Yes, but Siemens can now get these slaves to build dishwashers for less money than they would need to pay someone in Europe so who cares about that, I mean China have given the EU a "best efforts" commitment to abolish it, we know how much that means.
Not being part of an investment agreement with China is another good reason not to be part of the EU.
I think most commentators and on here are underestimating the economic tsunami coming our way. Any government would be effected by it , and how it handles the debt once the pandemic is eventually under control.
It's pretty obvious how they are going to handle it; keep borrowing and let inflation rip.
What are the other options?
70's here we come
Been there done that. Apart from the Summer of 1976 the rest of it we can skip (except for the lols of the SNP ushering in Mrs Thatcher).
70's were brilliant, politics were as much in my mind as pensions. It was a great time to be young though looking back at the fashions is a bit disturbing. London was also brilliant in those days, great pubs.
Not good. Forgive my ignorance but do you know if synagogues are still holding services?
This is grim in the circumstances, but also oddly expressed. Time to become a Christian man...
'Even after adjusting for socio-economic factors, data from Public Health England shows that Jewish men are twice as likely to die from Covid-19 than Christian men in the UK.'
Some synagogues are still, unbelievably, holding regular services. Mine stayed open for a bit during lockdown but then shut after Sadiq Khan led a push to close all places of worship (one of the few things he's ever done I can unconditionally support).
Worth noting that the report Roger links to relates to (as far as I can tell) the ultra-orthodox community specifically, which is a fairly small and self-contained part of the wider community. Although it's pretty clear that the findings are applicable to both, albeit to differing extents.
Some church 'leaders' (whatever that means) are taking the Scottish government to court for not allowing any church services. One of them was interviewed on the radio on Sunday and the air of messianic entitlement was gobsmacking:
In this time of crisis coming together and witnessing the good news of Jesus is the only way we can bring redemption to the world (I paraphrase but only in detail not intent).
The thing is, this attitude worked pretty well for thousands of years - religion was a good way of helping people come to terms with random acts of chaos inflicted upon them by a seemingly uncaring universe. Communal prayers and support networks did a lot of good during times when we (as a species) couldn't do much else.
The problem is that, now that we have much more effective means of addressing the problem head on (rather than simply coping with the effects), it's difficult to switch gears and suddenly ditch all the previously comforting defence mechanisms that have been put up.
Which is not an excuse. But it does serve to explain the mindset.
But religion is also about the collective and looking after others. Doing something which explicitly harms others is quite contrary to those principles.
"He who saves a life saves the world entire." Is that not a Jewish saying/principle?
Yes - there is centuries old commentaries/rulings on this - when the choice is breaking the rules and life, life wins.
I doubt that one comment will do Starmer much harm, but we do know his current image is being carefully crafted, unlike Jezza willing to say things that previously he would never as his eye is on the prize of winning, not sticking to appearing idealogically pure.
Err he is up against Boris? Anyone who votes for Boris ahead of Starmer simply because Starmer's image is carefully crafted is a bit weird imo.
Another 40% of 'deplorables' - you could not make this up.
40% of people vote for Boris simply because Starmers image is carefully crafted? Really. Please read what I post and dont extrapolate random non sequiturs from it.
Non weird reasons for voting for Boris:
Brexit Personality Always vote Tory Fear of lingering Corbyn
Weird reason for voting for Boris:
Dislike of carefully crafted images
His model buses are beautifully crafted, that's true. It's hard to dislike them.
Not good. Forgive my ignorance but do you know if synagogues are still holding services?
This is grim in the circumstances, but also oddly expressed. Time to become a Christian man...
'Even after adjusting for socio-economic factors, data from Public Health England shows that Jewish men are twice as likely to die from Covid-19 than Christian men in the UK.'
Some synagogues are still, unbelievably, holding regular services. Mine stayed open for a bit during lockdown but then shut after Sadiq Khan led a push to close all places of worship (one of the few things he's ever done I can unconditionally support).
Worth noting that the report Roger links to relates to (as far as I can tell) the ultra-orthodox community specifically, which is a fairly small and self-contained part of the wider community. Although it's pretty clear that the findings are applicable to both, albeit to differing extents.
Some church 'leaders' (whatever that means) are taking the Scottish government to court for not allowing any church services. One of them was interviewed on the radio on Sunday and the air of messianic entitlement was gobsmacking:
In this time of crisis coming together and witnessing the good news of Jesus is the only way we can bring redemption to the world (I paraphrase but only in detail not intent).
The thing is, this attitude worked pretty well for thousands of years - religion was a good way of helping people come to terms with random acts of chaos inflicted upon them by a seemingly uncaring universe. Communal prayers and support networks did a lot of good during times when we (as a species) couldn't do much else.
The problem is that, now that we have much more effective means of addressing the problem head on (rather than simply coping with the effects), it's difficult to switch gears and suddenly ditch all the previously comforting defence mechanisms that have been put up.
Which is not an excuse. But it does serve to explain the mindset.
