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New Ipsos US polling finds HALF of Republican voters oppose the plan to fill the Supreme Court vacan

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  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080

    @IanB2 I thought the story was that the christening was in Italy at the rich Russian dudes house?

    The Sun story doesn’t give a location. But it says a small number of family and friends attended, and the press release claims “Planning was focused on the fact the country is in the midst of a pandemic.“

    That the whole lot of them went off to Italy for a day doesn’t really seem credible.
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715
    IanB2 said:

    @IanB2 I thought the story was that the christening was in Italy at the rich Russian dudes house?

    The Sun story doesn’t give a location. But it says a small number of family and friends attended, and the press release claims “Planning was focused on the fact the country is in the midst of a pandemic.“

    That the whole lot of them went off to Italy for a day doesn’t really seem credible.
    Just says 'family and friends'; small private plane to Perugia, with, say ten people. Some friends already in Italy. Where has Carrie's mum been lately? First grandchild and all that!
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830

    @IanB2 I thought the story was that the christening was in Italy at the rich Russian dudes house?

    Makes possible sense if the Russian dude is a godfather. And could send a private jet to collect everybody.
  • moonshinemoonshine Posts: 5,226
    What to make of Witty and Valance going on the podium without any politicians?

    Could this be them setting out their case for a hard lockdown before tomorrow the PM says notwithstanding that, he is applying a more nuanced policy?
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,072
    I see Super Rishi has just paid me my student loan. Huzzah!
  • IanB2 said:

    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    Lockdown again is a waste of time. Compliance will be nowhere near what it was in the last one. That much is obvious from one weekend of the North East “lockdown”. Everyone is just getting on with it, ignoring the rules but being careful.

    My impression is that those who follow the rules are following them. Those that aren't aren't.
    The followers are hurting the economy, the non-followers are spreading the disease just as before.
    So the only effect really has been to keep the compliant away from spending any money.
    If they want to stop the disease then it is those who won't comply who need dealing with.
    As I said that is a choice.
    That’s not my experience. My anecdotal experience is that those who were very strict in following the rules the first time round are now not quite so strict.
    It's not really the "Not so strict" that are the problem though.
    It's the ones who egregiously insist on acting as if there is no problem, or can't be arsed, or who don't believe in it, or who are just too ignorant to cope with it all.
    The “not so strict” people occasionally going to see their friends or family without social distancing because “what’s the harm?” or “f*ck it” will be having an impact, and I include myself in that category.
    Then I would not include you in the "Not so strict" group.
    What does that mean? I know many people who last time wouldn’t even entertain the idea of seeing their friends or family who now are happy to have a coffee with a small group of their closest friends, or their close family, regardless of what the rules say.
    Which I imagine is because they're more confident/less afraid than they were months ago.
    I can imagine thats is certainly a big factor yeah.
    Only 307 healthy under 60s have died in England from Covid. My sense is that most people’s perceptions of the risk were orders of magnitude out at the start of the summer, but are coming slowly into line now, which would account for the decline In fearfulness.
    Of course, because it was new and scary, no-one knew the true facts or risks, and there were people like Sean (and the ‘experts‘ he was forever quoting) going round talking about millions of dead and bodies piling up at the end of the street.

    Time and experience helps most people put things into proportion. And it is an unavoidable fact that, for everyone except the elderly and ill, this virus on average tends not to be a big deal. It’s a big deal for society as a whole.

    One of the best factoids came quite early from R4 More or Less, which is that the virus roughly doubles the chances you already had of dying during 2020.
    What about the long term effects?
    You may say that we could tolerate a certain percentage of people getting the virus and a smaller percentage dying, but with a virus that grows exponentially and has a two week delay achieving that is difficult.
  • rpjs said:

    dodrade said:

    Nigelb said:

    That is an interesting poll.
    It tends to confirm the belief that perceived blatant unfairness often transcends voters’ political affiliation.

    Rather surprised at this. The vacancy is there to be filled now, it isn't meant to be an additional prize in the election. The GOP were deeply cynical and wrong to make up non-existent rules so as not to even give Garland a hearing (when they could simply have followed procedure and then voted against him) but they are perfectly within their rights to fill the seat before January if they can.

    I suspect Collins is toast no matter what she does.



    Just because they are “in their rights” doesn’t mean it’s politically a good idea to do it. If the position is filled and the democrats win big then there will likely be scorched earth retribution, perhaps expanding the size of the Supreme Court. Do GOP senators really want that?
    I think the obvious play is just to name a pick but leave it until the lame duck session and spare Collins etc a tough pre-election vote.

    If Trump holds on then there's no problem. If he doesn't it's not a slam-dunk that the Dems will take back the Senate, and if they don't then they won't even have the power to go scorched earth, so confirm the nominee then.

    If the Dems get both the presidency and the Senate then the GOP have a dilemma whether to take what they can and risk retribution or pivot to "bipartisan civility" and "respect senate traditions", but they can also offer a deal and blame the situation on the Dems if they don't take it, which will look better for them - eg say they're suspending their time-honoured principle of letting the new president make the pick because Biden won't promise not to blow up the filibuster.
    Not in Biden’s power to keep or not keep the filibuster. The new Senate decides which existing procedural rules to keep or not.
    But Edmund said "If the Dems get both the presidency and the Senate..."
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080
    edited September 2020
    IshmaelZ said:

    @IanB2 I thought the story was that the christening was in Italy at the rich Russian dudes house?

    Makes possible sense if the Russian dude is a godfather. And could send a private jet to collect everybody.
    There was a private jet from Perugia to Northolt on the Monday Bozo is supposed to have been sighted returning home. It was held up on the runway and left considerably delayed. By coincidence engagements the PM had planned with Patel later that morning were cancelled at the last minute.

    An additional little snippet is that Bozo’s ill fated zoom call to MPs, where his WiFi kept breaking up, falls on the afternoon after his purported sighting arriving in Perugia.

    Also worth noting that the first published claim that Bozo had been there came not from some random individual, but in an official press release issued by Perugia Airport.
  • rkrkrk said:

    Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    kamski said:

    There must be conservatives on the supreme court who are worried that the majority of americans lose all faith in the supreme court as an institution who must be against pushing through a nomination.

    There is one - Roberts.
    Thomas and Alito ? You’re joking. Kavanaugh clearly doesn’t give much of a damn about public opinion; Gorsuch, unlikely, but time will tell.

    If the Republicans seat another Justice after what they pulled with Garland, because it’s ‘within their rights’, I think it almost certain a Democratic Senate majority will expand the court, since that is equally ‘within their rights’.

    On the second point, even Senate moderates agree.

    https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/for-mitch-mcconnell-keeping-his-senate-majority-matters-more-than-the-supreme-court
    ... Senator Tim Kaine, of Virginia, who is ordinarily a mainstream Democrat, has said he could support enlarging the court as a tactic, if the Republicans force a confirmation vote...
    Doubt Dems would get 50 senators lined up on that.

    I think it's a pretty simple decision for a man with no scruples. Mitch is going to make sure there's a conservative majority.
    Why do you doubt that? Seems to be an increasingly mainstream view in the Democratic Party. The GOP has been trampling on conventions for years, now its time for the Dems to play dirty otherwise their legislative agenda will just be picked apart by the court for years to come.
    Dunno though, they don't just need *mainstream* Dems, they need people like Joe Manchin who represent extremely conservative states. If even if the Dems win big, they'll do it by electing more Dems from conservative-leaning states.
  • tlg86 said:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/news/rail-franchising-reaches-the-terminus-as-a-new-railway-takes-shape

    Ministers today ended rail franchising after 24 years as the first step in bringing Britain’s fragmented network back together.

    The new system will create a simpler, more effective structure and will take shape over the coming months. The first stage, today, is moving operators onto transitional contracts to prepare the ground for the new railway.


