Betfair WH2020 betting is back – politicalbetting.com
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Betfair WH2020 betting is back – politicalbetting.com
Betfair has now re-opened the WH2020 markets which were close before the weekend when Trump went into hospital . Chart @betdatapolitics pic.twitter.com/YRzbPNh0og
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Betfair back out of hospital and feeling 20 years younger?0
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Riverside megachurch pastor who attended White House event contracts Covid-19
https://www.politico.com/states/california/story/2020/10/05/riverside-megachurch-pastor-who-attended-white-house-event-contracts-covid-19-13212590 -
Possible Senate repercussions for 2022.
Sen. Pat Toomey to retire from politics in blow to GOP
The move puts Republicans at an immediate disadvantage as they survey the 2022 Senate landscape.
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/05/pat-toomey-senate-retirement-4264290 -
Thank goodness, I have a desperate need to lose some money.0
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I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?2 -
Ironically though if Biden wins the GOP will almost certainly pick up Senate seats in 2022 with the usual midterm protest vote and with Trump no longer around, however if Trump is re elected they will almost certainly lose Senate seats, including Toomey's seat in Pennsylvania and probably lose Senate control to the Democrats if they have not already lost it in NovemberNigelb said:Possible Senate repercussions for 2022.
Sen. Pat Toomey to retire from politics in blow to GOP
The move puts Republicans at an immediate disadvantage as they survey the 2022 Senate landscape.
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/05/pat-toomey-senate-retirement-4264290 -
"how long will it take for Trump to return to normal campaigning[?]"
Since when has Trumpsky EVER engaged in what you could reasonably call "normal" campaigning?
Short answer of course is, never!
Even his detractors (such as yours truly) must admit that DT is an amazing political phenomenon, along the lines of Huey Long, Benito Mussolini and . . . wait for it . . . Valdimir Putin.
Tried to think of a Brit other than Boris Johnson who might maybe perhaps qualify (except that BoJo has yet to stay in office for at least a few years running) but failed.
Which is a credit to the British and your constitution that as an America wish I could claim, but obviously (and sadly) cannot.0 -
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Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
What would make the Democrat plan even more binding is that, if they did expand the SC, they would almost certainly also give statehood to DC, Puerto Rico and possibly also Guam and American Samoa to give themselves a very strong lock hold on the Senate possibly for ever0 -
Big swing from Biden to Trump in that chart. Will we have a new header about that
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That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
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Is it constitutional ? Yes.kle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
It would possibly be unwise, but it would certainly be within the “rules”.
It would, of course, be a gross violation of norms, which is what Charles probably means - just that he doesn’t seem to get quite so exercised about that when it comes from the Republican side.1 -
The motivation for the latter may well be as you suggest and pretty cynical as a result, but is it quite the same as 'changing the rules'? I mean, the USA has added states before, including 2 only 61 years ago, so clearly has a process for doing so - whatever reasons exist for not making them into states, that it goes against 'the rules' seems unlikely to be among the reasons.MrEd said:
Agree with you Charles 100pc. The Republicans are bending the rules but they are the rules. The Democrats want to change them altogether.
The same goes for giving statehood to Puerto Rico and Washington DC (and maybe Guam and American Samoa). It’s designed to permanently lock in their advantage
Of course, sometimes rules should be changed, but it's unfortunate that oftentimes people are suddenly converted to the necessity of doing so by partisan considerations, like people discovering PR is the way after an election that has been lost.
I'm still not particularly clearer. I can certainly see that it is an escalation of the judicial warfare between the two, and a bad idea, but when it comes to 'breaking' the rules if they are legally allowed to do it and it'd been done before, it's not precisely breaking it surely? It's a question of degree, not something wholly different? After all, the criticism of the Republican move is that it is crappy but they can technically do it, and the same wording could be applied to the Democrat potential move?MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
I do think the Democrats outrage of the Supreme Court nomination issue has the smell of grandstanding about it. Yes the Republican hypocrisy in about facing their previous position must have been galling, if unsurprising, but it doesn't disguise that they are, for the same reasons, also about facing, and saying the other lot did it first hardly matters if they believed their own principals last time.0 -
Quite possibly. But X-factor might be intra-party divisions within both major problems, pitting right-wing Republicans against GOP moderates (at least comparatively speaking), while on other side of the aisle lefty progressives contest versus more center-left Democrats.HYUFD said:
Ironically though if Biden wins the GOP will almost certainly pick up Senate seats in 2022 with the usual midterm protest vote and with Trump no longer around, however if Trump is re elected they will almost certainly lose Senate seats, including Toomey's seat in Pennsylvania and probably lose Senate control to the Democrats if they have not already lost it in NovemberNigelb said:Possible Senate repercussions for 2022.
Sen. Pat Toomey to retire from politics in blow to GOP
The move puts Republicans at an immediate disadvantage as they survey the 2022 Senate landscape.
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/05/pat-toomey-senate-retirement-426429
My sense is that, regardless of Biden-Trump outcome, post-election the Republicans are a bit more likely to tear themselves up in more key races in more states & districts than the Democrats.
BUT not by much. What transpires could come down to who wins the White House like HYUFD says.0 -
Not sure exactly why but 538 have just narrowly moved Ohio back into the Trump column.
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2020-election-forecast/0 -
I don't necessarily think the Dems should pack the court, but if they are able to then surely they would also be acting within the rules. Otherwise how would they be able to do it?Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing2 -
Sorry @Nigelb that is not true. The Republican blocking of Obama’s choice was low politics but it didn’t permanently change the game ie if the Democrats won the Senate and a Republican President put their candidate forward, the Senate would be in their rights to do the same.Nigelb said:.
Is it constitutional ? Yes.kle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
It would possibly be unwise, but it would certainly be within the “rules”.
It would, of course, be a gross violation of norms, which is what Charles probably means - just that he doesn’t seem to get quite so exercised about that when it comes from the Republican side.
If the Democrats do expand the SC and do add their new justices, then it does permanently change the rules. It is no different from someone saying here “you know what, I can’t get my bill through the Commons, let me add another100 MPs and nominate them all”
It’s meant to permanently lock in one side’s advantage0 -
The "Democrat Plan" (which btw is GOP phraseology) is NOT going to include court packing.MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
What would make the Democrat plan even more binding is that, if they did expand the SC, they would almost certainly also give statehood to DC, Puerto Rico and possibly also Guam and American Samoa to give themselves a very strong lock hold on the Senate possibly for ever
For one thing, just about all the Democrats running for US Senate in contested races this year have gone on record pledged to OPPOSE any such plan.
For another, just a dumb idea, historically, judicially and above all politically.0 -
FPT.
Not many people realise Canada is more densely populated than Australia.
Which just goes to show how bloody empty Oz is.0 -
You’d have expected that though surely? The shift is his emerging from hospital, ergo seemingly able to actually fight the ejection.MrEd said:Big swing from Biden to Trump in that chart. Will we have a new header about that
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As it is the Senate who sets the number of Justices on the Supreme Court, it would surely be within the rules to change the number. (And, indeed, the number has been changed - for political reasons - in the past)OnlyLivingBoy said:
I don't necessarily think the Dems should pack the court, but if they are able to then surely they would also be acting within the rules. Otherwise how would they be able to do it?Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
The danger in doing this, of course, is that it devalues an institution that should be above politics. And yes... the Democrats started it with Roe vs Wade, which is one of the most appalling judicial decisions in history.
Personally, I think the best Justices are the ones appointed when the Senate and the Presidency are held by different parties.0 -
Sorry but you are wrong. The GOP pulled shanigans within the rules to give them a majority.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
If the Democrats "pack the court" then they too will be acting within the rules. There are no "rules" against "court packing" any more than there were "rules" against the Senate not holding hearings on Merrick Garland. The court has changed size frequently in the past, before Dred Scott.
In the Kavanaugh nomination the GOP changed the rules by scrapping the minority party's right to filibuster.
If the GOP want to push to the edge of the rules, so long as they stay within the rules, even changing the rules, then why shouldn't the Democrats do the same? What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.0 -
And also how distorted the Mercator projection is. Canada isn't that much bigger than Australia.dixiedean said:FPT.
Not many people realise Canada is more densely populated than Australia.
Which just goes to show how bloody empty Oz is.0 -
I think a couple of people have suggested doing that with the Lords on several occasions.MrEd said:
Sorry @Nigelb that is not true. The Republican blocking of Obama’s choice was low politics but it didn’t permanently change the game ie if the Democrats won the Senate and a Republican President put their candidate forward, the Senate would be in their rights to do the same.Nigelb said:.
Is it constitutional ? Yes.kle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
It would possibly be unwise, but it would certainly be within the “rules”.
It would, of course, be a gross violation of norms, which is what Charles probably means - just that he doesn’t seem to get quite so exercised about that when it comes from the Republican side.
If the Democrats do expand the SC and do add their new justices, then it does permanently change the rules. It is no different from someone saying here “you know what, I can’t get my bill through the Commons, let me add another100 MPs and nominate them all”
It’s meant to permanently lock in one side’s advantage
I won't belabour the point further, but I'm still not persuaded that it is such a stark distinction, other than in scale of crappiness. Expanding the court wouldn't permanently change the rules if expanding was already something they could do, and have done before - for one thing while I doubt it would happen, the court could presumably be reduced in future.