It is more subtle than that.
These are mainly independent churches which have a special concern about Govt control because they have a history of being persecuted by the established church and government. "Nonconformists".
This country has not had freedom of religion for *that* long. Hence Pulgrim Fathers etc and a lot more up to 1700 and after.
eg Non-conformists and Roman Catholics did not get full access to Oxford Uni until 1871. Before that you had to declare that you were an Anglican in various ways.
Very much around the time that Charles Bradlaugh was sent to prison for trying to take his seat as an MP without swearing a religious oath.
They don't forget, and they don't back down on principles. In many places they die for them.
I think that they are quite open to the Medical Guidance, but oppose the control.
I luv the idea of the Pulgrim Fathers - they must have sailed on the Fayplower!
I thought the regulations prevented foreign holidays. You could not even leave a Tier 4 area.
Don't care about the Captain - can quite understand why a free holiday at age 100 would appeal. But as a more general point, were foreign holidays permitted?
When he went, yes.
Extraordinary. So my husband could not travel up here - where he would have been safer than in London - and as a result caught the virus. But others could travel half-way round the globe.
These sort of half-arsed rules are one reason why the epidemic is so much worse than it could have been.
If he flew on 9 December then yes your husband could have travelled to you then surely? We weren't in lockdown then.
There were restrictions on movement then I believe. Daughter was having to check on bookings. But I thought the holiday was later. Anyway no matter. I think people travelling for holidays at such a time are quite mad.
Husband was in London for work and to be with our sons who have been largely alone this year and who needed a bit of TLC. Then it seemed nice to stay with them for Xmas. After that it was too late to move.
But yes it will be a bigger issue for him. Because he already has a patriotism issue and frankly Liz Truss does not.
When you lose the benefit of the doubt it becomes harder to avoid tough questions.
Anyone with an unaddled brain would think a Royal Family is a bonkers idea!! If we didn't have one we'd be laughing ourselves stupid at the the likes of Saudi Arabia for even thinking of the idea.
I don't agree, but I still don't think it'll be an issue for Sir Kier. He is a left wing politician. It would be odder to have uncovered the fact that he was a strong monarchist in his youth.
You don't have to look that hard to find Starmer statements / actions at odds with his current inage. I mean he played up how much of a leftie he was during the leadership race, then immediately switched.
Starmer is a "nice guy" but views politics as a real-time tactical challenge of presentation and triangulation.
He risks losing everyone with that approach.
And the risk isn't all to his right. Too much RW chasing could lose support in the MML (which is bigger than the RW). For example, on PT you told me that in order to win an election these days a Labour Party core value needs to be not just "loving your country" - which makes me squirm a bit but I can totally live with - but something rather more and rather different.
It must be OPENLY loving your country (you said).
I don't like that. I don't like that one bit. If that becomes a core Labour value I won't be voting Labour.
These people are completely stupid. I understand that schools should be a priority but we're contending with the SA variant right now and opening schools will see it spread far and wide and potentially undermine our whole vaccine programme.
It's time for a safety first approach with everything including reopening schools and hospitality. We've still got 34k people in hospital with this thing.
Given the rate of vaccination, I wouldn't be surprised if a first jab for everyone first before schools go back is a possibility.
It will be interesting to see what happens with the Pfizer secondary school age trial in the US. Do we have any information when that is supposed to report?
I think most commentators and on here are underestimating the economic tsunami coming our way. Any government would be effected by it , and how it handles the debt once the pandemic is eventually under control.
It's pretty obvious how they are going to handle it; keep borrowing and let inflation rip.
What are the other options?
70's here we come
Been there done that. Apart from the Summer of 1976 the rest of it we can skip (except for the lols of the SNP ushering in Mrs Thatcher).
70's were brilliant, politics were as much in my mind as pensions. It was a great time to be young though looking back at the fashions is a bit disturbing. London was also brilliant in those days, great pubs.
Lots of places and times are good when you're young. Especially if looking back.
You don't have to look that hard to find Starmer statements / actions at odds with his current inage. I mean he played up how much of a leftie he was during the leadership race, then immediately switched.
Starmer is a "nice guy" but views politics as a real-time tactical challenge of presentation and triangulation.
He risks losing everyone with that approach.
And the risk isn't all to his right. Too much RW chasing could lose support in the MML (which is bigger than the RW). For example, on PT you told me that in order to win an election these days a Labour Party core value needs to be not just "loving your country" - which makes me squirm a bit but I can totally live with - but something rather more and rather different.
It must be OPENLY loving your country (you said).
I don't like that. I don't like that one bit. If that becomes a core Labour value I won't be voting Labour.
Lol - there goes the majority. Purity, purity and keep the naffs out.
"Schools are shut, borders are open." - I've been saying this for ages.
About time for the Government to be scrutinised on this issue.
I can't work out why this policy is so hard...there are 10,000s of empty hotel rooms sitting there. You just have to bus people there and leave food outside their rooms.
