Howdy, Stranger!

It looks like you're new here. Sign in or register to get started.

New Ipsos MORI polling finds nearly half of Brits having favourable view of Biden – politicalbetting

2456

Comments

  • felixfelix Posts: 15,147
    Scott_xP said:

    ydoethur said:

    And that’s the reason why although the EU isn’t likely to break up, it’s also never likely to be really popular.

    https://twitter.com/thetimes/status/1352162681810268160
    Petulant?
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 42,753
    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:

    While the adults are back in charge in America, we still have a petulant toddler in Downing Street...

    https://twitter.com/patrickwintour/status/1352156166466498560

    Two petulant toddlers, surely?

    Although actually, Johnson is (for once) right about this. The EU isn’t a country and it shouldn’t be exchanging diplomats. As for their claims that the UK is a signatory to the Lisbon Treaty, in case they haven’t noticed, we’ve left and are no longer a signatory.

    Moreover, the Lisbon Treaty was signed over the strenuous objections of the party currently in power, partly because of this idea that the EU should have its own foreign service, and we all know no parliament can bind its successors.

    It’s the EU that are behaving like petulant toddlers here, and are in any case wrong about their status. They’re showing themselves at their pompous, stuck up, unselfaware and stupid worst, as over, say, that illegal ban on our beef.

    And that’s the reason why although the EU isn’t likely to break up, it’s also never likely to be really popular.
    So we left the EU because we said it is a unitary single power which was denying our right to self-determination; but we are now saying, by refusing to recognise its diplomats in this way, that it is not a unitary single power but a collection of sovereign nations.

    Gotit.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 49,774
    Scott_xP said:
    He was just asked the same on R4.

    It is shocking how clueless he is. He always starts interviews by reading out the prepared script that doubtless he sat up all night slowly writing out in longhand; when the interviewer manages to get him off that, he is all at sea.

    Robinson did at least get him to promise that schools (and hence parents) will now get two weeks' notice of opening/closing decisions, and that he won't chop and change thereafter. If there was any confidence that he was capable of achieving this - or indeed that he is ever allowed to take such decisions himself - that would be good news.
  • eekeek Posts: 28,077
    edited January 2021
    ydoethur said:

    alex_ said:

    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:
    Well, he is right. Nobody expected we would be closed because after the mass of fraud, corruption and incompetence at the DfE to deliberately conceal and falsify the true infection rates in order to keep schools open and themselves relevant that they would suddenly be forced to confront reality like this. I actually bet that regardless of the deaths it would cause, they would keep schools open - not to help children, but to save face.

    And truthfully, life would be pleasanter if we were not in this situation, but since it is at least partly the aforementioned fraud corruption and incompetence at the DfE that brought us to it - insofar as if they had looked at blended learning or closed schools a fortnight early in the worst hit areas, things would not have been as bad - it’s not worth giving them a good start for effort.
    They should have been making contingency plans for national home learning last summer. It's scary how in so many areas over the last few years we have discovered that contingency planning (or more accurately lack of it),across large and crucial areas of government, appears to have been driven by anticipation of the world as the Government would like it to be, and not by the world as it could be if things don't go as hoped. In fact the very scenarios that contingency planning is designed for.

    People should be asking serious questions about what else the Government hasn't currently got contingency plans for, but i fear that the answers would be too horrific to be made public.
    Do you want to know the worst bit?

    We were ordered to draw up contingency plans by local management over the summer in case of a second lockdown, and did. Then we were ordered to stop doing them by the DfE ‘because the virus isn’t spread through schools so they won’t be needed.’

    That also seems to be why they stopped rolling out laptops to poorer children.

    How do you spell ‘lowlifes?’

    Fortunately it did mean we had a basic outline plan ready to go, as we hadn’t destroyed our work. But really...
    Giving laptops to poorer children requires spending money - and a supply of laptops that actually doesn't seem to exist. Dell has just quoted me late March for a delivery and Lenovo are no better.

    I know a few schools have been able to source laptops for children but you then hit secondary issues of internet access and suitably quiet places for the children to study.

    And that's before we remember some MPs believe the laptops would be instantly sold to get the children's parents some smack...
  • algarkirkalgarkirk Posts: 12,360
    edited January 2021
    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:

    While the adults are back in charge in America, we still have a petulant toddler in Downing Street...

    https://twitter.com/patrickwintour/status/1352156166466498560

    Two petulant toddlers, surely?

    Although actually, Johnson is (for once) right about this. The EU isn’t a country and it shouldn’t be exchanging diplomats. As for their claims that the UK is a signatory to the Lisbon Treaty, in case they haven’t noticed, we’ve left and are no longer a signatory.

    Moreover, the Lisbon Treaty was signed over the strenuous objections of the party currently in power, partly because of this idea that the EU should have its own foreign service, and we all know no parliament can bind its successors.

    It’s the EU that are behaving like petulant toddlers here, and are in any case wrong about their status. They’re showing themselves at their pompous, stuck up, unselfaware and stupid worst, as over, say, that illegal ban on our beef.

    And that’s the reason why although the EU isn’t likely to break up, it’s also never likely to be really popular.
    The EU acts in four distinct ways: It both is and is not a country; and it both is and is not aiming at being a country in due course. The world divides between those who think this is clear and sensible strategy, and those who would like a bit of clarity in things. There is lots of evidence in favour of both sides. This hybrid status is one of the attractions, maybe simplistic, of Brexit and one of the compelling reasons for Remain as it allows all things to all people.

    So it is unsurprising that diplomatically the UK has reasons to act towards it as it acts towards itself, namely, without entire consistency.

    On two key questions of statehood the EU cuts both ways: Currency and central bank - Yes, and working towards completion. Defence: Don't ask.

  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,154
    IanB2 said:

    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:

    While the adults are back in charge in America, we still have a petulant toddler in Downing Street...

    https://twitter.com/patrickwintour/status/1352156166466498560

    Two petulant toddlers, surely?

    Although actually, Johnson is (for once) right about this. The EU isn’t a country and it shouldn’t be exchanging diplomats. As for their claims that the UK is a signatory to the Lisbon Treaty, in case they haven’t noticed, we’ve left and are no longer a signatory.

    Moreover, the Lisbon Treaty was signed over the strenuous objections of the party currently in power, partly because of this idea that the EU should have its own foreign service, and we all know no parliament can bind its successors.

    It’s the EU that are behaving like petulant toddlers here, and are in any case wrong about their status. They’re showing themselves at their pompous, stuck up, unselfaware and stupid worst, as over, say, that illegal ban on our beef.

    And that’s the reason why although the EU isn’t likely to break up, it’s also never likely to be really popular.
    The fact that every other country in the entire world does differently ought to be a clue. At the least, our government knew that denying this status would create a storm, which presumably is the object.
    It does them, AIUI, through bilateral agreements with the country in question, not as of right.

    There is an article on it here, if you’re feeling rich:

    https://brill.com/view/journals/hjd/7/1/article-p31_3.xml

    If that is the case, then again the UK government is quite right to insist that they don’t have diplomatic status until such agreement is reached.

    I imagine they’re also feeling a touch sensitive after the bungling of the Sacoolas case, which may have a bearing on it.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 59,994
    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:

    While the adults are back in charge in America, we still have a petulant toddler in Downing Street...

    https://twitter.com/patrickwintour/status/1352156166466498560

    Two petulant toddlers, surely?

    Although actually, Johnson is (for once) right about this. The EU isn’t a country and it shouldn’t be exchanging diplomats. As for their claims that the UK is a signatory to the Lisbon Treaty, in case they haven’t noticed, we’ve left and are no longer a signatory.

    Moreover, the Lisbon Treaty was signed over the strenuous objections of the party currently in power, partly because of this idea that the EU should have its own foreign service, and we all know no parliament can bind its successors.

    It’s the EU that are behaving like petulant toddlers here, and are in any case wrong about their status. They’re showing themselves at their pompous, stuck up, unselfaware and stupid worst, as over, say, that illegal ban on our beef.

    And that’s the reason why although the EU isn’t likely to break up, it’s also never likely to be really popular.
    Quite right.

    And, if the EU had refused to recognise UK diplomats, Scott would have cheered them on.
  • rkrkrkrkrkrk Posts: 8,214
    Foxy said:

    tlg86 said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Omnium said:

    Alistair said:

    Omnium said:

    eek said:
    Not true, but if you like not true things then great.

    Fairly easy to see why.
    Why?
    Well, actually I was just about to post an edit to say that the "If they voted like the majority of their age group" is actually fair enough.

    But suppose you vote randomly and the elections have been 50/50 then it's unlikely that as a 33 year old you'd have managed to not be with the winning side. It's even more unlikely that a 66 year old would have managed to avoid disappointment.

    So it's clear that the claim is questionable. Now consider correlations - this raises the chance that a voter might have been on the winning side hugely if they've always voted one way and that side has always won. Now we know that voters pretty much vote one way, but we certainly know that one side hasn't always won.

    So I suspect you will find a lot of 33 year olds that have never voted for the winning side (my guess would be around 40% - just because the Tories have won every election since 2010), but you'll find it quite hard to find 66 year olds that have always been celebrating on election night - I'd be a seller at 5%.
    I think the point is that the cohort overall has been shafted by democracy, not whether any given individual's record exactly matches that of the cohort.
    Of course, this is quite selective. The same is not true for 34-42 year olds.

    I’m 34 and have voted in five GEs and two UK-wide referendums. My record is:

    2005 - Lost
    2010 - Won
    2011 - Won
    2015 - Lost
    2016 - Won
    2017 - Lost
    2019 - Won

    Obviously you can argue that I did win in 2015, but it wasn’t just about Europe it was about Osbrown economics.

