politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » For how long can Johnson continue to defy gravity?

viewcode said:

Sean_F said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

OT rush out now and bag a copy of the Sun for its 50 greatest front pages souvenir magazine, including these political ones.

Crisis? What crisis?
Up Yours Delors
It's Paddy Pantsdown
If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights
Now we've ALL been screwed by the Cabinet
Is this the most dangerous man in Britain?
This party is no more..it has ceased to be..this is an EX-party
Hey Dude! Don't make it bad

Will they reproduce the ones where they gloried in the drowning of Argentinian conscripts or defamed the dead at Hillsborough? Those were classics of the genre.

People die in wars. Argentine combatants were legitimate targets.

Indeed. The objective of warfare is to kill as many of the enemy as possible until they stop.

The Essence of War is Violence. Moderation in War is Imbecility.

"Scrap the lot!" Fisher

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/PaulBrandITV/status/1195718866560782336

Disgraceful

It's quite a sight.

https://twitter.com/SocialistChris/status/1195640216385708032?s=20

MarqueeMark said:

Chris said:

ozymandias said:

Arthur said:

ozymandias said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

ozymandias said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Call me a leftie or whatever but I find it genuinally astonishing that people think Corbyn and Johnson are just as bad as each other.

Well not quite actually true. People think Corbyn is much, much worse than Johnson.

So increase your astonishment.

And I'd like to understand how this can be true.

Because Corbyn is an intellectually challenged, lazy, mendacious, hypocritical, ignorant piece of unreconstructed Marxist excrement.

Have I missed anything?

"Laziness": only one out of Johnson and Corbyn has called someone a "girly swot" for wanting MPs to do some work in the month of September.

"Mendacity": only one of them has repeatedly been sacked by employers for dishonesty. Not very many people have that kind of record, but the present prime minister does.

"Hypocrisy": if Tories think free-at-the-point-of-use broadband is "communist", why not say the same about NHS maternity care? And if getting stuff for free is a bad idea, and if the rich are rich because they're intelligent, then why not raise IHT to 90% on larger estates?

Because Corbyn is an intellectually challenged, ignorant piece of unreconstructed Marxist excrement.

That better? I could add treacherous, terrorist supporting, anti-semite enabler but I hate to state the very obvious which is very much already factored in to peoples opinion of him.

Wow. Living proof that some people really do swallow every particle of drivel that they read in the tabloids!

And you are living proof there are none so blind as those that will not see.

I need to point out that if you are reduced to saying "we know Boris is shit but Corbyn is shitter", then we are in big trouble.

Sean_F said:

viewcode said:

Sean_F said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

OT rush out now and bag a copy of the Sun for its 50 greatest front pages souvenir magazine, including these political ones.

Crisis? What crisis?
Up Yours Delors
It's Paddy Pantsdown
If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights
Now we've ALL been screwed by the Cabinet
Is this the most dangerous man in Britain?
This party is no more..it has ceased to be..this is an EX-party
Hey Dude! Don't make it bad

Will they reproduce the ones where they gloried in the drowning of Argentinian conscripts or defamed the dead at Hillsborough? Those were classics of the genre.

People die in wars. Argentine combatants were legitimate targets.

Indeed. The objective of warfare is to kill as many of the enemy as possible until they stop.

That is such an obvious truth, and it's surprising that so many people shy away from it.

I'm starting an MA in Military History. What's obvious is that commanders have to be ruthless, and if you're not prepared to be ruthless, you have no business being a commander. You need people like Wellington, Zhukov, Sir Arthur Harris, Curtis Le May in charge, because otherwise, you will lose.

@Sean_F, @CarlottaVance : agreed.

Chris said:

ozymandias said:

Arthur said:

ozymandias said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

ozymandias said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Call me a leftie or whatever but I find it genuinally astonishing that people think Corbyn and Johnson are just as bad as each other.

Well not quite actually true. People think Corbyn is much, much worse than Johnson.

So increase your astonishment.

And I'd like to understand how this can be true.

Because Corbyn is an intellectually challenged, lazy, mendacious, hypocritical, ignorant piece of unreconstructed Marxist excrement.

Have I missed anything?

"Laziness": only one out of Johnson and Corbyn has called someone a "girly swot" for wanting MPs to do some work in the month of September.

"Mendacity": only one of them has repeatedly been sacked by employers for dishonesty. Not very many people have that kind of record, but the present prime minister does.

"Hypocrisy": if Tories think free-at-the-point-of-use broadband is "communist", why not say the same about NHS maternity care? And if getting stuff for free is a bad idea, and if the rich are rich because they're intelligent, then why not raise IHT to 90% on larger estates?

Because Corbyn is an intellectually challenged, ignorant piece of unreconstructed Marxist excrement.

That better? I could add treacherous, terrorist supporting, anti-semite enabler but I hate to state the very obvious which is very much already factored in to peoples opinion of him.

Wow. Living proof that some people really do swallow every particle of drivel that they read in the tabloids!

How is that drivel? Genuine question.

Merely because something appears in the tabloids doesn't mean it isn't true.

Test

CorrectHorseBattery said:

OllyT said:

ozymandias said:

Arthur said:

ozymandias said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

ozymandias said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Call me a leftie or whatever but I find it genuinally astonishing that people think Corbyn and Johnson are just as bad as each other.

Well not quite actually true. People think Corbyn is much, much worse than Johnson.

So increase your astonishment.

And I'd like to understand how this can be true.

Because Corbyn is an intellectually challenged, lazy, mendacious, hypocritical, ignorant piece of unreconstructed Marxist excrement.