If you can organise vaccinating 10 million people in a few weeks you can organize this.
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
No it won't, 47% now have a favourable view of Prince Charles and only 23% have a negative opinion.
But yes it will be a bigger issue for him. Because he already has a patriotism issue and frankly Liz Truss does not.
When you lose the benefit of the doubt it becomes harder to avoid tough questions.
Anyone with an unaddled brain would think a Royal Family is a bonkers idea!! If we didn't have one we'd be laughing ourselves stupid at the the likes of Saudi Arabia for even thinking of the idea.
I don't agree, but I still don't think it'll be an issue for Sir Kier. He is a left wing politician. It would be odder to have uncovered the fact that he was a strong monarchist in his youth.
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
PS Double flag habit - he's a walking UJ (was he always? I can't remember.)
The lowest circle of hell is reserved for traitors (of the SNP and sainted Nikki).
It's a poll of voters not SNP members; much as a majority of them will be voting for the SNP, I doubt many of them give a fuck about 'traitors'.
It indicates a sort of anti-Salmond uneasy Venn diagram overlap between Unionists who've always disliked him and those on the SNP side who want him to shut up and stop tarnishing Nicola. Something that I feel is unlikely given that she has declared all out war now.
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
No it won't, 47% now have a favourable view of Prince Charles and only 23% have a negative opinion.
One march by the homeless on Buckingham Palace and those numbers could quickly flip.
Why? Prince William does a lot for homeless charities and Prince Charles does a lot for unemployed young people via the Prince's Trust. What a ridiculous statement
But yes it will be a bigger issue for him. Because he already has a patriotism issue and frankly Liz Truss does not.
When you lose the benefit of the doubt it becomes harder to avoid tough questions.
Anyone with an unaddled brain would think a Royal Family is a bonkers idea!! If we didn't have one we'd be laughing ourselves stupid at the the likes of Saudi Arabia for even thinking of the idea.
I don't agree, but I still don't think it'll be an issue for Sir Kier. He is a left wing politician. It would be odder to have uncovered the fact that he was a strong monarchist in his youth.
You don't have to look that hard to find Starmer statements / actions at odds with his current inage. I mean he played up how much of a leftie he was during the leadership race, then immediately switched.
Starmer is a "nice guy" but views politics as a real-time tactical challenge of presentation and triangulation.
He risks losing everyone with that approach.
And the risk isn't all to his right. Too much RW chasing could lose support in the MML (which is bigger than the RW). For example, on PT you told me that in order to win an election these days a Labour Party core value needs to be not just "loving your country" - which makes me squirm a bit but I can totally live with - but something rather more and rather different.
It must be OPENLY loving your country (you said).
I don't like that. I don't like that one bit. If that becomes a core Labour value I won't be voting Labour.
Genuine question this: why would Labour openly loving the country stop you voting Labour?
I don't understand why making it the "love that dare not speak its name" is more acceptable to you.
Not good. Forgive my ignorance but do you know if synagogues are still holding services?
This is grim in the circumstances, but also oddly expressed. Time to become a Christian man...
'Even after adjusting for socio-economic factors, data from Public Health England shows that Jewish men are twice as likely to die from Covid-19 than Christian men in the UK.'
Some synagogues are still, unbelievably, holding regular services. Mine stayed open for a bit during lockdown but then shut after Sadiq Khan led a push to close all places of worship (one of the few things he's ever done I can unconditionally support).
Worth noting that the report Roger links to relates to (as far as I can tell) the ultra-orthodox community specifically, which is a fairly small and self-contained part of the wider community. Although it's pretty clear that the findings are applicable to both, albeit to differing extents.
Some church 'leaders' (whatever that means) are taking the Scottish government to court for not allowing any church services. One of them was interviewed on the radio on Sunday and the air of messianic entitlement was gobsmacking:
In this time of crisis coming together and witnessing the good news of Jesus is the only way we can bring redemption to the world (I paraphrase but only in detail not intent).
The thing is, this attitude worked pretty well for thousands of years - religion was a good way of helping people come to terms with random acts of chaos inflicted upon them by a seemingly uncaring universe. Communal prayers and support networks did a lot of good during times when we (as a species) couldn't do much else.
The problem is that, now that we have much more effective means of addressing the problem head on (rather than simply coping with the effects), it's difficult to switch gears and suddenly ditch all the previously comforting defence mechanisms that have been put up.
Which is not an excuse. But it does serve to explain the mindset.
But religion is also about the collective and looking after others. Doing something which explicitly harms others is quite contrary to those principles.
"He who saves a life saves the world entire." Is that not a Jewish saying/principle?
Ataturk famously said 'One Turk equals the whole world'. I can only think he never worked with a Turkish crew
You don't have to look that hard to find Starmer statements / actions at odds with his current inage. I mean he played up how much of a leftie he was during the leadership race, then immediately switched.
Starmer is a "nice guy" but views politics as a real-time tactical challenge of presentation and triangulation.
