That job must be soul destroying at the best of times, and seems like it was a terrible job even under non-Trump presidents, I don't know who would choose to put themselves through it knowing the nonsense that you would have to say repeatedly.
While I condemn utterly the storming of the capitol in no uncertain terms I can't help thinking a lot here are wiffling when they huff and puff about it interrupting legal things.
All revolutions by their nature are illegal. Even the one that toppled Ceacescau and I think most would be applauding that one.
We condemn the capitol because we see it as democracy under threat ad that is currently how we govern ourselves therefore we see it as good. We applaud Ceacescu because it was a dictatorship and we see it as bad because thats not how we do things.
I do wonder though whether we are at the nether end of the representative democratic age, societies seem to polarised now and whoever is elected about half the country feels unrepresented. Look at america with republicans and democrats, brexit with remainers and leavers, the Johnson government where people claiming 53% of people voted against it. Macron and LePen though being french they seem to be more of the mind they don't really care who gets voted in as long as they don't try and implement any of the manifesto they got voted in for.
Is that to say democracy is dead? No but I think representative democracy is perhaps on life support in many places
Democracy needs renewal in a participatory direction, probably a radically participatory one. It's worth defending and preserving, but its flaws at the moment, in countries like the US and Britain, aren't just social and economic, but representational too.
It doesn't have flaws, it is working as intended.
The Americans just got rid of Trump and the Brits avoided his left wing mirror image last year. Two wins for democracy.
Any alternative system a Trump gets into power and he stays in power. Trump is on his way out now thanks to democracy working as it is supposed to do so.
It is Boris not Corbyn who is the British Trump. Charismatic and well-known from media appearances; winning the votes of those who'd lost their manufacturing jobs as the price of globalisation; blaming foreigners in Europe or China and Mexico. Boris is Trump.
No, Corbyn is Trump. Thankfully the Brits rejected him twice.
No, Boris is Trump. In addition to the similarities previously noted, both men are intelligent and highly educated but intellectually lazy; both are notoriously careless with facts; they are thin-skinned and duck accountability.
I hold Boris and Corbyn in very low regard, but if you take the worst halves of them combined, Trump is still in a completely different league of contempt. They both have some clear similarities with him, but also some clear differences.
Yes, quite.
Boris has elements of populism in his persona, but he is also a very smart man, an Eton scholar, Oxford star, speaks Ancient Greek, able to write (when he can be arsed) like a dream, and was a brilliant editor of probably the most revered political magazine in the world.
This is not necessarily the skillset you want in a PM, especially during a plague. Arguably many prior PMs would have handled it better (or not). The Pest has severely tested every leader on earth.
Comparing him to a delusional, narcissistic, demented, quasi-would-be tyrant like Trump is nuts. Boris is bad or or good or mediocre or whatever, but Trump is exceptional.
I cannot think of a worse leader elected by a major (or even minor) western democracy since 1945. Trump is in a class of his own. He makes Berlusconi look like Julius Caesar. I challenge PBers to give me someone inferior, or more damaging, in that era.
The Spectator is not "the most revered political magazine in the world".
And I speak as a former subscriber.
And by what measure was Johnson an "Oxford star"?
Have any PBers actually tried reading one of Boris Johnson's "books"?
Quite.
Boris is not a great speaker, and not even a terribly good writer. Dare I say it, Leon of this parish is far superior.
Yes, the problem is that a fair proportion of Britons find clowning incompetence endearing. I don't think that I have met a foreigner who understands his appeal to the English.
English ios the operational word. He really horrifies even the most rightwing and reactionary Scots. An elderly relativce, utterly Unionist and deferential to his betters, was appalled that a 'clown' could become PM. It's an interesting and highly indicative cultural difference.
I would agree somewhat there. Obviously there are some Scottish people who've conceived a liking for Boris, but the majority definitely doesn't feel 'in' on the joke. It would be nice if at the end of Boris' premiership, through getting the big calls right, and surprising on the upside, some of these people eventually felt a sense of grudging appreciation, if never ownership. However, it doesn't feel likely at the moment.
While I condemn utterly the storming of the capitol in no uncertain terms I can't help thinking a lot here are wiffling when they huff and puff about it interrupting legal things.
All revolutions by their nature are illegal. Even the one that toppled Ceacescau and I think most would be applauding that one.
We condemn the capitol because we see it as democracy under threat ad that is currently how we govern ourselves therefore we see it as good. We applaud Ceacescu because it was a dictatorship and we see it as bad because thats not how we do things.
I do wonder though whether we are at the nether end of the representative democratic age, societies seem to polarised now and whoever is elected about half the country feels unrepresented. Look at america with republicans and democrats, brexit with remainers and leavers, the Johnson government where people claiming 53% of people voted against it. Macron and LePen though being french they seem to be more of the mind they don't really care who gets voted in as long as they don't try and implement any of the manifesto they got voted in for.
Is that to say democracy is dead? No but I think representative democracy is perhaps on life support in many places
Democracy needs renewal in a participatory direction, probably a radically participatory one. It's worth defending and preserving, but its flaws at the moment, in countries like the US and Britain, aren't just social and economic, but representational too.
It doesn't have flaws, it is working as intended.
The Americans just got rid of Trump and the Brits avoided his left wing mirror image last year. Two wins for democracy.
Any alternative system a Trump gets into power and he stays in power. Trump is on his way out now thanks to democracy working as it is supposed to do so.
It is Boris not Corbyn who is the British Trump. Charismatic and well-known from media appearances; winning the votes of those who'd lost their manufacturing jobs as the price of globalisation; blaming foreigners in Europe or China and Mexico. Boris is Trump.
No, Corbyn is Trump. Thankfully the Brits rejected him twice.
No, Boris is Trump. In addition to the similarities previously noted, both men are intelligent and highly educated but intellectually lazy; both are notoriously careless with facts; they are thin-skinned and duck accountability.
I hold Boris and Corbyn in very low regard, but if you take the worst halves of them combined, Trump is still in a completely different league of contempt. They both have some clear similarities with him, but also some clear differences.
Yes, quite.
Boris has elements of populism in his persona, but he is also a very smart man, an Eton scholar, Oxford star, speaks Ancient Greek, able to write (when he can be arsed) like a dream, and was a brilliant editor of probably the most revered political magazine in the world.
This is not necessarily the skillset you want in a PM, especially during a plague. Arguably many prior PMs would have handled it better (or not). The Pest has severely tested every leader on earth.
Comparing him to a delusional, narcissistic, demented, quasi-would-be tyrant like Trump is nuts. Boris is bad or or good or mediocre or whatever, but Trump is exceptional.
I cannot think of a worse leader elected by a major (or even minor) western democracy since 1945. Trump is in a class of his own. He makes Berlusconi look like Julius Caesar. I challenge PBers to give me someone inferior, or more damaging, in that era.
The Spectator is not "the most revered political magazine in the world".
And I speak as a former subscriber.
And by what measure was Johnson an "Oxford star"?
Have any PBers actually tried reading one of Boris Johnson's "books"?
Quite.
Boris is not a great speaker, and not even a terribly good writer. Dare I say it, Leon of this parish is far superior.
Yes, the problem is that a fair proportion of Britons find clowning incompetence endearing. I don't think that I have met a foreigner who understands his appeal to the English.
English ios the operational word. He really horrifies even the most rightwing and reactionary Scots. An elderly relativce, utterly Unionist and deferential to his betters, was appalled that a 'clown' could become PM. It's an interesting and highly indicative cultural difference.
I would agree somewhat there. Obviously there are some Scottish people who've conceived a liking for Boris, but the majority definitely doesn't feel 'in' on the joke. It would be nice if at the end of Boris' premiership, through getting the big calls right, and surprising on the upside, some of these people eventually felt a sense of grudging appreciation, if never ownership. However, it doesn't feel likely at the moment.
Fair enough. BTW, that 'clown' was from him not me - and a big surprise too.
Talking of press secretaries, has the mystery of why Allegra’s job, which she is supposed to take up next week, appears recently to have been advertised as vacant?
All that is on Trumps mind right now is can he get out of this without ending up in court and possibly in jail. The idea that he is too big to take down is something he knows is not true, he hopes but he knows.
No, BoZo knows that he is a joke and fraud. He has the advantage over Trump of having insight.
Into what?
He constantly, continuously, infallibly, unendingly, inevitably, does the worst possible thing at the worst possible moment.
I disagree wholeheartedly with that notion at the moment. The vaccines pledge is political genius. Allegra and Nut Nuts are very clever people, they have hijacked the media agenda, no one is interested in any other metric besides the vaccine programme success.
On BBC Wales tonight there is consternation that Welsh ineptitude in rolling out the vaccine is confirmed by only 1.5% of the population vaccinated in Wales "lagging behind" Johnson's 1.9%. In Scotland there is also some disquiet about Sturgeon's vaccine performance. It is the key measurement of interest. Hospitalisations, deaths, pressure on the NHS are of secondary importance. Johnson has hit the jackpot. It will pay electoral dividends.
O/T Can anyone recommend the best solution for over-ear headphones, primarily for calls not music, for the iPhone 12.
Just upgraded from iPhone 6 and of course the 3.5mm jack plug socket is no more. Bought a cheap adapter from ebay which works fine for music but not recognised for phone calls (grrr!).
Bluetooth headphones? Wired headphones with a lightning socket? Better quality 3.5mm to lightning adapter?
Any help gratefully accepted. (This is GadgetProblemsolving.com right?)
How much is your budget? If just for calls, any particular reason why you want over the ear? Normally they are for music, as you are isolating the outside noise and bigger drivers for better sound.
Fair point. I used to prefer over-ear because of (sorry about this) sweaty ear-canal issues. But that was back when I was working and stuck on calls for hours at a time. Maybe airpods are the way to go.
Given you have an iPhone and you don't care about music quality, airpods probably want you want. Although there are plenty of cheap bluetooth airpod type clones on the market these days, no idea what they are like for call quality...my guess would be not great.
Thanks. Oh, just checked. £159 for bluetooth in-ear pods... yer 'aving a laugh Apple.
Think I might go the USB-C over-ear route and use the connector cable Apple kindly included foc(!)
I think if Pence/the GOP do not go after Trump, they can kiss goodbye to power for a generation.
They need him impeached so he is barred from running in 2024.
Ideally they need to do so quickly before he pardons his family, and others. But I think that he still has too many loyalists in Congress for the process to complete before the inauguration. Not even sure there would be two-thirds to convict in the Senate.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
I think that's the point though. Trump is no longer the de facto President of the United States of America.
There is no coup, there is no invocation of the 25th amendment and there is no impeachment. But the grown ups have got together and defanged him. They've removed his communications, they're making their own orders.
Trump seems to effectively be a prisoner within his own White House without any external communication. He has been dethroned in all but name while the grown ups move on without him.
Agreed. And you could make a powerful argument that there was only one coup last night, and it wasn't by Trump, it was against him. Trump's bollocks have been chopped off whilst everyone is still gawping from the scenes at the Capitol.
Before anyone starts, it matters very little now, and I'm not sure that giving Trump a helping hand out of the door is that regrettable, but there's no doubt the general outrage has been used in a very coordinated way.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
That job must be soul destroying at the best of times, and seems like it was a terrible job even under non-Trump presidents, I don't know who would choose to put themselves through it knowing the nonsense that you would have to say repeatedly.
Her predecessor, who was forced out by Mark Meadows and went back to working at Melania's chief of staff, had the decency to resign yesterday.
This one doesn't even have the guts to face the press - as supposed POTUS "press secretary".
Even Ron "Inoperative" Ziegler was better than this.
I think if Pence/the GOP do not go after Trump, they can kiss goodbye to power for a generation.
They need him impeached so he is barred from running in 2024.
Ideally they need to do so quickly before he pardons his family, and others. But I think that he still has too many loyalists in Congress for the process to complete before the inauguration. Not even sure there would be two-thirds to convict in the Senate.
Then he'll be back, running in 2024 and sowing chaos.
I think if Pence/the GOP do not go after Trump, they can kiss goodbye to power for a generation.
They need him impeached so he is barred from running in 2024.
Ideally they need to do so quickly before he pardons his family, and others. But I think that he still has too many loyalists in Congress for the process to complete before the inauguration. Not even sure there would be two-thirds to convict in the Senate.
I think even on a very clear crime which finally convinced 2/3 he deserved it, they still wouldn't. Notwithstanding the prevention of him running again, they would hope that won't prove a problem and it isn't worth the effort and difficulty of going through that process when he has so little time left in office.
While I condemn utterly the storming of the capitol in no uncertain terms I can't help thinking a lot here are wiffling when they huff and puff about it interrupting legal things.
All revolutions by their nature are illegal. Even the one that toppled Ceacescau and I think most would be applauding that one.
We condemn the capitol because we see it as democracy under threat ad that is currently how we govern ourselves therefore we see it as good. We applaud Ceacescu because it was a dictatorship and we see it as bad because thats not how we do things.
I do wonder though whether we are at the nether end of the representative democratic age, societies seem to polarised now and whoever is elected about half the country feels unrepresented. Look at america with republicans and democrats, brexit with remainers and leavers, the Johnson government where people claiming 53% of people voted against it. Macron and LePen though being french they seem to be more of the mind they don't really care who gets voted in as long as they don't try and implement any of the manifesto they got voted in for.
Is that to say democracy is dead? No but I think representative democracy is perhaps on life support in many places
Democracy needs renewal in a participatory direction, probably a radically participatory one. It's worth defending and preserving, but its flaws at the moment, in countries like the US and Britain, aren't just social and economic, but representational too.