Have I missed anything?

"Laziness": only one out of Johnson and Corbyn has called someone a "girly swot" for wanting MPs to do some work in the month of September.

"Mendacity": only one of them has repeatedly been sacked by employers for dishonesty. Not very many people have that kind of record, but the present prime minister does.

"Hypocrisy": if Tories think free-at-the-point-of-use broadband is "communist", why not say the same about NHS maternity care? And if getting stuff for free is a bad idea, and if the rich are rich because they're intelligent, then why not raise IHT to 90% on larger estates?

Because Corbyn is an intellectually challenged, ignorant piece of unreconstructed Marxist excrement.

That better? I could add treacherous, terrorist supporting, anti-semite enabler but I hate to state the very obvious which is very much already factored in to peoples opinion of him.

What some people can't seem to understand is that you can hold a similar view to yours re Corbyn and still vote Labour.

Out with friends the other day, know they loathe Corbyn so amazed when they said they are voting Labour. Reasoning was they are remainers who can't stand Johnson or Corbyn but their Labour MP is a moderate, a remainer and a good constituency MP whereas the Tory candidate is a rabid brexiteer.

I am in a very similar position in a different seat, a Lab-Con marginal. If it was a PR election I would vote Lib Dem but if I do vote on the 12th it will be Labour for similar reasons.

Lots of people out there can't stand either of the major party leaders.

If the Remain vote is intelligent which in most cases means voting Labour, Johnson won't win a majority. It's really their last chance.

No truly intelligent person will be voting Labour at this election. Or at least, only people who are intelligent in the way Dominic Cummings is intelligent.

If anyone who can, hasn't:

https://twitter.com/HouseofCommons/status/1195718166711853058?s=20

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/PaulBrandITV/status/1195718866560782336

Disgraceful

Apart from the immediate risk to life from fires, the biggest problem of the cladding scandal is that it has effectively reduced the value of several hundred thousand homes to zero.

Most of those are a) flats b) new builds, quite possibly bought using help to buy. They are leasehold, and the freeholders are able to dump the cost of fixing the problem onto the freeholder.

So this is several hundred thousand youngish first time buyers suddenly finding themselves with huge repair bills from the developers who f****d up in the first place, meanwhile the value of their home is dropped to zero meaning they can't remortgage or sell up.

It's an absolute timebomb.

Worth following accounts like the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership and the National Leasehold Campaign on Twitter for more.

Sean_F said:

viewcode said:

Sean_F said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

OT rush out now and bag a copy of the Sun for its 50 greatest front pages souvenir magazine, including these political ones.

Crisis? What crisis?
Up Yours Delors
It's Paddy Pantsdown
If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights
Now we've ALL been screwed by the Cabinet
Is this the most dangerous man in Britain?
This party is no more..it has ceased to be..this is an EX-party
Hey Dude! Don't make it bad

Will they reproduce the ones where they gloried in the drowning of Argentinian conscripts or defamed the dead at Hillsborough? Those were classics of the genre.

People die in wars. Argentine combatants were legitimate targets.

Indeed. The objective of warfare is to kill as many of the enemy as possible until they stop.

That is such an obvious truth, and it's surprising that so many people shy away from it.

I'm starting an MA in Military History. What's obvious is that commanders have to be ruthless, and if you're not prepared to be ruthless, you have no business being a commander. You need people like Wellington, Zhukov, Sir Arthur Harris, Curtis Le May in charge, because otherwise, you will lose.

How does Vietnam fit with that thesis?

Stocky said:

Having watched the John Curtice clip below, I`m still not clear on what happens in the scenario that CP wins most seats but doesn`t get a majority (and can`t cobble one together).

In this scenario, if the opposiiton parties coalesced in some way in order to form a majority, would they be able to form a government ahead of CP running along on a minority basis?

I`ve asked this question before and some of you, inc HYUFD I think, said that CP, as incumbents, will have "first dibs" on going forward on a minority basis even if a majority is present elewhere.

However, Curtice is saying that this election boils down to Tory majority + Brexit v coalition + referendum. He doesn`t mention the possibility of Tory minority government.

Can some explain the rules to me again?

I don't think John Curtice is disputing the fact that the Conservatives would have the first attempt to form a government even if they don't have a majority. But he's pointing out that ultimately it probably wouldn't work because they don't have any viable coalition partners and therefore you'd eventually get some sort of Labour minority government.

OldKingCole said:

I don't know whether this has been posted elsewhere; only just looked at todays Guardian website, due to other interesting things happening at home.
However it appears that information has come to light that 'Home secretary Priti Patel, (together with Ben Wallace and Said Javid) intervened to block a recent rescue operation to bring British orphans and unaccompanied minors home from Syria, sources have revealed.'
The report doesn't specify the ages of the children, but I wouldn't have thought they were very old; I would have thought probably primary school age.
On humanitarian grounds surely children of that age should be brought back, never mind what the parents may or may not have done.

And what happens when the parents are found ... clearly a mistake was made thinking they were orphans

Obviously you are not going to return the kids to Syria, but you can’t separate them from their parents

So the parents have to come back to the UK. But that is counter to government policy that those who made their choice to abandon the U.K. join ISIS have to live with the consequences of their decision.

I don’t know who is organising this “rescue mission” but I wouldn’t be surprised if there is another agenda if you dig deep enough

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Our roads are Communist

A lot of them date back to feudal times. A few Roman, and some are even earlier than that.

kyf_100 said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/PaulBrandITV/status/1195718866560782336

Disgraceful

Apart from the immediate risk to life from fires, the biggest problem of the cladding scandal is that it has effectively reduced the value of several hundred thousand homes to zero.

