Headline in the Times is that the Queen will be called upon to "boost confidence" in the safety of the vaccine.
Now i may be overcomplicating here, but is really a good idea to rely on a 94 year old woman to demonstrate safety in the vaccine? Given that there is a not insignificant possibility that she might die, or at least become ill, in the period after taking it? (just from natural causes, not linked to the vaccine)
She's exactly the sort of high risk person who ought to be having it
Be that as it may, i don't think you want to be putting her forward as someone to have it specifically to "increase confidence in the vaccine". Because such a strategy can result in an unfortunate outcome...
Just been listening to Tony Connelly (RTE) who is great on all things EU. He said that Macron is relaxed about a No Deal because it protects the French fishing industry. Is this correct? I thought that No Deal meant no fishing rights. Can anyone clarify?
No Deal stops fisherman from the South of England fishing, especially for shellfish, in French waters, as they have done for many years. There was quite a row about it 18 months or so ago.
If that happens they'll have to console themselves with 6.8 million square kilometres of exclusive fishing zones.
Often the wrong sort of fish, apparently. OK in NE Scotland and perhaps in East Anglia.
Is there a version of the map if the Shetlands decide to stay with the UK?
If Shetland decided to become an rUK enclave, its territorial limit would be 12 miles I believe, not sure if that's big enough to show up on that map. If it decided to go indy much bigger of course (unlike the chances of that actually happening).
Mann seems to have that sort of enclave limit in the map, actually..
Interesting to see that ICU mortality is about half it was in the first wave. Still nasty though, and 9/10 of ICU admissions no major co morbidity. I expect that those with major co morbidity and covid don't get ICU admission. Only 1/10 of our cases in Leicester are on ICU, for example.
I know that there is little to say beyond expressing horror and sadness at a life so cruelly taken. But the fact that the beheading on the streets of a French capital of a teacher - for doing their job - barely registers is itself noteworthy.
Have we become so inured to this sort of barbarism that we go “oh well, poor France” and carry on?
If being woke or being against hate crimes meant anything substantive, we ought to be incensed at what really is a hate crime and the barbaric bullying in the name of religion of those who dare challenge it.
I totally sympathise with this view, but don't agree that we are inured. We are incensed. The awful reality is that a liberal society and rule of law versus suicidal barbarism is not and cannot be a level playing field.
Cyclefree would need to tell us what 'incensed' looks like in a free society with liberal values? If it looks like revenge it is no longer a liberal society. If it counters barbarity with barbarity, the same applies. If it applies communal guilt to a swathe of people by ethnicity or religion, the same applies.
Well, I have set out what I would like to do pretty extensively on here back in 2015 when the Charlie Hebdo killings happened.
But three things we should do:-
1. We should not make the upholding of free speech something which only brave individuals do - at the cost of threats and, sometimes, their lives. When those cartoonists were killed or the Danish cartoonist attacked every paper in the country, in Europe, in free liberal societies should have published them. Solidarity in numbers. Instead we cravenly self-censored ourselves and are still doing it. Look at how much effort it took to defend those Birmingham schools, for instance. (See also http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2019/03/21/rendering-unto-caesar/.) 2. The Scottish Hate Crime Bill should be withdrawn and rewritten. As of now, it effectively permits censorship by religions by effectively deeming criticism of a religion a hate crime. 3. Those who incite the sort of thinking and behaviour carried out by this terrorist should be prosecuted.
Thanks for this comment. Some responses:
1) I believe in free speech, but personally I prefer to respect the religious sensibilities of others, on the 'do unto others' principle - and I strongly object to some forms of mocking and distortion of my own religious beliefs even though people are free to do so, I prefer it if they refrain. Media editors may feel the same.
2) In a liberal society you can't tell the media what to do. It is a self evident contradiction.
3) You are of course right about the Scottish Hate Crime Bill
4) Incitement. Easier to say than to define. Freedom of belief is what it is. I am not entitled to murder someone but I am entitled to stand for parliament on a manifesto saying that murder should be made lawful. It would not be difficult for illiberal people (as well as many liberals) to see that as incitement. Which would be the thin end of that Scottish wedge.
I agree on point (1) in the sense that I don’t go around insulting other people’s beliefs just for the hell of it. That is impolite. But there is a huge difference between doing it voluntarily out of politeness and courtesy and doing it because you are scared or because you are threatened. When somebody says that I can’t poke fun at someone’s religion because otherwise they will kill me I am bloody well going to be as provocative as possible. I am not - and nor should any free liberal society - going to be bullied into politeness or respect for something which I don’t respect.
Media editors did not refrain out of politeness; they refrained out of fear.
We should of course poke fun at all religions, and IMHO the world would be a better place without religions at all.
But blurring the boundary between Islamic extremists and the millions of Muslims worldwide is your blind spot, when your otherwise level headed objectivity takes its holidays.
Just been listening to Tony Connelly (RTE) who is great on all things EU. He said that Macron is relaxed about a No Deal because it protects the French fishing industry. Is this correct? I thought that No Deal meant no fishing rights. Can anyone clarify?
No Deal stops fisherman from the South of England fishing, especially for shellfish, in French waters, as they have done for many years. There was quite a row about it 18 months or so ago.
There was some story about most of the fish in UK waters being the sort of fish that the UK public don't like to eat. So it's a big problem for a lot of UK fisherman if they lose their markets in the EU.
No that's just a straw clutched by Remainers.
Currently for instance the French catch 90% of the cod in the English zone of the Channel and then they export much of that to the UK. So that is categorised as a British import despite it being fished from the British zone.
If you want to claim that the British don't eat cod then I'd like to see some substantiating evidence for that claim.
1) what percentage of total UK fish stocks is that? 2) what percentage of total UK cod consumption?
Think about it, it just took one man to ensure that no teachers or any other public figures will dare show pictures of Muhammad from now on in France or else have a good chance of being killed for doing so.
This is a key point. A small minority can have an effect regardless of what the majority think if the majority stay silent or look the other way.
“A man, whose family was German aristocracy prior to World War II, owned a number of large industries and estates. When asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism.
‘Very few people were true Nazis,’ he said, ‘but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.’
We are told again and again by ‘experts’ and ‘talking heads’ that Islam is the religion of peace and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unqualified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the spectre of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam.
The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars worldwide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honour-kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. It is the fanatics who teach their young to kill and to become suicide bombers. The hard, quantifiable fact is that the peaceful majority, the ’silent majority,’ is cowed and extraneous.
History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason, we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points: Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence. Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don’t speak up, because like my friend from Germany , they will awaken one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun.
As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts–the fanatics who threaten our way of life.
Like the silent Muslims, we remain silent and acquiescent, while our freedoms gradually disappear."
The author of that a big fan of the Chinese approach I assume.
You are assuming that the only choices are the Chinese approach or appeasement. I don’t think so. I hope I’m right.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
Just been listening to Tony Connelly (RTE) who is great on all things EU. He said that Macron is relaxed about a No Deal because it protects the French fishing industry. Is this correct? I thought that No Deal meant no fishing rights. Can anyone clarify?
No Deal stops fisherman from the South of England fishing, especially for shellfish, in French waters, as they have done for many years. There was quite a row about it 18 months or so ago.
There was some story about most of the fish in UK waters being the sort of fish that the UK public don't like to eat. So it's a big problem for a lot of UK fisherman if they lose their markets in the EU.
No that's just a straw clutched by Remainers.
Currently for instance the French catch 90% of the cod in the English zone of the Channel and then they export much of that to the UK. So that is categorised as a British import despite it being fished from the British zone.
If you want to claim that the British don't eat cod then I'd like to see some substantiating evidence for that claim.
1) what percentage of total UK fish stocks is that? 2) what percentage of total UK cod consumption?
If this were Wikipedia you just need to pin a {{citation required}} against his post.
Indeed with a Brexit disaster looming we might as well pin the tag to Thompson’s avatar.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
If the economy is in tatters and my future prospects looked bleak, I may very well prefer dull and competent over entertaining but incompetent.
Just been listening to Tony Connelly (RTE) who is great on all things EU. He said that Macron is relaxed about a No Deal because it protects the French fishing industry. Is this correct? I thought that No Deal meant no fishing rights. Can anyone clarify?
It screws the French fishing industry but protects Macron - who hasn't "sold out" to les rosbifs whose fault it is entirely.
When Scotland are fast tracked back into EU they will get it all back , so will be very short term pain and French will just fish anyway and there will not be enough Navy ships to do anything about it.
The RN Fisheries Protection Squadron is handsomely equipped with River Class OPVs. The MoD had to order a batch it didn't want or need in order to keep the BAE Clyde yards in business so they've got plenty. That's why they started decommissioning them less than halfway through their life and selling another to Bahrain for a fistful of dinars.
The crews are a different matter. FP is generally where they send the congenitally incapable so they can't fuck up anything important.
Yes but do they have enough to handle the amount of french boats that will be in the waters fishing. Or the French stopping the lorries in Calais for a few weeks in revenge if they do. Putting all their eggs in a single port in the south east will for sure haunt them. Be lovely to be living in Kent no doubt.
Just been listening to Tony Connelly (RTE) who is great on all things EU. He said that Macron is relaxed about a No Deal because it protects the French fishing industry. Is this correct? I thought that No Deal meant no fishing rights. Can anyone clarify?
No Deal stops fisherman from the South of England fishing, especially for shellfish, in French waters, as they have done for many years. There was quite a row about it 18 months or so ago.
There was some story about most of the fish in UK waters being the sort of fish that the UK public don't like to eat. So it's a big problem for a lot of UK fisherman if they lose their markets in the EU.
No that's just a straw clutched by Remainers.
Currently for instance the French catch 90% of the cod in the English zone of the Channel and then they export much of that to the UK. So that is categorised as a British import despite it being fished from the British zone.
If you want to claim that the British don't eat cod then I'd like to see some substantiating evidence for that claim.
1) what percentage of total UK fish stocks is that? 2) what percentage of total UK cod consumption?
If this were Wikipedia you just need to pin a {{citation required}} against his post.
Indeed with a Brexit disaster looming we might as well pin the tag to Thompson’s avatar.
Let's be honest Brexit may well be fine and not a catastrophe as billed, but even then fish will matter not one jot.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
If the economy is in tatters and my future prospects looked bleak, I may very well prefer dull and competent over entertaining but incompetent.
