I mean it is fine to pay attention to Sumption on say jurisprudence but not so much when it comes to epidemiological issues because of his epistemological problems.
CNN - In Britain, concluding that the government has no idea what it's doing is no longer the outlier choice of the conspiracy theorist, but an evidence-based assessment. Again and again, a decision point arrives for the Johnson administration, and a path is taken. It is criticized as wildly illogical or risky, even in the pandering tabloid press. And then it is hurriedly reversed -- normally at the very last moment possible.
Downing Street press conferences yawn with practiced uncertainty and platitudes. Exhausted scientific advisers seem to struggle to keep up with nature, now on a year-long hedonistic rip across humanity. And their advice is, it seems, only selectively applied by a stricken prime minister with increasingly tousled hair, whose increasingly tousled hair is unable to keep up with emulating the chaos he's presiding over.
It's quite possible that the new coronavirus variant is already in many other countries, and the UK's formidable genetic sequencing industry simply found it first. But 2020 has not left Boris Johnson with any authority chips to play. His warning was not accompanied by hard-won gravity earned by months of responsible behavior. Instead, the world took the UK seriously as we were, for the first time, not divided or unsure about something. Even Boris Johnson had to pay attention to it. What this new clarity has not given us -- as the holidays settle like unwelcome, deep new snow -- is any certainty as to when the simmering panic, or the current lockdown, or these short, dark days will end.
CNN - In Britain, concluding that the government has no idea what it's doing is no longer the outlier choice of the conspiracy theorist, but an evidence-based assessment. Again and again, a decision point arrives for the Johnson administration, and a path is taken. It is criticized as wildly illogical or risky, even in the pandering tabloid press. And then it is hurriedly reversed -- normally at the very last moment possible.
Downing Street press conferences yawn with practiced uncertainty and platitudes. Exhausted scientific advisers seem to struggle to keep up with nature, now on a year-long hedonistic rip across humanity. And their advice is, it seems, only selectively applied by a stricken prime minister with increasingly tousled hair, whose increasingly tousled hair is unable to keep up with emulating the chaos he's presiding over.
It's quite possible that the new coronavirus variant is already in many other countries, and the UK's formidable genetic sequencing industry simply found it first. But 2020 has not left Boris Johnson with any authority chips to play. His warning was not accompanied by hard-won gravity earned by months of responsible behavior. Instead, the world took the UK seriously as we were, for the first time, not divided or unsure about something. Even Boris Johnson had to pay attention to it. What this new clarity has not given us -- as the holidays settle like unwelcome, deep new snow -- is any certainty as to when the simmering panic, or the current lockdown, or these short, dark days will end.
What a load of crap. The decision was changed because new evidence emerged. What is wrong about that?
Something called “manifestation” is becoming popular with Gen-Z. Basically, it involves wishing something will happen, very hard, sometimes accompanied by incantation.
I asked a Gen-Z acquaintance to explain and she said because we have fuck all else.
USA doesn't do genetic sequencing, so may have our supercovid or its own variants, just has no way of telling.
"This month, U.K. researchers have uploaded 2,131 full sequences to an international repository, GISAID. U.S. researchers, on the other hand, have uploaded only 36—despite this country having five times more people and hundreds of thousands of cases."
Ditto almost every other country on the planet. IIRC it has been reported that no other European state has anything like the UK's genomic sequencing capabilities except for Denmark (which, surprise surprise, has found evidence of the same variant in its population.)
The UK has contributed over 40% of the global information of COVID genomics and is doing 140x Italy, 90x Germany and 60x France......of those its testing and since we're already testing more than any of them......
In the TV interviews with these lorry drivers many of them seem to have small kitchen facilities in their lorries. Which kind of makes sense if they are always on the road all day.
Do they have tend to have WC facilities? I wouldn't have thought so.
Apparently they are crapping by their own wheels. Gross. FFS get them some portaloos, food and water. It’s 4000 men, who need somewhere to do their biz. It’s not like organising D-Day
And, as has been pointed out, this is a Covid Emergency waiting to happen, if the bug visits them. THEN we have a real problem
There's been absolutely no festivals this summer. Portaloo companies would love the business ! Is it beyond the wit of the Gov't to organise this, as well as pop up vans to get them all food ?
I saw one excellent suggestion on Twitter. Open a lobster shack. Many of these lorries are full of delicious Scottish seafood, slowly rotting.
Get it out, cook it up, serve it with butter and a bap to the drivers. That will cheer everyone up and the Scottish seafood companies will be paid by HMG. All sorted (apart from the loos)
I am going to have to try lobster when I move close to Peterhead. Never had it
TBH I have always found lobster faintly disappointing, It is pleasant, if cooked properly, but I am not sure why it has this luxurious image.
King Crab is vastly superior: a divine foodstuff. Basic langoustines are generally nicer. Oysters are a much better aphrodisiac. And so on.
Insert. Gratuitous and completely unnecessary restaurant scene.
'She slips off her coat. Imelda is step-by-step taking her clothes off and Hugh's heart is working so fast he feels endangered, overbuzzed, like a student on too much speed. Stuck with his addiction Hugh watches, obsessing, as Imelda undoes buttons, glancing down he wants everything on the menu, he wants so much to take his time and explore it, slowly.
- We better be quick my mum will be home soon
- Sorry? - first course? - you order for both of us
She smiles across at him. Hugh prepares himself, unfolding his dress shirt, cotton soft between fingers. Her eyes fix upon it as he lowers good linen from her view. At the rugby club he is known as huge not Hugh. he motions with a hand; she understands:
- You mean I have to put all of that in my mouth?
You ordered it! Oh God. yes.
Hopeful, wistful, with mouthful of juice, he watches her little hands at work and he waits for as long as he can; but then he can't: now he goes: down to a rose, smelling the scent of St Malo restaurant on a winter's evening, lost in the thick soft furrier’s samples; lost in the young Czarina.
Gagging, enjoying, gagging; Hugh licks through a dish of shell food and considers the fact Imelda is the only woman he enjoys. He considers this: dismisses it. Dangerous, dangerous. Why shoud he enjoy her and no-one else?
Hugh lays off his tongue and considers the taste. It is, he feels, one of those very nearly disgusting lovely tastes that can so easily tip over into compete disgustingness. Like burnt charcoal peppers in oil. Like oysters. Olives. Anchovy butter. Like so much seafood.
But because he loves her, he loves the taste.. the taste of blood, from a war wound, from scar tissue, from mutilation; ohyes he loves it, loves the kowtow, yes he loves the taste.
But not that much. It is time. Now. Yes. Brupt, he rises from the dish, turns her over, flips her white body of flesh. Her small white tidy body. She is so small and so compact, and yet she has all the necessary features...
Shall I compare thee to a Sony Walkman? thou art more compact and more My own Toshiba, dinky little JVC, Oh sweet Aiwa
- Aiwa - She says, being served barbed sea bass between slimy red-peppers-in-olive-oil - Aiwa, aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwaaaaaaaaah
Goodness me. That is superb writing. Also very clever, as Aiwa means Yes. You do hide your light under a bushel
I mean it is fine to pay attention to Sumption on say jurisprudence but not so much when it comes to epidemiological issues because of his epistemological problems.
Yes, I appreciate you personally aren't hanging on his every word but... why even give it airtime?
I mean it is fine to pay attention to Sumption on say jurisprudence but not so much when it comes to epidemiological issues because of his epistemological problems.
Yes, I appreciate you personally aren't hanging on his every word but... why even give it airtime?
What better way to counter fake news and general bollocks than to point it out?
Something called “manifestation” is becoming popular with Gen-Z. Basically, it involves wishing something will happen, very hard, sometimes accompanied by incantation.
I asked a Gen-Z acquaintance to explain and she said because we have fuck all else.
Rampant asset price inflation has severely hampered the financial chances of my generation unless they're:
a) earning 100k+/pa per household b) run a business c) have family money d) live in Brum or further north.