It doesn't have flaws, it is working as intended.
The Americans just got rid of Trump and the Brits avoided his left wing mirror image last year. Two wins for democracy.
Any alternative system a Trump gets into power and he stays in power. Trump is on his way out now thanks to democracy working as it is supposed to do so.
It is Boris not Corbyn who is the British Trump. Charismatic and well-known from media appearances; winning the votes of those who'd lost their manufacturing jobs as the price of globalisation; blaming foreigners in Europe or China and Mexico. Boris is Trump.
No, Corbyn is Trump. Thankfully the Brits rejected him twice.
No, Boris is Trump. In addition to the similarities previously noted, both men are intelligent and highly educated but intellectually lazy; both are notoriously careless with facts; they are thin-skinned and duck accountability.
I hold Boris and Corbyn in very low regard, but if you take the worst halves of them combined, Trump is still in a completely different league of contempt. They both have some clear similarities with him, but also some clear differences.
Yes, quite.
Boris has elements of populism in his persona, but he is also a very smart man, an Eton scholar, Oxford star, speaks Ancient Greek, able to write (when he can be arsed) like a dream, and was a brilliant editor of probably the most revered political magazine in the world.
This is not necessarily the skillset you want in a PM, especially during a plague. Arguably many prior PMs would have handled it better (or not). The Pest has severely tested every leader on earth.
Comparing him to a delusional, narcissistic, demented, quasi-would-be tyrant like Trump is nuts. Boris is bad or or good or mediocre or whatever, but Trump is exceptional.
I cannot think of a worse leader elected by a major (or even minor) western democracy since 1945. Trump is in a class of his own. He makes Berlusconi look like Julius Caesar. I challenge PBers to give me someone inferior, or more damaging, in that era.
The Spectator is not "the most revered political magazine in the world".
And I speak as a former subscriber.
And by what measure was Johnson an "Oxford star"?
Have any PBers actually tried reading one of Boris Johnson's "books"?
Quite.
Boris is not a great speaker, and not even a terribly good writer. Dare I say it, Leon of this parish is far superior.
Yes, the problem is that a fair proportion of Britons find clowning incompetence endearing. I don't think that I have met a foreigner who understands his appeal to the English.
A very good point. Boris is particularly mystifying to Europeans, who expect earnest seriousness from their politicians, and find comedy off-putting.
That said, I believe some foreign English speakers find him at least quite charming - Americans, Aussies, etc -but this is probably in the sense they like floppy haired, but cleverly educated, nicely accented Englishmen (cf Hugh Grant in Three Weddings and so forth). The admiration goes no deeper.
The English do have a particular liking for the self deprecating buffoon with an amateur style but a good brain. In this sense, Boris is not a million miles away from Churchill, his hero. The difference is that Churchill was able to do proper gravitas, and bravery, in spades, when called upon. And Churchill was not obviously a cad in his love life, if indeed he ever had a love life.
All that said, I can see Boris winning a pretty handsome victory in 2024, if he is seen to defeat Covid. Starmer is boring, and the English hate boring.
That may in turn condemn the Union. Ah, the times. the times.
O/T Can anyone recommend the best solution for over-ear headphones, primarily for calls not music, for the iPhone 12.
Just upgraded from iPhone 6 and of course the 3.5mm jack plug socket is no more. Bought a cheap adapter from ebay which works fine for music but not recognised for phone calls (grrr!).
Bluetooth headphones? Wired headphones with a lightning socket? Better quality 3.5mm to lightning adapter?
Any help gratefully accepted. (This is GadgetProblemsolving.com right?)
How much is your budget? If just for calls, any particular reason why you want over the ear? Normally they are for music, as you are isolating the outside noise and bigger drivers for better sound.
Fair point. I used to prefer over-ear because of (sorry about this) sweaty ear-canal issues. But that was back when I was working and stuck on calls for hours at a time. Maybe airpods are the way to go.
Given you have an iPhone and you don't care about music quality, airpods probably want you want. Although there are plenty of cheap bluetooth airpod type clones on the market these days, no idea what they are like for call quality...my guess would be not great.
Thanks. Oh, just checked. £159 for bluetooth in-ear pods... yer 'aving a laugh Apple.
Think I might go the USB-C over-ear route and use the connector cable Apple kindly included foc(!)
I picked up a pair own brand in-ear pods from B&M costing £8.
They look just like the Apple ones, have been perfectly reliable, make good phone calls, good sound quality - they do the job. For £8. 🤷🏻♂️
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
To be fair to the Chinese, I can well believe that emancipation from conservative Islam would be genuinely liberating for many women.
Denying this is futile.
You know they're in labour camps where they're subject to forced abortions, sterilisation, compulsory "re-education" and torture for dissenters, right?
They're not in a friendly women's refuge complete with day trips to Butlins.
I have a friend who actually knows a Uyghur from Sinkiang who has "disappeared" apparently to one of the camps (if not something worse). That brings the situation home in a way that just reading about it does not.\
Here in Seattle, much of the economy has been built over the past decades by doing massive trade with China, and bending over backwards to keep it flowing.
From time to time, our leaders have criticized China. For example, former Governor and Ambassador Gary Locke, a Chinese American who made himself virtually persona non grata. Ironically, he's been characterized as a Chinese agent by Trumpskite liars (sorry for redundancy!) BUT even Gary' governorship was characterized by free-trade frenzy to sell airplanes and apples and computers, with human rights being a neglected step-child. AND also short-changed our own workers and companies trying to compete with China on an uneven playing field.
In other words, WE have been complicit. And as a result, helped give Trumpsky his biggest opening.
This will be a MAJOR challenge for the Biden Administration, and think he knows it.
We believed that we would set an example to the PRC which would civilise them and lead them to democracy. Basically a Soviet Union mark 2. In our greed to milk huge profits from them, they have corrupted us. No politician, nation or party is responsible. But an arrogant, myopic groupthink is.
Nicely put. The Chinese observed after the fall of the Soviet Union that communism was never going to beat capitalism, so the only way to defeat the West was to become better at capitalism than we are...
They drew the lessons of the fall of the Soviet Union in a far more nuanced way than we (the West) did. And then applied them. While we were doing a lap of honour patting ourselves on the back for being spot on 100% right all along.
Copying the USSR didn't work so they're trying to copy Nazi Germany.
While I condemn utterly the storming of the capitol in no uncertain terms I can't help thinking a lot here are wiffling when they huff and puff about it interrupting legal things.
All revolutions by their nature are illegal. Even the one that toppled Ceacescau and I think most would be applauding that one.
We condemn the capitol because we see it as democracy under threat ad that is currently how we govern ourselves therefore we see it as good. We applaud Ceacescu because it was a dictatorship and we see it as bad because thats not how we do things.
I do wonder though whether we are at the nether end of the representative democratic age, societies seem to polarised now and whoever is elected about half the country feels unrepresented. Look at america with republicans and democrats, brexit with remainers and leavers, the Johnson government where people claiming 53% of people voted against it. Macron and LePen though being french they seem to be more of the mind they don't really care who gets voted in as long as they don't try and implement any of the manifesto they got voted in for.
Is that to say democracy is dead? No but I think representative democracy is perhaps on life support in many places
Democracy needs renewal in a participatory direction, probably a radically participatory one. It's worth defending and preserving, but its flaws at the moment, in countries like the US and Britain, aren't just social and economic, but representational too.
It doesn't have flaws, it is working as intended.
The Americans just got rid of Trump and the Brits avoided his left wing mirror image last year. Two wins for democracy.
Any alternative system a Trump gets into power and he stays in power. Trump is on his way out now thanks to democracy working as it is supposed to do so.
It is Boris not Corbyn who is the British Trump. Charismatic and well-known from media appearances; winning the votes of those who'd lost their manufacturing jobs as the price of globalisation; blaming foreigners in Europe or China and Mexico. Boris is Trump.
No, Corbyn is Trump. Thankfully the Brits rejected him twice.
No, Boris is Trump. In addition to the similarities previously noted, both men are intelligent and highly educated but intellectually lazy; both are notoriously careless with facts; they are thin-skinned and duck accountability.
I hold Boris and Corbyn in very low regard, but if you take the worst halves of them combined, Trump is still in a completely different league of contempt. They both have some clear similarities with him, but also some clear differences.
Yes, quite.
Boris has elements of populism in his persona, but he is also a very smart man, an Eton scholar, Oxford star, speaks Ancient Greek, able to write (when he can be arsed) like a dream, and was a brilliant editor of probably the most revered political magazine in the world.
This is not necessarily the skillset you want in a PM, especially during a plague. Arguably many prior PMs would have handled it better (or not). The Pest has severely tested every leader on earth.
Comparing him to a delusional, narcissistic, demented, quasi-would-be tyrant like Trump is nuts. Boris is bad or or good or mediocre or whatever, but Trump is exceptional.
I cannot think of a worse leader elected by a major (or even minor) western democracy since 1945. Trump is in a class of his own. He makes Berlusconi look like Julius Caesar. I challenge PBers to give me someone inferior, or more damaging, in that era.
The Spectator is not "the most revered political magazine in the world".
And I speak as a former subscriber.
And by what measure was Johnson an "Oxford star"?
Have any PBers actually tried reading one of Boris Johnson's "books"?
Quite.
Boris is not a great speaker, and not even a terribly good writer. Dare I say it, Leon of this parish is far superior.
I own three of Boris's books (Churchill, Virgins, London) and two of Donald Trump's (Art of the Deal and Think Like a Billionaire).
And so?
And so I am not unthinkingly hostile to either man. And so I can objectively point out parallels between them. Oh yes, and so it answers the question, has anyone read Boris's books?
I think if Pence/the GOP do not go after Trump, they can kiss goodbye to power for a generation.
They need him impeached so he is barred from running in 2024.
Ideally they need to do so quickly before he pardons his family, and others. But I think that he still has too many loyalists in Congress for the process to complete before the inauguration. Not even sure there would be two-thirds to convict in the Senate.
Then he'll be back, running in 2024 and sowing chaos.
There is as much chance of Trump running in 2024 as there is of Corbyn running in 2024.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
I thought it was just an aside, but he’s tweeted it, and now Kamala has pretty much said the same.
This is not necessarily the skillset you want in a PM, especially during a plague. Arguably many prior PMs would have handled it better (or not). The Pest has severely tested every leader on earth.
Comparing him to a delusional, narcissistic, demented, quasi-would-be tyrant like Trump is nuts. Boris is bad or or good or mediocre or whatever, but Trump is exceptional.
BoZo wants to be Trump which makes the comparison apt
More like Trump wants to be Boris: someone who actually wins elections.
They've both won one each. (Unless you give BJ sole credit for Brexit vote?)
As for US, winning the Electoral College IS the election for US presidency, not winning a majority of popular votes cast - that's how Lincoln got in, among others.
Of course we KNOW that Trumpsky lost in 2020, and ditto the GA runoffs day before yesterday.
Whereas future electoral fortune of Johnson (if any) is yet to be determined.
You've forgotten (or are ignoring) the two mayoralty elections. Which were some achievement, given no other Tory has ever managed to win London, or even get particularly close.
That’s because the Tories have generally chosen to put up duffers.
As shit as I believe Boris is, he is certainly less shit than Zac Goldsmith.
It is also because there have only ever been three London mayors: Ken, Boris and Sadiq.
While I condemn utterly the storming of the capitol in no uncertain terms I can't help thinking a lot here are wiffling when they huff and puff about it interrupting legal things.
All revolutions by their nature are illegal. Even the one that toppled Ceacescau and I think most would be applauding that one.
We condemn the capitol because we see it as democracy under threat ad that is currently how we govern ourselves therefore we see it as good. We applaud Ceacescu because it was a dictatorship and we see it as bad because thats not how we do things.
I do wonder though whether we are at the nether end of the representative democratic age, societies seem to polarised now and whoever is elected about half the country feels unrepresented. Look at america with republicans and democrats, brexit with remainers and leavers, the Johnson government where people claiming 53% of people voted against it. Macron and LePen though being french they seem to be more of the mind they don't really care who gets voted in as long as they don't try and implement any of the manifesto they got voted in for.
Is that to say democracy is dead? No but I think representative democracy is perhaps on life support in many places
Democracy needs renewal in a participatory direction, probably a radically participatory one. It's worth defending and preserving, but its flaws at the moment, in countries like the US and Britain, aren't just social and economic, but representational too.
It doesn't have flaws, it is working as intended.
The Americans just got rid of Trump and the Brits avoided his left wing mirror image last year. Two wins for democracy.
Any alternative system a Trump gets into power and he stays in power. Trump is on his way out now thanks to democracy working as it is supposed to do so.
It is Boris not Corbyn who is the British Trump. Charismatic and well-known from media appearances; winning the votes of those who'd lost their manufacturing jobs as the price of globalisation; blaming foreigners in Europe or China and Mexico. Boris is Trump.
No, Corbyn is Trump. Thankfully the Brits rejected him twice.
No, Boris is Trump. In addition to the similarities previously noted, both men are intelligent and highly educated but intellectually lazy; both are notoriously careless with facts; they are thin-skinned and duck accountability.
I hold Boris and Corbyn in very low regard, but if you take the worst halves of them combined, Trump is still in a completely different league of contempt. They both have some clear similarities with him, but also some clear differences.
Yes, quite.
Boris has elements of populism in his persona, but he is also a very smart man, an Eton scholar, Oxford star, speaks Ancient Greek, able to write (when he can be arsed) like a dream, and was a brilliant editor of probably the most revered political magazine in the world.