    BBC reporting that the government has agreed to carry on with the current emergency funding for 18 months,

    Boris shoots another Labour fox, possibly while wearing an Italian silk kimono.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080
    edited September 2020

    IanB2 said:

    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    Lockdown again is a waste of time. Compliance will be nowhere near what it was in the last one. That much is obvious from one weekend of the North East “lockdown”. Everyone is just getting on with it, ignoring the rules but being careful.

    My impression is that those who follow the rules are following them. Those that aren't aren't.
    The followers are hurting the economy, the non-followers are spreading the disease just as before.
    So the only effect really has been to keep the compliant away from spending any money.
    If they want to stop the disease then it is those who won't comply who need dealing with.
    As I said that is a choice.
    That’s not my experience. My anecdotal experience is that those who were very strict in following the rules the first time round are now not quite so strict.
    It's not really the "Not so strict" that are the problem though.
    It's the ones who egregiously insist on acting as if there is no problem, or can't be arsed, or who don't believe in it, or who are just too ignorant to cope with it all.
    The “not so strict” people occasionally going to see their friends or family without social distancing because “what’s the harm?” or “f*ck it” will be having an impact, and I include myself in that category.
    Then I would not include you in the "Not so strict" group.
    What does that mean? I know many people who last time wouldn’t even entertain the idea of seeing their friends or family who now are happy to have a coffee with a small group of their closest friends, or their close family, regardless of what the rules say.
    Which I imagine is because they're more confident/less afraid than they were months ago.
    I can imagine thats is certainly a big factor yeah.
    Only 307 healthy under 60s have died in England from Covid. My sense is that most people’s perceptions of the risk were orders of magnitude out at the start of the summer, but are coming slowly into line now, which would account for the decline In fearfulness.
    Of course, because it was new and scary, no-one knew the true facts or risks, and there were people like Sean (and the ‘experts‘ he was forever quoting) going round talking about millions of dead and bodies piling up at the end of the street.

    Time and experience helps most people put things into proportion. And it is an unavoidable fact that, for everyone except the elderly and ill, this virus on average tends not to be a big deal. It’s a big deal for society as a whole.

    One of the best factoids came quite early from R4 More or Less, which is that the virus roughly doubles the chances you already had of dying during 2020.
    What about the long term effects?
    You may say that we could tolerate a certain percentage of people getting the virus and a smaller percentage dying, but with a virus that grows exponentially and has a two week delay achieving that is difficult.
    I wasn’t suggesting anything other than supporting Anabob’s suggestion that time has allowed people to better assess their personal risks, and the steep age related profile in serious consequences.

    Very little is known about these long term side effects, but in younger people such cases reported so far do seem pretty rare.
  • moonshinemoonshine Posts: 5,226

    IanB2 said:

    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    Lockdown again is a waste of time. Compliance will be nowhere near what it was in the last one. That much is obvious from one weekend of the North East “lockdown”. Everyone is just getting on with it, ignoring the rules but being careful.

    My impression is that those who follow the rules are following them. Those that aren't aren't.
    The followers are hurting the economy, the non-followers are spreading the disease just as before.
    So the only effect really has been to keep the compliant away from spending any money.
    If they want to stop the disease then it is those who won't comply who need dealing with.
    As I said that is a choice.
    That’s not my experience. My anecdotal experience is that those who were very strict in following the rules the first time round are now not quite so strict.
    It's not really the "Not so strict" that are the problem though.
    It's the ones who egregiously insist on acting as if there is no problem, or can't be arsed, or who don't believe in it, or who are just too ignorant to cope with it all.
    The “not so strict” people occasionally going to see their friends or family without social distancing because “what’s the harm?” or “f*ck it” will be having an impact, and I include myself in that category.
    Then I would not include you in the "Not so strict" group.
    What does that mean? I know many people who last time wouldn’t even entertain the idea of seeing their friends or family who now are happy to have a coffee with a small group of their closest friends, or their close family, regardless of what the rules say.
    Which I imagine is because they're more confident/less afraid than they were months ago.
    I can imagine thats is certainly a big factor yeah.
    Only 307 healthy under 60s have died in England from Covid. My sense is that most people’s perceptions of the risk were orders of magnitude out at the start of the summer, but are coming slowly into line now, which would account for the decline In fearfulness.
    Of course, because it was new and scary, no-one knew the true facts or risks, and there were people like Sean (and the ‘experts‘ he was forever quoting) going round talking about millions of dead and bodies piling up at the end of the street.

    Time and experience helps most people put things into proportion. And it is an unavoidable fact that, for everyone except the elderly and ill, this virus on average tends not to be a big deal. It’s a big deal for society as a whole.

    One of the best factoids came quite early from R4 More or Less, which is that the virus roughly doubles the chances you already had of dying during 2020.
    What about the long term effects?
    You may say that we could tolerate a certain percentage of people getting the virus and a smaller percentage dying, but with a virus that grows exponentially and has a two week delay achieving that is difficult.
    https://youtu.be/iaiQGJqZ6Y8
    On the long term effects
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715
    IanB2 said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    @IanB2 I thought the story was that the christening was in Italy at the rich Russian dudes house?

    Makes possible sense if the Russian dude is a godfather. And could send a private jet to collect everybody.
    There was a private jet from Perugia to Northolt on the Monday Bozo is supposed to have been sighted returning home. It was held up on the runway and left considerably delayed. By coincidence engagements the PM had planned with Patel later that morning were cancelled at the last minute.

    An additional little snippet is that Bozo’s ill fated zoom call to MPs, where his WiFi kept breaking up, falls on the afternoon after his purported sighting arriving in Perugia.

    Also worth noting that the first published claim that Bozo had been there came not from some random individual, but in an official press release issued by Perugia Airport.
    The Zoom was quite late in the day too; we had a discussion on it at the time. Did he do it just after arriving at his 'holiday destination'?
    And before evening cocktails?
  • Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 49,614
    IanB2 said:

    Qantas seven-hour flight to nowhere sells out in 10 minutes

    "It's probably the fastest selling flight in Qantas history," the airline's CEO, Alan Joyce, said in a statement.

    https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/flights-to-nowhere-qantas/index.html

    That’s actually quite a cool idea for somewhere like Australia, and they’re only selling half the seats on the plane.

    I keep seeing Airbus A380s flying circuits around DWC airport - they need to fly planes and pilots occasionally anyway, to stop both going rusty!
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080
    moonshine said:

    What to make of Witty and Valance going on the podium without any politicians?

    Could this be them setting out their case for a hard lockdown before tomorrow the PM says notwithstanding that, he is applying a more nuanced policy?

    Maybe the politicians have finally realised no-one is taking them seriously any more?
  • MysticroseMysticrose Posts: 4,688
    It's irrelevant and becoming boring. It won't be filled before Nov 3rd. The vetting and approval process takes months and involves endless wrangling and compromise.

    Virus news ... Johnson to address the nation tomorrow night. I hope we're not heading for lockdown. If people were more careful to follow the guidelines we might yet avoid it but it's astonishing how (deliberately) dumb some people are.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080
    Strictly, the statement that No 10 says was “wrong” is the one that said he landed at the airport at 2 pm. Easy to see how that could support a Clinton-denial.
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 49,614
    Here’s my prediction: The two scientists are going to spend an hour talking about R-numbers, case increases, safety precautions and possible next stages of the virus - to which all the journalists in the room are going to ask stupid questions about whether the prime minister took a private trip to get his child christened.
  • moonshine said:

    What to make of Witty and Valance going on the podium without any politicians?

    Could this be them setting out their case for a hard lockdown before tomorrow the PM says notwithstanding that, he is applying a more nuanced policy?