Given how laboriously detailed the US constitution is on certain points, I am somewhat surprised it doesn't specificy an exact number of Justices though.0 -
The wind of change is blowing out of Boris Johnson's nether regions.
What happens when there is fog?
https://twitter.com/MsHelicat/status/1313233907903614978
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Corbyn must be sitting at home, with his 8 friends round, thinking but when I proposed this stuff I got laughed out of the room.dr_spyn said:The wind of change is blowing out of Boris Johnson's nether regions.
What happens when there is fog?
https://twitter.com/MsHelicat/status/13132339079036149780 -
Must say from US perspective Canada makes an excellent green- (or rather white-) space buffer, and excellent source for maple syrup and wood chips, plus full of interesting wildlife such as William Shatner, Pamela Anderson, Celine Dion and Justin Bieber.dixiedean said:FPT.
Not many people realise Canada is more densely populated than Australia.
Which just goes to show how bloody empty Oz is.0 -
Maybe he'll finally realise then that he was the problem.FrancisUrquhart said:
Corbyn must be sitting at home, with his 8 friends round, thinking but when I proposed this stuff I got laughed out of the room.dr_spyn said:The wind of change is blowing out of Boris Johnson's nether regions.
What happens when there is fog?
https://twitter.com/MsHelicat/status/1313233907903614978
Pretty laughable boast from Boris though, given our record on housing and infrastructure delivery in this country.0 -
Abraham, Chilwell and Sancho to miss England game, because of breaking COVID rules, plus Greenwood and Foden weren't selected for similar reasons...that half the England team.0
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Re the admission of states, generally it was done with bi-partisan agreement as it was recognised it was unfair to have them outside the umbrella. Here it would be done for purely naked partisan reasons ie to help one side in the Senate. It risks causing these states’ statehood to be a permanent political football with perpetual tit for tat. A Republican President might come in and agitate for California to be split into two states for example.kle4 said:
The motivation for the latter may well be as you suggest and pretty cynical as a result, but is it quite the same as 'changing the rules'? I mean, the USA has added states before, including 2 only 61 years ago, so clearly has a process for doing so - whatever reasons exist for not making them into states, that it goes against 'the rules' seems unlikely to be among the reasons.MrEd said:
Agree with you Charles 100pc. The Republicans are bending the rules but they are the rules. The Democrats want to change them altogether.
The same goes for giving statehood to Puerto Rico and Washington DC (and maybe Guam and American Samoa). It’s designed to permanently lock in their advantage
Of course, sometimes rules should be changed, but it's unfortunate that oftentimes people are suddenly converted to the necessity of doing so by partisan considerations, like people discovering PR is the way after an election that has been lost.
I'm still not particularly clearer. I can certainly see that it is an escalation of the judicial warfare between the two, and a bad idea, but when it comes to 'breaking' the rules if they are legally allowed to do it and it'd been done before, it's not precisely breaking it surely? It's a question of degree, not something wholly different? After all, the criticism of the Republican move is that it is crappy but they can technically do it, and the same wording could be applied to the Democrat potential move?MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
I do think the Democrats outrage of the Supreme Court nomination issue has the smell of grandstanding about it. Yes the Republican hypocrisy in about facing their previous position must have been galling, if unsurprising, but it doesn't disguise that they are, for the same reasons, also about facing, and saying the other lot did it first hardly matters if they believed their own principals last time.
On the judges, it’s the permanency of the thing that would be the problem. Adding 6 justices, all of which would be Democratic nominees and (presumably) young would mean a permanent Democrat majority. In that case, I think a lot of Republican voters would decide the rules were being stacked against them and lose faith in the system (and worse)0 -
Absolute nonsense.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
Can you describe what rule the Dems would be breaking?1 -
Don't be silly, he is as deluded as Trump when it comes to his own failings.kle4 said:
Maybe he'll finally realise then that he was the problem.FrancisUrquhart said:
Corbyn must be sitting at home, with his 8 friends round, thinking but when I proposed this stuff I got laughed out of the room.dr_spyn said:The wind of change is blowing out of Boris Johnson's nether regions.
What happens when there is fog?
https://twitter.com/MsHelicat/status/13132339079036149780 -
Correction - West Virginia is one example of a nakedly political decision for statehood (Covil WR)MrEd said:
Re the admission of states, generally it was done with bi-partisan agreement as it was recognised it was unfair to have them outside the umbrella. Here it would be done for purely naked partisan reasons ie to help one side in the Senate. It risks causing these states’ statehood to be a permanent political football with perpetual tit for tat. A Republican President might come in and agitate for California to be split into two states for example.kle4 said:
The motivation for the latter may well be as you suggest and pretty cynical as a result, but is it quite the same as 'changing the rules'? I mean, the USA has added states before, including 2 only 61 years ago, so clearly has a process for doing so - whatever reasons exist for not making them into states, that it goes against 'the rules' seems unlikely to be among the reasons.MrEd said:
Agree with you Charles 100pc. The Republicans are bending the rules but they are the rules. The Democrats want to change them altogether.
The same goes for giving statehood to Puerto Rico and Washington DC (and maybe Guam and American Samoa). It’s designed to permanently lock in their advantage
Of course, sometimes rules should be changed, but it's unfortunate that oftentimes people are suddenly converted to the necessity of doing so by partisan considerations, like people discovering PR is the way after an election that has been lost.
I'm still not particularly clearer. I can certainly see that it is an escalation of the judicial warfare between the two, and a bad idea, but when it comes to 'breaking' the rules if they are legally allowed to do it and it'd been done before, it's not precisely breaking it surely? It's a question of degree, not something wholly different? After all, the criticism of the Republican move is that it is crappy but they can technically do it, and the same wording could be applied to the Democrat potential move?MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
I do think the Democrats outrage of the Supreme Court nomination issue has the smell of grandstanding about it. Yes the Republican hypocrisy in about facing their previous position must have been galling, if unsurprising, but it doesn't disguise that they are, for the same reasons, also about facing, and saying the other lot did it first hardly matters if they believed their own principals last time.
On the judges, it’s the permanency of the thing that would be the problem. Adding 6 justices, all of which would be Democratic nominees and (presumably) young would mean a permanent Democrat majority. In that case, I think a lot of Republican voters would decide the rules were being stacked against them and lose faith in the system (and worse)
0 -
Wind power will still work. Especially when its distributed around the UK, its actually quite a reliable form of energy generation.dr_spyn said:The wind of change is blowing out of Boris Johnson's nether regions.
What happens when there is fog?
https://twitter.com/MsHelicat/status/1313233907903614978
And the Tories for the past decade have been boosting wind power. It is a far better suggestion for renewable energy generation than solar power which the UK under Labour was investing ridiculous sums in . . . when solar works much worse in the winter and the UK electricity demand peaks in the winter.0 -
I am looking forward to seeing How Charles justifies Trump’s use of the courts to secure another term. His dismissal of industrial voter suppression by the GOP is a given.0
-
I don't think the Red Wall want to hear a load of stuff about windmills and how buying things like a car is going to get much more expensive and restrictive....when COVID unemployment is coming down the track.kle4 said:
Maybe he'll finally realise then that he was the problem.FrancisUrquhart said:
Corbyn must be sitting at home, with his 8 friends round, thinking but when I proposed this stuff I got laughed out of the room.dr_spyn said:The wind of change is blowing out of Boris Johnson's nether regions.
What happens when there is fog?
https://twitter.com/MsHelicat/status/1313233907903614978
Pretty laughable boast from Boris though, given our record on housing and infrastructure delivery in this country.0 -
Memory serves me right, 80pc or over of the Australian population is in its top 5 cities •SeaShantyIrish2 said:
Must say from US perspective Canada makes an excellent green- (or rather white-) space buffer, and excellent source for maple syrup and wood chips, plus full of interesting wildlife such as William Shatner, Pamela Anderson, Celine Dion and Justin Bieber.dixiedean said:FPT.
Not many people realise Canada is more densely populated than Australia.
Which just goes to show how bloody empty Oz is.
• ex-London0 -
International breaks seems an excellent way to mix up teams, allow a bit of partying, like University halls.FrancisUrquhart said:Abraham, Chilwell and Sancho to miss England game, because of breaking COVID rules, plus Greenwood and Foden weren't selected for similar reasons...that half the England team.
0 -
I must have missed the memo where the US was fixed at 50 states for all time. Maybe the founding fathers wrote it in the constitution.0
-
I missed that Sterling has also pulled out injuried. Going to be a really weak team.Foxy said:
International breaks seems an excellent way to mix up teams, allow a bit of partying, like University halls.FrancisUrquhart said:Abraham, Chilwell and Sancho to miss England game, because of breaking COVID rules, plus Greenwood and Foden weren't selected for similar reasons...that half the England team.