I think dull and competent is good for when things are generally ok. We're going to have a load of economic and other problems to sort out, so doing nothing is not a good strategy IMO.
If he'd taken over in 1997 rather than Blair then I think he'd have been ok.
Interesting to see that ICU mortality is about half it was in the first wave. Still nasty though, and 9/10 of ICU admissions no major co morbidity. I expect that those with major co morbidity and covid don't get ICU admission. Only 1/10 of our cases in Leicester are on ICU, for example.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
If the economy is in tatters and my future prospects looked bleak, I may very well prefer dull and competent over entertaining but incompetent.
I think dull and competent is good for when things are generally ok. We're going to have a load of economic and other problems to sort out, so doing nothing is not a good strategy IMO.
If he'd taken over in 1997 rather than Blair then I think he'd have been ok.
Who said anything about "doing nothing"?
Dull and competent is good when it's against the very thing that caused the problems in the first place.
Since the outset of our negotiations we were totally clear that we wanted nothing more complicated than the relationship the EU has with Canada.
One based on friendship and free trade.
But for much of the last few months the EU have refused to negotiate seriously.
Demanding the continued ability to control our legislative freedom and our fisheries in a way that is completely unacceptable to an independent country.
Which is why yesterday I decided that we should get ready for the end of the transition period on January 1st with arrangements based on the simple principles of global free trade, like Australia’s relationship.
And why I’m asking you to join me today as we embark on that new journey >>
Become a Member For whatever reason the EU are not willing to offer this country, after 45 years of membership, the same terms as they did to Canada.
So now is the time to prepare.
And with you by our side we can do that with high hearts and complete confidence.
By embracing this alternative path we will prosper mightily as an independent free trading nation, controlling our own borders, our own fisheries and setting our own laws.
If you’ve thought about joining our Party before, today is the day to >>
Become a Member – £25 a year / £2.09 a month Become an Armed Forces Member – £15 a year Become an under 26 member – £5 a year Yours sincerely,
Boris Johnson signature Boris Johnson Prime Minister
Still lying about Australia’s relationship with the EU, I see. How often does it need saying that this is on the basis of a deal between Australia and the EU.
And if we have no deal with the EU, we will not have a relationship with them which is like Australia’s.
We will have a relationship like the one Afghanistan has.
There is no trade deal between Australia and the EU they essentially trade on WTO terms
Australia barely trades with the EU at all. It's really not particularly important to them.
About 1/5th of their Services exports go to the EU. About 1/2 of ours do.
So we are talking about only a bit over double barely then.
Er... And the rest?
It's pretty inconsequential.
We are going to continue trading with Europe whether we are EU members, have an FTA or on WTO terms.
The primary difference between an FTA and no FTA is merely tariffs and tariffs are only about 3%. The currency fluctuates by more than 3%.
So even if we have no FTA we will adapt just fine. It just isn't that important. It would be nice to have but we can negotiate a better one in the future after we have adjusted to WTO and the French fishermen etc have adjusted to having zero of our stock.
You think we have the capacity in our fishing fleet to pick up the slack from the sudden absence of the French fishing our Cod and selling it to us? I suspect that supply demands will mean they carry on as normal in the medium term.
Yes I do since fishermen currently have to throw away a lot of their catch if they are over quota limits.
I love the notion that there might have to be growth and more jobs etc in the industry as a horrified reason not to do it.
Bit like burning your 20 pound notes so you can save your 10p coins
Your hypocrisy with regards to Scottish independence and Brexit remains breathtaking.
At least I'm consistent in applying the same principles to (and thus supporting) both.
What you talking about , Brexit is a disaster and Independence is the natural state for Scotland , where is the hypocrisy.
How is Brexit a disaster other than the same logic people use to Scottish independence is a disaster?
British independence is every bit as natural as Scottish independence is. The same logic applies to both.
You are off your nut Philip, UK control their own budgets, and all the powers , they are not a colony of the EU like Scotland is of England.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
If the economy is in tatters and my future prospects looked bleak, I may very well prefer dull and competent over entertaining but incompetent.
I think dull and competent is good for when things are generally ok. We're going to have a load of economic and other problems to sort out, so doing nothing is not a good strategy IMO.
If he'd taken over in 1997 rather than Blair then I think he'd have been ok.
Who said anything about "doing nothing"?
Dull and competent is good when it's against the very thing that caused the problems in the first place.
Well I think most people are against COVID to be honest.
Think about it, it just took one man to ensure that no teachers or any other public figures will dare show pictures of Muhammad from now on in France or else have a good chance of being killed for doing so.
This is a key point. A small minority can have an effect regardless of what the majority think if the majority stay silent or look the other way.
“A man, whose family was German aristocracy prior to World War II, owned a number of large industries and estates. When asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism.
‘Very few people were true Nazis,’ he said, ‘but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.’
We are told again and again by ‘experts’ and ‘talking heads’ that Islam is the religion of peace and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unqualified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the spectre of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam.
The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars worldwide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honour-kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. It is the fanatics who teach their young to kill and to become suicide bombers. The hard, quantifiable fact is that the peaceful majority, the ’silent majority,’ is cowed and extraneous.
History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason, we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points: Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence. Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don’t speak up, because like my friend from Germany , they will awaken one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun.
As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts–the fanatics who threaten our way of life.
Like the silent Muslims, we remain silent and acquiescent, while our freedoms gradually disappear."
As someone who currently lives in a peaceful Muslim country, I agree with you wholeheartedly.
Edit: It still amazes me that every newspaper and magazine in Europe didn't immediately republish the "Charlie Hebdo" cartoons.
It is really that amazing?
I'm sure the journalists who published it being machined gunned to death might have swayed the others not to do the same.
There is also the issue of the ides that the Charlie Hebdo cartoons were racist, since they were "punching down"
Others might recall the incident of policemen in the UK trying to get lists of who had purchased the reprint issue.
The contribution to the exchequer the "fishing" industry makes. The number of jobs currently depending on the "fishing" industry. The number of jobs that stand to be gained by "taking back control".
Only then can we judge if it's worth sacrificing other jobs and/or industries over.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
If the economy is in tatters and my future prospects looked bleak, I may very well prefer dull and competent over entertaining but incompetent.
Most people prefer the promise of a bright future from someone who comes across as upbeat. Not saying they should, but I think they do. Dull competence is a hard sell at Election time, especially coming from someone lacking charisma
Just been listening to Tony Connelly (RTE) who is great on all things EU. He said that Macron is relaxed about a No Deal because it protects the French fishing industry. Is this correct? I thought that No Deal meant no fishing rights. Can anyone clarify?
No Deal stops fisherman from the South of England fishing, especially for shellfish, in French waters, as they have done for many years. There was quite a row about it 18 months or so ago.
If that happens they'll have to console themselves with 6.8 million square kilometres of exclusive fishing zones.
Often the wrong sort of fish, apparently. OK in NE Scotland and perhaps in East Anglia.
Is there a version of the map if the Shetlands decide to stay with the UK?
Well given they are not a country and do not have that option the answer is no, however in your fantasy , they get 12 miles round the Shetlands so easy to see impact.
Interesting to see that ICU mortality is about half it was in the first wave. Still nasty though, and 9/10 of ICU admissions no major co morbidity. I expect that those with major co morbidity and covid don't get ICU admission. Only 1/10 of our cases in Leicester are on ICU, for example.
I know you were focussing on ICU, but might a reason for declining mortality rates be that more people (as a percentage of total cases) are choosing to present at hospital than in the first wave? Not least because the increase in testing means that people are more confident in presenting as they have more than just "symptoms" to justify it (and of course, once you know you have it, there's no risk that you don't have it but might actually contract it in hospital).
And they've taken on board suggestions that it's better to get treatment earlier than later.
Think about it, it just took one man to ensure that no teachers or any other public figures will dare show pictures of Muhammad from now on in France or else have a good chance of being killed for doing so.
This is a key point. A small minority can have an effect regardless of what the majority think if the majority stay silent or look the other way.
“A man, whose family was German aristocracy prior to World War II, owned a number of large industries and estates. When asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism.
‘Very few people were true Nazis,’ he said, ‘but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.’
We are told again and again by ‘experts’ and ‘talking heads’ that Islam is the religion of peace and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unqualified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the spectre of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam.
The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars worldwide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honour-kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. It is the fanatics who teach their young to kill and to become suicide bombers. The hard, quantifiable fact is that the peaceful majority, the ’silent majority,’ is cowed and extraneous.
History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason, we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points: Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence. Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don’t speak up, because like my friend from Germany , they will awaken one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun.
As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts–the fanatics who threaten our way of life.
Like the silent Muslims, we remain silent and acquiescent, while our freedoms gradually disappear."
The author of that a big fan of the Chinese approach I assume.
The piece is really just identifying the problem, without coming up with any policy to combat it. There is not really anything that can be done about it in my opinion.
The Chinese can deal with it because they are not a liberal democracy, it could never happen like that here.
For once we agree, there's a whole shitload of 'something must be done' around, hardly any 'this should be done'.
Back in 2015 I posted a whole load of “what should be done” ideas. I have no idea how to recover those posts. But believe me there is plenty that could be done that does not involve behaving like the Chinese.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
Perhaps he'll do a bungee jump dressed as a canary at some point.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
If the economy is in tatters and my future prospects looked bleak, I may very well prefer dull and competent over entertaining but incompetent.
Most people prefer the promise of a bright future from someone who comes across as upbeat. Not saying they should, but I think they do. Dull competence is a hard sell at Election time, especially coming from someone lacking charisma
Boris's ability to paint a bright future appears to be waining as time goes on. That may have something to do with him first smearing the walls of the bright future with human excrement.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
Perhaps he'll do a bungee jump dressed as a canary at some point.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
If the economy is in tatters and my future prospects looked bleak, I may very well prefer dull and competent over entertaining but incompetent.
That's the point.
If Borisism works, he will win in 2024 and deserve to.
If it fails, the Conservatives lose in 2024, unless they can come up with an anti-Boris to take over soon. I don't think they can, or that it would work.
In that scenario, Starmer's boringness might be a huge positive. We won't want to go on a bear hunt any more.
Excellent header. At least Jezza realised that the job of the opposition is to oppose. He didn't have the numbers to make it count but perhaps SKS enlisting somehow the Tory rebels would mean greater impact.