    Personally I don’t think my generation and the next one have been shafted by democracy. We’ve been shafted by Gordon Brown, George Osborne and the Bank of England.
    I have voted in 10 General Elections and 2 referendums. In only 3 GE's has the party I voted for won (1997, 2001 and 2010) and neither of the referendums. In my mid fifties, I have only had a government that represents me for a fraction of my life, so yes, I understand how the young feel alienated from politics and how it doesn't represent them.
    I'm about the age mentioned. I actually failed to vote in the 2010 election which would have been my only 'win'. That said - be careful what you wish for - the Lib Dem involvement in 2010 certainly didn't meet my expectations.

    Otherwise a straight string of losses on referenda and general elections. I've never voted for a winning candidate either except I suppose at European elections. Hopefully it will just make the victory sweeter.

    Plus - I get (vicarious?) pleasure from US elections - where the Republican alternative is generally much worse than the Conservative option here. Seeing Obama win in 2008 was great.
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 77,897
    ydoethur said:

    alex_ said:

    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:
    Well, he is right. Nobody expected we would be closed because after the mass of fraud, corruption and incompetence at the DfE to deliberately conceal and falsify the true infection rates in order to keep schools open and themselves relevant that they would suddenly be forced to confront reality like this. I actually bet that regardless of the deaths it would cause, they would keep schools open - not to help children, but to save face.

    And truthfully, life would be pleasanter if we were not in this situation, but since it is at least partly the aforementioned fraud corruption and incompetence at the DfE that brought us to it - insofar as if they had looked at blended learning or closed schools a fortnight early in the worst hit areas, things would not have been as bad - it’s not worth giving them a good start for effort.
    They should have been making contingency plans for national home learning last summer. It's scary how in so many areas over the last few years we have discovered that contingency planning (or more accurately lack of it),across large and crucial areas of government, appears to have been driven by anticipation of the world as the Government would like it to be, and not by the world as it could be if things don't go as hoped. In fact the very scenarios that contingency planning is designed for.

    People should be asking serious questions about what else the Government hasn't currently got contingency plans for, but i fear that the answers would be too horrific to be made public.
    Do you want to know the worst bit?

    We were ordered to draw up contingency plans by local management over the summer in case of a second lockdown, and did. Then we were ordered to stop doing them by the DfE ‘because the virus isn’t spread through schools so they won’t be needed.’

    That also seems to be why they stopped rolling out laptops to poorer children.

    How do you spell ‘lowlifes?’

    Fortunately it did mean we had a basic outline plan ready to go, as we hadn’t destroyed our work. But really...
    The story of schools was that the government prefferred convienient lies over inconvienient truth
  • eekeek Posts: 28,077
    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 26,123
    edited January 2021
    TOPPING said:

    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:

    While the adults are back in charge in America, we still have a petulant toddler in Downing Street...

    https://twitter.com/patrickwintour/status/1352156166466498560

    Two petulant toddlers, surely?

    Although actually, Johnson is (for once) right about this. The EU isn’t a country and it shouldn’t be exchanging diplomats. As for their claims that the UK is a signatory to the Lisbon Treaty, in case they haven’t noticed, we’ve left and are no longer a signatory.

    Moreover, the Lisbon Treaty was signed over the strenuous objections of the party currently in power, partly because of this idea that the EU should have its own foreign service, and we all know no parliament can bind its successors.

    It’s the EU that are behaving like petulant toddlers here, and are in any case wrong about their status. They’re showing themselves at their pompous, stuck up, unselfaware and stupid worst, as over, say, that illegal ban on our beef.

    And that’s the reason why although the EU isn’t likely to break up, it’s also never likely to be really popular.
    So we left the EU because we said it is a unitary single power which was denying our right to self-determination; but we are now saying, by refusing to recognise its diplomats in this way, that it is not a unitary single power but a collection of sovereign nations.

    Gotit.
    Surely it's an either/or. Either we treat the EU as a sovereign nation - and expel all French, German, etc. diplomats, or the EU STFU.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 26,123
    eek said:

    tlg86 said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Omnium said:

    Alistair said:

    Omnium said:

    eek said:
    Not true, but if you like not true things then great.

    Fairly easy to see why.
    Why?
    Well, actually I was just about to post an edit to say that the "If they voted like the majority of their age group" is actually fair enough.

    But suppose you vote randomly and the elections have been 50/50 then it's unlikely that as a 33 year old you'd have managed to not be with the winning side. It's even more unlikely that a 66 year old would have managed to avoid disappointment.

    So it's clear that the claim is questionable. Now consider correlations - this raises the chance that a voter might have been on the winning side hugely if they've always voted one way and that side has always won. Now we know that voters pretty much vote one way, but we certainly know that one side hasn't always won.

    So I suspect you will find a lot of 33 year olds that have never voted for the winning side (my guess would be around 40% - just because the Tories have won every election since 2010), but you'll find it quite hard to find 66 year olds that have always been celebrating on election night - I'd be a seller at 5%.
    I think the point is that the cohort overall has been shafted by democracy, not whether any given individual's record exactly matches that of the cohort.
    Of course, this is quite selective. The same is not true for 34-42 year olds.

    I’m 34 and have voted in five GEs and two UK-wide referendums. My record is:

    2005 - Lost
    2010 - Won
    2011 - Won
    2015 - Lost
    2016 - Won
    2017 - Lost
    2019 - Won

    Obviously you can argue that I did win in 2015, but it wasn’t just about Europe it was about Osbrown economics.

    Personally I don’t think my generation and the next one have been shafted by democracy. We’ve been shafted by Gordon Brown, George Osborne and the Bank of England.
    What is it the BOE are supposed to have done?
    The obvious ones would be not regulating mortgage lending (especially BTL) so house prices are sky high
    And the impact of low interest rates since 2010 on the same thing.

    As we are talking about people who are 33 years old this is probably a useful statistic from https://www.money.co.uk/guides/first-time-buyers-around-the-world

    Since 2007 the age of the average first time buyer in the UK has increased from 28 years old to 34 years old.

    Back in 2007 your typical 33 year old would have now owned a house for 5 years, now he's still a year away from buying one.

    Also, mortgage lengths have increased substantially in that time too. At some point - perhaps many decades from now - the chickens will come home to roost.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,362
    edited January 2021
    tlg86 said:

    At some point - perhaps many decades from now - the chickens will come home to roost.

    That's going to be some tough, chewy chicken....
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 54,314
    Floater said:
    Bloody British tourists, bringing their damn viruses with them on holiday.
  • rkrkrkrkrkrk Posts: 8,214
    edited January 2021
    Pulpstar said:

    ydoethur said:

    alex_ said:

    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:
    Well, he is right. Nobody expected we would be closed because after the mass of fraud, corruption and incompetence at the DfE to deliberately conceal and falsify the true infection rates in order to keep schools open and themselves relevant that they would suddenly be forced to confront reality like this. I actually bet that regardless of the deaths it would cause, they would keep schools open - not to help children, but to save face.

    And truthfully, life would be pleasanter if we were not in this situation, but since it is at least partly the aforementioned fraud corruption and incompetence at the DfE that brought us to it - insofar as if they had looked at blended learning or closed schools a fortnight early in the worst hit areas, things would not have been as bad - it’s not worth giving them a good start for effort.
    They should have been making contingency plans for national home learning last summer. It's scary how in so many areas over the last few years we have discovered that contingency planning (or more accurately lack of it),across large and crucial areas of government, appears to have been driven by anticipation of the world as the Government would like it to be, and not by the world as it could be if things don't go as hoped. In fact the very scenarios that contingency planning is designed for.

    People should be asking serious questions about what else the Government hasn't currently got contingency plans for, but i fear that the answers would be too horrific to be made public.
    Do you want to know the worst bit?

    We were ordered to draw up contingency plans by local management over the summer in case of a second lockdown, and did. Then we were ordered to stop doing them by the DfE ‘because the virus isn’t spread through schools so they won’t be needed.’

    That also seems to be why they stopped rolling out laptops to poorer children.

    How do you spell ‘lowlifes?’

    Fortunately it did mean we had a basic outline plan ready to go, as we hadn’t destroyed our work. But really...
    The story of schools was that the government prefferred convienient lies over inconvienient truth
    To be fair to the government - there was some limited evidence suggesting children were less likely to transmit...
    https://www.imperial.ac.uk/media/imperial-college/medicine/mrc-gida/2020-11-25-COVID19-Report-37.pdf

    "Overall, evidence suggests that children are less likely to transmit SARS-CoV-2 compared to adults. A
    cluster-based study from Japan did not identify any children aged 0 – 19 years as a probable primary case
    of a cluster [134], a national study in South Korea reported very low secondary household attack rates of
    0.5% (95% CI: 0.0 – 2.6%) from paediatric index cases [135], and a prospective study in New South Wales,
    Australia, similarly identified very few instances of onward transmission from a paediatric index case [136]."
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 54,314
    eek said:

    ydoethur said:

    alex_ said:

    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:
    Well, he is right. Nobody expected we would be closed because after the mass of fraud, corruption and incompetence at the DfE to deliberately conceal and falsify the true infection rates in order to keep schools open and themselves relevant that they would suddenly be forced to confront reality like this. I actually bet that regardless of the deaths it would cause, they would keep schools open - not to help children, but to save face.

    And truthfully, life would be pleasanter if we were not in this situation, but since it is at least partly the aforementioned fraud corruption and incompetence at the DfE that brought us to it - insofar as if they had looked at blended learning or closed schools a fortnight early in the worst hit areas, things would not have been as bad - it’s not worth giving them a good start for effort.
    They should have been making contingency plans for national home learning last summer. It's scary how in so many areas over the last few years we have discovered that contingency planning (or more accurately lack of it),across large and crucial areas of government, appears to have been driven by anticipation of the world as the Government would like it to be, and not by the world as it could be if things don't go as hoped. In fact the very scenarios that contingency planning is designed for.