0 -
Trump is out of his mind on drugs, isn’t he? The bloke is flying. But the deep, dark, relentless, all-consuming, bitter, low will follow. It always does. Then, it will be time to choose: cold turkey; or the search for another, tougher to get, tougher to maintain, high. His Tweets are going to get even more bizarre.1
-
The splitting of the Dakota territory I to North and South Dakota for statehood was also nakedly political.MrEd said:
Correction - West Virginia is one example of a nakedly political decision for statehood (Covil WR)MrEd said:
Re the admission of states, generally it was done with bi-partisan agreement as it was recognised it was unfair to have them outside the umbrella. Here it would be done for purely naked partisan reasons ie to help one side in the Senate. It risks causing these states’ statehood to be a permanent political football with perpetual tit for tat. A Republican President might come in and agitate for California to be split into two states for example.kle4 said:
The motivation for the latter may well be as you suggest and pretty cynical as a result, but is it quite the same as 'changing the rules'? I mean, the USA has added states before, including 2 only 61 years ago, so clearly has a process for doing so - whatever reasons exist for not making them into states, that it goes against 'the rules' seems unlikely to be among the reasons.MrEd said:
Agree with you Charles 100pc. The Republicans are bending the rules but they are the rules. The Democrats want to change them altogether.
The same goes for giving statehood to Puerto Rico and Washington DC (and maybe Guam and American Samoa). It’s designed to permanently lock in their advantage
Of course, sometimes rules should be changed, but it's unfortunate that oftentimes people are suddenly converted to the necessity of doing so by partisan considerations, like people discovering PR is the way after an election that has been lost.
I'm still not particularly clearer. I can certainly see that it is an escalation of the judicial warfare between the two, and a bad idea, but when it comes to 'breaking' the rules if they are legally allowed to do it and it'd been done before, it's not precisely breaking it surely? It's a question of degree, not something wholly different? After all, the criticism of the Republican move is that it is crappy but they can technically do it, and the same wording could be applied to the Democrat potential move?MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
I do think the Democrats outrage of the Supreme Court nomination issue has the smell of grandstanding about it. Yes the Republican hypocrisy in about facing their previous position must have been galling, if unsurprising, but it doesn't disguise that they are, for the same reasons, also about facing, and saying the other lot did it first hardly matters if they believed their own principals last time.
On the judges, it’s the permanency of the thing that would be the problem. Adding 6 justices, all of which would be Democratic nominees and (presumably) young would mean a permanent Democrat majority. In that case, I think a lot of Republican voters would decide the rules were being stacked against them and lose faith in the system (and worse)0 -
They designed the system to encourage compromise without realising how things would progress...kle4 said:
I think a couple of people have suggested doing that with the Lords on several occasions.MrEd said:
Sorry @Nigelb that is not true. The Republican blocking of Obama’s choice was low politics but it didn’t permanently change the game ie if the Democrats won the Senate and a Republican President put their candidate forward, the Senate would be in their rights to do the same.Nigelb said:.
Is it constitutional ? Yes.kle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
It would possibly be unwise, but it would certainly be within the “rules”.
It would, of course, be a gross violation of norms, which is what Charles probably means - just that he doesn’t seem to get quite so exercised about that when it comes from the Republican side.
If the Democrats do expand the SC and do add their new justices, then it does permanently change the rules. It is no different from someone saying here “you know what, I can’t get my bill through the Commons, let me add another100 MPs and nominate them all”
It’s meant to permanently lock in one side’s advantage
I won't belabour the point further, but I'm still not persuaded that it is such a stark distinction, other than in scale of crappiness. Expanding the court wouldn't permanently change the rules if expanding was already something they could do, and have done before - for one thing while I doubt it would happen, the court could presumably be reduced in future.
Given how laboriously detailed the US constitution is on certain points, I am somewhat surprised it doesn't specificy an exact number of Justices though.0 -
Of course it is, but it’s not completely ridiculous - and the mere possibility might just be of use as leverage for alternative reforms.SeaShantyIrish2 said:
The "Democrat Plan" (which btw is GOP phraseology) is NOT going to include court packing.MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
What would make the Democrat plan even more binding is that, if they did expand the SC, they would almost certainly also give statehood to DC, Puerto Rico and possibly also Guam and American Samoa to give themselves a very strong lock hold on the Senate possibly for ever
For one thing, just about all the Democrats running for US Senate in contested races this year have gone on record pledged to OPPOSE any such plan.
For another, just a dumb idea, historically, judicially and above all politically.
And the rhetoric about ‘rules’ is a little threadbare.0 -
Sometimes democracy needs a bit of help to give the right answer.SouthamObserver said:I am looking forward to seeing How Charles justifies Trump’s use of the courts to secure another term. His dismissal of industrial voter suppression by the GOP is a given.
0 -
No the GOP are the ones trying to permanently lock in their advantage. Which is why their horrified that their shenanigans may be reversed by the Democrats standing up for fixing the problem.MrEd said:
Sorry @Nigelb that is not true. The Republican blocking of Obama’s choice was low politics but it didn’t permanently change the game ie if the Democrats won the Senate and a Republican President put their candidate forward, the Senate would be in their rights to do the same.Nigelb said:.
Is it constitutional ? Yes.kle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
It would possibly be unwise, but it would certainly be within the “rules”.
It would, of course, be a gross violation of norms, which is what Charles probably means - just that he doesn’t seem to get quite so exercised about that when it comes from the Republican side.
If the Democrats do expand the SC and do add their new justices, then it does permanently change the rules. It is no different from someone saying here “you know what, I can’t get my bill through the Commons, let me add another100 MPs and nominate them all”
It’s meant to permanently lock in one side’s advantage
The court's size has changed many times in America's history. No rule against it whatsoever. The GOP removing the ability of the minority party to fillibuster a Justice, removing the requirement for bipartisan approval of Justices actually did change the rules though.3 -
Could be worse, there was a six state option mooted by one chap!MrEd said:
Re the admission of states, generally it was done with bi-partisan agreement as it was recognised it was unfair to have them outside the umbrella. Here it would be done for purely naked partisan reasons ie to help one side in the Senate. It risks causing these states’ statehood to be a permanent political football with perpetual tit for tat. A Republican President might come in and agitate for California to be split into two states for example.kle4 said:
The motivation for the latter may well be as you suggest and pretty cynical as a result, but is it quite the same as 'changing the rules'? I mean, the USA has added states before, including 2 only 61 years ago, so clearly has a process for doing so - whatever reasons exist for not making them into states, that it goes against 'the rules' seems unlikely to be among the reasons.MrEd said:
Agree with you Charles 100pc. The Republicans are bending the rules but they are the rules. The Democrats want to change them altogether.
The same goes for giving statehood to Puerto Rico and Washington DC (and maybe Guam and American Samoa). It’s designed to permanently lock in their advantage
Of course, sometimes rules should be changed, but it's unfortunate that oftentimes people are suddenly converted to the necessity of doing so by partisan considerations, like people discovering PR is the way after an election that has been lost.
I'm still not particularly clearer. I can certainly see that it is an escalation of the judicial warfare between the two, and a bad idea, but when it comes to 'breaking' the rules if they are legally allowed to do it and it'd been done before, it's not precisely breaking it surely? It's a question of degree, not something wholly different? After all, the criticism of the Republican move is that it is crappy but they can technically do it, and the same wording could be applied to the Democrat potential move?MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
I do think the Democrats outrage of the Supreme Court nomination issue has the smell of grandstanding about it. Yes the Republican hypocrisy in about facing their previous position must have been galling, if unsurprising, but it doesn't disguise that they are, for the same reasons, also about facing, and saying the other lot did it first hardly matters if they believed their own principals last time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_Californias
Certainly I can see the danger you suggest there, although who is deserving of being a state is a political question, and like most political questions bi-partisanship will not always occur.
The difficulty is, as with everything, the impossibility of objective assessment. I don't know if all those areas even want to be States (though I'd be surprised why they wouldn't, if the chance arose), but if they do, and if they fit the criteria (such as they exist) for statehood (certainly some are large enough), then just as those pushing for it might be doing so for partisan reasons, might not others resist it for partisan reasons?
I mean, OK, the Democrats are coming around on the statehood issue as they think it will help them in the Senate, that's a poor motivation. But if Republicans reject it simply to preserve their perceived advantage in the Senate, that's not a good motivation either.0 -
The Democrats already have that feeling, of course. That’s why the US is in such deep trouble.MrEd said:
Re the admission of states, generally it was done with bi-partisan agreement as it was recognised it was unfair to have them outside the umbrella. Here it would be done for purely naked partisan reasons ie to help one side in the Senate. It risks causing these states’ statehood to be a permanent political football with perpetual tit for tat. A Republican President might come in and agitate for California to be split into two states for example.kle4 said:
The motivation for the latter may well be as you suggest and pretty cynical as a result, but is it quite the same as 'changing the rules'? I mean, the USA has added states before, including 2 only 61 years ago, so clearly has a process for doing so - whatever reasons exist for not making them into states, that it goes against 'the rules' seems unlikely to be among the reasons.MrEd said:
Agree with you Charles 100pc. The Republicans are bending the rules but they are the rules. The Democrats want to change them altogether.
The same goes for giving statehood to Puerto Rico and Washington DC (and maybe Guam and American Samoa). It’s designed to permanently lock in their advantage
Of course, sometimes rules should be changed, but it's unfortunate that oftentimes people are suddenly converted to the necessity of doing so by partisan considerations, like people discovering PR is the way after an election that has been lost.
