have huge externalities (in economics terms). If I exercise my freedom and, in doing so, knowingly impair the freedoms of many others to live their lives, that's illiberal of me. I'll have taken away all the choices they could have made in future and made them for them.
If I take some actions that could knowingly hurt others, I am at fault. If I refuse a set of actions that exist to protect others, I am at fault. Of course, as The Good Place covers, virtually every action we can take or refrain from taking will have knock-on consequences and we can't prevent all negative outcomes - but we can look at ones where we know the negative outcomes are huge. Normal actions, where the harm theoretically caused is either hugely unlikely, or very limited in scope, or limited in effect - that's all of life, almost. We blunder through as best we can.
This, though, is nowhere near normal life.
The restrictions we did put successfully kicked the can down the road. Not only do we have vaccines that will be going into people's arms within days, we have vastly improved our treatments and the prognosis of people who are ill. We will continue to do so. There is hope. And there are also indications that some vaccines at least will either prevent spread or hugely reduce spread. We're not in a static scenario; the potential outcomes are improving day by day.
The "lockdown sceptics" and those of the Toby Young side that argue the libertarian case do always seem to gloss over the spreading-the-disease onwards aspect. Mary Mallon certainly had her personal freedoms hugely curtailed - but doing so stopped her from taking a load of life choices away from others. Totalitarianism is usually seen as people having choices imposed upon them rather than being able to make them themselves. Surely taking actions that can be reasonably seen to, en masse, take a lot of choices away from others (when killed or disabled by anothers choices, a lot of potential choices evaporate) isn't truly a liberal course of action?
(I'm also not sure that "risk-averse" sums me up. I've been accused of the opposite in the past, with the skydiving and the microlighting, but that could simply be a different category of risk. I'd say I'm risk averse when my risk-taking could affect my family or others; I really don't think "totalitarian" applies to me, but I could be wrong there as well).
Thanks for that. I don`t think were are far off from agreeing with each other. I usually agree with your posts on other things.
You say "If I exercise my freedom and, in doing so, knowingly impair the freedoms of many others to live their lives, that's illiberal of me" and "If I take some actions that could knowingly hurt others, I am at fault" - I couldn`t agree more with both of those statements - I`m a liberal - but note that this, for me, is different when you take out the word "knowingly". That is what my post was about.
I think we are indeed fairly close and the discrepancy is "knowingly." My core point is that in normal day-to-day life, no-one could realistically be held responsible for passing on a cold, or flu, or anything else, unless they could be reasonably expected to know they were doing so.
Given that we know R is relentlessly over 1 for this damn disease unless serious restrictions are imposed, and even that the infectious period includes multiple days before showing symptoms, then - during a known pandemic that we're trying to avoid further spreading - we can reasonably expect that if we're infected, we will infect others (with the best will in the world, we won't know the moment we become infectious, and if we are knowingly acting in such a way that we aren't minimising spread - as would be true if we were actively accepting the risk of infection), we will almost certainly pass it on. And it isn't really plausible for me (or anyone) to claim that I didn't know there was a very high risk of passing it on if I got it.
(remember that the core jumping off point was the assumption of accepting the risk of getting it in the first place)
With @YBarddCwsc 's example, as I said, I'd be fine with the high risk person accepting the risk of infection - but only if they could then ensure that the risk was confined to themselves. Sure, I might think it's the wrong choice, but who the hell am I to make that decision for them? I don't know their full situation, I certainly don't know what their priorities are, and even if I did, it's their life to lead. Not mine. If freedom of choice means anything, it must include the freedom to make the wrong choice, anyway, even if it is objectively wrong for them. Otherwise it's not a choice (and not a freedom) at all.
But not to make a choice for someone else that could be wrong, which is what people are perforce doing if they follow a course of action where they could reasonably be expected to know they're exposing others without their own choice made in it - and in a global pandemic which continues to spread at the slightest opportunity and where we're discussing the choices we're making to prevent that spread, I can't see that people could reasonably expect to be exposed without then exposing others.
Boils down to this: "reasonably be expected to know they're exposing others".
Lockdowns have meant that individuals who have not got the virus (the large majority) have had their liberties postponed when they have not been any risk to anyone. This is unarguable. The chances of having Covid and not knowing it at the highest probability point since this all started are - what would you say - 1 in 50?, 1 in 100? Therefore, these individuals, in your words cannot "reasonably be expected to know they're exposing others" and even if they did pass it on, it would be unknowing and therefore without intent.
In short, Covid, so far, has not reached the prevalence needed to pass your test IMO.
We can go round and round with this philosophical quandary, but to finish let`s say that people who are opposed to lockdowns, such as many liberals, some Conservative MPs, and many people I speak to in the real world, have a legitimate philosophical point to make. One founded in logic and principle. However, they make a mistake when that contort science and statistics to bolster their arguments. We can agree on that.
I know that retailers failing is Bad News. And it is. But lets be honest, if someone has to fail, let it be Arcadia.
Regardless of the ownership, the writing has been on the wall for ages. The high street has changed, fashion buying trends have changed, arcadia is stuck in the past.
The kids are all about fast fashion from Boohoo ordered online pushed by social media influencers, not going to the high street to shop at Topshop.
Well, point one, they have come to their senses (see the mistake/not mistake polling), point two this is one of those I've jumped off a hundred storey building, I've fallen ninety storeys without issue sort of situations, and point three you are simply losing when you stop making it about how well your project is going and start making it all about the attitude of your opponents to how well your project is going.
The only poll that matters is elections and we had one not twelve months ago. It was decisive and went the way I wanted not you.
The way you wanted because you have so little understanding of the consequences of any of the things you want.
I voted tory btw.
I appreciate your vote but that doesn't change what the manifesto promised and I still want it to be honoured.
Good to see that you for one are insisting that we maintain our spending on overseas aid.
No the pandemic has changed that, overseas aid can't be afforded anymore. Other spending commitments including taxes have gone out the window for that too in my eyes, though I still think the tax commitments should be honoured because its the right thing to do economically not because of the manifesto, tax rises would just strangle the economy.
And Rob Ford similarly doesn't reflect on the polling on those who think Brexit a mistake - currently around 50%, along with a large slice of don't knows. I would guess it's at least possible that a slug of economic discomfort might have some impact on the latter category.
It is possible to believe Brexit is a mistake and that it should be carried out. For some, democracy trumps economics.
But if the outcome of implementing a democratically made decision turned out to be very different to the expectations that people had when making the decision, would that not be grounds for reconsidering that decision? Must all such decisions be implemented, no matter how terrible and unanticipated the consequences of doing so?
Mm. We appear to have democratically elected a Conservative government which has pursued policies which are anything but.
It's policies seem broadly in line with what they said they would do, with adjustments or reversals due to Covid. Is the objection that they don't match their name then? As many a party has that issue.
Perhaps yes. Many backbenchers seem not to have noticed their manifesto was far removed from what has been broadly understood to be "Conservative" for the past 40 years. Hence the present unrest and discontent.
Particularly value for taxpayers money, and competitive tendering...
@Philip_Thompson seems to be suggesting that these "middlemen" were making our PPE but they weren't, were they? They were simply acting as middlemen as the name suggests.
They should certainly have been able to make a profit if they created avenues to PPE that we would otherwise not have had access to, but not millions of pounds of profit. That's just disaster capitalism.
Defending such behaviour is beyond the pale.
Why not millions of pounds of profit?
What percentage of trade being a profit is OK to you? Hypothetically someone invests in creating a plant that manufacturers PPE and gets a contract for say over £100mn with 98% going to total costs and a 2% margin then is that acceptable or unacceptable in your eyes?
WHO are you talking about? We're talking about middlemen, not about people investing in factories. Which is it?
We are not talking about middlemen primarily.
We have gone from 99% imported to 30% imported. That is a dramatic transformation.
As for those engaged in the import business, that has costs too of course it does. And when we were 99% imported of course we needed to import some.
Foxy is criticising middlemen. Not factory owners in the UK. You've completely moved the goalposts.
No I've not as the transformation that has happened in the last few months has been going from 99% imported (pre existing circumstances) which will inevitably involve what you term "middle men" to 30% imported.
How do you propose cutting out middle men and getting the goods from China to the UK? Teleportation spells? Magic portals? Wishful thinking?
If said "middlemen" provided a freight forwarding or logistics service then they could have been paid a nominal sum to cover their costs. War profiteering is wrong. Disaster profiteering is wrong. It's really as simple as that.
I wonder how much was profit and how much went in 'inducements'.
It might be that the government knew what it would take to get hold of the goods but weren't prepared to do it themselves. Plausible deniability and all that.