Most of those are a) flats b) new builds, quite possibly bought using help to buy. They are leasehold, and the freeholders are able to dump the cost of fixing the problem onto the freeholder.

So this is several hundred thousand youngish first time buyers suddenly finding themselves with huge repair bills from the developers who f****d up in the first place, meanwhile the value of their home is dropped to zero meaning they can't remortgage or sell up.

It's an absolute timebomb.

Worth following accounts like the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership and the National Leasehold Campaign on Twitter for more.

I though the Government had announced it would compel freeholders to pay or cover the cost (can’t recall which).

Edit - Found it. Having been applying pressure they have now said they will pay to avoid leaseholder charges.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/05/09/grenfell-style-cladding-stripped-170-tower-blocks-government/

Chris said:

ozymandias said:

Arthur said:

ozymandias said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

ozymandias said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Call me a leftie or whatever but I find it genuinally astonishing that people think Corbyn and Johnson are just as bad as each other.

Well not quite actually true. People think Corbyn is much, much worse than Johnson.

So increase your astonishment.

And I'd like to understand how this can be true.

Because Corbyn is an intellectually challenged, lazy, mendacious, hypocritical, ignorant piece of unreconstructed Marxist excrement.

Have I missed anything?

"Laziness": only one out of Johnson and Corbyn has called someone a "girly swot" for wanting MPs to do some work in the month of September.

"Mendacity": only one of them has repeatedly been sacked by employers for dishonesty. Not very many people have that kind of record, but the present prime minister does.

"Hypocrisy": if Tories think free-at-the-point-of-use broadband is "communist", why not say the same about NHS maternity care? And if getting stuff for free is a bad idea, and if the rich are rich because they're intelligent, then why not raise IHT to 90% on larger estates?

Because Corbyn is an intellectually challenged, ignorant piece of unreconstructed Marxist excrement.

That better? I could add treacherous, terrorist supporting, anti-semite enabler but I hate to state the very obvious which is very much already factored in to peoples opinion of him.

Wow. Living proof that some people really do swallow every particle of drivel that they read in the tabloids!

Most of the broadsheets are saying the same thing.

NoSpaceName said:

Sean_F said:

viewcode said:

Sean_F said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

OT rush out now and bag a copy of the Sun for its 50 greatest front pages souvenir magazine, including these political ones.

Crisis? What crisis?
Up Yours Delors
It's Paddy Pantsdown
If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights
Now we've ALL been screwed by the Cabinet
Is this the most dangerous man in Britain?
This party is no more..it has ceased to be..this is an EX-party
Hey Dude! Don't make it bad

Will they reproduce the ones where they gloried in the drowning of Argentinian conscripts or defamed the dead at Hillsborough? Those were classics of the genre.

People die in wars. Argentine combatants were legitimate targets.

Indeed. The objective of warfare is to kill as many of the enemy as possible until they stop.

That is such an obvious truth, and it's surprising that so many people shy away from it.

I'm starting an MA in Military History. What's obvious is that commanders have to be ruthless, and if you're not prepared to be ruthless, you have no business being a commander. You need people like Wellington, Zhukov, Sir Arthur Harris, Curtis Le May in charge, because otherwise, you will lose.

How does Vietnam fit with that thesis?

They didn't kill enough Vietnamese.

Yes I know what you mean, but Westmoreland worked on the basis that if they killed more Vietnamese than Americans they would win. They were using relative targets, not absolute.

Remember I keep banging on about "numbers, percentages, thresholds"? This is shorthand for absolute numbers, relative numbers (and variances) and thresholds. To gain understanding you must know all three.

This lecture is good.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6LR-UJsYRc

NoSpaceName said:

Sean_F said:

viewcode said:

Sean_F said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

OT rush out now and bag a copy of the Sun for its 50 greatest front pages souvenir magazine, including these political ones.

Crisis? What crisis?
Up Yours Delors
It's Paddy Pantsdown
If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights
Now we've ALL been screwed by the Cabinet
Is this the most dangerous man in Britain?
This party is no more..it has ceased to be..this is an EX-party
Hey Dude! Don't make it bad

Will they reproduce the ones where they gloried in the drowning of Argentinian conscripts or defamed the dead at Hillsborough? Those were classics of the genre.

People die in wars. Argentine combatants were legitimate targets.

Indeed. The objective of warfare is to kill as many of the enemy as possible until they stop.

That is such an obvious truth, and it's surprising that so many people shy away from it.

I'm starting an MA in Military History. What's obvious is that commanders have to be ruthless, and if you're not prepared to be ruthless, you have no business being a commander. You need people like Wellington, Zhukov, Sir Arthur Harris, Curtis Le May in charge, because otherwise, you will lose.

How does Vietnam fit with that thesis?

I was more surprised to see Wellington mentioned as ruthless. Compared to Napoleon I would have described him as very careful about the lives of his men. That might have been partly because in the two theatres he made his name - India and Iberia - it was bloody hard to find replacements but nevertheless it is a fact. Grant or Napoleon - or if we're sticking with the British, Montgomery - would have been better examples.