I'm still not particularly clearer. I can certainly see that it is an escalation of the judicial warfare between the two, and a bad idea, but when it comes to 'breaking' the rules if they are legally allowed to do it and it'd been done before, it's not precisely breaking it surely? It's a question of degree, not something wholly different? After all, the criticism of the Republican move is that it is crappy but they can technically do it, and the same wording could be applied to the Democrat potential move?MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
I do think the Democrats outrage of the Supreme Court nomination issue has the smell of grandstanding about it. Yes the Republican hypocrisy in about facing their previous position must have been galling, if unsurprising, but it doesn't disguise that they are, for the same reasons, also about facing, and saying the other lot did it first hardly matters if they believed their own principals last time.
On the judges, it’s the permanency of the thing that would be the problem. Adding 6 justices, all of which would be Democratic nominees and (presumably) young would mean a permanent Democrat majority. In that case, I think a lot of Republican voters would decide the rules were being stacked against them and lose faith in the system (and worse)
2 -
FPT
Two-thirds of the Welsh population are under very stringent Covid-19 restrictions, courtesy of Welsh Labour.Wulfrun_Phil said:
Utter cr*p from the Welsh Government. This is testing devolution beyond breaking point.
I cannot see any good reason why one set of UK authorities should be able to look at the same scientific evidence and come up with a completely different set of highly intrusive restrictions on daily life than does another based on the same evidence. What's worse is authorities that insist on applying even more restrictive rules on one group of people compared to other groups, the main difference being that the former does not have the right to ultimately vote the authorities out whereas the latter does.
A lot of the confusion over the myriad of lockdown rules could be avoided if there were a single set of rules across the UK, with a traffic light system of severity applying in different areas, applied in consultation with the relevant local authorities or regional governments. There should on the back of the pandemic be a review of the extent to which current devolution of powers should be reversed during a national emergency affecting the UK as a whole.
However, English visitors can stampede across our border unchecked, many from highly contaminated English regions, and climb a Welsh mountain or lounge in a Welsh holiday home. Why on Earth is this permitted?
Mark Drakeford is completely correct to insist on quarantining at the border.
I suspect it will be Welsh Labour's most popular policy ever. Drakeford could be looking at a landslide next year.0 -
Windmills are good. They work, are cheap, quick to build, reliable and clean.FrancisUrquhart said:
I don't think the Red Wall want to hear a load of stuff about windmills and how buying things like a car is going to get much more expensive and restrictive....when COVID unemployment is coming down the track.kle4 said:
Maybe he'll finally realise then that he was the problem.FrancisUrquhart said:
Corbyn must be sitting at home, with his 8 friends round, thinking but when I proposed this stuff I got laughed out of the room.dr_spyn said:The wind of change is blowing out of Boris Johnson's nether regions.
What happens when there is fog?
https://twitter.com/MsHelicat/status/1313233907903614978
Pretty laughable boast from Boris though, given our record on housing and infrastructure delivery in this country.
Why would "Red Wallers" be against reliable, clean, cheap energy?
Much better than investing in nuclear white elephants with three times the strike price.1 -
A Republican President could ‘agitate’ all he wanted...MrEd said:
Re the admission of states, generally it was done with bi-partisan agreement as it was recognised it was unfair to have them outside the umbrella. Here it would be done for purely naked partisan reasons ie to help one side in the Senate. It risks causing these states’ statehood to be a permanent political football with perpetual tit for tat. A Republican President might come in and agitate for California to be split into two states for example.kle4 said:
The motivation for the latter may well be as you suggest and pretty cynical as a result, but is it quite the same as 'changing the rules'? I mean, the USA has added states before, including 2 only 61 years ago, so clearly has a process for doing so - whatever reasons exist for not making them into states, that it goes against 'the rules' seems unlikely to be among the reasons.MrEd said:
Agree with you Charles 100pc. The Republicans are bending the rules but they are the rules. The Democrats want to change them altogether.
The same goes for giving statehood to Puerto Rico and Washington DC (and maybe Guam and American Samoa). It’s designed to permanently lock in their advantage
Of course, sometimes rules should be changed, but it's unfortunate that oftentimes people are suddenly converted to the necessity of doing so by partisan considerations, like people discovering PR is the way after an election that has been lost.
I'm still not particularly clearer. I can certainly see that it is an escalation of the judicial warfare between the two, and a bad idea, but when it comes to 'breaking' the rules if they are legally allowed to do it and it'd been done before, it's not precisely breaking it surely? It's a question of degree, not something wholly different? After all, the criticism of the Republican move is that it is crappy but they can technically do it, and the same wording could be applied to the Democrat potential move?MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
I do think the Democrats outrage of the Supreme Court nomination issue has the smell of grandstanding about it. Yes the Republican hypocrisy in about facing their previous position must have been galling, if unsurprising, but it doesn't disguise that they are, for the same reasons, also about facing, and saying the other lot did it first hardly matters if they believed their own principals last time.
New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the Jurisdiction of any other State; nor any State be formed by the Junction of two or more States, or Parts of States, without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.
0 -
I remember our crowd taunting him when he played Leicester, and was taking rather a long time to get off the grass after a fairly innocuous tackle "He's so tired, so f***ing tired"FrancisUrquhart said:
I missed that Sterling has also pulled out injuried. Going to be a really weak team.Foxy said:
International breaks seems an excellent way to mix up teams, allow a bit of partying, like University halls.FrancisUrquhart said:Abraham, Chilwell and Sancho to miss England game, because of breaking COVID rules, plus Greenwood and Foden weren't selected for similar reasons...that half the England team.
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/oct/12/raheem-sterling-tired-roy-hodgson-england-estonia0 -
Always thought the Evergreen State and BC had more in common with each other than with the rest of their respective nations, in many ways.SeaShantyIrish2 said:
Must say from US perspective Canada makes an excellent green- (or rather white-) space buffer, and excellent source for maple syrup and wood chips, plus full of interesting wildlife such as William Shatner, Pamela Anderson, Celine Dion and Justin Bieber.dixiedean said:FPT.
Not many people realise Canada is more densely populated than Australia.
Which just goes to show how bloody empty Oz is.0 -
From my days in High School 90% of Canada's is within 100 miles of the US border.MrEd said:
Memory serves me right, 80pc or over of the Australian population is in its top 5 cities •SeaShantyIrish2 said:
Must say from US perspective Canada makes an excellent green- (or rather white-) space buffer, and excellent source for maple syrup and wood chips, plus full of interesting wildlife such as William Shatner, Pamela Anderson, Celine Dion and Justin Bieber.dixiedean said:FPT.
Not many people realise Canada is more densely populated than Australia.
Which just goes to show how bloody empty Oz is.
• ex-London0 -
My immediate thought was its rather convenient injury.Foxy said:
I remember our crowd taunting him when he played Leicester, and was taking rather a long time to get off the grass after a fairly innocuous tackle "He's so tired, so f***ing tired"FrancisUrquhart said:
I missed that Sterling has also pulled out injuried. Going to be a really weak team.Foxy said:
International breaks seems an excellent way to mix up teams, allow a bit of partying, like University halls.FrancisUrquhart said:Abraham, Chilwell and Sancho to miss England game, because of breaking COVID rules, plus Greenwood and Foden weren't selected for similar reasons...that half the England team.
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/oct/12/raheem-sterling-tired-roy-hodgson-england-estonia1 -
From memory in the UK 100% of the population is within 100 miles of the sea.dixiedean said:
From my days in High School 90% of Canada's is within 100 miles of the US border.MrEd said:
Memory serves me right, 80pc or over of the Australian population is in its top 5 cities •SeaShantyIrish2 said:
Must say from US perspective Canada makes an excellent green- (or rather white-) space buffer, and excellent source for maple syrup and wood chips, plus full of interesting wildlife such as William Shatner, Pamela Anderson, Celine Dion and Justin Bieber.dixiedean said:FPT.
Not many people realise Canada is more densely populated than Australia.
Which just goes to show how bloody empty Oz is.
• ex-London0 -
During International breaks, there's a lot of it about...FrancisUrquhart said:
My immediate thought was its rather convenient injury.Foxy said:
I remember our crowd taunting him when he played Leicester, and was taking rather a long time to get off the grass after a fairly innocuous tackle "He's so tired, so f***ing tired"FrancisUrquhart said:
I missed that Sterling has also pulled out injuried. Going to be a really weak team.Foxy said:
International breaks seems an excellent way to mix up teams, allow a bit of partying, like University halls.FrancisUrquhart said:Abraham, Chilwell and Sancho to miss England game, because of breaking COVID rules, plus Greenwood and Foden weren't selected for similar reasons...that half the England team.
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/oct/12/raheem-sterling-tired-roy-hodgson-england-estonia0 -
Has Anyone Told the President?
> medical leeches have been proven to possess miraculous healing properties, thanks to their amazing ability to suck out "bad blood" from the human body.
> WHO quacks and socialist bureaucrats have conspired to suppress startling new findings that medical leeches are already curing thousands of COVID sufferers in secret cave laboratories all across (or rather under) China.
> Florida is prime source in US for top-quality medical leeches, followed by Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and Ohio.
Mr President, the leech is as American as you, and almost as impressive in it's own blood-sucking way.
