Special relationship: the British right’s appeasement of Donald Trump – politicalbetting.com
Barring a much bloodier insurrection than the one mounted two weeks ago, Joe Biden will assume the presidency of the United States on Wednesday. Where does that leave the UK?
Excellent piece. Brexit's glory days - Theresa's effigy being erected on the cliffs of Dover, the Trump victory, Nigel fingered as a possible trade negotiator or even UK ambassador in Washington - seem like a lifetime ago. In the cold light of day Brexit just seems dreary and pointless.
I don't think the Yanks are terribly interested in trade deals. Apart from NAFTA they seem quite keen to avoid them, seeing the size of their domestic economy as more important than exports.
Apart from Agricultural goods, which we seem keen to keep out, their exports are heavily tech, and they seem to be flogging that like hotcakes without any deal, so why bother?
Absolute nonsense on stilts from Mr Meeks who has been driven mad by Brexit.
Yes Johnson was right to call Trump "stupefyingly ignorant", but then the US public somehow elected him President and our politicians had to deal with him. Biden understands that, he's not a pettyminded ignorant partisan hack out for revenge because his side were rejected once.
Mr Meeks approaches the entire thing from his "oh woe is Brexit" viewpoint and expects America to grind an axe for him. That's not Biden.
Yes Biden is a career machine politician and as a career machine politician Biden's priority is to put the Trump MAGA madness behind him.
Boris prompty recognised and congratulated Biden on winning and they've been talking together on their priorities since. Biden reciprocated by giving Boris the customary first telephone call after Canada. Biden and Boris want to reset politics back to normal post Trump. They want to deal with climate change. They want to deal with China. They want to work together and they will do, petty poisoning the well because of photos from years ago is the kind of ludicrous sad nonsense that Biden won't have time to deal with.
The British government will of course do its best to get on with the next President, as it did with his predecessor and as it will do with his successor. Biden is a career politician - he'll recognise insincere flattery when he sees it.
On a large number of areas, from Iran to climate change, Johnson has far more in common with Biden than he did with Trump, despite the traditional links between the Conservatives and the Republicans.
The British government will of course do its best to get on with the next President, as it did with his predecessor and as it will do with his successor. Biden is a career politician - he'll recognise insincere flattery when he sees it.
On a large number of areas, from Iran to climate change, Johnson has far more in common with Biden than he did with Trump, despite the traditional links between the Conservatives and the Republicans.
Trump is not a traditional Republican.
The traditional Republicans, the ones the British are closer to like the Californian Republicans, are an increasing ostracised minority.
That is why it is a shrinking minority on the hard right that can relate to Trumpian Republicans.
I just spent an hour on a business call with three Americans from the religious right. We mostly stuck to business but whenever we veered off topic, the conversation quickly became very surreal.
I don't think the Yanks are terribly interested in trade deals. Apart from NAFTA they seem quite keen to avoid them, seeing the size of their domestic economy as more important than exports.
Apart from Agricultural goods, which we seem keen to keep out, their exports are heavily tech, and they seem to be flogging that like hotcakes without any deal, so why bother?
OTOH America is a fast declining power, relatively. The FT today has a piece (£££) on how China is surging past America, despite Covid. China will grow 8% this year, America 3.5%. The sorpasso is coming.
Part of this is trade. Out of 190 countries examined, 128 do more trade with China than with America. This matters. Trade means leverage. Sure, America is big enough to go it alone, and will never be vanquished, but it will lose its dwindling supremacy even faster if it does try isolationism.
Biden is a president of an America that, for the first time in 80 years, needs more friends and allies, if it wants to retain mere equality with China, rather than yield, wearily, to outright inferiority.
The Storming of the Capitol just adds to this sense of American slippage.
I don't think the Yanks are terribly interested in trade deals. Apart from NAFTA they seem quite keen to avoid them, seeing the size of their domestic economy as more important than exports.
Apart from Agricultural goods, which we seem keen to keep out, their exports are heavily tech, and they seem to be flogging that like hotcakes without any deal, so why bother?
OTOH America is a fast declining power, relatively. The FT today has a piece (£££) on how China is surging past America, despite Covid. China will grow 8% this year, America 3.5%. The sorpasso is coming.
Part of this is trade. Out of 190 countries examined, 128 do more trade with China than with America. This matters. Trade means leverage. Sure, America is big enough to go it alone, and will never be vanquished, but it will lose its dwindling supremacy even faster if it does try isolationism.