It didn't help that legitimate British companies had their production lines commandeered by the Chinese government.
And the French requisitioned goods too.
If inducements were the price needed to get a hold of the goods and we couldn't get them without paying that price then what alternative was there exactly?
I see a lot of whinging, not so many productive alternatives.
I don't disagree. We could have done everything properly and had no PPE, which would have been much worse.
Those arguing for a bigger stockpiles are forgetting that there was even a furore over the re-certification of old stock. We'd have to have had an active stockpile where stuff was thrown out regularly.
No, we just needed the stockpile to be properly managed, so the shorter dated stuff is issued regularly, and replenished with long dated stock. Basic supplies management rally.
And built up rather than run down. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/12/revealed-value-of-uk-pandemic-stockpile-fell-by-40-in-six-years ...In 2016, after years of delays, the government staged another nationwide pandemic drill, codenamed Exercise Cygnus. The exercise, which simulated a deadly outbreak of so-called “swan flu”, is believed to have shown that in the event of a deadly pandemic the NHS would be overwhelmed by a shortage of critical care beds and vital equipment.
The government is refusing to release the official conclusions from Exercise Cygnus, which have never been made public, but there are indications in reports by local authorities who participated in the exercise that PPE supplies were an area of concern.
It is not clear whether at a national level the conclusions included recommendations about emergency stockpile funding. But DHSC accounts show that in the three years after the 2016 drill, the value of the stockpile fell by more than £200m...
It will also be interesting to see how long government runs with more expensive domestic manufacturing post-pandemic.
I know that retailers failing is Bad News. And it is. But lets be honest, if someone has to fail, let it be Arcadia.
Arcadia failing "due to the pandemic" is like Woolworths failing "due to the financial crisis".
No it failed because it had a rotten failed business model. The writing has been on the wall for years.
If I remember correctly, Woolies massive killer was sticking to buying / trying to sell physical music, when everybody had gone digital. For the demographic Topshop goes after, fashion has gone the same way, its all about digital influencers pushing clothes that you can buy cheaper and quickly online via an app, without you ever going to a store.
I know that retailers failing is Bad News. And it is. But lets be honest, if someone has to fail, let it be Arcadia.
Arcadia failing "due to the pandemic" is like Woolworths failing "due to the financial crisis".
No it failed because it had a rotten failed business model. The writing has been on the wall for years.
I didn't mention the pandemic...
I know you didn't, but that's what they're trying to blame. They're liars.
The media are running with the story too along the lines of the pandemic is why they've failed - no they've been failing for years. This may have been the final straw but they were dying for years and they've done nothing credible to fix their issues for years too.
I agree with the Header that he's not helping himself in this regard. Mind you, I don't see how he could without undergoing a procedure which I don't believe is yet available - a complete character and personality transplant. Normally, when a political leader in the democratic world falls, I seek to find something good to say about them and their tenure. This applies as much to politicians of the Right as of the Centre or Left. In fact it applies especially to those on the Right since saying something positive about them virtue signals the objectivity and balance for which I am known. But here, with Donald J Trump, the 45th President of the United States, it is simply not possible. He has been a huge and unremitting disaster for America and the wider world, soup to nuts. There isn't a single positive aspect to his legacy. Worse even than that, he didn't even try to do any good. If I could detect just a shred of benign intention, albeit frustrated in delivery by a lack of intellect or competence, then I would jump avidly on that and highlight it, now he's going. But I can't because there was none. 100% self gratification 0% public service. Amazing. RIP Donald Trump. You made Boris Johnson look like Mahatma Gandhi.
To be fair to Trump in terms of any positives under his administration, the economy grew pre Covid and he has started fewer foreign wars or launched fewer US airstrikes abroad than any US President since Carter (Biden will be more of a hawk against Russia and North Korea and in the Middle East outside Iran than Trump was), however Carter was also the last President to lose after only one term of his party in the White House
He's been less of a disaster than I thought he would be but then I thought there was a real chance he might start a nuclear war so I set the bar pretty low.
I agree with you about the lack of wars. I suspect the reason is that he just didn't understand foreign affairs so didn't meddle. (I believe Obama referred to him having the understanding of international affairs of a thirteen year old, which sounds about right.) When he did, it was to suit his domestic agenda. The Turkish Kurds episode was appalling and the US will be paying for that for decades. His Middle East initiative however seems to have done little harm and may possibly lead to some good when Biden picks up the threads.
I can't give him a pass on the economy. He inherited a very healthy situation. Again, he didn't stuff it up but he did favor the rich corporations and did little to rebuild the country's ailing infrastructure. It was however a case of missed opportunities rather than malfeasance.
The big downside was of course his perversion of the State and undermining of democracy. I remember Nixon and the concerns then that he was subverting democracy and the institutions of State but outside the Socialist Workers Party nobody reallly thought the US was turning into a despotism. For the first time in my long life I really worried that this might happen under Trump, particularly when he first indicated his intention to disregard the election result. I still do think it may have come to pass if the result had been a bit closer. It seems the danger has passed now though, whatever he (and Betfair) may think.
He has been without doubt the worst US President of my lifetime, and quite possibly the worst ever. James Buchanan's long reign as holder of that unwanted title may be about to end.
You don't get 73-74m votes by being the worst President ever.
You're making it sound like the situation Trump inherited from Obama was generally positive. It wasn't. The US was embroiled in conflicts. It had let China run riot. It is also easy to forget how relatively easy the West and Russia could have got into conflict over Crimea and the Ukraine in the mid-2010s. With HRC as President, that could have happened. You'
Oh yes you can, if you are a populist selling snake oil to suckers.
It helps of course if your opponent is less than stellar, and the opposition Party has balled a lot voters off in various ways, but even so it remains true that you can fool an awful lot of the people an awful lot of the time.
As for what Trump took over, I mentioned only the Economy, which was definitely strong. Other areas, less so, I agree. Hard to think of a significant area though where Trump's record has been indisputably strong.
Perform more airstrikes in Somalia than Bush and Obama combined == de-escalated.
And a vast expansion of SF ops in Niger which have mostly gone wrong.
I cannot imagine Niger comes up in western news very much, so he probably got away with that.
Though on Somalia I see this story on the BBC
A teacher and two other men have been executed by a firing squad in Somalia after being convicted of carrying out assassinations on behalf of militant Islamist group al-Shabab.
Mohamed Haji Ahmed was a popular English teacher at a college in Mogadishu. He was also an al-Shabab assassin – known as Ilkacase, or Red Teeth – and was responsible for the killing of several senior government officials.
Trump performed more Airstrikes in 3 years than Obama did over 8.
This pernicious myth that he de-escalated American intervention abroad is parroted with zero thought or research on here.
As is the myth that Obama was successful in foreign policy. Some of you need to do your own research.
Trump's airstrikes had a clear aim. Hit hard, negotiate from a position of strength and then get out. Obama's foreign policy interventions were muddled exercises.
I know that retailers failing is Bad News. And it is. But lets be honest, if someone has to fail, let it be Arcadia.
Arcadia failing "due to the pandemic" is like Woolworths failing "due to the financial crisis".
No it failed because it had a rotten failed business model. The writing has been on the wall for years.
If I remember correctly, Woolies massive killer was sticking to buying / trying to sell physical music, when everybody had gone digital. For the demographic Topshop goes after, fashion has gone the same way, its all about digital influencers pushing clothes that you can buy cheaper and quickly online via an app, without you ever going to a store.
I always felt that I didn't now what Woolies were trying to sell - what was their market? Most stores you have a good idea, but for them? Not sure.
I know that retailers failing is Bad News. And it is. But lets be honest, if someone has to fail, let it be Arcadia.
Arcadia failing "due to the pandemic" is like Woolworths failing "due to the financial crisis".
No it failed because it had a rotten failed business model. The writing has been on the wall for years.
If I remember correctly, Woolies massive killer was sticking to buying / trying to sell physical music, when everybody had gone digital. For the demographic Topshop goes after, fashion has gone the same way, its all about digital influencers pushing clothes that you can buy cheaper and quickly online via an app, without you ever going to a store.
Plus 'fast fashion' online means having new product ranges every week nowadays, not goods for a season.
Heard an amusing interview on the radio this morning while driving with an "influencer" who asked why Topshop failed said she'd looked at Topshop's website then looked again a few weeks later and 'it was the same products as last time'.
Seems hard for me personally to understand the need to have new products every week but if that is what the consumer wants and expects then the consumer is king - or in the fast fashion world princess may be more appropriate.
My wife received her supply of Vitamin D from Scottish Government today. Great service all handled with little fuss, one text and delivered.