I can see it in my own circle. Two of us fall into category b), several are a) (Docs, Lawyers or consultants), the rest struggle to buy any assets at all.
Covid cash injections are only helping those of us in b), but those in a) seem to have steady jobs.
In the TV interviews with these lorry drivers many of them seem to have small kitchen facilities in their lorries. Which kind of makes sense if they are always on the road all day.
Do they have tend to have WC facilities? I wouldn't have thought so.
Apparently they are crapping by their own wheels. Gross. FFS get them some portaloos, food and water. It’s 4000 men, who need somewhere to do their biz. It’s not like organising D-Day
And, as has been pointed out, this is a Covid Emergency waiting to happen, if the bug visits them. THEN we have a real problem
There's been absolutely no festivals this summer. Portaloo companies would love the business ! Is it beyond the wit of the Gov't to organise this, as well as pop up vans to get them all food ?
I saw one excellent suggestion on Twitter. Open a lobster shack. Many of these lorries are full of delicious Scottish seafood, slowly rotting.
Get it out, cook it up, serve it with butter and a bap to the drivers. That will cheer everyone up and the Scottish seafood companies will be paid by HMG. All sorted (apart from the loos)
I am going to have to try lobster when I move close to Peterhead. Never had it
TBH I have always found lobster faintly disappointing, It is pleasant, if cooked properly, but I am not sure why it has this luxurious image.
King Crab is vastly superior: a divine foodstuff. Basic langoustines are generally nicer. Oysters are a much better aphrodisiac. And so on.
Insert. Gratuitous and completely unnecessary restaurant scene.
'She slips off her coat. Imelda is step-by-step taking her clothes off and Hugh's heart is working so fast he feels endangered, overbuzzed, like a student on too much speed. Stuck with his addiction Hugh watches, obsessing, as Imelda undoes buttons, glancing down he wants everything on the menu, he wants so much to take his time and explore it, slowly.
- We better be quick my mum will be home soon
- Sorry? - first course? - you order for both of us
She smiles across at him. Hugh prepares himself, unfolding his dress shirt, cotton soft between fingers. Her eyes fix upon it as he lowers good linen from her view. At the rugby club he is known as huge not Hugh. he motions with a hand; she understands:
- You mean I have to put all of that in my mouth?
You ordered it! Oh God. yes.
Hopeful, wistful, with mouthful of juice, he watches her little hands at work and he waits for as long as he can; but then he can't: now he goes: down to a rose, smelling the scent of St Malo restaurant on a winter's evening, lost in the thick soft furrier’s samples; lost in the young Czarina.
Gagging, enjoying, gagging; Hugh licks through a dish of shell food and considers the fact Imelda is the only woman he enjoys. He considers this: dismisses it. Dangerous, dangerous. Why shoud he enjoy her and no-one else?
Hugh lays off his tongue and considers the taste. It is, he feels, one of those very nearly disgusting lovely tastes that can so easily tip over into compete disgustingness. Like burnt charcoal peppers in oil. Like oysters. Olives. Anchovy butter. Like so much seafood.
But because he loves her, he loves the taste.. the taste of blood, from a war wound, from scar tissue, from mutilation; ohyes he loves it, loves the kowtow, yes he loves the taste.
But not that much. It is time. Now. Yes. Brupt, he rises from the dish, turns her over, flips her white body of flesh. Her small white tidy body. She is so small and so compact, and yet she has all the necessary features...
Shall I compare thee to a Sony Walkman? thou art more compact and more My own Toshiba, dinky little JVC, Oh sweet Aiwa
- Aiwa - She says, being served barbed sea bass between slimy red-peppers-in-olive-oil - Aiwa, aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwaaaaaaaaah
Goodness me. That is superb writing. Also very clever, as Aiwa means Yes. You do hide your light under a bushel
It won the Bad Sex in Fiction award.
Tony Blair was also nominated for that in 2010 (I think it was the same year). He wasn’t terribly pleased about it. Not for the obvious reason, but because the bad sex in question was in his autobiography and he wasn’t amused at being told it was a pack of lies.
I mean it is fine to pay attention to Sumption on say jurisprudence but not so much when it comes to epidemiological issues because of his epistemological problems.
Disagree. I think his wazzockry over covid is so serious it casts doubt on his credibility as lawyer and historian too. He has had a terrible pandemic.
I've been busy enacting our No Deal plans but the rumour doing the rounds in this sector is that Boris Johnson will soon announce I can't believe it isn't an extension to the transition period (probably until 30th of June with the proviso that it can end the moment a deal is agreed.)
The EU are willing to give Boris Johnson cover and spin it as the incompetent EU can't ratify the agreement and blame mutant Covid-19.
With the sweet spot of Covid-19 denier Tory MPs and we get the horn over WTO Brexit Tory MPs Johnson will be like Edward Heath and relying on the votes of Labour MPs to pass his European Communities Act 1972.
If we have to re plan our Brexit stockpile a-fucking-gain I will be livid.
In the TV interviews with these lorry drivers many of them seem to have small kitchen facilities in their lorries. Which kind of makes sense if they are always on the road all day.
Do they have tend to have WC facilities? I wouldn't have thought so.
Apparently they are crapping by their own wheels. Gross. FFS get them some portaloos, food and water. It’s 4000 men, who need somewhere to do their biz. It’s not like organising D-Day
And, as has been pointed out, this is a Covid Emergency waiting to happen, if the bug visits them. THEN we have a real problem
There's been absolutely no festivals this summer. Portaloo companies would love the business ! Is it beyond the wit of the Gov't to organise this, as well as pop up vans to get them all food ?
I saw one excellent suggestion on Twitter. Open a lobster shack. Many of these lorries are full of delicious Scottish seafood, slowly rotting.
Get it out, cook it up, serve it with butter and a bap to the drivers. That will cheer everyone up and the Scottish seafood companies will be paid by HMG. All sorted (apart from the loos)
I am going to have to try lobster when I move close to Peterhead. Never had it
TBH I have always found lobster faintly disappointing, It is pleasant, if cooked properly, but I am not sure why it has this luxurious image.
King Crab is vastly superior: a divine foodstuff. Basic langoustines are generally nicer. Oysters are a much better aphrodisiac. And so on.
Insert. Gratuitous and completely unnecessary restaurant scene.
'She slips off her coat. Imelda is step-by-step taking her clothes off and Hugh's heart is working so fast he feels endangered, overbuzzed, like a student on too much speed. Stuck with his addiction Hugh watches, obsessing, as Imelda undoes buttons, glancing down he wants everything on the menu, he wants so much to take his time and explore it, slowly.
- We better be quick my mum will be home soon
- Sorry? - first course? - you order for both of us
She smiles across at him. Hugh prepares himself, unfolding his dress shirt, cotton soft between fingers. Her eyes fix upon it as he lowers good linen from her view. At the rugby club he is known as huge not Hugh. he motions with a hand; she understands:
- You mean I have to put all of that in my mouth?
You ordered it! Oh God. yes.
Hopeful, wistful, with mouthful of juice, he watches her little hands at work and he waits for as long as he can; but then he can't: now he goes: down to a rose, smelling the scent of St Malo restaurant on a winter's evening, lost in the thick soft furrier’s samples; lost in the young Czarina.
Gagging, enjoying, gagging; Hugh licks through a dish of shell food and considers the fact Imelda is the only woman he enjoys. He considers this: dismisses it. Dangerous, dangerous. Why shoud he enjoy her and no-one else?
Hugh lays off his tongue and considers the taste. It is, he feels, one of those very nearly disgusting lovely tastes that can so easily tip over into compete disgustingness. Like burnt charcoal peppers in oil. Like oysters. Olives. Anchovy butter. Like so much seafood.
But because he loves her, he loves the taste.. the taste of blood, from a war wound, from scar tissue, from mutilation; ohyes he loves it, loves the kowtow, yes he loves the taste.