However great response also by @NickPalmer. It's a long game. Although SKS must be careful he doesn't paint himself into too many corners by not opposing now.
Just been listening to Tony Connelly (RTE) who is great on all things EU. He said that Macron is relaxed about a No Deal because it protects the French fishing industry. Is this correct? I thought that No Deal meant no fishing rights. Can anyone clarify?
No Deal stops fisherman from the South of England fishing, especially for shellfish, in French waters, as they have done for many years. There was quite a row about it 18 months or so ago.
If that happens they'll have to console themselves with 6.8 million square kilometres of exclusive fishing zones.
Often the wrong sort of fish, apparently. OK in NE Scotland and perhaps in East Anglia.
Is there a version of the map if the Shetlands decide to stay with the UK?
Well given they are not a country and do not have that option the answer is no, however in your fantasy , they get 12 miles round the Shetlands so easy to see impact.
That's not the situation for the many island colonies in the Caribbean.
Still got this twattish article up. Sorry but true.
I've just put some more money on the US elections, going in on both Presidential and Senate races. This is landslide territory. A seismic change taking place. The corollary will be Johnson's isolation in the world. Delicious.
The contribution to the exchequer the "fishing" industry makes. The number of jobs currently depending on the "fishing" industry. The number of jobs that stand to be gained by "taking back control".
Only then can we judge if it's worth sacrificing other jobs and/or industries over.
It's not even like we are holding out to protect the existing UK fishing industry. The EU would be perfectly happy with the status quo and therefore guaranteeing the UK industry at its existing level. It is the EU which is potentially losing jobs from the UK demands, not the UK. Most trade deals are conducted on the basis that they should be mutually beneficial. Not conducted on the basis of reducing existing market access.
To the extent that it means anything beyond symbolism, making it a "sticking point" only makes sense to create more UK fishing jobs. But it's not surprising the French aren't happy about it.
Interesting to see that ICU mortality is about half it was in the first wave. Still nasty though, and 9/10 of ICU admissions no major co morbidity. I expect that those with major co morbidity and covid don't get ICU admission. Only 1/10 of our cases in Leicester are on ICU, for example.
Do you mean they'd get palliative only rather than ICU?
The majority of Covid-19 deaths are not in ICU, so essentially yes. ICU only take people likely to benefit from and survive their interventions, and the threshold for ECMO is even tougher.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
If the economy is in tatters and my future prospects looked bleak, I may very well prefer dull and competent over entertaining but incompetent.
3 Nov will give us a clue of what happens when 'safe pair of hands' meets 'further dose of colourful egotism, corruption and incompetence'.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
If the economy is in tatters and my future prospects looked bleak, I may very well prefer dull and competent over entertaining but incompetent.
Most people prefer the promise of a bright future from someone who comes across as upbeat. Not saying they should, but I think they do. Dull competence is a hard sell at Election time, especially coming from someone lacking charisma
Boris's ability to paint a bright future appears to be waining as time goes on. That may have something to do with him first smearing the walls of the bright future with human excrement.
The lesson is to elect politicians who are driven by a vision of what they want to achieve for our country and our fellow citizens, rather than those who simply fancy themselves as king of the world. It’s a lesson we are going to have to learn the hard way.
It's a piss poor header followed by a load of verbose twaddle.
This is NOT the time for grandstanding. Burnham was completely wrong this week. Events like the death of the Liverpool mayor's brother, just announced, illustrate that this isn't a game.
Jacinda won a landslide. So will Joe Biden. Steady, sensible, science-based leaders are winning big because the people around the world are seeing through bullshit. Whether that's from the left or the right. They don't want it any more. The days of charisma, bluster and bluff are at an end. For now.
Still got this twattish article up. Sorry but true.
I've just put some more money on the US elections, going in on both Presidential and Senate races. This is landslide territory. A seismic change taking place. The corollary will be Johnson's isolation in the world. Delicious.
I know that there is little to say beyond expressing horror and sadness at a life so cruelly taken. But the fact that the beheading on the streets of a French capital of a teacher - for doing their job - barely registers is itself noteworthy.
Have we become so inured to this sort of barbarism that we go “oh well, poor France” and carry on?
If being woke or being against hate crimes meant anything substantive, we ought to be incensed at what really is a hate crime and the barbaric bullying in the name of religion of those who dare challenge it.
I totally sympathise with this view, but don't agree that we are inured. We are incensed. The awful reality is that a liberal society and rule of law versus suicidal barbarism is not and cannot be a level playing field.
Cyclefree would need to tell us what 'incensed' looks like in a free society with liberal values? If it looks like revenge it is no longer a liberal society. If it counters barbarity with barbarity, the same applies. If it applies communal guilt to a swathe of people by ethnicity or religion, the same applies.
Well, I have set out what I would like to do pretty extensively on here back in 2015 when the Charlie Hebdo killings happened.
But three things we should do:-
1. We should not make the upholding of free speech something which only brave individuals do - at the cost of threats and, sometimes, their lives. When those cartoonists were killed or the Danish cartoonist attacked every paper in the country, in Europe, in free liberal societies should have published them. Solidarity in numbers. Instead we cravenly self-censored ourselves and are still doing it. Look at how much effort it took to defend those Birmingham schools, for instance. (See also http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2019/03/21/rendering-unto-caesar/.) 2. The Scottish Hate Crime Bill should be withdrawn and rewritten. As of now, it effectively permits censorship by religions by effectively deeming criticism of a religion a hate crime. 3. Those who incite the sort of thinking and behaviour carried out by this terrorist should be prosecuted.
Thanks for this comment. Some responses:
1) I believe in free speech, but personally I prefer to respect the religious sensibilities of others, on the 'do unto others' principle - and I strongly object to some forms of mocking and distortion of my own religious beliefs even though people are free to do so, I prefer it if they refrain. Media editors may feel the same.
2) In a liberal society you can't tell the media what to do. It is a self evident contradiction.
3) You are of course right about the Scottish Hate Crime Bill
4) Incitement. Easier to say than to define. Freedom of belief is what it is. I am not entitled to murder someone but I am entitled to stand for parliament on a manifesto saying that murder should be made lawful. It would not be difficult for illiberal people (as well as many liberals) to see that as incitement. Which would be the thin end of that Scottish wedge.
I agree on point (1) in the sense that I don’t go around insulting other people’s beliefs just for the hell of it. That is impolite. But there is a huge difference between doing it voluntarily out of politeness and courtesy and doing it because you are scared or because you are threatened. When somebody says that I can’t poke fun at someone’s religion because otherwise they will kill me I am bloody well going to be as provocative as possible. I am not - and nor should any free liberal society - going to be bullied into politeness or respect for something which I don’t respect.
Media editors did not refrain out of politeness; they refrained out of fear.
We should of course poke fun at all religions, and IMHO the world would be a better place without religions at all.
But blurring the boundary between Islamic extremists and the millions of Muslims worldwide is your blind spot, when your otherwise level headed objectivity takes its holidays.
I don’t blur the distinction. Quite the opposite in fact. But if we stay silent when extremists do things in our name then others may worry that that such silence betokens consent rather than disgust.
I apply the same principle to silent bankers.
The liberal West has been very poor at supporting liberal Muslims, most of them in Muslim majority countries, who are trying to fight back against the extremists. I would like to see far more such support precisely in order to show Muslims that we do not accept or assume that the extremists speak for them.
It is one reason why I was so appalled at Britain’s feebleness when Serbs were killing Muslims in Bosnia. It played into the story extremists were telling: that the Christian west did not care about peaceful Muslim communities who had been living here for centuries and was content to stand idly by while they were slaughtered.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
If the economy is in tatters and my future prospects looked bleak, I may very well prefer dull and competent over entertaining but incompetent.
Most people prefer the promise of a bright future from someone who comes across as upbeat. Not saying they should, but I think they do. Dull competence is a hard sell at Election time, especially coming from someone lacking charisma
Boris's ability to paint a bright future appears to be waining as time goes on. That may have something to do with him first smearing the walls of the bright future with human excrement.
The occasional reminder that an “Australia-style deal” is also a “Sierra Leone-style deal”, a “Guam-style deal” or a “Tajikistan-style deal” does not sound quite so good.
It's a piss poor header followed by a load of verbose twaddle.
This is NOT the time for grandstanding. Burnham was completely wrong this week. Events like the death of the Liverpool mayor's brother, just announced, illustrate that this isn't a game.
Jacinda won a landslide. So will Joe Biden. Steady, sensible, science-based leaders are winning big because the people around the world are seeing through bullshit. Whether that's from the left or the right. They don't want it any more. The days of charisma, bluster and bluff are at an end. For now.
Well done Sir Keir. You're doing briliantly.
Remarkably for a self-proclaimed writer you seem to find reading so very difficult. If you have actually read the header, it is progress.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
If the economy is in tatters and my future prospects looked bleak, I may very well prefer dull and competent over entertaining but incompetent.
Most people prefer the promise of a bright future from someone who comes across as upbeat. Not saying they should, but I think they do. Dull competence is a hard sell at Election time, especially coming from someone lacking charisma
Boris's ability to paint a bright future appears to be waining as time goes on. That may have something to do with him first smearing the walls of the bright future with human excrement.
Well maybe, but I have been around when they said that twice before he won London Mayor, before Leave won, before he became Tory leader, and before he won a big majority.
In 2008 I suffered from Boris Derangement Syndrome and had a grand on Ken Livingstone to win the Mayoralty, because I couldn't understand how Londoners could vote for soemwho said "Balderdash" and "piffle".. but I was wrong, I was letting my own prejudices blind me.
Since the outset of our negotiations we were totally clear that we wanted nothing more complicated than the relationship the EU has with Canada.
One based on friendship and free trade.
But for much of the last few months the EU have refused to negotiate seriously.
Demanding the continued ability to control our legislative freedom and our fisheries in a way that is completely unacceptable to an independent country.
Which is why yesterday I decided that we should get ready for the end of the transition period on January 1st with arrangements based on the simple principles of global free trade, like Australia’s relationship.
And why I’m asking you to join me today as we embark on that new journey >>
Become a Member For whatever reason the EU are not willing to offer this country, after 45 years of membership, the same terms as they did to Canada.
So now is the time to prepare.
And with you by our side we can do that with high hearts and complete confidence.
By embracing this alternative path we will prosper mightily as an independent free trading nation, controlling our own borders, our own fisheries and setting our own laws.
