"They are country boys. The fact is they live by a code of honour and a standard. It's called Pashtunwali. It has honour at the heart of what they do.
They don't like corrupt government or governance that is self-serving and want an Afghanistan that is inclusive for all.
I think they have changed and they recognise Afghanistan has evolved and the fundamental role women have played in that evolution. They say they want to respect women's rights under Islamic law, and that will be Sharia law, but that doesn't necessarily mean they won't allow them to be involved in government, education and medicine."
He's an utter moron. The only honour these people care about is male honour and women bear the brunt of guarding it. They do not care about honouring her or her honour. So they can rape a woman and because this dishonours a man she gets stoned. Or they can order a woman to be raped to pay for the dishonour caused to a man.
This is not honour. It is barbarism. And if the Head of the Army does not understand this he is too deficient in sense to be put in charge of a Swiss army penknife let alone an army.
Out of interest how many taliban and Afghans have you had to meet with, fight against, negotiate with? How many people have you had to write to to tell them their son or daughter has been killed by the taliban whilst under your command? As head of the army I don’t think he’s been able to get there by being a moron. Maybe by being an intelligent soldier who doesn’t just say “Taliban bad, kill” but maybe considers the situation from personal contacts, experience and speaking to his commanders and soldiers on the ground. And maybe, just maybe, the head of the British armed forces, whilst they are trying to keep the taliban at bay to get people out of Afghanistan is better to be seen to be offering an olive branch rather than just shouting that all taliban are Rapey bastards?
His view is probably more nuanced in reality that there is a patchwork of afghans who comprise the taliban and so doesn’t lump them all together - I’m assuming you think all Germans are barbaric because some did heinous acts in world war 2 or maybe by being a little even handed at the end of the war we ended up with a better Germany.
But I’m sure you are the fount of all knowledge re Afghanistan on top of naughty city workers and Cumbrian restaurants and should maybe pop over and show him how to use a Swiss Army knife quick......
I am allowed to comment on his comment that the Taliban have honour, regardless of whether or not I have fought in the army or not.
Quite why you feel the need to make unpleasant personal comments about me in your disagreement with my views, which of course you are entitled to have, I don't know.
And I repeat there is and has been plenty of evidence of what the Taliban are like in reality for others to say that he is a moron making such a comment about an evil group. "Honour" to the Taliban means something very different to how we - and I would hope him - would understand it. He sounds naive and deluded. And I have seen enough people who have reached the top of their particular organisation to realise that this says very little about whether they have any common or moral sense.
If he wanted to play nice with them in order to facilitate the evacuation of his men and other civilians - a perfectly understandable and possibly even sensible gesture in the circumstances - then there are plenty of ways of being polite and not antagonising them without coming out with this drivel about their honour. People whose first act when in power is to go round rounding up women between the ages of 12 and 40 as bounty for soldiers are not honourable under any meaning of the term and the Head of the British Army should not be going round saying so.
And yeah I feel strongly about this. I've been raped. So I have zero patience with those who think it's something we need to be even-handed about.
As for Germany at the end of WW2, well my mother's family were part-Jewish and in hiding during it so they didn't have an even-handed view of the Germans. Nor did my father who, as a doctor, had to deal with the victims he saw at Belsen.
I am not sure a like is appropriate but totally agree and horrified at you and your families suffering
More than 100 guards at the British embassy in Kabul have been told they are not eligible for UK government protection because they were hired through an outsourced contractor, the Guardian has learned.
Most of the 125-strong team of security personnel, employed by the global security firm GardaWorld, have been given informal notice that they no longer have jobs guarding the embassy, several said.
The guards, some of whom had been working for the UK embassy for over a decade, described feeling abandoned by British officials and their employer. Many have been forced into hiding, fearing for their lives.
Meanwhile, more than 100 guards doing the same work for the US embassy, under a separate GardaWorld contract, have been evacuated and others were receiving support from the US embassy, according to a senior Afghan national GardaWorld employee in charge of human resources.
FFS. There is no way we are going to get them all out but we need to do what we can. This is just outrageous.
Priti Patel hasn't stopped cackling since the decision was made, Boris Johnson is probably tupping the secretary, whilst Raab is still on holiday mode to notice.
I am generally a Tory but Christ , their choice of Home Secretaries really tests me. It is the indulgence of that evil, slithering, foul, crap that is found at the bottom of the party. Narrow minded, bigoted, sanctimonious, hypocritical, and those are the redeeming features.
It honestly turns my stomach and I feel guilty that I turn a blind eye to it for the bigger picture.
I knew this was coming, it was the reason people like David Herdson, Richard Nabavi, and myself quit the party in 2019.
Genuine question. What has Priti Patel actually done that make people like you and DavidL loathe her so much? Apart from have a smirking smile?
I get a sense of misogyny, even, dare I say it, racism, but that seems highly unlikely given your origin so what is it?
She’s a moderately robust Home Secretary with an admirable backstory, female Ugandan Asian immigrant family who made it to the Cabinet. Good for her.
However, to me the one notable feature of her tenure is her FAILURE to get a grip on Cross Channel migrants. Hardly the mark of a hideous Nazi, just a mortal politician struggling with a very tricky problem
What has she done that so offends?
I found Theresa May much more offensive, both as HS and PM. “Citizens of Nowhere” was actually fucking hard right shite AND it boxed us into a needlessly hard Brexit
She is a populist conservative, pro Brexit and non public school and non Oxbridge.
So 3 reasons for liberal, establishment Tories not to be keen
Hangin' and floggin' could be a problem for more liberally minded souls.
More than 100 guards at the British embassy in Kabul have been told they are not eligible for UK government protection because they were hired through an outsourced contractor, the Guardian has learned.
Most of the 125-strong team of security personnel, employed by the global security firm GardaWorld, have been given informal notice that they no longer have jobs guarding the embassy, several said.
The guards, some of whom had been working for the UK embassy for over a decade, described feeling abandoned by British officials and their employer. Many have been forced into hiding, fearing for their lives.
Meanwhile, more than 100 guards doing the same work for the US embassy, under a separate GardaWorld contract, have been evacuated and others were receiving support from the US embassy, according to a senior Afghan national GardaWorld employee in charge of human resources.
FFS. There is no way we are going to get them all out but we need to do what we can. This is just outrageous.
Priti Patel hasn't stopped cackling since the decision was made, Boris Johnson is probably tupping the secretary, whilst Raab is still on holiday mode to notice.
I am generally a Tory but Christ , their choice of Home Secretaries really tests me. It is the indulgence of that evil, slithering, foul, crap that is found at the bottom of the party. Narrow minded, bigoted, sanctimonious, hypocritical, and those are the redeeming features.
It honestly turns my stomach and I feel guilty that I turn a blind eye to it for the bigger picture.
I knew this was coming, it was the reason people like David Herdson, Richard Nabavi, and myself quit the party in 2019.
Genuine question. What has Priti Patel actually done that make people like you and DavidL loathe her so much? Apart from have a smirking smile?
I get a sense of misogyny, even, dare I say it, racism, but that seems highly unlikely given your origin so what is it?
She’s a moderately robust Home Secretary with an admirable backstory, female Ugandan Asian immigrant family who made it to the Cabinet. Good for her.
However, to me the one notable feature of her tenure is her FAILURE to get a grip on Cross Channel migrants. Hardly the mark of a hideous Nazi, just a mortal politician struggling with a very tricky problem
What has she done that so offends?
I found Theresa May much more offensive, both as HS and PM. “Citizens of Nowhere” was actually fucking hard right shite AND it boxed us into a needlessly hard Brexit
I don't agree with the view that just because we don't grant asylum every single Afghan who served as a Chaiwala to a Briton at any point in the last 20 years that makes Priti Patel a Nazi.
There are over 30 million Afghans - and hundreds of millions more living under despicable regimes - and she has to prioritise those most at risk, maintain confidence in the immigration system and balance conflicting political pressures.
"Nor is it any longer possible for you to give up this empire … Your empire is now like a tyranny: it may have been wrong to take it; it is certainly dangerous to let it go."
My favourite Pericles quote is the one where he basically says if he cocked up it was the peoples' fault for being persuaded by him in the first place*.
"If you were persuaded by me to go to war because you thought I had the qualities necessary for leadership at least moderately more than other men, it is not right that I should now be blamed for doing wrong".
*The book I read this in, by an actual expert, is in fairness more forgiving, probably correctly - 'He was that rare political leader in a democratic state who had told the people the truth, while pursuing disputed and even unpopular polices. [His] constant forthrightness left his angry listeners with no rejoinder, for they could not claim they had been uninformed or deceived'. (Kagan, The Peloponnesian War)
He was a complete shit. Stole from the League to build the Parthenon, utterly abused democracy with his nasty little decree of 431 with the rider that "anyone proposing an amendment of this decree is to be put to death," destroyed Athens by starting and posthumously losing the war with Sparta. And that bellyachingly pompous funeral oration has to be read in light of the fact that "the many, not the few" judicially murdered his eldest son after Arginusae on a "The Sun says: string 'em up" sort of basis. The man was a c--t.
The Pnyx is impressive, tho. Especially the view of the Acropolis. Where Pericles did his thang
The original topography of Athens might just be the most impressive urban topography in the world. Genius. The temples soar above the parliament and both look down at the Agora, where the philosophers speak of ideas which rise above it all
I finally made it to the actual Stoa Poikile yesterday, the painted Stoa, where Zeno spoke and the Stoics got their name. It’s now an Irish pub and a crappy clothes shop looming over some desultory rubble
Yet, still, rather moving
It's all bloody lovely, but that doesn't make it right. That Keats shtick about "Beauty is truth, truth beauty" is just as wrong as it is possible to be. To me the most beautiful thing in the world, by a country mile, is St Peter's Rome, but everything it says and stands for just ain't so.