Vietnam was perhaps better thought of as an example of where ruthlessness was not matched by the will to win. For the Americans, it was a small part of the overall diplomatic picture, so they committed resources to it but were not willing to undertake the only solution that would have let them 'win' - invade the North and run it as a colony. Meanwhile the Vietnamese, who entirely understandably saw it as a war of national liberation, were willing to absorb much greater punishment to win (3 million dead, against 58,000).

viewcode said:

NoSpaceName said:

Sean_F said:

viewcode said:

Sean_F said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

OT rush out now and bag a copy of the Sun for its 50 greatest front pages souvenir magazine, including these political ones.

Crisis? What crisis?
Up Yours Delors
It's Paddy Pantsdown
If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights
Now we've ALL been screwed by the Cabinet
Is this the most dangerous man in Britain?
This party is no more..it has ceased to be..this is an EX-party
Hey Dude! Don't make it bad

Will they reproduce the ones where they gloried in the drowning of Argentinian conscripts or defamed the dead at Hillsborough? Those were classics of the genre.

People die in wars. Argentine combatants were legitimate targets.

Indeed. The objective of warfare is to kill as many of the enemy as possible until they stop.

That is such an obvious truth, and it's surprising that so many people shy away from it.

I'm starting an MA in Military History. What's obvious is that commanders have to be ruthless, and if you're not prepared to be ruthless, you have no business being a commander. You need people like Wellington, Zhukov, Sir Arthur Harris, Curtis Le May in charge, because otherwise, you will lose.

How does Vietnam fit with that thesis?

They didn't kill enough Vietnamese.

Yes I know what you mean, but Westmoreland worked on the basis that if they killed more Vietnamese than Americans they would win. They were using relative targets, not absolute.

Remember I keep banging on about "numbers, percentages, thresholds"? This is shorthand for absolute numbers, relative numbers (and variances) and thresholds. To gain understanding you must know all three.

This lecture is good.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6LR-UJsYRc

Around 20% of the Vietnamese population were killed in the American War there. Perhaps the Yanks needed to kill the other 80% in order to win.

ydoethur said:

NoSpaceName said:

Sean_F said:

viewcode said:

Sean_F said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

OT rush out now and bag a copy of the Sun for its 50 greatest front pages souvenir magazine, including these political ones.

Crisis? What crisis?
Up Yours Delors
It's Paddy Pantsdown
If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights
Now we've ALL been screwed by the Cabinet
Is this the most dangerous man in Britain?
This party is no more..it has ceased to be..this is an EX-party
Hey Dude! Don't make it bad

Will they reproduce the ones where they gloried in the drowning of Argentinian conscripts or defamed the dead at Hillsborough? Those were classics of the genre.

People die in wars. Argentine combatants were legitimate targets.

Indeed. The objective of warfare is to kill as many of the enemy as possible until they stop.

That is such an obvious truth, and it's surprising that so many people shy away from it.

I'm starting an MA in Military History. What's obvious is that commanders have to be ruthless, and if you're not prepared to be ruthless, you have no business being a commander. You need people like Wellington, Zhukov, Sir Arthur Harris, Curtis Le May in charge, because otherwise, you will lose.

How does Vietnam fit with that thesis?

I was more surprised to see Wellington mentioned as ruthless. Compared to Napoleon I would have described him as very careful about the lives of his men. That might have been partly because in the two theatres he made his name - India and Iberia - it was bloody hard to find replacements but nevertheless it is a fact. Grant or Napoleon - or if we're sticking with the British, Montgomery - would have been better examples.

Vietnam was perhaps better thought of as an example of where ruthlessness was not matched by the will to win. For the Americans, it was a small part of the overall diplomatic picture, so they committed resources to it but were not willing to undertake the only solution that would have let them 'win' - invade the North and run it as a colony. Meanwhile the Vietnamese, who entirely understandably saw it as a war of national liberation, were willing to absorb much greater punishment to win (3 million dead, against 58,000).

Wellington didn't throw his soldiers' lives away. But, he was quite prepared to take and inflict very heavy casualties when necessary.

..

Sean_F said:

Foxy said:

Sean_F said:

viewcode said:

Sean_F said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

OT rush out now and bag a copy of the Sun for its 50 greatest front pages souvenir magazine, including these political ones.

Crisis? What crisis?
Up Yours Delors
It's Paddy Pantsdown
If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights
Now we've ALL been screwed by the Cabinet
Is this the most dangerous man in Britain?
This party is no more..it has ceased to be..this is an EX-party
Hey Dude! Don't make it bad

Will they reproduce the ones where they gloried in the drowning of Argentinian conscripts or defamed the dead at Hillsborough? Those were classics of the genre.

People die in wars. Argentine combatants were legitimate targets.

Indeed. The objective of warfare is to kill as many of the enemy as possible until they stop.

That is such an obvious truth, and it's surprising that so many people shy away from it.

I'm starting an MA in Military History. What's obvious is that commanders have to be ruthless, and if you're not prepared to be ruthless, you have no business being a commander. You need people like Wellington, Zhukov, Sir Arthur Harris, Curtis Le May in charge, because otherwise, you will lose.

Most wars are not existential. Such ruthlessness in our colonial wars, or more recent expeditionary wars would have merely resulted in failure, as the Americans found out in Vietnam and Soviets in Afghanistan. Unless you intend to exterminate the enemy, you will have to make peace with them.

The important thing is to be as ruthless as you have to be.

Quite obviously that requires judgement and an overall willingness not to be too heavy handed when the situation requires it.

Time_to_Leave said:

kyf_100 said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/PaulBrandITV/status/1195718866560782336

Disgraceful

Apart from the immediate risk to life from fires, the biggest problem of the cladding scandal is that it has effectively reduced the value of several hundred thousand homes to zero.