If you’ve thought about joining our Party before, today is the day to >>
Become a Member – £25 a year / £2.09 a month Become an Armed Forces Member – £15 a year Become an under 26 member – £5 a year Yours sincerely,
Boris Johnson signature Boris Johnson Prime Minister
Still lying about Australia’s relationship with the EU, I see. How often does it need saying that this is on the basis of a deal between Australia and the EU.
And if we have no deal with the EU, we will not have a relationship with them which is like Australia’s.
We will have a relationship like the one Afghanistan has.
There is no trade deal between Australia and the EU they essentially trade on WTO terms
Australia barely trades with the EU at all. It's really not particularly important to them.
About 1/5th of their Services exports go to the EU. About 1/2 of ours do.
So we are talking about only a bit over double barely then.
This shows where brave talk of our trade deficit with the EU is misleading. It is true we run a deficit in goods, but we run a surplus in services. Whether this will continue after Brexit is doubtful. We have already seen City banks moving their squillions abroad into European financial centres.
I again highly recommend the latest episode of the 538 podcast: "FiveThirtyEight Politics". The episode is called "Model Talk: Why Democrats' Chances of Winning The Senate Have Increased".
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
If the economy is in tatters and my future prospects looked bleak, I may very well prefer dull and competent over entertaining but incompetent.
Most people prefer the promise of a bright future from someone who comes across as upbeat. Not saying they should, but I think they do. Dull competence is a hard sell at Election time, especially coming from someone lacking charisma
Greetings from tier 3. We are only just in Lancashire and North of the Lune there are very low rates of infection, other side of the Lune are the students from Lancaster uni and rates are higher there. We have just been for a meal at our local pub which is allowed to serve alcohol if you have a meal, it was very sad, they have made huge efforts to comply but now only single households. The place was empty, you normally would have to book a few days in advance. We could break the rules and nip into Cumbria. People round here are mostly obeying the rules. In theory I can go to a gym and meet friends, but I normally run the fells round here with friends and this is not allowed, especially if I cross into Cumbria, Lancs has negotiated an exemption to allow gyms, it is a huge mess. I intend to just be sensible.
It's a piss poor header followed by a load of verbose twaddle.
This is NOT the time for grandstanding. Burnham was completely wrong this week. Events like the death of the Liverpool mayor's brother, just announced, illustrate that this isn't a game.
Jacinda won a landslide. So will Joe Biden. Steady, sensible, science-based leaders are winning big because the people around the world are seeing through bullshit. Whether that's from the left or the right. They don't want it any more. The days of charisma, bluster and bluff are at an end. For now.
Well done Sir Keir. You're doing briliantly.
Take me. Conservative voter last time round, active member and canvasser for many years. No longer a party member.
Voted anyone but Corbyn last year.
So I'm sort of stateless. I just left a party because i couldn't agree with its direction only to find that the leader of the opposition agrees with everything the government brings before the house.
Unless I hear concrete dissent I might wonder why I left the Cons.
By the way, re. the discussion below and Boris' self-love in of Winston Churchill ... Churchill spent the 1930's sounding like the embodiment of Eeyore. He was a doom-mongerer. A prophet of utter pessimism-laden gloom, issuing dire warnings that almost no-one wanted to hear. There was no hope. No joy. Just dollops of gloom.
About which he was right.
A great leader doesn't pander to the people. He or she tells it like it is and acts accordingly, whether they like it or not. Ultimately the people learn to trust them. Margaret Thatcher was a great example.
Interesting to see that ICU mortality is about half it was in the first wave. Still nasty though, and 9/10 of ICU admissions no major co morbidity. I expect that those with major co morbidity and covid don't get ICU admission. Only 1/10 of our cases in Leicester are on ICU, for example.
I know you were focussing on ICU, but might a reason for declining mortality rates be that more people (as a percentage of total cases) are choosing to present at hospital than in the first wave? Not least because the increase in testing means that people are more confident in presenting as they have more than just "symptoms" to justify it (and of course, once you know you have it, there's no risk that you don't have it but might actually contract it in hospital).
And they've taken on board suggestions that it's better to get treatment earlier than later.
The report does cite that the patients were less likely to be ventilated within 24 hours of admission, which would suggest earlier presentation. The report comes from the weekly update of the ICU society, so cannot really comment on out of hospital care.
I agree though that the "stay at home with some hot broth" advice of the first wave has rightly been dropped. I think that behind some of the poor first wave outcomes.
I know that there is little to say beyond expressing horror and sadness at a life so cruelly taken. But the fact that the beheading on the streets of a French capital of a teacher - for doing their job - barely registers is itself noteworthy.
Have we become so inured to this sort of barbarism that we go “oh well, poor France” and carry on?
If being woke or being against hate crimes meant anything substantive, we ought to be incensed at what really is a hate crime and the barbaric bullying in the name of religion of those who dare challenge it.
I totally sympathise with this view, but don't agree that we are inured. We are incensed. The awful reality is that a liberal society and rule of law versus suicidal barbarism is not and cannot be a level playing field.
Cyclefree would need to tell us what 'incensed' looks like in a free society with liberal values? If it looks like revenge it is no longer a liberal society. If it counters barbarity with barbarity, the same applies. If it applies communal guilt to a swathe of people by ethnicity or religion, the same applies.
Well, I have set out what I would like to do pretty extensively on here back in 2015 when the Charlie Hebdo killings happened.
But three things we should do:-
1. We should not make the upholding of free speech something which only brave individuals do - at the cost of threats and, sometimes, their lives. When those cartoonists were killed or the Danish cartoonist attacked every paper in the country, in Europe, in free liberal societies should have published them. Solidarity in numbers. Instead we cravenly self-censored ourselves and are still doing it. Look at how much effort it took to defend those Birmingham schools, for instance. (See also http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2019/03/21/rendering-unto-caesar/.) 2. The Scottish Hate Crime Bill should be withdrawn and rewritten. As of now, it effectively permits censorship by religions by effectively deeming criticism of a religion a hate crime. 3. Those who incite the sort of thinking and behaviour carried out by this terrorist should be prosecuted.
Thanks for this comment. Some responses:
1) I believe in free speech, but personally I prefer to respect the religious sensibilities of others, on the 'do unto others' principle - and I strongly object to some forms of mocking and distortion of my own religious beliefs even though people are free to do so, I prefer it if they refrain. Media editors may feel the same.
2) In a liberal society you can't tell the media what to do. It is a self evident contradiction.
3) You are of course right about the Scottish Hate Crime Bill
4) Incitement. Easier to say than to define. Freedom of belief is what it is. I am not entitled to murder someone but I am entitled to stand for parliament on a manifesto saying that murder should be made lawful. It would not be difficult for illiberal people (as well as many liberals) to see that as incitement. Which would be the thin end of that Scottish wedge.
I agree on point (1) in the sense that I don’t go around insulting other people’s beliefs just for the hell of it. That is impolite. But there is a huge difference between doing it voluntarily out of politeness and courtesy and doing it because you are scared or because you are threatened. When somebody says that I can’t poke fun at someone’s religion because otherwise they will kill me I am bloody well going to be as provocative as possible. I am not - and nor should any free liberal society - going to be bullied into politeness or respect for something which I don’t respect.
Media editors did not refrain out of politeness; they refrained out of fear.
We should of course poke fun at all religions, and IMHO the world would be a better place without religions at all.
But blurring the boundary between Islamic extremists and the millions of Muslims worldwide is your blind spot, when your otherwise level headed objectivity takes its holidays.
I don’t blur the distinction. Quite the opposite in fact. But if we stay silent when extremists do things in our name then others may worry that that such silence betokens consent rather than disgust.
I apply the same principle to silent bankers.
The liberal West has been very poor at supporting liberal Muslims, most of them in Muslim majority countries, who are trying to fight back against the extremists. I would like to see far more such support precisely in order to show Muslims that we do not accept or assume that the extremists speak for them.
It is one reason why I was so appalled at Britain’s feebleness when Serbs were killing Muslims in Bosnia. It played into the story extremists were telling: that the Christian west did not care about peaceful Muslim communities who had been living here for centuries and was content to stand idly by while they were slaughtered.
For sure. But you don’t, really. As soon as Islam is mentioned your posts tend to join the race for the bottom with those from Sean(s) of this parish.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
Starmer will be absolutely devastated that both you and isam find him unutterably dull. He was counting on your votes.
It's a piss poor header followed by a load of verbose twaddle.
This is NOT the time for grandstanding. Burnham was completely wrong this week. Events like the death of the Liverpool mayor's brother, just announced, illustrate that this isn't a game.
Jacinda won a landslide. So will Joe Biden. Steady, sensible, science-based leaders are winning big because the people around the world are seeing through bullshit. Whether that's from the left or the right. They don't want it any more. The days of charisma, bluster and bluff are at an end. For now.
Well done Sir Keir. You're doing briliantly.
Remarkably for a self-proclaimed writer you seem to find reading so very difficult. If you have actually read the header, it is progress.
I read voluminously. I just have a knack for stripping out the bullshit. It's something you learn when you're an editor, and when you have to deal with the slush pile. To which this thread header would belong.
I'm self-proclaimed on here only because I wish to preserve my anonymity. Beyond pb.com I'm well-known. But, no, I won't break that situation so you can believe it or not. I couldn't care a less.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
Starmer will be absolutely devastated that both you and isam find him unutterably dull. He was counting on your votes.
Wel I have voted Labour more than I have for any other party, so it wasn't out of the question that i would do it again. Still not really, but I cant see it under BSK
It's a piss poor header followed by a load of verbose twaddle.
This is NOT the time for grandstanding. Burnham was completely wrong this week. Events like the death of the Liverpool mayor's brother, just announced, illustrate that this isn't a game.
Jacinda won a landslide. So will Joe Biden. Steady, sensible, science-based leaders are winning big because the people around the world are seeing through bullshit. Whether that's from the left or the right. They don't want it any more. The days of charisma, bluster and bluff are at an end. For now.
Well done Sir Keir. You're doing briliantly.
Remarkably for a self-proclaimed writer you seem to find reading so very difficult. If you have actually read the header, it is progress.
I read voluminously. I just have a knack for stripping out the bullshit. It's something you learn when you're an editor, and when you have to deal with the slush pile. To which this thread header would belong.