    People should be asking serious questions about what else the Government hasn't currently got contingency plans for, but i fear that the answers would be too horrific to be made public.
    Do you want to know the worst bit?

    We were ordered to draw up contingency plans by local management over the summer in case of a second lockdown, and did. Then we were ordered to stop doing them by the DfE ‘because the virus isn’t spread through schools so they won’t be needed.’

    That also seems to be why they stopped rolling out laptops to poorer children.

    How do you spell ‘lowlifes?’

    Fortunately it did mean we had a basic outline plan ready to go, as we hadn’t destroyed our work. But really...
    Giving laptops to poorer children requires spending money - and a supply of laptops that actually doesn't seem to exist. Dell has just quoted me late March for a delivery and Lenovo are no better.

    I know a few schools have been able to source laptops for children but you then hit secondary issues of internet access and suitably quiet places for the children to study.

    And that's before we remember some MPs believe the laptops would be instantly sold to get the children's parents some smack...
    It also means a lot more than just getting the laptops purchased. In many cases, the schools won’t be set up to configure and deploy them effectively, then deal with the many technical and training issues arising.
  • eekeek Posts: 28,077
    tlg86 said:

    eek said:

    tlg86 said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Omnium said:

    Alistair said:

    Omnium said:

    eek said:
    Not true, but if you like not true things then great.

    Fairly easy to see why.
    Why?
    Well, actually I was just about to post an edit to say that the "If they voted like the majority of their age group" is actually fair enough.

    But suppose you vote randomly and the elections have been 50/50 then it's unlikely that as a 33 year old you'd have managed to not be with the winning side. It's even more unlikely that a 66 year old would have managed to avoid disappointment.

    So it's clear that the claim is questionable. Now consider correlations - this raises the chance that a voter might have been on the winning side hugely if they've always voted one way and that side has always won. Now we know that voters pretty much vote one way, but we certainly know that one side hasn't always won.

    So I suspect you will find a lot of 33 year olds that have never voted for the winning side (my guess would be around 40% - just because the Tories have won every election since 2010), but you'll find it quite hard to find 66 year olds that have always been celebrating on election night - I'd be a seller at 5%.
    I think the point is that the cohort overall has been shafted by democracy, not whether any given individual's record exactly matches that of the cohort.
    Of course, this is quite selective. The same is not true for 34-42 year olds.

    I’m 34 and have voted in five GEs and two UK-wide referendums. My record is:

    2005 - Lost
    2010 - Won
    2011 - Won
    2015 - Lost
    2016 - Won
    2017 - Lost
    2019 - Won

    Obviously you can argue that I did win in 2015, but it wasn’t just about Europe it was about Osbrown economics.

    Personally I don’t think my generation and the next one have been shafted by democracy. We’ve been shafted by Gordon Brown, George Osborne and the Bank of England.
    What is it the BOE are supposed to have done?
    The obvious ones would be not regulating mortgage lending (especially BTL) so house prices are sky high
    And the impact of low interest rates since 2010 on the same thing.

    As we are talking about people who are 33 years old this is probably a useful statistic from https://www.money.co.uk/guides/first-time-buyers-around-the-world

    Since 2007 the age of the average first time buyer in the UK has increased from 28 years old to 34 years old.

    Back in 2007 your typical 33 year old would have now owned a house for 5 years, now he's still a year away from buying one.

    Also, mortgage lengths have increased substantially in that time too. At some point - perhaps many decades from now - the chickens will come home to roost.
    Yep - in a complete lack of pension saving as the money went on the more essential money pit of owning a house to live in.
  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 18,080
    He's chosen to use the Resolute desk. If he was as anti-British as advertised I'm sure that would be firewood by now.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 59,994
    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
  • RogerRoger Posts: 19,851
    Foxy said:

    tlg86 said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Omnium said:

    Alistair said:

    Omnium said:

    eek said:
    Not true, but if you like not true things then great.

    Fairly easy to see why.
    Why?
    Well, actually I was just about to post an edit to say that the "If they voted like the majority of their age group" is actually fair enough.

    But suppose you vote randomly and the elections have been 50/50 then it's unlikely that as a 33 year old you'd have managed to not be with the winning side. It's even more unlikely that a 66 year old would have managed to avoid disappointment.

    So it's clear that the claim is questionable. Now consider correlations - this raises the chance that a voter might have been on the winning side hugely if they've always voted one way and that side has always won. Now we know that voters pretty much vote one way, but we certainly know that one side hasn't always won.

    So I suspect you will find a lot of 33 year olds that have never voted for the winning side (my guess would be around 40% - just because the Tories have won every election since 2010), but you'll find it quite hard to find 66 year olds that have always been celebrating on election night - I'd be a seller at 5%.
    I think the point is that the cohort overall has been shafted by democracy, not whether any given individual's record exactly matches that of the cohort.
    Of course, this is quite selective. The same is not true for 34-42 year olds.

    I’m 34 and have voted in five GEs and two UK-wide referendums. My record is:

    2005 - Lost
    2010 - Won
    2011 - Won
    2015 - Lost
    2016 - Won
    2017 - Lost
    2019 - Won

    Obviously you can argue that I did win in 2015, but it wasn’t just about Europe it was about Osbrown economics.

    Personally I don’t think my generation and the next one have been shafted by democracy. We’ve been shafted by Gordon Brown, George Osborne and the Bank of England.
    I have voted in 10 General Elections and 2 referendums. In only 3 GE's has the party I voted for won (1997, 2001 and 2010) and neither of the referendums. In my mid fifties, I have only had a government that represents me for a fraction of my life, so yes, I understand how the young feel alienated from politics and how it doesn't represent them.
    Interesting thought. It doesn't matter normally as there's precious little difference. Nothing you'd notice for a few years other than having to live with a particular group of politicians you don't like such as '79' '83 and '87.

    That's what made the referendum in 2016 so disagreeable. It was a real change and one many people won't take lightly particularly as those responsible are those now in power
  • JonathanJonathan Posts: 21,555

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    Nah. It will get some Conservative knickers in a twist, but no one else will care.
  • NickPalmerNickPalmer Posts: 21,503
    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    ydoethur said:

    alex_ said:

    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:
    Well, he is right. Nobody expected we would be closed because after the mass of fraud, corruption and incompetence at the DfE to deliberately conceal and falsify the true infection rates in order to keep schools open and themselves relevant that they would suddenly be forced to confront reality like this. I actually bet that regardless of the deaths it would cause, they would keep schools open - not to help children, but to save face.

    And truthfully, life would be pleasanter if we were not in this situation, but since it is at least partly the aforementioned fraud corruption and incompetence at the DfE that brought us to it - insofar as if they had looked at blended learning or closed schools a fortnight early in the worst hit areas, things would not have been as bad - it’s not worth giving them a good start for effort.
    They should have been making contingency plans for national home learning last summer. It's scary how in so many areas over the last few years we have discovered that contingency planning (or more accurately lack of it),across large and crucial areas of government, appears to have been driven by anticipation of the world as the Government would like it to be, and not by the world as it could be if things don't go as hoped. In fact the very scenarios that contingency planning is designed for.

    People should be asking serious questions about what else the Government hasn't currently got contingency plans for, but i fear that the answers would be too horrific to be made public.
    Do you want to know the worst bit?

    We were ordered to draw up contingency plans by local management over the summer in case of a second lockdown, and did. Then we were ordered to stop doing them by the DfE ‘because the virus isn’t spread through schools so they won’t be needed.’

    That also seems to be why they stopped rolling out laptops to poorer children.

    How do you spell ‘lowlifes?’

    Fortunately it did mean we had a basic outline plan ready to go, as we hadn’t destroyed our work. But really...
    Giving laptops to poorer children requires spending money - and a supply of laptops that actually doesn't seem to exist. Dell has just quoted me late March for a delivery and Lenovo are no better.

    I know a few schools have been able to source laptops for children but you then hit secondary issues of internet access and suitably quiet places for the children to study.

    And that's before we remember some MPs believe the laptops would be instantly sold to get the children's parents some smack...
    It also means a lot more than just getting the laptops purchased. In many cases, the schools won’t be set up to configure and deploy them effectively, then deal with the many technical and training issues arising.
    Yes, it's a complex and multi-layered problem. All the more reason to be tackling it systematically and consistently. It would clearly be helpful even weithout the pandemic if as many children as possible had laptop access, and internet access is less of an issue in urban areas where poverty levels are higher.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 59,994
    It's quite clear the Democrats have been wholly captured by the Wokeists; this will be the most toe-curlingly Woke and wanky US administration there has ever been.

    It will do nothing to solve America's divisions or heal them, except exacerbate them further. The only question is whether the Republicans can capitalise on it in November 2022, or whether their own fratricidal civil war will consume them, giving more space to the nutters in the Dems.

    Sad.
  • Dura_AceDura_Ace Posts: 13,677
    Floater said:
    Don't care. The Cyclone closed years ago.

  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706
    rkrkrk said:

    Foxy said:

    tlg86 said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Omnium said:

    Alistair said:

    Omnium said:

    eek said:
    Not true, but if you like not true things then great.

    Fairly easy to see why.
    Why?
    Well, actually I was just about to post an edit to say that the "If they voted like the majority of their age group" is actually fair enough.

    But suppose you vote randomly and the elections have been 50/50 then it's unlikely that as a 33 year old you'd have managed to not be with the winning side. It's even more unlikely that a 66 year old would have managed to avoid disappointment.