This is not necessarily the skillset you want in a PM, especially during a plague. Arguably many prior PMs would have handled it better (or not). The Pest has severely tested every leader on earth.
Comparing him to a delusional, narcissistic, demented, quasi-would-be tyrant like Trump is nuts. Boris is bad or or good or mediocre or whatever, but Trump is exceptional.
I cannot think of a worse leader elected by a major (or even minor) western democracy since 1945. Trump is in a class of his own. He makes Berlusconi look like Julius Caesar. I challenge PBers to give me someone inferior, or more damaging, in that era.
The Spectator is not "the most revered political magazine in the world".
And I speak as a former subscriber.
And by what measure was Johnson an "Oxford star"?
Have any PBers actually tried reading one of Boris Johnson's "books"?
Quite.
Boris is not a great speaker, and not even a terribly good writer. Dare I say it, Leon of this parish is far superior.
Yes, the problem is that a fair proportion of Britons find clowning incompetence endearing. I don't think that I have met a foreigner who understands his appeal to the English.
A very good point. Boris is particularly mystifying to Europeans, who expect earnest seriousness from their politicians, and find comedy off-putting.
That said, I believe some foreign English speakers find him at least quite charming - Americans, Aussies, etc -but this is probably in the sense they like floppy haired, but cleverly educated, nicely accented Englishmen (cf Hugh Grant in Three Weddings and so forth). The admiration goes no deeper.
The English do have a particular liking for the self deprecating buffoon with an amateur style but a good brain. In this sense, Boris is not a million miles away from Churchill, his hero. The difference is that Churchill was able to do proper gravitas, and bravery, in spades, when called upon. And Churchill was not obviously a cad in his love life, if indeed he ever had a love life.
All that said, I can see Boris winning a pretty handsome victory in 2024, if he is seen to defeat Covid. Starmer is boring, and the English hate boring.
That may in turn condemn the Union. Ah, the times. the times.
Yet ironically it is only Scottish MPs backing him, or more specifically SNP MPs, that would enable Starmer to become PM.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Not sure what you mean exactly by "Capitol Guard" there is most definitely going to be investigation of the snafu by House & Senate Sergeants at Arms and leadership of Capitol Police. AND would definitely expect inquires by Congress AND executive branch into the events of this summer, when Trumpsky tried to sick the military of peaceful BLM protests.
As for BLM in this context, note that MANY on the left here in US are making point Biden just made. While I agree it is NOT what should be emphasized, the new (dare I say real) President has to keep the left on board as he proceeds forward, without unduly upsetting the middle.
And unlike the UK, here among Middle America (geographically and demographically) the support for the basic justice of Black Live Matter's core message has - since the death of George Floyd - enjoyed significant support; support that is NOT confined to the left.
Bottom line for me - let Joe be Joe. Give him space, and do NOT assume he doesn't know what he's doing.
O/T Can anyone recommend the best solution for over-ear headphones, primarily for calls not music, for the iPhone 12.
Just upgraded from iPhone 6 and of course the 3.5mm jack plug socket is no more. Bought a cheap adapter from ebay which works fine for music but not recognised for phone calls (grrr!).
Bluetooth headphones? Wired headphones with a lightning socket? Better quality 3.5mm to lightning adapter?
Any help gratefully accepted. (This is GadgetProblemsolving.com right?)
Apple make a lightning to lightning+USB adapter which should let you plug a USB headset in
Cheers, not thought of that.
The Apple EarPods (lightning connector) which used to come in the box, can still be bought and are fine for voice stuff like calls/meetings, I also use them to record audio.
If you're looking to go wireless, the AirPods and Pro are both good, if costly. There are plenty of decent competitors, though.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
I thought it was just an aside, but he’s tweeted it, and now Kamala has pretty much said the same.
So what are they saying? That the BLM protestors ought to have been allowed into the Capitol too?
Obviously they regard one group as good and the other bad, but it doesn't follow that they think the former should have been permitted to storm the Capitol had they sought to.
It doesn't seem unreasonable to me to note that they never would have gotten the chance even if they had wanted to, given the disparity in the preparation and response. And not unreasonable to speculate on some reasons for that disparity.
And I say that having been clear that BLM protestors who did engage in destructive behaviour were not protestors but rioters in my mind.
While I condemn utterly the storming of the capitol in no uncertain terms I can't help thinking a lot here are wiffling when they huff and puff about it interrupting legal things.
All revolutions by their nature are illegal. Even the one that toppled Ceacescau and I think most would be applauding that one.
We condemn the capitol because we see it as democracy under threat ad that is currently how we govern ourselves therefore we see it as good. We applaud Ceacescu because it was a dictatorship and we see it as bad because thats not how we do things.
I do wonder though whether we are at the nether end of the representative democratic age, societies seem to polarised now and whoever is elected about half the country feels unrepresented. Look at america with republicans and democrats, brexit with remainers and leavers, the Johnson government where people claiming 53% of people voted against it. Macron and LePen though being french they seem to be more of the mind they don't really care who gets voted in as long as they don't try and implement any of the manifesto they got voted in for.
Is that to say democracy is dead? No but I think representative democracy is perhaps on life support in many places
Democracy needs renewal in a participatory direction, probably a radically participatory one. It's worth defending and preserving, but its flaws at the moment, in countries like the US and Britain, aren't just social and economic, but representational too.
It doesn't have flaws, it is working as intended.
The Americans just got rid of Trump and the Brits avoided his left wing mirror image last year. Two wins for democracy.
Any alternative system a Trump gets into power and he stays in power. Trump is on his way out now thanks to democracy working as it is supposed to do so.
It is Boris not Corbyn who is the British Trump. Charismatic and well-known from media appearances; winning the votes of those who'd lost their manufacturing jobs as the price of globalisation; blaming foreigners in Europe or China and Mexico. Boris is Trump.
No, Corbyn is Trump. Thankfully the Brits rejected him twice.
No, Boris is Trump. In addition to the similarities previously noted, both men are intelligent and highly educated but intellectually lazy; both are notoriously careless with facts; they are thin-skinned and duck accountability.
I hold Boris and Corbyn in very low regard, but if you take the worst halves of them combined, Trump is still in a completely different league of contempt. They both have some clear similarities with him, but also some clear differences.
Yes, quite.
Boris has elements of populism in his persona, but he is also a very smart man, an Eton scholar, Oxford star, speaks Ancient Greek, able to write (when he can be arsed) like a dream, and was a brilliant editor of probably the most revered political magazine in the world.
This is not necessarily the skillset you want in a PM, especially during a plague. Arguably many prior PMs would have handled it better (or not). The Pest has severely tested every leader on earth.
Comparing him to a delusional, narcissistic, demented, quasi-would-be tyrant like Trump is nuts. Boris is bad or or good or mediocre or whatever, but Trump is exceptional.
I cannot think of a worse leader elected by a major (or even minor) western democracy since 1945. Trump is in a class of his own. He makes Berlusconi look like Julius Caesar. I challenge PBers to give me someone inferior, or more damaging, in that era.
The Spectator is not "the most revered political magazine in the world".
And I speak as a former subscriber.
And by what measure was Johnson an "Oxford star"?
Have any PBers actually tried reading one of Boris Johnson's "books"?
Quite.
Boris is not a great speaker, and not even a terribly good writer. Dare I say it, Leon of this parish is far superior.
I own three of Boris's books (Churchill, Virgins, London) and two of Donald Trump's (Art of the Deal and Think Like a Billionaire).
And so?
And so I am not unthinkingly hostile to either man. And so I can objectively point out parallels between them. Oh yes, and so it answers the question, has anyone read Boris's books?
Given that Boris' book on Churchill has 2000+ reviews on amazon uk, with a very high rating of 4.5 stars, I fear the answer you dread is YES, people read his books
You could replace "footballer" with any section of society.
You could and imo it would make a great deal of sense to prioritise groups like footballers, teachers and bus drivers, along with others chosen to accelerate a return to normal life.
While I condemn utterly the storming of the capitol in no uncertain terms I can't help thinking a lot here are wiffling when they huff and puff about it interrupting legal things.
All revolutions by their nature are illegal. Even the one that toppled Ceacescau and I think most would be applauding that one.
We condemn the capitol because we see it as democracy under threat ad that is currently how we govern ourselves therefore we see it as good. We applaud Ceacescu because it was a dictatorship and we see it as bad because thats not how we do things.
I do wonder though whether we are at the nether end of the representative democratic age, societies seem to polarised now and whoever is elected about half the country feels unrepresented. Look at america with republicans and democrats, brexit with remainers and leavers, the Johnson government where people claiming 53% of people voted against it. Macron and LePen though being french they seem to be more of the mind they don't really care who gets voted in as long as they don't try and implement any of the manifesto they got voted in for.
Is that to say democracy is dead? No but I think representative democracy is perhaps on life support in many places
Democracy needs renewal in a participatory direction, probably a radically participatory one. It's worth defending and preserving, but its flaws at the moment, in countries like the US and Britain, aren't just social and economic, but representational too.
It doesn't have flaws, it is working as intended.
The Americans just got rid of Trump and the Brits avoided his left wing mirror image last year. Two wins for democracy.
Any alternative system a Trump gets into power and he stays in power. Trump is on his way out now thanks to democracy working as it is supposed to do so.
It is Boris not Corbyn who is the British Trump. Charismatic and well-known from media appearances; winning the votes of those who'd lost their manufacturing jobs as the price of globalisation; blaming foreigners in Europe or China and Mexico. Boris is Trump.
No, Corbyn is Trump. Thankfully the Brits rejected him twice.
No, Boris is Trump. In addition to the similarities previously noted, both men are intelligent and highly educated but intellectually lazy; both are notoriously careless with facts; they are thin-skinned and duck accountability.
I hold Boris and Corbyn in very low regard, but if you take the worst halves of them combined, Trump is still in a completely different league of contempt. They both have some clear similarities with him, but also some clear differences.
Yes, quite.
Boris has elements of populism in his persona, but he is also a very smart man, an Eton scholar, Oxford star, speaks Ancient Greek, able to write (when he can be arsed) like a dream, and was a brilliant editor of probably the most revered political magazine in the world.
This is not necessarily the skillset you want in a PM, especially during a plague. Arguably many prior PMs would have handled it better (or not). The Pest has severely tested every leader on earth.
Comparing him to a delusional, narcissistic, demented, quasi-would-be tyrant like Trump is nuts. Boris is bad or or good or mediocre or whatever, but Trump is exceptional.
I cannot think of a worse leader elected by a major (or even minor) western democracy since 1945. Trump is in a class of his own. He makes Berlusconi look like Julius Caesar. I challenge PBers to give me someone inferior, or more damaging, in that era.
The Spectator is not "the most revered political magazine in the world".
And I speak as a former subscriber.
And by what measure was Johnson an "Oxford star"?
Have any PBers actually tried reading one of Boris Johnson's "books"?
Quite.
Boris is not a great speaker, and not even a terribly good writer. Dare I say it, Leon of this parish is far superior.
Yes, the problem is that a fair proportion of Britons find clowning incompetence endearing. I don't think that I have met a foreigner who understands his appeal to the English.
A very good point. Boris is particularly mystifying to Europeans, who expect earnest seriousness from their politicians, and find comedy off-putting.
That said, I believe some foreign English speakers find him at least quite charming - Americans, Aussies, etc -but this is probably in the sense they like floppy haired, but cleverly educated, nicely accented Englishmen (cf Hugh Grant in Three Weddings and so forth). The admiration goes no deeper.
The English do have a particular liking for the self deprecating buffoon with an amateur style but a good brain. In this sense, Boris is not a million miles away from Churchill, his hero. The difference is that Churchill was able to do proper gravitas, and bravery, in spades, when called upon. And Churchill was not obviously a cad in his love life, if indeed he ever had a love life.
All that said, I can see Boris winning a pretty handsome victory in 2024, if he is seen to defeat Covid. Starmer is boring, and the English hate boring.
That may in turn condemn the Union. Ah, the times. the times.
I think if Pence/the GOP do not go after Trump, they can kiss goodbye to power for a generation.
They need him impeached so he is barred from running in 2024.
Ideally they need to do so quickly before he pardons his family, and others. But I think that he still has too many loyalists in Congress for the process to complete before the inauguration. Not even sure there would be two-thirds to convict in the Senate.
Then he'll be back, running in 2024 and sowing chaos.
There is as much chance of Trump running in 2024 as there is of Corbyn running in 2024.
People are moving on.
I hope so. It might be funny if he ran again, as an independent, and was utterly humiliated. But I'd rather the USA not have to face that risk.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
The Police shouldn't be armed thugs beating up those they dislike or shooting those who have the wrong skin colour, they should be professionals doing a job.
No, BoZo knows that he is a joke and fraud. He has the advantage over Trump of having insight.
Into what?
He constantly, continuously, infallibly, unendingly, inevitably, does the worst possible thing at the worst possible moment.
I disagree wholeheartedly with that notion at the moment. The vaccines pledge is political genius. Allegra and Nut Nuts are very clever people, they have hijacked the media agenda, no one is interested in any other metric besides the vaccine programme success.
On BBC Wales tonight there is consternation that Welsh ineptitude in rolling out the vaccine is confirmed by only 1.5% of the population vaccinated in Wales "lagging behind" Johnson's 1.9%. In Scotland there is also some disquiet about Sturgeon's vaccine performance. It is the key measurement of interest. Hospitalisations, deaths, pressure on the NHS are of secondary importance. Johnson has hit the jackpot. It will pay electoral dividends.
The ultimate key measurement of interest will be the total number of people killed by the virus. Boris, and we, had better hope that the vaccine is rolled out fast enough to shift the UK from its spot as one of the worst performing countries in the world on that metric.