Biden is a president of an America that, for the first time in 80 years, needs more friends and allies, if it wants to retain mere equality with China, rather than yield, wearily, to outright inferiority.
The Storming of the Capitol just adds to this sense of American slippage.
I don't think the Yanks are terribly interested in trade deals. Apart from NAFTA they seem quite keen to avoid them, seeing the size of their domestic economy as more important than exports.
Apart from Agricultural goods, which we seem keen to keep out, their exports are heavily tech, and they seem to be flogging that like hotcakes without any deal, so why bother?
OTOH America is a fast declining power, relatively. The FT today has a piece (£££) on how China is surging past America, despite Covid. China will grow 8% this year, America 3.5%. The sorpasso is coming.
Part of this is trade. Out of 190 countries examined, 128 do more trade with China than with America. This matters. Trade means leverage. Sure, America is big enough to go it alone, and will never be vanquished, but it will lose its dwindling supremacy even faster if it does try isolationism.
Biden is a president of an America that, for the first time in 80 years, needs more friends and allies, if it wants to retain mere equality with China, rather than yield, wearily, to outright inferiority.
The Storming of the Capitol just adds to this sense of American slippage.
The British government will of course do its best to get on with the next President, as it did with his predecessor and as it will do with his successor. Biden is a career politician - he'll recognise insincere flattery when he sees it.
On a large number of areas, from Iran to climate change, Johnson has far more in common with Biden than he did with Trump, despite the traditional links between the Conservatives and the Republicans.
Trump is not a traditional Republican.
The traditional Republicans, the ones the British are closer to like the Californian Republicans, are an increasing ostracised minority.
That is why it is a shrinking minority on the hard right that can relate to Trumpian Republicans.
It depends what you mean by traditional Republican, of course. American political parties are very different from the European ones - they don't have official party programmes, their discipline is much weaker, they represent a much more diverse society and they are federations of state organisations, not national ones. So I don't really buy into the notion of a traditional Republican as opposed to Trump.
As I have got older, so muchof the music and comedy I used to consider exciting and edgy I now find quite cringe worthily anti establishment, and I like some of the things this Niall Gooch says.. but fuck me
I don't think the Yanks are terribly interested in trade deals. Apart from NAFTA they seem quite keen to avoid them, seeing the size of their domestic economy as more important than exports.
Apart from Agricultural goods, which we seem keen to keep out, their exports are heavily tech, and they seem to be flogging that like hotcakes without any deal, so why bother?
OTOH America is a fast declining power, relatively. The FT today has a piece (£££) on how China is surging past America, despite Covid. China will grow 8% this year, America 3.5%. The sorpasso is coming.
Part of this is trade. Out of 190 countries examined, 128 do more trade with China than with America. This matters. Trade means leverage. Sure, America is big enough to go it alone, and will never be vanquished, but it will lose its dwindling supremacy even faster if it does try isolationism.
Biden is a president of an America that, for the first time in 80 years, needs more friends and allies, if it wants to retain mere equality with China, rather than yield, wearily, to outright inferiority.
The Storming of the Capitol just adds to this sense of American slippage.
Very good header. It ought to have been hilarious watching the Brexiteers extricating their tongues from Trump's backside but it wasn't. Too embarrassing for that.
While I can see that in the UK, immunising the over seventies will have a big effect on mortality, in America it looks much less so.
I wonder why so many more young die of Covid-19 in the USA.
Obesity?
Dunno, we're quite fat as a nation too. Our second peak looks more in line with the USA though 25-44 is much lower. Our eldest were hit incredibly hard in the first wave.
Very good header. It ought to have been hilarious watching the Brexiteers extricating their tongues from Trump's backside but it wasn't. Too embarrassing for that.
The header's merely a net... look below to see the incredible haul. Masterful work from Meeks.
The book is called "My Antifa Lover". And yes, it's as bad as it sounds.
After encountering him at a non-violent burning down of a federal building she can’t tell what is hotter, the fire or her feelings developing for him.” This description raises some questions. Primarily, how exactly does one “non-violently” burn down a federal building
I just spent an hour on a business call with three Americans from the religious right. We mostly stuck to business but whenever we veered off topic, the conversation quickly became very surreal.
I actually find the Religious Right broadly OK.