    So it's clear that the claim is questionable. Now consider correlations - this raises the chance that a voter might have been on the winning side hugely if they've always voted one way and that side has always won. Now we know that voters pretty much vote one way, but we certainly know that one side hasn't always won.

    So I suspect you will find a lot of 33 year olds that have never voted for the winning side (my guess would be around 40% - just because the Tories have won every election since 2010), but you'll find it quite hard to find 66 year olds that have always been celebrating on election night - I'd be a seller at 5%.
    I think the point is that the cohort overall has been shafted by democracy, not whether any given individual's record exactly matches that of the cohort.
    Of course, this is quite selective. The same is not true for 34-42 year olds.

    I’m 34 and have voted in five GEs and two UK-wide referendums. My record is:

    2005 - Lost
    2010 - Won
    2011 - Won
    2015 - Lost
    2016 - Won
    2017 - Lost
    2019 - Won

    Obviously you can argue that I did win in 2015, but it wasn’t just about Europe it was about Osbrown economics.

    Personally I don’t think my generation and the next one have been shafted by democracy. We’ve been shafted by Gordon Brown, George Osborne and the Bank of England.
    I have voted in 10 General Elections and 2 referendums. In only 3 GE's has the party I voted for won (1997, 2001 and 2010) and neither of the referendums. In my mid fifties, I have only had a government that represents me for a fraction of my life, so yes, I understand how the young feel alienated from politics and how it doesn't represent them.
    I'm about the age mentioned. I actually failed to vote in the 2010 election which would have been my only 'win'. That said - be careful what you wish for - the Lib Dem involvement in 2010 certainly didn't meet my expectations.

    Otherwise a straight string of losses on referenda and general elections. I've never voted for a winning candidate either except I suppose at European elections. Hopefully it will just make the victory sweeter.

    Plus - I get (vicarious?) pleasure from US elections - where the Republican alternative is generally much worse than the Conservative option here. Seeing Obama win in 2008 was great.
    Hmm...interesting perspective. I am in my late 50s and I have never, ever voted for the winning candidate in my constituency. In the 80s I voted SDP/Liberal Democrat, since the 90s I have voted Tory. None has ever even come close.

    OTOH I have had a government that I voted for for the last decade and have a record of 3 from 3 on referendums. Maybe there is something in this direct government.
  • eekeek Posts: 28,077

    It's quite clear the Democrats have been wholly captured by the Wokeists; this will be the most toe-curlingly Woke and wanky US administration there has ever been.

    It will do nothing to solve America's divisions or heal them, except exacerbate them further. The only question is whether the Republicans can capitalise on it in November 2022, or whether their own fratricidal civil war will consume them, giving more space to the nutters in the Dems.

    Sad.

    What are you basing that on so far?
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,362

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    Wouldn't have been any busts of civil rights leaders if we hadn't put everything on the line to defeat Hitler. Churchill is the ultimate singular embodiment of that. For that reason alone, his bust deserves his place in that company.

    Try pursuing a Woke agenda under Nazism. Might have - briefly - discovered slavery wasn't just an historical stain to be cleansed.
  • eekeek Posts: 28,077

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    It shouldn't do an issue unless, of cause, the other country is run by petulant toddlers.

    Equally though it shows our importance (or lack thereof) in the real world and the state of the relationship between the UK and US.

    A sensible person would just ignore it...
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 59,994
    eek said:

    It's quite clear the Democrats have been wholly captured by the Wokeists; this will be the most toe-curlingly Woke and wanky US administration there has ever been.

    It will do nothing to solve America's divisions or heal them, except exacerbate them further. The only question is whether the Republicans can capitalise on it in November 2022, or whether their own fratricidal civil war will consume them, giving more space to the nutters in the Dems.

    Sad.

    What are you basing that on so far?
    All the evidence from the campaign, the speeches, the rhetoric, the videos, the ads, what Biden and Kamala have said and how they've said it. Dems in the House and Senate.. everything.

    Look, I'm pleased Trump is good too. He was an ogre, bigot, and demagogue, and needed to be evicted, but let's not deify this new administration - please.

    There is a lot I think they will get badly wrong, and I am absolutely going to call them out on it.

    The desire for healing and unity needs to be reflected by both the right language, actions and humility.
  • eekeek Posts: 28,077

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    Wouldn't have been any busts of civil rights leaders if we hadn't put everything on the line to defeat Hitler. Churchill is the ultimate singular embodiment of that. For that reason alone, his bust deserves his place in that company.

    Try pursuing a Woke agenda under Nazism. Might have - briefly - discovered slavery wasn't just an historical stain to be cleansed.
    80 year old battles.
  • Dura_AceDura_Ace Posts: 13,677
    eek said:

    It's quite clear the Democrats have been wholly captured by the Wokeists; this will be the most toe-curlingly Woke and wanky US administration there has ever been.

    It will do nothing to solve America's divisions or heal them, except exacerbate them further. The only question is whether the Republicans can capitalise on it in November 2022, or whether their own fratricidal civil war will consume them, giving more space to the nutters in the Dems.

    Sad.

    What are you basing that on so far?
    The Churchill bust. It's like a little stachoo and we all know how important they are.
  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 18,080

    It's quite clear the Democrats have been wholly captured by the Wokeists; this will be the most toe-curlingly Woke and wanky US administration there has ever been.

    It will do nothing to solve America's divisions or heal them, except exacerbate them further. The only question is whether the Republicans can capitalise on it in November 2022, or whether their own fratricidal civil war will consume them, giving more space to the nutters in the Dems.

    Sad.

    Is there anything they've done that you object to, or are you simply projecting from your fears?

    I'm still luxuriating in the relief that the twice-impeached President is gone. Everything the new administration does seems amazingly good in comparison to before. It will take a while for expectations to adjust.
  • Entirely off-topic, but later this morning I have several back to back video meetings. One is an invite to Teams

    *shudder*

    Why is it that everything Microsoft is as complex and user-unfriendly as possible? I don't to integrate into your sodding hell, just let me connect to this meeting that someone else is hosting so that I can then go back to using platforms that actually work.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 95,873
    edited January 2021

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    Only if we are pathetically needy. The relationship is, I would hope, sufficiently strong that other actions can serve as suitable symbols.

    Worship of Churchill to the point of being upset about a bust of him being moved is just sad more than anything else. The alliance can be marked in many other ways.

    It's not whataboutism to say it doesnt matter, it's just disagreement.
  • FishingFishing Posts: 4,947
    edited January 2021

    It's quite clear the Democrats have been wholly captured by the Wokeists; this will be the most toe-curlingly Woke and wanky US administration there has ever been.

    It will do nothing to solve America's divisions or heal them, except exacerbate them further. The only question is whether the Republicans can capitalise on it in November 2022, or whether their own fratricidal civil war will consume them, giving more space to the nutters in the Dems.

    Sad.

    I agree. A "diverse" society is generally a divided one. It needs an overwhelming, external enemy to unite, which America doesn't really have at the moment.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 59,994

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    Wouldn't have been any busts of civil rights leaders if we hadn't put everything on the line to defeat Hitler. Churchill is the ultimate singular embodiment of that. For that reason alone, his bust deserves his place in that company.

    Try pursuing a Woke agenda under Nazism. Might have - briefly - discovered slavery wasn't just an historical stain to be cleansed.
    There will be people in Biden's team whose first reaction will have been, "let's get that racist out of here."
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 54,314
    edited January 2021

    It's quite clear the Democrats have been wholly captured by the Wokeists; this will be the most toe-curlingly Woke and wanky US administration there has ever been.

    It will do nothing to solve America's divisions or heal them, except exacerbate them further. The only question is whether the Republicans can capitalise on it in November 2022, or whether their own fratricidal civil war will consume them, giving more space to the nutters in the Dems.

    Sad.

    I’m happy to give them the benefit of the doubt for now, let’s see what policies actually get enacted and legislation passed in the coming months.

    Most of the announcements of EOs for the first few days are normally more symbolic than effective in practice.

    We’ll soon discover if he does actually intend to follow through on his pledge to unite and heal, or whether his idea of unity is that you must agree with everything we say or be ostracised from society.
  • eekeek Posts: 28,077

    eek said:

    It's quite clear the Democrats have been wholly captured by the Wokeists; this will be the most toe-curlingly Woke and wanky US administration there has ever been.

    It will do nothing to solve America's divisions or heal them, except exacerbate them further. The only question is whether the Republicans can capitalise on it in November 2022, or whether their own fratricidal civil war will consume them, giving more space to the nutters in the Dems.

    Sad.

    What are you basing that on so far?
    All the evidence from the campaign, the speeches, the rhetoric, the videos, the ads, what Biden and Kamala have said and how they've said it. Dems in the House and Senate.. everything.

    Look, I'm pleased Trump is good too. He was an ogre, bigot, and demagogue, and needed to be evicted, but let's not deify this new administration - please.

    There is a lot I think they will get badly wrong, and I am absolutely going to call them out on it.

    The desire for healing and unity needs to be reflected by both the right language, actions and humility.
    The campaign had to bring the vote out...

    I would ignore any campaign messaging and wait to see what happens in the first 100 days in power - that will give you a more accurate picture.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 35,895
    IanB2 said:

    The fact that every other country in the entire world does differently ought to be a clue. At the least, our government knew that denying this status would create a storm, which presumably is the object.

    https://twitter.com/CER_IanBond/status/1352154880807460864
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,528

    Entirely off-topic, but later this morning I have several back to back video meetings. One is an invite to Teams

    *shudder*

    Why is it that everything Microsoft is as complex and user-unfriendly as possible? I don't to integrate into your sodding hell, just let me connect to this meeting that someone else is hosting so that I can then go back to using platforms that actually work.