That's good to hear. Vitamin D supplements can be tricky, in the sense that they only provide the precursors for Vitamin D (as it's a hormone I think) so your body is meant to produce it. I've never tried them, but I am very interested in 'super mushrooms' as a source of vitamin D - these are mushrooms that have been stored in UV light. https://www.sainsburys.co.uk/gol-ui/product/mushrooms/sainsburys-white-super-mushrooms-300g
If your wife is a mushroom fan, definitely worth a try, probably more absorbable than supplements, and just a bit pricier than normal mushrooms.
Thanks for that. My wife already buys Vitamin D in liquid form which we have taken for some time now
I know that retailers failing is Bad News. And it is. But lets be honest, if someone has to fail, let it be Arcadia.
Arcadia failing "due to the pandemic" is like Woolworths failing "due to the financial crisis".
No it failed because it had a rotten failed business model. The writing has been on the wall for years.
If I remember correctly, Woolies massive killer was sticking to buying / trying to sell physical music, when everybody had gone digital. For the demographic Topshop goes after, fashion has gone the same way, its all about digital influencers pushing clothes that you can buy cheaper and quickly online via an app, without you ever going to a store.
Plus 'fast fashion' online means having new product ranges every week nowadays, not goods for a season.
Heard an amusing interview on the radio this morning while driving with an "influencer" who asked why Topshop failed said she'd looked at Topshop's website then looked again a few weeks later and 'it was the same products as last time'.
Seems hard for me personally to understand the need to have new products every week but if that is what the consumer wants and expects then the consumer is king - or in the fast fashion world princess may be more appropriate.
If there aren't new products every week then there's nothing new for the "influencer" to peddle.
I know that retailers failing is Bad News. And it is. But lets be honest, if someone has to fail, let it be Arcadia.
Arcadia failing "due to the pandemic" is like Woolworths failing "due to the financial crisis".
No it failed because it had a rotten failed business model. The writing has been on the wall for years.
If I remember correctly, Woolies massive killer was sticking to buying / trying to sell physical music, when everybody had gone digital. For the demographic Topshop goes after, fashion has gone the same way, its all about digital influencers pushing clothes that you can buy cheaper and quickly online via an app, without you ever going to a store.
Plus 'fast fashion' online means having new product ranges every week nowadays, not goods for a season.
Heard an amusing interview on the radio this morning while driving with an "influencer" who asked why Topshop failed said she'd looked at Topshop's website then looked again a few weeks later and 'it was the same products as last time'.
Seems hard for me personally to understand the need to have new products every week but if that is what the consumer wants and expects then the consumer is king - or in the fast fashion world princess may be more appropriate.
Good point. I have to say I find it quite odd, both idea of needing something different to buy every few weeks, but also that the youth are big into eco issues, very trendy to be vegan, unis banning beef etc, but then happy to buy throw away clothes.
I know that retailers failing is Bad News. And it is. But lets be honest, if someone has to fail, let it be Arcadia.
Arcadia failing "due to the pandemic" is like Woolworths failing "due to the financial crisis".
No it failed because it had a rotten failed business model. The writing has been on the wall for years.
If I remember correctly, Woolies massive killer was sticking to buying / trying to sell physical music, when everybody had gone digital. For the demographic Topshop goes after, fashion has gone the same way, its all about digital influencers pushing clothes that you can buy cheaper and quickly online via an app, without you ever going to a store.
I always felt that I didn't now what Woolies were trying to sell - what was their market? Most stores you have a good idea, but for them? Not sure.
There's still a market for a small town shop selling limited ranges of cheapish homewares, it's just that Wilkinson's does that sort of thing more effectively. And it never tried to sell records.
I know that retailers failing is Bad News. And it is. But lets be honest, if someone has to fail, let it be Arcadia.
Arcadia failing "due to the pandemic" is like Woolworths failing "due to the financial crisis".
No it failed because it had a rotten failed business model. The writing has been on the wall for years.
If I remember correctly, Woolies massive killer was sticking to buying / trying to sell physical music, when everybody had gone digital. For the demographic Topshop goes after, fashion has gone the same way, its all about digital influencers pushing clothes that you can buy cheaper and quickly online via an app, without you ever going to a store.
Plus 'fast fashion' online means having new product ranges every week nowadays, not goods for a season.
Heard an amusing interview on the radio this morning while driving with an "influencer" who asked why Topshop failed said she'd looked at Topshop's website then looked again a few weeks later and 'it was the same products as last time'.
Seems hard for me personally to understand the need to have new products every week but if that is what the consumer wants and expects then the consumer is king - or in the fast fashion world princess may be more appropriate.
Good point. I have to say I find it quite odd, both idea of needing something different to buy every few weeks, but also that the youth are big into eco issues, very trendy to be vegan, unis banning beef etc, but then happy to buy throw away clothes.
I suspect the reality is they are very different elements of youth.
Vegans probably make up a noisy 3-5% tops element.
Those wanting cheap throwaway clothes probably much, much more numerous but less politically vocal.
Probably also from very different socioeconomic backgrounds. "Extinction Rebellion" rallies don't seem to be full of Primark or Boohoo etc shoppers who are worried about money and who buy cheap throwaway clothes as their treat that they can afford.
And Rob Ford similarly doesn't reflect on the polling on those who think Brexit a mistake - currently around 50%, along with a large slice of don't knows. I would guess it's at least possible that a slug of economic discomfort might have some impact on the latter category.
It is possible to believe Brexit is a mistake and that it should be carried out. For some, democracy trumps economics.
Many of us Remoaners would accept that without demur.
Do Leavers also accept that a 52/48 win did not justify leaving without regard to the views of those who wished to remain? Personally I would have thought that even if the vote had gone 90/10 to Leave, the Government would still have had an obligation to negotiate the best possible deal on leaving. It is after all obliged to do its best for the whole country, and not just its supporters.
Anyway it's an ill wind that brings no good. I see that the closer we get to the reality of Brexit, the less popular it becomes. No Deal would certainly be worse than a Negotiated Deal in the short term, but you never know. In the long run if we all learned that voting for Stupid has bad consequences it may serve us all better in future.
You can't be half pregnant sometimes, how do you want to reflect the views of those who wished to remain considering both leavers and remainers said that leaving would mean leaving the Single Market? That is the one thing that united Cameron, Osborne, Clegg, Corbyn, Gove and Johnson during the referendum, every single one of them said that.
The government is seeking a deal but we can't guarantee one. If the EU won't compromise we have to be willing to countenance no deal, or we can't negotiate.
@Peter_the_Punter , the saying 'It's an ill wind that blows nobody any good' means just about the opposite of your intended meaning, just FYI.
And Rob Ford similarly doesn't reflect on the polling on those who think Brexit a mistake - currently around 50%, along with a large slice of don't knows. I would guess it's at least possible that a slug of economic discomfort might have some impact on the latter category.
It is possible to believe Brexit is a mistake and that it should be carried out. For some, democracy trumps economics.
Many of us Remoaners would accept that without demur.
Do Leavers also accept that a 52/48 win did not justify leaving without regard to the views of those who wished to remain? Personally I would have thought that even if the vote had gone 90/10 to Leave, the Government would still have had an obligation to negotiate the best possible deal on leaving. It is after all obliged to do its best for the whole country, and not just its supporters.
Anyway it's an ill wind that brings no good. I see that the closer we get to the reality of Brexit, the less popular it becomes. No Deal would certainly be worse than a Negotiated Deal in the short term, but you never know. In the long run if we all learned that voting for Stupid has bad consequences it may serve us all better in future.
You can't be half pregnant sometimes, how do you want to reflect the views of those who wished to remain considering both leavers and remainers said that leaving would mean leaving the Single Market? That is the one thing that united Cameron, Osborne, Clegg, Corbyn, Gove and Johnson during the referendum, every single one of them said that.
The government is seeking a deal but we can't guarantee one. If the EU won't compromise we have to be willing to countenance no deal, or we can't negotiate.
@Peter_the_Punter , the saying 'It's an ill wind that blows nobody any good' means just about the opposite of your intended meaning, just FYI.
Thanks Lucky. Bit dopey this morning (no snarky remarks please) and didn't proof-read.
@Philip_Thompson seems to be suggesting that these "middlemen" were making our PPE but they weren't, were they? They were simply acting as middlemen as the name suggests.
They should certainly have been able to make a profit if they created avenues to PPE that we would otherwise not have had access to, but not millions of pounds of profit. That's just disaster capitalism.
Defending such behaviour is beyond the pale.
Why not millions of pounds of profit?
What percentage of trade being a profit is OK to you? Hypothetically someone invests in creating a plant that manufacturers PPE and gets a contract for say over £100mn with 98% going to total costs and a 2% margin then is that acceptable or unacceptable in your eyes?