Most of those are a) flats b) new builds, quite possibly bought using help to buy. They are leasehold, and the freeholders are able to dump the cost of fixing the problem onto the freeholder.

So this is several hundred thousand youngish first time buyers suddenly finding themselves with huge repair bills from the developers who f****d up in the first place, meanwhile the value of their home is dropped to zero meaning they can't remortgage or sell up.

It's an absolute timebomb.

Worth following accounts like the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership and the National Leasehold Campaign on Twitter for more.

I though the Government had announced it would compel freeholders to pay or cover the cost (can’t recall which).

Edit - Found it. Having been applying pressure they have now said they will pay to avoid leaseholder charges.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/05/09/grenfell-style-cladding-stripped-170-tower-blocks-government/

I believe the funds the government have made available refer only to ACM type cladding, while there is still debate on many other types of cladding being potentially just as dangerous. Many, many more flats are affected.

884 days after Grenfell funding has only been secured for one building.

https://twitter.com/martinboydlkp/status/1195378641221431296

Meanwhile people are able to buy £685k flats that are now worth nothing, are potential deathtraps, and are locked into expensive mortgages with no idea if or when they will be able to get out.

https://www.hackneygazette.co.uk/news/kings-crescent-flat-valued-at-0-1-6265405

ydoethur said:

"No truly intelligent person will be voting Labour at this election. Or at least, only people who are intelligent in the way Dominic Cummings is intelligent."

That is pretty insulting to the millions of people who will vote Labour.

We have an electoral system that gives us a very restricted choice of 2 governing parties, nothing I can do about that. My seat is a Lab-Con marginal. I am opposed to Brexit, don't think Johnson or Corbyn are fit to run the country so I look at the two candidates. The Labour candidate is a moderate and a remainer and the Tory is the sort of Brexiteer that would actively be supporting No Deal when a the trade deal fails to materialise next summer.

What what an intelligent person do?

Sean_F said:

Wellington didn't throw his soldiers' lives away. But, he was quite prepared to take and inflict very heavy casualties when necessary.

That's part of being a general and I would argue quite separate from being ruthless. To my mind, being ruthless is throwing away your soldiers' lives because although there is an alternative it is one you consider less attractive. From that point of view Napoleon, Grant or Zhukov are the classic examples of 'ruthless' generals.

It's worth noting of course that two of them won, and one had a long series of successes before he was finally brought low.

Time_to_Leave said:

ydoethur said:

viewcode said:

ydoethur said:

viewcode said:

MarqueeMark said:

Chris said:

ozymandias said:

Arthur said:

ozymandias said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

ozymandias said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Call me a leftie or whatever but I find it genuinally astonishing that people think Corbyn and Johnson are just as bad as each other.

Well not quite actually true. People think Corbyn is much, much worse than Johnson.

So increase your astonishment.

And I'd like to understand how this can be true.

Because Corbyn is an intellectually challenged, lazy, mendacious, hypocritical, ignorant piece of unreconstructed Marxist excrement.

Have I missed anything?

"Laziness": only one out of Johnson and Corbyn has called someone a "girly swot" for wanting MPs to do some work in the month of September.

"Mendacity": only one of them has repeatedly been sacked by employers for dishones
Because Corbyn is an intellectually challenged, ignorant piece of unreconstructed Marxist excrement.

That better? I could add treacherous, terrorist supporting, anti-semite enabler but I hate to state the very obvious which is very much already factored in to peoples opinion of him.

Wow. Living proof that some people really do swallow every particle of drivel that they read in the tabloids!

And you are living proof there are none so blind as those that will not see.

Good point

In fairness I should point out I am not alone! Cyclefree, Richard Nabavi, TSE etc have been saying much the same thing.

Before Iraq and Afghanistan people used to say we were great at counter-insurgency and quote the Malaya example. They always spoke about the hearts and minds bit, and conveniently forgot the “string up lots of people and burn down villages” bit. “Winning“ a counter-insurgency operation requires tactics we’d now think unacceptable.

Quite so. Malaya is a textbook example of how you should conduct a counter-insurgency operation.

Sean_F said:

viewcode said:

Sean_F said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

OT rush out now and bag a copy of the Sun for its 50 greatest front pages souvenir magazine, including these political ones.

Crisis? What crisis?
Up Yours Delors
It's Paddy Pantsdown
If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights
Now we've ALL been screwed by the Cabinet
Is this the most dangerous man in Britain?
This party is no more..it has ceased to be..this is an EX-party
Hey Dude! Don't make it bad

Will they reproduce the ones where they gloried in the drowning of Argentinian conscripts or defamed the dead at Hillsborough? Those were classics of the genre.

People die in wars. Argentine combatants were legitimate targets.

Indeed. The objective of warfare is to kill as many of the enemy as possible until they stop.

That is such an obvious truth, and it's surprising that so many people shy away from it.

I'm starting an MA in Military History. What's obvious is that commanders have to be ruthless, and if you're not prepared to be ruthless, you have no business being a commander. You need people like Wellington, Zhukov, Sir Arthur Harris, Curtis Le May in charge, because otherwise, you will lose.

Best wishes for the MA. I briefly studied Just War Theory and the morality of warfare as part of my PPE degree. Not a straightforward issue.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

The election narrative is quickly running away from the Tories

Nope. Only in your mind.

RobD said:

brokenwheel said:

rottenborough said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

rottenborough said:

Pidcock could lose her seat?

https://www.buzzfeed.com/alexwickham/tories-losing-the-media-labour-policy-winning?ref=hpsplash

That report should have Tories shitting themselves. Labour winning every day.