    Teams is the worst. Our IT department tried to foist it on us in the first lockdown because it's free but they decided that the subscription cost for Zoom was worth it to avoid the bitching.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 26,123
    On the subject of house prices:

    https://www.theguardian.com/money/2021/jan/20/average-london-house-price-exceeds-500000-for-first-time-covid

    In its monthly snapshot of the market – based on sales registered last November – the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed that the average price of a home in London was up by 9.7%, to a record of £514,000.

    The temporary break on stamp duty, which covers homes costing up to £500,000 in England, has led to a boom in sales and pushed up prices in properties that benefit from the largest saving.

    Within the capital, prices had risen most strongly in the upmarket borough of Kensington and Chelsea, which recorded annual growth of 28.6% and an average price of £1.5m.


    So much for COVID dampening the London housing market.
  • NickPalmerNickPalmer Posts: 21,503
    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:

    While the adults are back in charge in America, we still have a petulant toddler in Downing Street...

    https://twitter.com/patrickwintour/status/1352156166466498560

    Two petulant toddlers, surely?

    Although actually, Johnson is (for once) right about this. The EU isn’t a country and it shouldn’t be exchanging diplomats. As for their claims that the UK is a signatory to the Lisbon Treaty, in case they haven’t noticed, we’ve left and are no longer a signatory.

    Moreover, the Lisbon Treaty was signed over the strenuous objections of the party currently in power, partly because of this idea that the EU should have its own foreign service, and we all know no parliament can bind its successors.

    It’s the EU that are behaving like petulant toddlers here, and are in any case wrong about their status. They’re showing themselves at their pompous, stuck up, unselfaware and stupid worst, as over, say, that illegal ban on our beef.

    And that’s the reason why although the EU isn’t likely to break up, it’s also never likely to be really popular.
    Point of order: the EU is very popular in most of its countries (62-37 on average), although not without criticisms; see Pew Research for a nuanced view:

    https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/03/19/europeans-credit-eu-with-promoting-peace-and-prosperity-but-say-brussels-is-out-of-touch-with-its-citizens/

    - DavidL will choke on his cornflakes, but the European Parliament is popular too, though not as heavily. Contrast with, say, the US, where Congress has been hugely unpopular with voters for as long as I can recall. I'm not sure the question has been asked in Britain.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 95,873
    Dura_Ace said:

    eek said:

    It's quite clear the Democrats have been wholly captured by the Wokeists; this will be the most toe-curlingly Woke and wanky US administration there has ever been.

    It will do nothing to solve America's divisions or heal them, except exacerbate them further. The only question is whether the Republicans can capitalise on it in November 2022, or whether their own fratricidal civil war will consume them, giving more space to the nutters in the Dems.

    Sad.

    What are you basing that on so far?
    The Churchill bust. It's like a little stachoo and we all know how important they are.
    Symbols can be very important. This one isn't given the closeness of the relationship, any politician bringing it up is looking for an excuse. I doubt Boris will care so long as he can get access to Biden, though hed pretend to care if he wasnt PM, as before.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,362
    eek said:

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    Wouldn't have been any busts of civil rights leaders if we hadn't put everything on the line to defeat Hitler. Churchill is the ultimate singular embodiment of that. For that reason alone, his bust deserves his place in that company.

    Try pursuing a Woke agenda under Nazism. Might have - briefly - discovered slavery wasn't just an historical stain to be cleansed.
    80 year old battles.
    Well, let's give up on fighting fascism, eh? 80 year old battles.....

    No lessons for us today there.

    Yes, it's a statue of some foreign guy, long dead. But given the symbolism Americans place on their flag, you'd think they might just make a space for the ultimate political symbol of standing up to The Bad Guys.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706

    Entirely off-topic, but later this morning I have several back to back video meetings. One is an invite to Teams

    *shudder*

    Why is it that everything Microsoft is as complex and user-unfriendly as possible? I don't to integrate into your sodding hell, just let me connect to this meeting that someone else is hosting so that I can then go back to using platforms that actually work.

    I had the joys of something called Blue Jeans recently. It made Teams look good. Yesterday I spent more than half an hour trying to join Webex for an appeal and eventually did so on my phone. The novelty of these platforms is wearing a tad thin...
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 54,314

    Entirely off-topic, but later this morning I have several back to back video meetings. One is an invite to Teams

    *shudder*

    Why is it that everything Microsoft is as complex and user-unfriendly as possible? I don't to integrate into your sodding hell, just let me connect to this meeting that someone else is hosting so that I can then go back to using platforms that actually work.

    Pretty much anything else is better than Teams, the problem is that for most companies it’s included in their Office subscription and doesn’t require any money spending on purchasing and installing it.

    Depending on the main use cases, Slack, Webex, Skype, Signal or even plain old FaceTime work much better.
  • NickPalmerNickPalmer Posts: 21,503
    alex_ said:

    Coronavirus cases 'DIDN'T fall during the first ten days of Lockdown 3.0': Imperial College study finds number of positive tests 'barely changed'

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9168531/Coronavirus-cases-DIDNT-fall-ten-days-Englands-lockdown-major-study-claims.html

    Where PB leads....we have talked about how we thought it was likely the case that the first few days of lockdown don't do anything to squashing COVID and why 2 week firebreak is flawed.

    Don't drag me into your trope please.

    The Imperial college data is lagging behind and it's clear that lockdowns do work and so do firebreaks. In c. 3 weeks Imperial college data will catch up. There is now a clear and definite downturn in infection rates.
    Whilst there is obviously the problem of misuse/misrepresentation, it is not inconsistent (absent actual data to the contrary) to simultaneously advance the arguments that

    1) Lockdowns "work"
    2) Initial days of lockdowns can generate increases in cases (and by extension argue against "firebreaks"

    For two reasons.

    1) the issue of behaviour outside of the lockdown. A pre-announced lockdown may lead to behaviour prior to the lockdown that contributes to increased transmission. And even without pre-announcing (in the context of a 'firebreak', there is the potential impact of adverse behaviour once the lockdown is lifted (if the lockdown period hasn't clamped down sufficiently on case numbers). It should also be noted that advocates of the "firebreak" policy were arguing for a number of scheduled short lockdowns to allow businesses to "plan" around them. Of course this makes them pre-announced and would result, not just in businesses planning around them, but also people planning their social calendar around them.

    2) Potential for increased (or at least accelerated) intra household transmission in the first few days, particularly if the lockdown involves home schooling. Lockdowns result in people within households spending more time together, increasing the likelihood of transmission where one individual is entering the lockdown infected.

    In the long run (and this of course depends on the extent, and is made harder by more transmissable variants), lockdowns should 'work' by ultimately preventing transmission between households. Those households which enter lockdown uninfected will exit it in the same way. Those entering it infected will burn themselves out. But this is not inconsistent with a lack of immediate short term infectiveness.
    Hmm, as an erstwhile supporter of planned firebreaks I see what you mean: you've convinced me that I was wrong. As I said the other day, that doesn't happen often! Thanks.
  • eekeek Posts: 28,077
    MaxPB said:

    Entirely off-topic, but later this morning I have several back to back video meetings. One is an invite to Teams

    *shudder*

    Why is it that everything Microsoft is as complex and user-unfriendly as possible? I don't to integrate into your sodding hell, just let me connect to this meeting that someone else is hosting so that I can then go back to using platforms that actually work.

    Teams is the worst. Our IT department tried to foist it on us in the first lockdown because it's free but they decided that the subscription cost for Zoom was worth it to avoid the bitching.
    Yet Zoom is a frigging security nightmare while Teams in my world just works - each to their own I suppose.
  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 18,080

    Entirely off-topic, but later this morning I have several back to back video meetings. One is an invite to Teams

    *shudder*

    Why is it that everything Microsoft is as complex and user-unfriendly as possible? I don't to integrate into your sodding hell, just let me connect to this meeting that someone else is hosting so that I can then go back to using platforms that actually work.

    President Biden is to Trump as Microsoft Teams is to Skype for Business. Be thankful that you missed out on the latter.
  • Entirely off-topic, but later this morning I have several back to back video meetings. One is an invite to Teams

    *shudder*

    Why is it that everything Microsoft is as complex and user-unfriendly as possible? I don't to integrate into your sodding hell, just let me connect to this meeting that someone else is hosting so that I can then go back to using platforms that actually work.

    We use Teams at the school I teach at. It works well enough for what I need, though I do need to remember to set up the calls so that my Y9s can't mute me...
  • Dura_AceDura_Ace Posts: 13,677

    eek said:

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    Wouldn't have been any busts of civil rights leaders if we hadn't put everything on the line to defeat Hitler. Churchill is the ultimate singular embodiment of that. For that reason alone, his bust deserves his place in that company.

    Try pursuing a Woke agenda under Nazism. Might have - briefly - discovered slavery wasn't just an historical stain to be cleansed.
    80 year old battles.
    Well, let's give up on fighting fascism, eh? 80 year old battles.....

    No lessons for us today there.

    Yes, it's a statue of some foreign guy, long dead. But given the symbolism Americans place on their flag, you'd think they might just make a space for the ultimate political symbol of standing up to The Bad Guys.
    On that score Stalin is more deserving of a place on the sideboard than WLSC.
  • Wulfrun_PhilWulfrun_Phil Posts: 4,780
    edited January 2021

    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:

    While the adults are back in charge in America, we still have a petulant toddler in Downing Street...

    https://twitter.com/patrickwintour/status/1352156166466498560

    Two petulant toddlers, surely?

    Although actually, Johnson is (for once) right about this. The EU isn’t a country and it shouldn’t be exchanging diplomats. As for their claims that the UK is a signatory to the Lisbon Treaty, in case they haven’t noticed, we’ve left and are no longer a signatory.