WHO are you talking about? We're talking about middlemen, not about people investing in factories. Which is it?
We are not talking about middlemen primarily.
We have gone from 99% imported to 30% imported. That is a dramatic transformation.
As for those engaged in the import business, that has costs too of course it does. And when we were 99% imported of course we needed to import some.
Foxy is criticising middlemen. Not factory owners in the UK. You've completely moved the goalposts.
No I've not as the transformation that has happened in the last few months has been going from 99% imported (pre existing circumstances) which will inevitably involve what you term "middle men" to 30% imported.
How do you propose cutting out middle men and getting the goods from China to the UK? Teleportation spells? Magic portals? Wishful thinking?
If said "middlemen" provided a freight forwarding or logistics service then they could have been paid a nominal sum to cover their costs. War profiteering is wrong. Disaster profiteering is wrong. It's really as simple as that.
I wonder how much was profit and how much went in 'inducements'.
It might be that the government knew what it would take to get hold of the goods but weren't prepared to do it themselves. Plausible deniability and all that.
It didn't help that legitimate British companies had their production lines commandeered by the Chinese government.
And the French requisitioned goods too.
If inducements were the price needed to get a hold of the goods and we couldn't get them without paying that price then what alternative was there exactly?
I see a lot of whinging, not so many productive alternatives.
I don't disagree. We could have done everything properly and had no PPE, which would have been much worse.
Those arguing for a bigger stockpiles are forgetting that there was even a furore over the re-certification of old stock. We'd have to have had an active stockpile where stuff was thrown out regularly.
No, we just needed the stockpile to be properly managed, so the shorter dated stuff is issued regularly, and replenished with long dated stock. Basic supplies management rally.
And built up rather than run down. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/12/revealed-value-of-uk-pandemic-stockpile-fell-by-40-in-six-years ...In 2016, after years of delays, the government staged another nationwide pandemic drill, codenamed Exercise Cygnus. The exercise, which simulated a deadly outbreak of so-called “swan flu”, is believed to have shown that in the event of a deadly pandemic the NHS would be overwhelmed by a shortage of critical care beds and vital equipment.
The government is refusing to release the official conclusions from Exercise Cygnus, which have never been made public, but there are indications in reports by local authorities who participated in the exercise that PPE supplies were an area of concern.
It is not clear whether at a national level the conclusions included recommendations about emergency stockpile funding. But DHSC accounts show that in the three years after the 2016 drill, the value of the stockpile fell by more than £200m...
It will also be interesting to see how long government runs with more expensive domestic manufacturing post-pandemic.
I don’t think Mr T thinks that there’s much connection between the Party in power 2015-7 and the one in power now.
The entire argument of the "just let us decide our own risk" crowd totally fails to take into account that they're asking to decide everyone else's risk as well. And it's an asymmetric risk profile.
The ones wanting to choose for themselves and others to accept the risk are almost invariably the ones with the least risk. But they almost always look at the "risk of me being infected" and gloss over "the risk of me infecting others," and, in a public health scenario with an infectious pandemic: that is the crucial element.
After all, not one person in the UK (with the possible exception of Allison Pearson) has wanted anyone else to be infected, and no-one who has infected someone else has deliberately done so.
Yet over 5 million people have been infected nevertheless in the UK.
Those who did the infecting have indeed, overwhelmingly been okay. To the tune of 96% or so not needing hospitalisation and 99% or so not dying.
Yet 60,000 people who those infectors managed to infect have gone on to die. Given that most of these were in the higher risk categories, it's highly probable that very few of those 60,000 made the choice to face exposure and risk; instead others made the choice for them - and they ended up dying.
Nearly quarter of a million of the people those infectors did infect have been so sick they were hospitalised. A lot of those needing assistance to merely breathe.
At least a third of a million people face long-term consequences with what has been termed "long covid," many of these suffering organ damage.
Too many of those people infected - the third of a million with long covid, the quarter of a million so sick they were hospitalised, and the 60,000+ dead - had not made a decision to face higher risk.
They had that decision made for them.
By people whose own risk was low, and who did not fully think through the cost to others.
Another excellent post from Andy. Very thought-provoking - deserves a similarly thoughtful response to engage with his view (which is so widely held). So I`ll give it a go.
I`ve said before that lockdown skeptics should avoid tangling with the science and stick to principles only. For example, they should say that they don`t hold anyone else responsible for their own health; one`s own health is one`s own responsibility. This is the elephant in the room. It always has been. The opposition should come from philosophy not from scientific illiteracy, deliberate misinterpretation and mischief. Back in March I said here that at his briefings Johnson should have been flanked by a healthcare scientist, an economist and a philosopher - not just solely the former.
This is the bit I`m struggling with. Andy`s post reveals himself as a strong utilitarian. A moral framework that I don`t hold. I believe that good and bad acts come from intentions not consequences. Therefore you cannot apportion blame to someone who passes on a virus without even knowing that they had it themselves. Andy himself points out that no one has deliberately infected another person with Covid as far as we know (unlike what happened in small numbers with HIV). And, of course, an infection is not imprinted with the signature of the person it came from.
I think people who know me in real life would say that I`m as thoughtful and polite and caring and gentle as they come. But I don`t accept responsibility for other people`s health outside of my closest family. Of course I wish no one ill, but it is not my responsibility. I can`t get away from this. Utilitarians are not going to guilt-trip me into thinking otherwise. We need to stop blaming each other for things. This year has been ugly.
The vaccines are great news. But will they get us out? Only partial I think. The virus will still be present. As far as I know, a vaccine will protect that particular person from symptoms but will not prevent that person from spreading it to others. Covid is not, therefore, going away. And, of course, not everyone will agree to be vaccinated. Social-distancing will still be a thing. Covid will still be here. We still have to learn to live with it. Sorry.
This is bleak outlook - though doesn`t match @Black_Rook levels of bleakness. I`m betting that those holding a utilitarian outlook (which lends itself more to totalitarianism than liberalism I think) who are also risk-averse, and probably financially comfortable in themselves, will still have no intention of learning to live with Covid and will selfishly continue to chide, bully and rebuke the rest of us, who just want to live their lives in the ways we choose in a precious liberal society. For me, the selfishness is on the other side.
If you don`t agree, at least give me the courtesy of being honest.
Thank you for a well thought-out reply, and the up-front compliment.
I have no idea whether or not I am a utilitarian; I'm not really up on moral philosophy. I usually see myself as a liberal: everyone should have the right to pilot their own life in whatever way they can.
But the freedom to swing one's fist ends at someone else's face.
I did highlight that no-one has intentionally infected others. But that others have been infected nevertheless - and at a staggering scale. That actions, in a global pandemic, have huge externalities (in economics terms). If I exercise my freedom and, in doing so, knowingly impair the freedoms of many others to live their lives, that's illiberal of me. I'll have taken away all the choices they could have made in future and made them for them.
If I take some actions that could knowingly hurt others, I am at fault. If I refuse a set of actions that exist to protect others, I am at fault. Of course, as The Good Place covers, virtually every action we can take or refrain from taking will have knock-on consequences and we can't prevent all negative outcomes - but we can look at ones where we know the negative outcomes are huge. Normal actions, where the harm theoretically caused is either hugely unlikely, or very limited in scope, or limited in effect - that's all of life, almost. We blunder through as best we can.
This, though, is nowhere near normal life.
The restrictions we did put successfully kicked the can down the road. Not only do we have vaccines that will be going into people's arms within days, we have vastly improved our treatments and the prognosis of people who are ill. We will continue to do so. There is hope. And there are also indications that some vaccines at least will either prevent spread or hugely reduce spread. We're not in a static scenario; the potential outcomes are improving day by day.
The "lockdown sceptics" and those of the Toby Young side that argue the libertarian case do always seem to gloss over the spreading-the-disease onwards aspect. Mary Mallon certainly had her personal freedoms hugely curtailed - but doing so stopped her from taking a load of life choices away from others. Totalitarianism is usually seen as people having choices imposed upon them rather than being able to make them themselves. Surely taking actions that can be reasonably seen to, en masse, take a lot of choices away from others (when killed or disabled by anothers choices, a lot of potential choices evaporate) isn't truly a liberal course of action?
(I'm also not sure that "risk-averse" sums me up. I've been accused of the opposite in the past, with the skydiving and the microlighting, but that could simply be a different category of risk. I'd say I'm risk averse when my risk-taking could affect my family or others; I really don't think "totalitarian" applies to me, but I could be wrong there as well).
Thanks for that. I don`t think were are far off from agreeing with each other. I usually agree with your posts on other things.