I'm self-proclaimed on here only because I wish to preserve my anonymity. Beyond pb.com I'm well-known. But, no, I won't break that situation so you can believe it or not. I couldn't care a less.
I didn't know they were still publishing Haynes manuals.
A stunning win for Jacinda Ardern and her Labour Party in the New Zealand GE. With most of the votes counted, Labour has won 49% of the vote so outpolling their final forecast numbers by two points. That has enabled them to win an overall majority with 64 seats in the 120 seat Parliament.
It's the best Labour performance since Norman Kirk won 48.4% and 55 seats in the then 87-seat Parliament in 1972. It's the first absolute majority under the MMP system.
MMP has both constituencies (electorates as they called in NZ) and List MPs. 72 MPs are electorate MPs and the List MPs make up the number to 120 or occasionally 121.
That means two votes - one for the Electorate and one for the Party (List) vote. National has traditionally performed well in the former and Labour in the latter but this time National has won just 27 of the 72 electorates and has seen seats fall across the country lost including their Deputy Leader, Gerry Brownlee, in suburban Christchurch.
Overall, National has won 26.8% of the vote and 35 seats, the worst result since the 2002 disaster.
The party has been driven right back to its rural strongholds in the Bay of Plenty, the Far North and the top of the South Island. As to whether Party leader, Judith Collins, will survive such a bloodbath remains to be seen.
ACT had the best election in their party's history winning 8% of the vote and 10 seats. The Greens polled 7.6% and also won 10 seats including Auckland Central from National. Perhaps the one real surprise of the evening was the Maori Party getting one seat gaining Waiariki (the Maori electorate covering the Bay of Plenty, Rotorua and Taupo) from Labour.
Apart from National, the night's other big losers were New Zealand First under Deputy PM Winston Peters. They lost all their seats and polled 2.7% so failing to win a List MP. Peters is finished politically and it's quite likely the Party will fade away as well.
As for Jacinda Ardern, she now reigns supreme and it looks a huge task for National to become competitive by 2023 but that's an eternity away and so much can and will happen. My suspicion is Collins will step aside sooner or later and it will then be a battle for the soul of the National Party between social conservatives and more liberal conservatives. The former might look to Simeon Brown who would be my long shot to be the challenger to Ardern next time but whether NZ is socially conservative enough to elect someone like him as PM is open to question.
Still got this twattish article up. Sorry but true.
I've just put some more money on the US elections, going in on both Presidential and Senate races. This is landslide territory. A seismic change taking place. The corollary will be Johnson's isolation in the world. Delicious.
Isn't the UK being isolated just when we need friends the most a bad thing?
I can't quite understand the glee at the prospect of the UK doing badly.
Of course the isolation and probable break up of the UK is a bad thing, but other countries turning away from similar policies is a good thing. We can only look on in envy. Their idiocies are more easily reversed than ours.
Off topic, is it the case that the UK, the worlds second largest arms exporter, despite signing up to an embargo on arms sales to Armenia and Azerbaijan has managed to sell £60m worth of arms to both? Bodes well for our bright, globalist (aka hooring ourselves to all comers) future.
On Topic - Sir Keir looks boring, sounds boring when he talks, and says boring things. The more the pollsters ask people whether they think he has any personality, the more people reply "no", and the undecided's are breaking to negatives in his approval ratings, possibly as a consequence
He may be better than Corbyn and Boris, but I fancy he will never better Jezza's vote tally at a GE or defeat Boris at the ballot box, and the only way he will be thought of as better than either will be subjectively in the mind of someone who hates the other two.
He just seems to take the safest option on literally everything. If you distilled a public sector committee down into a person it would be SKS.
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
Starmer will be absolutely devastated that both you and isam find him unutterably dull. He was counting on your votes.
Well do you find him interesting and charismatic?
Does he have any radical policies to help solve for example the housing crisis?
I know that there is little to say beyond expressing horror and sadness at a life so cruelly taken. But the fact that the beheading on the streets of a French capital of a teacher - for doing their job - barely registers is itself noteworthy.
Have we become so inured to this sort of barbarism that we go “oh well, poor France” and carry on?
If being woke or being against hate crimes meant anything substantive, we ought to be incensed at what really is a hate crime and the barbaric bullying in the name of religion of those who dare challenge it.
I totally sympathise with this view, but don't agree that we are inured. We are incensed. The awful reality is that a liberal society and rule of law versus suicidal barbarism is not and cannot be a level playing field.
Cyclefree would need to tell us what 'incensed' looks like in a free society with liberal values? If it looks like revenge it is no longer a liberal society. If it counters barbarity with barbarity, the same applies. If it applies communal guilt to a swathe of people by ethnicity or religion, the same applies.
Well, I have set out what I would like to do pretty extensively on here back in 2015 when the Charlie Hebdo killings happened.
But three things we should do:-
1. We should not make the upholding of free speech something which only brave individuals do - at the cost of threats and, sometimes, their lives. When those cartoonists were killed or the Danish cartoonist attacked every paper in the country, in Europe, in free liberal societies should have published them. Solidarity in numbers. Instead we cravenly self-censored ourselves and are still doing it. Look at how much effort it took to defend those Birmingham schools, for instance. (See also http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2019/03/21/rendering-unto-caesar/.) 2. The Scottish Hate Crime Bill should be withdrawn and rewritten. As of now, it effectively permits censorship by religions by effectively deeming criticism of a religion a hate crime. 3. Those who incite the sort of thinking and behaviour carried out by this terrorist should be prosecuted.
Thanks for this comment. Some responses:
1) I believe in free speech, but personally I prefer to respect the religious sensibilities of others, on the 'do unto others' principle - and I strongly object to some forms of mocking and distortion of my own religious beliefs even though people are free to do so, I prefer it if they refrain. Media editors may feel the same.
2) In a liberal society you can't tell the media what to do. It is a self evident contradiction.
3) You are of course right about the Scottish Hate Crime Bill
4) Incitement. Easier to say than to define. Freedom of belief is what it is. I am not entitled to murder someone but I am entitled to stand for parliament on a manifesto saying that murder should be made lawful. It would not be difficult for illiberal people (as well as many liberals) to see that as incitement. Which would be the thin end of that Scottish wedge.
I agree on point (1) in the sense that I don’t go around insulting other people’s beliefs just for the hell of it. That is impolite. But there is a huge difference between doing it voluntarily out of politeness and courtesy and doing it because you are scared or because you are threatened. When somebody says that I can’t poke fun at someone’s religion because otherwise they will kill me I am bloody well going to be as provocative as possible. I am not - and nor should any free liberal society - going to be bullied into politeness or respect for something which I don’t respect.
Media editors did not refrain out of politeness; they refrained out of fear.
We should of course poke fun at all religions, and IMHO the world would be a better place without religions at all.
But blurring the boundary between Islamic extremists and the millions of Muslims worldwide is your blind spot, when your otherwise level headed objectivity takes its holidays.
I don’t blur the distinction. Quite the opposite in fact. But if we stay silent when extremists do things in our name then others may worry that that such silence betokens consent rather than disgust.
I apply the same principle to silent bankers.
The liberal West has been very poor at supporting liberal Muslims, most of them in Muslim majority countries, who are trying to fight back against the extremists. I would like to see far more such support precisely in order to show Muslims that we do not accept or assume that the extremists speak for them.
It is one reason why I was so appalled at Britain’s feebleness when Serbs were killing Muslims in Bosnia. It played into the story extremists were telling: that the Christian west did not care about peaceful Muslim communities who had been living here for centuries and was content to stand idly by while they were slaughtered.
For sure. But you don’t, really. As soon as Islam is mentioned your posts tend to join the race for the bottom with those from Sean(s) of this parish.
No they don’t. Though you would clearly like to believe so, which says rather more about you than me.
I know that there is little to say beyond expressing horror and sadness at a life so cruelly taken. But the fact that the beheading on the streets of a French capital of a teacher - for doing their job - barely registers is itself noteworthy.
Have we become so inured to this sort of barbarism that we go “oh well, poor France” and carry on?
If being woke or being against hate crimes meant anything substantive, we ought to be incensed at what really is a hate crime and the barbaric bullying in the name of religion of those who dare challenge it.
I totally sympathise with this view, but don't agree that we are inured. We are incensed. The awful reality is that a liberal society and rule of law versus suicidal barbarism is not and cannot be a level playing field.
Cyclefree would need to tell us what 'incensed' looks like in a free society with liberal values? If it looks like revenge it is no longer a liberal society. If it counters barbarity with barbarity, the same applies. If it applies communal guilt to a swathe of people by ethnicity or religion, the same applies.
Well, I have set out what I would like to do pretty extensively on here back in 2015 when the Charlie Hebdo killings happened.
But three things we should do:-
1. We should not make the upholding of free speech something which only brave individuals do - at the cost of threats and, sometimes, their lives. When those cartoonists were killed or the Danish cartoonist attacked every paper in the country, in Europe, in free liberal societies should have published them. Solidarity in numbers. Instead we cravenly self-censored ourselves and are still doing it. Look at how much effort it took to defend those Birmingham schools, for instance. (See also http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2019/03/21/rendering-unto-caesar/.) 2. The Scottish Hate Crime Bill should be withdrawn and rewritten. As of now, it effectively permits censorship by religions by effectively deeming criticism of a religion a hate crime. 3. Those who incite the sort of thinking and behaviour carried out by this terrorist should be prosecuted.
Has the question been asked directly as to whether publishing the Hebdo cartoons would have been illegal under the Scottish bill ?
Even in its amended form it is objectionable (making it a crime only if there is intent) because someone could certainly intend to criticise, for instance, a religion which thinks the penalty for apostasy or publication of images should be death. And it would be all too easy to say that they are thereby intending to stir up hate against the followers of such a religion, as indeed many such followers do, conveniently conflating hatred of an idea with hatred of people.
It’s a de facto blasphemy law by the back door. It will inevitably lead to self-censorship and it will involve the police in determining what is or is not legitimate criticism and debate. It is totally wrong in a free and liberal society.
I agree the bill is objectionable, or worse. My point was that such questions ought to be asked and answered before a bill like this is even considered.
Still got this twattish article up. Sorry but true.
I've just put some more money on the US elections, going in on both Presidential and Senate races. This is landslide territory. A seismic change taking place. The corollary will be Johnson's isolation in the world. Delicious.