Sure, they care a lot more about abortion than I do, but most of them were never particularly keen on Trump. He was a tool who gave them the judges they craved.
While I can see that in the UK, immunising the over seventies will have a big effect on mortality, in America it looks much less so.
I wonder why so many more young die of Covid-19 in the USA.
Obesity?
Maybe it is just an effect of the axes and shapes of the curves, and the proportions (apart from the first wave peak) aren't very different.
One of my junior doctors lost an aunt this week, aged 58, with no underlying conditions apart from being Sikh. He has a socially distanced funeral next week.
FPT - I'd concede that there are challenges with the new Brexit deal in smoothing GB/NI trade - with both the EU and UK agreeing more work needs to be done there - and on the export and import of fresh meat and fish, where there are challenges with IT systems, customs agents, Covid-19 and the health certification process, with some rumours of "work to rule" on the French side, but on wine I very much doubt there will be a problem.
I've found new world wines easy to get hold of, more competitively priced and of better quality for some time.
While I can see that in the UK, immunising the over seventies will have a big effect on mortality, in America it looks less so.
There doesn't seem to be a way to reconcile these excess death figures with the official Covid death figures, even when you account for relative population sizes.
American excess deaths looking at that chart should massive exceed British ones proportionately yet our death toll is supposedly worse? I don't believe it. If our excess deaths were to the scale of American ones then we would have had 2k-3k excess deaths each interval through the summer but instead it was negligible or in the hundreds.
I suspect that when all is said and done the official death tolls used in tables at the moment as a proportion of excess deaths will vary wildly between countries.
While I can see that in the UK, immunising the over seventies will have a big effect on mortality, in America it looks much less so.
I wonder why so many more young die of Covid-19 in the USA.
Obesity?
Dunno, we're quite fat as a nation too. Our second peak looks more in line with the USA though 25-44 is much lower. Our eldest were hit incredibly hard in the first wave.
That was roughly my take as well. The graphs seem to show broadly similar ratios between the age groups for each country.
Very good header. It ought to have been hilarious watching the Brexiteers extricating their tongues from Trump's backside but it wasn't. Too embarrassing for that.
The header's merely a net... look below to see the incredible haul. Masterful work from Meeks.
Yes it is. I was smiling as I was reading but then you remember that it's a true story and this is our current leadersip and laughing seems inappropriate
Well that's not helpful - what's the solution, not jab them? We're already telling people not to immediately relax just because people are getting vaccinated.
The UK will also have a better relationship with Biden that it did with Trump. Because, ultimately, while Trump might bask in flattery, he was also profoundly uninterested in the rest of the world, except for an utter certainty that foreigners were somehow ripping America off.
Biden is a pragmatist. He believes in the Atlantic alliance. He will probably pressure Germany to spend more on defence: but he'll do it in private, not public (which means he might actually achieve his goals).
I don't expect an imminent UK-US trade agreement, because US goals are driven by its agriculture lobby, and lots of Conservative MPs come from rural seats.
How on earth will they decide who is BAME and thus entitled to "jump the queue"?
Seriously. A colour chart? Self declaration? An apartheid style "pencil test"? How??
No, just a matter of being in the top 4 groups due to underlying conditions. Diabetes, heart disease and kidney disease are all more common in British South Asians, but so is anti-vaxxing. There is already a targeting campaign because of this as an issue. Covid certainly seems racist.
Using mosques as vaccination centres as well as cathedrals might be a useful step.
How on earth will they decide who is BAME and thus entitled to "jump the queue"?
Seriously. A colour chart? Self declaration? An apartheid style "pencil test"? How??
No, just a matter of being in the top 4 groups due to underlying conditions. Diabetes, heart disease and kidney disease are all more common in British South Asians, but so is anti-vaxxing. There is already a targeting campaign because of this as an issue. Covid certainly seems racist.
Using mosques as vaccination centres as well as cathedrals might be a useful step.
Could using mosques rather skew the gender balance?
As I have got older, so muchof the music and comedy I used to consider exciting and edgy I now find quite cringe worthily anti establishment, and I like some of the things this Niall Gooch says.. but fuck me
I'm curious about the inauguration ceremonies. Even though it is not a coronation I can understand a certain level of pagentry being appropriate for the occasion, but I presume they were not always quite so elaborate with peoples' favourite pop stars and the like, so who really started the trend?