You say "If I exercise my freedom and, in doing so, knowingly impair the freedoms of many others to live their lives, that's illiberal of me" and "If I take some actions that could knowingly hurt others, I am at fault" - I couldn`t agree more with both of those statements - I`m a liberal - but note that this, for me, is different when you take out the word "knowingly". That is what my post was about.
I think we are indeed fairly close and the discrepancy is "knowingly." My core point is that in normal day-to-day life, no-one could realistically be held responsible for passing on a cold, or flu, or anything else, unless they could be reasonably expected to know they were doing so.
Given that we know R is relentlessly over 1 for this damn disease unless serious restrictions are imposed, and even that the infectious period includes multiple days before showing symptoms, then - during a known pandemic that we're trying to avoid further spreading - we can reasonably expect that if we're infected, we will infect others (with the best will in the world, we won't know the moment we become infectious, and if we are knowingly acting in such a way that we aren't minimising spread - as would be true if we were actively accepting the risk of infection), we will almost certainly pass it on. And it isn't really plausible for me (or anyone) to claim that I didn't know there was a very high risk of passing it on if I got it.
(remember that the core jumping off point was the assumption of accepting the risk of getting it in the first place)
With @YBarddCwsc 's example, as I said, I'd be fine with the high risk person accepting the risk of infection - but only if they could then ensure that the risk was confined to themselves. Sure, I might think it's the wrong choice, but who the hell am I to make that decision for them? I don't know their full situation, I certainly don't know what their priorities are, and even if I did, it's their life to lead. Not mine. If freedom of choice means anything, it must include the freedom to make the wrong choice, anyway, even if it is objectively wrong for them. Otherwise it's not a choice (and not a freedom) at all.
But not to make a choice for someone else that could be wrong, which is what people are perforce doing if they follow a course of action where they could reasonably be expected to know they're exposing others without their own choice made in it - and in a global pandemic which continues to spread at the slightest opportunity and where we're discussing the choices we're making to prevent that spread, I can't see that people could reasonably expect to be exposed without then exposing others.
Boils down to this: "reasonably be expected to know they're exposing others".
Lockdowns have meant that individuals who have not got the virus (the large majority) have had their liberties postponed when they have not been any risk to anyone. This is unarguable. The chances of having Covid and not knowing it at the highest probability point since this all started are - what would you say - 1 in 50?, 1 in 100? Therefore, these individuals, in your words cannot "reasonably be expected to know they're exposing others" and even if they did pass it on, it would be unknowing and therefore without intent.
In short, Covid, so far, has not reached the prevalence needed to pass your test IMO.
We can go round and round with this philosophical quandary, but to finish let`s say that people who are opposed to lockdowns, such as many liberals, some Conservative MPs, and many people I speak to in the real world, have a legitimate philosophical point to make. One founded in logic and principle. However, they make a mistake when that contort science and statistics to bolster their arguments. We can agree on that.
I dislike lockdowns because they are crude tools and affect everyone. However, partly thanks to things with which I'd disagree with the Government on decisions made on testing and isolation incentives, nothing else chosen has worked.
The rate of prevalence is a questionable metric - because the core intent is to prevent it moving upwards. It was around 0.04% at the low point. It was thirty times higher at the start of the lockdown. This implies that a random group of 6 people would have a one in 14 chance of at least one infective person. Interact with nine people, and there's a one in ten chance one of them had covid at the time (assuming totally random distribution in the community, which there isn't).
Due at least partially to reluctance to impose restrictions, in some US states, they're looking at 10%+ of the public having covid right now. A group of six is therefore 50:50 to contain someone with covid. It's not long at all since this prevalence was far, far lower.
At what point do we accept the need to impose restrictions? Bearing in mind that it's a slow and lagging indicator.
I'm also reluctant to accept that probability argument. What are the chances of causing death or injury when speeding? Or when drink-driving? Or when carelessly discharging a fire-arm? All of those are similarly extremely low, yet we accept a curtailment of liberty and that the person committing the act could reasonably know he or she is endangering others. Given that the nature of an infectious disease with an R greater than one is that there is a chain reaction of infectees (especially if we choose to act in such a way as to result in a further elevated R), then we multiply that one in fifty (or whatever) chance by the expected number of negative outcomes caused. With R greater than 1, eventually that chain reaction will result in death to someone, unless someone, somewhere along the chain, just happens to have acted in such a way to break the exposure chain themselves, and the further that chain reaction goes, the more such someones we need.
@Philip_Thompson seems to be suggesting that these "middlemen" were making our PPE but they weren't, were they? They were simply acting as middlemen as the name suggests.
They should certainly have been able to make a profit if they created avenues to PPE that we would otherwise not have had access to, but not millions of pounds of profit. That's just disaster capitalism.
Defending such behaviour is beyond the pale.
Why not millions of pounds of profit?
What percentage of trade being a profit is OK to you? Hypothetically someone invests in creating a plant that manufacturers PPE and gets a contract for say over £100mn with 98% going to total costs and a 2% margin then is that acceptable or unacceptable in your eyes?
WHO are you talking about? We're talking about middlemen, not about people investing in factories. Which is it?
We are not talking about middlemen primarily.
We have gone from 99% imported to 30% imported. That is a dramatic transformation.
As for those engaged in the import business, that has costs too of course it does. And when we were 99% imported of course we needed to import some.
Foxy is criticising middlemen. Not factory owners in the UK. You've completely moved the goalposts.
No I've not as the transformation that has happened in the last few months has been going from 99% imported (pre existing circumstances) which will inevitably involve what you term "middle men" to 30% imported.
How do you propose cutting out middle men and getting the goods from China to the UK? Teleportation spells? Magic portals? Wishful thinking?
If said "middlemen" provided a freight forwarding or logistics service then they could have been paid a nominal sum to cover their costs. War profiteering is wrong. Disaster profiteering is wrong. It's really as simple as that.
I wonder how much was profit and how much went in 'inducements'.
It might be that the government knew what it would take to get hold of the goods but weren't prepared to do it themselves. Plausible deniability and all that.
It didn't help that legitimate British companies had their production lines commandeered by the Chinese government.
And the French requisitioned goods too.
If inducements were the price needed to get a hold of the goods and we couldn't get them without paying that price then what alternative was there exactly?
I see a lot of whinging, not so many productive alternatives.
I don't disagree. We could have done everything properly and had no PPE, which would have been much worse.
Those arguing for a bigger stockpiles are forgetting that there was even a furore over the re-certification of old stock. We'd have to have had an active stockpile where stuff was thrown out regularly.
No, we just needed the stockpile to be properly managed, so the shorter dated stuff is issued regularly, and replenished with long dated stock. Basic supplies management rally.
And built up rather than run down. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/12/revealed-value-of-uk-pandemic-stockpile-fell-by-40-in-six-years ...In 2016, after years of delays, the government staged another nationwide pandemic drill, codenamed Exercise Cygnus. The exercise, which simulated a deadly outbreak of so-called “swan flu”, is believed to have shown that in the event of a deadly pandemic the NHS would be overwhelmed by a shortage of critical care beds and vital equipment.
The government is refusing to release the official conclusions from Exercise Cygnus, which have never been made public, but there are indications in reports by local authorities who participated in the exercise that PPE supplies were an area of concern.
It is not clear whether at a national level the conclusions included recommendations about emergency stockpile funding. But DHSC accounts show that in the three years after the 2016 drill, the value of the stockpile fell by more than £200m...
It will also be interesting to see how long government runs with more expensive domestic manufacturing post-pandemic.
I don’t think Mr T thinks that there’s much connection between the Party in power 2015-7 and the one in power now.
Not just me, a lot of people don't think its the same. Though 2015-16 wasn't bad, it was 2016-19 that I disliked.
Of course if you have particular concerns about the managing of Health in 2016 then its worth remembering that the Health Secretary of 2016, one Right Honourable Jeremy Hunt MP, was the person who lost the 2019 Tory Leadership election.
I know that retailers failing is Bad News. And it is. But lets be honest, if someone has to fail, let it be Arcadia.
Arcadia failing "due to the pandemic" is like Woolworths failing "due to the financial crisis".
No it failed because it had a rotten failed business model. The writing has been on the wall for years.
If I remember correctly, Woolies massive killer was sticking to buying / trying to sell physical music, when everybody had gone digital. For the demographic Topshop goes after, fashion has gone the same way, its all about digital influencers pushing clothes that you can buy cheaper and quickly online via an app, without you ever going to a store.