While I condemn utterly the storming of the capitol in no uncertain terms I can't help thinking a lot here are wiffling when they huff and puff about it interrupting legal things.
All revolutions by their nature are illegal. Even the one that toppled Ceacescau and I think most would be applauding that one.
We condemn the capitol because we see it as democracy under threat ad that is currently how we govern ourselves therefore we see it as good. We applaud Ceacescu because it was a dictatorship and we see it as bad because thats not how we do things.
I do wonder though whether we are at the nether end of the representative democratic age, societies seem to polarised now and whoever is elected about half the country feels unrepresented. Look at america with republicans and democrats, brexit with remainers and leavers, the Johnson government where people claiming 53% of people voted against it. Macron and LePen though being french they seem to be more of the mind they don't really care who gets voted in as long as they don't try and implement any of the manifesto they got voted in for.
Is that to say democracy is dead? No but I think representative democracy is perhaps on life support in many places
Democracy needs renewal in a participatory direction, probably a radically participatory one. It's worth defending and preserving, but its flaws at the moment, in countries like the US and Britain, aren't just social and economic, but representational too.
It doesn't have flaws, it is working as intended.
The Americans just got rid of Trump and the Brits avoided his left wing mirror image last year. Two wins for democracy.
Any alternative system a Trump gets into power and he stays in power. Trump is on his way out now thanks to democracy working as it is supposed to do so.
It is Boris not Corbyn who is the British Trump. Charismatic and well-known from media appearances; winning the votes of those who'd lost their manufacturing jobs as the price of globalisation; blaming foreigners in Europe or China and Mexico. Boris is Trump.
No, Corbyn is Trump. Thankfully the Brits rejected him twice.
No, Boris is Trump. In addition to the similarities previously noted, both men are intelligent and highly educated but intellectually lazy; both are notoriously careless with facts; they are thin-skinned and duck accountability.
I hold Boris and Corbyn in very low regard, but if you take the worst halves of them combined, Trump is still in a completely different league of contempt. They both have some clear similarities with him, but also some clear differences.
Yes, quite.
Boris has elements of populism in his persona, but he is also a very smart man, an Eton scholar, Oxford star, speaks Ancient Greek, able to write (when he can be arsed) like a dream, and was a brilliant editor of probably the most revered political magazine in the world.
This is not necessarily the skillset you want in a PM, especially during a plague. Arguably many prior PMs would have handled it better (or not). The Pest has severely tested every leader on earth.
Comparing him to a delusional, narcissistic, demented, quasi-would-be tyrant like Trump is nuts. Boris is bad or or good or mediocre or whatever, but Trump is exceptional.
I cannot think of a worse leader elected by a major (or even minor) western democracy since 1945. Trump is in a class of his own. He makes Berlusconi look like Julius Caesar. I challenge PBers to give me someone inferior, or more damaging, in that era.
The Spectator is not "the most revered political magazine in the world".
And I speak as a former subscriber.
Hasn't a former habituée of this place been a contributor?
While I condemn utterly the storming of the capitol in no uncertain terms I can't help thinking a lot here are wiffling when they huff and puff about it interrupting legal things.
All revolutions by their nature are illegal. Even the one that toppled Ceacescau and I think most would be applauding that one.
We condemn the capitol because we see it as democracy under threat ad that is currently how we govern ourselves therefore we see it as good. We applaud Ceacescu because it was a dictatorship and we see it as bad because thats not how we do things.
I do wonder though whether we are at the nether end of the representative democratic age, societies seem to polarised now and whoever is elected about half the country feels unrepresented. Look at america with republicans and democrats, brexit with remainers and leavers, the Johnson government where people claiming 53% of people voted against it. Macron and LePen though being french they seem to be more of the mind they don't really care who gets voted in as long as they don't try and implement any of the manifesto they got voted in for.
Is that to say democracy is dead? No but I think representative democracy is perhaps on life support in many places
Democracy needs renewal in a participatory direction, probably a radically participatory one. It's worth defending and preserving, but its flaws at the moment, in countries like the US and Britain, aren't just social and economic, but representational too.
It doesn't have flaws, it is working as intended.
The Americans just got rid of Trump and the Brits avoided his left wing mirror image last year. Two wins for democracy.
Any alternative system a Trump gets into power and he stays in power. Trump is on his way out now thanks to democracy working as it is supposed to do so.
It is Boris not Corbyn who is the British Trump. Charismatic and well-known from media appearances; winning the votes of those who'd lost their manufacturing jobs as the price of globalisation; blaming foreigners in Europe or China and Mexico. Boris is Trump.
No, Corbyn is Trump. Thankfully the Brits rejected him twice.
No, Boris is Trump. In addition to the similarities previously noted, both men are intelligent and highly educated but intellectually lazy; both are notoriously careless with facts; they are thin-skinned and duck accountability.
I hold Boris and Corbyn in very low regard, but if you take the worst halves of them combined, Trump is still in a completely different league of contempt. They both have some clear similarities with him, but also some clear differences.
Yes, quite.
Boris has elements of populism in his persona, but he is also a very smart man, an Eton scholar, Oxford star, speaks Ancient Greek, able to write (when he can be arsed) like a dream, and was a brilliant editor of probably the most revered political magazine in the world.
This is not necessarily the skillset you want in a PM, especially during a plague. Arguably many prior PMs would have handled it better (or not). The Pest has severely tested every leader on earth.
Comparing him to a delusional, narcissistic, demented, quasi-would-be tyrant like Trump is nuts. Boris is bad or or good or mediocre or whatever, but Trump is exceptional.
I cannot think of a worse leader elected by a major (or even minor) western democracy since 1945. Trump is in a class of his own. He makes Berlusconi look like Julius Caesar. I challenge PBers to give me someone inferior, or more damaging, in that era.
The Spectator is not "the most revered political magazine in the world".
And I speak as a former subscriber.
And by what measure was Johnson an "Oxford star"?
Have any PBers actually tried reading one of Boris Johnson's "books"?
Quite.
Boris is not a great speaker, and not even a terribly good writer. Dare I say it, Leon of this parish is far superior.
I own three of Boris's books (Churchill, Virgins, London) and two of Donald Trump's (Art of the Deal and Think Like a Billionaire).
And so?
And so I am not unthinkingly hostile to either man. And so I can objectively point out parallels between them. Oh yes, and so it answers the question, has anyone read Boris's books?
Given that Boris' book on Churchill has 2000+ reviews on amazon uk, with a very high rating of 4.5 stars, I fear the answer you dread is YES, people read his books
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
I thought it was just an aside, but he’s tweeted it, and now Kamala has pretty much said the same.
The horrific scenes yesterday were horrific in their own right as an attack on democracy - not because they provide another lesson to be woker.
The policing looked far too soft to me yesterday, watching some archived Kenosha stuff on youtube - soft there too. I mean it's all overly soft, and then they randomly overdo it on someone or other they're just not very good I think.
The secret service (Wasn't police) shooting looked justified to me at any rate, gov't members were beyond that corridor.
O/T Can anyone recommend the best solution for over-ear headphones, primarily for calls not music, for the iPhone 12.
Just upgraded from iPhone 6 and of course the 3.5mm jack plug socket is no more. Bought a cheap adapter from ebay which works fine for music but not recognised for phone calls (grrr!).
Bluetooth headphones? Wired headphones with a lightning socket? Better quality 3.5mm to lightning adapter?
Any help gratefully accepted. (This is GadgetProblemsolving.com right?)
How much is your budget? If just for calls, any particular reason why you want over the ear? Normally they are for music, as you are isolating the outside noise and bigger drivers for better sound.
Fair point. I used to prefer over-ear because of (sorry about this) sweaty ear-canal issues. But that was back when I was working and stuck on calls for hours at a time. Maybe airpods are the way to go.
Given you have an iPhone and you don't care about music quality, airpods probably want you want. Although there are plenty of cheap bluetooth airpod type clones on the market these days, no idea what they are like for call quality...my guess would be not great.
Thanks. Oh, just checked. £159 for bluetooth in-ear pods... yer 'aving a laugh Apple.
Think I might go the USB-C over-ear route and use the connector cable Apple kindly included foc(!)
They are expensive, yes, but they also work pretty well and (unlike almost all Bluetooth devices I've ever used) connect very quickly to your phone without fuss. The sound quality is good both for the speakers and the microphone, though not as good as some wired ones I've had for half the price, and I don't find them uncomfortable though I can imagine that there are a few people who do.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
The Police shouldn't be armed thugs beating up those they dislike or shooting those who have the wrong skin colour, they should be professionals doing a job.
I just feel this is a non sequitur to the events or yesterday.
The attempted coup was an attack on democracy, incited by a President who has spent the past four years trying to subvert the rule of law.
The message that I want to hear from Biden/Harris is that an attack on the rule of law cannot be tolerated and that no-one - not even the President of the USA - can be above it.
I do not - at this juncture - want to hear Ms Harris talking about race. Apart from the fact that the rioters tended to be white incels, race is a non-sequitur.
I think if Pence/the GOP do not go after Trump, they can kiss goodbye to power for a generation.
They need him impeached so he is barred from running in 2024.
Ideally they need to do so quickly before he pardons his family, and others. But I think that he still has too many loyalists in Congress for the process to complete before the inauguration. Not even sure there would be two-thirds to convict in the Senate.
Then he'll be back, running in 2024 and sowing chaos.
There is as much chance of Trump running in 2024 as there is of Corbyn running in 2024.
People are moving on.
I hope so. It might be funny if he ran again, as an independent, and was utterly humiliated. But I'd rather the USA not have to face that risk.
If he ran again as an independent it would guarantee a Democrat landslide that would make 1992 look close.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
America seems determined to drive itself into civil war. It is only getting worse.
The more violent, antifa/BLM "protests" of the last year were disgraceful and unacceptable -like the THREE SOLID MONTHS of rioting, burning, lawlessness, and looting in Portland, Oregon.
The scenes yesterday in Washington were shorter, but more shocking, because of the symbolism. They chilled the world.
Surely it is not beyond the wit of politicians to condemn BOTH? To say there is proper room for protest about racial injustice, just as there is democratic room to protest about election counting, but neither should result in violence. Especially protest that shuts down entire towns, or menaces democracy.
Maybe I just don't get America any more. But I do get history, and what propels societies to civil strife, and America seems bent on that.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
I thought it was just an aside, but he’s tweeted it, and now Kamala has pretty much said the same.
The horrific scenes yesterday were horrific in their own right as an attack on democracy - not because they provide another lesson to be woker.
The policing looked far too soft to me yesterday, watching some archived Kenosha stuff on youtube - soft there too. I mean it's all overly soft, and then they randomly overdo it on someone or other they're just not very good I think.
The secret service (Wasn't police) shooting looked justified to me at any rate, gov't members were beyond that corridor.
The blunt fact is that the Capitol police did not call on assistance in advance of the rally yesterday. They could have, they did not.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
I thought it was just an aside, but he’s tweeted it, and now Kamala has pretty much said the same.
The horrific scenes yesterday were horrific in their own right as an attack on democracy - not because they provide another lesson to be woker.
The policing looked far too soft to me yesterday, watching some archived Kenosha stuff on youtube - soft there too. I mean it's all overly soft, and then they randomly overdo it on someone or other they're just not very good I think.
The secret service (Wasn't police) shooting looked justified to me at any rate, gov't members were beyond that corridor.
It is worth pointing out that the initial police response to the protests of George Floyd were very soft....so much so they when they turned violent, they quickly got overrun and had to abandon their police station, which was destroyed. The same in Seattle, they lost control of a small area of the city.
Now, I suppose the criticism would be that there appears to have been plenty of chatter about wanting to do what happened. However, up to now, Trump holds these rallies, the loonies get all excitable about QAnon and alike and then go home. He has regularly held these big events and nothing happens.
There is a small hardcore linked to Proud Boys that do have a record of going looking to start trouble, but in the past the authorities have managed to handle them without getting overrun as there aren't many of them, they are poorly organized and thick as shit.
The big exception to all the above was the Charlottesville one, which wasn't a Trump rally, but similar crowd.
While I condemn utterly the storming of the capitol in no uncertain terms I can't help thinking a lot here are wiffling when they huff and puff about it interrupting legal things.
All revolutions by their nature are illegal. Even the one that toppled Ceacescau and I think most would be applauding that one.
We condemn the capitol because we see it as democracy under threat ad that is currently how we govern ourselves therefore we see it as good. We applaud Ceacescu because it was a dictatorship and we see it as bad because thats not how we do things.
I do wonder though whether we are at the nether end of the representative democratic age, societies seem to polarised now and whoever is elected about half the country feels unrepresented. Look at america with republicans and democrats, brexit with remainers and leavers, the Johnson government where people claiming 53% of people voted against it. Macron and LePen though being french they seem to be more of the mind they don't really care who gets voted in as long as they don't try and implement any of the manifesto they got voted in for.
Is that to say democracy is dead? No but I think representative democracy is perhaps on life support in many places
Democracy needs renewal in a participatory direction, probably a radically participatory one. It's worth defending and preserving, but its flaws at the moment, in countries like the US and Britain, aren't just social and economic, but representational too.
It doesn't have flaws, it is working as intended.
The Americans just got rid of Trump and the Brits avoided his left wing mirror image last year. Two wins for democracy.
Any alternative system a Trump gets into power and he stays in power. Trump is on his way out now thanks to democracy working as it is supposed to do so.