It always amuses me: that Australians and New Zealanders, these famous sporting nations, are even fatter than the slothful Brits
The top 10 are all polynesian countries. Those genes that helped their ancestors survive 1,000 mile trips across uncharted oceans are a big disadvantage now.
Absolute nonsense on stilts from Mr Meeks who has been driven mad by Brexit.
Yes Johnson was right to call Trump "stupefyingly ignorant", but then the US public somehow elected him President and our politicians had to deal with him. Biden understands that, he's not a pettyminded ignorant partisan hack out for revenge because his side were rejected once.
Mr Meeks approaches the entire thing from his "oh woe is Brexit" viewpoint and expects America to grind an axe for him. That's not Biden.
Yes Biden is a career machine politician and as a career machine politician Biden's priority is to put the Trump MAGA madness behind him.
Boris prompty recognised and congratulated Biden on winning and they've been talking together on their priorities since. Biden reciprocated by giving Boris the customary first telephone call after Canada. Biden and Boris want to reset politics back to normal post Trump. They want to deal with climate change. They want to deal with China. They want to work together and they will do, petty poisoning the well because of photos from years ago is the kind of ludicrous sad nonsense that Biden won't have time to deal with.
I knew who'd written the article just from the headline.
I read similar takes just after Biden was elected about how he'd call Britain last, and only then to give Boris a bollocking, which he'd have to beg for.
How on earth will they decide who is BAME and thus entitled to "jump the queue"?
Seriously. A colour chart? Self declaration? An apartheid style "pencil test"? How??
No, just a matter of being in the top 4 groups due to underlying conditions. Diabetes, heart disease and kidney disease are all more common in British South Asians, but so is anti-vaxxing. There is already a targeting campaign because of this as an issue. Covid certainly seems racist.
Using mosques as vaccination centres as well as cathedrals might be a useful step.
Difficult to disagree with any of that - it's more the idea any race group should be "prioritied" that sticks in the throat.
I mean if we're going to go along that route with risk profiles, men should probably be getting the jab before women....
Very good header. It ought to have been hilarious watching the Brexiteers extricating their tongues from Trump's backside but it wasn't. Too embarrassing for that.
The header's merely a net... look below to see the incredible haul. Masterful work from Meeks.
The echo chamber doesn't like the header though. As you say "masterful work".
How on earth will they decide who is BAME and thus entitled to "jump the queue"?
Seriously. A colour chart? Self declaration? An apartheid style "pencil test"? How??
No, just a matter of being in the top 4 groups due to underlying conditions. Diabetes, heart disease and kidney disease are all more common in British South Asians, but so is anti-vaxxing. There is already a targeting campaign because of this as an issue. Covid certainly seems racist.
Using mosques as vaccination centres as well as cathedrals might be a useful step.
That's fine, of course. IF BAMEs (how I hate that acronym) naturally fall, disproportionately, in the higher priority groups, due to medical risk, then, of course, go for it. Immunize them. We are all Brits: just jab us all, fairly, according to the science.
But the headline seems to suggest BAME folk should be prioritised JUST for being BAME. Which to me seems morally wrong as well as undo-able, unless you act like the pre-apartheid South African police.
Perhaps the headline has it wrong. This is not unknown.
I know the story does clarify about a targeted publicity campaign as well, but if there is scepticism among specific groups as the story says then targeting them for vaccination may be difficult, as it isn't necessarily getting it to them that is the problem.
Well that's not helpful - what's the solution, not jab them? We're already telling people not to immediately relax just because people are getting vaccinated.
Indeed.
And perhaps plays a part in delaying the second dose - "you're not fully safe yet so don't take risks".
Having some people with two doses and others with none would, I think, lead to social cohesion problems and widespread ignoring of restrictions by the young.
How on earth will they decide who is BAME and thus entitled to "jump the queue"?
Seriously. A colour chart? Self declaration? An apartheid style "pencil test"? How??
No, just a matter of being in the top 4 groups due to underlying conditions. Diabetes, heart disease and kidney disease are all more common in British South Asians, but so is anti-vaxxing. There is already a targeting campaign because of this as an issue. Covid certainly seems racist.
Using mosques as vaccination centres as well as cathedrals might be a useful step.
Could using mosques rather skew the gender balance?
Men are at more risk...
But it might percolate down through the communities too.
While I can see that in the UK, immunising the over seventies will have a big effect on mortality, in America it looks less so.