    It does seem a sensible move as opposition will have to address the scientists arguments making it more difficult to politicise it
  • tlg86 said:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/news/rail-franchising-reaches-the-terminus-as-a-new-railway-takes-shape

    Ministers today ended rail franchising after 24 years as the first step in bringing Britain’s fragmented network back together.

    The new system will create a simpler, more effective structure and will take shape over the coming months. The first stage, today, is moving operators onto transitional contracts to prepare the ground for the new railway.


    BBC reporting that the government has agreed to carry on with the current emergency funding for 18 months,

    It is long overdue and something HMG has said they would enact
  • MysticroseMysticrose Posts: 4,688
    IanB2 said:

    IanB2 said:

    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    Lockdown again is a waste of time. Compliance will be nowhere near what it was in the last one. That much is obvious from one weekend of the North East “lockdown”. Everyone is just getting on with it, ignoring the rules but being careful.

    My impression is that those who follow the rules are following them. Those that aren't aren't.
    The followers are hurting the economy, the non-followers are spreading the disease just as before.
    So the only effect really has been to keep the compliant away from spending any money.
    If they want to stop the disease then it is those who won't comply who need dealing with.
    As I said that is a choice.
    That’s not my experience. My anecdotal experience is that those who were very strict in following the rules the first time round are now not quite so strict.
    It's not really the "Not so strict" that are the problem though.
    It's the ones who egregiously insist on acting as if there is no problem, or can't be arsed, or who don't believe in it, or who are just too ignorant to cope with it all.
    The “not so strict” people occasionally going to see their friends or family without social distancing because “what’s the harm?” or “f*ck it” will be having an impact, and I include myself in that category.
    Then I would not include you in the "Not so strict" group.
    What does that mean? I know many people who last time wouldn’t even entertain the idea of seeing their friends or family who now are happy to have a coffee with a small group of their closest friends, or their close family, regardless of what the rules say.
    Which I imagine is because they're more confident/less afraid than they were months ago.
    I can imagine thats is certainly a big factor yeah.
    Only 307 healthy under 60s have died in England from Covid. My sense is that most people’s perceptions of the risk were orders of magnitude out at the start of the summer, but are coming slowly into line now, which would account for the decline In fearfulness.
    Of course, because it was new and scary, no-one knew the true facts or risks, and there were people like Sean (and the ‘experts‘ he was forever quoting) going round talking about millions of dead and bodies piling up at the end of the street.

    Time and experience helps most people put things into proportion. And it is an unavoidable fact that, for everyone except the elderly and ill, this virus on average tends not to be a big deal. It’s a big deal for society as a whole.

    One of the best factoids came quite early from R4 More or Less, which is that the virus roughly doubles the chances you already had of dying during 2020.
    What about the long term effects?
    You may say that we could tolerate a certain percentage of people getting the virus and a smaller percentage dying, but with a virus that grows exponentially and has a two week delay achieving that is difficult.
    I wasn’t suggesting anything other than supporting Anabob’s suggestion that time has allowed people to better assess their personal risks, and the steep age related profile in serious consequences.

    Very little is known about these long term side effects, but in younger people such cases reported so far do seem pretty rare.
    Gibberish and dangerous gibberish. It's typical of the right-wing nutjobs to start putting economic benefit above people's welfare. That's the end result and golden fleece of capitalism. Sod the people if you can make a profit.

    We know fully well what the long term effects are and so do you, so stop being disingenuous.

    It's a vicious virus. The US has just passed the 200,000 deaths mark and you mock the fact that some people like Sean thought deaths would be in the millions?

    You just wait until this winter has passed before spouting such inappropriate hubris.

    Have a good day everyone. Stay safe.
  • So, fun fun fun developments this morning:

    1. Whitty and Vallance being sent out on their own to berate us. If it's received badly or goes wrong, they will simply be thrown under the bus and replaced by Dildo. Cabinet demonstrating that they are gutless yellow cowards
    2. Shagger's mystery trip to Italy. All kinds of scandalous potential for what he was doing there with whom...
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080

    IanB2 said:

    IanB2 said:

    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    Lockdown again is a waste of time. Compliance will be nowhere near what it was in the last one. That much is obvious from one weekend of the North East “lockdown”. Everyone is just getting on with it, ignoring the rules but being careful.

    My impression is that those who follow the rules are following them. Those that aren't aren't.
    The followers are hurting the economy, the non-followers are spreading the disease just as before.
    So the only effect really has been to keep the compliant away from spending any money.
    If they want to stop the disease then it is those who won't comply who need dealing with.
    As I said that is a choice.
    That’s not my experience. My anecdotal experience is that those who were very strict in following the rules the first time round are now not quite so strict.
    It's not really the "Not so strict" that are the problem though.
    It's the ones who egregiously insist on acting as if there is no problem, or can't be arsed, or who don't believe in it, or who are just too ignorant to cope with it all.
    The “not so strict” people occasionally going to see their friends or family without social distancing because “what’s the harm?” or “f*ck it” will be having an impact, and I include myself in that category.
    Then I would not include you in the "Not so strict" group.
    What does that mean? I know many people who last time wouldn’t even entertain the idea of seeing their friends or family who now are happy to have a coffee with a small group of their closest friends, or their close family, regardless of what the rules say.
    Which I imagine is because they're more confident/less afraid than they were months ago.
    I can imagine thats is certainly a big factor yeah.
    Only 307 healthy under 60s have died in England from Covid. My sense is that most people’s perceptions of the risk were orders of magnitude out at the start of the summer, but are coming slowly into line now, which would account for the decline In fearfulness.
    Of course, because it was new and scary, no-one knew the true facts or risks, and there were people like Sean (and the ‘experts‘ he was forever quoting) going round talking about millions of dead and bodies piling up at the end of the street.

    Time and experience helps most people put things into proportion. And it is an unavoidable fact that, for everyone except the elderly and ill, this virus on average tends not to be a big deal. It’s a big deal for society as a whole.

    One of the best factoids came quite early from R4 More or Less, which is that the virus roughly doubles the chances you already had of dying during 2020.
    What about the long term effects?
    You may say that we could tolerate a certain percentage of people getting the virus and a smaller percentage dying, but with a virus that grows exponentially and has a two week delay achieving that is difficult.
    I wasn’t suggesting anything other than supporting Anabob’s suggestion that time has allowed people to better assess their personal risks, and the steep age related profile in serious consequences.

    Very little is known about these long term side effects, but in younger people such cases reported so far do seem pretty rare.
    Gibberish and dangerous gibberish. It's typical of the right-wing nutjobs to start putting economic benefit above people's welfare. That's the end result and golden fleece of capitalism. Sod the people if you can make a profit.

    We know fully well what the long term effects are and so do you, so stop being disingenuous.

    It's a vicious virus. The US has just passed the 200,000 deaths mark and you mock the fact that some people like Sean thought deaths would be in the millions?

    You just wait until this winter has passed before spouting such inappropriate hubris.

    Have a good day everyone. Stay safe.
    Sean’s figures were for the UK only.
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,072

    tlg86 said:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/news/rail-franchising-reaches-the-terminus-as-a-new-railway-takes-shape

    Ministers today ended rail franchising after 24 years as the first step in bringing Britain’s fragmented network back together.

    The new system will create a simpler, more effective structure and will take shape over the coming months. The first stage, today, is moving operators onto transitional contracts to prepare the ground for the new railway.


    BBC reporting that the government has agreed to carry on with the current emergency funding for 18 months,

    It is long overdue and something HMG has said they would enact
    Another Ed Milliband policy successfully delivered isn’t it?
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 49,614

    tlg86 said:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/news/rail-franchising-reaches-the-terminus-as-a-new-railway-takes-shape

    Ministers today ended rail franchising after 24 years as the first step in bringing Britain’s fragmented network back together.