But not that much. It is time. Now. Yes. Brupt, he rises from the dish, turns her over, flips her white body of flesh. Her small white tidy body. She is so small and so compact, and yet she has all the necessary features...
Shall I compare thee to a Sony Walkman? thou art more compact and more My own Toshiba, dinky little JVC, Oh sweet Aiwa
- Aiwa - She says, being served barbed sea bass between slimy red-peppers-in-olive-oil - Aiwa, aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwaaaaaaaaah
Goodness me. That is superb writing. Also very clever, as Aiwa means Yes. You do hide your light under a bushel
It won the Bad Sex in Fiction award.
Tony Blair was also nominated for that in 2010 (I think it was the same year). He wasn’t terribly pleased about it. Not for the obvious reason, but because the bad sex in question was in his autobiography and he wasn’t amused at being told it was a pack of lies.
Bad Sex in Fiction? But it’s brilliant. Pff! Gaelbhan has been unjustly served by the literary gods.
I see the ridiculous gaslighting continues. The people who are responsible for Brexit are those who voted and/or campaigned for Cameron, Brexit, May and Johnson. No-one else. Brexit is yours, for better or worse. For God's sake, have the guts to own it.
It's pretty silly, indeed raving bonkers, to blame the one person who campaigned vigorously for Remain for Brexit. And also pretty silly to blame those who voted for Theresa May: Brexit had already been decided by then, and if she had had the majority she asked for and needed, she'd have been able to deliver it in the sensible way she was planning, without Labour and other opposition parties helping (and actively voting with) the ERG to torpedo it.
I'll grant you the other two categories.
Cameron's idea of campaigning for Remain was to spend years slagging off the EU to prove he was down with the Eurosceptics, and then bully people into voting for his deal by threatening them with the abyss if they didn't. He's one of the most disastrous Prime Ministers in history.
Poppycock. That's like blaming the solicitor who advises you against a bad purchase for the bad purchase you decide to make.
Cameron remain the best Prime Minister, apart from the very special case of Maggie, for at least a half century, in the sense that he ran the country and the government better than any other PM. It's completely absurd to blame him for decisions made by others - not least, voters.
If people want to make an argument that he should never have permitted the question to be asked, that is one thing, but it really goes too far when every thing that happens as a result of voters doing the opposite of what he said is suggested as his direct responsibility. That's like taking literally the joke of holding Eric Joyce responsible for everything that has occurred since because it led to Corbyn or whatever.
Something called “manifestation” is becoming popular with Gen-Z. Basically, it involves wishing something will happen, very hard, sometimes accompanied by incantation.
I asked a Gen-Z acquaintance to explain and she said because we have fuck all else.
Scott Adams of Dilbert fame is a huge proponent of that.
Last I check the lunatic fruitcake is not a millennial or gen-z
I mean it is fine to pay attention to Sumption on say jurisprudence but not so much when it comes to epidemiological issues because of his epistemological problems.
Disagree. I think his wazzockry over covid is so serious it casts doubt on his credibility as lawyer and historian too. He has had a terrible pandemic.
Fair point.
He's not the only Old Etonian to have a terrible pandemic.
I mean it is fine to pay attention to Sumption on say jurisprudence but not so much when it comes to epidemiological issues because of his epistemological problems.
It does seem unfortunate that he is both sound and persuasive in several fields, but then makes truly basic errors of fact and logic that far less competent laymen are able to avoid on this issue, on which he is a layman himself.
Come back to me in a few weeks, we will regret not taking action now.
Time to lockdown the entirety of England.
I think the regional approach is better. I think that is how many countries have faced this issue. Locking down the entire country because of an outbreak in one area is a bit of overkill.
The Tier system has comprehensively failed. It's time to accept that.
Yet it works in other countries. Shutting down the entire country for an outbreak in one part is not the answer.
It's not an outbreak in one place, it's spreading everywhere.
You have your point of view, I think it's going to come to be a very poor one. We will see.
Then that argues for an adjustment to the restrictions in each region. It doesn't mean one size fits all.
I think a regional approach simply doesn't work, as I said, we will see.
The regional approach worked ok in Scotland. The problem is that the increased transmissibility of the new virus renders anything below tier 4 insufficient to keep R below 1, so I agree it needs to be tier 4 everywhere now.
And the jury is out on whether tier 4 is enough. Good job it will effectively be tier 5 for the next couple weeks due to the school holidays. God help us if that's not enough.
My amateur hunch, from reading the various expert views, is that Tier 4/5 will not be enough. Supercovid is that bad. I fervently pray I am wrong.
If I am right we are in for a horrific winter, until the vaccines really start to kick in, around March/April, when a significant proportion of the country will be invulnerable and the virus will find it harder and harder to spread
Um. Supercovid can't leap through walls.
If we all stay at home it can't spread.
The higher R is largely down to a longer asymptomatic period.
It hasn't grown legs.
But that’s exactly it. The only answer is Ultra-lockdown, a la Wuhan, where you weld everyone into their homes for several months. Is that do-able in a western democracy? I guess it will have to be, if it’s the only choice.
But wow. You can see why any politician - of any flavour - would be reluctant to go down that road.
That's impossible. I would suggest that the end state would be a lockdown almost the same as that in March and April, where people are allowed out of their homes only for work (if it can't be done from home,) for essential shopping, to attend medical appointments and for exercise. The main difference being that, now we've established that outdoor settings are very much safer than indoors, and that (socially distanced) outdoor exercise is good for physical and mental health, people should be encouraged to do as much of that as possible - crap weather allowing - and that should include shielders, who previously were effectively welded up inside their homes. And education must go back online, except for the relatively small numbers of children who could still be sent to school under the arrangements in force last Spring.
If that's not sufficient to stop the thing in its tracks, or at least slow it down enough to limit the damage whilst we race to get the vaccinations completed, then we're stuffed.
Lockdown 1 - in the Spring - got R down to 0.8. If the pessimistic take on Supercovid is correct, and the new variant increases R by 0.4-0.9 (and likely nearer 0.9) your lockdown would not be enough. Plenty of key workers would still have to leave home (we are not all lawyers or bankers) they would get infected, they will then hit the hospitals, and the health system crashes.
As I say, let’s hope the pessimistic take is very wrong.
The big difference between now and last March is the vaccines. Hopefully AstraZeneca willl be approved just after Xmas. That releases millions of jabs, and will offer real cause for cautious and guarded optimism
I was under the impression that the estimate was an increase in R0. That is, from 3 to 3.4-3.9.
If the spring lockdown reduced R from 3 to 0.8, then it reduced it by a factor of 3.75.
I see the ridiculous gaslighting continues. The people who are responsible for Brexit are those who voted and/or campaigned for Cameron, Brexit, May and Johnson. No-one else. Brexit is yours, for better or worse. For God's sake, have the guts to own it.
It's pretty silly, indeed raving bonkers, to blame the one person who campaigned vigorously for Remain for Brexit. And also pretty silly to blame those who voted for Theresa May: Brexit had already been decided by then, and if she had had the majority she asked for and needed, she'd have been able to deliver it in the sensible way she was planning, without Labour and other opposition parties helping (and actively voting with) the ERG to torpedo it.
I'll grant you the other two categories.
Cameron's idea of campaigning for Remain was to spend years slagging off the EU to prove he was down with the Eurosceptics, and then bully people into voting for his deal by threatening them with the abyss if they didn't. He's one of the most disastrous Prime Ministers in history.
Poppycock. That's like blaming the solicitor who advises you against a bad purchase for the bad purchase you decide to make.
Cameron remain the best Prime Minister, apart from the very special case of Maggie, for at least a half century, in the sense that he ran the country and the government better than any other PM. It's completely absurd to blame him for decisions made by others - not least, voters.