It is Boris not Corbyn who is the British Trump. Charismatic and well-known from media appearances; winning the votes of those who'd lost their manufacturing jobs as the price of globalisation; blaming foreigners in Europe or China and Mexico. Boris is Trump.
No, Corbyn is Trump. Thankfully the Brits rejected him twice.
No, Boris is Trump. In addition to the similarities previously noted, both men are intelligent and highly educated but intellectually lazy; both are notoriously careless with facts; they are thin-skinned and duck accountability.
I hold Boris and Corbyn in very low regard, but if you take the worst halves of them combined, Trump is still in a completely different league of contempt. They both have some clear similarities with him, but also some clear differences.
Yes, quite.
Boris has elements of populism in his persona, but he is also a very smart man, an Eton scholar, Oxford star, speaks Ancient Greek, able to write (when he can be arsed) like a dream, and was a brilliant editor of probably the most revered political magazine in the world.
This is not necessarily the skillset you want in a PM, especially during a plague. Arguably many prior PMs would have handled it better (or not). The Pest has severely tested every leader on earth.
Comparing him to a delusional, narcissistic, demented, quasi-would-be tyrant like Trump is nuts. Boris is bad or or good or mediocre or whatever, but Trump is exceptional.
I cannot think of a worse leader elected by a major (or even minor) western democracy since 1945. Trump is in a class of his own. He makes Berlusconi look like Julius Caesar. I challenge PBers to give me someone inferior, or more damaging, in that era.
The Spectator is not "the most revered political magazine in the world".
And I speak as a former subscriber.
And by what measure was Johnson an "Oxford star"?
Have any PBers actually tried reading one of Boris Johnson's "books"?
Quite.
Boris is not a great speaker, and not even a terribly good writer. Dare I say it, Leon of this parish is far superior.
I own three of Boris's books (Churchill, Virgins, London) and two of Donald Trump's (Art of the Deal and Think Like a Billionaire).
And so?
And so I am not unthinkingly hostile to either man. And so I can objectively point out parallels between them. Oh yes, and so it answers the question, has anyone read Boris's books?
Given that Boris' book on Churchill has 2000+ reviews on amazon uk, with a very high rating of 4.5 stars, I fear the answer you dread is YES, people read his books
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
America seems determined to drive itself into civil war. It is only getting worse.
The more violent, antifa/BLM "protests" of the last year were disgraceful and unacceptable -like the THREE SOLID MONTHS of rioting, burning, lawlessness, and looting in Portland, Oregon.
The scenes yesterday in Washington were shorter, but more shocking, because of the symbolism. They chilled the world.
Surely it is not beyond the wit of politicians to condemn BOTH? To say there is proper room for protest about racial injustice, just as there is democratic room to protest about election counting, but neither should result in violence. Especially protest that shuts down entire towns, or menaces democracy.
Maybe I just don't get America any more. But I do get history, and what propels societies to civil strife, and America seems bent on that.
Plus remember even last year as he lost the election across the USA as a whole, Trump still won all but 2 states of the Old Confederacy.
The legacy of the last civil war is still present there still, as show too by the Confederate flag being carried into the Capitol by a Trumpite
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
The Police shouldn't be armed thugs beating up those they dislike or shooting those who have the wrong skin colour, they should be professionals doing a job.
I just feel this is a non sequitur to the events or yesterday.
The attempted coup was an attack on democracy, incited by a President who has spent the past four years trying to subvert the rule of law.
The message that I want to hear from Biden/Harris is that an attack on the rule of law cannot be tolerated and that no-one - not even the President of the USA - can be above it.
I do not - at this juncture - want to hear Ms Harris talking about race. Apart from the fact that the rioters tended to be white incels, race is a non-sequitur.
It is not a non sequitur it is entirely relevant. She is not talking about race - she is talking about the rule of law. She is talking about justice. These things matter.
It is worth asking a question why the Police can use tear gas on unarmed peaceful protestors and journalists to clear the streets - but they can't prevent a pre-planned, forewarned, pre-announced invasion of the Capitol by those they knew were coming with that intention?
The Police need complete and utter root and branch reform. They need new leadership. They need to be able to do the basics and Police to stop actual crimes like what we saw yesterday and not concentrate on attacking the unarmed.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
The Police shouldn't be armed thugs beating up those they dislike or shooting those who have the wrong skin colour, they should be professionals doing a job.
I just feel this is a non sequitur to the events or yesterday.
The attempted coup was an attack on democracy, incited by a President who has spent the past four years trying to subvert the rule of law.
The message that I want to hear from Biden/Harris is that an attack on the rule of law cannot be tolerated and that no-one - not even the President of the USA - can be above it.
I do not - at this juncture - want to hear Ms Harris talking about race. Apart from the fact that the rioters tended to be white incels, race is a non-sequitur.
It is not a non sequitur it is entirely relevant. She is not talking about race - she is talking about the rule of law. She is talking about justice. These things matter.
It is worth asking a question why the Police can use tear gas on unarmed peaceful protestors and journalists to clear the streets - but they can't prevent a pre-planned, forewarned, pre-announced invasion of the Capitol by those they knew were coming with that intention?
The Police need complete and utter root and branch reform. They need new leadership. They need to be able to do the basics and Police to stop actual crimes like what we saw yesterday and not concentrate on attacking the unarmed.
It is worth asking that definitely. But she doesn’t.
Shocked by the comments on social media about the death of the young woman in Congress. So many people gloating over her death. Not the right attitude at all IMO.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
The Police shouldn't be armed thugs beating up those they dislike or shooting those who have the wrong skin colour, they should be professionals doing a job.
I just feel this is a non sequitur to the events or yesterday.
The attempted coup was an attack on democracy, incited by a President who has spent the past four years trying to subvert the rule of law.
The message that I want to hear from Biden/Harris is that an attack on the rule of law cannot be tolerated and that no-one - not even the President of the USA - can be above it.
I do not - at this juncture - want to hear Ms Harris talking about race. Apart from the fact that the rioters tended to be white incels, race is a non-sequitur.
It is not a non sequitur it is entirely relevant. She is not talking about race - she is talking about the rule of law. She is talking about justice. These things matter.
It is worth asking a question why the Police can use tear gas on unarmed peaceful protestors and journalists to clear the streets - but they can't prevent a pre-planned, forewarned, pre-announced invasion of the Capitol by those they knew were coming with that intention?
The Police need complete and utter root and branch reform. They need new leadership. They need to be able to do the basics and Police to stop actual crimes like what we saw yesterday and not concentrate on attacking the unarmed.
It is worth asking that definitely. But she doesn’t.
She literally does.
Did you even watch her 2 minute video? That is precisely what she is talking about. Equality under the law.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
America seems determined to drive itself into civil war. It is only getting worse.
The more violent, antifa/BLM "protests" of the last year were disgraceful and unacceptable -like the THREE SOLID MONTHS of rioting, burning, lawlessness, and looting in Portland, Oregon.
The scenes yesterday in Washington were shorter, but more shocking, because of the symbolism. They chilled the world.
Surely it is not beyond the wit of politicians to condemn BOTH? To say there is proper room for protest about racial injustice, just as there is democratic room to protest about election counting, but neither should result in violence. Especially protest that shuts down entire towns, or menaces democracy.
Maybe I just don't get America any more. But I do get history, and what propels societies to civil strife, and America seems bent on that.
True. Both sides seem determined to never say anything that might be perceived as conciliatory to the other side, but that's the only way to solve the problems.
O/T Can anyone recommend the best solution for over-ear headphones, primarily for calls not music, for the iPhone 12.
Just upgraded from iPhone 6 and of course the 3.5mm jack plug socket is no more. Bought a cheap adapter from ebay which works fine for music but not recognised for phone calls (grrr!).
Bluetooth headphones? Wired headphones with a lightning socket? Better quality 3.5mm to lightning adapter?
Any help gratefully accepted. (This is GadgetProblemsolving.com right?)
How much is your budget? If just for calls, any particular reason why you want over the ear? Normally they are for music, as you are isolating the outside noise and bigger drivers for better sound.
Fair point. I used to prefer over-ear because of (sorry about this) sweaty ear-canal issues. But that was back when I was working and stuck on calls for hours at a time. Maybe airpods are the way to go.
Given you have an iPhone and you don't care about music quality, airpods probably want you want. Although there are plenty of cheap bluetooth airpod type clones on the market these days, no idea what they are like for call quality...my guess would be not great.
Thanks. Oh, just checked. £159 for bluetooth in-ear pods... yer 'aving a laugh Apple.
Think I might go the USB-C over-ear route and use the connector cable Apple kindly included foc(!)
I got these over-ear bluetooth headphones for my father-in-law: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07V37NHN9. They seem okay for an older guy who is slightly deaf, i.e. not exactly hi fidelity.
While I condemn utterly the storming of the capitol in no uncertain terms I can't help thinking a lot here are wiffling when they huff and puff about it interrupting legal things.
All revolutions by their nature are illegal. Even the one that toppled Ceacescau and I think most would be applauding that one.
We condemn the capitol because we see it as democracy under threat ad that is currently how we govern ourselves therefore we see it as good. We applaud Ceacescu because it was a dictatorship and we see it as bad because thats not how we do things.
I do wonder though whether we are at the nether end of the representative democratic age, societies seem to polarised now and whoever is elected about half the country feels unrepresented. Look at america with republicans and democrats, brexit with remainers and leavers, the Johnson government where people claiming 53% of people voted against it. Macron and LePen though being french they seem to be more of the mind they don't really care who gets voted in as long as they don't try and implement any of the manifesto they got voted in for.
Is that to say democracy is dead? No but I think representative democracy is perhaps on life support in many places
Democracy needs renewal in a participatory direction, probably a radically participatory one. It's worth defending and preserving, but its flaws at the moment, in countries like the US and Britain, aren't just social and economic, but representational too.
It doesn't have flaws, it is working as intended.
The Americans just got rid of Trump and the Brits avoided his left wing mirror image last year. Two wins for democracy.
Any alternative system a Trump gets into power and he stays in power. Trump is on his way out now thanks to democracy working as it is supposed to do so.
It is Boris not Corbyn who is the British Trump. Charismatic and well-known from media appearances; winning the votes of those who'd lost their manufacturing jobs as the price of globalisation; blaming foreigners in Europe or China and Mexico. Boris is Trump.
No, Corbyn is Trump. Thankfully the Brits rejected him twice.
No, Boris is Trump. In addition to the similarities previously noted, both men are intelligent and highly educated but intellectually lazy; both are notoriously careless with facts; they are thin-skinned and duck accountability.
I hold Boris and Corbyn in very low regard, but if you take the worst halves of them combined, Trump is still in a completely different league of contempt. They both have some clear similarities with him, but also some clear differences.
Yes, quite.
Boris has elements of populism in his persona, but he is also a very smart man, an Eton scholar, Oxford star, speaks Ancient Greek, able to write (when he can be arsed) like a dream, and was a brilliant editor of probably the most revered political magazine in the world.
This is not necessarily the skillset you want in a PM, especially during a plague. Arguably many prior PMs would have handled it better (or not). The Pest has severely tested every leader on earth.
Comparing him to a delusional, narcissistic, demented, quasi-would-be tyrant like Trump is nuts. Boris is bad or or good or mediocre or whatever, but Trump is exceptional.
I cannot think of a worse leader elected by a major (or even minor) western democracy since 1945. Trump is in a class of his own. He makes Berlusconi look like Julius Caesar. I challenge PBers to give me someone inferior, or more damaging, in that era.
The Spectator is not "the most revered political magazine in the world".
And I speak as a former subscriber.
And by what measure was Johnson an "Oxford star"?
Have any PBers actually tried reading one of Boris Johnson's "books"?
Quite.
Boris is not a great speaker, and not even a terribly good writer. Dare I say it, Leon of this parish is far superior.
Yes, the problem is that a fair proportion of Britons find clowning incompetence endearing. I don't think that I have met a foreigner who understands his appeal to the English.
I am a foreigner. I have never like Johnson much even when he was a supposed globalist liberal of my sort. I realised people found him charming but he always seemed fake and slightly unpleasant to me.
In all honesty, I would rather be a woman in Xi's China than a woman in, say, Saudi or Afghanistan. You have greater freedoms, and you have more respect from wider society. You are not automatically regarded as severely inferior.
Would you rather be a woman in Xi's China or a woman in Indonesia or Bangladesh? I mention those 2 countries as they are far more representative of the Islamic world: Indonesia has the largest Muslim population in the world; Bangladesh is at #4.
You deliberately and misleadingly picked the two countries which are worst for women, neither of which makes the top 10 countries by Muslim population. Indeed, by some estimates (but not others), China has more Muslims than either Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan. Constantly misrepresenting Islam by cherry-picking examples demonstrates that you're not interested in a reasoned discussion.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
The Police shouldn't be armed thugs beating up those they dislike or shooting those who have the wrong skin colour, they should be professionals doing a job.
I just feel this is a non sequitur to the events or yesterday.
The attempted coup was an attack on democracy, incited by a President who has spent the past four years trying to subvert the rule of law.
The message that I want to hear from Biden/Harris is that an attack on the rule of law cannot be tolerated and that no-one - not even the President of the USA - can be above it.
I do not - at this juncture - want to hear Ms Harris talking about race. Apart from the fact that the rioters tended to be white incels, race is a non-sequitur.
It is not a non sequitur it is entirely relevant. She is not talking about race - she is talking about the rule of law. She is talking about justice. These things matter.
It is worth asking a question why the Police can use tear gas on unarmed peaceful protestors and journalists to clear the streets - but they can't prevent a pre-planned, forewarned, pre-announced invasion of the Capitol by those they knew were coming with that intention?