    The new system will create a simpler, more effective structure and will take shape over the coming months. The first stage, today, is moving operators onto transitional contracts to prepare the ground for the new railway.


    BBC reporting that the government has agreed to carry on with the current emergency funding for 18 months,

    It is long overdue and something HMG has said they would enact
    The railway business model has been completely broken by the virus. Given all the more historic problems as well, now is probably not a bad time for some out-of-the-box thinking - hopefully to be accompanied by some modernisation of railway labour practices too.
  • tlg86 said:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/news/rail-franchising-reaches-the-terminus-as-a-new-railway-takes-shape

    Ministers today ended rail franchising after 24 years as the first step in bringing Britain’s fragmented network back together.

    The new system will create a simpler, more effective structure and will take shape over the coming months. The first stage, today, is moving operators onto transitional contracts to prepare the ground for the new railway.


    BBC reporting that the government has agreed to carry on with the current emergency funding for 18 months,

    It is long overdue and something HMG has said they would enact
    Another Ed Milliband policy successfully delivered isn’t it?
    It does look like a variation on the theme
  • From the people who wanted the government to pay delboy trotters and Athur Daleys for PPE....
    Isn't that what happened anyway?
    No they paid their mates and cronies, who in turn paid Delboy and Daley after skimming off the toffs cut.
  • nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
  • He quite clearly meant 200,000 dead which was the grim milestone they just passed and said 200,000,000 by mistake.

    Up to the American voters to determine which is worse: a POTUS candidate who said the wrong word by mistake, or a POTUS who dismissed the virus as a hoax, has undermined medical advice throughout and now have 200,000 dead, with now more per capita dead than in the UK despite them having a population density a tiny fraction of what we have.
  • Allegations re Boris are not being covered by the media so I assume caution is needed on this subject
  • nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
  • Dura_AceDura_Ace Posts: 12,880

    So, fun fun fun developments this morning:

    1. Whitty and Vallance being sent out on their own to berate us. If it's received badly or goes wrong, they will simply be thrown under the bus and replaced by Dildo. Cabinet demonstrating that they are gutless yellow cowards
    2. Shagger's mystery trip to Italy. All kinds of scandalous potential for what he was doing there with whom...

    He was obviously there to gargle Lebedev's balls.
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 27,007
    edited September 2020
    Sandpit said:

    tlg86 said:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/news/rail-franchising-reaches-the-terminus-as-a-new-railway-takes-shape

    Ministers today ended rail franchising after 24 years as the first step in bringing Britain’s fragmented network back together.

    The new system will create a simpler, more effective structure and will take shape over the coming months. The first stage, today, is moving operators onto transitional contracts to prepare the ground for the new railway.


    BBC reporting that the government has agreed to carry on with the current emergency funding for 18 months,

    It is long overdue and something HMG has said they would enact
    The railway business model has been completely broken by the virus. Given all the more historic problems as well, now is probably not a bad time for some out-of-the-box thinking - hopefully to be accompanied by some modernisation of railway labour practices too.
    Practically speaking it doesn't make much difference. We've had management contracts at various points before for failed franchises, this just means that they're now all on that basis. The financial risk on paper transfers to the DfT, however as franchising hasn't been viable for a while "cap and collar" arrangements have allowed the likes of firstGroup to hand the financial risk on gWr back to the DfT anyway.

    What the government are going to have to do now is decide what they want the railway system to deliver. They have been micromanaging for years - this franchise will assume x passenger growth running services y using rolling stock z. Now they get to decide on the big stuff - is it a commuter railway, a freight railway, a leisure travel railway?
  • Dura_Ace said:

    So, fun fun fun developments this morning:

    1. Whitty and Vallance being sent out on their own to berate us. If it's received badly or goes wrong, they will simply be thrown under the bus and replaced by Dildo. Cabinet demonstrating that they are gutless yellow cowards
    2. Shagger's mystery trip to Italy. All kinds of scandalous potential for what he was doing there with whom...

    He was obviously there to gargle Lebedev's balls.
    Ewwwww
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,754
    If you are convinced that the virus remains a great enough threat to public health that drastic action is needed the only policy that makes sense to me is to make University teaching online and virtual and ask students to stay home rather than going to their new accommodation over the next couple of weeks. If they go we will not see an R rate below 1 this side of Christmas, no matter what else we do.

    The consequence of this is that the largest part of the price will be paid by those least at risk. This strikes me as unfair and unreasonable but, let's face it, it wouldn't be the first time. I can see our scientists making this case, possibly even today.
  • Sky just stopped Professor Ashton accusing Boris of being in Perugia

  • Allegations re Boris are not being covered by the media so I assume caution is needed on this subject

    Indeed. May well tie into the alleged super-injunction or a new one or whatever. Hence me not making allegations. However, we know that Shagger has a history of philandering and lying, so I'm not taking Downing Street's dance on a pinhead denial in good faith.
  • nico679nico679 Posts: 4,530
    I should add two earlier polls on the SC had a much more partisan split . They were YouGov and RMG taken on the 19th , the Reuter’s Ipsos was done 19th and 20th , they still showed 10+ points advantage for delaying the nomination .
  • Interesting that John Ashton going on another rant against Boris on Sky just mentioned the Perugia allegaton and Kay Burley immediately interupted him and stopped him and said that's been denied and there is no evidence for that.

    Funny how John Ashton keeps coming on the media being introduced as "Former Public Health Director" and never introduced as "lifelong Socialist, campaigner and Labour Party member".
  • IanB2 said:

    Strictly, the statement that No 10 says was “wrong” is the one that said he landed at the airport at 2 pm. Easy to see how that could support a Clinton-denial.
    Pesto's been on the case;

    https://twitter.com/Peston/status/1307933782889107456?s=09

    Though is either of the parents RC? Mixing up the Abbey and Cathedral feels like the sort of mistake made by someone who doesn't frequent either.
    (Though the idea that Boris's exhaustion is due to diligent preparation for reception into the Holy Mother Church is a cheering one.)
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,557
    Fishing said:

    Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    kamski said:

    There must be conservatives on the supreme court who are worried that the majority of americans lose all faith in the supreme court as an institution who must be against pushing through a nomination.

    There is one - Roberts.
    Thomas and Alito ? You’re joking. Kavanaugh clearly doesn’t give much of a damn about public opinion; Gorsuch, unlikely, but time will tell.

    If the Republicans seat another Justice after what they pulled with Garland, because it’s ‘within their rights’, I think it almost certain a Democratic Senate majority will expand the court, since that is equally ‘within their rights’.

    On the second point, even Senate moderates agree.

    https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/for-mitch-mcconnell-keeping-his-senate-majority-matters-more-than-the-supreme-court
    ... Senator Tim Kaine, of Virginia, who is ordinarily a mainstream Democrat, has said he could support enlarging the court as a tactic, if the Republicans force a confirmation vote...
    They should remember what happened to the last President who tried that.
    They do.
    The circumstances are not remotely comparable.
  • OllyTOllyT Posts: 4,911
    edited September 2020

    Lockdown again is a waste of time. Compliance will be nowhere near what it was in the last one. That much is obvious from one weekend of the North East “lockdown”. Everyone is just getting on with it, ignoring the rules but being careful.

    On a similar theme we came back from Europe via the tunnel yesterday. 48 hours before arriving we were required to each complete a Passenger Locator form on line, receive an email confirmation and code and and this had to be printed out or available on the phone and be produced before arriving in the UK. The Government website said that anyone who had failed to do this could expect a lengthy delay.

    To cut a long story short we sailed through and nobody even mentioned it let alone asked to see it. I also know that we are required to quarantine for 14 days but again nobody mentioned this or provided any information telling us what that actually meant. In short we could have waltzed back into the UK without even being aware there was a pandemic in progress.