There doesn't seem to be a way to reconcile these excess death figures with the official Covid death figures, even when you account for relative population sizes.
American excess deaths looking at that chart should massive exceed British ones proportionately yet our death toll is supposedly worse? I don't believe it. If our excess deaths were to the scale of American ones then we would have had 2k-3k excess deaths each interval through the summer but instead it was negligible or in the hundreds.
I suspect that when all is said and done the official death tolls used in tables at the moment as a proportion of excess deaths will vary wildly between countries.
Do the US figures use the same methodology as ours?
Absolute nonsense on stilts from Mr Meeks who has been driven mad by Brexit.
Yes Johnson was right to call Trump "stupefyingly ignorant", but then the US public somehow elected him President and our politicians had to deal with him. Biden understands that, he's not a pettyminded ignorant partisan hack out for revenge because his side were rejected once.
Mr Meeks approaches the entire thing from his "oh woe is Brexit" viewpoint and expects America to grind an axe for him. That's not Biden.
Yes Biden is a career machine politician and as a career machine politician Biden's priority is to put the Trump MAGA madness behind him.
Boris prompty recognised and congratulated Biden on winning and they've been talking together on their priorities since. Biden reciprocated by giving Boris the customary first telephone call after Canada. Biden and Boris want to reset politics back to normal post Trump. They want to deal with climate change. They want to deal with China. They want to work together and they will do, petty poisoning the well because of photos from years ago is the kind of ludicrous sad nonsense that Biden won't have time to deal with.
I knew who'd written the article just from the headline.
I read similar takes just after Biden was elected about how he'd call Britain last, and only then to give Boris a bollocking, which he'd have to beg for.
Biden's a professional. I imagine he doles out his bollockings with care so as not to waste them not overindulge his personal whims.
Well that's not helpful - what's the solution, not jab them? We're already telling people not to immediately relax just because people are getting vaccinated.
More to the point, why is Josh Widdecombe looking at a petri dish?
How on earth will they decide who is BAME and thus entitled to "jump the queue"?
Seriously. A colour chart? Self declaration? An apartheid style "pencil test"? How??
No, just a matter of being in the top 4 groups due to underlying conditions. Diabetes, heart disease and kidney disease are all more common in British South Asians, but so is anti-vaxxing. There is already a targeting campaign because of this as an issue. Covid certainly seems racist.
Using mosques as vaccination centres as well as cathedrals might be a useful step.
Difficult to disagree with any of that - it's more the idea any race group should be "prioritied" that sticks in the throat.
I mean if we're going to go along that route with risk profiles, men should probably be getting the jab before women....
It's curious though. We can't prioritise on race or gender but we can on age?
It always amuses me: that Australians and New Zealanders, these famous sporting nations, are even fatter than the slothful Brits
The top 10 are all polynesian countries. Those genes that helped their ancestors survive 1,000 mile trips across uncharted oceans are a big disadvantage now.
People in the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, etc, are often hideously fat, as the chart shows.
Too much oil money, too hot to walk, too many air con'd cab rides, equals = a blob
How on earth will they decide who is BAME and thus entitled to "jump the queue"?
Seriously. A colour chart? Self declaration? An apartheid style "pencil test"? How??
Rather than patronising stuff like that they'd be better off focussing on those without English as a first language, higher risk groups - which medically can include some specific ethnicities, I understand - higher risk occupations and groups that have cultural aversions to the vaccine.
But, the Guardian are playing to their base who love it fashionably Woke, and they want the clickbait traffic/reshares from the rest who don't, so they do it. And it works.
It always amuses me: that Australians and New Zealanders, these famous sporting nations, are even fatter than the slothful Brits
The top 10 are all polynesian countries. Those genes that helped their ancestors survive 1,000 mile trips across uncharted oceans are a big disadvantage now.
People in the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, etc, are often hideously fat, as the chart shows.
Too much oil money, too hot to walk, too many air con'd cab rides, equals = a blob
50% of Saudi males have diabetes. The prophet says dates are a gift from Allah...
How on earth will they decide who is BAME and thus entitled to "jump the queue"?
Seriously. A colour chart? Self declaration? An apartheid style "pencil test"? How??
No, just a matter of being in the top 4 groups due to underlying conditions. Diabetes, heart disease and kidney disease are all more common in British South Asians, but so is anti-vaxxing. There is already a targeting campaign because of this as an issue. Covid certainly seems racist.