I see the ridiculous gaslighting continues. The people who are responsible for Brexit are those who voted and/or campaigned for Cameron, Brexit, May and Johnson. No-one else. Brexit is yours, for better or worse. For God's sake, have the guts to own it.
It's pretty silly, indeed raving bonkers, to blame the one person who campaigned vigorously for Remain for Brexit. And also pretty silly to blame those who voted for Theresa May: Brexit had already been decided by then, and if she had had the majority she asked for and needed, she'd have been able to deliver it in the sensible way she was planning, without Labour and other opposition parties helping (and actively voting with) the ERG to torpedo it.
I'll grant you the other two categories.
Cameron's idea of campaigning for Remain was to spend years slagging off the EU to prove he was down with the Eurosceptics, and then bully people into voting for his deal by threatening them with the abyss if they didn't. He's one of the most disastrous Prime Ministers in history.
Poppycock. That's like blaming the solicitor who advises you against a bad purchase for the bad purchase you decide to make.
Cameron remain the best Prime Minister, apart from the very special case of Maggie, for at least a half century, in the sense that he ran the country and the government better than any other PM. It's completely absurd to blame him for decisions made by others - not least, voters.
Something called “manifestation” is becoming popular with Gen-Z. Basically, it involves wishing something will happen, very hard, sometimes accompanied by incantation.
I asked a Gen-Z acquaintance to explain and she said because we have fuck all else.
Rampant asset price inflation has severely hampered the chances of my generation unless they're:
a) earning 100k+/pa per household b) run a business c) have family money d) live in Brum or further north.
I can see it in my own circle. Two of us fall into category b), several are a) (Docs, Lawyers or consultants), the rest.
Covid cash injections are only helping those of us in b), but those in a) seem to have steady jobs.
The problem is scarily misunderstood by complacent over 50s. I believe the current generation of under 25s (or maybe even 30s) will be the first to be poorer than their parents since the Industrial Revolution.
Covid adds further pain. Unemployment heavily skews young.
I expect the current government to do nothing, indeed to make it worse.
If anything it looks like an outlier. Nothing much has changed in the last month or so to warrant such a shift.
Not really - people just gave him six months to prove himself. Evidently, he failed.
And he’s still polling better than Boris Johnson on best PM despite (a) not being seen as Prime Ministerial and (b) not being Prime Minister.
So just how shit is your guy?
He's so shit that Labour can't hold a polling lead over the party he leads during the worst domestic crisis for a hundred years, despite unlimited opportunities to criticize without needing to take any responsibility.
I should think that secretly MPs not on the government payroll will be happy if they have so little time to give to it. Any problems with it they can blame on their ministerial colleagues. Party staffers will put together bullet points for each side, more time wouldn't change any minds.
Let's be honest, most of them were never going to read the damn thing anyway, and may not have gotten much from it if they did. I read most of May's WA, and it's so packed with legalese and reference to other legal protocols it's incomprehensible to non experts I'd bet, which includes most MPs.
Old people like to imply that it has always been this way. It helps them hold onto their wealth. I'm fairly right wing but I'd be 100% in favour of rinsing defined benefit pension holders with windfall taxes.
But Grant Shapps told us last night that the number was in the low hundreds, and indeed we were of course prepared for this kind of thing due to our “transition planning”.
I mean it is fine to pay attention to Sumption on say jurisprudence but not so much when it comes to epidemiological issues because of his epistemological problems.
It does seem unfortunate that he is both sound and persuasive in several fields, but then makes truly basic errors of fact and logic that far less competent laymen are able to avoid on this issue, on which he is a layman himself.
Very common though. For example, while I gather he’s a more than competent biological theorist, anything Richard Dawkins says on history should be automatically assumed to be wrong. It saves time and has the same result.
If anything it looks like an outlier. Nothing much has changed in the last month or so to warrant such a shift.
Could be that Tories delight in hearing Johnson jeer at and mock Starmer? Thus does Starmer getsto be judged not on his merits but on what Johnson makes people think are his demerits. And then these Tories can always say that it was only because there was this new variant of the virus that Johnson came to do what he'd mocked Starmer for "wanting". (The truth was (a) that Starmer didn't want it, but thought it best, and (b) 3 weeks of sharply rising infection rates in some localities, however they might be explained, sufficed to show that the Xmas plans had to be scrapped.)
I wonder if it is easier to estimate lorry numbers than crowd numbers, since whenever you get a big march or whatever estimates seem to run from tens to hundreds of thousands depending on who is stating it.
If anything it looks like an outlier. Nothing much has changed in the last month or so to warrant such a shift.
Not really - people just gave him six months to prove himself. Evidently, he failed.
And he’s still polling better than Boris Johnson on best PM despite (a) not being seen as Prime Ministerial and (b) not being Prime Minister.
So just how shit is your guy?
He's so shit that Labour can't hold a polling lead over the party he leads during the worst domestic crisis for a hundred years, despite unlimited opportunities to criticize without needing to take any responsibility.
So not all that shit, as it turns out.
Labour polled ahead of the Tories 2010-15.
Miliband trailed Cameron as best leader.
So it’s obvious that it’s the party rating and not the leadership rating that matters, as Ed Miliband’s victory in 2015 demon...hang on,
I should think that secretly MPs not on the government payroll will be happy if they have so little time to give to it. Any problems with it they can blame on their ministerial colleagues. Party staffers will put together bullet points for each side, more time wouldn't change any minds.
Let's be honest, most of them were never going to read the damn thing anyway, and may not have gotten much from it if they did. I read most of May's WA, and it's so packed with legalese and reference to other legal protocols it's incomprehensible to non experts I'd bet, which includes most MPs.
Plus so long as there's a termination clause (which there wasn't for May's backstop) it doesn't matter as much if you discover something you dislike down the line ... You can serve notice you're terminating the agreement if you wish to do so, and or renegotiate it.
In the TV interviews with these lorry drivers many of them seem to have small kitchen facilities in their lorries. Which kind of makes sense if they are always on the road all day.
Do they have tend to have WC facilities? I wouldn't have thought so.
Apparently they are crapping by their own wheels. Gross. FFS get them some portaloos, food and water. It’s 4000 men, who need somewhere to do their biz. It’s not like organising D-Day
And, as has been pointed out, this is a Covid Emergency waiting to happen, if the bug visits them. THEN we have a real problem
There's been absolutely no festivals this summer. Portaloo companies would love the business ! Is it beyond the wit of the Gov't to organise this, as well as pop up vans to get them all food ?
I saw one excellent suggestion on Twitter. Open a lobster shack. Many of these lorries are full of delicious Scottish seafood, slowly rotting.
Get it out, cook it up, serve it with butter and a bap to the drivers. That will cheer everyone up and the Scottish seafood companies will be paid by HMG. All sorted (apart from the loos)
I am going to have to try lobster when I move close to Peterhead. Never had it
TBH I have always found lobster faintly disappointing, It is pleasant, if cooked properly, but I am not sure why it has this luxurious image.
King Crab is vastly superior: a divine foodstuff. Basic langoustines are generally nicer. Oysters are a much better aphrodisiac. And so on.
Insert. Gratuitous and completely unnecessary restaurant scene.
'She slips off her coat. Imelda is step-by-step taking her clothes off and Hugh's heart is working so fast he feels endangered, overbuzzed, like a student on too much speed. Stuck with his addiction Hugh watches, obsessing, as Imelda undoes buttons, glancing down he wants everything on the menu, he wants so much to take his time and explore it, slowly.
- We better be quick my mum will be home soon
- Sorry? - first course? - you order for both of us
She smiles across at him. Hugh prepares himself, unfolding his dress shirt, cotton soft between fingers. Her eyes fix upon it as he lowers good linen from her view. At the rugby club he is known as huge not Hugh. he motions with a hand; she understands:
- You mean I have to put all of that in my mouth?
You ordered it! Oh God. yes.