    Seems typical of the government's handling of the virus from start to finish. Lots of fine words and sod all delivery.
  • DavidL said:

    If you are convinced that the virus remains a great enough threat to public health that drastic action is needed the only policy that makes sense to me is to make University teaching online and virtual and ask students to stay home rather than going to their new accommodation over the next couple of weeks. If they go we will not see an R rate below 1 this side of Christmas, no matter what else we do.

    The consequence of this is that the largest part of the price will be paid by those least at risk. This strikes me as unfair and unreasonable but, let's face it, it wouldn't be the first time. I can see our scientists making this case, possibly even today.

    The alternative option is to make Universities "bubbles" and tell students to stay at university and not go home, not visit their parents or grandparents etc
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080

    Allegations re Boris are not being covered by the media so I assume caution is needed on this subject

    Reputable journalists are covering them on Twitter, so there’s clearly no injunction.

    Anyhow, Bozo planning his little escapade will have made absolutely sure Italy wasn’t going onto the quarantine list (and indeed may explain why the EU ‘air corridors’ were introduced so rapidly after the initial universal quarantine policy). So it’s not all bad. ;)
  • NerysHughesNerysHughes Posts: 3,346
    edited September 2020

    nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
    In July I said that infections would rise because people would feel they were invincible and would stop socially distancing. Thats exactly what has happened. Compare a supermarket now to May/June.
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483

    nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
    In July I said that infections would rise because people would feel they were invincible and would stop socially distancing. Thats exactly what has happened. Compare a supermarket now to May/June.
    Nothing to do with masks all to do with people either ignoring the rules or like you, idiots.
  • OllyT said:

    Lockdown again is a waste of time. Compliance will be nowhere near what it was in the last one. That much is obvious from one weekend of the North East “lockdown”. Everyone is just getting on with it, ignoring the rules but being careful.

    On a similar theme we came back from Europe via the tunnel yesterday. 48 hours before arriving we were required to each complete a Passenger Locator form on line, receive an email confirmation and code and and this had to be printed out or available on the phone and be produced before arriving in the UK. The Government website said that anyone who had failed to do this could expect a lengthy delay.

    To cut a long story short we sailed through and nobody even mentioned it let alone asked to see it. I also know that we are required to quarantine for 14 days but again nobody mentioned this or provided any information telling us what that actually meant. In short we could have waltzed back into the UK without even being aware there was a pandemic in progress.

    Seems typical of the government's handling of the virus from start to finish. Lots of fine words and sod all delivery.
    I've been saying this for a while. Checking is minimal with a lot of people able to just walk through. The absolute minimal thing we could do is a check at the border. Every person entering the UK (except via ROI) has to show their passport. "Can I see your Passenger Locator form" has to be the question asked every single time. Its so simple. Yet Shitty Patel can't even manage that.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797

    nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
    In July I said that infections would rise because people would feel they were invincible and would stop socially distancing. Thats exactly what has happened. Compare a supermarket now to May/June.
    Is it better to high a slightly higher infection rate but low death rate (due to reduced viral load) or a lower infection rate but higher death rate.

    @NerysHughes you seem to prefer less infections but more deaths.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,754

    DavidL said:

    If you are convinced that the virus remains a great enough threat to public health that drastic action is needed the only policy that makes sense to me is to make University teaching online and virtual and ask students to stay home rather than going to their new accommodation over the next couple of weeks. If they go we will not see an R rate below 1 this side of Christmas, no matter what else we do.

    The consequence of this is that the largest part of the price will be paid by those least at risk. This strikes me as unfair and unreasonable but, let's face it, it wouldn't be the first time. I can see our scientists making this case, possibly even today.

    The alternative option is to make Universities "bubbles" and tell students to stay at university and not go home, not visit their parents or grandparents etc
    That's completely impractical and impossible. Students go to bars (yes, really, sometimes even when they might be studying instead), shops and our city centres. Very few campuses are locked away in their own part of the city. Many thousands of these students come from abroad like the 3 Irish girls who my nephew is to be sharing with. Its almost inevitable some of these will by asymptomatically infected. We either accept a much higher rate of infection or we stop them travelling. It's a tough choice.
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483

    Interesting that John Ashton going on another rant against Boris on Sky just mentioned the Perugia allegaton and Kay Burley immediately interupted him and stopped him and said that's been denied and there is no evidence for that.

    Funny how John Ashton keeps coming on the media being introduced as "Former Public Health Director" and never introduced as "lifelong Socialist, campaigner and Labour Party member".

    Do you know of anyone introduced as life long conservative campaigner and party member?
  • nichomar said:

    Interesting that John Ashton going on another rant against Boris on Sky just mentioned the Perugia allegaton and Kay Burley immediately interupted him and stopped him and said that's been denied and there is no evidence for that.

    Funny how John Ashton keeps coming on the media being introduced as "Former Public Health Director" and never introduced as "lifelong Socialist, campaigner and Labour Party member".

    Do you know of anyone introduced as life long conservative campaigner and party member?
    It is happening on the BBC across the political divide
  • It will probably be labelled as xenophobic again to remind people that the oligarch in Perugia, Evgeny Lebedev is the son of a KGB and FSB agent who worked at the London embassy and somehow managed to acquire $4bn. The father, the (ex?) KGB/FSB agent is also often in Perugia and meets Johnson.

    The son has recently been appointed by Johnson to the House of Lords.

    This week we also find out that Putins former deputy finance minister, married to Lubov Chernukhin who paid the Tory party £160k to play tennis with Johnson and Cameron (and another £1.5m for other reasons), received $8m from another Russian oligarch with ties to Putin.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,583

    nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
    In July I said that infections would rise because people would feel they were invincible and would stop socially distancing. Thats exactly what has happened. Compare a supermarket now to May/June.
    In May/June one hunter gatherer from each household tentatively braved the supermarket. On arrival we queued for half a mile at 2 metre intervals. We could not go to pubs and restaurants and our children were off school.

    Here in Wales mask wearing became mandatory two weeks ago. So prior to that date we were all partying down the pub like England, but mask-free. The current Covid situation remains similar to England.
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483

    OllyT said:

    Lockdown again is a waste of time. Compliance will be nowhere near what it was in the last one. That much is obvious from one weekend of the North East “lockdown”. Everyone is just getting on with it, ignoring the rules but being careful.

    On a similar theme we came back from Europe via the tunnel yesterday. 48 hours before arriving we were required to each complete a Passenger Locator form on line, receive an email confirmation and code and and this had to be printed out or available on the phone and be produced before arriving in the UK. The Government website said that anyone who had failed to do this could expect a lengthy delay.

    To cut a long story short we sailed through and nobody even mentioned it let alone asked to see it. I also know that we are required to quarantine for 14 days but again nobody mentioned this or provided any information telling us what that actually meant. In short we could have waltzed back into the UK without even being aware there was a pandemic in progress.

    Seems typical of the government's handling of the virus from start to finish. Lots of fine words and sod all delivery.
    I've been saying this for a while. Checking is minimal with a lot of people able to just walk through. The absolute minimal thing we could do is a check at the border. Every person entering the UK (except via ROI) has to show their passport. "Can I see your Passenger Locator form" has to be the question asked every single time. Its so simple. Yet Shitty Patel can't even manage that.
    Electronic gates can’t ask you for PLF
  • nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
    In July I said that infections would rise because people would feel they were invincible and would stop socially distancing. Thats exactly what has happened. Compare a supermarket now to May/June.
    In May/June one hunter gatherer from each household tentatively braved the supermarket. On arrival we queued for half a mile at 2 metre intervals. We could not go to pubs and restaurants and our children were off school.