The Police need complete and utter root and branch reform. They need new leadership. They need to be able to do the basics and Police to stop actual crimes like what we saw yesterday and not concentrate on attacking the unarmed.
It is worth asking that definitely. But she doesn’t.
Precisely.
She's just pouring petrol on the fire. This is nuts.
Biden, Pence and Romney all made excellent speeches yesterday. "Let's get back to work". Totally condemning the Trumpite idiots, and rightly so.
One day later America is picking the scab of its ultimate wound: racial injustice, in a way that will only make the wound fester. It is madness. I am a Briton looking at the most important western country in the West, and our greatest ally, carefully tearing itself to shreds. Desperate stuff.
I disagree wholeheartedly with that notion at the moment. The vaccines pledge is political genius. Allegra and Nut Nuts are very clever people, they have hijacked the media agenda, no one is interested in any other metric besides the vaccine programme success.
On BBC Wales tonight there is consternation that Welsh ineptitude in rolling out the vaccine is confirmed by only 1.5% of the population vaccinated in Wales "lagging behind" Johnson's 1.9%. In Scotland there is also some disquiet about Sturgeon's vaccine performance. It is the key measurement of interest. Hospitalisations, deaths, pressure on the NHS are of secondary importance. Johnson has hit the jackpot. It will pay electoral dividends.
There is going to be huge disquiet if England is jabbing 60 year olds while Wales is still jabbing 80 year olds at the care homes.
Let's just look at the race so far:
1= Scotland (SNP) ... 2.1 per cent jabbed 1= N Ireland (DUP/SF) ... 2.1 per cent jabbed 3 England (Tories) ...1.9 per cent jabbed 4 Wales (Lab/LibDem) ... 1.6 per cent jabbed.
(Source: BBC).
SKS needs to spend his time kicking Drakeford's sorry arse.
(I know the Welsh posters give him a regular kicking, but it doesn't have any effect when we do it).
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
The Police shouldn't be armed thugs beating up those they dislike or shooting those who have the wrong skin colour, they should be professionals doing a job.
Yep. And I think a deep dig into the way US Police are recruited, trained and deployed wouldn't be wildly unpopular. The institution and culture (and some individuals within it) is in desperate need of reform.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
The Police shouldn't be armed thugs beating up those they dislike or shooting those who have the wrong skin colour, they should be professionals doing a job.
I just feel this is a non sequitur to the events or yesterday.
The attempted coup was an attack on democracy, incited by a President who has spent the past four years trying to subvert the rule of law.
The message that I want to hear from Biden/Harris is that an attack on the rule of law cannot be tolerated and that no-one - not even the President of the USA - can be above it.
I do not - at this juncture - want to hear Ms Harris talking about race. Apart from the fact that the rioters tended to be white incels, race is a non-sequitur.
It is not a non sequitur it is entirely relevant. She is not talking about race - she is talking about the rule of law. She is talking about justice. These things matter.
It is worth asking a question why the Police can use tear gas on unarmed peaceful protestors and journalists to clear the streets - but they can't prevent a pre-planned, forewarned, pre-announced invasion of the Capitol by those they knew were coming with that intention?
The Police need complete and utter root and branch reform. They need new leadership. They need to be able to do the basics and Police to stop actual crimes like what we saw yesterday and not concentrate on attacking the unarmed.
It is worth asking that definitely. But she doesn’t.
Precisely.
She's just pouring petrol on the fire. This is nuts.
Biden, Pence and Romney all made excellent speeches yesterday. "Let's get back to work". Totally condemning the Trumpite idiots, and rightly so.
One day later America is picking the scab of its ultimate wound: racial injustice, in a way that will only make the wound fester. It is madness. I am a Briton looking at the most important western country in the West, and our greatest ally, carefully tearing itself to shreds. Desperate stuff.
Reforming the Police and judicial system so they actually fight crimes instead of minorities is not festering a wound. It is doing what needs to be done.
O/T Can anyone recommend the best solution for over-ear headphones, primarily for calls not music, for the iPhone 12.
Just upgraded from iPhone 6 and of course the 3.5mm jack plug socket is no more. Bought a cheap adapter from ebay which works fine for music but not recognised for phone calls (grrr!).
Bluetooth headphones? Wired headphones with a lightning socket? Better quality 3.5mm to lightning adapter?
Any help gratefully accepted. (This is GadgetProblemsolving.com right?)
How much is your budget? If just for calls, any particular reason why you want over the ear? Normally they are for music, as you are isolating the outside noise and bigger drivers for better sound.
Fair point. I used to prefer over-ear because of (sorry about this) sweaty ear-canal issues. But that was back when I was working and stuck on calls for hours at a time. Maybe airpods are the way to go.
Given you have an iPhone and you don't care about music quality, airpods probably want you want. Although there are plenty of cheap bluetooth airpod type clones on the market these days, no idea what they are like for call quality...my guess would be not great.
Thanks. Oh, just checked. £159 for bluetooth in-ear pods... yer 'aving a laugh Apple.
Think I might go the USB-C over-ear route and use the connector cable Apple kindly included foc(!)
I got these over-ear bluetooth headphones for my father-in-law: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07V37NHN9. They seem okay for an older guy who is slightly deaf, i.e. not exactly hi fidelity.
--AS
If you are going to spend £50, you are then into the territory of cheaper end of Sennheisers or Audio-Technica, which are significantly better.
O/T Can anyone recommend the best solution for over-ear headphones, primarily for calls not music, for the iPhone 12.
Just upgraded from iPhone 6 and of course the 3.5mm jack plug socket is no more. Bought a cheap adapter from ebay which works fine for music but not recognised for phone calls (grrr!).
Bluetooth headphones? Wired headphones with a lightning socket? Better quality 3.5mm to lightning adapter?
Any help gratefully accepted. (This is GadgetProblemsolving.com right?)
How much is your budget? If just for calls, any particular reason why you want over the ear? Normally they are for music, as you are isolating the outside noise and bigger drivers for better sound.
Fair point. I used to prefer over-ear because of (sorry about this) sweaty ear-canal issues. But that was back when I was working and stuck on calls for hours at a time. Maybe airpods are the way to go.
Given you have an iPhone and you don't care about music quality, airpods probably want you want. Although there are plenty of cheap bluetooth airpod type clones on the market these days, no idea what they are like for call quality...my guess would be not great.
Thanks. Oh, just checked. £159 for bluetooth in-ear pods... yer 'aving a laugh Apple.
Think I might go the USB-C over-ear route and use the connector cable Apple kindly included foc(!)
I got these over-ear bluetooth headphones for my father-in-law: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07V37NHN9. They seem okay for an older guy who is slightly deaf, i.e. not exactly hi fidelity.
--AS
If you are going to spend £50, you are then into the territory of cheaper end of Sennheisers or Audio-Technica, which are significantly better.
Do they do bluetooth in that price range? (Also I hadn't noticed that those ones are now £50, it was only £20 or £30 when I bought it.)
O/T Can anyone recommend the best solution for over-ear headphones, primarily for calls not music, for the iPhone 12.
Just upgraded from iPhone 6 and of course the 3.5mm jack plug socket is no more. Bought a cheap adapter from ebay which works fine for music but not recognised for phone calls (grrr!).
Bluetooth headphones? Wired headphones with a lightning socket? Better quality 3.5mm to lightning adapter?
Any help gratefully accepted. (This is GadgetProblemsolving.com right?)
How much is your budget? If just for calls, any particular reason why you want over the ear? Normally they are for music, as you are isolating the outside noise and bigger drivers for better sound.
Fair point. I used to prefer over-ear because of (sorry about this) sweaty ear-canal issues. But that was back when I was working and stuck on calls for hours at a time. Maybe airpods are the way to go.
Given you have an iPhone and you don't care about music quality, airpods probably want you want. Although there are plenty of cheap bluetooth airpod type clones on the market these days, no idea what they are like for call quality...my guess would be not great.
Thanks. Oh, just checked. £159 for bluetooth in-ear pods... yer 'aving a laugh Apple.
Think I might go the USB-C over-ear route and use the connector cable Apple kindly included foc(!)
I got these over-ear bluetooth headphones for my father-in-law: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07V37NHN9. They seem okay for an older guy who is slightly deaf, i.e. not exactly hi fidelity.
--AS
If you are going to spend £50, you are then into the territory of cheaper end of Sennheisers or Audio-Technica, which are significantly better.
Sennheisers are better but in my experience, Sennheiser headphones are not robust. I've got through many pairs and have no complaint about sound or comfort but their cables seem very delicate and the plastic covering on the earpieces can flake off.
In all honesty, I would rather be a woman in Xi's China than a woman in, say, Saudi or Afghanistan. You have greater freedoms, and you have more respect from wider society. You are not automatically regarded as severely inferior.
Would you rather be a woman in Xi's China or a woman in Indonesia or Bangladesh? I mention those 2 countries as they are far more representative of the Islamic world: Indonesia has the largest Muslim population in the world; Bangladesh is at #4.
You deliberately and misleadingly picked the two countries which are worst for women, neither of which makes the top 10 countries by Muslim population. Indeed, by some estimates (but not others), China has more Muslims than either Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan. Constantly misrepresenting Islam by cherry-picking examples demonstrates that you're not interested in a reasoned discussion.
Given the difference in GDP per capita, which is ever widening. yes I would rather be a woman in China than Bangladesh
China: 8130.00 USD
Bangladesh: 1,698.26 USD
So your point is futile, as well as inane, and jejune, and banal. And dim. And boring.
O/T Can anyone recommend the best solution for over-ear headphones, primarily for calls not music, for the iPhone 12.
Just upgraded from iPhone 6 and of course the 3.5mm jack plug socket is no more. Bought a cheap adapter from ebay which works fine for music but not recognised for phone calls (grrr!).
Bluetooth headphones? Wired headphones with a lightning socket? Better quality 3.5mm to lightning adapter?
Any help gratefully accepted. (This is GadgetProblemsolving.com right?)
How much is your budget? If just for calls, any particular reason why you want over the ear? Normally they are for music, as you are isolating the outside noise and bigger drivers for better sound.
Fair point. I used to prefer over-ear because of (sorry about this) sweaty ear-canal issues. But that was back when I was working and stuck on calls for hours at a time. Maybe airpods are the way to go.
Given you have an iPhone and you don't care about music quality, airpods probably want you want. Although there are plenty of cheap bluetooth airpod type clones on the market these days, no idea what they are like for call quality...my guess would be not great.
Thanks. Oh, just checked. £159 for bluetooth in-ear pods... yer 'aving a laugh Apple.
Think I might go the USB-C over-ear route and use the connector cable Apple kindly included foc(!)
I got these over-ear bluetooth headphones for my father-in-law: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07V37NHN9. They seem okay for an older guy who is slightly deaf, i.e. not exactly hi fidelity.
--AS
If you are going to spend £50, you are then into the territory of cheaper end of Sennheisers or Audio-Technica, which are significantly better.
Do they do bluetooth in that price range? (Also I hadn't noticed that those ones are now £50, it was only £20 or £30 when I bought it.)
--AS
You can get HD 350BT for £60 or so.
As mentioned below, just for working out I got the DOQAUS Bluetooth Headphones Over Ear for £25. And they are very good for the money.
O/T Can anyone recommend the best solution for over-ear headphones, primarily for calls not music, for the iPhone 12.
Just upgraded from iPhone 6 and of course the 3.5mm jack plug socket is no more. Bought a cheap adapter from ebay which works fine for music but not recognised for phone calls (grrr!).
Bluetooth headphones? Wired headphones with a lightning socket? Better quality 3.5mm to lightning adapter?
Any help gratefully accepted. (This is GadgetProblemsolving.com right?)
How much is your budget? If just for calls, any particular reason why you want over the ear? Normally they are for music, as you are isolating the outside noise and bigger drivers for better sound.
Fair point. I used to prefer over-ear because of (sorry about this) sweaty ear-canal issues. But that was back when I was working and stuck on calls for hours at a time. Maybe airpods are the way to go.
Given you have an iPhone and you don't care about music quality, airpods probably want you want. Although there are plenty of cheap bluetooth airpod type clones on the market these days, no idea what they are like for call quality...my guess would be not great.
Thanks. Oh, just checked. £159 for bluetooth in-ear pods... yer 'aving a laugh Apple.
Think I might go the USB-C over-ear route and use the connector cable Apple kindly included foc(!)
I got these over-ear bluetooth headphones for my father-in-law: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07V37NHN9. They seem okay for an older guy who is slightly deaf, i.e. not exactly hi fidelity.
--AS
If you are going to spend £50, you are then into the territory of cheaper end of Sennheisers or Audio-Technica, which are significantly better.
Sennheisers are better but in my experience, Sennheiser headphones are not robust. I've got through many pairs and have no complaint about sound or comfort but their cables seem very delicate and the plastic covering on the earpieces can flake off.
I have never bought the cheaper ones, so that might well be the case. I presuming the "cost engineer" the hell out of some models, given how good some Chinese models have got in the £40-50 range.
The £350 pair I have, they have lasted 5+ years with zero issues of any sort, they are pretty much like the day I bought them, despite using them for several years as my go to travel ones that got rammed in my backpack to go on airplanes.
In all honesty, I would rather be a woman in Xi's China than a woman in, say, Saudi or Afghanistan. You have greater freedoms, and you have more respect from wider society. You are not automatically regarded as severely inferior.
Would you rather be a woman in Xi's China or a woman in Indonesia or Bangladesh? I mention those 2 countries as they are far more representative of the Islamic world: Indonesia has the largest Muslim population in the world; Bangladesh is at #4.