St Peter’s is the most “beautiful thing in the world by a country mile”. Really?
An eccentric opinion. It’s far from a masterpiece. Most people accept that Bramante and Michelangelo etc made it too big with the dome set too far back as a result, so it lacks drama and poetry. It’s just BIG and grandiose. Bernini improved it with the embracing colonnades but it still doesn’t work as it should (given the money and talent involved, it’s a bit like Star Wars 7 or whatever)
Of course it contains world class art. Michelangelo’s Pieta is almost beyond comprehension, given the age he was when he did it
For once I agree with you. Gaudy and a bit tasteless.
"They are country boys. The fact is they live by a code of honour and a standard. It's called Pashtunwali. It has honour at the heart of what they do.
They don't like corrupt government or governance that is self-serving and want an Afghanistan that is inclusive for all.
I think they have changed and they recognise Afghanistan has evolved and the fundamental role women have played in that evolution. They say they want to respect women's rights under Islamic law, and that will be Sharia law, but that doesn't necessarily mean they won't allow them to be involved in government, education and medicine."
He's an utter moron. The only honour these people care about is male honour and women bear the brunt of guarding it. They do not care about honouring her or her honour. So they can rape a woman and because this dishonours a man she gets stoned. Or they can order a woman to be raped to pay for the dishonour caused to a man.
This is not honour. It is barbarism. And if the Head of the Army does not understand this he is too deficient in sense to be put in charge of a Swiss army penknife let alone an army.
I thought that was more or less a requirement for being a staff officer in the British Army?
And yet you expect Scots to blindly honour British institutions.
Do I?
I thought I spent most of my time on here railing against judges, politicians, civil servants (especially at the DfE) and business execs.
We can now add the senior staff of the British army to that list.
The fact that most Scottish institutions have sunk into an even worse quagmire than the Westminster hierarchy, and I have not troubled to hide my disgust at them, may of course have misled you.
The last five years have been enough to turn anyone into a raving anarchist, tbf.
More than 100 guards at the British embassy in Kabul have been told they are not eligible for UK government protection because they were hired through an outsourced contractor, the Guardian has learned.
Most of the 125-strong team of security personnel, employed by the global security firm GardaWorld, have been given informal notice that they no longer have jobs guarding the embassy, several said.
The guards, some of whom had been working for the UK embassy for over a decade, described feeling abandoned by British officials and their employer. Many have been forced into hiding, fearing for their lives.
Meanwhile, more than 100 guards doing the same work for the US embassy, under a separate GardaWorld contract, have been evacuated and others were receiving support from the US embassy, according to a senior Afghan national GardaWorld employee in charge of human resources.
FFS. There is no way we are going to get them all out but we need to do what we can. This is just outrageous.
Priti Patel hasn't stopped cackling since the decision was made, Boris Johnson is probably tupping the secretary, whilst Raab is still on holiday mode to notice.
I am generally a Tory but Christ , their choice of Home Secretaries really tests me. It is the indulgence of that evil, slithering, foul, crap that is found at the bottom of the party. Narrow minded, bigoted, sanctimonious, hypocritical, and those are the redeeming features.
It honestly turns my stomach and I feel guilty that I turn a blind eye to it for the bigger picture.
I knew this was coming, it was the reason people like David Herdson, Richard Nabavi, and myself quit the party in 2019.
Genuine question. What has Priti Patel actually done that make people like you and DavidL loathe her so much? Apart from have a smirking smile?
I get a sense of misogyny, even, dare I say it, racism, but that seems highly unlikely given your origin so what is it?
She’s a moderately robust Home Secretary with an admirable backstory, female Ugandan Asian immigrant family who made it to the Cabinet. Good for her.
However, to me the one notable feature of her tenure is her FAILURE to get a grip on Cross Channel migrants. Hardly the mark of a hideous Nazi, just a mortal politician struggling with a very tricky problem
What has she done that so offends?
I found Theresa May much more offensive, both as HS and PM. “Citizens of Nowhere” was actually fucking hard right shite AND it boxed us into a needlessly hard Brexit
Total liberal cant. How many innocent children have we killed with bombs and drones? Yet we clutch our handbags in horror at “capital punishment”
I am not quite persuaded of its merits, but neither am I so appalled by the idea I wet myself in faux lefty shock. And Patel, there, is merely espousing the beliefs of about half the British people, who support the death penalty. That’s democracy
If she had said "It is tragic that, in a very small number of cases, the wrong person might be executed. But I support the death penalty, because I think the deterrent effect dramatically exceeds the small number of people wrongly executed. We would save 100 or 200 innocent victims for every wrongly hanged man", that would have been fine.
You can agree, or disagree with it, but it would have been coherent.
But she didn't.
Instead she seemed to argue that there never any miscarriages, and even if there were it was OK to execute the wrong people because they could be posthumously pardoned. And that'd be OK.
Perhaps she was adopting a purely deontological approach: executing murderers is morally correct weather it provides a deterrent or not, and if the morally questionable action of executing an innocent occurs then the state can neutralize that by apologizing.
More than 100 guards at the British embassy in Kabul have been told they are not eligible for UK government protection because they were hired through an outsourced contractor, the Guardian has learned.
Most of the 125-strong team of security personnel, employed by the global security firm GardaWorld, have been given informal notice that they no longer have jobs guarding the embassy, several said.
The guards, some of whom had been working for the UK embassy for over a decade, described feeling abandoned by British officials and their employer. Many have been forced into hiding, fearing for their lives.
Meanwhile, more than 100 guards doing the same work for the US embassy, under a separate GardaWorld contract, have been evacuated and others were receiving support from the US embassy, according to a senior Afghan national GardaWorld employee in charge of human resources.
FFS. There is no way we are going to get them all out but we need to do what we can. This is just outrageous.
Priti Patel hasn't stopped cackling since the decision was made, Boris Johnson is probably tupping the secretary, whilst Raab is still on holiday mode to notice.
I am generally a Tory but Christ , their choice of Home Secretaries really tests me. It is the indulgence of that evil, slithering, foul, crap that is found at the bottom of the party. Narrow minded, bigoted, sanctimonious, hypocritical, and those are the redeeming features.
It honestly turns my stomach and I feel guilty that I turn a blind eye to it for the bigger picture.
I knew this was coming, it was the reason people like David Herdson, Richard Nabavi, and myself quit the party in 2019.
Genuine question. What has Priti Patel actually done that make people like you and DavidL loathe her so much? Apart from have a smirking smile?
I get a sense of misogyny, even, dare I say it, racism, but that seems highly unlikely given your origin so what is it?
She’s a moderately robust Home Secretary with an admirable backstory, female Ugandan Asian immigrant family who made it to the Cabinet. Good for her.
However, to me the one notable feature of her tenure is her FAILURE to get a grip on Cross Channel migrants. Hardly the mark of a hideous Nazi, just a mortal politician struggling with a very tricky problem
What has she done that so offends?
I found Theresa May much more offensive, both as HS and PM. “Citizens of Nowhere” was actually fucking hard right shite AND it boxed us into a needlessly hard Brexit
Total liberal cant. How many innocent children have we killed with bombs and drones? Yet we clutch our handbags in horror at “capital punishment”
I am not quite persuaded of its merits, but neither am I so appalled by the idea I wet myself in faux lefty shock. And Patel, there, is merely espousing the beliefs of about half the British people, who support the death penalty. That’s democracy
It's.... It's not because she supports the death penalty.
It's because she says mis-carriages of justice never occur.
"Nor is it any longer possible for you to give up this empire … Your empire is now like a tyranny: it may have been wrong to take it; it is certainly dangerous to let it go."
My favourite Pericles quote is the one where he basically says if he cocked up it was the peoples' fault for being persuaded by him in the first place*.
"If you were persuaded by me to go to war because you thought I had the qualities necessary for leadership at least moderately more than other men, it is not right that I should now be blamed for doing wrong".
*The book I read this in, by an actual expert, is in fairness more forgiving, probably correctly - 'He was that rare political leader in a democratic state who had told the people the truth, while pursuing disputed and even unpopular polices. [His] constant forthrightness left his angry listeners with no rejoinder, for they could not claim they had been uninformed or deceived'. (Kagan, The Peloponnesian War)
He was a complete shit. Stole from the League to build the Parthenon, utterly abused democracy with his nasty little decree of 431 with the rider that "anyone proposing an amendment of this decree is to be put to death," destroyed Athens by starting and posthumously losing the war with Sparta. And that bellyachingly pompous funeral oration has to be read in light of the fact that "the many, not the few" judicially murdered his eldest son after Arginusae on a "The Sun says: string 'em up" sort of basis. The man was a c--t.
The Pnyx is impressive, tho. Especially the view of the Acropolis. Where Pericles did his thang
The original topography of Athens might just be the most impressive urban topography in the world. Genius. The temples soar above the parliament and both look down at the Agora, where the philosophers speak of ideas which rise above it all
I finally made it to the actual Stoa Poikile yesterday, the painted Stoa, where Zeno spoke and the Stoics got their name. It’s now an Irish pub and a crappy clothes shop looming over some desultory rubble
Yet, still, rather moving
It's all bloody lovely, but that doesn't make it right. That Keats shtick about "Beauty is truth, truth beauty" is just as wrong as it is possible to be. To me the most beautiful thing in the world, by a country mile, is St Peter's Rome, but everything it says and stands for just ain't so.