    Moreover, the Lisbon Treaty was signed over the strenuous objections of the party currently in power, partly because of this idea that the EU should have its own foreign service, and we all know no parliament can bind its successors.

    It’s the EU that are behaving like petulant toddlers here, and are in any case wrong about their status. They’re showing themselves at their pompous, stuck up, unselfaware and stupid worst, as over, say, that illegal ban on our beef.

    And that’s the reason why although the EU isn’t likely to break up, it’s also never likely to be really popular.
    Point of order: the EU is very popular in most of its countries (62-37 on average), although not without criticisms; see Pew Research for a nuanced view:

    https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/03/19/europeans-credit-eu-with-promoting-peace-and-prosperity-but-say-brussels-is-out-of-touch-with-its-citizens/

    - DavidL will choke on his cornflakes, but the European Parliament is popular too, though not as heavily. Contrast with, say, the US, where Congress has been hugely unpopular with voters for as long as I can recall. I'm not sure the question has been asked in Britain.
    Is the European Commission popular?
  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 61,700
    Glad it's above freezing unlike some recent days, but still not the warmest time to lose the heating...

    Going to have to wave my wiffle stick very vigorously to stay warm.
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 54,314

    Glad it's above freezing unlike some recent days, but still not the warmest time to lose the heating...

    Going to have to wave my wiffle stick very vigorously to stay warm.

    Oh dear, doesn’t sound good to lose the heating.

    Enjoy playing vigorously with the wiffle stick, every good Morris dancer should do that at least twice a day!
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,528
    eek said:

    MaxPB said:

    Entirely off-topic, but later this morning I have several back to back video meetings. One is an invite to Teams

    *shudder*

    Why is it that everything Microsoft is as complex and user-unfriendly as possible? I don't to integrate into your sodding hell, just let me connect to this meeting that someone else is hosting so that I can then go back to using platforms that actually work.

    Teams is the worst. Our IT department tried to foist it on us in the first lockdown because it's free but they decided that the subscription cost for Zoom was worth it to avoid the bitching.
    Yet Zoom is a frigging security nightmare while Teams in my world just works - each to their own I suppose.
    You're the IT department though! We heard all of that spiel from them too and told them to just deal with Zoom. Their job is to make it work. 🤷‍♂️
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 35,895

    President Biden is to Trump as Microsoft Teams is to Skype for Business. Be thankful that you missed out on the latter.

    Entirely backwards.

    S4B worked. Really well. And Teams just doesn't.

    Still better than Webex though
  • eek said:

    MaxPB said:

    Entirely off-topic, but later this morning I have several back to back video meetings. One is an invite to Teams

    *shudder*

    Why is it that everything Microsoft is as complex and user-unfriendly as possible? I don't to integrate into your sodding hell, just let me connect to this meeting that someone else is hosting so that I can then go back to using platforms that actually work.

    Teams is the worst. Our IT department tried to foist it on us in the first lockdown because it's free but they decided that the subscription cost for Zoom was worth it to avoid the bitching.
    Yet Zoom is a frigging security nightmare while Teams in my world just works - each to their own I suppose.
    We are using Teams to run North Sea drilling operations. No hassles at all and find it easily the most stable and useable of the various systems.
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 42,753
    tlg86 said:

    TOPPING said:

    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:

    While the adults are back in charge in America, we still have a petulant toddler in Downing Street...

    https://twitter.com/patrickwintour/status/1352156166466498560

    Two petulant toddlers, surely?

    Although actually, Johnson is (for once) right about this. The EU isn’t a country and it shouldn’t be exchanging diplomats. As for their claims that the UK is a signatory to the Lisbon Treaty, in case they haven’t noticed, we’ve left and are no longer a signatory.

    Moreover, the Lisbon Treaty was signed over the strenuous objections of the party currently in power, partly because of this idea that the EU should have its own foreign service, and we all know no parliament can bind its successors.

    It’s the EU that are behaving like petulant toddlers here, and are in any case wrong about their status. They’re showing themselves at their pompous, stuck up, unselfaware and stupid worst, as over, say, that illegal ban on our beef.

    And that’s the reason why although the EU isn’t likely to break up, it’s also never likely to be really popular.
    So we left the EU because we said it is a unitary single power which was denying our right to self-determination; but we are now saying, by refusing to recognise its diplomats in this way, that it is not a unitary single power but a collection of sovereign nations.

    Gotit.
    Surely it's an either/or. Either we treat the EU as a sovereign nation - and expel all French, German, etc. diplomats, or the EU STFU.
    I appreciate the whole thing is a bit complicated so it's tricky to get your head wrapped around.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    Wouldn't have been any busts of civil rights leaders if we hadn't put everything on the line to defeat Hitler. Churchill is the ultimate singular embodiment of that. For that reason alone, his bust deserves his place in that company.

    Try pursuing a Woke agenda under Nazism. Might have - briefly - discovered slavery wasn't just an historical stain to be cleansed.
    There will be people in Biden's team whose first reaction will have been, "let's get that racist out of here."

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    I think you need to recalibrate that remark to take account of the importance, to America, of Anglo-American relations. You are right in a way, though. Look at Biden's aggressive Irishry (it isn't obvious that you would quote Joyce on Dublin when saying farewell to Delaware), and consider the point that Churchill would on some views have invaded Ireland if he didn't think the USA would object. Then consider the point that Johnson's dire Churchill book was a crass attempt to align himself with the man. Add in what Kamala thinks about what Johnson said about Obama and his colonial past. The special relationship is an ad hoc construct 75 years past its useful life, never mind that it is surely rather circular to appeal to it in Churchillian matters?
  • kjhkjh Posts: 11,695
    Scott_xP said:

    IanB2 said:

    The fact that every other country in the entire world does differently ought to be a clue. At the least, our government knew that denying this status would create a storm, which presumably is the object.

    https://twitter.com/CER_IanBond/status/1352154880807460864
    Yes this is pathetic. Even it is only for etiquette reasons it is utterly childish if every other country in the world does it. And of course it gets remembered in future negotiations. When an 'i' hasn't been dotted or a 't' crossed and we have made a mistake for something that was obviously intended to be agreed it will come home an bite us.

    It should be remembered that people only resort to going back to what the contract says or what was agreed in writing when things go wrong and that is why they are there.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706
    eek said:

    MaxPB said:

    Entirely off-topic, but later this morning I have several back to back video meetings. One is an invite to Teams

    *shudder*

    Why is it that everything Microsoft is as complex and user-unfriendly as possible? I don't to integrate into your sodding hell, just let me connect to this meeting that someone else is hosting so that I can then go back to using platforms that actually work.

    Teams is the worst. Our IT department tried to foist it on us in the first lockdown because it's free but they decided that the subscription cost for Zoom was worth it to avoid the bitching.
    Yet Zoom is a frigging security nightmare while Teams in my world just works - each to their own I suppose.
    I thought that they had improved the security on zoom. For any number of participants feedback is a joy unless everyone is disciplined about the mute button.
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 42,753
    MaxPB said:

    Entirely off-topic, but later this morning I have several back to back video meetings. One is an invite to Teams

    *shudder*

    Why is it that everything Microsoft is as complex and user-unfriendly as possible? I don't to integrate into your sodding hell, just let me connect to this meeting that someone else is hosting so that I can then go back to using platforms that actually work.

    Teams is the worst. Our IT department tried to foist it on us in the first lockdown because it's free but they decided that the subscription cost for Zoom was worth it to avoid the bitching.
    What do they call Zoom...sophisticated Chinese spyware.

    I love Teams.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,362
    Dura_Ace said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    Wouldn't have been any busts of civil rights leaders if we hadn't put everything on the line to defeat Hitler. Churchill is the ultimate singular embodiment of that. For that reason alone, his bust deserves his place in that company.

    Try pursuing a Woke agenda under Nazism. Might have - briefly - discovered slavery wasn't just an historical stain to be cleansed.
    80 year old battles.
    Well, let's give up on fighting fascism, eh? 80 year old battles.....

    No lessons for us today there.

    Yes, it's a statue of some foreign guy, long dead. But given the symbolism Americans place on their flag, you'd think they might just make a space for the ultimate political symbol of standing up to The Bad Guys.
    On that score Stalin is more deserving of a place on the sideboard than WLSC.
    The other side of his Ledger is, er, difficult. You know, when he became The Bad Guy. What is it - 6 million deaths? Nine million?

    At least a bust of Churchill doesn't leave behind a blood-stain on the mahogony....
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 42,753
    Scott_xP said:

    President Biden is to Trump as Microsoft Teams is to Skype for Business. Be thankful that you missed out on the latter.

    Entirely backwards.

    S4B worked. Really well. And Teams just doesn't.

    Still better than Webex though
    Teams is the god of online meetings. So simple, can't think of a failing OTTOMH.
  • rkrkrkrkrkrk Posts: 8,214
    One key thing to remember is Teams share screen function only shares what you told it to originally.

    So if you change your screen - everyone will stay watching what you had displayed before.

    Zoom follows you round and shows whatever pop-up notifications you have to everyone.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 35,895
    kjh said:

    Yes this is pathetic. Even it is only for etiquette reasons it is utterly childish if every other country in the world does it. And of course it gets remembered in future negotiations. When an 'i' hasn't been dotted or a 't' crossed and we have made a mistake for something that was obviously intended to be agreed it will come home an bite us.

    It should be remembered that people only resort to going back to what the contract says or what was agreed in writing when things go wrong and that is why they are there.

    https://twitter.com/BBCJLandale/status/1352183611848613888
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 8,609

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    Wouldn't have been any busts of civil rights leaders if we hadn't put everything on the line to defeat Hitler. Churchill is the ultimate singular embodiment of that. For that reason alone, his bust deserves his place in that company.