Using mosques as vaccination centres as well as cathedrals might be a useful step.
Difficult to disagree with any of that - it's more the idea any race group should be "prioritied" that sticks in the throat.
I mean if we're going to go along that route with risk profiles, men should probably be getting the jab before women....
It's curious though. We can't prioritise on race or gender but we can on age?
Age is not a fiction. Not a "social construct". You just have to look at birth certificate. Age is a fact.
Race is much more contentious. The Left has spent decades telling us race is a fallacy, a biological nonsense. Yet now it matters?
Either race exists, and we can say who is what, or it does not, in which case this policy is a load of illogical bollocks, and will only annoy people.
FPT - I'd concede that there are challenges with the new Brexit deal in smoothing GB/NI trade - with both the EU and UK agreeing more work needs to be done there - and on the export and import of fresh meat and fish, where there are challenges with IT systems, customs agents, Covid-19 and the health certification process, with some rumours of "work to rule" on the French side, but on wine I very much doubt there will be a problem.
I've found new world wines easy to get hold of, more competitively priced and of better quality for some time.
I don't tend to get involved with these discussions on border trade as they are an exercise in frustration of people making mountains out of molehills, I only commented because I buy wine online a lot and most of it is from Australia or Italy. Neither seem particularly impacted since Brexit, I'm still able to buy everything just the same as I was beforehand. If a company is able to profitably import wine from Australia then they can apply identical procedures for EU wine.
Well that's not helpful - what's the solution, not jab them? We're already telling people not to immediately relax just because people are getting vaccinated.
More to the point, why is Josh Widdecombe looking at a petri dish?
Does he want to become PM one day?
Maybe it's like the Melanias.
Wearing a facemask makes it easier for stunt doubles to pass themselves off as the PM.
Stand by for their wearing to be made compulsory for all time.
How on earth will they decide who is BAME and thus entitled to "jump the queue"?
Seriously. A colour chart? Self declaration? An apartheid style "pencil test"? How??
No, just a matter of being in the top 4 groups due to underlying conditions. Diabetes, heart disease and kidney disease are all more common in British South Asians, but so is anti-vaxxing. There is already a targeting campaign because of this as an issue. Covid certainly seems racist.
Using mosques as vaccination centres as well as cathedrals might be a useful step.
Difficult to disagree with any of that - it's more the idea any race group should be "prioritied" that sticks in the throat.
I mean if we're going to go along that route with risk profiles, men should probably be getting the jab before women....
It's curious though. We can't prioritise on race or gender but we can on age?
And it happens in many areas.
Why should a pensioner get a cheaper Sunday dinner or sports ticket than someone in their 20s ?
I realise its a relict of the time when there were proportionally far fewer oldies and they tended to be poorer but its ridiculous now.
How on earth will they decide who is BAME and thus entitled to "jump the queue"?
Seriously. A colour chart? Self declaration? An apartheid style "pencil test"? How??
No, just a matter of being in the top 4 groups due to underlying conditions. Diabetes, heart disease and kidney disease are all more common in British South Asians, but so is anti-vaxxing. There is already a targeting campaign because of this as an issue. Covid certainly seems racist.
Using mosques as vaccination centres as well as cathedrals might be a useful step.
On your definition so would diabetes, heart disease and kidney disease be racist. But that'd be uninformative since it would only (disproportionately) affects one particular group of ethnicities, rather than anyone non-White, which BAME generalisations would suggest.
Absolute nonsense on stilts from Mr Meeks who has been driven mad by Brexit.
Yes Johnson was right to call Trump "stupefyingly ignorant", but then the US public somehow elected him President and our politicians had to deal with him. Biden understands that, he's not a pettyminded ignorant partisan hack out for revenge because his side were rejected once.
Mr Meeks approaches the entire thing from his "oh woe is Brexit" viewpoint and expects America to grind an axe for him. That's not Biden.
Yes Biden is a career machine politician and as a career machine politician Biden's priority is to put the Trump MAGA madness behind him.
Boris prompty recognised and congratulated Biden on winning and they've been talking together on their priorities since. Biden reciprocated by giving Boris the customary first telephone call after Canada. Biden and Boris want to reset politics back to normal post Trump. They want to deal with climate change. They want to deal with China. They want to work together and they will do, petty poisoning the well because of photos from years ago is the kind of ludicrous sad nonsense that Biden won't have time to deal with.