St Peter’s is the most “beautiful thing in the world by a country mile”. Really?
An eccentric opinion. It’s far from a masterpiece. Most people accept that Bramante and Michelangelo etc made it too big with the dome set too far back as a result, so it lacks drama and poetry. It’s just BIG and grandiose. Bernini improved it with the embracing colonnades but it still doesn’t work as it should (given the money and talent involved, it’s a bit like Star Wars 7 or whatever)
Of course it contains world class art. Michelangelo’s Pieta is almost beyond comprehension, given the age he was when he did it
For once I agree with you. Gaudy and a bit tasteless.
I'd prefer Stonehenge as it was when intact, or maybe even now. As one approaches it on the A303 it exerts a magical punch.
Actually I first saw the thing in 1962 when touring the area on a 500cc Norton e72 motor bike. It was misty and no-one else was about---quite deserted. You could walk around at your leisure and touch the stones.
Can you imagine Rory as HS ? Now there would be a government worth voting for.
All the best and ablest Conservatives left the party or were kicked out in 2019.
But now we get Patel, Raab, and Williamson as the cabinet.
'The best and ablest' Conservatives I suppose now LDs like you then TSE?
For the last time, I'm not a Lib Dem, I'm not voting for them in the future.
Why not? I often find I have a lot in common with people like you, Richard N, David H and David L and even when I disagree I find the arguments put forward by you all very sound. Of course I could be wrong and I don't agree with all LD stuff, but I am much closer to them than anyone else and you lot clearly aren't keen on the current Tories. I also have a lot in common with the Tories that got thrown out or left in 2019.
Wera Hobhouse is the reason.
As mobile operators step up efforts to roll out 5G networks, they face resistance from local groups convinced that the new technology poses a threat to health. In the city of Bath, in Somerset, one such group is celebrating a victory after the local council refused permission for a 5G mast - with the backing of the local MP.
It's a decision which has sparked dismay not just from the mobile industry but from the minister who has been urging councils to smooth the way for the rollout. Digital Minister Matt Warman said that while he could not comment on a particular planning case, "there is no credible scientific basis that 5G has an adverse impact on people's health".
The minister said the government wanted people across the country to get fast and reliable connectivity as soon as possible, and said it would do "all we can to avoid delays to that programme".
But Bath's Liberal Democrat MP Wera Hobhouse was among those calling on the council to listen to concerns about health.
Enabling 5G conspiracy theorists is just like enabling antivaxxers, that Hobhouse is the Lib Dem Justice Spokesman is the reason I cannot vote Lib Dem.
Can't argue with that. Excluding that, then what do you think?
For me, whenever I think te Lib Dems are worth a look, it's normally Layla Moran who pops up and says something moronic. But I agree Wera Hobhouse is also a suitable reason to avoid them. That's 2/9ths of the parliamentary party. But I expect there are some stout brains among the other 7.
I have to agree the pool of talent isn't quite what it was.
More than 100 guards at the British embassy in Kabul have been told they are not eligible for UK government protection because they were hired through an outsourced contractor, the Guardian has learned.
Most of the 125-strong team of security personnel, employed by the global security firm GardaWorld, have been given informal notice that they no longer have jobs guarding the embassy, several said.
The guards, some of whom had been working for the UK embassy for over a decade, described feeling abandoned by British officials and their employer. Many have been forced into hiding, fearing for their lives.
Meanwhile, more than 100 guards doing the same work for the US embassy, under a separate GardaWorld contract, have been evacuated and others were receiving support from the US embassy, according to a senior Afghan national GardaWorld employee in charge of human resources.
FFS. There is no way we are going to get them all out but we need to do what we can. This is just outrageous.
Priti Patel hasn't stopped cackling since the decision was made, Boris Johnson is probably tupping the secretary, whilst Raab is still on holiday mode to notice.
I am generally a Tory but Christ , their choice of Home Secretaries really tests me. It is the indulgence of that evil, slithering, foul, crap that is found at the bottom of the party. Narrow minded, bigoted, sanctimonious, hypocritical, and those are the redeeming features.
It honestly turns my stomach and I feel guilty that I turn a blind eye to it for the bigger picture.
I knew this was coming, it was the reason people like David Herdson, Richard Nabavi, and myself quit the party in 2019.
Genuine question. What has Priti Patel actually done that make people like you and DavidL loathe her so much? Apart from have a smirking smile?
I get a sense of misogyny, even, dare I say it, racism, but that seems highly unlikely given your origin so what is it?
She’s a moderately robust Home Secretary with an admirable backstory, female Ugandan Asian immigrant family who made it to the Cabinet. Good for her.
However, to me the one notable feature of her tenure is her FAILURE to get a grip on Cross Channel migrants. Hardly the mark of a hideous Nazi, just a mortal politician struggling with a very tricky problem
What has she done that so offends?
I found Theresa May much more offensive, both as HS and PM. “Citizens of Nowhere” was actually fucking hard right shite AND it boxed us into a needlessly hard Brexit
Total liberal cant. How many innocent children have we killed with bombs and drones? Yet we clutch our handbags in horror at “capital punishment”
I am not quite persuaded of its merits, but neither am I so appalled by the idea I wet myself in faux lefty shock. And Patel, there, is merely espousing the beliefs of about half the British people, who support the death penalty. That’s democracy
I think capital punishment appeals to us as a base level of justice - child killers should themselves be killed - but I think if you have such a system it will be subject to endless appeals, it will cost a lot and you will get it wrong occasionally, so you need to accept you'll ultimately kill people innocent of the crimes they've been accused of 5-15% of the time.
I think it's a different argument from "collateral damage" from bombing because you always try and minimise that and killing innocents is not the intent - with capital punishment you won't ever have absolute proof every single time and I really think you need to if the State is looking to legally terminate an individual.
"They are country boys. The fact is they live by a code of honour and a standard. It's called Pashtunwali. It has honour at the heart of what they do.
They don't like corrupt government or governance that is self-serving and want an Afghanistan that is inclusive for all.
I think they have changed and they recognise Afghanistan has evolved and the fundamental role women have played in that evolution. They say they want to respect women's rights under Islamic law, and that will be Sharia law, but that doesn't necessarily mean they won't allow them to be involved in government, education and medicine."
He's an utter moron. The only honour these people care about is male honour and women bear the brunt of guarding it. They do not care about honouring her or her honour. So they can rape a woman and because this dishonours a man she gets stoned. Or they can order a woman to be raped to pay for the dishonour caused to a man.
This is not honour. It is barbarism. And if the Head of the Army does not understand this he is too deficient in sense to be put in charge of a Swiss army penknife let alone an army.
Out of interest how many taliban and Afghans have you had to meet with, fight against, negotiate with? How many people have you had to write to to tell them their son or daughter has been killed by the taliban whilst under your command? As head of the army I don’t think he’s been able to get there by being a moron. Maybe by being an intelligent soldier who doesn’t just say “Taliban bad, kill” but maybe considers the situation from personal contacts, experience and speaking to his commanders and soldiers on the ground. And maybe, just maybe, the head of the British armed forces, whilst they are trying to keep the taliban at bay to get people out of Afghanistan is better to be seen to be offering an olive branch rather than just shouting that all taliban are Rapey bastards?
His view is probably more nuanced in reality that there is a patchwork of afghans who comprise the taliban and so doesn’t lump them all together - I’m assuming you think all Germans are barbaric because some did heinous acts in world war 2 or maybe by being a little even handed at the end of the war we ended up with a better Germany.
But I’m sure you are the fount of all knowledge re Afghanistan on top of naughty city workers and Cumbrian restaurants and should maybe pop over and show him how to use a Swiss Army knife quick......
I am allowed to comment on his comment that the Taliban have honour, regardless of whether or not I have fought in the army or not.
Quite why you feel the need to make unpleasant personal comments about me in your disagreement with my views, which of course you are entitled to have, I don't know.
And I repeat there is and has been plenty of evidence of what the Taliban are like in reality for others to say that he is a moron making such a comment about an evil group. "Honour" to the Taliban means something very different to how we - and I would hope him - would understand it. He sounds naive and deluded. And I have seen enough people who have reached the top of their particular organisation to realise that this says very little about whether they have any common or moral sense.
If he wanted to play nice with them in order to facilitate the evacuation of his men and other civilians - a perfectly understandable and possibly even sensible gesture in the circumstances - then there are plenty of ways of being polite and not antagonising them without coming out with this drivel about their honour. People whose first act when in power is to go round rounding up women between the ages of 12 and 40 as bounty for soldiers are not honourable under any meaning of the term and the Head of the British Army should not be going round saying so.
And yeah I feel strongly about this. I've been raped. So I have zero patience with those who think it's something we need to be even-handed about.
As for Germany at the end of WW2, well my mother's family were part-Jewish and in hiding during it so they didn't have an even-handed view of the Germans. Nor did my father who, as a doctor, had to deal with the victims he saw at Belsen.
I am not sure a like is appropriate but totally agree and horrified at you and your families suffering
It is no worse than what countless others endured. Many endured far far worse than my family.
I count myself blessed to have been born at the time and in the place I was and that my life has been infinitely calmer and more peaceful than what my parents and grandparents endured.
I distrusted them for their lack of policy coherence (a side effect of voting for the manifesto), the dodgy bar graphs, and the tendency to have contradictory leaflets in the north and south of my City. But this was largely their campaigning style - their poltiics were rooted in rationality (whatever you thought of the axioms from which they argued).