Hopeful, wistful, with mouthful of juice, he watches her little hands at work and he waits for as long as he can; but then he can't: now he goes: down to a rose, smelling the scent of St Malo restaurant on a winter's evening, lost in the thick soft furrier’s samples; lost in the young Czarina.
Gagging, enjoying, gagging; Hugh licks through a dish of shell food and considers the fact Imelda is the only woman he enjoys. He considers this: dismisses it. Dangerous, dangerous. Why shoud he enjoy her and no-one else?
Hugh lays off his tongue and considers the taste. It is, he feels, one of those very nearly disgusting lovely tastes that can so easily tip over into compete disgustingness. Like burnt charcoal peppers in oil. Like oysters. Olives. Anchovy butter. Like so much seafood.
But because he loves her, he loves the taste.. the taste of blood, from a war wound, from scar tissue, from mutilation; ohyes he loves it, loves the kowtow, yes he loves the taste.
But not that much. It is time. Now. Yes. Brupt, he rises from the dish, turns her over, flips her white body of flesh. Her small white tidy body. She is so small and so compact, and yet she has all the necessary features...
Shall I compare thee to a Sony Walkman? thou art more compact and more My own Toshiba, dinky little JVC, Oh sweet Aiwa
- Aiwa - She says, being served barbed sea bass between slimy red-peppers-in-olive-oil - Aiwa, aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwaaaaaaaaah
Goodness me. That is superb writing. Also very clever, as Aiwa means Yes. You do hide your light under a bushel
Thanks 😂
Someone once said, all texts are woven from other texts.
Maybe some things are better when not so obvious, subtle more, hidden behind another meaning?
Something called “manifestation” is becoming popular with Gen-Z. Basically, it involves wishing something will happen, very hard, sometimes accompanied by incantation.
I asked a Gen-Z acquaintance to explain and she said because we have fuck all else.
Rampant asset price inflation has severely hampered the chances of my generation unless they're:
a) earning 100k+/pa per household b) run a business c) have family money d) live in Brum or further north.
I can see it in my own circle. Two of us fall into category b), several are a) (Docs, Lawyers or consultants), the rest.
Covid cash injections are only helping those of us in b), but those in a) seem to have steady jobs.
The problem is scarily misunderstood by complacent over 50s. I believe the current generation of under 25s (or maybe even 30s) will be the first to be poorer than their parents since the Industrial Revolution.
It was true for the generation that grew up in the early 1500s. Hence all the ‘peasants’ revolts of that era. Which mostly comprised what we would call middle class people, peasants being too busy to walk all the way to London to have their heads put on a pole.
Tony Connelly's Twitter thread doesn't suggest an imminent deal to me. Lots of gaps on fundamental issues.
What the f*ck have they been doing every time they tell us progress was being made even as gaps remained? Even incremental progress should mean there are not that many gaps on fundamental issues remaining, so they really have spent most of the year play acting for the cameras.
The various schemes have already been extended until the end of the financial year. And he's been busy on his twitter feed.
Nevertheless, he was definitely getting more attention even than a Chancellor would normally get for making announcements. I wouldn't be surprised if he was told to dial it back, as certain people did not like him getting the attention.
Tony Connelly's Twitter thread doesn't suggest an imminent deal to me. Lots of gaps on fundamental issues.
What the f*ck have they been doing every time they tell us progress was being made even as gaps remained? Even incremental progress should mean there are not that many gaps on fundamental issues remaining, so they really have spent most of the year play acting for the cameras.
Or they have closed most of the gaps but now want to give cover for the idea of an extension.
Old people like to imply that it has always been this way. It helps them hold onto their wealth. I'm fairly right wing but I'd be 100% in favour of rinsing defined benefit pension holders with windfall taxes.
Do you have a DB pension?
I do, and I took a lower salary and gave up job opportunities to keep it. Why should I be penalised now?
OTOH, I'd think it perfectly fair to equalise the tax system and take NI contributions on unearned income and pensions (including mine).
The final deadline is and always has been 22:59 on the day. If a deal is agreed then there will just be an interim agreement to keep things going for a few days/weeks.
The Brexit deal will be announced this Thursday early in the afternoon. I say that on basis it’s optimal moment for little scrutiny and quick rubber stamp.
Hmm. The first Christmas ghost is not traditionally due to arrive until 1am, so midnight on Brussells time, so it might not be until Xmas day itself that a revelation is had.
Tony Connelly's Twitter thread doesn't suggest an imminent deal to me. Lots of gaps on fundamental issues.
What the f*ck have they been doing every time they tell us progress was being made even as gaps remained? Even incremental progress should mean there are not that many gaps on fundamental issues remaining, so they really have spent most of the year play acting for the cameras.
I'm not sure what FF43 is basing his claim of "lots of gaps on fundamental issues" on. The tweet mentions fishing, and then what look like three rather minor areas.
If anything it looks like an outlier. Nothing much has changed in the last month or so to warrant such a shift.
Not really - people just gave him six months to prove himself. Evidently, he failed.
And he’s still polling better than Boris Johnson on best PM despite (a) not being seen as Prime Ministerial and (b) not being Prime Minister.
So just how shit is your guy?
He's so shit that Labour can't hold a polling lead over the party he leads during the worst domestic crisis for a hundred years, despite unlimited opportunities to criticize without needing to take any responsibility.
So not all that shit, as it turns out.
Labour polled ahead of the Tories 2010-15.
Miliband trailed Cameron as best leader.
So it’s obvious that it’s the party rating and not the leadership rating that matters, as Ed Miliband’s victory in 2015 demon...hang on,
Weren't the 2010-2015 polls widely believed to have been wrong
Tony Connelly's Twitter thread doesn't suggest an imminent deal to me. Lots of gaps on fundamental issues.
What the f*ck have they been doing every time they tell us progress was being made even as gaps remained? Even incremental progress should mean there are not that many gaps on fundamental issues remaining, so they really have spent most of the year play acting for the cameras.
I'm not sure what FF43 is basing his claim of "lots of gaps on fundamental issues" on. The tweet mentions fishing, and then what look like three rather minor areas.
Indeed. We are not going to No Deal because of rules of origin for batteries.
Come back to me in a few weeks, we will regret not taking action now.
Time to lockdown the entirety of England.
I think the regional approach is better. I think that is how many countries have faced this issue. Locking down the entire country because of an outbreak in one area is a bit of overkill.
The Tier system has comprehensively failed. It's time to accept that.
Yet it works in other countries. Shutting down the entire country for an outbreak in one part is not the answer.
It's not an outbreak in one place, it's spreading everywhere.
You have your point of view, I think it's going to come to be a very poor one. We will see.
Then that argues for an adjustment to the restrictions in each region. It doesn't mean one size fits all.
I think a regional approach simply doesn't work, as I said, we will see.
The regional approach worked ok in Scotland. The problem is that the increased transmissibility of the new virus renders anything below tier 4 insufficient to keep R below 1, so I agree it needs to be tier 4 everywhere now.
And the jury is out on whether tier 4 is enough. Good job it will effectively be tier 5 for the next couple weeks due to the school holidays. God help us if that's not enough.
My amateur hunch, from reading the various expert views, is that Tier 4/5 will not be enough. Supercovid is that bad. I fervently pray I am wrong.
If I am right we are in for a horrific winter, until the vaccines really start to kick in, around March/April, when a significant proportion of the country will be invulnerable and the virus will find it harder and harder to spread
Um. Supercovid can't leap through walls.
If we all stay at home it can't spread.
The higher R is largely down to a longer asymptomatic period.
It hasn't grown legs.
But that’s exactly it. The only answer is Ultra-lockdown, a la Wuhan, where you weld everyone into their homes for several months. Is that do-able in a western democracy? I guess it will have to be, if it’s the only choice.
But wow. You can see why any politician - of any flavour - would be reluctant to go down that road.