SO display you vision and leadership to the world, by grabbing hold of a fistful of leeches, and clutching them to your bosom!
Hard on the leeches. But best if you REALLY want to MAGA.0 -
Would have thought windmills would be less popular in areas of high house prices.FrancisUrquhart said:
I don't think the Red Wall want to hear a load of stuff about windmills and how buying things like a car is going to get much more expensive and restrictive....when COVID unemployment is coming down the track.kle4 said:
Maybe he'll finally realise then that he was the problem.FrancisUrquhart said:
Corbyn must be sitting at home, with his 8 friends round, thinking but when I proposed this stuff I got laughed out of the room.dr_spyn said:The wind of change is blowing out of Boris Johnson's nether regions.
What happens when there is fog?
https://twitter.com/MsHelicat/status/1313233907903614978
Pretty laughable boast from Boris though, given our record on housing and infrastructure delivery in this country.
The Red Wall is used to factories, mills and pit head winding gear blocking the views.2 -
I hope everyone was paying attention to Ireland tonight. The treatment of the public health professionals by the politicians here was absolutely brutal. They were dismissed as being out-of-touch, ignorant, plain wrong on the facts, making things up as they go along.
It's a big call by the politicians here - and despite the lack of unity it's all the politicians. The Opposition were confident enough that the government would follow NPHET recommendations that they felt able to outflank the government by criticising NPHET during the day. But the government weren't for allowing that to happen so joined in themselves, leaving the Opposition with nowhere to go. Only the fringe People Before Profit group support the NPHET recommendation for level 5, crushing the virus, and solving the health problem as a precondition to solving the economic problem.
It's a new world where the government are freestyling their own epidemiology, and they've taken a huge risk, because if the spread of the virus doesn't come under control, and the death toll rises and they eventually follow the advice to move to level 5 anyway, they will clearly be seen to have made the wrong call.
ps. One interesting side point was that the government admitted that they'd created a plan, with five levels, but with no idea how they would implement one of those levels, and so it was impossible for them to do so when it was recommended to them. Astonishing - and yet only a footnote to the main issue.1 -
I really hope they don't have to do that.LostPassword said:I hope everyone was paying attention to Ireland tonight. The treatment of the public health professionals by the politicians here was absolutely brutal. They were dismissed as being out-of-touch, ignorant, plain wrong on the facts, making things up as they go along.
It's a big call by the politicians here - and despite the lack of unity it's all the politicians. The Opposition were confident enough that the government would follow NPHET recommendations that they felt able to outflank the government by criticising NPHET during the day. But the government weren't for allowing that to happen so joined in themselves, leaving the Opposition with nowhere to go. Only the fringe People Before Profit group support the NPHET recommendation for level 5, crushing the virus, and solving the health problem as a precondition to solving the economic problem.
It's a new world where the government are freestyling their own epidemiology, and they've taken a huge risk, because if the spread of the virus doesn't come under control, and the death toll rises and they eventually follow the advice to move to level 5 anyway, they will clearly be seen to have made the wrong call.0 -
Your tongue is firmly in your cheek.YBarddCwsc said:FPT
Two-thirds of the Welsh population are under very stringent Covid-19 restrictions, courtesy of Welsh Labour.Wulfrun_Phil said:
Utter cr*p from the Welsh Government. This is testing devolution beyond breaking point.
I cannot see any good reason why one set of UK authorities should be able to look at the same scientific evidence and come up with a completely different set of highly intrusive restrictions on daily life than does another based on the same evidence. What's worse is authorities that insist on applying even more restrictive rules on one group of people compared to other groups, the main difference being that the former does not have the right to ultimately vote the authorities out whereas the latter does.
A lot of the confusion over the myriad of lockdown rules could be avoided if there were a single set of rules across the UK, with a traffic light system of severity applying in different areas, applied in consultation with the relevant local authorities or regional governments. There should on the back of the pandemic be a review of the extent to which current devolution of powers should be reversed during a national emergency affecting the UK as a whole.
However, English visitors can stampede across our border unchecked, many from highly contaminated English regions, and climb a Welsh mountain or lounge in a Welsh holiday home. Why on Earth is this permitted?
Mark Drakeford is completely correct to insist on quarantining at the border.
I suspect it will be Welsh Labour's most popular policy ever. Drakeford could be looking at a landslide next year.
To earn a crust, I am tomorrow heading for a Covid-free Southampton from lockdown hotspot, the Vale of Glamorgan. I hope they let me back in!0 -
Because they have run Wales so well to date?YBarddCwsc said:FPT
Two-thirds of the Welsh population are under very stringent Covid-19 restrictions, courtesy of Welsh Labour.Wulfrun_Phil said:
Utter cr*p from the Welsh Government. This is testing devolution beyond breaking point.
I cannot see any good reason why one set of UK authorities should be able to look at the same scientific evidence and come up with a completely different set of highly intrusive restrictions on daily life than does another based on the same evidence. What's worse is authorities that insist on applying even more restrictive rules on one group of people compared to other groups, the main difference being that the former does not have the right to ultimately vote the authorities out whereas the latter does.
A lot of the confusion over the myriad of lockdown rules could be avoided if there were a single set of rules across the UK, with a traffic light system of severity applying in different areas, applied in consultation with the relevant local authorities or regional governments. There should on the back of the pandemic be a review of the extent to which current devolution of powers should be reversed during a national emergency affecting the UK as a whole.
However, English visitors can stampede across our border unchecked, many from highly contaminated English regions, and climb a Welsh mountain or lounge in a Welsh holiday home. Why on Earth is this permitted?
Mark Drakeford is completely correct to insist on quarantining at the border.
I suspect it will be Welsh Labour's most popular policy ever. Drakeford could be looking at a landslide next year.
Oh boy......0 -
You are correct, partly. One thing that I've always found strange, is how little coverage and knowledge there is of BC in WA State. For example, doubt one Seattleite in one hundred could tell you the name of Premier of BC. About only BC news that makes it down here is sky report from Whistler.dixiedean said:
Always thought the Evergreen State and BC had more in common with each other than with the rest of their respective nations, in many ways.SeaShantyIrish2 said:
Must say from US perspective Canada makes an excellent green- (or rather white-) space buffer, and excellent source for maple syrup and wood chips, plus full of interesting wildlife such as William Shatner, Pamela Anderson, Celine Dion and Justin Bieber.dixiedean said:FPT.
Not many people realise Canada is more densely populated than Australia.
Which just goes to show how bloody empty Oz is.
BUT perhaps OUR butt-head ignorance, is YOUR greatest defense?
0 -
Me too, but the Irish health system is considerably weaker than the UK's, and they have much less room to manoeuvre, while the number of hospitalised Covid patients increased by a quarter over the last 24 hours.Philip_Thompson said:
I really hope they don't have to do that.LostPassword said:I hope everyone was paying attention to Ireland tonight. The treatment of the public health professionals by the politicians here was absolutely brutal. They were dismissed as being out-of-touch, ignorant, plain wrong on the facts, making things up as they go along.
It's a big call by the politicians here - and despite the lack of unity it's all the politicians. The Opposition were confident enough that the government would follow NPHET recommendations that they felt able to outflank the government by criticising NPHET during the day. But the government weren't for allowing that to happen so joined in themselves, leaving the Opposition with nowhere to go. Only the fringe People Before Profit group support the NPHET recommendation for level 5, crushing the virus, and solving the health problem as a precondition to solving the economic problem.
It's a new world where the government are freestyling their own epidemiology, and they've taken a huge risk, because if the spread of the virus doesn't come under control, and the death toll rises and they eventually follow the advice to move to level 5 anyway, they will clearly be seen to have made the wrong call.0 -
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1313243541959737349SouthamObserver said:Trump is out of his mind on drugs, isn’t he? The bloke is flying. But the deep, dark, relentless, all-consuming, bitter, low will follow. It always does. Then, it will be time to choose: cold turkey; or the search for another, tougher to get, tougher to maintain, high. His Tweets are going to get even more bizarre.
0 -
Solar and wind are excellent complements for each other in the UK.Philip_Thompson said:
Wind power will still work. Especially when its distributed around the UK, its actually quite a reliable form of energy generation.dr_spyn said:The wind of change is blowing out of Boris Johnson's nether regions.
What happens when there is fog?
https://twitter.com/MsHelicat/status/1313233907903614978
And the Tories for the past decade have been boosting wind power. It is a far better suggestion for renewable energy generation than solar power which the UK under Labour was investing ridiculous sums in . . . when solar works much worse in the winter and the UK electricity demand peaks in the winter.0 -
The longer and more stringent lockdown remained popular in Wales. The hitherto useless Drakeford brought the people with him. There is however growing dissent at the current restrictions.Floater said:
Because they have run Wales so well to date?YBarddCwsc said:FPT
Two-thirds of the Welsh population are under very stringent Covid-19 restrictions, courtesy of Welsh Labour.Wulfrun_Phil said:
Utter cr*p from the Welsh Government. This is testing devolution beyond breaking point.
I cannot see any good reason why one set of UK authorities should be able to look at the same scientific evidence and come up with a completely different set of highly intrusive restrictions on daily life than does another based on the same evidence. What's worse is authorities that insist on applying even more restrictive rules on one group of people compared to other groups, the main difference being that the former does not have the right to ultimately vote the authorities out whereas the latter does.