I now have they impression (fairly or unfairly) that they have veered towards the honey nut loops.
Like all the parties, they are liquorice allsorts, but rather more than most because of their ideological distate for strong leadership. That is a distaste with a strong liberal tradition and it protects them from the abuses of over-powerful leadership - it's hard to imagine either Mrs Thatcher or Arthur Scargill successfully leading them. The drawback is that they have no particular direction and there are few policies that it's impossible to imagine some of them endorsing - 5G theories, anti-vaxxery, whatever. Similarly, the coalition with the Conservatives was not especially surprising, nor would one be with Labour.
I don't like and respect many of them and we work happily together at local level, but I don't really see what they're trying to achieve.
"Nor is it any longer possible for you to give up this empire … Your empire is now like a tyranny: it may have been wrong to take it; it is certainly dangerous to let it go."
My favourite Pericles quote is the one where he basically says if he cocked up it was the peoples' fault for being persuaded by him in the first place*.
"If you were persuaded by me to go to war because you thought I had the qualities necessary for leadership at least moderately more than other men, it is not right that I should now be blamed for doing wrong".
*The book I read this in, by an actual expert, is in fairness more forgiving, probably correctly - 'He was that rare political leader in a democratic state who had told the people the truth, while pursuing disputed and even unpopular polices. [His] constant forthrightness left his angry listeners with no rejoinder, for they could not claim they had been uninformed or deceived'. (Kagan, The Peloponnesian War)
He was a complete shit. Stole from the League to build the Parthenon, utterly abused democracy with his nasty little decree of 431 with the rider that "anyone proposing an amendment of this decree is to be put to death," destroyed Athens by starting and posthumously losing the war with Sparta. And that bellyachingly pompous funeral oration has to be read in light of the fact that "the many, not the few" judicially murdered his eldest son after Arginusae on a "The Sun says: string 'em up" sort of basis. The man was a c--t.
The Pnyx is impressive, tho. Especially the view of the Acropolis. Where Pericles did his thang
The original topography of Athens might just be the most impressive urban topography in the world. Genius. The temples soar above the parliament and both look down at the Agora, where the philosophers speak of ideas which rise above it all
I finally made it to the actual Stoa Poikile yesterday, the painted Stoa, where Zeno spoke and the Stoics got their name. It’s now an Irish pub and a crappy clothes shop looming over some desultory rubble
Yet, still, rather moving
It's all bloody lovely, but that doesn't make it right. That Keats shtick about "Beauty is truth, truth beauty" is just as wrong as it is possible to be. To me the most beautiful thing in the world, by a country mile, is St Peter's Rome, but everything it says and stands for just ain't so.
St Peter’s is the most “beautiful thing in the world by a country mile”. Really?
An eccentric opinion. It’s far from a masterpiece. Most people accept that Bramante and Michelangelo etc made it too big with the dome set too far back as a result, so it lacks drama and poetry. It’s just BIG and grandiose. Bernini improved it with the embracing colonnades but it still doesn’t work as it should (given the money and talent involved, it’s a bit like Star Wars 7 or whatever)
Of course it contains world class art. Michelangelo’s Pieta is almost beyond comprehension, given the age he was when he did it
For once I agree with you. Gaudy and a bit tasteless.
The standard reaction of the repressed Englishman.
More than 100 guards at the British embassy in Kabul have been told they are not eligible for UK government protection because they were hired through an outsourced contractor, the Guardian has learned.
Most of the 125-strong team of security personnel, employed by the global security firm GardaWorld, have been given informal notice that they no longer have jobs guarding the embassy, several said.
The guards, some of whom had been working for the UK embassy for over a decade, described feeling abandoned by British officials and their employer. Many have been forced into hiding, fearing for their lives.
Meanwhile, more than 100 guards doing the same work for the US embassy, under a separate GardaWorld contract, have been evacuated and others were receiving support from the US embassy, according to a senior Afghan national GardaWorld employee in charge of human resources.
FFS. There is no way we are going to get them all out but we need to do what we can. This is just outrageous.
Priti Patel hasn't stopped cackling since the decision was made, Boris Johnson is probably tupping the secretary, whilst Raab is still on holiday mode to notice.
I am generally a Tory but Christ , their choice of Home Secretaries really tests me. It is the indulgence of that evil, slithering, foul, crap that is found at the bottom of the party. Narrow minded, bigoted, sanctimonious, hypocritical, and those are the redeeming features.
It honestly turns my stomach and I feel guilty that I turn a blind eye to it for the bigger picture.
I knew this was coming, it was the reason people like David Herdson, Richard Nabavi, and myself quit the party in 2019.
Genuine question. What has Priti Patel actually done that make people like you and DavidL loathe her so much? Apart from have a smirking smile?
I get a sense of misogyny, even, dare I say it, racism, but that seems highly unlikely given your origin so what is it?
She’s a moderately robust Home Secretary with an admirable backstory, female Ugandan Asian immigrant family who made it to the Cabinet. Good for her.
However, to me the one notable feature of her tenure is her FAILURE to get a grip on Cross Channel migrants. Hardly the mark of a hideous Nazi, just a mortal politician struggling with a very tricky problem
What has she done that so offends?
I found Theresa May much more offensive, both as HS and PM. “Citizens of Nowhere” was actually fucking hard right shite AND it boxed us into a needlessly hard Brexit
Total liberal cant. How many innocent children have we killed with bombs and drones? Yet we clutch our handbags in horror at “capital punishment”
I am not quite persuaded of its merits, but neither am I so appalled by the idea I wet myself in faux lefty shock. And Patel, there, is merely espousing the beliefs of about half the British people, who support the death penalty. That’s democracy
I think capital punishment appeals to us as a base level of justice - child killers should themselves be killed - but I think if you have such a system it will be subject to endless appeals, it will cost a lot and you will get it wrong occasionally, so you need to accept you'll ultimately kill people innocent of the crimes they've been accused of 5-15% of the time.
I think it's a different argument from "collateral damage" from bombing because you always try and minimise that and killing innocents is not the intent - with capital punishment you won't ever have absolute proof every single time and I really think you need to if the State is looking to legally terminate an individual.
It is also worth pointing out that - AFAIUI - the UK doesn't actually use Reaper drones in Syria to take out targets, that's the US.
"They are country boys. The fact is they live by a code of honour and a standard. It's called Pashtunwali. It has honour at the heart of what they do.
They don't like corrupt government or governance that is self-serving and want an Afghanistan that is inclusive for all.
I think they have changed and they recognise Afghanistan has evolved and the fundamental role women have played in that evolution. They say they want to respect women's rights under Islamic law, and that will be Sharia law, but that doesn't necessarily mean they won't allow them to be involved in government, education and medicine."
He's an utter moron. The only honour these people care about is male honour and women bear the brunt of guarding it. They do not care about honouring her or her honour. So they can rape a woman and because this dishonours a man she gets stoned. Or they can order a woman to be raped to pay for the dishonour caused to a man.
This is not honour. It is barbarism. And if the Head of the Army does not understand this he is too deficient in sense to be put in charge of a Swiss army penknife let alone an army.
Out of interest how many taliban and Afghans have you had to meet with, fight against, negotiate with? How many people have you had to write to to tell them their son or daughter has been killed by the taliban whilst under your command? As head of the army I don’t think he’s been able to get there by being a moron. Maybe by being an intelligent soldier who doesn’t just say “Taliban bad, kill” but maybe considers the situation from personal contacts, experience and speaking to his commanders and soldiers on the ground. And maybe, just maybe, the head of the British armed forces, whilst they are trying to keep the taliban at bay to get people out of Afghanistan is better to be seen to be offering an olive branch rather than just shouting that all taliban are Rapey bastards?
His view is probably more nuanced in reality that there is a patchwork of afghans who comprise the taliban and so doesn’t lump them all together - I’m assuming you think all Germans are barbaric because some did heinous acts in world war 2 or maybe by being a little even handed at the end of the war we ended up with a better Germany.
But I’m sure you are the fount of all knowledge re Afghanistan on top of naughty city workers and Cumbrian restaurants and should maybe pop over and show him how to use a Swiss Army knife quick......
I am allowed to comment on his comment that the Taliban have honour, regardless of whether or not I have fought in the army or not.
Quite why you feel the need to make unpleasant personal comments about me in your disagreement with my views, which of course you are entitled to have, I don't know.
And I repeat there is and has been plenty of evidence of what the Taliban are like in reality for others to say that he is a moron making such a comment about an evil group. "Honour" to the Taliban means something very different to how we - and I would hope him - would understand it. He sounds naive and deluded. And I have seen enough people who have reached the top of their particular organisation to realise that this says very little about whether they have any common or moral sense.
If he wanted to play nice with them in order to facilitate the evacuation of his men and other civilians - a perfectly understandable and possibly even sensible gesture in the circumstances - then there are plenty of ways of being polite and not antagonising them without coming out with this drivel about their honour. People whose first act when in power is to go round rounding up women between the ages of 12 and 40 as bounty for soldiers are not honourable under any meaning of the term and the Head of the British Army should not be going round saying so.
And yeah I feel strongly about this. I've been raped. So I have zero patience with those who think it's something we need to be even-handed about.
As for Germany at the end of WW2, well my mother's family were part-Jewish and in hiding during it so they didn't have an even-handed view of the Germans. Nor did my father who, as a doctor, had to deal with the victims he saw at Belsen.