And we are soon to have our socks blown off by the Lab manifesto.

Never fear, free socks for all will be a key pledge.

Thank god, my christmas ones are wearing out.

Will the socks be delivered by the owls, along with the modem?

CorrectHorseBattery said:

The election narrative is quickly running away from the Tories

Cite some firm evidence for that.

Or otherwise we will just point and laugh.

Time_to_Leave said:

kyf_100 said:

Time_to_Leave said:

kyf_100 said:

Apart from the immediate risk to life from fires, the biggest problem of the cladding scandal is that it has effectively reduced the value of several hundred thousand homes to zero.

Most of those are a) flats b) new builds, quite possibly bought using help to buy. They are leasehold, and the freeholders are able to dump the cost of fixing the problem onto the freeholder.

So this is several hundred thousand youngish first time buyers suddenly finding themselves with huge repair bills from the developers who f****d up in the first place, meanwhile the value of their home is dropped to zero meaning they can't remortgage or sell up.

It's an absolute timebomb.

Worth following accounts like the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership and the National Leasehold Campaign on Twitter for more.

I though the Government had announced it would compel freeholders to pay or cover the cost (can’t recall which).

Edit - Found it. Having been applying pressure they have now said they will pay to avoid leaseholder charges.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/05/09/grenfell-style-cladding-stripped-170-tower-blocks-government/

I believe the funds the government have made available refer only to ACM type cladding, while there is still debate on many other types of cladding being potentially just as dangerous. Many, many more flats are affected.

884 days after Grenfell funding has only been secured for one building.

https://twitter.com/ukcag/status/1195393638005645312

Meanwhile people are able to buy £685k flats that are now worth nothing, are potential deathtraps, and are locked into expensive mortgages with no idea if or when they will be able to get out.

https://www.hackneygazette.co.uk/news/kings-crescent-flat-valued-at-0-1-6265405

As you say it’s morally right for the Government to just sort the problem, and then possibly pursue private landlords for the cash later.

It’s even the right decision if you’re just being cynical and political, since the Gvt will be forced to do it in the end anyway. May as well take the initiative. I suspect it’s been slowed down by conversations about cost inside HMT, missing the bigger picture as ever.

How does it even achieve that?

You need all sorts of agreements to cover a building in scaffolding, take it all down and put it up again. Plus the necessary preparatory investigations and other works, to assess the materials required, and ensure any replacement is not only fire order compliant but also ensures weather and structural protection.

The whole problem with the cladding legal is that there is no "just do it" option.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

The election narrative is quickly running away from the Tories

I'm looking forward to tonight's polls, if there are some.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

The election narrative is quickly running away from the Tories

I was worried when the NHS stats came out - but Labour helpfully blew that out of the narrative with British Broken Broadband

kyf_100 said:

Time_to_Leave said:

kyf_100 said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/PaulBrandITV/status/1195718866560782336

Disgraceful

Apart from the immediate risk to life from fires, the biggest problem of the cladding scandal is that it has effectively reduced the value of several hundred thousand homes to zero.

Most of those are a) flats b) new builds, quite possibly bought using help to buy. They are leasehold, and the freeholders are able to dump the cost of fixing the problem onto the freeholder.

So this is several hundred thousand youngish first time buyers suddenly finding themselves with huge repair bills from the developers who f****d up in the first place, meanwhile the value of their home is dropped to zero meaning they can't remortgage or sell up.

It's an absolute timebomb.

Worth following accounts like the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership and the National Leasehold Campaign on Twitter for more.

I though the Government had announced it would compel freeholders to pay or cover the cost (can’t recall which).

Edit - Found it. Having been applying pressure they have now said they will pay to avoid leaseholder charges.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/05/09/grenfell-style-cladding-stripped-170-tower-blocks-government/

I believe the funds the government have made available refer only to ACM type cladding, while there is still debate on many other types of cladding being potentially just as dangerous. Many, many more flats are affected.

884 days after Grenfell funding has only been secured for one building.

https://twitter.com/martinboydlkp/status/1195378641221431296

Meanwhile people are able to buy £685k flats that are now worth nothing, are potential deathtraps, and are locked into expensive mortgages with no idea if or when they will be able to get out.

https://www.hackneygazette.co.uk/news/kings-crescent-flat-valued-at-0-1-6265405

It’s also worth noting that this is a global problem. There’s probably tens of thousands of buildings around the world with dodgy cladding installed in the past couple of decades.

It’s a big story in the Middle East, we’ve had several fires in the last few years fanned by flammable cladding. Thankfully, as with yesterday’s fire in Bolton, few people have lost their lives as the damage is mostly to the outside of the building in the early stages of the fire and people were able to evacuate. Not so at Grenfell, where the older design, single staircase and and ‘stay put’ instructions just weren’t suitable for an externally-cladded building.

Foxy said:

tlg86 said:

So Jezza is an admirer of the Bundesliga. A league which is won by the same team every season.

Good attacking football, €10 tickets, safe standing and a consistently strong national team.

What's not to like for a fan that actually goes to matches?

And who decides who gets the cheap tickets? I don’t know what the situation is like at other clubs but the price cap on seat tickets has contributed to a situation at Arsenal where a small group of supporters have control over who gets a ticket to away games.

SandyRentool said:

Sean_F said:

viewcode said:

Sean_F said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

OT rush out now and bag a copy of the Sun for its 50 greatest front pages souvenir magazine, including these political ones.