Isn't the UK being isolated just when we need friends the most a bad thing?
I can't quite understand the glee at the prospect of the UK doing badly.
Of course the isolation and probable break up of the UK is a bad thing, but other countries turning away from similar policies is a good thing. We can only look on in envy. Their idiocies are more easily reversed than ours.
What is the problem with a US trade deal if Trump wins the election?
Back on matters domestic, two observations - first, walking past the Spoons in the Barking Road, it looked as though the usual suspects were all round their usual tables drinking their beer. After yesterday's comments (for which many thanks), I have agreed with my brother we will eat outdoors on Wednesday and sit in his garden after which I believe keeps us legal as long as I access his garden via the side gate and not through the house.
I've reminded Mrs Stodge we can still go and eat at the local cafe and I will be giving them my custom next week as usual even though my T&T app tells me I am now in a High risk area. Anecdotally, more mask wearing in my part of London today but far from universal.
As for the thread topic (thank you, as always, @david_herdson for the read), there's a dilemma for Starmer between playing politics and looking responsible. It's not the role of Opposition to oppose for the sake of it - it is the role of Opposition to scrutinise, to ask awkward questions and to point out inconsistencies and anomalies and seek clarification of those but in the end Starmer has to be seen to be joining the fight against the virus as much as Johnson.
Opportunist Opposition doesn't help as it is all too often obvious. Supporting Government in difficult times is responsible and sensible and even more so if the election is 2024. Trying to carve out a different line just for the sake of being different is I believe politically counter-productive. Starmer is still working on the Labour "offer" for 2024 (or at least he should be). He will know the best way for Labour to look electable against a tired Conservative Government after a decade and a half in Opposition will not be to sound radical and promise the sun, moon and stars but to accept much of what has happened and simply argue it can be done better - that's basically how Blair and Wilson won as non-ideological politicians of the centre-left offering a better way of doing the same things.
Still got this twattish article up. Sorry but true.
I've just put some more money on the US elections, going in on both Presidential and Senate races. This is landslide territory. A seismic change taking place. The corollary will be Johnson's isolation in the world. Delicious.
Isn't the UK being isolated just when we need friends the most a bad thing?
I can't quite understand the glee at the prospect of the UK doing badly.
Of course the isolation and probable break up of the UK is a bad thing, but other countries turning away from similar policies is a good thing. We can only look on in envy. Their idiocies are more easily reversed than ours.
What is the problem with a US trade deal if Trump wins the election?
Nothing. Just most people in this country don't want Trump to win the election.
It doesn't matter anyway because a US FTA is not realistically going to happen in any scenario.
Think about it, it just took one man to ensure that no teachers or any other public figures will dare show pictures of Muhammad from now on in France or else have a good chance of being killed for doing so.
This is a key point. A small minority can have an effect regardless of what the majority think if the majority stay silent or look the other way.
“A man, whose family was German aristocracy prior to World War II, owned a number of large industries and estates. When asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism.
‘Very few people were true Nazis,’ he said, ‘but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.’
We are told again and again by ‘experts’ and ‘talking heads’ that Islam is the religion of peace and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unqualified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the spectre of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam.
The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars worldwide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honour-kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. It is the fanatics who teach their young to kill and to become suicide bombers. The hard, quantifiable fact is that the peaceful majority, the ’silent majority,’ is cowed and extraneous.
History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason, we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points: Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence. Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don’t speak up, because like my friend from Germany , they will awaken one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun.
As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts–the fanatics who threaten our way of life.
Like the silent Muslims, we remain silent and acquiescent, while our freedoms gradually disappear."
As someone who currently lives in a peaceful Muslim country, I agree with you wholeheartedly.
Edit: It still amazes me that every newspaper and magazine in Europe didn't immediately republish the "Charlie Hebdo" cartoons.
It is really that amazing?
I'm sure the journalists who published it being machined gunned to death might have swayed the others not to do the same.
There is also the issue of the ides that the Charlie Hebdo cartoons were racist, since they were "punching down"
Others might recall the incident of policemen in the UK trying to get lists of who had purchased the reprint issue.
I smiled when I heard that.
I still have my copy of the Gair Rhydd from my first year at uni which had the cartoons, managed to snag one before the recall as we were walking home and saw it being delivered to the union at 5am. Massive respect to the editor who published it, still the only publication in the UK to do so afaik.
By the way, re. the discussion below and Boris' self-love in of Winston Churchill ... Churchill spent the 1930's sounding like the embodiment of Eeyore. He was a doom-mongerer. A prophet of utter pessimism-laden gloom, issuing dire warnings that almost no-one wanted to hear. There was no hope. No joy. Just dollops of gloom.
About which he was right.
A great leader doesn't pander to the people. He or she tells it like it is and acts accordingly, whether they like it or not. Ultimately the people learn to trust them. Margaret Thatcher was a great example.
This talk of gloom reminds me of Nicola Sturgeon being positively Rev. I. M. Jolly* at a minor relaxation of the rules in Scotland some weeks back - making it quite clear she was worried about doing so and we were expected to behave epecially, IIRC, with schools coming. It was so different from the boosterism, hooray-let's-party stuff and distracting tangents of Mr Johnson's presentation at the same time.
*Scots TV character played by Rikki Fulton. Think a Calvinist Eeyore with depression and you have the idea.
Still got this twattish article up. Sorry but true.
I've just put some more money on the US elections, going in on both Presidential and Senate races. This is landslide territory. A seismic change taking place. The corollary will be Johnson's isolation in the world. Delicious.
Isn't the UK being isolated just when we need friends the most a bad thing?
I can't quite understand the glee at the prospect of the UK doing badly.
Of course the isolation and probable break up of the UK is a bad thing, but other countries turning away from similar policies is a good thing. We can only look on in envy. Their idiocies are more easily reversed than ours.
What is the problem with a US trade deal if Trump wins the election?
Nothing. Just most people in this country don't want Trump to win the election.
It doesn't matter anyway because a US FTA is not realistically going to happen in any scenario.
Quite right. No British PM - not even Boris - would swallow the US trade-deal demands, and that's assuming that they'd ever even offer us one - a remote possibility. I think most Leavers have abandoned that fantasy anyway.
It doesn't matter whether that offside was technically correct or not. The simple fact that it was possible to be declared offside is everything that is wrong about what is happening with VAR.
Think about it, it just took one man to ensure that no teachers or any other public figures will dare show pictures of Muhammad from now on in France or else have a good chance of being killed for doing so.
This is a key point. A small minority can have an effect regardless of what the majority think if the majority stay silent or look the other way.
“A man, whose family was German aristocracy prior to World War II, owned a number of large industries and estates. When asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism.
‘Very few people were true Nazis,’ he said, ‘but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.’
We are told again and again by ‘experts’ and ‘talking heads’ that Islam is the religion of peace and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unqualified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the spectre of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam.
The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars worldwide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honour-kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. It is the fanatics who teach their young to kill and to become suicide bombers. The hard, quantifiable fact is that the peaceful majority, the ’silent majority,’ is cowed and extraneous.
History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason, we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points: Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence. Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don’t speak up, because like my friend from Germany , they will awaken one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun.
As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts–the fanatics who threaten our way of life.
Like the silent Muslims, we remain silent and acquiescent, while our freedoms gradually disappear."
The author of that a big fan of the Chinese approach I assume.
The piece is really just identifying the problem, without coming up with any policy to combat it. There is not really anything that can be done about it in my opinion.
The Chinese can deal with it because they are not a liberal democracy, it could never happen like that here.
For once we agree, there's a whole shitload of 'something must be done' around, hardly any 'this should be done'.
Perhaps a pause on Muslim immigration while we figure out a better way of handling things would be a good start.
What, because of the nutter in France? Oh do stop it.
It was in response to Cyclefree's post on the rise of Islamic extremism, not because of one single nutter.
How would you like to see the problem tackled?
Well step one is to dismiss notions such as officially labeling all Muslims (25% of the world's population) as a threat to our welfare. That is paranoia. As to doing more about the problem, I think the main thing is to have equality under the law. We should not - to the extent this does happen - tolerate hate speech from reactionary Muslims, or illiberal policies from reactionary Muslim institutions, due to fear or cultural cringe.
Who has labelled all Muslims as a threat? I even said the vast majority of Muslims are not extremists.
There's a small, but significant minority who are extreme and there's currently no way of knowing which ones they are. More Muslims means more extremists and it makes sense to pause immigration until we can tackle the problem effectively.
As far as I can see a lot of the terrorists were never actually involved in public hate speech. Just clamping down on that isn't going to do much.
Making "Muslim" a status which precludes entry to the UK is officially labeling all Muslims as a threat. Of course it is. Not knowing who will commit a violent atrocity before they do it is simply a general and inescapable truth, regardless of race or religion. Until "Minority Report" becomes a reality it's the job of the police and security services to mitigate these risks. A Muslim ban is a total no no. C'mon. Think about it. Did we ban all Irish people back in IRA days? No. And no-one suggested it. I wonder why some people do so now with Muslims? A clue. The policy is Trumpian and the justification is exactly like Trump Jnr with his "M&Ms" analogy. Bad company.
Think about it, it just took one man to ensure that no teachers or any other public figures will dare show pictures of Muhammad from now on in France or else have a good chance of being killed for doing so.
This is a key point. A small minority can have an effect regardless of what the majority think if the majority stay silent or look the other way.
“A man, whose family was German aristocracy prior to World War II, owned a number of large industries and estates. When asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism.
‘Very few people were true Nazis,’ he said, ‘but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.’
We are told again and again by ‘experts’ and ‘talking heads’ that Islam is the religion of peace and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unqualified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the spectre of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam.
The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars worldwide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honour-kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. It is the fanatics who teach their young to kill and to become suicide bombers. The hard, quantifiable fact is that the peaceful majority, the ’silent majority,’ is cowed and extraneous.
History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason, we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points: Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence. Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don’t speak up, because like my friend from Germany , they will awaken one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun.
As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts–the fanatics who threaten our way of life.
Like the silent Muslims, we remain silent and acquiescent, while our freedoms gradually disappear."
Think about it, it just took one man to ensure that no teachers or any other public figures will dare show pictures of Muhammad from now on in France or else have a good chance of being killed for doing so.
This is a key point. A small minority can have an effect regardless of what the majority think if the majority stay silent or look the other way.