I knew who'd written the article just from the headline.
I read similar takes just after Biden was elected about how he'd call Britain last, and only then to give Boris a bollocking, which he'd have to beg for.
Actually, I can kind of imagine Johnson asking for a bollocking, while purring "Oh Biden... put the boot in... pleeeaasse."
Now I can't get that image out of my mind.
Thanks @Casino_Royale. I now don't know how I will sleep this evening.
How on earth will they decide who is BAME and thus entitled to "jump the queue"?
Seriously. A colour chart? Self declaration? An apartheid style "pencil test"? How??
No, just a matter of being in the top 4 groups due to underlying conditions. Diabetes, heart disease and kidney disease are all more common in British South Asians, but so is anti-vaxxing. There is already a targeting campaign because of this as an issue. Covid certainly seems racist.
Using mosques as vaccination centres as well as cathedrals might be a useful step.
Difficult to disagree with any of that - it's more the idea any race group should be "prioritied" that sticks in the throat.
I mean if we're going to go along that route with risk profiles, men should probably be getting the jab before women....
It's curious though. We can't prioritise on race or gender but we can on age?
Age is not a fiction. Not a "social construct". You just have to look at birth certificate. Age is a fact.
Race is much more contentious. The Left has spent decades telling us race is a fallacy, a biological nonsense. Yet now it matters?
Either race exists, and we can say who is what, or it does not, in which case this policy is a load of illogical bollocks, and will only annoy people.
I'm sorry, that's simply not true.
Age is a social construct, like gender. People should be free to identify as whatever age they like, and should be treated accordingly.
From this story, Government spokesman said: "The Pfizer vaccine comes in large packs, which cannot be split and must be stored at ultra-low temperatures - at -70C. There are only two centres in Wales where we can keep them at this temperature."
Re Welsh vaccine rollout; I've just heard from my dad that an old friend of his who runs a medical supplies company, including the UK's largest tissue bank, offered the Welsh government use of his -80C freezers in Pontyclun to help storing the Pfizer vaccine. They have completed ignored his approach.
Comments
Oh noes.. How will we survive?
Apart from Agricultural goods, which we seem keen to keep out, their exports are heavily tech, and they seem to be flogging that like hotcakes without any deal, so why bother?
BDS
We do not know how the future pans out, but I did not need to check who the author was of this piece
Yes Johnson was right to call Trump "stupefyingly ignorant", but then the US public somehow elected him President and our politicians had to deal with him. Biden understands that, he's not a pettyminded ignorant partisan hack out for revenge because his side were rejected once.
Mr Meeks approaches the entire thing from his "oh woe is Brexit" viewpoint and expects America to grind an axe for him. That's not Biden.
Yes Biden is a career machine politician and as a career machine politician Biden's priority is to put the Trump MAGA madness behind him.
Boris prompty recognised and congratulated Biden on winning and they've been talking together on their priorities since. Biden reciprocated by giving Boris the customary first telephone call after Canada. Biden and Boris want to reset politics back to normal post Trump. They want to deal with climate change. They want to deal with China. They want to work together and they will do, petty poisoning the well because of photos from years ago is the kind of ludicrous sad nonsense that Biden won't have time to deal with.
It would be a good name for a very bad sitcom based on PB
On a large number of areas, from Iran to climate change, Johnson has far more in common with Biden than he did with Trump, despite the traditional links between the Conservatives and the Republicans.
Though we'd have to marry him off to Charles PDQ to be sure.
The traditional Republicans, the ones the British are closer to like the Californian Republicans, are an increasing ostracised minority.
That is why it is a shrinking minority on the hard right that can relate to Trumpian Republicans.
LEAVERS, LEAVERS, LEAVERS!!!!
Part of this is trade. Out of 190 countries examined, 128 do more trade with China than with America. This matters. Trade means leverage. Sure, America is big enough to go it alone, and will never be vanquished, but it will lose its dwindling supremacy even faster if it does try isolationism.
Biden is a president of an America that, for the first time in 80 years, needs more friends and allies, if it wants to retain mere equality with China, rather than yield, wearily, to outright inferiority.