    Here in Wales mask wearing became mandatory two weeks ago. So prior to that date we were all partying down the pub like England, but mask-free. The current Covid situation remains similar to England.
    So what difference did not wearing masks in Wales make?
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483

    nichomar said:

    Interesting that John Ashton going on another rant against Boris on Sky just mentioned the Perugia allegaton and Kay Burley immediately interupted him and stopped him and said that's been denied and there is no evidence for that.

    Funny how John Ashton keeps coming on the media being introduced as "Former Public Health Director" and never introduced as "lifelong Socialist, campaigner and Labour Party member".

    Do you know of anyone introduced as life long conservative campaigner and party member?
    It is happening on the BBC across the political divide
    Never heard it name a few then
  • eek said:

    nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
    In July I said that infections would rise because people would feel they were invincible and would stop socially distancing. Thats exactly what has happened. Compare a supermarket now to May/June.
    Is it better to high a slightly higher infection rate but low death rate (due to reduced viral load) or a lower infection rate but higher death rate.

    @NerysHughes you seem to prefer less infections but more deaths.
    FFS you think I want more people to die! My whole point about masks was that we had got into an excellent position with Covid, deaths were minimal as were infections, then we made the big change to mask wearing and since then infections have started increasing.
  • nichomar said:

    nichomar said:

    Interesting that John Ashton going on another rant against Boris on Sky just mentioned the Perugia allegaton and Kay Burley immediately interupted him and stopped him and said that's been denied and there is no evidence for that.

    Funny how John Ashton keeps coming on the media being introduced as "Former Public Health Director" and never introduced as "lifelong Socialist, campaigner and Labour Party member".

    Do you know of anyone introduced as life long conservative campaigner and party member?
    It is happening on the BBC across the political divide
    Never heard it name a few then
    It is happening on the the BBC under the new DG and I expect it to become common in the media, as it should
  • rkrkrkrkrkrk Posts: 7,879

    rkrkrk said:

    Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    kamski said:

    There must be conservatives on the supreme court who are worried that the majority of americans lose all faith in the supreme court as an institution who must be against pushing through a nomination.

    There is one - Roberts.
    Thomas and Alito ? You’re joking. Kavanaugh clearly doesn’t give much of a damn about public opinion; Gorsuch, unlikely, but time will tell.

    If the Republicans seat another Justice after what they pulled with Garland, because it’s ‘within their rights’, I think it almost certain a Democratic Senate majority will expand the court, since that is equally ‘within their rights’.

    On the second point, even Senate moderates agree.

    https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/for-mitch-mcconnell-keeping-his-senate-majority-matters-more-than-the-supreme-court
    ... Senator Tim Kaine, of Virginia, who is ordinarily a mainstream Democrat, has said he could support enlarging the court as a tactic, if the Republicans force a confirmation vote...
    Doubt Dems would get 50 senators lined up on that.

    I think it's a pretty simple decision for a man with no scruples. Mitch is going to make sure there's a conservative majority.
    Why do you doubt that? Seems to be an increasingly mainstream view in the Democratic Party. The GOP has been trampling on conventions for years, now its time for the Dems to play dirty otherwise their legislative agenda will just be picked apart by the court for years to come.
    Oh I agree that the democrats *should* wake up and realize they are playing by rules the other side have been ignoring for years. But they aren't going to.

    Biden said he wouldn't try it last year. Even if he changes his mind, they would need to win the Senate AND have basically all Democratic senators on board. The likes of Joe Manchin are just not going to go along with it.

    https://iowastartingline.com/2019/07/05/joe-biden-interview-talk-about-the-future-in-dem-primary/
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483

    nichomar said:

    nichomar said:

    Interesting that John Ashton going on another rant against Boris on Sky just mentioned the Perugia allegaton and Kay Burley immediately interupted him and stopped him and said that's been denied and there is no evidence for that.

    Funny how John Ashton keeps coming on the media being introduced as "Former Public Health Director" and never introduced as "lifelong Socialist, campaigner and Labour Party member".

    Do you know of anyone introduced as life long conservative campaigner and party member?
    It is happening on the BBC across the political divide
    Never heard it name a few then
    It is happening on the the BBC under the new DG and I expect it to become common in the media, as it should
    The one that is a life long conservative and vice chairman of his constituency association?
  • eek said:

    nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
    In July I said that infections would rise because people would feel they were invincible and would stop socially distancing. Thats exactly what has happened. Compare a supermarket now to May/June.
    Is it better to high a slightly higher infection rate but low death rate (due to reduced viral load) or a lower infection rate but higher death rate.

    @NerysHughes you seem to prefer less infections but more deaths.
    FFS you think I want more people to die! My whole point about masks was that we had got into an excellent position with Covid, deaths were minimal as were infections, then we made the big change to mask wearing and since then infections have started increasing.
    We were in lockdown you Muppet. Did you want us to remain in lockdown forever?
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    nichomar said:

    OllyT said:

    Lockdown again is a waste of time. Compliance will be nowhere near what it was in the last one. That much is obvious from one weekend of the North East “lockdown”. Everyone is just getting on with it, ignoring the rules but being careful.

    On a similar theme we came back from Europe via the tunnel yesterday. 48 hours before arriving we were required to each complete a Passenger Locator form on line, receive an email confirmation and code and and this had to be printed out or available on the phone and be produced before arriving in the UK. The Government website said that anyone who had failed to do this could expect a lengthy delay.

    To cut a long story short we sailed through and nobody even mentioned it let alone asked to see it. I also know that we are required to quarantine for 14 days but again nobody mentioned this or provided any information telling us what that actually meant. In short we could have waltzed back into the UK without even being aware there was a pandemic in progress.

    Seems typical of the government's handling of the virus from start to finish. Lots of fine words and sod all delivery.
    I've been saying this for a while. Checking is minimal with a lot of people able to just walk through. The absolute minimal thing we could do is a check at the border. Every person entering the UK (except via ROI) has to show their passport. "Can I see your Passenger Locator form" has to be the question asked every single time. Its so simple. Yet Shitty Patel can't even manage that.
    Electronic gates can’t ask you for PLF
    It seems every single electronic gate I ever go through has a human standing next to it explaining its use, so they could be repurposed, or multitasked.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,557

    It's irrelevant and becoming boring. It won't be filled before Nov 3rd. The vetting and approval process takes months and involves endless wrangling and compromise...

    It really doesn’t ; that is just convention. And what does that matter to McConnell ?
    With a pre-vetted candidate (anyone already on the circuit court) the process could be done in a fortnight.

    It’s also possible the process will start before the election and finish during the lame duck session.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,583

    nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
    In July I said that infections would rise because people would feel they were invincible and would stop socially distancing. Thats exactly what has happened. Compare a supermarket now to May/June.
    In May/June one hunter gatherer from each household tentatively braved the supermarket. On arrival we queued for half a mile at 2 metre intervals. We could not go to pubs and restaurants and our children were off school.

    Here in Wales mask wearing became mandatory two weeks ago. So prior to that date we were all partying down the pub like England, but mask-free. The current Covid situation remains similar to England.
    So what difference did not wearing masks in Wales make?
    You are now conveniently arguing from the diametrically opposed point of view. Wear a mask because it is one strand of a suite of precautions we need to take to keep ourselves and others safe. Mask wearing is not the magic bullet on its own.
  • nichomarnichomar Posts: 7,483

    eek said:

    nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
    In July I said that infections would rise because people would feel they were invincible and would stop socially distancing. Thats exactly what has happened. Compare a supermarket now to May/June.
    Is it better to high a slightly higher infection rate but low death rate (due to reduced viral load) or a lower infection rate but higher death rate.