You deliberately and misleadingly picked the two countries which are worst for women, neither of which makes the top 10 countries by Muslim population. Indeed, by some estimates (but not others), China has more Muslims than either Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan. Constantly misrepresenting Islam by cherry-picking examples demonstrates that you're not interested in a reasoned discussion.
It would probably be better to be a woman in Bangladesh where they've had female PMs.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
America seems determined to drive itself into civil war. It is only getting worse.
The more violent, antifa/BLM "protests" of the last year were disgraceful and unacceptable -like the THREE SOLID MONTHS of rioting, burning, lawlessness, and looting in Portland, Oregon.
The scenes yesterday in Washington were shorter, but more shocking, because of the symbolism. They chilled the world.
Surely it is not beyond the wit of politicians to condemn BOTH? To say there is proper room for protest about racial injustice, just as there is democratic room to protest about election counting, but neither should result in violence. Especially protest that shuts down entire towns, or menaces democracy.
Maybe I just don't get America any more. But I do get history, and what propels societies to civil strife, and America seems bent on that.
True. Both sides seem determined to never say anything that might be perceived as conciliatory to the other side, but that's the only way to solve the problems.
One side consists of racists, the other side consists of people who think racism is bad.
I have a sneaking suspicion that Ireland may go for broke and approve the Astra Zeneca vaccine sooner rather than later. No evidence , just a gut thought.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
America seems determined to drive itself into civil war. It is only getting worse.
The more violent, antifa/BLM "protests" of the last year were disgraceful and unacceptable -like the THREE SOLID MONTHS of rioting, burning, lawlessness, and looting in Portland, Oregon.
The scenes yesterday in Washington were shorter, but more shocking, because of the symbolism. They chilled the world.
Surely it is not beyond the wit of politicians to condemn BOTH? To say there is proper room for protest about racial injustice, just as there is democratic room to protest about election counting, but neither should result in violence. Especially protest that shuts down entire towns, or menaces democracy.
Maybe I just don't get America any more. But I do get history, and what propels societies to civil strife, and America seems bent on that.
True. Both sides seem determined to never say anything that might be perceived as conciliatory to the other side, but that's the only way to solve the problems.
One side consists of racists, the other side consists of people who think racism is bad.
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
The Police shouldn't be armed thugs beating up those they dislike or shooting those who have the wrong skin colour, they should be professionals doing a job.
I just feel this is a non sequitur to the events or yesterday.
The attempted coup was an attack on democracy, incited by a President who has spent the past four years trying to subvert the rule of law.
The message that I want to hear from Biden/Harris is that an attack on the rule of law cannot be tolerated and that no-one - not even the President of the USA - can be above it.
I do not - at this juncture - want to hear Ms Harris talking about race. Apart from the fact that the rioters tended to be white incels, race is a non-sequitur.
It is not a non sequitur it is entirely relevant. She is not talking about race - she is talking about the rule of law. She is talking about justice. These things matter.
It is worth asking a question why the Police can use tear gas on unarmed peaceful protestors and journalists to clear the streets - but they can't prevent a pre-planned, forewarned, pre-announced invasion of the Capitol by those they knew were coming with that intention?
The Police need complete and utter root and branch reform. They need new leadership. They need to be able to do the basics and Police to stop actual crimes like what we saw yesterday and not concentrate on attacking the unarmed.
It is worth asking that definitely. But she doesn’t.
Precisely.
She's just pouring petrol on the fire. This is nuts.
Biden, Pence and Romney all made excellent speeches yesterday. "Let's get back to work". Totally condemning the Trumpite idiots, and rightly so.
One day later America is picking the scab of its ultimate wound: racial injustice, in a way that will only make the wound fester. It is madness. I am a Briton looking at the most important western country in the West, and our greatest ally, carefully tearing itself to shreds. Desperate stuff.
Indeed and if it was Biden v Pence in 2024 I could see Biden being re elected, if he did not run again and Harris was the Democratic candidate Pence could now even present himself as the more moderate option against her
In a sense Biden is going to have a breeze of a presidency. Every daily act of normality will be seen as restoring the calm governance of the republic.
On the other hand the future expects him to put in place constitutional changes that will stop someone with Trump's conditions every able to get near the Oval office again.
Biden is putting together a dreary cabinet. The two appointees lined up for tomorrow are Waldorf and Statler. And that sums it up beautifully.
What is actually going to happen, this presidency will remind everyone exactly why they voted Trump in the first place and Boris in U.K. Lazy misadventures over seas, wokeism, socialism, but overall just no clear sense what they want to do in the world.
I don't see how it is compatible that it will be both a dreary cabinet and one full of wokeism and socialism, since those are not known brands of Biden's dreary approach.
I know this is hard for you to grasp: Biden will be an excellent president.
I have a sneaking suspicion that Ireland may go for broke and approve the Astra Zeneca vaccine sooner rather than later. No evidence , just a gut thought.
That's all well and good, but do they actually have any of it on order? The EU has approved the Moderna one, but they ain't got any and not getting any for months.
In all honesty, I would rather be a woman in Xi's China than a woman in, say, Saudi or Afghanistan. You have greater freedoms, and you have more respect from wider society. You are not automatically regarded as severely inferior.
Would you rather be a woman in Xi's China or a woman in Indonesia or Bangladesh? I mention those 2 countries as they are far more representative of the Islamic world: Indonesia has the largest Muslim population in the world; Bangladesh is at #4.
You deliberately and misleadingly picked the two countries which are worst for women, neither of which makes the top 10 countries by Muslim population. Indeed, by some estimates (but not others), China has more Muslims than either Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan. Constantly misrepresenting Islam by cherry-picking examples demonstrates that you're not interested in a reasoned discussion.
Given the difference in GDP per capita, which is ever widening. yes I would rather be a woman in China than Bangladesh
China: 8130.00 USD
Bangladesh: 1,698.26 USD
So your point is futile, as well as inane, and jejune, and banal. And dim. And boring.
O/T Can anyone recommend the best solution for over-ear headphones, primarily for calls not music, for the iPhone 12.
Just upgraded from iPhone 6 and of course the 3.5mm jack plug socket is no more. Bought a cheap adapter from ebay which works fine for music but not recognised for phone calls (grrr!).
Bluetooth headphones? Wired headphones with a lightning socket? Better quality 3.5mm to lightning adapter?
Any help gratefully accepted. (This is GadgetProblemsolving.com right?)
How much is your budget? If just for calls, any particular reason why you want over the ear? Normally they are for music, as you are isolating the outside noise and bigger drivers for better sound.
Fair point. I used to prefer over-ear because of (sorry about this) sweaty ear-canal issues. But that was back when I was working and stuck on calls for hours at a time. Maybe airpods are the way to go.
Given you have an iPhone and you don't care about music quality, airpods probably want you want. Although there are plenty of cheap bluetooth airpod type clones on the market these days, no idea what they are like for call quality...my guess would be not great.
Thanks. Oh, just checked. £159 for bluetooth in-ear pods... yer 'aving a laugh Apple.
Think I might go the USB-C over-ear route and use the connector cable Apple kindly included foc(!)
I got these over-ear bluetooth headphones for my father-in-law: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07V37NHN9. They seem okay for an older guy who is slightly deaf, i.e. not exactly hi fidelity.
--AS
If you are going to spend £50, you are then into the territory of cheaper end of Sennheisers or Audio-Technica, which are significantly better.
Do they do bluetooth in that price range? (Also I hadn't noticed that those ones are now £50, it was only £20 or £30 when I bought it.)
--AS
You can get HD 350BT for £60 or so.
As mentioned below, just for working out I got the DOQAUS Bluetooth Headphones Over Ear for £25. And they are very good for the money.
Interesting. It all depends on the quality of the ears doing the listening, of course. I myself don't consider Sennheisers with model numbers below 600
I'm sorry, there's no healing this. These traitors need to be defeated, not coddled.
Biden has a chance to heal the centre and put common sense back in to US policy, but he's fluffed it. Pelosi needed to go for a clean break and to give him a chance, He decided on business as usual.
The President has no role in appointing the House leader.
Of course, he's a man without influence.
Is your ignorance of US politics real, or simply a trolling device ?
I have a sneaking suspicion that Ireland may go for broke and approve the Astra Zeneca vaccine sooner rather than later. No evidence , just a gut thought.
That's all well and good, but do they actually have any of it on order? The EU has approved the Moderna one, but they ain't got any and not getting any for months.
Don't they have one of AZN's half dozen manufacturing plants? If so, they could probably come to a deal
Biden’s comments that BLM protestors would have been treated differently - while true - is hardly fucking salient unless he’s planning an investigation into the Capitol Guard.
Not a good omen.
Did he say that? Way to go, to deepen the Culture Wars. Idiotic.
The Police shouldn't be armed thugs beating up those they dislike or shooting those who have the wrong skin colour, they should be professionals doing a job.
I just feel this is a non sequitur to the events or yesterday.
The attempted coup was an attack on democracy, incited by a President who has spent the past four years trying to subvert the rule of law.
The message that I want to hear from Biden/Harris is that an attack on the rule of law cannot be tolerated and that no-one - not even the President of the USA - can be above it.
I do not - at this juncture - want to hear Ms Harris talking about race. Apart from the fact that the rioters tended to be white incels, race is a non-sequitur.
It is not a non sequitur it is entirely relevant. She is not talking about race - she is talking about the rule of law. She is talking about justice. These things matter.
It is worth asking a question why the Police can use tear gas on unarmed peaceful protestors and journalists to clear the streets - but they can't prevent a pre-planned, forewarned, pre-announced invasion of the Capitol by those they knew were coming with that intention?
The Police need complete and utter root and branch reform. They need new leadership. They need to be able to do the basics and Police to stop actual crimes like what we saw yesterday and not concentrate on attacking the unarmed.
It is worth asking that definitely. But she doesn’t.
Precisely.
She's just pouring petrol on the fire. This is nuts.
Biden, Pence and Romney all made excellent speeches yesterday. "Let's get back to work". Totally condemning the Trumpite idiots, and rightly so.
One day later America is picking the scab of its ultimate wound: racial injustice, in a way that will only make the wound fester. It is madness. I am a Briton looking at the most important western country in the West, and our greatest ally, carefully tearing itself to shreds. Desperate stuff.
Reforming the Police and judicial system so they actually fight crimes instead of minorities is not festering a wound. It is doing what needs to be done.
Maybe, maybe even probably. Maybe even urgently.
But is this what you should be saying, right now, to 70m Trump voters - pretty much half the country - many of whom feel dismayed, disgruntled, or disenfranchised?
No, it is not. This is not statesmanship. It is goading of the loser, it is stoking of the fires.
There are plenty of ways to condemn yesterday's utterly disgraceful scenes without making the atmosphere worse. Biden did exactly that with his first response, last night. Yet now, Biden's Democrats seem like they want to double down on the mad identity politics and rub the noses of the Republicans in their defeat. This seems to me, as an outsider, like a tragic mistake. Akin to the British shooting the Irish rebels in 1916, in a strange way,
I hope I am wrong, and yielding to hyperbole, which is not unknown.
Now I am going to watch The Crown, and our beloved and calming Queen. Goodnight PB.
O/T Can anyone recommend the best solution for over-ear headphones, primarily for calls not music, for the iPhone 12.
Just upgraded from iPhone 6 and of course the 3.5mm jack plug socket is no more. Bought a cheap adapter from ebay which works fine for music but not recognised for phone calls (grrr!).
Bluetooth headphones? Wired headphones with a lightning socket? Better quality 3.5mm to lightning adapter?
Any help gratefully accepted. (This is GadgetProblemsolving.com right?)
How much is your budget? If just for calls, any particular reason why you want over the ear? Normally they are for music, as you are isolating the outside noise and bigger drivers for better sound.
Fair point. I used to prefer over-ear because of (sorry about this) sweaty ear-canal issues. But that was back when I was working and stuck on calls for hours at a time. Maybe airpods are the way to go.
Given you have an iPhone and you don't care about music quality, airpods probably want you want. Although there are plenty of cheap bluetooth airpod type clones on the market these days, no idea what they are like for call quality...my guess would be not great.
Thanks. Oh, just checked. £159 for bluetooth in-ear pods... yer 'aving a laugh Apple.
Think I might go the USB-C over-ear route and use the connector cable Apple kindly included foc(!)
I got these over-ear bluetooth headphones for my father-in-law: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07V37NHN9. They seem okay for an older guy who is slightly deaf, i.e. not exactly hi fidelity.
--AS
If you are going to spend £50, you are then into the territory of cheaper end of Sennheisers or Audio-Technica, which are significantly better.
Do they do bluetooth in that price range? (Also I hadn't noticed that those ones are now £50, it was only £20 or £30 when I bought it.)
--AS
You can get HD 350BT for £60 or so.
As mentioned below, just for working out I got the DOQAUS Bluetooth Headphones Over Ear for £25. And they are very good for the money.
Interesting. It all depends on the quality of the ears doing the listening, of course. I myself don't consider Sennheisers with model numbers below 600
I have a sneaking suspicion that Ireland may go for broke and approve the Astra Zeneca vaccine sooner rather than later. No evidence , just a gut thought.
That's all well and good, but do they actually have any of it on order? The EU has approved the Moderna one, but they ain't got any and not getting any for months.
Optics are everything. Some pictures of ambulances lining up outside Antrim Area Hospital caused the NI Executive to shit themselves.
While I condemn utterly the storming of the capitol in no uncertain terms I can't help thinking a lot here are wiffling when they huff and puff about it interrupting legal things.