The Storming of the Capitol just adds to this sense of American slippage.
https://twitter.com/tompeck/status/1351180870389014532
From: https://www.coioshealth.info/amp/two-countries-divided-by-a-common-virus?__twitter_impression=true
While I can see that in the UK, immunising the over seventies will have a big effect on mortality, in America it looks less so.
https://twitter.com/johnredwood/status/1351230020392517632
https://twitter.com/niall_gooch/status/1351289407987453958?s=20
Our second peak looks more in line with the USA though 25-44 is much lower. Our eldest were hit incredibly hard in the first wave.
Also: their terrible health system must be a factor
https://slate.com/culture/2021/01/my-antifa-lover-review-ahhh.html
The book is called "My Antifa Lover". And yes, it's as bad as it sounds.
https://twitter.com/johnredwood/status/1347908587851546626?s=20
After encountering him at a non-violent burning down of a federal building she can’t tell what is hotter, the fire or her feelings developing for him.” This description raises some questions. Primarily, how exactly does one “non-violently” burn down a federal building
LOL!
Seriously. A colour chart? Self declaration? An apartheid style "pencil test"? How??
Sure, they care a lot more about abortion than I do, but most of them were never particularly keen on Trump. He was a tool who gave them the judges they craved.
Now, he's just a tool.
One of my junior doctors lost an aunt this week, aged 58, with no underlying conditions apart from being Sikh. He has a socially distanced funeral next week.
I've found new world wines easy to get hold of, more competitively priced and of better quality for some time.
American excess deaths looking at that chart should massive exceed British ones proportionately yet our death toll is supposedly worse? I don't believe it. If our excess deaths were to the scale of American ones then we would have had 2k-3k excess deaths each interval through the summer but instead it was negligible or in the hundreds.
I suspect that when all is said and done the official death tolls used in tables at the moment as a proportion of excess deaths will vary wildly between countries.
Biden is a pragmatist. He believes in the Atlantic alliance. He will probably pressure Germany to spend more on defence: but he'll do it in private, not public (which means he might actually achieve his goals).
I don't expect an imminent UK-US trade agreement, because US goals are driven by its agriculture lobby, and lots of Conservative MPs come from rural seats.
Using mosques as vaccination centres as well as cathedrals might be a useful step.
I read similar takes just after Biden was elected about how he'd call Britain last, and only then to give Boris a bollocking, which he'd have to beg for.
BBC News - Covid vaccine: Health minister denies jabs being held back
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-55704017
I mean if we're going to go along that route with risk profiles, men should probably be getting the jab before women....
But the headline seems to suggest BAME folk should be prioritised JUST for being BAME. Which to me seems morally wrong as well as undo-able, unless you act like the pre-apartheid South African police.
Perhaps the headline has it wrong. This is not unknown.
And perhaps plays a part in delaying the second dose - "you're not fully safe yet so don't take risks".
Having some people with two doses and others with none would, I think, lead to social cohesion problems and widespread ignoring of restrictions by the young.
But it might percolate down through the communities too.
Does he want to become PM one day?
https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1351236031065038848?s=19
Too much oil money, too hot to walk, too many air con'd cab rides, equals = a blob
But, the Guardian are playing to their base who love it fashionably Woke, and they want the clickbait traffic/reshares from the rest who don't, so they do it. And it works.
Race is much more contentious. The Left has spent decades telling us race is a fallacy, a biological nonsense. Yet now it matters?
Either race exists, and we can say who is what, or it does not, in which case this policy is a load of illogical bollocks, and will only annoy people.
Wearing a facemask makes it easier for stunt doubles to pass themselves off as the PM.
Stand by for their wearing to be made compulsory for all time.
Why should a pensioner get a cheaper Sunday dinner or sports ticket than someone in their 20s ?
I realise its a relict of the time when there were proportionally far fewer oldies and they tended to be poorer but its ridiculous now.
So we can simply put this down to fashion.
Now I can't get that image out of my mind.
Thanks @Casino_Royale. I now don't know how I will sleep this evening.
And it’s all apparently because Alastair is deranged.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9161133/Shoppers-face-online-sales-tax-Rishi-Sunak-looks-pay-huge-Covid-19-debt.html
Age is a social construct, like gender. People should be free to identify as whatever age they like, and should be treated accordingly.
FBI checking profiles of National Guardsmen protecting Washington. There is a fear that some guarding Biden are loyal to Trump!
Jon Sopel BBC
Government spokesman said: "The Pfizer vaccine comes in large packs, which cannot be split and must be stored at ultra-low temperatures - at -70C. There are only two centres in Wales where we can keep them at this temperature."
And my earlier post..