Crisis? What crisis?
Up Yours Delors
It's Paddy Pantsdown
If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights
Now we've ALL been screwed by the Cabinet
Is this the most dangerous man in Britain?
This party is no more..it has ceased to be..this is an EX-party
Hey Dude! Don't make it bad

Will they reproduce the ones where they gloried in the drowning of Argentinian conscripts or defamed the dead at Hillsborough? Those were classics of the genre.

People die in wars. Argentine combatants were legitimate targets.

Indeed. The objective of warfare is to kill as many of the enemy as possible until they stop.

That is such an obvious truth, and it's surprising that so many people shy away from it.

I'm starting an MA in Military History. What's obvious is that commanders have to be ruthless, and if you're not prepared to be ruthless, you have no business being a commander. You need people like Wellington, Zhukov, Sir Arthur Harris, Curtis Le May in charge, because otherwise, you will lose.

Best wishes for the MA. I briefly studied Just War Theory and the morality of warfare as part of my PPE degree. Not a straightforward issue.

No, it isn't.

https://twitter.com/martinboon/status/1195727945794543617?s=20

Theuniondivvie said:

Form an orderly queue PB Tories.

https://twitter.com/divaeharris/status/1195337444759146496?s=20

Nationalised Tory porn

TheWhiteRabbit said:

Time_to_Leave said:

kyf_100 said:

Time_to_Leave said:

kyf_100 said:

Apart from the immediate risk to life from fires

Most of those are a) flats b) new builds, quite possibly bought using help to buy. They are leasehold, and the freeholders are able to dump the cost of fixing the problem onto the freeholder.

So this is several hundred thousand youngish first time buyers suddenly finding themselves with huge repair bills from the developers

Worth following accounts like the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership and the National Leasehold Campaign on Twitter for more.

I though the Government had announced it would compel freeholders to pay or cover the cost

Edit - Found it. Having been applying pressure they have now said they will

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/05/09/grenfell-style-cladding-stripped-170-tower-blocks-government/

I believe the funds the government have made available refer only to ACM type cladding, while there is still debate on many other types of cladding be

https://twitter.com/ukcag/status/1195393638005645312

Meanwhile people are able to buy £685k flats that are now worth nothing, are potential deathtraps, and are locked into expensive mortgages with no idea if or when they will be able to get out.

https://www.hackneygazette.co.uk/news/kings-crescent-flat-valued-at-0-1-6265405

As you say it’s morally right for the Government to just sort the problem, and then possibly pursue private landlords for the cash later.

It’s even the right decision if you’re just being cynical and political, since the Gvt will be forced to do it in the end anyway. May as well take the initiative. I suspect it’s been slowed down by conversations about cost inside HMT, missing the bigger picture as ever.

How does it even achieve that?

You need all sorts of agreements to cover a building in scaffolding, take it all down and put it up again. Plus the necessary preparatory investigations and other works, to assess the materials required, and ensure any replacement is not only fire order compliant but also ensures weather and structural protection.

The whole problem with the cladding legal is that there is no "just do it" option.

There is - you put a programme in place to have it removed so that even if someone doesn’t see action today you can give dates and set expectations.

Quite a lot (even most or all?) of this stuff is clearly cosmetic or there for insulation (I’ve seen a lot of buildings with it stripped stay “naked” for a while which implies there’s a limited impact in that).

Doing nothing (or being seen to do nothing) gets the Gvt nowhere as it will have to act in the end. The politics of that is inevitable.

I thought Gvt already had acted but I’ve been corrected.

Brom said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

The election narrative is quickly running away from the Tories

Not sure if you are new to PB but you sound like Comical Ali! At least Momentum still have a sense of humour

Comical Ali, lol. I don't think he was quite as hysterical as our friend, though.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

ozymandias said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

The election narrative is quickly running away from the Tories

Nope. Only in your mind.

Today the big story is about a fire which people are claiming on cladding.

Yesterday it was about free broadband.

The day before it was about the NHS.

What would you call it?

NHS where the NHS in Wales under Labour was the worst performing of all? Where satisfaction surveys of the NHS are still above 50%?
Broadband? Back of a fag packet policy released in panic to try and wrestle the narrative back after Corbyns car crash with Indy ref 2? Subsequently ripped apart by anyone with half an understanding of economics.

Fire? What’s that got to do with anything? Private student residence. No fatalities. No injuries either. Not the same kind of cladding. Presumably under Labour nothing will ever catch fire. Perhaps that’s what’s going into their manifesto.

It seems you’re desperately trying to scrabble around looking for something to prove what isn’t there. No adoring chanting crowds for Corbyn this time. Just an old man shuffling around the country recycling his non sensical policies in a desperate attempt to shore up his core vote.

Not going quite as you like it, is it?

Charles said:

Arthur said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/ToryFibs/status/1195691890080976896

What could it be?

Free sex on the NHS!

Labour are running a masterful campaign.

Summary of the final month:

* two weeks debating popular and sensible and in some cases surprise policies from Labour (surprise gets attention), doubtless with more "gaffs" from Boris Johnson such as not knowing how to make a cup of tea, not knowing how to show compassion for flood victims, not wanting to say how many children he's got, etc.,

* followed by two weeks of "if you want a Romanian for your neighbour" from Tories and from the voter suppression operation called the Brexit "Party".

What’s the “not knowing how to make a cup of tea” meme?

He put milk in first - very common (I don’t) with lots of argument about why people do this (it tends to divide on socio-economic grounds)

He left the tea bag in - I do this too as I like my tea strong

I don't really think he doesn't know how to make a cup of tea, nor that there's anything wrong with how he or anyone else does it, but the meme is out there. He didn't put milk in first: he put it in a few seconds after he put the bag in.