All revolutions by their nature are illegal. Even the one that toppled Ceacescau and I think most would be applauding that one.
We condemn the capitol because we see it as democracy under threat ad that is currently how we govern ourselves therefore we see it as good. We applaud Ceacescu because it was a dictatorship and we see it as bad because thats not how we do things.
I do wonder though whether we are at the nether end of the representative democratic age, societies seem to polarised now and whoever is elected about half the country feels unrepresented. Look at america with republicans and democrats, brexit with remainers and leavers, the Johnson government where people claiming 53% of people voted against it. Macron and LePen though being french they seem to be more of the mind they don't really care who gets voted in as long as they don't try and implement any of the manifesto they got voted in for.
Is that to say democracy is dead? No but I think representative democracy is perhaps on life support in many places
Democracy needs renewal in a participatory direction, probably a radically participatory one. It's worth defending and preserving, but its flaws at the moment, in countries like the US and Britain, aren't just social and economic, but representational too.
It doesn't have flaws, it is working as intended.
The Americans just got rid of Trump and the Brits avoided his left wing mirror image last year. Two wins for democracy.
Any alternative system a Trump gets into power and he stays in power. Trump is on his way out now thanks to democracy working as it is supposed to do so.
It is Boris not Corbyn who is the British Trump. Charismatic and well-known from media appearances; winning the votes of those who'd lost their manufacturing jobs as the price of globalisation; blaming foreigners in Europe or China and Mexico. Boris is Trump.
No, Corbyn is Trump. Thankfully the Brits rejected him twice.
No, Boris is Trump. In addition to the similarities previously noted, both men are intelligent and highly educated but intellectually lazy; both are notoriously careless with facts; they are thin-skinned and duck accountability.
I hold Boris and Corbyn in very low regard, but if you take the worst halves of them combined, Trump is still in a completely different league of contempt. They both have some clear similarities with him, but also some clear differences.
Yes, quite.
Boris has elements of populism in his persona, but he is also a very smart man, an Eton scholar, Oxford star, speaks Ancient Greek, able to write (when he can be arsed) like a dream, and was a brilliant editor of probably the most revered political magazine in the world.
This is not necessarily the skillset you want in a PM, especially during a plague. Arguably many prior PMs would have handled it better (or not). The Pest has severely tested every leader on earth.
Comparing him to a delusional, narcissistic, demented, quasi-would-be tyrant like Trump is nuts. Boris is bad or or good or mediocre or whatever, but Trump is exceptional.
I cannot think of a worse leader elected by a major (or even minor) western democracy since 1945. Trump is in a class of his own. He makes Berlusconi look like Julius Caesar. I challenge PBers to give me someone inferior, or more damaging, in that era.
The Spectator is not "the most revered political magazine in the world".
And I speak as a former subscriber.
And by what measure was Johnson an "Oxford star"?
Have any PBers actually tried reading one of Boris Johnson's "books"?
Quite.
Boris is not a great speaker, and not even a terribly good writer. Dare I say it, Leon of this parish is far superior.
I own three of Boris's books (Churchill, Virgins, London) and two of Donald Trump's (Art of the Deal and Think Like a Billionaire).
And so?
And so I am not unthinkingly hostile to either man. And so I can objectively point out parallels between them. Oh yes, and so it answers the question, has anyone read Boris's books?
Given that Boris' book on Churchill has 2000+ reviews on amazon uk, with a very high rating of 4.5 stars, I fear the answer you dread is YES, people read his books
The reviews aren't what you might expect. Those that are interested in history give it one star. Those who start off saying "I like Boris" give it five stars. I haven't counted them but presumably there are more readers in the second group than the first.
Both groups agree the book is really about Boris Johnson and not Winston Churchill.
No, BoZo knows that he is a joke and fraud. He has the advantage over Trump of having insight.
Into what?
He constantly, continuously, infallibly, unendingly, inevitably, does the worst possible thing at the worst possible moment.
I disagree wholeheartedly with that notion at the moment. The vaccines pledge is political genius. Allegra and Nut Nuts are very clever people, they have hijacked the media agenda, no one is interested in any other metric besides the vaccine programme success.
On BBC Wales tonight there is consternation that Welsh ineptitude in rolling out the vaccine is confirmed by only 1.5% of the population vaccinated in Wales "lagging behind" Johnson's 1.9%. In Scotland there is also some disquiet about Sturgeon's vaccine performance. It is the key measurement of interest. Hospitalisations, deaths, pressure on the NHS are of secondary importance. Johnson has hit the jackpot. It will pay electoral dividends.
The ultimate key measurement of interest will be the total number of people killed by the virus. Boris, and we, had better hope that the vaccine is rolled out fast enough to shift the UK from its spot as one of the worst performing countries in the world on that metric.
I don't believe that is the key metric for the next few months at least. The vaccine rollout is, and by the time we start worrying about anything other than the vaccine rollout, Boris will have beaten Covid.
I have previously underesetimated Johnson's genius in manipulating the media.
Comments
https://twitter.com/CBSNews/status/1347308592198791168?s=20
On BBC Wales tonight there is consternation that Welsh ineptitude in rolling out the vaccine is confirmed by only 1.5% of the population vaccinated in Wales "lagging behind" Johnson's 1.9%. In Scotland there is also some disquiet about Sturgeon's vaccine performance. It is the key measurement of interest. Hospitalisations, deaths, pressure on the NHS are of secondary importance. Johnson has hit the jackpot. It will pay electoral dividends.
Think I might go the USB-C over-ear route and use the connector cable Apple kindly included foc(!)
Not a good omen.
Before anyone starts, it matters very little now, and I'm not sure that giving Trump a helping hand out of the door is that regrettable, but there's no doubt the general outrage has been used in a very coordinated way.
This one doesn't even have the guts to face the press - as supposed POTUS "press secretary".
Even Ron "Inoperative" Ziegler was better than this.
That said, I believe some foreign English speakers find him at least quite charming - Americans, Aussies, etc -but this is probably in the sense they like floppy haired, but cleverly educated, nicely accented Englishmen (cf Hugh Grant in Three Weddings and so forth). The admiration goes no deeper.
The English do have a particular liking for the self deprecating buffoon with an amateur style but a good brain. In this sense, Boris is not a million miles away from Churchill, his hero. The difference is that Churchill was able to do proper gravitas, and bravery, in spades, when called upon. And Churchill was not obviously a cad in his love life, if indeed he ever had a love life.
All that said, I can see Boris winning a pretty handsome victory in 2024, if he is seen to defeat Covid. Starmer is boring, and the English hate boring.
That may in turn condemn the Union. Ah, the times. the times.
They look just like the Apple ones, have been perfectly reliable, make good phone calls, good sound quality - they do the job. For £8. 🤷🏻♂️
People are moving on.
https://twitter.com/kamalaharris/status/1347279867574943745?s=21
So what are they saying? That the BLM protestors ought to have been allowed into the Capitol too?
The horrific scenes yesterday were horrific in their own right as an attack on democracy - not because they provide another lesson to be woker.
So it could be the Union that saves Starmer
As for BLM in this context, note that MANY on the left here in US are making point Biden just made. While I agree it is NOT what should be emphasized, the new (dare I say real) President has to keep the left on board as he proceeds forward, without unduly upsetting the middle.
And unlike the UK, here among Middle America (geographically and demographically) the support for the basic justice of Black Live Matter's core message has - since the death of George Floyd - enjoyed significant support; support that is NOT confined to the left.
Bottom line for me - let Joe be Joe. Give him space, and do NOT assume he doesn't know what he's doing.
It doesn't seem unreasonable to me to note that they never would have gotten the chance even if they had wanted to, given the disparity in the preparation and response. And not unreasonable to speculate on some reasons for that disparity.
And I say that having been clear that BLM protestors who did engage in destructive behaviour were not protestors but rioters in my mind.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Churchill-Factor-How-Made-History/dp/144478305X/ref=sr_1_4?dchild=1&keywords=boris+johnson&qid=1610059758&s=books&sr=1-4
The Police shouldn't be armed thugs beating up those they dislike or shooting those who have the wrong skin colour, they should be professionals doing a job.
Ah, I see what you mean.
The secret service (Wasn't police) shooting looked justified to me at any rate, gov't members were beyond that corridor.
She is shaping up as someone who could make an excellent President after Biden. 👍🏻
Just asking.
The attempted coup was an attack on democracy, incited by a President who has spent the past four years trying to subvert the rule of law.
The message that I want to hear from Biden/Harris is that an attack on the rule of law cannot be tolerated and that no-one - not even the President of the USA - can be above it.
I do not - at this juncture - want to hear Ms Harris talking about race. Apart from the fact that the rioters tended to be white incels, race is a non-sequitur.
https://twitter.com/avenaim/status/1347279018400174080?s=20
The more violent, antifa/BLM "protests" of the last year were disgraceful and unacceptable -like the THREE SOLID MONTHS of rioting, burning, lawlessness, and looting in Portland, Oregon.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Floyd_protests_in_Portland,_Oregon#:~:text=Portland Police Bureau (PPB) declared,As of June 2, 2020.
The scenes yesterday in Washington were shorter, but more shocking, because of the symbolism. They chilled the world.
Surely it is not beyond the wit of politicians to condemn BOTH? To say there is proper room for protest about racial injustice, just as there is democratic room to protest about election counting, but neither should result in violence. Especially protest that shuts down entire towns, or menaces democracy.
Maybe I just don't get America any more. But I do get history, and what propels societies to civil strife, and America seems bent on that.
Now, I suppose the criticism would be that there appears to have been plenty of chatter about wanting to do what happened. However, up to now, Trump holds these rallies, the loonies get all excitable about QAnon and alike and then go home. He has regularly held these big events and nothing happens.
There is a small hardcore linked to Proud Boys that do have a record of going looking to start trouble, but in the past the authorities have managed to handle them without getting overrun as there aren't many of them, they are poorly organized and thick as shit.
The big exception to all the above was the Charlottesville one, which wasn't a Trump rally, but similar crowd.
Have not read any of the later, but did read his Churchill - dreadful (the book, not WSC).
The legacy of the last civil war is still present there still, as show too by the Confederate flag being carried into the Capitol by a Trumpite
It is worth asking a question why the Police can use tear gas on unarmed peaceful protestors and journalists to clear the streets - but they can't prevent a pre-planned, forewarned, pre-announced invasion of the Capitol by those they knew were coming with that intention?
The Police need complete and utter root and branch reform. They need new leadership. They need to be able to do the basics and Police to stop actual crimes like what we saw yesterday and not concentrate on attacking the unarmed.
This also means Pence cant stand in for a week or two to pardon him.....maybe he is wielding a knife after all.
But she doesn’t.
https://twitter.com/AllThingsProg/status/1347273649104056320?s=20
Did you even watch her 2 minute video? That is precisely what she is talking about. Equality under the law.
--AS
You deliberately and misleadingly picked the two countries which are worst for women, neither of which makes the top 10 countries by Muslim population. Indeed, by some estimates (but not others), China has more Muslims than either Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan. Constantly misrepresenting Islam by cherry-picking examples demonstrates that you're not interested in a reasoned discussion.
She's just pouring petrol on the fire. This is nuts.
Biden, Pence and Romney all made excellent speeches yesterday. "Let's get back to work". Totally condemning the Trumpite idiots, and rightly so.
One day later America is picking the scab of its ultimate wound: racial injustice, in a way that will only make the wound fester. It is madness. I am a Briton looking at the most important western country in the West, and our greatest ally, carefully tearing itself to shreds. Desperate stuff.
Let's just look at the race so far:
1= Scotland (SNP) ... 2.1 per cent jabbed
1= N Ireland (DUP/SF) ... 2.1 per cent jabbed
3 England (Tories) ...1.9 per cent jabbed
4 Wales (Lab/LibDem) ... 1.6 per cent jabbed.
(Source: BBC).
SKS needs to spend his time kicking Drakeford's sorry arse.
(I know the Welsh posters give him a regular kicking, but it doesn't have any effect when we do it).
And I think a deep dig into the way US Police are recruited, trained and deployed wouldn't be wildly unpopular.
The institution and culture (and some individuals within it) is in desperate need of reform.
--AS
China: 8130.00 USD
Bangladesh: 1,698.26 USD
So your point is futile, as well as inane, and jejune, and banal. And dim. And boring.
As mentioned below, just for working out I got the DOQAUS Bluetooth Headphones Over Ear for £25. And they are very good for the money.
The £350 pair I have, they have lasted 5+ years with zero issues of any sort, they are pretty much like the day I bought them, despite using them for several years as my go to travel ones that got rammed in my backpack to go on airplanes.
Where's the middle ground?
Watch Israel.
--AS
But is this what you should be saying, right now, to 70m Trump voters - pretty much half the country - many of whom feel dismayed, disgruntled, or disenfranchised?
No, it is not. This is not statesmanship. It is goading of the loser, it is stoking of the fires.
There are plenty of ways to condemn yesterday's utterly disgraceful scenes without making the atmosphere worse. Biden did exactly that with his first response, last night. Yet now, Biden's Democrats seem like they want to double down on the mad identity politics and rub the noses of the Republicans in their defeat. This seems to me, as an outsider, like a tragic mistake. Akin to the British shooting the Irish rebels in 1916, in a strange way,
I hope I am wrong, and yielding to hyperbole, which is not unknown.
Now I am going to watch The Crown, and our beloved and calming Queen. Goodnight PB.
Both groups agree the book is really about Boris Johnson and not Winston Churchill.
I have previously underesetimated Johnson's genius in manipulating the media.