He risks losing everyone with that approach.
And the risk isn't all to his right. Too much RW chasing could lose support in the MML (which is bigger than the RW). For example, on PT you told me that in order to win an election these days a Labour Party core value needs to be not just "loving your country" - which makes me squirm a bit but I can totally live with - but something rather more and rather different.
It must be OPENLY loving your country (you said).
I don't like that. I don't like that one bit. If that becomes a core Labour value I won't be voting Labour.
I am sure Starmer can afford to lose a few more leftwingers to the Greens in inner cities as long as he wins switchers from the Tories in the Red Wall
Not good. Forgive my ignorance but do you know if synagogues are still holding services?
This is grim in the circumstances, but also oddly expressed. Time to become a Christian man...
'Even after adjusting for socio-economic factors, data from Public Health England shows that Jewish men are twice as likely to die from Covid-19 than Christian men in the UK.'
Some synagogues are still, unbelievably, holding regular services. Mine stayed open for a bit during lockdown but then shut after Sadiq Khan led a push to close all places of worship (one of the few things he's ever done I can unconditionally support).
Worth noting that the report Roger links to relates to (as far as I can tell) the ultra-orthodox community specifically, which is a fairly small and self-contained part of the wider community. Although it's pretty clear that the findings are applicable to both, albeit to differing extents.
Some church 'leaders' (whatever that means) are taking the Scottish government to court for not allowing any church services. One of them was interviewed on the radio on Sunday and the air of messianic entitlement was gobsmacking:
In this time of crisis coming together and witnessing the good news of Jesus is the only way we can bring redemption to the world (I paraphrase but only in detail not intent).
It is also absurd because streaming of services is possible. It is what my church did during the first lockdown. Not ideal, obviously. But nothing is at the moment. When so many are making sacrifices - often at great cost to themselves - I find myself increasingly annoyed with those demanding special privileges.
Depends on your religion. Within (Orthodox) Judaism, streaming the service is pointless because prayer is intended to be communal, which requires a physical presence.
Prayer is communal in Catholicism too. Holy Communion is pretty key but has been impossible.
Does doing something which risk killing / harming people really override everything else?
No, of course it doesn't. Quite the reverse, actually.
I was just pointing out that streaming services is functionally the same as cancelling them outright.
But yes it will be a bigger issue for him. Because he already has a patriotism issue and frankly Liz Truss does not.
When you lose the benefit of the doubt it becomes harder to avoid tough questions.
Anyone with an unaddled brain would think a Royal Family is a bonkers idea!! If we didn't have one we'd be laughing ourselves stupid at the the likes of Saudi Arabia for even thinking of the idea.
I don't agree, but I still don't think it'll be an issue for Sir Kier. He is a left wing politician. It would be odder to have uncovered the fact that he was a strong monarchist in his youth.
40's is youth now?
In the video, he claims he 'used to be' a strong anti monarchist no?
Yes, but Siemens can now get these slaves to build dishwashers for less money than they would need to pay someone in Europe so who cares about that, I mean China have given the EU a "best efforts" commitment to abolish it, we know how much that means.
Not being part of an investment agreement with China is another good reason not to be part of the EU.
Yup, it goes against everything we stand for, profiting from slavery and misery inflicted upon millions by a tyrannical dictatorship. Ultimately the EU has chosen German company profits over human rights, that's their choice but those who support it must face up to it.
But yes it will be a bigger issue for him. Because he already has a patriotism issue and frankly Liz Truss does not.
When you lose the benefit of the doubt it becomes harder to avoid tough questions.
Anyone with an unaddled brain would think a Royal Family is a bonkers idea!! If we didn't have one we'd be laughing ourselves stupid at the the likes of Saudi Arabia for even thinking of the idea.
I don't agree, but I still don't think it'll be an issue for Sir Kier. He is a left wing politician. It would be odder to have uncovered the fact that he was a strong monarchist in his youth.
A man of your obvious (if cranky) intellect really ought to be able to spell the Loto's name correctly.
The lowest circle of hell is reserved for traitors (of the SNP and sainted Nikki).
It's a poll of voters not SNP members; much as a majority of them will be voting for the SNP, I doubt many of them give a fuck about 'traitors'.
It indicates a sort of anti-Salmond uneasy Venn diagram overlap between Unionists who've always disliked him and those on the SNP side who want him to shut up and stop tarnishing Nicola. Something that I feel is unlikely given that she has declared all out war now.
Again for the hard of hearing, it's a poll of voters.
"Schools are shut, borders are open." - I've been saying this for ages.
About time for the Government to be scrutinised on this issue.
I can't work out why this policy is so hard...there are 10,000s of empty hotel rooms sitting there. You just have to bus people there and leave food outside their rooms.
If you can organise vaccinating 10 million pekppe5 in a few weeks you can organize this.
100%
And once this is in place while traveller numbers are low it can be scaled up if and when traveller numbers increase until it is safe to remove all restrictions.