    Try pursuing a Woke agenda under Nazism. Might have - briefly - discovered slavery wasn't just an historical stain to be cleansed.
    That's a bit of a stretch - without Churchill/UK the US would be under Nazi rule?

    Does Downing Street hold a bust/portrait of Roosevelt - or Stalin? Serious question - I don't know but I imagine the former is possible but the latter rather unlikely. Without them we very likely would have been under Nazi rule.
  • RogerRoger Posts: 19,851

    It's quite clear the Democrats have been wholly captured by the Wokeists; this will be the most toe-curlingly Woke and wanky US administration there has ever been.

    It will do nothing to solve America's divisions or heal them, except exacerbate them further. The only question is whether the Republicans can capitalise on it in November 2022, or whether their own fratricidal civil war will consume them, giving more space to the nutters in the Dems.

    Sad.

    If you've been watching what the alternative to the Wokeists look like-grotesques with bazooka's slung over their shoulders-you might conclude you're pointing your venom in the wrong direction.

    Or more disturbingly maybe not.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,528
    rkrkrk said:

    One key thing to remember is Teams share screen function only shares what you told it to originally.

    So if you change your screen - everyone will stay watching what you had displayed before.

    Zoom follows you round and shows whatever pop-up notifications you have to everyone.

    Zoom does that too, in fact teams copied that feature.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 35,895
    While the Biden Presidency will be about returning to sanity in most respects, it is "woke" and will do dumb shit like this

    https://twitter.com/AbigailShrier/status/1352121732723666946
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 54,314
    TOPPING said:

    Scott_xP said:

    President Biden is to Trump as Microsoft Teams is to Skype for Business. Be thankful that you missed out on the latter.

    Entirely backwards.

    S4B worked. Really well. And Teams just doesn't.

    Still better than Webex though
    Teams is the god of online meetings. So simple, can't think of a failing OTTOMH.
    The issue is that getting Teams to work well, really requires your company to sign up for the whole Microsoft Cloud ‘ecosystem’. If you’re only half in, which is the vast majority of SMEs, it can be a total nightmare.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 26,123
    Scott_xP said:

    President Biden is to Trump as Microsoft Teams is to Skype for Business. Be thankful that you missed out on the latter.

    Entirely backwards.

    S4B worked. Really well. And Teams just doesn't.

    Still better than Webex though
    I guess it had to happen one day. I agree with Scott.

    And with that, I have a Teams meeting to join...
  • It's quite clear the Democrats have been wholly captured by the Wokeists; this will be the most toe-curlingly Woke and wanky US administration there has ever been.

    It will do nothing to solve America's divisions or heal them, except exacerbate them further. The only question is whether the Republicans can capitalise on it in November 2022, or whether their own fratricidal civil war will consume them, giving more space to the nutters in the Dems.

    Sad.

    Can't be Woke, it is led by Sleepy Joe.
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 42,753
    Sandpit said:

    TOPPING said:

    Scott_xP said:

    President Biden is to Trump as Microsoft Teams is to Skype for Business. Be thankful that you missed out on the latter.

    Entirely backwards.

    S4B worked. Really well. And Teams just doesn't.

    Still better than Webex though
    Teams is the god of online meetings. So simple, can't think of a failing OTTOMH.
    The issue is that getting Teams to work well, really requires your company to sign up for the whole Microsoft Cloud ‘ecosystem’. If you’re only half in, which is the vast majority of SMEs, it can be a total nightmare.
    Ah. I see. Yes we have the full kaboodle and it is pretty good for us but I can see that any lesser version or component might be problematic.

    What is the nightmare bit of it in those cases?
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,528
    TOPPING said:

    MaxPB said:

    Entirely off-topic, but later this morning I have several back to back video meetings. One is an invite to Teams

    *shudder*

    Why is it that everything Microsoft is as complex and user-unfriendly as possible? I don't to integrate into your sodding hell, just let me connect to this meeting that someone else is hosting so that I can then go back to using platforms that actually work.

    Teams is the worst. Our IT department tried to foist it on us in the first lockdown because it's free but they decided that the subscription cost for Zoom was worth it to avoid the bitching.
    What do they call Zoom...sophisticated Chinese spyware.

    I love Teams.
    They've moved the majority of their servers out if China aiui after pressure from the US government. The rest are set to follow in the next few months.

    Our next big change is switching from Tableau to Looker, can't wait to get stuck into LookML!
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706

    ydoethur said:

    Scott_xP said:

    While the adults are back in charge in America, we still have a petulant toddler in Downing Street...

    https://twitter.com/patrickwintour/status/1352156166466498560

    Two petulant toddlers, surely?

    Although actually, Johnson is (for once) right about this. The EU isn’t a country and it shouldn’t be exchanging diplomats. As for their claims that the UK is a signatory to the Lisbon Treaty, in case they haven’t noticed, we’ve left and are no longer a signatory.

    Moreover, the Lisbon Treaty was signed over the strenuous objections of the party currently in power, partly because of this idea that the EU should have its own foreign service, and we all know no parliament can bind its successors.

    It’s the EU that are behaving like petulant toddlers here, and are in any case wrong about their status. They’re showing themselves at their pompous, stuck up, unselfaware and stupid worst, as over, say, that illegal ban on our beef.

    And that’s the reason why although the EU isn’t likely to break up, it’s also never likely to be really popular.
    Point of order: the EU is very popular in most of its countries (62-37 on average), although not without criticisms; see Pew Research for a nuanced view:

    https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/03/19/europeans-credit-eu-with-promoting-peace-and-prosperity-but-say-brussels-is-out-of-touch-with-its-citizens/

    - DavidL will choke on his cornflakes, but the European Parliament is popular too, though not as heavily. Contrast with, say, the US, where Congress has been hugely unpopular with voters for as long as I can recall. I'm not sure the question has been asked in Britain.
    Surely the best measure of "popularity" is who can be bothered to vote for this. There had been a consistent downward trend in this, until 2019 when there was quite a large jump.
    2004: 45.47%: 2009: 42.97%: 2014: 42.61%: 2019: 50.66%. 50.66% is not much to write home about but it will be interesting to see where they go from here. The absence of the UK should probably increase the average next time around.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 35,895
    TOPPING said:

    Teams is the god of online meetings. So simple, can't think of a failing OTTOMH.

    It may be a versioning thing, or it may be something on my machine, but Teams doesn't pop up a window when someone calls me. I hear the ring, but can't answer. I have to wait for them to hang up, then look in call history to find out who it was, then call them back.

    S4B never had that problem.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830

    Dura_Ace said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    Wouldn't have been any busts of civil rights leaders if we hadn't put everything on the line to defeat Hitler. Churchill is the ultimate singular embodiment of that. For that reason alone, his bust deserves his place in that company.

    Try pursuing a Woke agenda under Nazism. Might have - briefly - discovered slavery wasn't just an historical stain to be cleansed.
    80 year old battles.
    Well, let's give up on fighting fascism, eh? 80 year old battles.....

    No lessons for us today there.

    Yes, it's a statue of some foreign guy, long dead. But given the symbolism Americans place on their flag, you'd think they might just make a space for the ultimate political symbol of standing up to The Bad Guys.
    On that score Stalin is more deserving of a place on the sideboard than WLSC.
    The other side of his Ledger is, er, difficult. You know, when he became The Bad Guy. What is it - 6 million deaths? Nine million?

    At least a bust of Churchill doesn't leave behind a blood-stain on the mahogony....
    Except that Churchill was cheerfully complicit in all that. "If Hitler invaded hell..."
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,528
    Sandpit said:

    TOPPING said:

    Scott_xP said:

    President Biden is to Trump as Microsoft Teams is to Skype for Business. Be thankful that you missed out on the latter.

    Entirely backwards.

    S4B worked. Really well. And Teams just doesn't.

    Still better than Webex though
    Teams is the god of online meetings. So simple, can't think of a failing OTTOMH.
    The issue is that getting Teams to work well, really requires your company to sign up for the whole Microsoft Cloud ‘ecosystem’. If you’re only half in, which is the vast majority of SMEs, it can be a total nightmare.
    Yup, this is our issue, we're a GCP company, everything else we have runs on Google so integrating teams properly is a bit rubbish. If Microsoft sold Excel 365 as a separate subscription we'd do away with the rest of it too.
  • rkrkrkrkrkrk Posts: 8,214
    MaxPB said:

    rkrkrk said:

    One key thing to remember is Teams share screen function only shares what you told it to originally.

    So if you change your screen - everyone will stay watching what you had displayed before.

    Zoom follows you round and shows whatever pop-up notifications you have to everyone.

    Zoom does that too, in fact teams copied that feature.
    Zoom for me shows pop-ups and shows when I got bored with a longwinded question and started reading pb.cm whilst teams doesn't. As was embarrassingly clear on a recent call. Probably there are settings that give you options.
  • Northern_AlNorthern_Al Posts: 8,314
    Fishing said:

    It's quite clear the Democrats have been wholly captured by the Wokeists; this will be the most toe-curlingly Woke and wanky US administration there has ever been.

    It will do nothing to solve America's divisions or heal them, except exacerbate them further. The only question is whether the Republicans can capitalise on it in November 2022, or whether their own fratricidal civil war will consume them, giving more space to the nutters in the Dems.

    Sad.

    I agree. A "diverse" society is generally a divided one. It needs an overwhelming, external enemy to unite, which America doesn't really have at the moment.
    Sorry, but that's nonsense isn't it? All modern western societies are pretty diverse - are you saying that they need an 'overwhelming, external enemy to unite'? Who should this enemy be? If anything, those societies that are less diverse (e.g. Russia, Iran etc.) seem to be more accomplished at finding external enemies.
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 54,314
    edited January 2021
    TOPPING said:

    Sandpit said:

    TOPPING said:

    Scott_xP said:

    President Biden is to Trump as Microsoft Teams is to Skype for Business. Be thankful that you missed out on the latter.