That's impossible. I would suggest that the end state would be a lockdown almost the same as that in March and April, where people are allowed out of their homes only for work (if it can't be done from home,) for essential shopping, to attend medical appointments and for exercise. The main difference being that, now we've established that outdoor settings are very much safer than indoors, and that (socially distanced) outdoor exercise is good for physical and mental health, people should be encouraged to do as much of that as possible - crap weather allowing - and that should include shielders, who previously were effectively welded up inside their homes. And education must go back online, except for the relatively small numbers of children who could still be sent to school under the arrangements in force last Spring.
If that's not sufficient to stop the thing in its tracks, or at least slow it down enough to limit the damage whilst we race to get the vaccinations completed, then we're stuffed.
Lockdown 1 - in the Spring - got R down to 0.8. If the pessimistic take on Supercovid is correct, and the new variant increases R by 0.4-0.9 (and likely nearer 0.9) your lockdown would not be enough. Plenty of key workers would still have to leave home (we are not all lawyers or bankers) they would get infected, they will then hit the hospitals, and the health system crashes.
As I say, let’s hope the pessimistic take is very wrong.
The big difference between now and last March is the vaccines. Hopefully AstraZeneca willl be approved just after Xmas. That releases millions of jabs, and will offer real cause for cautious and guarded optimism
I was under the impression that the estimate was an increase in R0. That is, from 3 to 3.4-3.9.
If the spring lockdown reduced R from 3 to 0.8, then it reduced it by a factor of 3.75.
I see the ridiculous gaslighting continues. The people who are responsible for Brexit are those who voted and/or campaigned for Cameron, Brexit, May and Johnson. No-one else. Brexit is yours, for better or worse. For God's sake, have the guts to own it.
It's pretty silly, indeed raving bonkers, to blame the one person who campaigned vigorously for Remain for Brexit. And also pretty silly to blame those who voted for Theresa May: Brexit had already been decided by then, and if she had had the majority she asked for and needed, she'd have been able to deliver it in the sensible way she was planning, without Labour and other opposition parties helping (and actively voting with) the ERG to torpedo it.
I'll grant you the other two categories.
Cameron's idea of campaigning for Remain was to spend years slagging off the EU to prove he was down with the Eurosceptics, and then bully people into voting for his deal by threatening them with the abyss if they didn't. He's one of the most disastrous Prime Ministers in history.
Poppycock. That's like blaming the solicitor who advises you against a bad purchase for the bad purchase you decide to make.
Cameron remain the best Prime Minister, apart from the very special case of Maggie, for at least a half century, in the sense that he ran the country and the government better than any other PM. It's completely absurd to blame him for decisions made by others - not least, voters.
If people want to make an argument that he should never have permitted the question to be asked, that is one thing, but it really goes too far when every thing that happens as a result of voters doing the opposite of what he said is suggested as his direct responsibility. That's like taking literally the joke of holding Eric Joyce responsible for everything that has occurred since because it led to Corbyn or whatever.
I agree with you to a certain extent. I think that there are two problems though.
The first is that it was his failure to secure meaningful reform of the British relationship with the EU that led to the Leave vote.
The second is that he refused to make any preparation for the possibility of a Leave vote and then as soon as it happened he walked away as if it were nothing to do with him.
I actually like Cameron both as a person and generally as a PM. He did a couple of very important things, not least Gay Marriage. But it is simply not realistic to claim that he was not responsible at least in part for both the referendum result (though of course I was glad of that) and its aftermath.
Entirely the fault of the French, who are in a panic about importing the thing when they've probably already got it - it's just that they are incapable of looking for it. Fascinating titbit I just picked up from the BBC website:
Prof Tom Connor, who was involved in setting up Covid sequencing in Wales, believes it is "probable" that similar variants are emerging around the world, but they may not have been detected yet.
"We are sequencing in the UK at a disproportionate rate," he said, insisting the UK has a better surveillance system than other countries.
In order to know how far the variant has travelled or where it came from, you would need to compare notes with other countries - but comparable data very often does not exist, Prof Connor said.
For example, Public Health Wales sequenced about 4,000 genomes in the past week, more than the whole of France since the beginning of the pandemic.
The problem is not just asset price inflation. The tax system has entrenched inequality and the rungs of the ladder are further apart than they used to be.
If anything it looks like an outlier. Nothing much has changed in the last month or so to warrant such a shift.
Not really - people just gave him six months to prove himself. Evidently, he failed.
And he’s still polling better than Boris Johnson on best PM despite (a) not being seen as Prime Ministerial and (b) not being Prime Minister.
So just how shit is your guy?
He's so shit that Labour can't hold a polling lead over the party he leads during the worst domestic crisis for a hundred years, despite unlimited opportunities to criticize without needing to take any responsibility.
So not all that shit, as it turns out.
Labour polled ahead of the Tories 2010-15.
Miliband trailed Cameron as best leader.
So it’s obvious that it’s the party rating and not the leadership rating that matters, as Ed Miliband’s victory in 2015 demon...hang on,
Thank god we rejected that coalition of Chaos under Ed Miliband, and opted for the steady as she goes approach of the Conservatives!
Come back to me in a few weeks, we will regret not taking action now.
Time to lockdown the entirety of England.
I think the regional approach is better. I think that is how many countries have faced this issue. Locking down the entire country because of an outbreak in one area is a bit of overkill.
The Tier system has comprehensively failed. It's time to accept that.
Yet it works in other countries. Shutting down the entire country for an outbreak in one part is not the answer.
It's not an outbreak in one place, it's spreading everywhere.
You have your point of view, I think it's going to come to be a very poor one. We will see.
Then that argues for an adjustment to the restrictions in each region. It doesn't mean one size fits all.
I think a regional approach simply doesn't work, as I said, we will see.
The regional approach worked ok in Scotland. The problem is that the increased transmissibility of the new virus renders anything below tier 4 insufficient to keep R below 1, so I agree it needs to be tier 4 everywhere now.
And the jury is out on whether tier 4 is enough. Good job it will effectively be tier 5 for the next couple weeks due to the school holidays. God help us if that's not enough.
My amateur hunch, from reading the various expert views, is that Tier 4/5 will not be enough. Supercovid is that bad. I fervently pray I am wrong.
If I am right we are in for a horrific winter, until the vaccines really start to kick in, around March/April, when a significant proportion of the country will be invulnerable and the virus will find it harder and harder to spread
Um. Supercovid can't leap through walls.
If we all stay at home it can't spread.
The higher R is largely down to a longer asymptomatic period.
It hasn't grown legs.
But that’s exactly it. The only answer is Ultra-lockdown, a la Wuhan, where you weld everyone into their homes for several months. Is that do-able in a western democracy? I guess it will have to be, if it’s the only choice.
But wow. You can see why any politician - of any flavour - would be reluctant to go down that road.
That's impossible. I would suggest that the end state would be a lockdown almost the same as that in March and April, where people are allowed out of their homes only for work (if it can't be done from home,) for essential shopping, to attend medical appointments and for exercise. The main difference being that, now we've established that outdoor settings are very much safer than indoors, and that (socially distanced) outdoor exercise is good for physical and mental health, people should be encouraged to do as much of that as possible - crap weather allowing - and that should include shielders, who previously were effectively welded up inside their homes. And education must go back online, except for the relatively small numbers of children who could still be sent to school under the arrangements in force last Spring.
If that's not sufficient to stop the thing in its tracks, or at least slow it down enough to limit the damage whilst we race to get the vaccinations completed, then we're stuffed.
Lockdown 1 - in the Spring - got R down to 0.8. If the pessimistic take on Supercovid is correct, and the new variant increases R by 0.4-0.9 (and likely nearer 0.9) your lockdown would not be enough. Plenty of key workers would still have to leave home (we are not all lawyers or bankers) they would get infected, they will then hit the hospitals, and the health system crashes.
As I say, let’s hope the pessimistic take is very wrong.