Not good. Forgive my ignorance but do you know if synagogues are still holding services?
This is grim in the circumstances, but also oddly expressed. Time to become a Christian man...
'Even after adjusting for socio-economic factors, data from Public Health England shows that Jewish men are twice as likely to die from Covid-19 than Christian men in the UK.'
Some synagogues are still, unbelievably, holding regular services. Mine stayed open for a bit during lockdown but then shut after Sadiq Khan led a push to close all places of worship (one of the few things he's ever done I can unconditionally support).
Worth noting that the report Roger links to relates to (as far as I can tell) the ultra-orthodox community specifically, which is a fairly small and self-contained part of the wider community. Although it's pretty clear that the findings are applicable to both, albeit to differing extents.
Some church 'leaders' (whatever that means) are taking the Scottish government to court for not allowing any church services. One of them was interviewed on the radio on Sunday and the air of messianic entitlement was gobsmacking:
In this time of crisis coming together and witnessing the good news of Jesus is the only way we can bring redemption to the world (I paraphrase but only in detail not intent).
The thing is, this attitude worked pretty well for thousands of years - religion was a good way of helping people come to terms with random acts of chaos inflicted upon them by a seemingly uncaring universe. Communal prayers and support networks did a lot of good during times when we (as a species) couldn't do much else.
The problem is that, now that we have much more effective means of addressing the problem head on (rather than simply coping with the effects), it's difficult to switch gears and suddenly ditch all the previously comforting defence mechanisms that have been put up.
Which is not an excuse. But it does serve to explain the mindset.
But religion is also about the collective and looking after others. Doing something which explicitly harms others is quite contrary to those principles.
"He who saves a life saves the world entire." Is that not a Jewish saying/principle?
The most recent example in the public arena being the Sikh community in Kent feeding hundreds of truck drivers - that is an outgrowth of the belief in Langar, which is an open and equal table where any Gudwara in the country will serve you a free meal.
Not sure that we do have better ways of addressing needs. Just look at all the desperate attempts to provide 'community' during lockdown - which already exist in such structures.
We now even have a decaffeinated, individualistic pseudo-religion called "mindfulness" everywhere .
You don't have to look that hard to find Starmer statements / actions at odds with his current inage. I mean he played up how much of a leftie he was during the leadership race, then immediately switched.
Starmer is a "nice guy" but views politics as a real-time tactical challenge of presentation and triangulation.
He risks losing everyone with that approach.
You cannot make yourself into something you are not just because you think it will be popular
You have to believe in it in the first place
(whispers) Are you going to tell the PM, or shall I?
On being patriotic I do not think I need to tell Boris anything
Absolutely. Putting a border down the Irish Sea so that you need to fill in customs and sanitary forms to ship products from one part of the UK to another is as patriotic as you can get.
It was the EU who demanded that for a trade deal with the UK
"Schools are shut, borders are open." - I've been saying this for ages.
About time for the Government to be scrutinised on this issue.
I can't work out why this policy is so hard...there are 10,000s of empty hotel rooms sitting there. You just have to bus people there and leave food outside their rooms.
If you can organise vaccinating 10 million people in a few weeks you can organize this.
It's a mystery - I suspect "pass the parcel" between Shapps & Patel......
Not good. Forgive my ignorance but do you know if synagogues are still holding services?
This is grim in the circumstances, but also oddly expressed. Time to become a Christian man...
'Even after adjusting for socio-economic factors, data from Public Health England shows that Jewish men are twice as likely to die from Covid-19 than Christian men in the UK.'
Some synagogues are still, unbelievably, holding regular services. Mine stayed open for a bit during lockdown but then shut after Sadiq Khan led a push to close all places of worship (one of the few things he's ever done I can unconditionally support).
Worth noting that the report Roger links to relates to (as far as I can tell) the ultra-orthodox community specifically, which is a fairly small and self-contained part of the wider community. Although it's pretty clear that the findings are applicable to both, albeit to differing extents.
Some church 'leaders' (whatever that means) are taking the Scottish government to court for not allowing any church services. One of them was interviewed on the radio on Sunday and the air of messianic entitlement was gobsmacking:
In this time of crisis coming together and witnessing the good news of Jesus is the only way we can bring redemption to the world (I paraphrase but only in detail not intent).
It is also absurd because streaming of services is possible. It is what my church did during the first lockdown. Not ideal, obviously. But nothing is at the moment. When so many are making sacrifices - often at great cost to themselves - I find myself increasingly annoyed with those demanding special privileges.
Depends on your religion. Within (Orthodox) Judaism, streaming the service is pointless because prayer is intended to be communal, which requires a physical presence.
Prayer is communal in Catholicism too. Holy Communion is pretty key but has been impossible.
Does doing something which risk killing / harming people really override everything else?
No, of course it doesn't. Quite the reverse, actually.
I was just pointing out that streaming services is functionally the same as cancelling them outright.