    @NerysHughes you seem to prefer less infections but more deaths.
    FFS you think I want more people to die! My whole point about masks was that we had got into an excellent position with Covid, deaths were minimal as were infections, then we made the big change to mask wearing and since then infections have started increasing.
    If people had followed the rules you may have kept infections down, nothing to do with masks in fact they should have been mandated for everyone in all public spaces indoors and outdoors.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,583

    eek said:

    nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
    In July I said that infections would rise because people would feel they were invincible and would stop socially distancing. Thats exactly what has happened. Compare a supermarket now to May/June.
    Is it better to high a slightly higher infection rate but low death rate (due to reduced viral load) or a lower infection rate but higher death rate.

    @NerysHughes you seem to prefer less infections but more deaths.
    FFS you think I want more people to die! My whole point about masks was that we had got into an excellent position with Covid, deaths were minimal as were infections, then we made the big change to mask wearing and since then infections have started increasing.

    Johnson encouraged us to go to the pub and the office and we went on foreign holidays, which we were not doing in May and June.
  • contrariancontrarian Posts: 5,818
    Interesting choice for labour now.

    Will they back the government on emergency powers, or support Brady & Co? They may well have the balance of power here.
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715

    IanB2 said:

    Strictly, the statement that No 10 says was “wrong” is the one that said he landed at the airport at 2 pm. Easy to see how that could support a Clinton-denial.
    Pesto's been on the case;

    https://twitter.com/Peston/status/1307933782889107456?s=09

    Though is either of the parents RC? Mixing up the Abbey and Cathedral feels like the sort of mistake made by someone who doesn't frequent either.
    (Though the idea that Boris's exhaustion is due to diligent preparation for reception into the Holy Mother Church is a cheering one.)
    LOL.

    Don't Churches of England (etc) keep a record of baptisms any more.

    Recently found a very interesting, and informative, one which has solved an ancestral mystery for two families..
  • OllyTOllyT Posts: 4,911

    nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    It's happening because a significant number of idiots, no doubt including yourself, don't bother with mask wearing and pack out pubs, don't wear a mask on public transport and go on pub crawls from South Wales to Doncaster etc etc.

    The virus is being spread by the selfish sods who ignore the rules not by the people who are doing their best to comply with what they are being asked.. If you really can't see that then you really are extremely dim. Your arguments have been torn to shreds on numerous occasions yet you bounce back with the same old drivel.
  • At the time Boris was allegedly in Italy, he did the Zoom call with the whole of parliamentary conservative party.

    I doubt Bozzo is good with the virtual backgrounds etc and if he was in an odd location, I am sure at least one MP won't be able to resist saying so.
  • Andy_CookeAndy_Cooke Posts: 4,793
    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    Wow.

    So, if 0.8% at least of tests are false positives, that implies we had a sustained period of -0.2% as the real figure.

    I'm really not sure how that could even work.

  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715

    At the time Boris was allegedly in Italy, he did the Zoom call with the whole of parliamentary conservative party.

    I doubt Bozzo is good with the virtual backgrounds etc and if he was in an odd location, I am sure at least one MP won't be able to resist saying so.

    As PM Johnson surely has people who will do the virtual backgrounds for him. I rather like them. Acts as an ice-breaker in discussions.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797

    IanB2 said:

    Strictly, the statement that No 10 says was “wrong” is the one that said he landed at the airport at 2 pm. Easy to see how that could support a Clinton-denial.
    Pesto's been on the case;

    https://twitter.com/Peston/status/1307933782889107456?s=09

    Though is either of the parents RC? Mixing up the Abbey and Cathedral feels like the sort of mistake made by someone who doesn't frequent either.
    (Though the idea that Boris's exhaustion is due to diligent preparation for reception into the Holy Mother Church is a cheering one.)
    LOL.

    Don't Churches of England (etc) keep a record of baptisms any more.

    Recently found a very interesting, and informative, one which has solved an ancestral mystery for two families..
    All churches do - so there should be paperwork.

    Unless the priest did the baptism in a different church (say a private chapel in Italy).
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,583
    edited September 2020

    Interesting choice for labour now.

    Will they back the government on emergency powers, or support Brady & Co? They may well have the balance of power here.

    Not even a choice. Emergency powers.
  • Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    Wow.

    So, if 0.8% at least of tests are false positives, that implies we had a sustained period of -0.2% as the real figure.

    I'm really not sure how that could even work.

    And we have gone from -0.2% to +0.7%

    Interesting times.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797

    eek said:

    nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
    In July I said that infections would rise because people would feel they were invincible and would stop socially distancing. Thats exactly what has happened. Compare a supermarket now to May/June.
    Is it better to high a slightly higher infection rate but low death rate (due to reduced viral load) or a lower infection rate but higher death rate.

    @NerysHughes you seem to prefer less infections but more deaths.
    FFS you think I want more people to die! My whole point about masks was that we had got into an excellent position with Covid, deaths were minimal as were infections, then we made the big change to mask wearing and since then infections have started increasing.
    Read back as that was exactly what you were arguing for - things needed to change to allow what is left of the economy to continue - that means masks as it's the best solution for what is otherwise an unfixable problem
  • Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    Wow.

    So, if 0.8% at least of tests are false positives, that implies we had a sustained period of -0.2% as the real figure.

    I'm really not sure how that could even work.

    And we have gone from -0.2% to +0.7%

    Interesting times.
    Does this mean that R is -3.5?

    --AS
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,583

    eek said:

    nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
    In July I said that infections would rise because people would feel they were invincible and would stop socially distancing. Thats exactly what has happened. Compare a supermarket now to May/June.
    Is it better to high a slightly higher infection rate but low death rate (due to reduced viral load) or a lower infection rate but higher death rate.

    @NerysHughes you seem to prefer less infections but more deaths.
    FFS you think I want more people to die! My whole point about masks was that we had got into an excellent position with Covid, deaths were minimal as were infections, then we made the big change to mask wearing and since then infections have started increasing.
    But the two facts aren't mutually inclusive. At the same time we were told to wear masks we were told to do "dangerous" stuff like use public transport and send our children to school.
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 49,614

    nichomar said:

    nichomar said:

    Interesting that John Ashton going on another rant against Boris on Sky just mentioned the Perugia allegaton and Kay Burley immediately interupted him and stopped him and said that's been denied and there is no evidence for that.

    Funny how John Ashton keeps coming on the media being introduced as "Former Public Health Director" and never introduced as "lifelong Socialist, campaigner and Labour Party member".

    Do you know of anyone introduced as life long conservative campaigner and party member?
    It is happening on the BBC across the political divide
    Never heard it name a few then
    It is happening on the the BBC under the new DG and I expect it to become common in the media, as it should
    Guido has a long-running thread on guests introduced by very misleading titles of omission. The TV media are getting slowly better at it, but still a long way to go.

    It’s quite amazing how many people now working as ‘head of a think tank’ stood for Parliament at the last election.
  • contrariancontrarian Posts: 5,818


    Interesting choice for labour now.

    Will they back the government on emergency powers, or support Brady & Co? They may well have the balance of power here.

    Not even a choice. Emergency powers.
    Yes I guess so but it kinda makes them own the Johnson chaos to come.

  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,583


    Interesting choice for labour now.

    Will they back the government on emergency powers, or support Brady & Co? They may well have the balance of power here.

    Not even a choice. Emergency powers.
    Yes I guess so but it kinda makes them own the Johnson chaos to come.

    Not really. Johnson has ALL the advice from Government experts at his fingertips to do the right thing, and Labour will be taking him at his word.

    Hands washed...for 20 seconds.
  • Allowing people to go on foreign holidays over the summer is now looking like an enormous mistake. It may have been crowd-pleasing but it will end up costing the government far more than it would have to simply prop up the travel industry for a few months.
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 49,614
    nichomar said:

    eek said:

    nichomar said:

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    So from the date that masks were introuduced in shops the percentage of positive cases started increasing
    You would but then you’re an idiot.
    An idiot eh, everything I said that would happen has happened.
    That's not true. And there's mounting evidence that due to masks people are getting weak infections due to lower viral load so are recovering and not dying from the illness.
    In July I said that infections would rise because people would feel they were invincible and would stop socially distancing. Thats exactly what has happened. Compare a supermarket now to May/June.
    Is it better to high a slightly higher infection rate but low death rate (due to reduced viral load) or a lower infection rate but higher death rate.