    Entirely backwards.

    S4B worked. Really well. And Teams just doesn't.

    Still better than Webex though
    Teams is the god of online meetings. So simple, can't think of a failing OTTOMH.
    The issue is that getting Teams to work well, really requires your company to sign up for the whole Microsoft Cloud ‘ecosystem’. If you’re only half in, which is the vast majority of SMEs, it can be a total nightmare.
    Ah. I see. Yes we have the full kaboodle and it is pretty good for us but I can see that any lesser version or component might be problematic.

    What is the nightmare bit of it in those cases?
    The bit that really makes it work is to have the Active Directory syncing with the Azure Cloud, then it does funky stuff with virtual proxy servers and VPN tunnels to make all your internal users see each other as if they were on the company LAN.

    The difficult bits are random error messages when trying to have people from different organisations on the same call, and bandwidth/latency issues at their server end.
  • IshmaelZ said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    I'm sorry but only a complete idiot believes decorations have to sit in the same place all the time. the choice of busts (Martin Luther King Jr, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt and Cesar Chavez) seems very appropriate for an 21st century American president.

    Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez all point to the work that is still required to make America an equal place.
    All the apologising and the whataboutism doesn't matter. Churchill is a symbol (*THE* symbol) of the transatlantic alliance.

    Moving it out - without explaining why or where, and acknowledging the sheer importance of the man in Anglo-American relations - is going to have political implications.
    Wouldn't have been any busts of civil rights leaders if we hadn't put everything on the line to defeat Hitler. Churchill is the ultimate singular embodiment of that. For that reason alone, his bust deserves his place in that company.

    Try pursuing a Woke agenda under Nazism. Might have - briefly - discovered slavery wasn't just an historical stain to be cleansed.
    80 year old battles.
    Well, let's give up on fighting fascism, eh? 80 year old battles.....

    No lessons for us today there.

    Yes, it's a statue of some foreign guy, long dead. But given the symbolism Americans place on their flag, you'd think they might just make a space for the ultimate political symbol of standing up to The Bad Guys.
    On that score Stalin is more deserving of a place on the sideboard than WLSC.
    The other side of his Ledger is, er, difficult. You know, when he became The Bad Guy. What is it - 6 million deaths? Nine million?

    At least a bust of Churchill doesn't leave behind a blood-stain on the mahogony....
    Except that Churchill was cheerfully complicit in all that. "If Hitler invaded hell..."
    He didn't say he would become the devil. Stalin did become it.
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 42,753
    Scott_xP said:

    TOPPING said:

    Teams is the god of online meetings. So simple, can't think of a failing OTTOMH.

    It may be a versioning thing, or it may be something on my machine, but Teams doesn't pop up a window when someone calls me. I hear the ring, but can't answer. I have to wait for them to hang up, then look in call history to find out who it was, then call them back.

    S4B never had that problem.
    Yurgh. That is gruesome.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,586
    rkrkrk said:

    MaxPB said:

    rkrkrk said:

    One key thing to remember is Teams share screen function only shares what you told it to originally.

    So if you change your screen - everyone will stay watching what you had displayed before.

    Zoom follows you round and shows whatever pop-up notifications you have to everyone.

    Zoom does that too, in fact teams copied that feature.
    Zoom for me shows pop-ups and shows when I got bored with a longwinded question and started reading pb.cm whilst teams doesn't. As was embarrassingly clear on a recent call. Probably there are settings that give you options.
    Rather glad I retired just as the age of voice conference calls gave way to video conference calls. Voice conferencing gave you so much more freedom to get on with other work stuff (or non-work stuff) during long boring calls.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,528
    rkrkrk said:

    MaxPB said:

    rkrkrk said:

    One key thing to remember is Teams share screen function only shares what you told it to originally.

    So if you change your screen - everyone will stay watching what you had displayed before.

    Zoom follows you round and shows whatever pop-up notifications you have to everyone.

    Zoom does that too, in fact teams copied that feature.
    Zoom for me shows pop-ups and shows when I got bored with a longwinded question and started reading pb.cm whilst teams doesn't. As was embarrassingly clear on a recent call. Probably there are settings that give you options.
    When you share your screen zoom gives you an option of which screen you want to share it if you want to share the whole desktop. I usually only share the presentation screen so any other notifications or if I switch to another screen for slack etc... doesn't get on screen.
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 54,314

    rkrkrk said:

    MaxPB said:

    rkrkrk said:

    One key thing to remember is Teams share screen function only shares what you told it to originally.

    So if you change your screen - everyone will stay watching what you had displayed before.

    Zoom follows you round and shows whatever pop-up notifications you have to everyone.

    Zoom does that too, in fact teams copied that feature.
    Zoom for me shows pop-ups and shows when I got bored with a longwinded question and started reading pb.cm whilst teams doesn't. As was embarrassingly clear on a recent call. Probably there are settings that give you options.
    Rather glad I retired just as the age of voice conference calls gave way to video conference calls. Voice conferencing gave you so much more freedom to get on with other work stuff (or non-work stuff) during long boring calls.
    A young lady I was working with yesterday had never seen a boardroom spider phone before, didn’t comprehend that we’d ever do conference calls without video!
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,528
    edited January 2021
    TOPPING said:

    Scott_xP said:

    TOPPING said:

    Teams is the god of online meetings. So simple, can't think of a failing OTTOMH.

    It may be a versioning thing, or it may be something on my machine, but Teams doesn't pop up a window when someone calls me. I hear the ring, but can't answer. I have to wait for them to hang up, then look in call history to find out who it was, then call them back.

    S4B never had that problem.
    Yurgh. That is gruesome.
    Then try having a meeting with loads of outside clients at once with loads of people on and off the VPN with teams. That's why we went back to Zoom, it was just embarrassing for our meetings to not work properly for clients.
  • eekeek Posts: 28,077
    edited January 2021
    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    MaxPB said:

    Entirely off-topic, but later this morning I have several back to back video meetings. One is an invite to Teams

    *shudder*

    Why is it that everything Microsoft is as complex and user-unfriendly as possible? I don't to integrate into your sodding hell, just let me connect to this meeting that someone else is hosting so that I can then go back to using platforms that actually work.

    Teams is the worst. Our IT department tried to foist it on us in the first lockdown because it's free but they decided that the subscription cost for Zoom was worth it to avoid the bitching.
    Yet Zoom is a frigging security nightmare while Teams in my world just works - each to their own I suppose.
    I thought that they had improved the security on zoom. For any number of participants feedback is a joy unless everyone is disciplined about the mute button.
    They might have done - but the tricks they used to pull to ensure installation are such that on a corporate level I won't allow that software on the network.

    If you need to use Zoom I'll lend you an iPad...
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 33,344
    Morning all. And a fine bright, if cold, one it is too.

    I do quite a few virtual u3a meetings and they're all Zoom; the only problem seems to be the 40 minute limit for meetings and it's quite easy to get round that.
    WEA uses Zoom too, plus something called Canvas for feedback and background reading. The Zoom works fine, but the Canvas is a bit clunky.
    One of my sons tried Teams for business, but I don't think either he or his company were very pleased with it.
    Never tried Skype for Business; with how many can you have a meeting?

    I think Zoom has caught the public imagination and the inventor and his (?) backers must now be rolling it it!
  • Dura_AceDura_Ace Posts: 13,677
    IshmaelZ said:

    You are right in a way, though. Look at Biden's aggressive Irishry (it isn't obvious that you would quote Joyce on Dublin when saying farewell to Delaware), and consider the point that Churchill would on some views have invaded Ireland if he didn't think the USA would object.

    Churchill was almost the facilitator of a liberated Ireland. He offered the 6 countries to de Valera if the Republic would join the allies in WW2. Unsurprisingly and probably accurately, de Valera didn't trust Churchill to deliver on his end of the bargain and said no.
  • kjh said:

    Scott_xP said:

    While the Biden Presidency will be about returning to sanity in most respects, it is "woke" and will do dumb shit like this

    https://twitter.com/AbigailShrier/status/1352121732723666946

    Trans in sport is an impossible problem.

    I get frustrated with both sides on the issue of men/women/trans. Just treat people as people. I don't give a toss what you are.

    And that works for just about everything, except women's sport.

    Except for a few specific sports the physical difference is important and the solution can't be to just treat everyone as equal as otherwise half the population has been removed from competitive sport. Yet that still leaves the trans issue.

    I don't know what the answer is.
    Treat everyone as equal and with respect. Trans women should be able to understand that they are to be treated in general as women despite being biologically male, but for the purposes of sport biology matters. So they can be recognised as women but in doing so would become ineligible for sport - in the same way someone doping is. Its not doping, but its the same biological effect.

    I don't see why that is unreasonable?
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706
    Scott_xP said:

    kjh said:

    Yes this is pathetic. Even it is only for etiquette reasons it is utterly childish if every other country in the world does it. And of course it gets remembered in future negotiations. When an 'i' hasn't been dotted or a 't' crossed and we have made a mistake for something that was obviously intended to be agreed it will come home an bite us.

    It should be remembered that people only resort to going back to what the contract says or what was agreed in writing when things go wrong and that is why they are there.

    https://twitter.com/BBCJLandale/status/1352183611848613888
    I agree that this is childish and self defeating. We need to smooth the practicalities of the deal done with the EU and that is going to require a lot of cooperation and goodwill. Its always a bit frustrating when people just won't accept that they have won. We need to move on to a more friendly and mature relationship than we had as members (not a particularly high bar). This is not a step in that direction.
This discussion has been closed.