“A man, whose family was German aristocracy prior to World War II, owned a number of large industries and estates. When asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism.
‘Very few people were true Nazis,’ he said, ‘but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.’
We are told again and again by ‘experts’ and ‘talking heads’ that Islam is the religion of peace and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unqualified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the spectre of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam.
The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars worldwide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honour-kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. It is the fanatics who teach their young to kill and to become suicide bombers. The hard, quantifiable fact is that the peaceful majority, the ’silent majority,’ is cowed and extraneous.
History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason, we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points: Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence. Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don’t speak up, because like my friend from Germany , they will awaken one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun.
As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts–the fanatics who threaten our way of life.
Like the silent Muslims, we remain silent and acquiescent, while our freedoms gradually disappear."
The author of that a big fan of the Chinese approach I assume.
The piece is really just identifying the problem, without coming up with any policy to combat it. There is not really anything that can be done about it in my opinion.
The Chinese can deal with it because they are not a liberal democracy, it could never happen like that here.
For once we agree, there's a whole shitload of 'something must be done' around, hardly any 'this should be done'.
Perhaps a pause on Muslim immigration while we figure out a better way of handling things would be a good start.
What, because of the nutter in France? Oh do stop it.
It was in response to Cyclefree's post on the rise of Islamic extremism, not because of one single nutter.
How would you like to see the problem tackled?
Well step one is to dismiss notions such as officially labeling all Muslims (25% of the world's population) as a threat to our welfare. That is paranoia. As to doing more about the problem, I think the main thing is to have equality under the law. We should not - to the extent this does happen - tolerate hate speech from reactionary Muslims, or illiberal policies from reactionary Muslim institutions, due to fear or cultural cringe.
Who has labelled all Muslims as a threat? I even said the vast majority of Muslims are not extremists.
There's a small, but significant minority who are extreme and there's currently no way of knowing which ones they are. More Muslims means more extremists and it makes sense to pause immigration until we can tackle the problem effectively.
As far as I can see a lot of the terrorists were never actually involved in public hate speech. Just clamping down on that isn't going to do much.
Making "Muslim" a status which precludes entry to the UK is officially labeling all Muslims as a threat. Of course it is. Not knowing who will commit a violent atrocity before they do it is simply a general and inescapable truth, regardless of race or religion. Until "Minority Report" becomes a reality it's the job of the police and security services to mitigate these risks. A Muslim ban is a total no no. C'mon. Think about it. Did we ban all Irish people back in IRA days? No. And no-one suggested it. I wonder why some people do so now with Muslims? A clue. The policy is Trumpian and the justification is exactly like Trump Jnr with his "M&Ms" analogy. Bad company.
So your solution is to continue to allow mass immigration from Muslim countries and we'll just have to put up with the odd beheading and bomb attack.
Well you will be delighted to know that is exactly what is going to happen.
It doesn't matter whether that offside was technically correct or not. The simple fact that it was possible to be declared offside is everything that is wrong about what is happening with VAR.
Given the camera is at an angle (and also they aren't using super high frame rate cameras) and the interpolated straight lines there is already a certain level of inaccuracy. Thus then trying to make a decision based upon 1 or 2 pixels is ridiculous.
Still got this twattish article up. Sorry but true.
I've just put some more money on the US elections, going in on both Presidential and Senate races. This is landslide territory. A seismic change taking place. The corollary will be Johnson's isolation in the world. Delicious.
Isn't the UK being isolated just when we need friends the most a bad thing?
I can't quite understand the glee at the prospect of the UK doing badly.
Of course the isolation and probable break up of the UK is a bad thing, but other countries turning away from similar policies is a good thing. We can only look on in envy. Their idiocies are more easily reversed than ours.
What is the problem with a US trade deal if Trump wins the election?
Reduction in food standards. Watch this, if you can.
I know that there is little to say beyond expressing horror and sadness at a life so cruelly taken. But the fact that the beheading on the streets of a French capital of a teacher - for doing their job - barely registers is itself noteworthy.
Have we become so inured to this sort of barbarism that we go “oh well, poor France” and carry on?
If being woke or being against hate crimes meant anything substantive, we ought to be incensed at what really is a hate crime and the barbaric bullying in the name of religion of those who dare challenge it.
I totally sympathise with this view, but don't agree that we are inured. We are incensed. The awful reality is that a liberal society and rule of law versus suicidal barbarism is not and cannot be a level playing field.
Cyclefree would need to tell us what 'incensed' looks like in a free society with liberal values? If it looks like revenge it is no longer a liberal society. If it counters barbarity with barbarity, the same applies. If it applies communal guilt to a swathe of people by ethnicity or religion, the same applies.
Well, I have set out what I would like to do pretty extensively on here back in 2015 when the Charlie Hebdo killings happened.
But three things we should do:-
1. We should not make the upholding of free speech something which only brave individuals do - at the cost of threats and, sometimes, their lives. When those cartoonists were killed or the Danish cartoonist attacked every paper in the country, in Europe, in free liberal societies should have published them. Solidarity in numbers. Instead we cravenly self-censored ourselves and are still doing it. Look at how much effort it took to defend those Birmingham schools, for instance. (See also http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2019/03/21/rendering-unto-caesar/.) 2. The Scottish Hate Crime Bill should be withdrawn and rewritten. As of now, it effectively permits censorship by religions by effectively deeming criticism of a religion a hate crime. 3. Those who incite the sort of thinking and behaviour carried out by this terrorist should be prosecuted.
Thanks for this comment. Some responses:
1) I believe in free speech, but personally I prefer to respect the religious sensibilities of others, on the 'do unto others' principle - and I strongly object to some forms of mocking and distortion of my own religious beliefs even though people are free to do so, I prefer it if they refrain. Media editors may feel the same.
2) In a liberal society you can't tell the media what to do. It is a self evident contradiction.
3) You are of course right about the Scottish Hate Crime Bill
4) Incitement. Easier to say than to define. Freedom of belief is what it is. I am not entitled to murder someone but I am entitled to stand for parliament on a manifesto saying that murder should be made lawful. It would not be difficult for illiberal people (as well as many liberals) to see that as incitement. Which would be the thin end of that Scottish wedge.
I agree on point (1) in the sense that I don’t go around insulting other people’s beliefs just for the hell of it. That is impolite. But there is a huge difference between doing it voluntarily out of politeness and courtesy and doing it because you are scared or because you are threatened. When somebody says that I can’t poke fun at someone’s religion because otherwise they will kill me I am bloody well going to be as provocative as possible. I am not - and nor should any free liberal society - going to be bullied into politeness or respect for something which I don’t respect.
Media editors did not refrain out of politeness; they refrained out of fear.
We should of course poke fun at all religions, and IMHO the world would be a better place without religions at all.
But blurring the boundary between Islamic extremists and the millions of Muslims worldwide is your blind spot, when your otherwise level headed objectivity takes its holidays.
Think about it, it just took one man to ensure that no teachers or any other public figures will dare show pictures of Muhammad from now on in France or else have a good chance of being killed for doing so.
This is a key point. A small minority can have an effect regardless of what the majority think if the majority stay silent or look the other way.
“A man, whose family was German aristocracy prior to World War II, owned a number of large industries and estates. When asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism.
‘Very few people were true Nazis,’ he said, ‘but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.’
We are told again and again by ‘experts’ and ‘talking heads’ that Islam is the religion of peace and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unqualified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the spectre of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam.
The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars worldwide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honour-kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. It is the fanatics who teach their young to kill and to become suicide bombers. The hard, quantifiable fact is that the peaceful majority, the ’silent majority,’ is cowed and extraneous.
History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason, we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points: Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence. Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don’t speak up, because like my friend from Germany , they will awaken one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun.
As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts–the fanatics who threaten our way of life.
Like the silent Muslims, we remain silent and acquiescent, while our freedoms gradually disappear."
The author of that a big fan of the Chinese approach I assume.
The piece is really just identifying the problem, without coming up with any policy to combat it. There is not really anything that can be done about it in my opinion.
The Chinese can deal with it because they are not a liberal democracy, it could never happen like that here.
For once we agree, there's a whole shitload of 'something must be done' around, hardly any 'this should be done'.
Perhaps a pause on Muslim immigration while we figure out a better way of handling things would be a good start.
What, because of the nutter in France? Oh do stop it.
It was in response to Cyclefree's post on the rise of Islamic extremism, not because of one single nutter.
How would you like to see the problem tackled?
Well step one is to dismiss notions such as officially labeling all Muslims (25% of the world's population) as a threat to our welfare. That is paranoia. As to doing more about the problem, I think the main thing is to have equality under the law. We should not - to the extent this does happen - tolerate hate speech from reactionary Muslims, or illiberal policies from reactionary Muslim institutions, due to fear or cultural cringe.
Who has labelled all Muslims as a threat? I even said the vast majority of Muslims are not extremists.
There's a small, but significant minority who are extreme and there's currently no way of knowing which ones they are. More Muslims means more extremists and it makes sense to pause immigration until we can tackle the problem effectively.
As far as I can see a lot of the terrorists were never actually involved in public hate speech. Just clamping down on that isn't going to do much.
Making "Muslim" a status which precludes entry to the UK is officially labeling all Muslims as a threat. Of course it is. Not knowing who will commit a violent atrocity before they do it is simply a general and inescapable truth, regardless of race or religion. Until "Minority Report" becomes a reality it's the job of the police and security services to mitigate these risks. A Muslim ban is a total no no. C'mon. Think about it. Did we ban all Irish people back in IRA days? No. And no-one suggested it. I wonder why some people do so now with Muslims? A clue. The policy is Trumpian and the justification is exactly like Trump Jnr with his "M&Ms" analogy. Bad company.
So your solution is to continue to allow mass immigration from Muslim countries and we'll just have to put up with the odd beheading and bomb attack.
Well you will be delighted to know that is exactly what is going to happen.
Perhaps you should have prefaced your post with "I am not racist but..."
Still got this twattish article up. Sorry but true.
I've just put some more money on the US elections, going in on both Presidential and Senate races. This is landslide territory. A seismic change taking place. The corollary will be Johnson's isolation in the world. Delicious.
Isn't the UK being isolated just when we need friends the most a bad thing?
I can't quite understand the glee at the prospect of the UK doing badly.