They had many issues - Selling CDs (both as a retailer and a wholesaler to Zaavi) was definitely one of them. So many of their stores were relics - either huge barn stores you could get lost in or traditional high street stores with huge warehouses that stock got lost in. Their computer system was incapable of managing stock. Store managers would receive random allocations of stuff like BBQs which they would manually swap between them. Stock audits were an embarassment - they did a confectionery audit in 2007 which wrote off £1.5m of stock they didn't have and found £1m of stock they didn't know they had.
Towards the end their position was visibly untenable and credit lines would get cut and cut. I was told by my now former Woolies buyer that what finally did it for them was Take That. Polydor refused them credit for copies of the new album ("The Circus" - appropriate) and recalled the stock whilst it was on the trucks being delivered. This was the final straw for disgruntled and worried creditors, pulled credit turned into an avalanche and the group ran out of cash.
For someone who's role was selling products to Woolworths it was an exciting time...!
I agree with the Header that he's not helping himself in this regard. Mind you, I don't see how he could without undergoing a procedure which I don't believe is yet available - a complete character and personality transplant. Normally, when a political leader in the democratic world falls, I seek to find something good to say about them and their tenure. This applies as much to politicians of the Right as of the Centre or Left. In fact it applies especially to those on the Right since saying something positive about them virtue signals the objectivity and balance for which I am known. But here, with Donald J Trump, the 45th President of the United States, it is simply not possible. He has been a huge and unremitting disaster for America and the wider world, soup to nuts. There isn't a single positive aspect to his legacy. Worse even than that, he didn't even try to do any good. If I could detect just a shred of benign intention, albeit frustrated in delivery by a lack of intellect or competence, then I would jump avidly on that and highlight it, now he's going. But I can't because there was none. 100% self gratification 0% public service. Amazing. RIP Donald Trump. You made Boris Johnson look like Mahatma Gandhi.
To be fair to Trump in terms of any positives under his administration, the economy grew pre Covid and he has started fewer foreign wars or launched fewer US airstrikes abroad than any US President since Carter (Biden will be more of a hawk against Russia and North Korea and in the Middle East outside Iran than Trump was), however Carter was also the last President to lose after only one term of his party in the White House
He's been less of a disaster than I thought he would be but then I thought there was a real chance he might start a nuclear war so I set the bar pretty low.
I agree with you about the lack of wars. I suspect the reason is that he just didn't understand foreign affairs so didn't meddle. (I believe Obama referred to him having the understanding of international affairs of a thirteen year old, which sounds about right.) When he did, it was to suit his domestic agenda. The Turkish Kurds episode was appalling and the US will be paying for that for decades. His Middle East initiative however seems to have done little harm and may possibly lead to some good when Biden picks up the threads.
I can't give him a pass on the economy. He inherited a very healthy situation. Again, he didn't stuff it up but he did favor the rich corporations and did little to rebuild the country's ailing infrastructure. It was however a case of missed opportunities rather than malfeasance.
The big downside was of course his perversion of the State and undermining of democracy. I remember Nixon and the concerns then that he was subverting democracy and the institutions of State but outside the Socialist Workers Party nobody reallly thought the US was turning into a despotism. For the first time in my long life I really worried that this might happen under Trump, particularly when he first indicated his intention to disregard the election result. I still do think it may have come to pass if the result had been a bit closer. It seems the danger has passed now though, whatever he (and Betfair) may think.
He has been without doubt the worst US President of my lifetime, and quite possibly the worst ever. James Buchanan's long reign as holder of that unwanted title may be about to end.
You don't get 73-74m votes by being the worst President ever.
You're making it sound like the situation Trump inherited from Obama was generally positive. It wasn't. The US was embroiled in conflicts. It had let China run riot. It is also easy to forget how relatively easy the West and Russia could have got into conflict over Crimea and the Ukraine in the mid-2010s. With HRC as President, that could have happened. You'
Oh yes you can, if you are a populist selling snake oil to suckers.
It helps of course if your opponent is less than stellar, and the opposition Party has balled a lot voters off in various ways, but even so it remains true that you can fool an awful lot of the people an awful lot of the time.
As for what Trump took over, I mentioned only the Economy, which was definitely strong. Other areas, less so, I agree. Hard to think of a significant area though where Trump's record has been indisputably strong.
Golf, maybe?
Economically, he did. Another myth is that most of the post-2016 success was due to Obama's policies. It wasn't - Obama steadied the ship post-2008/9 but employment participation rates saw a sharp drop off in the Obama period even as unemployment rates fell, and only rose post-Trump's election. Wage growth in the Trump administration post-2017 also accelerated from Obama times.
Trump didn't get people to vote for him because they were dupes and too stupid to buy the snake oil. He won the votes because many people thought their lives were poor under Obama and Hillary represented much of the same.
Trump performed more Airstrikes in 3 years than Obama did over 8.
This pernicious myth that he de-escalated American intervention abroad is parroted with zero thought or research on here.
As is the myth that Obama was successful in foreign policy. Some of you need to do your own research.
Trump's airstrikes had a clear aim. Hit hard, negotiate from a position of strength and then get out. Obama's foreign policy interventions were muddled exercises.
I agree with the Header that he's not helping himself in this regard. Mind you, I don't see how he could without undergoing a procedure which I don't believe is yet available - a complete character and personality transplant. Normally, when a political leader in the democratic world falls, I seek to find something good to say about them and their tenure. This applies as much to politicians of the Right as of the Centre or Left. In fact it applies especially to those on the Right since saying something positive about them virtue signals the objectivity and balance for which I am known. But here, with Donald J Trump, the 45th President of the United States, it is simply not possible. He has been a huge and unremitting disaster for America and the wider world, soup to nuts. There isn't a single positive aspect to his legacy. Worse even than that, he didn't even try to do any good. If I could detect just a shred of benign intention, albeit frustrated in delivery by a lack of intellect or competence, then I would jump avidly on that and highlight it, now he's going. But I can't because there was none. 100% self gratification 0% public service. Amazing. RIP Donald Trump. You made Boris Johnson look like Mahatma Gandhi.
To be fair to Trump in terms of any positives under his administration, the economy grew pre Covid and he has started fewer foreign wars or launched fewer US airstrikes abroad than any US President since Carter (Biden will be more of a hawk against Russia and North Korea and in the Middle East outside Iran than Trump was), however Carter was also the last President to lose after only one term of his party in the White House
He's been less of a disaster than I thought he would be but then I thought there was a real chance he might start a nuclear war so I set the bar pretty low.
I agree with you about the lack of wars. I suspect the reason is that he just didn't understand foreign affairs so didn't meddle. (I believe Obama referred to him having the understanding of international affairs of a thirteen year old, which sounds about right.) When he did, it was to suit his domestic agenda. The Turkish Kurds episode was appalling and the US will be paying for that for decades. His Middle East initiative however seems to have done little harm and may possibly lead to some good when Biden picks up the threads.
I can't give him a pass on the economy. He inherited a very healthy situation. Again, he didn't stuff it up but he did favor the rich corporations and did little to rebuild the country's ailing infrastructure. It was however a case of missed opportunities rather than malfeasance.
The big downside was of course his perversion of the State and undermining of democracy. I remember Nixon and the concerns then that he was subverting democracy and the institutions of State but outside the Socialist Workers Party nobody reallly thought the US was turning into a despotism. For the first time in my long life I really worried that this might happen under Trump, particularly when he first indicated his intention to disregard the election result. I still do think it may have come to pass if the result had been a bit closer. It seems the danger has passed now though, whatever he (and Betfair) may think.
He has been without doubt the worst US President of my lifetime, and quite possibly the worst ever. James Buchanan's long reign as holder of that unwanted title may be about to end.
You don't get 73-74m votes by being the worst President ever.
You're making it sound like the situation Trump inherited from Obama was generally positive. It wasn't. The US was embroiled in conflicts. It had let China run riot. It is also easy to forget how relatively easy the West and Russia could have got into conflict over Crimea and the Ukraine in the mid-2010s. With HRC as President, that could have happened. You'
Oh yes you can, if you are a populist selling snake oil to suckers.
It helps of course if your opponent is less than stellar, and the opposition Party has balled a lot voters off in various ways, but even so it remains true that you can fool an awful lot of the people an awful lot of the time.
As for what Trump took over, I mentioned only the Economy, which was definitely strong. Other areas, less so, I agree. Hard to think of a significant area though where Trump's record has been indisputably strong.
Golf, maybe?
Economically, he did. Another myth is that most of the post-2016 success was due to Obama's policies. It wasn't - Obama steadied the ship post-2008/9 but employment participation rates saw a sharp drop off in the Obama period even as unemployment rates fell, and only rose post-Trump's election. Wage growth in the Trump administration post-2017 also accelerated from Obama times.
Trump didn't get people to vote for him because they were dupes and too stupid to buy the snake oil. He won the votes because many people thought their lives were poor under Obama and Hillary represented much of the same.