When I'm in a cafe that does cups rather than pots, I usually ask them to leave the bag in too. Otherwise they're prone to assume everybody prefers tea as weak as gnat's piss and whip the bag out as soon as the water has gone slightly cloudy. At home though it's proper leaf tea and milk in at the end - none of that dust from the drying room floor that goes into teabags :-)

https://twitter.com/i/status/1194320453877280768

NeilVW said:

I have been looking at a couple of the early-declaring seats on election night. Often they are misleading due to being unrepresentative, but they are interesting nonetheless, particularly as they are quite strongly Leave areas.

Remain United’s model has the Tories within 7 points of Labour in both Houghton & Sunderland S and Sunderland C. The projected swings since the last election are 11% and 8% respectively, above the 4.5 - 5% GB average. In both seats the Tories are estimated to be roughly standing still while Lab plummet. Electoral Calculus shows a similar, if slightly less dramatic picture.

Thanks, I’ve been wondering what we conclude from them. The other question is whether any of the churn we will see could confuse the Exit Poll? I’m guessing not as it’s been about right for years through all sorts of upheaval.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

ozymandias said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

The election narrative is quickly running away from the Tories

Nope. Only in your mind.

Today the big story is about a fire which people are claiming on cladding.

Yesterday it was about free broadband.

The day before it was about the NHS.

What would you call it?

I would suggest you read this

"The group, floating voters who have supported all three main political parties in the past, overwhelmingly distrusted Jeremy Corbyn and simply didn’t believe his main election claim that the Conservatives would “sell off” the NHS to Donald Trump." https://t.co/lLtx7zCjF7

Arthur said:

Charles said:

Arthur said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/ToryFibs/status/1195691890080976896

What could it be?

Free sex on the NHS!

Labour are running a masterful campaign.

Summary of the final month:

* two weeks debating popular and sensible and in some cases surprise policies from Labour (surprise gets attention), doubtless with more "gaffs" from Boris Johnson such as not knowing how to make a cup of tea, not knowing how to show compassion for flood victims, not wanting to say how many children he's got, etc.,

* followed by two weeks of "if you want a Romanian for your neighbour" from Tories and from the voter suppression operation called the Brexit "Party".

What’s the “not knowing how to make a cup of tea” meme?

He put milk in first - very common (I don’t) with lots of argument about why people do this (it tends to divide on socio-economic grounds)

He left the tea bag in - I do this too as I like my tea strong

I don't really think he doesn't know how to make a cup of tea, nor that there's anything wrong with how he or anyone else does it, but the meme is out there. He didn't put milk in first: he put it in a few seconds after he put the bag in.

When I'm in a cafe that does cups rather than pots, I usually ask them to leave the bag in too. Otherwise they're prone to assume everybody prefers tea as weak as gnat's piss and whip the bag out as soon as the water has gone slightly cloudy. At home though it's proper leaf tea and milk in at the end - none of that dust from the drying room floor that goes into teabags :-)

https://twitter.com/i/status/1194320453877280768

Point of order - milk goes in the cup first, in a situation where you’ve got proper leaf tea mashing in a pot and will then pour it out.

Foxy said:

Sean_F said:

viewcode said:

Sean_F said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

OT rush out now and bag a copy of the Sun for its 50 greatest front pages souvenir magazine, including these political ones.

Crisis? What crisis?
Up Yours Delors
It's Paddy Pantsdown
If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights
Now we've ALL been screwed by the Cabinet
Is this the most dangerous man in Britain?
This party is no more..it has ceased to be..this is an EX-party
Hey Dude! Don't make it bad

Will they reproduce the ones where they gloried in the drowning of Argentinian conscripts or defamed the dead at Hillsborough? Those were classics of the genre.

People die in wars. Argentine combatants were legitimate targets.

Indeed. The objective of warfare is to kill as many of the enemy as possible until they stop.

That is such an obvious truth, and it's surprising that so many people shy away from it.

I'm starting an MA in Military History. What's obvious is that commanders have to be ruthless, and if you're not prepared to be ruthless, you have no business being a commander. You need people like Wellington, Zhukov, Sir Arthur Harris, Curtis Le May in charge, because otherwise, you will lose.

Most wars are not existential. Such ruthlessness in our colonial wars, or more recent expeditionary wars would have merely resulted in failure, as the Americans found out in Vietnam and Soviets in Afghanistan. Unless you intend to exterminate the enemy, you will have to make peace with them.

Remember the Cathars and "Kill them all, the Lord will recognise His own! Religious wars have always, I think, been more savage than political ones

https://twitter.com/PaulBrandITV/status/1195698742743195648?s=20

https://southstreetam.co.uk/portfolio/the-cube/

ydoethur said:

Sean_F said:

Wellington didn't throw his soldiers' lives away. But, he was quite prepared to take and inflict very heavy casualties when necessary.

That's part of being a general and I would argue quite separate from being ruthless. To my mind, being ruthless is throwing away your soldiers' lives because although there is an alternative it is one you consider less attractive. From that point of view Napoleon, Grant or Zhukov are the classic examples of 'ruthless' generals.

It's worth noting of course that two of them won, and one had a long series of successes before he was finally brought low.

What about Sherman? He was deliberately ruthless to the South. He coined the phrase “War is hell” and said “ War is cruelty. There is no use trying to reform it; the crueler it is, the sooner it will be over.”