A lot of the confusion over the myriad of lockdown rules could be avoided if there were a single set of rules across the UK, with a traffic light system of severity applying in different areas, applied in consultation with the relevant local authorities or regional governments. There should on the back of the pandemic be a review of the extent to which current devolution of powers should be reversed during a national emergency affecting the UK as a whole.
However, English visitors can stampede across our border unchecked, many from highly contaminated English regions, and climb a Welsh mountain or lounge in a Welsh holiday home. Why on Earth is this permitted?
Mark Drakeford is completely correct to insist on quarantining at the border.
I suspect it will be Welsh Labour's most popular policy ever. Drakeford could be looking at a landslide next year.
Oh boy......0 -
Even if there were four additional states added (and assuming they voted Democrat in perpetuity) it would at best neutralise the GOP’s current advantage in the senate due to its rural bias.MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
What would make the Democrat plan even more binding is that, if they did expand the SC, they would almost certainly also give statehood to DC, Puerto Rico and possibly also Guam and American Samoa to give themselves a very strong lock hold on the Senate possibly for ever
The Republicans started this war off with their obstruction and blatant attempts to suppress voting, I have no sympathy for them.3 -
Why is expanding the court, or giving statehood to Puerto Rico "against the rules"? The Democrats should certainly try to make the Senate slightly less so obscenely tilted towards rural conservative voters if they believe in democracy. Ideally it would be cross-party consensual reform, but there's no hope of that. The Republican party has proved itself to be violently opposed to democracy let's hope the Democrats get a chance to show they can live up to their name.MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
What would make the Democrat plan even more binding is that, if they did expand the SC, they would almost certainly also give statehood to DC, Puerto Rico and possibly also Guam and American Samoa to give themselves a very strong lock hold on the Senate possibly for ever
0 -
What was the supposed level/implementation?LostPassword said:ps. One interesting side point was that the government admitted that they'd created a plan, with five levels, but with no idea how they would implement one of those levels, and so it was impossible for them to do so when it was recommended to them. Astonishing - and yet only a footnote to the main issue.
0 -
It wouldn't mean a Permanent Democratic Majority, it would mean a majority until the Republicans next held the Presidency and the Senate.MrEd said:
Re the admission of states, generally it was done with bi-partisan agreement as it was recognised it was unfair to have them outside the umbrella. Here it would be done for purely naked partisan reasons ie to help one side in the Senate. It risks causing these states’ statehood to be a permanent political football with perpetual tit for tat. A Republican President might come in and agitate for California to be split into two states for example.kle4 said:
The motivation for the latter may well be as you suggest and pretty cynical as a result, but is it quite the same as 'changing the rules'? I mean, the USA has added states before, including 2 only 61 years ago, so clearly has a process for doing so - whatever reasons exist for not making them into states, that it goes against 'the rules' seems unlikely to be among the reasons.MrEd said:
Agree with you Charles 100pc. The Republicans are bending the rules but they are the rules. The Democrats want to change them altogether.
The same goes for giving statehood to Puerto Rico and Washington DC (and maybe Guam and American Samoa). It’s designed to permanently lock in their advantage
Of course, sometimes rules should be changed, but it's unfortunate that oftentimes people are suddenly converted to the necessity of doing so by partisan considerations, like people discovering PR is the way after an election that has been lost.
I'm still not particularly clearer. I can certainly see that it is an escalation of the judicial warfare between the two, and a bad idea, but when it comes to 'breaking' the rules if they are legally allowed to do it and it'd been done before, it's not precisely breaking it surely? It's a question of degree, not something wholly different? After all, the criticism of the Republican move is that it is crappy but they can technically do it, and the same wording could be applied to the Democrat potential move?MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
I do think the Democrats outrage of the Supreme Court nomination issue has the smell of grandstanding about it. Yes the Republican hypocrisy in about facing their previous position must have been galling, if unsurprising, but it doesn't disguise that they are, for the same reasons, also about facing, and saying the other lot did it first hardly matters if they believed their own principals last time.
On the judges, it’s the permanency of the thing that would be the problem. Adding 6 justices, all of which would be Democratic nominees and (presumably) young would mean a permanent Democrat majority. In that case, I think a lot of Republican voters would decide the rules were being stacked against them and lose faith in the system (and worse)1 -
In that case Plan B is probably to annex Cuba.Nigelb said:
A Republican President could ‘agitate’ all he wanted...MrEd said:
Re the admission of states, generally it was done with bi-partisan agreement as it was recognised it was unfair to have them outside the umbrella. Here it would be done for purely naked partisan reasons ie to help one side in the Senate. It risks causing these states’ statehood to be a permanent political football with perpetual tit for tat. A Republican President might come in and agitate for California to be split into two states for example.kle4 said:
The motivation for the latter may well be as you suggest and pretty cynical as a result, but is it quite the same as 'changing the rules'? I mean, the USA has added states before, including 2 only 61 years ago, so clearly has a process for doing so - whatever reasons exist for not making them into states, that it goes against 'the rules' seems unlikely to be among the reasons.MrEd said:
Agree with you Charles 100pc. The Republicans are bending the rules but they are the rules. The Democrats want to change them altogether.
The same goes for giving statehood to Puerto Rico and Washington DC (and maybe Guam and American Samoa). It’s designed to permanently lock in their advantage
Of course, sometimes rules should be changed, but it's unfortunate that oftentimes people are suddenly converted to the necessity of doing so by partisan considerations, like people discovering PR is the way after an election that has been lost.
I'm still not particularly clearer. I can certainly see that it is an escalation of the judicial warfare between the two, and a bad idea, but when it comes to 'breaking' the rules if they are legally allowed to do it and it'd been done before, it's not precisely breaking it surely? It's a question of degree, not something wholly different? After all, the criticism of the Republican move is that it is crappy but they can technically do it, and the same wording could be applied to the Democrat potential move?MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
I do think the Democrats outrage of the Supreme Court nomination issue has the smell of grandstanding about it. Yes the Republican hypocrisy in about facing their previous position must have been galling, if unsurprising, but it doesn't disguise that they are, for the same reasons, also about facing, and saying the other lot did it first hardly matters if they believed their own principals last time.
New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the Jurisdiction of any other State; nor any State be formed by the Junction of two or more States, or Parts of States, without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.
I don't think Biden will pack the court as it will just lead to tit for tat Judge inflation and the bench tripling in size by 2050.
DC statehood is more likely than Puerto Rico I think.0 -
Love the reporter . How many staff are sick , are you a superspreader ?
0 -
They were advised to move to level 5 - the strictest level in the plan - for four weeks, as a "circuit-breaker". The Tanaiste told RTE that they'd asked the Public Health team what they should do about unemployment support, or job subsidies, etc, and the public health team told them that it was their job to sort that out. And the government didn't have anything ready, to support the five levels in the plan that they published three weeks ago.solarflare said:
What was the supposed level/implementation?LostPassword said:ps. One interesting side point was that the government admitted that they'd created a plan, with five levels, but with no idea how they would implement one of those levels, and so it was impossible for them to do so when it was recommended to them. Astonishing - and yet only a footnote to the main issue.
Regardless of whether you think now was the right time to move to level 5, I rather think that if you have a plan that includes five levels, you should be able to use all five levels if doing so is indicated. But they aren't ready to do so. They seemed to believe they would never have to.0 -
Whereas the Republicans are hoping that with a 6-3 majority and many of the 6 being in their forties, they really could be seeing a permenant majority.rcs1000 said:
It wouldn't mean a Permanent Democratic Majority, it would mean a majority until the Republicans next held the Presidency and the Senate.MrEd said:
Re the admission of states, generally it was done with bi-partisan agreement as it was recognised it was unfair to have them outside the umbrella. Here it would be done for purely naked partisan reasons ie to help one side in the Senate. It risks causing these states’ statehood to be a permanent political football with perpetual tit for tat. A Republican President might come in and agitate for California to be split into two states for example.kle4 said:
The motivation for the latter may well be as you suggest and pretty cynical as a result, but is it quite the same as 'changing the rules'? I mean, the USA has added states before, including 2 only 61 years ago, so clearly has a process for doing so - whatever reasons exist for not making them into states, that it goes against 'the rules' seems unlikely to be among the reasons.MrEd said:
Agree with you Charles 100pc. The Republicans are bending the rules but they are the rules. The Democrats want to change them altogether.
The same goes for giving statehood to Puerto Rico and Washington DC (and maybe Guam and American Samoa). It’s designed to permanently lock in their advantage
Of course, sometimes rules should be changed, but it's unfortunate that oftentimes people are suddenly converted to the necessity of doing so by partisan considerations, like people discovering PR is the way after an election that has been lost.
I'm still not particularly clearer. I can certainly see that it is an escalation of the judicial warfare between the two, and a bad idea, but when it comes to 'breaking' the rules if they are legally allowed to do it and it'd been done before, it's not precisely breaking it surely? It's a question of degree, not something wholly different? After all, the criticism of the Republican move is that it is crappy but they can technically do it, and the same wording could be applied to the Democrat potential move?MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
I do think the Democrats outrage of the Supreme Court nomination issue has the smell of grandstanding about it. Yes the Republican hypocrisy in about facing their previous position must have been galling, if unsurprising, but it doesn't disguise that they are, for the same reasons, also about facing, and saying the other lot did it first hardly matters if they believed their own principals last time.