Trump was an economic disaster.
All he did for four years was spend, spend, spend and blow the budget deficit wide open.
He was totally fiscally irresponsible. Worst leader in decades. He blew the economy wide open with spending and deficits so high that it would make Brown, Callaghan, Wilson or Healey blush.
Nobody who believes in conservative economics could support Trump.
My wife received her supply of Vitamin D from Scottish Government today. Great service all handled with little fuss, one text and delivered.
That's good to hear. Vitamin D supplements can be tricky, in the sense that they only provide the precursors for Vitamin D (as it's a hormone I think) so your body is meant to produce it. I've never tried them, but I am very interested in 'super mushrooms' as a source of vitamin D - these are mushrooms that have been stored in UV light. https://www.sainsburys.co.uk/gol-ui/product/mushrooms/sainsburys-white-super-mushrooms-300g
If your wife is a mushroom fan, definitely worth a try, probably more absorbable than supplements, and just a bit pricier than normal mushrooms.
Thanks for that. My wife already buys Vitamin D in liquid form which we have taken for some time now
malcy, did your Good Lady make a full recovery from her health scare earlier in the year?
I agree with the Header that he's not helping himself in this regard. Mind you, I don't see how he could without undergoing a procedure which I don't believe is yet available - a complete character and personality transplant. Normally, when a political leader in the democratic world falls, I seek to find something good to say about them and their tenure. This applies as much to politicians of the Right as of the Centre or Left. In fact it applies especially to those on the Right since saying something positive about them virtue signals the objectivity and balance for which I am known. But here, with Donald J Trump, the 45th President of the United States, it is simply not possible. He has been a huge and unremitting disaster for America and the wider world, soup to nuts. There isn't a single positive aspect to his legacy. Worse even than that, he didn't even try to do any good. If I could detect just a shred of benign intention, albeit frustrated in delivery by a lack of intellect or competence, then I would jump avidly on that and highlight it, now he's going. But I can't because there was none. 100% self gratification 0% public service. Amazing. RIP Donald Trump. You made Boris Johnson look like Mahatma Gandhi.
To be fair to Trump in terms of any positives under his administration, the economy grew pre Covid and he has started fewer foreign wars or launched fewer US airstrikes abroad than any US President since Carter (Biden will be more of a hawk against Russia and North Korea and in the Middle East outside Iran than Trump was), however Carter was also the last President to lose after only one term of his party in the White House
He's been less of a disaster than I thought he would be but then I thought there was a real chance he might start a nuclear war so I set the bar pretty low.
I agree with you about the lack of wars. I suspect the reason is that he just didn't understand foreign affairs so didn't meddle. (I believe Obama referred to him having the understanding of international affairs of a thirteen year old, which sounds about right.) When he did, it was to suit his domestic agenda. The Turkish Kurds episode was appalling and the US will be paying for that for decades. His Middle East initiative however seems to have done little harm and may possibly lead to some good when Biden picks up the threads.
I can't give him a pass on the economy. He inherited a very healthy situation. Again, he didn't stuff it up but he did favor the rich corporations and did little to rebuild the country's ailing infrastructure. It was however a case of missed opportunities rather than malfeasance.
The big downside was of course his perversion of the State and undermining of democracy. I remember Nixon and the concerns then that he was subverting democracy and the institutions of State but outside the Socialist Workers Party nobody reallly thought the US was turning into a despotism. For the first time in my long life I really worried that this might happen under Trump, particularly when he first indicated his intention to disregard the election result. I still do think it may have come to pass if the result had been a bit closer. It seems the danger has passed now though, whatever he (and Betfair) may think.
He has been without doubt the worst US President of my lifetime, and quite possibly the worst ever. James Buchanan's long reign as holder of that unwanted title may be about to end.
You don't get 73-74m votes by being the worst President ever.
You're making it sound like the situation Trump inherited from Obama was generally positive. It wasn't. The US was embroiled in conflicts. It had let China run riot. It is also easy to forget how relatively easy the West and Russia could have got into conflict over Crimea and the Ukraine in the mid-2010s. With HRC as President, that could have happened. You'
Oh yes you can, if you are a populist selling snake oil to suckers.
It helps of course if your opponent is less than stellar, and the opposition Party has balled a lot voters off in various ways, but even so it remains true that you can fool an awful lot of the people an awful lot of the time.
As for what Trump took over, I mentioned only the Economy, which was definitely strong. Other areas, less so, I agree. Hard to think of a significant area though where Trump's record has been indisputably strong.
Golf, maybe?
Economically, he did. Another myth is that most of the post-2016 success was due to Obama's policies. It wasn't - Obama steadied the ship post-2008/9 but employment participation rates saw a sharp drop off in the Obama period even as unemployment rates fell, and only rose post-Trump's election. Wage growth in the Trump administration post-2017 also accelerated from Obama times.
Trump didn't get people to vote for him because they were dupes and too stupid to buy the snake oil. He won the votes because many people thought their lives were poor under Obama and Hillary represented much of the same.
And it got a whole lot better under Trump?!
Obviously many voted for many different reasons but what Trump's election did show was that if your democratic institutions are not robust you can easily wind up with a second rate game show host as President and if you do, be grateful for how little damage that does.
We ought to learn a similar lesson from the election of our own clown before we pay too heavy a price.
I know that retailers failing is Bad News. And it is. But lets be honest, if someone has to fail, let it be Arcadia.
I'm sure the staff will be touched by your concern.
Arcadia was destroyed by it's inability to move in to ecommerce - I know Next had its catalogue and therefore had a better starting point than most companies but it does show how important the internet has become for sales.
Arcadia will also take down Debenhams and between them probably a lot of shopping centres. A lot of tenancy agreements are based the named key and secondary tenants remaining there. And Arcadia / Debenham stores were often those named tenants.
I know that retailers failing is Bad News. And it is. But lets be honest, if someone has to fail, let it be Arcadia.
Arcadia failing "due to the pandemic" is like Woolworths failing "due to the financial crisis".
No it failed because it had a rotten failed business model. The writing has been on the wall for years.
If I remember correctly, Woolies massive killer was sticking to buying / trying to sell physical music, when everybody had gone digital. For the demographic Topshop goes after, fashion has gone the same way, its all about digital influencers pushing clothes that you can buy cheaper and quickly online via an app, without you ever going to a store.
Plus 'fast fashion' online means having new product ranges every week nowadays, not goods for a season.
Heard an amusing interview on the radio this morning while driving with an "influencer" who asked why Topshop failed said she'd looked at Topshop's website then looked again a few weeks later and 'it was the same products as last time'.
Seems hard for me personally to understand the need to have new products every week but if that is what the consumer wants and expects then the consumer is king - or in the fast fashion world princess may be more appropriate.
Good point. I have to say I find it quite odd, both idea of needing something different to buy every few weeks, but also that the youth are big into eco issues, very trendy to be vegan, unis banning beef etc, but then happy to buy throw away clothes.
It is almost the definition of youth to be changeable, swayed by the issues of the day and inconsistent. It's part of growing up.
Comments
Censuses are important so the risk ratio must reflect that, and the difficulties not insurmountable. This is exactly the kind of unreasonable criticism that undermines the valid criticism elsewhere on procurement and so on. What criticism might afford to the idea is not in 'WTAF' territory.
https://twitter.com/hendopolis/status/1333395524418940929?s=19
Its time to pull back the curtain and get on with it. If you're right and its a disaster there is another election in four years time and Sir Keir Starmer can pledge to change course. If its not then you can eat your words.
I appreciate your vote but that doesn't change what the manifesto promised and I still want it to be honoured.
Additionally using healthcare services for vaccinations all 7 days during the week poses significant capacity issues for everything else people need to see medical staff for.
https://twitter.com/tomhfh/status/1333390840178339842?s=20
I suggest Nicholas Soames.
NOT Jacob Rees-Mogg.
During an emergency breaking a few eggs may be necessary. Yes facilitation payments abroad is a bribe and thus if someone pays them to release PPE during a pandemic that we would otherwise go without then is prosecuting that in the public interest? The DPP has always had a right under public interest determinations to turn a blind eye to breaches of the law that serve the public interest.
The pandemic has tested government politicians immensely and some things could not be mitigated and others will have been mitigated incorrectly but understandably given what was known at the time so we cannot be too harsh on some issues, but many politicians have not been great at looking ahead at possibilities.
Its like saying only eat 500 calories a day for 2 weeks and you will have a 6 pack and you can go back to eating what you like, or you can grind for months living on 2000 calories and working out for 6 days a week and you with see slow progress towards it.