I am not sure a like is appropriate but totally agree and horrified at you and your families suffering
It is no worse than what countless others endured. Many endured far far worse than my family.
I count myself blessed to have been born at the time and in the place I was and that my life has been infinitely calmer and more peaceful than what my parents and grandparents endured.
"Nor is it any longer possible for you to give up this empire … Your empire is now like a tyranny: it may have been wrong to take it; it is certainly dangerous to let it go."
My favourite Pericles quote is the one where he basically says if he cocked up it was the peoples' fault for being persuaded by him in the first place*.
"If you were persuaded by me to go to war because you thought I had the qualities necessary for leadership at least moderately more than other men, it is not right that I should now be blamed for doing wrong".
*The book I read this in, by an actual expert, is in fairness more forgiving, probably correctly - 'He was that rare political leader in a democratic state who had told the people the truth, while pursuing disputed and even unpopular polices. [His] constant forthrightness left his angry listeners with no rejoinder, for they could not claim they had been uninformed or deceived'. (Kagan, The Peloponnesian War)
He was a complete shit. Stole from the League to build the Parthenon, utterly abused democracy with his nasty little decree of 431 with the rider that "anyone proposing an amendment of this decree is to be put to death," destroyed Athens by starting and posthumously losing the war with Sparta. And that bellyachingly pompous funeral oration has to be read in light of the fact that "the many, not the few" judicially murdered his eldest son after Arginusae on a "The Sun says: string 'em up" sort of basis. The man was a c--t.
The Pnyx is impressive, tho. Especially the view of the Acropolis. Where Pericles did his thang
The original topography of Athens might just be the most impressive urban topography in the world. Genius. The temples soar above the parliament and both look down at the Agora, where the philosophers speak of ideas which rise above it all
I finally made it to the actual Stoa Poikile yesterday, the painted Stoa, where Zeno spoke and the Stoics got their name. It’s now an Irish pub and a crappy clothes shop looming over some desultory rubble
Yet, still, rather moving
It's all bloody lovely, but that doesn't make it right. That Keats shtick about "Beauty is truth, truth beauty" is just as wrong as it is possible to be. To me the most beautiful thing in the world, by a country mile, is St Peter's Rome, but everything it says and stands for just ain't so.
St Peter’s is the most “beautiful thing in the world by a country mile”. Really?
An eccentric opinion. It’s far from a masterpiece. Most people accept that Bramante and Michelangelo etc made it too big with the dome set too far back as a result, so it lacks drama and poetry. It’s just BIG and grandiose. Bernini improved it with the embracing colonnades but it still doesn’t work as it should (given the money and talent involved, it’s a bit like Star Wars 7 or whatever)
Of course it contains world class art. Michelangelo’s Pieta is almost beyond comprehension, given the age he was when he did it
For once I agree with you. Gaudy and a bit tasteless.
The standard reaction of the repressed Englishman.
The last time I was in the Vatican it was stuffed with tourists. Horrible. Then I saw an area that was cordoned off as it was for people having Confession. So that is what I did and further on a priest was celebrating Mass, with a choir. And so I sat in a virtually empty part of the Vatican with a few other Catholics listening to this wonderful singing and looking around me while at the other end crowds jostled to take pictures of a statue which would be never as good as the postcards you could get in the shops outside.
As I was saying earlier today. The politicians will overrule the JCVI. There's no way they risk another cancellation of Christmas like last year. We have the vaccines, what's the point in not using them.
You’re good at this stuff Max. Why is the JCVI coming out with this weird bollocks?
It seems obviously nonsense to me. We have the jabs, there’s no evidence 3rd jabs will do any harm, and mounting evidence they might be not just beneficial but crucial
Are they on drugs or what?
I do think that there is a moral question here. Should we really be trying to top already high immunity when so much of the world is unvaccinated? Is it even utilitarian, given that these unvaccinated countries will produce dangerous variants? How selfish do we want to be?
We need to avoid a repeat of last year at any cost. We've bought the vaccines, we have ca. 150m due in the next few months. We can do 45m booster jabs and give plenty of vaccines away to the rest of the world.
What's more important than us giving away 100m or 150m doses is investing in building an additional 2-3bn in capacity for 2022. That's what we have been doing over the last year and we need to continue doing that.
Agreed. The UK can't help anyone else if the virus regains a foothold here.
More than 100 guards at the British embassy in Kabul have been told they are not eligible for UK government protection because they were hired through an outsourced contractor, the Guardian has learned.
Most of the 125-strong team of security personnel, employed by the global security firm GardaWorld, have been given informal notice that they no longer have jobs guarding the embassy, several said.
The guards, some of whom had been working for the UK embassy for over a decade, described feeling abandoned by British officials and their employer. Many have been forced into hiding, fearing for their lives.
Meanwhile, more than 100 guards doing the same work for the US embassy, under a separate GardaWorld contract, have been evacuated and others were receiving support from the US embassy, according to a senior Afghan national GardaWorld employee in charge of human resources.
FFS. There is no way we are going to get them all out but we need to do what we can. This is just outrageous.
Priti Patel hasn't stopped cackling since the decision was made, Boris Johnson is probably tupping the secretary, whilst Raab is still on holiday mode to notice.
I am generally a Tory but Christ , their choice of Home Secretaries really tests me. It is the indulgence of that evil, slithering, foul, crap that is found at the bottom of the party. Narrow minded, bigoted, sanctimonious, hypocritical, and those are the redeeming features.
It honestly turns my stomach and I feel guilty that I turn a blind eye to it for the bigger picture.
I knew this was coming, it was the reason people like David Herdson, Richard Nabavi, and myself quit the party in 2019.
Genuine question. What has Priti Patel actually done that make people like you and DavidL loathe her so much? Apart from have a smirking smile?
I get a sense of misogyny, even, dare I say it, racism, but that seems highly unlikely given your origin so what is it?
She’s a moderately robust Home Secretary with an admirable backstory, female Ugandan Asian immigrant family who made it to the Cabinet. Good for her.
However, to me the one notable feature of her tenure is her FAILURE to get a grip on Cross Channel migrants. Hardly the mark of a hideous Nazi, just a mortal politician struggling with a very tricky problem
What has she done that so offends?
I found Theresa May much more offensive, both as HS and PM. “Citizens of Nowhere” was actually fucking hard right shite AND it boxed us into a needlessly hard Brexit
Total liberal cant. How many innocent children have we killed with bombs and drones? Yet we clutch our handbags in horror at “capital punishment”
I am not quite persuaded of its merits, but neither am I so appalled by the idea I wet myself in faux lefty shock. And Patel, there, is merely espousing the beliefs of about half the British people, who support the death penalty. That’s democracy
It's amusing because you portray "high snobbery". You're basically so snobby you think you're above the snobs.
Some truth in this. I actually do believe I am socially superior to everyone. I am more interesting than anyone, and I’ve had a more diverse and remarkable life than anyone. And I’m generally smarter
What am I meant to do about that? It’s like being born Tsar of all the Russias but then having to pretend you’re just the Mayor of Nuneaton. Pointless, really
More than 100 guards at the British embassy in Kabul have been told they are not eligible for UK government protection because they were hired through an outsourced contractor, the Guardian has learned.
Most of the 125-strong team of security personnel, employed by the global security firm GardaWorld, have been given informal notice that they no longer have jobs guarding the embassy, several said.
The guards, some of whom had been working for the UK embassy for over a decade, described feeling abandoned by British officials and their employer. Many have been forced into hiding, fearing for their lives.
Meanwhile, more than 100 guards doing the same work for the US embassy, under a separate GardaWorld contract, have been evacuated and others were receiving support from the US embassy, according to a senior Afghan national GardaWorld employee in charge of human resources.
FFS. There is no way we are going to get them all out but we need to do what we can. This is just outrageous.
Priti Patel hasn't stopped cackling since the decision was made, Boris Johnson is probably tupping the secretary, whilst Raab is still on holiday mode to notice.
I am generally a Tory but Christ , their choice of Home Secretaries really tests me. It is the indulgence of that evil, slithering, foul, crap that is found at the bottom of the party. Narrow minded, bigoted, sanctimonious, hypocritical, and those are the redeeming features.
It honestly turns my stomach and I feel guilty that I turn a blind eye to it for the bigger picture.
I knew this was coming, it was the reason people like David Herdson, Richard Nabavi, and myself quit the party in 2019.
Genuine question. What has Priti Patel actually done that make people like you and DavidL loathe her so much? Apart from have a smirking smile?
I get a sense of misogyny, even, dare I say it, racism, but that seems highly unlikely given your origin so what is it?
She’s a moderately robust Home Secretary with an admirable backstory, female Ugandan Asian immigrant family who made it to the Cabinet. Good for her.
However, to me the one notable feature of her tenure is her FAILURE to get a grip on Cross Channel migrants. Hardly the mark of a hideous Nazi, just a mortal politician struggling with a very tricky problem
What has she done that so offends?
I found Theresa May much more offensive, both as HS and PM. “Citizens of Nowhere” was actually fucking hard right shite AND it boxed us into a needlessly hard Brexit
Total liberal cant. How many innocent children have we killed with bombs and drones? Yet we clutch our handbags in horror at “capital punishment”
I am not quite persuaded of its merits, but neither am I so appalled by the idea I wet myself in faux lefty shock. And Patel, there, is merely espousing the beliefs of about half the British people, who support the death penalty. That’s democracy
It's amusing because you portray "high snobbery". You're basically so snobby you think you're above the snobs.