I understand. Streaming Mass functionally kills one of its key components - Communion. Churches still did it and it was better than nothing. In an emergency we are all making sacrifices and no group should get a free pass from doing that.
I think many have questioned the born to be head of state in a mature democracy. Especially after the current Queen. Even you or maybe not,
Nope. I am a supporter of constitutional monarchy, which I believe to be the best system of government; it separates the icons and symbols of statehood from politics, and that continuity of family (the most natural of human instincts) makes for a more harmonious and rooted society with flesh and blood roots going back thousands of years into the past.
The republic versus monarchy debate is, I believe, still trapped in the 19th century when we had absolutism versus democracy debates going on. It doesn't apply today where we effectively have a crowned republic.
Not only do I believe it works here but I also believe it would work well elsewhere where - for example, if Putin were simply the Russian first minister under a constitutional Tsar (provided they were strong and neutral enough) it would be much easier to patriotically oppose him without being seen to be against Mother Russia.
I think many have questioned the born to be head of state in a mature democracy. Especially after the current Queen. Even you or maybe not,
Nope. I am a supporter of constitutional monarchy, which I believe to be the best system of government; it separates the icons and symbols of statehood from politics, and that continuity of family (the most natural of human instincts) makes for a more harmonious and rooted society with flesh and blood roots going back thousands of years into the past.
The republic versus monarchy debate is, I believe, still trapped in the 19th century when we had absolutism versus democracy debates going on. It doesn't apply today where we effectively have a crowned republic.
Not only do I believe it works here but I also believe it would work well elsewhere where - for example, if Putin were simply the Russian first minister under a constitutional Tsar (provided they were strong and neutral enough) it would be much easier to patriotically oppose him without being seen to be against Mother Russia.
Will Johnson get asked about stepping up school openings at PMQs?
Brady on the radio this morning was getting his freak on.
He won't be alone.
Brady has been getting his freak on all pandemic. If we'd listened to him things would be far worse now.
As much as the girls want to go back to school (and I'd be happy for it to happen), the proposal of giving 2 weeks notice for future changes to schools is a good one.
I was worried schools wouldn't be going back until after the Easter break, which pushes us into April before they go back. Saying they'll go on the 8th March instead - I doubt many people will quibble over a fortnight.
At this moment, my understanding is that the 8th March is the *earliest* schools may start going back. Not that they definitely will be going back. Put it this way, I'm not counting on being back onsite before the end of March.
I agree about the two weeks' notice. Life would be far easier now if the government had made the call about January on December 9th, as anyone with half a brain would have done but the DfE didn't.
Not good. Forgive my ignorance but do you know if synagogues are still holding services?
This is grim in the circumstances, but also oddly expressed. Time to become a Christian man...
'Even after adjusting for socio-economic factors, data from Public Health England shows that Jewish men are twice as likely to die from Covid-19 than Christian men in the UK.'
Some synagogues are still, unbelievably, holding regular services. Mine stayed open for a bit during lockdown but then shut after Sadiq Khan led a push to close all places of worship (one of the few things he's ever done I can unconditionally support).
Worth noting that the report Roger links to relates to (as far as I can tell) the ultra-orthodox community specifically, which is a fairly small and self-contained part of the wider community. Although it's pretty clear that the findings are applicable to both, albeit to differing extents.
Some church 'leaders' (whatever that means) are taking the Scottish government to court for not allowing any church services. One of them was interviewed on the radio on Sunday and the air of messianic entitlement was gobsmacking:
In this time of crisis coming together and witnessing the good news of Jesus is the only way we can bring redemption to the world (I paraphrase but only in detail not intent).
The thing is, this attitude worked pretty well for thousands of years - religion was a good way of helping people come to terms with random acts of chaos inflicted upon them by a seemingly uncaring universe. Communal prayers and support networks did a lot of good during times when we (as a species) couldn't do much else.
The problem is that, now that we have much more effective means of addressing the problem head on (rather than simply coping with the effects), it's difficult to switch gears and suddenly ditch all the previously comforting defence mechanisms that have been put up.
Which is not an excuse. But it does serve to explain the mindset.
But religion is also about the collective and looking after others. Doing something which explicitly harms others is quite contrary to those principles.
"He who saves a life saves the world entire." Is that not a Jewish saying/principle?
As per my other post, yes, absolutely. There's just a lot of cognitive dissonance against the idea that ordinary communal activities could be harmful. This is distinct from the attitudes of not wanting to accept authority although it can be hard to spot the difference sometimes.
But yes it will be a bigger issue for him. Because he already has a patriotism issue and frankly Liz Truss does not.
When you lose the benefit of the doubt it becomes harder to avoid tough questions.
Anyone with an unaddled brain would think a Royal Family is a bonkers idea!! If we didn't have one we'd be laughing ourselves stupid at the the likes of Saudi Arabia for even thinking of the idea.
I don't agree, but I still don't think it'll be an issue for Sir Kier. He is a left wing politician. It would be odder to have uncovered the fact that he was a strong monarchist in his youth.