The big difference between now and last March is the vaccines. Hopefully AstraZeneca willl be approved just after Xmas. That releases millions of jabs, and will offer real cause for cautious and guarded optimism
I was under the impression that the estimate was an increase in R0. That is, from 3 to 3.4-3.9.
If the spring lockdown reduced R from 3 to 0.8, then it reduced it by a factor of 3.75.
That equates to 0.90-1.04.
That’s doable.
DID the Spring lockdown reduce R from 3 to 0.8?
Genuine Q. I have no idea
That was the sort of figure suggested in early summer.
That’s yesterday’s story. Talented journalists are now on case that lorry’s aren’t being released out into it, and what that means for incoming and outgoing to U.K.
Also of course, are we seeing much reporting from other side of channel? Presumably similar issues?
I mean it is fine to pay attention to Sumption on say jurisprudence but not so much when it comes to epidemiological issues because of his epistemological problems.
It does seem unfortunate that he is both sound and persuasive in several fields, but then makes truly basic errors of fact and logic that far less competent laymen are able to avoid on this issue, on which he is a layman himself.
Very common though. For example, while I gather he’s a more than competent biological theorist, anything Richard Dawkins says on history should be automatically assumed to be wrong. It saves time and has the same result.
People love the idea of a renaissance man. I think even then we can be forgivable where a very bright person in one field makes some slip ups when talking about another - it's when they stick stupidly to their guns even when it is pointed out they are wrong, in a way that would drive them nuts when people discussed their own fields, that is infuriating.
For some reason it makes me think of how Stargate SG-1 showed us for instance that the assumption that Doctor always means a physician is a galaxy wide phenomenom, when Dr Jackson had to patiently explain that he was a Doctor of Archaeology.
This joker was wanting Wenger out when we were finishing third in the league. I think he was anti-Emery, but felt he should show he can back a manager so is still backing Arteta.
The problem is not just asset price inflation. The tax system has entrenched inequality and the rungs of the ladder are further apart than they used to be.
Until the young start turning out for elections they are more fucked than a TSE metaphor.
I see the ridiculous gaslighting continues. The people who are responsible for Brexit are those who voted and/or campaigned for Cameron, Brexit, May and Johnson. No-one else. Brexit is yours, for better or worse. For God's sake, have the guts to own it.
It's pretty silly, indeed raving bonkers, to blame the one person who campaigned vigorously for Remain for Brexit. And also pretty silly to blame those who voted for Theresa May: Brexit had already been decided by then, and if she had had the majority she asked for and needed, she'd have been able to deliver it in the sensible way she was planning, without Labour and other opposition parties helping (and actively voting with) the ERG to torpedo it.
I'll grant you the other two categories.
Cameron's idea of campaigning for Remain was to spend years slagging off the EU to prove he was down with the Eurosceptics, and then bully people into voting for his deal by threatening them with the abyss if they didn't. He's one of the most disastrous Prime Ministers in history.
Poppycock. That's like blaming the solicitor who advises you against a bad purchase for the bad purchase you decide to make.
Cameron remain the best Prime Minister, apart from the very special case of Maggie, for at least a half century, in the sense that he ran the country and the government better than any other PM. It's completely absurd to blame him for decisions made by others - not least, voters.
If people want to make an argument that he should never have permitted the question to be asked, that is one thing, but it really goes too far when every thing that happens as a result of voters doing the opposite of what he said is suggested as his direct responsibility. That's like taking literally the joke of holding Eric Joyce responsible for everything that has occurred since because it led to Corbyn or whatever.
I agree with you to a certain extent. I think that there are two problems though.
The first is that it was his failure to secure meaningful reform of the British relationship with the EU that led to the Leave vote.
The second is that he refused to make any preparation for the possibility of a Leave vote and then as soon as it happened he walked away as if it were nothing to do with him.
I actually like Cameron both as a person and generally as a PM. He did a couple of very important things, not least Gay Marriage. But it is simply not realistic to claim that he was not responsible at least in part for both the referendum result (though of course I was glad of that) and its aftermath.
That's fair, and I suspect historical analysis even when very clear eyed will not look kindly on it or him from that point of view. But let us be real here, a lot of the 'Worst PM EVAR' takes on the internet are pretty much purely to do with the fact that Brexit happened, not some assessment about his failings leading up to the event. It's emotional, not analytical.
Old people like to imply that it has always been this way. It helps them hold onto their wealth. I'm fairly right wing but I'd be 100% in favour of rinsing defined benefit pension holders with windfall taxes.
Do you have a DB pension?
I do, and I took a lower salary and gave up job opportunities to keep it. Why should I be penalised now?
OTOH, I'd think it perfectly fair to equalise the tax system and take NI contributions on unearned income and pensions (including mine).
Excactly so. When I got a job in the public sector I looked into the matter. It was made quite clear to me that the lower pay was to compensate for the presence of a DB pension, and indeed I found out that it was formalised by review panels. Swings and roundabouts. The private sector has fucked up big time, so now they want us screwed as well to camouflage it?
And that 'but' in MaxPB's should be 'therefore', no?
But I agree it's difficult to defend the failurte to reform NI. Also outrageous to give special allowances for bank savings, dividends, and land rental and so on. All, together with the IHT changes, tending to pander to middle-aged and older, often pensioner, better off, people with coinventional families who [edit] are owner-occupiers in expensive houses, ergo mainly in the SE. Demography remind you of any particular party?
Tony Connelly's Twitter thread doesn't suggest an imminent deal to me. Lots of gaps on fundamental issues.
What the f*ck have they been doing every time they tell us progress was being made even as gaps remained? Even incremental progress should mean there are not that many gaps on fundamental issues remaining, so they really have spent most of the year play acting for the cameras.
I'm not sure what FF43 is basing his claim of "lots of gaps on fundamental issues" on. The tweet mentions fishing, and then what look like three rather minor areas.
Fishing and non-discrimination between treatment of EU member states for visas are fundamental issues of principle for the EU. This thread is from an EU perspective but it implies that the UK has issues over permanent commitments (ie need for "sunset clauses")
I sincerely hope Starmer is biding his time. But it doesn’t look like it.
Depressing.
Starmer has a real problem with presentation. I reckon he’s clever at politics and policy, and is a strategic thinker. He’s put Labour in a much better place, already, when it comes to the culture wars, devolution, patriotism, Brexit, and so on. And he’s kept mostly everyone on board.
Trouble is he has good words to say, but he can’t say them. Jesus effing Christ he’s boring. He’s like a talking coffin lid on TV. You could give him the best joke in the world and he would deliver it like a boiler repairman describing your minor boiler problems.
And the more people see this, the less interested they are. They’d rather watch Boris being an idiot with amusingly mad hair. In an age of limited attention spans and 3 second opinion-formations, based on tweets and YouTube, this really matters. I don’t see how it is solvable. This is what Starmer is.
This joker was wanting Wenger out when we were finishing third in the league. I think he was anti-Emery, but felt he should show he can back a manager so is still backing Arteta.
Sorry, not sorry.
To be honest I think some of the Arsenal fandom could do with a good look at themselves.
For this vantage point AFTV seem happier when Arsenal are doing bad as it generates more views and thus more income.
Tony Connelly's Twitter thread doesn't suggest an imminent deal to me. Lots of gaps on fundamental issues.
What the f*ck have they been doing every time they tell us progress was being made even as gaps remained? Even incremental progress should mean there are not that many gaps on fundamental issues remaining, so they really have spent most of the year play acting for the cameras.
To be fair, most FTAs are negotiated over a period of years, not a few weeks.
Old people like to imply that it has always been this way. It helps them hold onto their wealth. I'm fairly right wing but I'd be 100% in favour of rinsing defined benefit pension holders with windfall taxes.
Do you have a DB pension?
I do, and I took a lower salary and gave up job opportunities to keep it. Why should I be penalised now?
OTOH, I'd think it perfectly fair to equalise the tax system and take NI contributions on unearned income and pensions (including mine).