    @NerysHughes you seem to prefer less infections but more deaths.
    FFS you think I want more people to die! My whole point about masks was that we had got into an excellent position with Covid, deaths were minimal as were infections, then we made the big change to mask wearing and since then infections have started increasing.
    If people had followed the rules you may have kept infections down, nothing to do with masks in fact they should have been mandated for everyone in all public spaces indoors and outdoors.
    Yes, how the hell is this still contentious?

    The only reason for not mandating mask wearing in oublic was back in March and April when every mask the country could get their hands on was needed for key workers. Now there’s no longer a supply problem they need to be made mandatory outside your home.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,583
    Sandpit said:

    nichomar said:

    nichomar said:

    Interesting that John Ashton going on another rant against Boris on Sky just mentioned the Perugia allegaton and Kay Burley immediately interupted him and stopped him and said that's been denied and there is no evidence for that.

    Funny how John Ashton keeps coming on the media being introduced as "Former Public Health Director" and never introduced as "lifelong Socialist, campaigner and Labour Party member".

    Do you know of anyone introduced as life long conservative campaigner and party member?
    It is happening on the BBC across the political divide
    Never heard it name a few then
    It is happening on the the BBC under the new DG and I expect it to become common in the media, as it should
    Guido has a long-running thread on guests introduced by very misleading titles of omission. The TV media are getting slowly better at it, but still a long way to go.

    It’s quite amazing how many people now working as ‘head of a think tank’ stood for Parliament at the last election.
    Since when has Guido been the go-to for non-partisanship?
  • DavidL said:

    If you are convinced that the virus remains a great enough threat to public health that drastic action is needed the only policy that makes sense to me is to make University teaching online and virtual and ask students to stay home rather than going to their new accommodation over the next couple of weeks. If they go we will not see an R rate below 1 this side of Christmas, no matter what else we do.

    The consequence of this is that the largest part of the price will be paid by those least at risk. This strikes me as unfair and unreasonable but, let's face it, it wouldn't be the first time. I can see our scientists making this case, possibly even today.

    The young getting infected builds herd immunity and so fewer infections later on among vulnerable groups.
  • edmundintokyoedmundintokyo Posts: 17,136
    edited September 2020

    Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    Wow.

    So, if 0.8% at least of tests are false positives, that implies we had a sustained period of -0.2% as the real figure.

    I'm really not sure how that could even work.

    IIUC when the infection rate is low the false positive rate is also low, because false positives tend to come from somebody contaminating a negative sample with somebody else's positive sample, and you can't do that unless you have positive samples.

    * Unless you count people as false positive if they correctly detected positive with the virus but the detected virus was mostly dead, ie they're infected but potentially cured
  • eek said:

    IanB2 said:

    Strictly, the statement that No 10 says was “wrong” is the one that said he landed at the airport at 2 pm. Easy to see how that could support a Clinton-denial.
    Pesto's been on the case;

    https://twitter.com/Peston/status/1307933782889107456?s=09

    Though is either of the parents RC? Mixing up the Abbey and Cathedral feels like the sort of mistake made by someone who doesn't frequent either.
    (Though the idea that Boris's exhaustion is due to diligent preparation for reception into the Holy Mother Church is a cheering one.)
    LOL.

    Don't Churches of England (etc) keep a record of baptisms any more.

    Recently found a very interesting, and informative, one which has solved an ancestral mystery for two families..
    All churches do - so there should be paperwork.

    Unless the priest did the baptism in a different church (say a private chapel in Italy).
    Even then, I'd expect records somewhere. I got married in my college chapel, and we had to borrow the register from the parish church.

    Like the was he at the airport question, the records exist and would be hard to be confused about.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,728

    Interesting choice for labour now.

    Will they back the government on emergency powers, or support Brady & Co? They may well have the balance of power here.

    https://twitter.com/joncstone/status/1307942541673848832
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    edited September 2020

    eek said:

    IanB2 said:

    Strictly, the statement that No 10 says was “wrong” is the one that said he landed at the airport at 2 pm. Easy to see how that could support a Clinton-denial.
    Pesto's been on the case;

    https://twitter.com/Peston/status/1307933782889107456?s=09

    Though is either of the parents RC? Mixing up the Abbey and Cathedral feels like the sort of mistake made by someone who doesn't frequent either.
    (Though the idea that Boris's exhaustion is due to diligent preparation for reception into the Holy Mother Church is a cheering one.)
    LOL.

    Don't Churches of England (etc) keep a record of baptisms any more.

    Recently found a very interesting, and informative, one which has solved an ancestral mystery for two families..
    All churches do - so there should be paperwork.

    Unless the priest did the baptism in a different church (say a private chapel in Italy).
    Even then, I'd expect records somewhere. I got married in my college chapel, and we had to borrow the register from the parish church.

    Like the was he at the airport question, the records exist and would be hard to be confused about.
    It's a typical Boris lie, works until you step back and think about it for two second by which time he's run to hide in the freezer or whatever other private space is available.

    The funny bit is that the registers are public documents, if the baptism is a lie the truth will be revealed by midday.
  • alex_alex_ Posts: 7,518
    No of positive tests in London has fallen by 27% in the last week...
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715
    Just had a newsflash on my phone to the effect that 'No 10 denies reports that Boris Johnson went on a secret Italy trip.'

    So it wasn't secret then; other people knew about it!
  • Gadfly said:

    7-day moving average of positive tests expressed as a percentage of all tests.



    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

    Wow.

    So, if 0.8% at least of tests are false positives, that implies we had a sustained period of -0.2% as the real figure.

    I'm really not sure how that could even work.

    IIUC when the infection rate is low the false positive rate is also low, because false positives tend to come from somebody contaminating a negative sample with somebody else's positive sample, and you can't do that unless you have positive samples.

    * Unless you count people as false positive if they correctly detected positive with the virus but the detected virus was mostly dead, ie they're infected but potentially cured
    From the SAGE report on PCR testing and false results:

    "What causes false positives?
    • Cross reactions with other genetic material. Other sources of DNA or RNA may have cross
    reactive genetic material that can be amplified by the RT-PCR test. False positives were
    observed unexpectedly in norovirus assays in patients with enterocolitis, due to unusually high
    levels of human DNA in samples [1]
    • Contamination during sampling. This may happen if the swab head accidently contacts, or is
    placed on a contaminated surface (e.g. latex gloves, hospital surface).
    • Contamination during swab extraction. Viral RNA is extracted from swabs in solution;
    accidental aerosolization of liquid can cause cross contamination between samples.
    • Contamination with PCR amplicon. The PCR amplification process generates millions of copies
    of the DNA target (amplicon) that can cause false positives in subsequent PCR reactions. If a
    testing lab is accidently contaminated with amplicon it can lead to sporadic false positives.
    • Contamination of PCR laboratory consumables. Contamination can spread from a post-PCR lab
    into a pre-PCR lab by transfer of equipment, chemicals, people or aerosol. Even experienced
    national labs can be affected. In early-March 2020, COVID-19 RT-PCR assays produced by the
    CDC were withdrawn after many showed false positives due to contaminated reagents.
    "
  • https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.repubblica.it/esteri/2020/09/20/news/the_mystery_of_boris_johnson_s_trip_to_perugia_-267989244/amp/

    I didn't know Lebedev had a dog named after our prime minister, although when you consider how the Tory party is awash with Roubles it's not surprising.
This discussion has been closed.