A man of your obvious (if cranky) intellect really ought to be able to spell the Loto's name correctly.
You don't have to look that hard to find Starmer statements / actions at odds with his current inage. I mean he played up how much of a leftie he was during the leadership race, then immediately switched.
Starmer is a "nice guy" but views politics as a real-time tactical challenge of presentation and triangulation.
He risks losing everyone with that approach.
And the risk isn't all to his right. Too much RW chasing could lose support in the MML (which is bigger than the RW). For example, on PT you told me that in order to win an election these days a Labour Party core value needs to be not just "loving your country" - which makes me squirm a bit but I can totally live with - but something rather more and rather different.
It must be OPENLY loving your country (you said).
I don't like that. I don't like that one bit. If that becomes a core Labour value I won't be voting Labour.
I think your fears are unfounded. All Starmer is trying to do it to rid Labour of the "Britain-hating" narrative, and unfortunately that means random flags and bouts of patriotism. It's not false either, because the vast majority of Labour members and voters don't hate Britain; they are proud of much of our culture, our institutions, our tolerance, our multiculturalism, and so forth. Labour's patriotism is about the strength of our democracy, our arts and culture, our NHS, and much else. In his own way, Corbyn is actually a patriot - in a funny sort of way, he's terribly British with his allotment, his dislike of the EU, and all that. But he couldn't disguise his disappointment at our foreign adventures and some other matters, so he lay himself open to the constant charge of being anti-British. Michael Foot was, even more so, a patriot. The idea that you can't be both left wing and proud of your country is risible.
I'd be embarrassed to read back my cap-doffing quotes now, but guess what?
People's views change over time.
Yup, don't think this makes any difference really.
It doesn't, as long as people think that Starmer is genuine and says what he believes in. If they don't then it's a problem.
That's right. It's not so much Keir Starmer himself, it's the Labour Party as a whole which has the problem. I can see why they want to try to change the perception that they are anti-British, but all this appearing in front of Union Jacks etc just looks fake. It's too transparently a response to focus group findings.
How it looks to swing voters by 2024 is different to how it looks to political geeks in 2021 though.
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
The model was only yesterday, Keir hasn't had a chance to retaliate yet. It' s coming.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
The model was only yesterday, Keir hasn't had a chance to retaliate yet. It' s coming.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
Surely a Spitfire. Can't get more patriotic than that.
You don't have to look that hard to find Starmer statements / actions at odds with his current inage. I mean he played up how much of a leftie he was during the leadership race, then immediately switched.
Starmer is a "nice guy" but views politics as a real-time tactical challenge of presentation and triangulation.
He risks losing everyone with that approach.
And the risk isn't all to his right. Too much RW chasing could lose support in the MML (which is bigger than the RW). For example, on PT you told me that in order to win an election these days a Labour Party core value needs to be not just "loving your country" - which makes me squirm a bit but I can totally live with - but something rather more and rather different.
It must be OPENLY loving your country (you said).
I don't like that. I don't like that one bit. If that becomes a core Labour value I won't be voting Labour.
I think your fears are unfounded. All Starmer is trying to do it to rid Labour of the "Britain-hating" narrative, and unfortunately that means random flags and bouts of patriotism. It's not false either, because the vast majority of Labour members and voters don't hate Britain; they are proud of much of our culture, our institutions, our tolerance, our multiculturalism, and so forth. Labour's patriotism is about the strength of our democracy, our arts and culture, our NHS, and much else. In his own way, Corbyn is actually a patriot - in a funny sort of way, he's terribly British with his allotment, his dislike of the EU, and all that. But he couldn't disguise his disappointment at our foreign adventures and some other matters, so he lay himself open to the constant charge of being anti-British. Michael Foot was, even more so, a patriot. The idea that you can't be both left wing and proud of your country is risible.
How about putting the people of your country first, say in the context of a pandemic? Any thoughts on that?
Will Johnson get asked about stepping up school openings at PMQs?
Brady on the radio this morning was getting his freak on.
He won't be alone.
Brady has been getting his freak on all pandemic. If we'd listened to him things would be far worse now.
As much as the girls want to go back to school (and I'd be happy for it to happen), the proposal of giving 2 weeks notice for future changes to schools is a good one.
I was worried schools wouldn't be going back until after the Easter break, which pushes us into April before they go back. Saying they'll go on the 8th March instead - I doubt many people will quibble over a fortnight.
At this moment, my understanding is that the 8th March is the *earliest* schools may start going back. Not that they definitely will be going back. Put it this way, I'm not counting on being back onsite before the end of March.
I agree about the two weeks' notice. Life would be far easier now if the government had made the call about January on December 9th, as anyone with half a brain would have done but the DfE didn't.
Interesting More or Less today explaining that the risk to teachers of catching Covid was no greater than the risk to the general population.
Should give you some comfort when you go back.
(And as a mere stripling of 37 you won't have been jabbed!)