Nobody really wants to hear it is the later that you have to do.
If your wife is a mushroom fan, definitely worth a try, probably more absorbable than supplements, and just a bit pricier than normal mushrooms.
Hence the present unrest and discontent.
The government is seeking a deal but we can't guarantee one. If the EU won't compromise we have to be willing to countenance no deal, or we can't negotiate.
Whilst it is mealy mouthed and unhelpful at times, even Boris has usually been like 'We really hope not to do X' which might well give people the wrong impression, but is still less of a surprise if you then have to do X.
I suspect we might have had a bigger stockpile if the government had anticipated that supplies would be cut off in the way they were. Lessons learned on that front, I hope.
Trump's airstrikes had a clear aim. Hit hard, negotiate from a position of strength and then get out. Obama's foreign policy interventions were muddled exercises.
Name one major Obama policy foreign success
Ie in a single week we were consuming an annual supply. In a month we were consuming a four year supply.
If the stockpile was two years supply it would last a fortnight. If it was six months supply it would last 3-4 days.
Stockpiles aren't the answer for everything.
This far in and even though it is an ongoing situation it is not unreasonable, I think, to take stock of what was decided, how it was decided, how we are still deciding things, and seeing if we can in fact improve things now we have a bit more time to think, and perhaps even fix egregious mistakes.
Masks, gowns, gloves, aprons all have long shelf lives and are in routine use, so stock rotation would not result in significant wastage.
No it failed because it had a rotten failed business model. The writing has been on the wall for years.
Even after a month in England, Witty / Valance were far from 100% how well Englands lockdown had worked.
But 6 months normal supply was enough for about 3-4 days consumption during the pandemic. So what then? 6 months supply gets you to about Thursday, what happens after Thursday?
Lockdowns have meant that individuals who have not got the virus (the large majority) have had their liberties postponed when they have not been any risk to anyone. This is unarguable. The chances of having Covid and not knowing it at the highest probability point since this all started are - what would you say - 1 in 50?, 1 in 100? Therefore, these individuals, in your words cannot "reasonably be expected to know they're exposing others" and even if they did pass it on, it would be unknowing and therefore without intent.
In short, Covid, so far, has not reached the prevalence needed to pass your test IMO.
We can go round and round with this philosophical quandary, but to finish let`s say that people who are opposed to lockdowns, such as many liberals, some Conservative MPs, and many people I speak to in the real world, have a legitimate philosophical point to make. One founded in logic and principle. However, they make a mistake when that contort science and statistics to bolster their arguments. We can agree on that.
The kids are all about fast fashion from Boohoo ordered online pushed by social media influencers, not going to the high street to shop at Topshop.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/12/revealed-value-of-uk-pandemic-stockpile-fell-by-40-in-six-years
...In 2016, after years of delays, the government staged another nationwide pandemic drill, codenamed Exercise Cygnus. The exercise, which simulated a deadly outbreak of so-called “swan flu”, is believed to have shown that in the event of a deadly pandemic the NHS would be overwhelmed by a shortage of critical care beds and vital equipment.
The government is refusing to release the official conclusions from Exercise Cygnus, which have never been made public, but there are indications in reports by local authorities who participated in the exercise that PPE supplies were an area of concern.
It is not clear whether at a national level the conclusions included recommendations about emergency stockpile funding. But DHSC accounts show that in the three years after the 2016 drill, the value of the stockpile fell by more than £200m...
It will also be interesting to see how long government runs with more expensive domestic manufacturing post-pandemic.
'neatly paints'
https://twitter.com/ITVWales/status/1333318686694895616?s=20
The media are running with the story too along the lines of the pandemic is why they've failed - no they've been failing for years. This may have been the final straw but they were dying for years and they've done nothing credible to fix their issues for years too.
It helps of course if your opponent is less than stellar, and the opposition Party has balled a lot voters off in various ways, but even so it remains true that you can fool an awful lot of the people an awful lot of the time.
As for what Trump took over, I mentioned only the Economy, which was definitely strong. Other areas, less so, I agree. Hard to think of a significant area though where Trump's record has been indisputably strong.
Golf, maybe?
"Phil has a range of colourful tattoos stretching from ET to the Lion King and Finding Nemo"
Though on Somalia I see this story on the BBC
A teacher and two other men have been executed by a firing squad in Somalia after being convicted of carrying out assassinations on behalf of militant Islamist group al-Shabab.
Mohamed Haji Ahmed was a popular English teacher at a college in Mogadishu. He was also an al-Shabab assassin – known as Ilkacase, or Red Teeth – and was responsible for the killing of several senior government officials.
Makes me worry about some teacher PBers.
He was just using the secondary meaning, divorced from reality. As in Fantastic Beasts...
Heard an amusing interview on the radio this morning while driving with an "influencer" who asked why Topshop failed said she'd looked at Topshop's website then looked again a few weeks later and 'it was the same products as last time'.
Seems hard for me personally to understand the need to have new products every week but if that is what the consumer wants and expects then the consumer is king - or in the fast fashion world princess may be more appropriate.
On a more artistic note, there's at least one design blogger - swiss-miss.com - who's parlayed a $5m business out of temporary tattoos.
https://tattly.com/
I'll be going.
Vegans probably make up a noisy 3-5% tops element.
Those wanting cheap throwaway clothes probably much, much more numerous but less politically vocal.
Probably also from very different socioeconomic backgrounds. "Extinction Rebellion" rallies don't seem to be full of Primark or Boohoo etc shoppers who are worried about money and who buy cheap throwaway clothes as their treat that they can afford.
However, partly thanks to things with which I'd disagree with the Government on decisions made on testing and isolation incentives, nothing else chosen has worked.
The rate of prevalence is a questionable metric - because the core intent is to prevent it moving upwards. It was around 0.04% at the low point. It was thirty times higher at the start of the lockdown. This implies that a random group of 6 people would have a one in 14 chance of at least one infective person. Interact with nine people, and there's a one in ten chance one of them had covid at the time (assuming totally random distribution in the community, which there isn't).
Due at least partially to reluctance to impose restrictions, in some US states, they're looking at 10%+ of the public having covid right now. A group of six is therefore 50:50 to contain someone with covid. It's not long at all since this prevalence was far, far lower.
At what point do we accept the need to impose restrictions? Bearing in mind that it's a slow and lagging indicator.
I'm also reluctant to accept that probability argument. What are the chances of causing death or injury when speeding? Or when drink-driving? Or when carelessly discharging a fire-arm? All of those are similarly extremely low, yet we accept a curtailment of liberty and that the person committing the act could reasonably know he or she is endangering others. Given that the nature of an infectious disease with an R greater than one is that there is a chain reaction of infectees (especially if we choose to act in such a way as to result in a further elevated R), then we multiply that one in fifty (or whatever) chance by the expected number of negative outcomes caused. With R greater than 1, eventually that chain reaction will result in death to someone, unless someone, somewhere along the chain, just happens to have acted in such a way to break the exposure chain themselves, and the further that chain reaction goes, the more such someones we need.
Of course if you have particular concerns about the managing of Health in 2016 then its worth remembering that the Health Secretary of 2016, one Right Honourable Jeremy Hunt MP, was the person who lost the 2019 Tory Leadership election.
Towards the end their position was visibly untenable and credit lines would get cut and cut. I was told by my now former Woolies buyer that what finally did it for them was Take That. Polydor refused them credit for copies of the new album ("The Circus" - appropriate) and recalled the stock whilst it was on the trucks being delivered. This was the final straw for disgruntled and worried creditors, pulled credit turned into an avalanche and the group ran out of cash.
For someone who's role was selling products to Woolworths it was an exciting time...!
Trump didn't get people to vote for him because they were dupes and too stupid to buy the snake oil. He won the votes because many people thought their lives were poor under Obama and Hillary represented much of the same.
All he did for four years was spend, spend, spend and blow the budget deficit wide open.
He was totally fiscally irresponsible. Worst leader in decades. He blew the economy wide open with spending and deficits so high that it would make Brown, Callaghan, Wilson or Healey blush.
Nobody who believes in conservative economics could support Trump.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/nov/30/have-hope-uk-track-record-successful-vaccine-campaigns-covid-19
Oh, and happy St. Andrew's day.
Obviously many voted for many different reasons but what Trump's election did show was that if your democratic institutions are not robust you can easily wind up with a second rate game show host as President and if you do, be grateful for how little damage that does.
We ought to learn a similar lesson from the election of our own clown before we pay too heavy a price.
Arcadia will also take down Debenhams and between them probably a lot of shopping centres. A lot of tenancy agreements are based the named key and secondary tenants remaining there. And Arcadia / Debenham stores were often those named tenants.