On the judges, it’s the permanency of the thing that would be the problem. Adding 6 justices, all of which would be Democratic nominees and (presumably) young would mean a permanent Democrat majority. In that case, I think a lot of Republican voters would decide the rules were being stacked against them and lose faith in the system (and worse)
That's why they're terrified about the idea of packing. Because it would make all their shenanigans meaningless.0 -
Trump, with the full support of the GOP has driven an idealogical coach and horses through the system. Between them they have pushed the Constitution to breaking point, and over the next three months will likely as not break it.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
If you can't see that you need stronger glasses.4 -
Statehood for Puerto Rico is simply sensible governance (assuming Puerto Rico votes for it) - and there’s no guarantee it would be reliably Democratic in the medium term. I also favour statehood for DC (FWIW).kamski said:
Why is expanding the court, or giving statehood to Puerto Rico "against the rules"? The Democrats should certainly try to make the Senate slightly less so obscenely tilted towards rural conservative voters if they believe in democracy. Ideally it would be cross-party consensual reform, but there's no hope of that. The Republican party has proved itself to be violently opposed to democracy let's hope the Democrats get a chance to show they can live up to their name.MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
What would make the Democrat plan even more binding is that, if they did expand the SC, they would almost certainly also give statehood to DC, Puerto Rico and possibly also Guam and American Samoa to give themselves a very strong lock hold on the Senate possibly for ever
Packing the Court would be a serious breach of political norms, even in these degraded times. It would be constitutional, though.1 -
What are the key factors to consider in the US election betting at this point?
1) The current state of play: both RCP and 538 have Biden now c.8 points ahead. He may be slightly less far ahead in the key swing states like Pennsylvania, but a 3-4 point lead is very likely to be enough. An election tomorrow would be a near-certain Biden win.
2) Volatility: Biden's lead has been remarkably stable for months, in a way the 2016 election was not. Trump becoming incapacitated or worse would have been a genuine black swan event in terms of people's reactions, but I don't think a week's long illness followed by Trump being very Trump-like about it all is going to make a big impact (bearing in mind Biden's lead has persisted through the entire Covid and Black Lives Matter sagas).
3) Time: four weeks doesn't offer that long for things to change given the lack of volatility in the polls after some very significant events.
All in all, this means the likelihood of a Trump win is overstated in the betting markets. But there is a great benefit to this: the general public continue to not believe that Biden is winning comfortably. That is ideal for motivating people to vote Trump out; and I think a similar thing happened in 2017/2019 in the UK where people only took Corbyn win seriously the second time around.
1 -
Running a place well, or badly, does not necessarily impact electoral performance of course.Floater said:
Because they have run Wales so well to date?YBarddCwsc said:FPT
Two-thirds of the Welsh population are under very stringent Covid-19 restrictions, courtesy of Welsh Labour.Wulfrun_Phil said:
Utter cr*p from the Welsh Government. This is testing devolution beyond breaking point.
I cannot see any good reason why one set of UK authorities should be able to look at the same scientific evidence and come up with a completely different set of highly intrusive restrictions on daily life than does another based on the same evidence. What's worse is authorities that insist on applying even more restrictive rules on one group of people compared to other groups, the main difference being that the former does not have the right to ultimately vote the authorities out whereas the latter does.
A lot of the confusion over the myriad of lockdown rules could be avoided if there were a single set of rules across the UK, with a traffic light system of severity applying in different areas, applied in consultation with the relevant local authorities or regional governments. There should on the back of the pandemic be a review of the extent to which current devolution of powers should be reversed during a national emergency affecting the UK as a whole.
However, English visitors can stampede across our border unchecked, many from highly contaminated English regions, and climb a Welsh mountain or lounge in a Welsh holiday home. Why on Earth is this permitted?
Mark Drakeford is completely correct to insist on quarantining at the border.
I suspect it will be Welsh Labour's most popular policy ever. Drakeford could be looking at a landslide next year.
Oh boy......1 -
Absolutely.not_on_fire said:
Even if there were four additional states added (and assuming they voted Democrat in perpetuity) it would at best neutralise the GOP’s current advantage in the senate due to its rural bias.MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
What would make the Democrat plan even more binding is that, if they did expand the SC, they would almost certainly also give statehood to DC, Puerto Rico and possibly also Guam and American Samoa to give themselves a very strong lock hold on the Senate possibly for ever
The Republicans started this war off with their obstruction and blatant attempts to suppress voting, I have no sympathy for them.
Plus apart from racism I see no reason why Hawaii should be a State but Puerto Rico should not.
Not considered Guam and American Samoa but if they're Americans and they want to be a State then of course they should be.0 -
Note that according to US Constitution, that NO state can be deprived of equal representation (two per state or whatever multiple) without its own consent. Which increases practical difficulty of passing "ordinary" constitutional amendment to a whole new order of magnitude. Ain't gonna happen.kamski said:
Why is expanding the court, or giving statehood to Puerto Rico "against the rules"? The Democrats should certainly try to make the Senate slightly less so obscenely tilted towards rural conservative voters if they believe in democracy. Ideally it would be cross-party consensual reform, but there's no hope of that. The Republican party has proved itself to be violently opposed to democracy let's hope the Democrats get a chance to show they can live up to their name.MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
What would make the Democrat plan even more binding is that, if they did expand the SC, they would almost certainly also give statehood to DC, Puerto Rico and possibly also Guam and American Samoa to give themselves a very strong lock hold on the Senate possibly for ever
Possible statehood for Puerto Rico or District of Columbia is different kettle of fish. In case of PR, both US parties have pledged themselves in not-so-distant pass to granting statehood IF and when clear majority of islanders so decide. GOP has never made same (theoretical) commitment to statehood for DC.
BTW, note that a little-considered option would be returning District of Columbia to State of Maryland, at least for electoral purposes. That would mean no US Senate seats, except as part of the Maryland electorate, but WOULD give Washingtonians a couple or more voting Representatives in US House.
As for court-packing, repeat it's a historical, judicial, practical political downer. Forgetaboutit.0 -
Interesting stuff, good to get a sense of how some other countries are dealing with this other than us and the USA.LostPassword said:I hope everyone was paying attention to Ireland tonight. The treatment of the public health professionals by the politicians here was absolutely brutal. They were dismissed as being out-of-touch, ignorant, plain wrong on the facts, making things up as they go along.
It's a big call by the politicians here - and despite the lack of unity it's all the politicians. The Opposition were confident enough that the government would follow NPHET recommendations that they felt able to outflank the government by criticising NPHET during the day. But the government weren't for allowing that to happen so joined in themselves, leaving the Opposition with nowhere to go. Only the fringe People Before Profit group support the NPHET recommendation for level 5, crushing the virus, and solving the health problem as a precondition to solving the economic problem.
It's a new world where the government are freestyling their own epidemiology, and they've taken a huge risk, because if the spread of the virus doesn't come under control, and the death toll rises and they eventually follow the advice to move to level 5 anyway, they will clearly be seen to have made the wrong call.
ps. One interesting side point was that the government admitted that they'd created a plan, with five levels, but with no idea how they would implement one of those levels, and so it was impossible for them to do so when it was recommended to them. Astonishing - and yet only a footnote to the main issue.0 -
Indeed.Casino_Royale said:
Taking his last breath on Friday and waving to his adoring fans on Sunday. It is almost biblical.0 -
-
Why forget about it if the GOP ram through ACB to ensure a 6-3 majority that could last for decades?SeaShantyIrish2 said:
Note that according to US Constitution, that NO state can be deprived of equal representation (two per state or whatever multiple) without its own consent. Which increases practical difficulty of passing "ordinary" constitutional amendment to a whole new order of magnitude. Ain't gonna happen.kamski said:
Why is expanding the court, or giving statehood to Puerto Rico "against the rules"? The Democrats should certainly try to make the Senate slightly less so obscenely tilted towards rural conservative voters if they believe in democracy. Ideally it would be cross-party consensual reform, but there's no hope of that. The Republican party has proved itself to be violently opposed to democracy let's hope the Democrats get a chance to show they can live up to their name.MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
What would make the Democrat plan even more binding is that, if they did expand the SC, they would almost certainly also give statehood to DC, Puerto Rico and possibly also Guam and American Samoa to give themselves a very strong lock hold on the Senate possibly for ever
Possible statehood for Puerto Rico or District of Columbia is different kettle of fish. In case of PR, both US parties have pledged themselves in not-so-distant pass to granting statehood IF and when clear majority of islanders so decide. GOP has never made same (theoretical) commitment to statehood for DC.
BTW, note that a little-considered option would be returning District of Columbia to State of Maryland, at least for electoral purposes. That would mean no US Senate seats, except as part of the Maryland electorate, but WOULD give Washingtonians a couple or more voting Representatives in US House.
As for court-packing, repeat it's a historical, judicial, practical political downer. Forgetaboutit.