Some truth in this. I actually do believe I am socially superior to everyone. I am more interesting than anyone, and I’ve had a more diverse and remarkable life than anyone. And I’m generally smarter
And yet you spend all your time on a political blog with nerds and "nobodies".
Total liberal cant. How many innocent children have we killed with bombs and drones? Yet we clutch our handbags in horror at “capital punishment”
I am not quite persuaded of its merits, but neither am I so appalled by the idea I wet myself in faux lefty shock. And Patel, there, is merely espousing the beliefs of about half the British people, who support the death penalty. That’s democracy
And yet no party seems remotely interested in bringing it back despite it being definitely popular.
And I cannot see what makes Hislop's position particularly liberal in any case, not that he was wetting himself about it, it was a practical point. We should try our best not to kill innocent people, that seems uncontroversial. Given the death penalty doesn't seem to work as a deterrent and is expensive to boot, not killing anyone to be on the safe side seems reasonable, since the alternative is not being to release people who would otherwise have death. The risks of killing innocents is not worth the cost of not killing the guilty, is that liberal?
Not sure what bombing and droning has to do with it. Many would argue the risk is not worth the cost there either, but one could also decide the risk is worth it given the targets, it's the same calculation but the assessment of risk of taking no action is different.
Japan and Singapore have the death penalty. And almost zero murders. No deterrent effect? Debatable
More than 100 guards at the British embassy in Kabul have been told they are not eligible for UK government protection because they were hired through an outsourced contractor, the Guardian has learned.
Most of the 125-strong team of security personnel, employed by the global security firm GardaWorld, have been given informal notice that they no longer have jobs guarding the embassy, several said.
The guards, some of whom had been working for the UK embassy for over a decade, described feeling abandoned by British officials and their employer. Many have been forced into hiding, fearing for their lives.
Meanwhile, more than 100 guards doing the same work for the US embassy, under a separate GardaWorld contract, have been evacuated and others were receiving support from the US embassy, according to a senior Afghan national GardaWorld employee in charge of human resources.
FFS. There is no way we are going to get them all out but we need to do what we can. This is just outrageous.
Priti Patel hasn't stopped cackling since the decision was made, Boris Johnson is probably tupping the secretary, whilst Raab is still on holiday mode to notice.
I am generally a Tory but Christ , their choice of Home Secretaries really tests me. It is the indulgence of that evil, slithering, foul, crap that is found at the bottom of the party. Narrow minded, bigoted, sanctimonious, hypocritical, and those are the redeeming features.
It honestly turns my stomach and I feel guilty that I turn a blind eye to it for the bigger picture.
I knew this was coming, it was the reason people like David Herdson, Richard Nabavi, and myself quit the party in 2019.
Genuine question. What has Priti Patel actually done that make people like you and DavidL loathe her so much? Apart from have a smirking smile?
I get a sense of misogyny, even, dare I say it, racism, but that seems highly unlikely given your origin so what is it?
She’s a moderately robust Home Secretary with an admirable backstory, female Ugandan Asian immigrant family who made it to the Cabinet. Good for her.
However, to me the one notable feature of her tenure is her FAILURE to get a grip on Cross Channel migrants. Hardly the mark of a hideous Nazi, just a mortal politician struggling with a very tricky problem
What has she done that so offends?
I found Theresa May much more offensive, both as HS and PM. “Citizens of Nowhere” was actually fucking hard right shite AND it boxed us into a needlessly hard Brexit
Total liberal cant. How many innocent children have we killed with bombs and drones? Yet we clutch our handbags in horror at “capital punishment”
I am not quite persuaded of its merits, but neither am I so appalled by the idea I wet myself in faux lefty shock. And Patel, there, is merely espousing the beliefs of about half the British people, who support the death penalty. That’s democracy
It's amusing because you portray "high snobbery". You're basically so snobby you think you're above the snobs.
Some truth in this. I actually do believe I am socially superior to everyone. I am more interesting than anyone, and I’ve had a more diverse and remarkable life than anyone. And I’m generally smarter
And yet you spend all your time on a political blog with nerds and "nobodies".
As I was saying earlier today. The politicians will overrule the JCVI. There's no way they risk another cancellation of Christmas like last year. We have the vaccines, what's the point in not using them.
You’re good at this stuff Max. Why is the JCVI coming out with this weird bollocks?
It seems obviously nonsense to me. We have the jabs, there’s no evidence 3rd jabs will do any harm, and mounting evidence they might be not just beneficial but crucial
Are they on drugs or what?
I do think that there is a moral question here. Should we really be trying to top already high immunity when so much of the world is unvaccinated? Is it even utilitarian, given that these unvaccinated countries will produce dangerous variants? How selfish do we want to be?
That's surely a question for the politicians to answer, not the JCVI.
Total liberal cant. How many innocent children have we killed with bombs and drones? Yet we clutch our handbags in horror at “capital punishment”
I am not quite persuaded of its merits, but neither am I so appalled by the idea I wet myself in faux lefty shock. And Patel, there, is merely espousing the beliefs of about half the British people, who support the death penalty. That’s democracy
And yet no party seems remotely interested in bringing it back despite it being definitely popular.
And I cannot see what makes Hislop's position particularly liberal in any case, not that he was wetting himself about it, it was a practical point. We should try our best not to kill innocent people, that seems uncontroversial. Given the death penalty doesn't seem to work as a deterrent and is expensive to boot, not killing anyone to be on the safe side seems reasonable, since the alternative is not being to release people who would otherwise have death. The risks of killing innocents is not worth the cost of not killing the guilty, is that liberal?
Not sure what bombing and droning has to do with it. Many would argue the risk is not worth the cost there either, but one could also decide the risk is worth it given the targets, it's the same calculation but the assessment of risk of taking no action is different.
Japan and Singapore have the death penalty. And almost zero murders. No deterrent effect? Debatable
America has the death penalty and has plenty of murders.
"They are country boys. The fact is they live by a code of honour and a standard. It's called Pashtunwali. It has honour at the heart of what they do.
They don't like corrupt government or governance that is self-serving and want an Afghanistan that is inclusive for all.
I think they have changed and they recognise Afghanistan has evolved and the fundamental role women have played in that evolution. They say they want to respect women's rights under Islamic law, and that will be Sharia law, but that doesn't necessarily mean they won't allow them to be involved in government, education and medicine."
He's an utter moron. The only honour these people care about is male honour and women bear the brunt of guarding it. They do not care about honouring her or her honour. So they can rape a woman and because this dishonours a man she gets stoned. Or they can order a woman to be raped to pay for the dishonour caused to a man.
This is not honour. It is barbarism. And if the Head of the Army does not understand this he is too deficient in sense to be put in charge of a Swiss army penknife let alone an army.
Out of interest how many taliban and Afghans have you had to meet with, fight against, negotiate with? How many people have you had to write to to tell them their son or daughter has been killed by the taliban whilst under your command? As head of the army I don’t think he’s been able to get there by being a moron. Maybe by being an intelligent soldier who doesn’t just say “Taliban bad, kill” but maybe considers the situation from personal contacts, experience and speaking to his commanders and soldiers on the ground. And maybe, just maybe, the head of the British armed forces, whilst they are trying to keep the taliban at bay to get people out of Afghanistan is better to be seen to be offering an olive branch rather than just shouting that all taliban are Rapey bastards?
His view is probably more nuanced in reality that there is a patchwork of afghans who comprise the taliban and so doesn’t lump them all together - I’m assuming you think all Germans are barbaric because some did heinous acts in world war 2 or maybe by being a little even handed at the end of the war we ended up with a better Germany.
But I’m sure you are the fount of all knowledge re Afghanistan on top of naughty city workers and Cumbrian restaurants and should maybe pop over and show him how to use a Swiss Army knife quick......
I am allowed to comment on his comment that the Taliban have honour, regardless of whether or not I have fought in the army or not.
Quite why you feel the need to make unpleasant personal comments about me in your disagreement with my views, which of course you are entitled to have, I don't know.
And I repeat there is and has been plenty of evidence of what the Taliban are like in reality for others to say that he is a moron making such a comment about an evil group. "Honour" to the Taliban means something very different to how we - and I would hope him - would understand it. He sounds naive and deluded. And I have seen enough people who have reached the top of their particular organisation to realise that this says very little about whether they have any common or moral sense.
If he wanted to play nice with them in order to facilitate the evacuation of his men and other civilians - a perfectly understandable and possibly even sensible gesture in the circumstances - then there are plenty of ways of being polite and not antagonising them without coming out with this drivel about their honour. People whose first act when in power is to go round rounding up women between the ages of 12 and 40 as bounty for soldiers are not honourable under any meaning of the term and the Head of the British Army should not be going round saying so.
And yeah I feel strongly about this. I've been raped. So I have zero patience with those who think it's something we need to be even-handed about.
As for Germany at the end of WW2, well my mother's family were part-Jewish and in hiding during it so they didn't have an even-handed view of the Germans. Nor did my father who, as a doctor, had to deal with the victims he saw at Belsen.
I am not sure a like is appropriate but totally agree and horrified at you and your families suffering
It is no worse than what countless others endured. Many endured far far worse than my family.
I count myself blessed to have been born at the time and in the place I was and that my life has been infinitely calmer and more peaceful than what my parents and grandparents endured.
I think he was trying to be Woke, and has ended up being very unWoke, and looking like a tit. Which is what happens when you play the Woke game.
He reacted to Kay Burley describing them as "The Enemy" (unWoke) by pointing out they have a "code of honour" and want to be "inclusive for all" (Woke), and a chance to outWoke someone is a temptation that those in authority these days simply find too hard to resist.