Of course the isolation and probable break up of the UK is a bad thing, but other countries turning away from similar policies is a good thing. We can only look on in envy. Their idiocies are more easily reversed than ours.
What is the problem with a US trade deal if Trump wins the election?
Reduction in food standards. Watch this, if you can.
Yes it is disgusting. As is us exporting animals to Spain for fast "fattening" and then them being exported again to the Middle East for slaughter in terrible conditions.
But highlighting one and ignoring the other smacks of not wanting a deal with the US IMO.
Think about it, it just took one man to ensure that no teachers or any other public figures will dare show pictures of Muhammad from now on in France or else have a good chance of being killed for doing so.
This is a key point. A small minority can have an effect regardless of what the majority think if the majority stay silent or look the other way.
“A man, whose family was German aristocracy prior to World War II, owned a number of large industries and estates. When asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism.
‘Very few people were true Nazis,’ he said, ‘but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.’
We are told again and again by ‘experts’ and ‘talking heads’ that Islam is the religion of peace and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unqualified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the spectre of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam.
The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars worldwide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honour-kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. It is the fanatics who teach their young to kill and to become suicide bombers. The hard, quantifiable fact is that the peaceful majority, the ’silent majority,’ is cowed and extraneous.
History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason, we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points: Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence. Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don’t speak up, because like my friend from Germany , they will awaken one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun.
As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts–the fanatics who threaten our way of life.
Like the silent Muslims, we remain silent and acquiescent, while our freedoms gradually disappear."
Sounds good, but if you are a "silent Muslim" I think it is much harder to speak up than you make it seem. If you are a minority group that often feels persecuted, and has lots of encouragement from the state to make you feel like you should feel you are persecuted, it's very difficult to call out other members of that minority group for exaggerated forms of the belief you share. The fanatics already own them really, that's why introducing Islam to Europe, en masse, was such a bad idea - conflict was bound to follow
Comments
1223 ICU admissions since 1st Sept is a significant burden of disease.
But blurring the boundary between Islamic extremists and the millions of Muslims worldwide is your blind spot, when your otherwise level headed objectivity takes its holidays.
2) what percentage of total UK cod consumption?
Biden 53.5%
Trump 41.7%
He's just so totally and utterly dull in every possible way.
Indeed with a Brexit disaster looming we might as well pin the tag to Thompson’s avatar.
If he'd taken over in 1997 rather than Blair then I think he'd have been ok.
Dull and competent is good when it's against the very thing that caused the problems in the first place.
Others might recall the incident of policemen in the UK trying to get lists of who had purchased the reprint issue.
I smiled when I heard that.
The contribution to the exchequer the "fishing" industry makes.
The number of jobs currently depending on the "fishing" industry.
The number of jobs that stand to be gained by "taking back control".
Only then can we judge if it's worth sacrificing other jobs and/or industries over.
And they've taken on board suggestions that it's better to get treatment earlier than later.
More delay, more deaths....this isn't like brexit talks, where bumping things down the road a week in the grans scheme of things isn't a big deal.
If Borisism works, he will win in 2024 and deserve to.
If it fails, the Conservatives lose in 2024, unless they can come up with an anti-Boris to take over soon. I don't think they can, or that it would work.
In that scenario, Starmer's boringness might be a huge positive. We won't want to go on a bear hunt any more.
However great response also by @NickPalmer. It's a long game. Although SKS must be careful he doesn't paint himself into too many corners by not opposing now.
I've just put some more money on the US elections, going in on both Presidential and Senate races. This is landslide territory. A seismic change taking place. The corollary will be Johnson's isolation in the world. Delicious.
https://news.sky.com/story/us-election-huge-numbers-cast-early-ballots-as-trump-and-biden-pitch-for-votes-12106142
To the extent that it means anything beyond symbolism, making it a "sticking point" only makes sense to create more UK fishing jobs. But it's not surprising the French aren't happy about it.
This is NOT the time for grandstanding. Burnham was completely wrong this week. Events like the death of the Liverpool mayor's brother, just announced, illustrate that this isn't a game.
Jacinda won a landslide. So will Joe Biden. Steady, sensible, science-based leaders are winning big because the people around the world are seeing through bullshit. Whether that's from the left or the right. They don't want it any more. The days of charisma, bluster and bluff are at an end. For now.
Well done Sir Keir. You're doing briliantly.
I can't quite understand the glee at the prospect of the UK doing badly.
I apply the same principle to silent bankers.
The liberal West has been very poor at supporting liberal Muslims, most of them in Muslim majority countries, who are trying to fight back against the extremists. I would like to see far more such support precisely in order to show Muslims that we do not accept or assume that the extremists speak for them.
It is one reason why I was so appalled at Britain’s feebleness when Serbs were killing Muslims in Bosnia. It played into the story extremists were telling: that the Christian west did not care about peaceful Muslim communities who had been living here for centuries and was content to stand idly by while they were slaughtered.
https://twitter.com/DanielJHannan/status/1317057396464848896
Put that in your pipe and smoke it you Trafalgars and Latino rumours and Michigan court rulings.
In 2008 I suffered from Boris Derangement Syndrome and had a grand on Ken Livingstone to win the Mayoralty, because I couldn't understand how Londoners could vote for soemwho said "Balderdash" and "piffle".. but I was wrong, I was letting my own prejudices blind me.
‘£350 million a week extra for Serco’
We have just been for a meal at our local pub which is allowed to serve alcohol if you have a meal, it was very sad, they have made huge efforts to comply but now only single households. The place was empty, you normally would have to book a few days in advance.
We could break the rules and nip into Cumbria. People round here are mostly obeying the rules.
In theory I can go to a gym and meet friends, but I normally run the fells round here with friends and this is not allowed, especially if I cross into Cumbria, Lancs has negotiated an exemption to allow gyms, it is a huge mess.
I intend to just be sensible.
Voted anyone but Corbyn last year.
So I'm sort of stateless. I just left a party because i couldn't agree with its direction only to find that the leader of the opposition agrees with everything the government brings before the house.
Unless I hear concrete dissent I might wonder why I left the Cons.
About which he was right.
A great leader doesn't pander to the people. He or she tells it like it is and acts accordingly, whether they like it or not. Ultimately the people learn to trust them. Margaret Thatcher was a great example.
I agree though that the "stay at home with some hot broth" advice of the first wave has rightly been dropped. I think that behind some of the poor first wave outcomes.
https://twitter.com/DaleJohnsonESPN/status/1317447073227296769?s=20
I'm self-proclaimed on here only because I wish to preserve my anonymity. Beyond pb.com I'm well-known. But, no, I won't break that situation so you can believe it or not. I couldn't care a less.
It's the best Labour performance since Norman Kirk won 48.4% and 55 seats in the then 87-seat Parliament in 1972. It's the first absolute majority under the MMP system.
MMP has both constituencies (electorates as they called in NZ) and List MPs. 72 MPs are electorate MPs and the List MPs make up the number to 120 or occasionally 121.
That means two votes - one for the Electorate and one for the Party (List) vote. National has traditionally performed well in the former and Labour in the latter but this time National has won just 27 of the 72 electorates and has seen seats fall across the country lost including their Deputy Leader, Gerry Brownlee, in suburban Christchurch.
Overall, National has won 26.8% of the vote and 35 seats, the worst result since the 2002 disaster.
The party has been driven right back to its rural strongholds in the Bay of Plenty, the Far North and the top of the South Island. As to whether Party leader, Judith Collins, will survive such a bloodbath remains to be seen.
ACT had the best election in their party's history winning 8% of the vote and 10 seats. The Greens polled 7.6% and also won 10 seats including Auckland Central from National. Perhaps the one real surprise of the evening was the Maori Party getting one seat gaining Waiariki (the Maori electorate covering the Bay of Plenty, Rotorua and Taupo) from Labour.
Apart from National, the night's other big losers were New Zealand First under Deputy PM Winston Peters. They lost all their seats and polled 2.7% so failing to win a List MP. Peters is finished politically and it's quite likely the Party will fade away as well.
As for Jacinda Ardern, she now reigns supreme and it looks a huge task for National to become competitive by 2023 but that's an eternity away and so much can and will happen. My suspicion is Collins will step aside sooner or later and it will then be a battle for the soul of the National Party between social conservatives and more liberal conservatives. The former might look to Simeon Brown who would be my long shot to be the challenger to Ardern next time but whether NZ is socially conservative enough to elect someone like him as PM is open to question.
Does he have any radical policies to help solve for example the housing crisis?
My point was that such questions ought to be asked and answered before a bill like this is even considered.
I've reminded Mrs Stodge we can still go and eat at the local cafe and I will be giving them my custom next week as usual even though my T&T app tells me I am now in a High risk area. Anecdotally, more mask wearing in my part of London today but far from universal.
As for the thread topic (thank you, as always, @david_herdson for the read), there's a dilemma for Starmer between playing politics and looking responsible. It's not the role of Opposition to oppose for the sake of it - it is the role of Opposition to scrutinise, to ask awkward questions and to point out inconsistencies and anomalies and seek clarification of those but in the end Starmer has to be seen to be joining the fight against the virus as much as Johnson.
Opportunist Opposition doesn't help as it is all too often obvious. Supporting Government in difficult times is responsible and sensible and even more so if the election is 2024. Trying to carve out a different line just for the sake of being different is I believe politically counter-productive. Starmer is still working on the Labour "offer" for 2024 (or at least he should be). He will know the best way for Labour to look electable against a tired Conservative Government after a decade and a half in Opposition will not be to sound radical and promise the sun, moon and stars but to accept much of what has happened and simply argue it can be done better - that's basically how Blair and Wilson won as non-ideological politicians of the centre-left offering a better way of doing the same things.
It doesn't matter anyway because a US FTA is not realistically going to happen in any scenario.
*Scots TV character played by Rikki Fulton. Think a Calvinist Eeyore with depression and you have the idea.
Well you will be delighted to know that is exactly what is going to happen.
https://twitter.com/C4Dispatches/status/1315702629108985861?s=19
What's yours?
https://twitter.com/CrimeLdn/status/1317450711081287680?s=20
But highlighting one and ignoring the other smacks of not wanting a deal with the US IMO.
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1317460178246291462
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1317460179223498753
Confusion about the Covid-19 science is hampering debate — and costing lives
BY SUNETRA GUPTA"
https://unherd.com/2020/10/matt-hancock-is-wrong-about-herd-immunity/