People claim it was a failure of an idea for FDR but forget that it became unnecessary for FDR since some of the Justices FDR was against chose to retire and he ended up picking most of the Court's nine Jusices then anyway.
If ACB is approved then SCOTUS could have a GOP majority from existing Justices alone, if they choose not to retire, for the next 30 plus years. Plus you would expect if they do choose to retire they'll retire when the GOP controls the Senate and Oval Office, as Ginsburg probably should have done in Obama's era.
Packing the court would rectify what the GOP has done, otherwise they could face a decades-long permanent conservative majority because the GOP were prepared to push and change the rules but they weren't.0 -
MrEd said:
Short answer yeskle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
The Democrat plan would involve permanently changing the number of SC judges to ensure a permanent majority effectively. The Republican actions involved bending the rules but not breaking them altogether.
What would make the Democrat plan even more binding is that, if they did expand the SC, they would almost certainly also give statehood to DC, Puerto Rico and possibly also Guam and American Samoa to give themselves a very strong lock hold on the Senate possibly for ever
If the GOP were in the same position they would do exactly the same thing.MrEd said:
Sorry @Nigelb that is not true. The Republican blocking of Obama’s choice was low politics but it didn’t permanently change the game ie if the Democrats won the Senate and a Republican President put their candidate forward, the Senate would be in their rights to do the same.Nigelb said:.
Is it constitutional ? Yes.kle4 said:
I certainly agree with the point that breaking rules is not ok, especially for partisan advantage, and where the rules allow really crappy things I think they should be changed.Charles said:
That’s just crap Philip. I’m sorry but you have a complete blind spot here.Philip_Thompson said:
Given the GOP's shenanigans with the Court, why shouldn't they fight fire with fire and pack it if they have the ability to do so?Charles said:I hope so
His [Biden’s] refusal to disavow plans to pack the Supreme Court is deeply disturbing
That is just karma for the GOP's own actions from 2016 onwards.
The Republicans behaved aggressively in 2016 by leveraging their control of the Senate to frustrate Obama’s desire to nominate a new SC Justice. The arguments they put forward were utterly specious.
In 2020 they are behaving hypocritically is trying to ram through an appointment leveraging their control of the White House and the Senate.
In both cases they are acting within the rules
If the Democrats chose to appoint 6 ideologically pure Justices to ensure they have a majority on the bench they will destroy an institution that is a fundamental part of the American system and one which, by and large, (yes, I know, Dred Scott was both bad law and bad morally) has served the American people well.
You repeatedly seem to think it’s ok to break the rules for partisan advantage. I find that disturbing
But I am less clear on your examples here. I'm sure it was argued on here that it would be within the rules to stack the bench, since it does not have a set membership or something, and there is precedent for expanding its scale.
Sounds like a bad idea, and frankly the politicisation of the judges by their very nature seems a poor idea to me as well, but is it actually the case that the Republican shenanigans are within the rules, but expanding the court is not?
It would possibly be unwise, but it would certainly be within the “rules”.
It would, of course, be a gross violation of norms, which is what Charles probably means - just that he doesn’t seem to get quite so exercised about that when it comes from the Republican side.
If the Democrats do expand the SC and do add their new justices, then it does permanently change the rules. It is no different from someone saying here “you know what, I can’t get my bill through the Commons, let me add another100 MPs and nominate them all”
It’s meant to permanently lock in one side’s advantage1 -
Well that is true. Bigger mountains, bigger islands, bigger interior, bigger forests, more and better weed. Lesser and fewer rednecks in the boonies.SeaShantyIrish2 said:
You are correct, partly. One thing that I've always found strange, is how little coverage and knowledge there is of BC in WA State. For example, doubt one Seattleite in one hundred could tell you the name of Premier of BC. About only BC news that makes it down here is sky report from Whistler.dixiedean said:
Always thought the Evergreen State and BC had more in common with each other than with the rest of their respective nations, in many ways.SeaShantyIrish2 said:
Must say from US perspective Canada makes an excellent green- (or rather white-) space buffer, and excellent source for maple syrup and wood chips, plus full of interesting wildlife such as William Shatner, Pamela Anderson, Celine Dion and Justin Bieber.dixiedean said:FPT.
Not many people realise Canada is more densely populated than Australia.
Which just goes to show how bloody empty Oz is.
BUT perhaps OUR butt-head ignorance, is YOUR greatest defense?
Sssh!
I take it the BC election isn't featuring on the news?
It'll probably be of more import than the gubernatorials on the East Coast.
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Thoughts on Covid in the UK...
The focus has seemed to be on the Excel file debacle, but the true story is that we're now running at close to 12,000 cases per day by the latest (complete) specimen dates. That removes my hope that the rate of cases increasing was slowing significantly. The slowdown hypothesis was apparently supported by ONS and Imperial studies, while also coinciding with when we would have expected a slowdown from the 'rule of six' rule coming into place, but it seems it was too good to be true.
Now it's possible that this increase is driven by schools and universities going back, but in any case it shows the difficulty of keeping a lid on cases while retaining some semblance of normality. It now seems very likely that "true" (ONS) cases will be close to 20,000 per day once the current period is covered in their report in a couple of weeks. Given that's close to 1% of the UK population per month, I can't help but think that tighter restrictions are coming up before the year is out once hospitalisations have risen by enough.
In the near term, I wouldn't be surprised if at least some parts of London joins the local lockdown later this week or next given recent data.0 -
I'd rather not have wind turbines visible from every piece of land in Scotland, the Pennines and the Lake District.LostPassword said:
Solar and wind are excellent complements for each other in the UK.Philip_Thompson said:
Wind power will still work. Especially when its distributed around the UK, its actually quite a reliable form of energy generation.dr_spyn said:The wind of change is blowing out of Boris Johnson's nether regions.
What happens when there is fog?
https://twitter.com/MsHelicat/status/1313233907903614978
And the Tories for the past decade have been boosting wind power. It is a far better suggestion for renewable energy generation than solar power which the UK under Labour was investing ridiculous sums in . . . when solar works much worse in the winter and the UK electricity demand peaks in the winter.
Offshore would be OK. That will stop the Spanish trawlers too.
If we could get tidal stream energy working that could be huge . It might eventually add a few milliseconds on to each day though!0 -
Laughable live scenes at the White House. They need people in white coats.0
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Trump doing the PR shots arriving back at the White House...Mask off for the photographer0
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What is the issue with wind turbines? I think they are pretty. Certainly in comparison with a string of pylons.Flatlander said:
I'd rather not have wind turbines visible from every piece of land in Scotland, the Pennines and the Lake District.LostPassword said:
Solar and wind are excellent complements for each other in the UK.Philip_Thompson said:
Wind power will still work. Especially when its distributed around the UK, its actually quite a reliable form of energy generation.dr_spyn said:The wind of change is blowing out of Boris Johnson's nether regions.
What happens when there is fog?
https://twitter.com/MsHelicat/status/1313233907903614978
And the Tories for the past decade have been boosting wind power. It is a far better suggestion for renewable energy generation than solar power which the UK under Labour was investing ridiculous sums in . . . when solar works much worse in the winter and the UK electricity demand peaks in the winter.
Offshore would be OK. That will stop the Spanish trawlers too.
If we could get tidal stream energy working that could be huge . It might eventually add a few milliseconds on to each day though!5 -
Love or hate Trump he truly is a showman.
Is anyone actually paying any attention to Biden in this election campaign?0 -
What they should do is pack the court so it leans Dem but then ask the GOP if they'd like to agree to a constitutional amendment to fix the system, which wasn't designed with a two-party system in mind, and bring it back to neutral. For example, appoint justices in pairs on a single vote, so in the worst case the parties could choose equal-and-opposite political hacks, but hopefully they'd be motivated to make a deal to each choose a non-hack, in exchange for the other side choosing a non-hack.Nigelb said:
Statehood for Puerto Rico is simply sensible governance (assuming Puerto Rico votes for it) - and there’s no guarantee it would be reliably Democratic in the medium term. I also favour statehood for DC (FWIW).
Packing the Court would be a serious breach of political norms, even in these degraded times. It would be constitutional, though.0 -
Boris leading the way on renewable energy, good to seedixiedean said:
What is the issue with wind turbines? I think they are pretty. Certainly in comparison with a string of pylons.Flatlander said:
I'd rather not have wind turbines visible from every piece of land in Scotland, the Pennines and the Lake District.LostPassword said:
Solar and wind are excellent complements for each other in the UK.Philip_Thompson said:
Wind power will still work. Especially when its distributed around the UK, its actually quite a reliable form of energy generation.dr_spyn said:The wind of change is blowing out of Boris Johnson's nether regions.
What happens when there is fog?
https://twitter.com/MsHelicat/status/1313233907903614978
And the Tories for the past decade have been boosting wind power. It is a far better suggestion for renewable energy generation than solar power which the UK under Labour was investing ridiculous sums in . . . when solar works much worse in the winter and the UK electricity demand peaks in the winter.
Offshore would be OK. That will stop the Spanish trawlers too.
If we could get tidal stream energy working that could be huge . It might eventually add a few milliseconds on to each day though!1 -
Trump needs to be sectioned . The first thing he does is take off his mask ! And tries to look like the tough guy but this performance is going to sicken many Americans who aren’t part of the Trump cult !0
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