No, your generation pulled up the ladder same as property.
I'd obviously do it for larger income pots rather than everyone but it's time to target older people who have benefited time and again from pulling the ladder up. You personally might not have been responsible but fair is fair.
Tony Connelly's Twitter thread doesn't suggest an imminent deal to me. Lots of gaps on fundamental issues.
What the f*ck have they been doing every time they tell us progress was being made even as gaps remained? Even incremental progress should mean there are not that many gaps on fundamental issues remaining, so they really have spent most of the year play acting for the cameras.
I'm not sure what FF43 is basing his claim of "lots of gaps on fundamental issues" on. The tweet mentions fishing, and then what look like three rather minor areas.
Fishing and non-discrimination between treatment of EU member states for visas are fundamental issues of principle for the EU. This thread is from an EU perspective but it implies that the UK has issues over permanent commitments (ie need for "sunset clauses")
Treating EU citizens equally is easy, with probably the exception of Ireland given the common travel area. I find it extremely hard to believe this will be a significant sticking point. Still, not lots of gaps, just a couple.
Comments
I mean it is fine to pay attention to Sumption on say jurisprudence but not so much when it comes to epidemiological issues because of his epistemological problems.
Downing Street press conferences yawn with practiced uncertainty and platitudes. Exhausted scientific advisers seem to struggle to keep up with nature, now on a year-long hedonistic rip across humanity. And their advice is, it seems, only selectively applied by a stricken prime minister with increasingly tousled hair, whose increasingly tousled hair is unable to keep up with emulating the chaos he's presiding over.
It's quite possible that the new coronavirus variant is already in many other countries, and the UK's formidable genetic sequencing industry simply found it first. But 2020 has not left Boris Johnson with any authority chips to play. His warning was not accompanied by hard-won gravity earned by months of responsible behavior. Instead, the world took the UK seriously as we were, for the first time, not divided or unsure about something. Even Boris Johnson had to pay attention to it. What this new clarity has not given us -- as the holidays settle like unwelcome, deep new snow -- is any certainty as to when the simmering panic, or the current lockdown, or these short, dark days will end.
https://twitter.com/RBReich/status/1341491616922521600?s=19
I asked a Gen-Z acquaintance to explain and she said because we have fuck all else.
https://twitter.com/LeftieStats/status/1341387020384538624
a) earning 100k+/pa per household
b) run a business
c) have family money
d) live in Brum or further north.
I can see it in my own circle. Two of us fall into category b), several are a) (Docs, Lawyers or consultants), the rest struggle to buy any assets at all.
Covid cash injections are only helping those of us in b), but those in a) seem to have steady jobs.
Asking for a friend.
Tony Blair was also nominated for that in 2010 (I think it was the same year). He wasn’t terribly pleased about it. Not for the obvious reason, but because the bad sex in question was in his autobiography and he wasn’t amused at being told it was a pack of lies.
So just how shit is your guy?
But shouldn't this one be called Covid-20?
(Plus, we'll have room for Covid-21 in a couple of weeks.)
Last I check the lunatic fruitcake is not a millennial or gen-z
He's not the only Old Etonian to have a terrible pandemic.
That is, from 3 to 3.4-3.9.
If the spring lockdown reduced R from 3 to 0.8, then it reduced it by a factor of 3.75.
That equates to 0.90-1.04.
That’s doable.
Cameron best Prime Minister. Haha.
Hahaha, hahahahahahah....
Very funny. 🤣
https://twitter.com/Independent/status/1341496284092489730?s=20
Covid adds further pain. Unemployment heavily skews young.
I expect the current government to do nothing, indeed to make it worse.
So not all that shit, as it turns out.
Let's be honest, most of them were never going to read the damn thing anyway, and may not have gotten much from it if they did. I read most of May's WA, and it's so packed with legalese and reference to other legal protocols it's incomprehensible to non experts I'd bet, which includes most MPs.
And then these Tories can always say that it was only because there was this new variant of the virus that Johnson came to do what he'd mocked Starmer for "wanting". (The truth was (a) that Starmer didn't want it, but thought it best, and (b) 3 weeks of sharply rising infection rates in some localities, however they might be explained, sufficed to show that the Xmas plans had to be scrapped.)
https://twitter.com/Mij_Europe/status/1341492148949180416?s=20
Miliband trailed Cameron as best leader.
So it’s obvious that it’s the party rating and not the leadership rating that matters, as Ed Miliband’s victory in 2015 demon...hang on,
But it doesn’t look like it.
Depressing.
Someone once said, all texts are woven from other texts.
Maybe some things are better when not so obvious, subtle more, hidden behind another meaning?
Stop printing money. Build more houses.
I do, and I took a lower salary and gave up job opportunities to keep it. Why should I be penalised now?
OTOH, I'd think it perfectly fair to equalise the tax system and take NI contributions on unearned income and pensions (including mine).
https://twitter.com/SinghLions/status/1341452055890694144?s=20
The fans killed their father (Wenger) and have now fucked their mum/club.
We are not going to No Deal because of rules of origin for batteries.
Genuine Q. I have no idea
The first is that it was his failure to secure meaningful reform of the British relationship with the EU that led to the Leave vote.
The second is that he refused to make any preparation for the possibility of a Leave vote and then as soon as it happened he walked away as if it were nothing to do with him.
I actually like Cameron both as a person and generally as a PM. He did a couple of very important things, not least Gay Marriage. But it is simply not realistic to claim that he was not responsible at least in part for both the referendum result (though of course I was glad of that) and its aftermath.
Prof Tom Connor, who was involved in setting up Covid sequencing in Wales, believes it is "probable" that similar variants are emerging around the world, but they may not have been detected yet.
"We are sequencing in the UK at a disproportionate rate," he said, insisting the UK has a better surveillance system than other countries.
In order to know how far the variant has travelled or where it came from, you would need to compare notes with other countries - but comparable data very often does not exist, Prof Connor said.
For example, Public Health Wales sequenced about 4,000 genomes in the past week, more than the whole of France since the beginning of the pandemic.
But also, tax wealth; especially unearned wealth.
The problem is not just asset price inflation. The tax system has entrenched inequality and the rungs of the ladder are further apart than they used to be.
Also of course, are we seeing much reporting from other side of channel? Presumably similar issues?
For some reason it makes me think of how Stargate SG-1 showed us for instance that the assumption that Doctor always means a physician is a galaxy wide phenomenom, when Dr Jackson had to patiently explain that he was a Doctor of Archaeology.
https://le-grove.co.uk/
This joker was wanting Wenger out when we were finishing third in the league. I think he was anti-Emery, but felt he should show he can back a manager so is still backing Arteta.
It is a bit hit and miss.
And that 'but' in MaxPB's should be 'therefore', no?
But I agree it's difficult to defend the failurte to reform NI. Also outrageous to give special allowances for bank savings, dividends, and land rental and so on. All, together with the IHT changes, tending to pander to middle-aged and older, often pensioner, better off, people with coinventional families who [edit] are owner-occupiers in expensive houses, ergo mainly in the SE. Demography remind you of any particular party?
Trouble is he has good words to say, but he can’t say them. Jesus effing Christ he’s boring. He’s like a talking coffin lid on TV. You could give him the best joke in the world and he would deliver it like a boiler repairman describing your minor boiler problems.
And the more people see this, the less interested they are. They’d rather watch Boris being an idiot with amusingly mad hair. In an age of limited attention spans and 3 second opinion-formations, based on tweets and YouTube, this really matters. I don’t see how it is solvable. This is what Starmer is.
To be honest I think some of the Arsenal fandom could do with a good look at themselves.
For this vantage point AFTV seem happier when Arsenal are doing bad as it generates more views and thus more income.
I'd obviously do it for larger income pots rather than everyone but it's time to target older people who have benefited time and again from pulling the ladder up. You personally might not have been responsible but fair is fair.