He possibly also did it because he wanted it to be true as well; he's got to rationalise his own story of the last 20 years that no doubt is difficult for him too.
What I'm still not clear on about the supposed (and real) lack of UK government strategy on Afghanistan - what exactly were the critics such as Theresa May expecting? That Dominic Raab and Boris would snap their fingers and miraculously transport 50k troops to Kabul to keep hold of the country while we resettled millions of people to other parts of the world? These MPs have been overseeing a huge drop in military spending so we can spunk the cash on buying votes from old people and now they're bitching about it.
I have to say for all the wailing and gnashing of teeth and totally understandable sympathy for the plight of the Afghan people I simply don't see it as the geopolitical catastrophe some on here claim.
Comparable to the fall of Saigon in 1975? Well perhaps but will it compare to the day we stand by and let the Russians march into Kiev - perhaps not. Is it as big a disaster as the loss of Iran in 1979? Hardly.
The ultimate disaster will be the day NATO fails to live up to the doctrine of collective security - fortunately we've not seen that tested to date.
I come back to the point I made it seems an eternity ago - in the end there was no one willing to fight for Afghanistan. A seemingly well-equipped army and administration disintegrated in days. Perhaps the problem was we believed our shiny things and our money could buy us security by proxy. The lesson may be that we either do our own dirty work or we don't do it.
Yet we aren't the Roman Empire - we might have hoped momentarily in the aftermath of the fall of Communism and the liberation of Kuwait a Pax Americana could drive "the bad guys" from the face of the Earth and the goodness of liberal democracy would triumph for all time. Perhaps we believed the intervention of force of arms could prevail in the war against evil and we could topple evil here there and everywhere.
There is a theory that the Vietnam War was justified by the decade it bought.
Between 1965 and 1975 the likes of Thailand and Malaysia became much stronger countries while China and Indonesia switched from being anti-western to being anti-Soviet.
The Indonesian massacres of 1965 were pretty spectacular if that is what you mean:
In terms of absolute numbers killed, it is in the same ballpark as the Khymer Rouge, but as those killed were suspected leftists, we in the West are less bothered.
"They are country boys. The fact is they live by a code of honour and a standard. It's called Pashtunwali. It has honour at the heart of what they do.
They don't like corrupt government or governance that is self-serving and want an Afghanistan that is inclusive for all.
I think they have changed and they recognise Afghanistan has evolved and the fundamental role women have played in that evolution. They say they want to respect women's rights under Islamic law, and that will be Sharia law, but that doesn't necessarily mean they won't allow them to be involved in government, education and medicine."
He's an utter moron. The only honour these people care about is male honour and women bear the brunt of guarding it. They do not care about honouring her or her honour. So they can rape a woman and because this dishonours a man she gets stoned. Or they can order a woman to be raped to pay for the dishonour caused to a man.
This is not honour. It is barbarism. And if the Head of the Army does not understand this he is too deficient in sense to be put in charge of a Swiss army penknife let alone an army.
Out of interest how many taliban and Afghans have you had to meet with, fight against, negotiate with? How many people have you had to write to to tell them their son or daughter has been killed by the taliban whilst under your command? As head of the army I don’t think he’s been able to get there by being a moron. Maybe by being an intelligent soldier who doesn’t just say “Taliban bad, kill” but maybe considers the situation from personal contacts, experience and speaking to his commanders and soldiers on the ground. And maybe, just maybe, the head of the British armed forces, whilst they are trying to keep the taliban at bay to get people out of Afghanistan is better to be seen to be offering an olive branch rather than just shouting that all taliban are Rapey bastards?
His view is probably more nuanced in reality that there is a patchwork of afghans who comprise the taliban and so doesn’t lump them all together - I’m assuming you think all Germans are barbaric because some did heinous acts in world war 2 or maybe by being a little even handed at the end of the war we ended up with a better Germany.
But I’m sure you are the fount of all knowledge re Afghanistan on top of naughty city workers and Cumbrian restaurants and should maybe pop over and show him how to use a Swiss Army knife quick......
I am allowed to comment on his comment that the Taliban have honour, regardless of whether or not I have fought in the army or not.
Quite why you feel the need to make unpleasant personal comments about me in your disagreement with my views, which of course you are entitled to have, I don't know.
And I repeat there is and has been plenty of evidence of what the Taliban are like in reality for others to say that he is a moron making such a comment about an evil group. "Honour" to the Taliban means something very different to how we - and I would hope him - would understand it. He sounds naive and deluded. And I have seen enough people who have reached the top of their particular organisation to realise that this says very little about whether they have any common or moral sense.
If he wanted to play nice with them in order to facilitate the evacuation of his men and other civilians - a perfectly understandable and possibly even sensible gesture in the circumstances - then there are plenty of ways of being polite and not antagonising them without coming out with this drivel about their honour. People whose first act when in power is to go round rounding up women between the ages of 12 and 40 as bounty for soldiers are not honourable under any meaning of the term and the Head of the British Army should not be going round saying so.
And yeah I feel strongly about this. I've been raped. So I have zero patience with those who think it's something we need to be even-handed about.
As for Germany at the end of WW2, well my mother's family were part-Jewish and in hiding during it so they didn't have an even-handed view of the Germans. Nor did my father who, as a doctor, had to deal with the victims he saw at Belsen.
I am not sure a like is appropriate but totally agree and horrified at you and your families suffering
It is no worse than what countless others endured. Many endured far far worse than my family.
I count myself blessed to have been born at the time and in the place I was and that my life has been infinitely calmer and more peaceful than what my parents and grandparents endured.
I think he was trying to be Woke, and has ended up being very unWoke, and looking like a tit. Which is what happens when you play the Woke game.
He reacted to Kay Burley describing them as "The Enemy" (unWoke) by pointing out they have a "code of honour" and want to be "inclusive for all" (Woke), and a chance to outWoke someone is a temptation that those in authority these days simply find too hard to resist.
He possibly also did it because he wanted it to be true as well; he's got to rationalise his own story of the last 20 years that no doubt is difficult for him too.
A precise and accurate diagnosis. Woke-ism plus guilty cognitive dissonance
Can you imagine Rory as HS ? Now there would be a government worth voting for.
All the best and ablest Conservatives left the party or were kicked out in 2019.
But now we get Patel, Raab, and Williamson as the cabinet.
'The best and ablest' Conservatives I suppose now LDs like you then TSE?
For the last time, I'm not a Lib Dem, I'm not voting for them in the future.
Why not? I often find I have a lot in common with people like you, Richard N, David H and David L and even when I disagree I find the arguments put forward by you all very sound. Of course I could be wrong and I don't agree with all LD stuff, but I am much closer to them than anyone else and you lot clearly aren't keen on the current Tories. I also have a lot in common with the Tories that got thrown out or left in 2019.
Wera Hobhouse is the reason.
As mobile operators step up efforts to roll out 5G networks, they face resistance from local groups convinced that the new technology poses a threat to health. In the city of Bath, in Somerset, one such group is celebrating a victory after the local council refused permission for a 5G mast - with the backing of the local MP.
It's a decision which has sparked dismay not just from the mobile industry but from the minister who has been urging councils to smooth the way for the rollout. Digital Minister Matt Warman said that while he could not comment on a particular planning case, "there is no credible scientific basis that 5G has an adverse impact on people's health".
The minister said the government wanted people across the country to get fast and reliable connectivity as soon as possible, and said it would do "all we can to avoid delays to that programme".
But Bath's Liberal Democrat MP Wera Hobhouse was among those calling on the council to listen to concerns about health.
Enabling 5G conspiracy theorists is just like enabling antivaxxers, that Hobhouse is the Lib Dem Justice Spokesman is the reason I cannot vote Lib Dem.
Can't argue with that. Excluding that, then what do you think?
For me, whenever I think te Lib Dems are worth a look, it's normally Layla Moran who pops up and says something moronic. But I agree Wera Hobhouse is also a suitable reason to avoid them. That's 2/9ths of the parliamentary party. But I expect there are some stout brains among the other 7.
I have to agree the pool of talent isn't quite what it was.
I like to keep in touch with Lib Dem thinking - some of it is an encouraging ideas factory.
But also too much stuff seems to me to be predictable. Especially Layla and similar.
"Nor is it any longer possible for you to give up this empire … Your empire is now like a tyranny: it may have been wrong to take it; it is certainly dangerous to let it go."
My favourite Pericles quote is the one where he basically says if he cocked up it was the peoples' fault for being persuaded by him in the first place*.
"If you were persuaded by me to go to war because you thought I had the qualities necessary for leadership at least moderately more than other men, it is not right that I should now be blamed for doing wrong".
*The book I read this in, by an actual expert, is in fairness more forgiving, probably correctly - 'He was that rare political leader in a democratic state who had told the people the truth, while pursuing disputed and even unpopular polices. [His] constant forthrightness left his angry listeners with no rejoinder, for they could not claim they had been uninformed or deceived'. (Kagan, The Peloponnesian War)
He was a complete shit. Stole from the League to build the Parthenon, utterly abused democracy with his nasty little decree of 431 with the rider that "anyone proposing an amendment of this decree is to be put to death," destroyed Athens by starting and posthumously losing the war with Sparta. And that bellyachingly pompous funeral oration has to be read in light of the fact that "the many, not the few" judicially murdered his eldest son after Arginusae on a "The Sun says: string 'em up" sort of basis. The man was a c--t.
The Pnyx is impressive, tho. Especially the view of the Acropolis. Where Pericles did his thang
The original topography of Athens might just be the most impressive urban topography in the world. Genius. The temples soar above the parliament and both look down at the Agora, where the philosophers speak of ideas which rise above it all
I finally made it to the actual Stoa Poikile yesterday, the painted Stoa, where Zeno spoke and the Stoics got their name. It’s now an Irish pub and a crappy clothes shop looming over some desultory rubble
Yet, still, rather moving
It's all bloody lovely, but that doesn't make it right. That Keats shtick about "Beauty is truth, truth beauty" is just as wrong as it is possible to be. To me the most beautiful thing in the world, by a country mile, is St Peter's Rome, but everything it says and stands for just ain't so.
St Peter’s is the most “beautiful thing in the world by a country mile”. Really?
An eccentric opinion. It’s far from a masterpiece. Most people accept that Bramante and Michelangelo etc made it too big with the dome set too far back as a result, so it lacks drama and poetry. It’s just BIG and grandiose. Bernini improved it with the embracing colonnades but it still doesn’t work as it should (given the money and talent involved, it’s a bit like Star Wars 7 or whatever)
Of course it contains world class art. Michelangelo’s Pieta is almost beyond comprehension, given the age he was when he did it
For once I agree with you. Gaudy and a bit tasteless.
The standard reaction of the repressed Englishman.
Not really. There’s some magnificent art, but the overall effect has a touch of Trump Towers. The Donald might agree with you, though.
What I'm still not clear on about the supposed (and real) lack of UK government strategy on Afghanistan - what exactly were the critics such as Theresa May expecting? That Dominic Raab and Boris would snap their fingers and miraculously transport 50k troops to Kabul to keep hold of the country while we resettled millions of people to other parts of the world? These MPs have been overseeing a huge drop in military spending so we can spunk the cash on buying votes from old people and now they're bitching about it.
I have to say for all the wailing and gnashing of teeth and totally understandable sympathy for the plight of the Afghan people I simply don't see it as the geopolitical catastrophe some on here claim.
Comparable to the fall of Saigon in 1975? Well perhaps but will it compare to the day we stand by and let the Russians march into Kiev - perhaps not. Is it as big a disaster as the loss of Iran in 1979? Hardly.
The ultimate disaster will be the day NATO fails to live up to the doctrine of collective security - fortunately we've not seen that tested to date.
I come back to the point I made it seems an eternity ago - in the end there was no one willing to fight for Afghanistan. A seemingly well-equipped army and administration disintegrated in days. Perhaps the problem was we believed our shiny things and our money could buy us security by proxy. The lesson may be that we either do our own dirty work or we don't do it.
Yet we aren't the Roman Empire - we might have hoped momentarily in the aftermath of the fall of Communism and the liberation of Kuwait a Pax Americana could drive "the bad guys" from the face of the Earth and the goodness of liberal democracy would triumph for all time. Perhaps we believed the intervention of force of arms could prevail in the war against evil and we could topple evil here there and everywhere.
There is a theory that the Vietnam War was justified by the decade it bought.
Between 1965 and 1975 the likes of Thailand and Malaysia became much stronger countries while China and Indonesia switched from being anti-western to being anti-Soviet.
The Indonesian massacres of 1965 were pretty spectacular if that is what you mean:
In terms of absolute numbers killed, it is in the same ballpark as the Khymer Rouge, but as those killed were suspected leftists, we in the West are less bothered.
Perhaps you'd like to compare the populations of Cambodia and Indonesia.
I'll also point out that the Commonwealth was in a de facto war with Sukarno's Indonesia because of his attempts to conquer Malaysia.
What I'm still not clear on about the supposed (and real) lack of UK government strategy on Afghanistan - what exactly were the critics such as Theresa May expecting? That Dominic Raab and Boris would snap their fingers and miraculously transport 50k troops to Kabul to keep hold of the country while we resettled millions of people to other parts of the world? These MPs have been overseeing a huge drop in military spending so we can spunk the cash on buying votes from old people and now they're bitching about it.
I have to say for all the wailing and gnashing of teeth and totally understandable sympathy for the plight of the Afghan people I simply don't see it as the geopolitical catastrophe some on here claim.
Comparable to the fall of Saigon in 1975? Well perhaps but will it compare to the day we stand by and let the Russians march into Kiev - perhaps not. Is it as big a disaster as the loss of Iran in 1979? Hardly.
The ultimate disaster will be the day NATO fails to live up to the doctrine of collective security - fortunately we've not seen that tested to date.
I come back to the point I made it seems an eternity ago - in the end there was no one willing to fight for Afghanistan. A seemingly well-equipped army and administration disintegrated in days. Perhaps the problem was we believed our shiny things and our money could buy us security by proxy. The lesson may be that we either do our own dirty work or we don't do it.
Yet we aren't the Roman Empire - we might have hoped momentarily in the aftermath of the fall of Communism and the liberation of Kuwait a Pax Americana could drive "the bad guys" from the face of the Earth and the goodness of liberal democracy would triumph for all time. Perhaps we believed the intervention of force of arms could prevail in the war against evil and we could topple evil here there and everywhere.
There is a theory that the Vietnam War was justified by the decade it bought.
Between 1965 and 1975 the likes of Thailand and Malaysia became much stronger countries while China and Indonesia switched from being anti-western to being anti-Soviet.
The Indonesian massacres of 1965 were pretty spectacular if that is what you mean:
In terms of absolute numbers killed, it is in the same ballpark as the Khymer Rouge, but as those killed were suspected leftists, we in the West are less bothered.
Perhaps you'd like to compare the populations of Cambodia and Indonesia.
I'll also point out that the Commonwealth was in a de facto war with Sukarno's Indonesia because of his attempts to conquer Malaysia.
That is why I said in absolute numbers.
Is a million leftists murdered just a little blip on the way? Eggs that need to be broken to make the omelette?
I still can't quite believe the head of the UK armed forces described the Taliban as "country boys" who live by a "code of honour", who want an "inclusive country".
But it's okay because Defence Secretary Ben Wallace has endorsed the comments, according to this article.
Comments
There are over 30 million Afghans - and hundreds of millions more living under despicable regimes - and she has to prioritise those most at risk, maintain confidence in the immigration system and balance conflicting political pressures.
Best cathedral = Laon
I thought I spent most of my time on here railing against judges, politicians, civil servants (especially at the DfE) and business execs.
We can now add the senior staff of the British army to that list.
The fact that most Scottish institutions have sunk into an even worse quagmire than the Westminster hierarchy, and I have not troubled to hide my disgust at them, may of course have misled you.
The last five years have been enough to turn anyone into a raving anarchist, tbf.
It's because she says mis-carriages of justice never occur.
Actually I first saw the thing in 1962 when touring the area on a 500cc Norton e72 motor bike. It was misty and no-one else was about---quite deserted. You could walk around at your leisure and touch the stones.
https://news.sky.com/story/afghanistan-ministers-accused-of-ignoring-warning-from-influential-house-of-lords-committee-12385551
I think it's a different argument from "collateral damage" from bombing because you always try and minimise that and killing innocents is not the intent - with capital punishment you won't ever have absolute proof every single time and I really think you need to if the State is looking to legally terminate an individual.
Keir needs to remember he's a politician now and not a prosecuting lawyer.
I count myself blessed to have been born at the time and in the place I was and that my life has been infinitely calmer and more peaceful than what my parents and grandparents endured.
The military do a lot for us. But they are not beyond criticism. Not even the Head of the British Army who gets an even more severe kicking from one of his soldiers here - https://twitter.com/groot66/status/1428248943557758977?s=21.
Perhaps @Boulay will listen to her.
I don't like and respect many of them and we work happily together at local level, but I don't really see what they're trying to achieve.
New thread
What am I meant to do about that? It’s like being born Tsar of all the Russias but then having to pretend you’re just the Mayor of Nuneaton. Pointless, really
Why?
He reacted to Kay Burley describing them as "The Enemy" (unWoke) by pointing out they have a "code of honour" and want to be "inclusive for all" (Woke), and a chance to outWoke someone is a temptation that those in authority these days simply find too hard to resist.
He possibly also did it because he wanted it to be true as well; he's got to rationalise his own story of the last 20 years that no doubt is difficult for him too.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_mass_killings_of_1965–66
In terms of absolute numbers killed, it is in the same ballpark as the Khymer Rouge, but as those killed were suspected leftists, we in the West are less bothered.
But also too much stuff seems to me to be predictable. Especially Layla and similar.
There’s some magnificent art, but the overall effect has a touch of Trump Towers. The Donald might agree with you, though.
Drawing an analogy with Eastern Europeans who sought refuge here after WW2 from Stalin's persecution.
Which is in its way quite apt.
https://www.facebook.com/LeeAndersoninAshfieldEastwood/posts/355718079560127
I'll also point out that the Commonwealth was in a de facto war with Sukarno's Indonesia because of his attempts to conquer Malaysia.
Is a million leftists murdered just a little blip on the way? Eggs that need to be broken to make the omelette?
But it's okay because Defence Secretary Ben Wallace has endorsed the comments, according to this article.
https://news.sky.com/story/afghanistan-defence-secretary-ben-wallace-backs-uk-armed-forces-chief-general-sir-nick-carter-over-taliban-has-changed-remarks-12385054
Infratest dimap
Union: 23 % (-4)
SPD: 21 (+3)
GRN: 17% (-2)
Changes from 05.08.2021
https://www.wahlrecht.de/umfragen/dimap.htm