But yes it will be a bigger issue for him. Because he already has a patriotism issue and frankly Liz Truss does not.
When you lose the benefit of the doubt it becomes harder to avoid tough questions.
Anyone with an unaddled brain would think a Royal Family is a bonkers idea!! If we didn't have one we'd be laughing ourselves stupid at the the likes of Saudi Arabia for even thinking of the idea.
I don't agree, but I still don't think it'll be an issue for Sir Kier. He is a left wing politician. It would be odder to have uncovered the fact that he was a strong monarchist in his youth.
A man of your obvious (if cranky) intellect really ought to be able to spell the Loto's name correctly.
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
The model was only yesterday, Keir hasn't had a chance to retaliate yet. It' s coming.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
Will Johnson get asked about stepping up school openings at PMQs?
Brady on the radio this morning was getting his freak on.
He won't be alone.
Brady has been getting his freak on all pandemic. If we'd listened to him things would be far worse now.
As much as the girls want to go back to school (and I'd be happy for it to happen), the proposal of giving 2 weeks notice for future changes to schools is a good one.
I was worried schools wouldn't be going back until after the Easter break, which pushes us into April before they go back. Saying they'll go on the 8th March instead - I doubt many people will quibble over a fortnight.
At this moment, my understanding is that the 8th March is the *earliest* schools may start going back. Not that they definitely will be going back. Put it this way, I'm not counting on being back onsite before the end of March.
I agree about the two weeks' notice. Life would be far easier now if the government had made the call about January on December 9th, as anyone with half a brain would have done but the DfE didn't.
Interesting More or Less today explaining that the risk to teachers of catching Covid was no greater than the risk to the general population.
Should give you some comfort when you go back.
(And as a mere stripling of 37 you won't have been jabbed!)
And? the issue is more that schools being open create a vector that increases R by about 0.4
You don't have to look that hard to find Starmer statements / actions at odds with his current inage. I mean he played up how much of a leftie he was during the leadership race, then immediately switched.
Starmer is a "nice guy" but views politics as a real-time tactical challenge of presentation and triangulation.
He risks losing everyone with that approach.
You cannot make yourself into something you are not just because you think it will be popular
You have to believe in it in the first place
(whispers) Are you going to tell the PM, or shall I?
On being patriotic I do not think I need to tell Boris anything
Absolutely. Putting a border down the Irish Sea so that you need to fill in customs and sanitary forms to ship products from one part of the UK to another is as patriotic as you can get.
It was the EU who demanded that for a trade deal with the UK
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
The model was only yesterday, Keir hasn't had a chance to retaliate yet. It' s coming.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
A Churchill tank perhaps?
Might go too far in aggravating his angrier members to reference Churchill.
You don't have to look that hard to find Starmer statements / actions at odds with his current inage. I mean he played up how much of a leftie he was during the leadership race, then immediately switched.
Starmer is a "nice guy" but views politics as a real-time tactical challenge of presentation and triangulation.
He risks losing everyone with that approach.
And the risk isn't all to his right. Too much RW chasing could lose support in the MML (which is bigger than the RW). For example, on PT you told me that in order to win an election these days a Labour Party core value needs to be not just "loving your country" - which makes me squirm a bit but I can totally live with - but something rather more and rather different.
It must be OPENLY loving your country (you said).
I don't like that. I don't like that one bit. If that becomes a core Labour value I won't be voting Labour.
I think your fears are unfounded. All Starmer is trying to do it to rid Labour of the "Britain-hating" narrative, and unfortunately that means random flags and bouts of patriotism. It's not false either, because the vast majority of Labour members and voters don't hate Britain; they are proud of much of our culture, our institutions, our tolerance, our multiculturalism, and so forth. Labour's patriotism is about the strength of our democracy, our arts and culture, our NHS, and much else. In his own way, Corbyn is actually a patriot - in a funny sort of way, he's terribly British with his allotment, his dislike of the EU, and all that. But he couldn't disguise his disappointment at our foreign adventures and some other matters, so he lay himself open to the constant charge of being anti-British. Michael Foot was, even more so, a patriot. The idea that you can't be both left wing and proud of your country is risible.
The "tell" with Corbyn was that he instinctively sided with any other country in a dispute with the UK. Hence his behaviour over MH17, polonium high tea and exotic perfume sales in Salisbury.
Will Johnson get asked about stepping up school openings at PMQs?
Brady on the radio this morning was getting his freak on.
He won't be alone.
Brady has been getting his freak on all pandemic. If we'd listened to him things would be far worse now.
As much as the girls want to go back to school (and I'd be happy for it to happen), the proposal of giving 2 weeks notice for future changes to schools is a good one.
I was worried schools wouldn't be going back until after the Easter break, which pushes us into April before they go back. Saying they'll go on the 8th March instead - I doubt many people will quibble over a fortnight.
At this moment, my understanding is that the 8th March is the *earliest* schools may start going back. Not that they definitely will be going back. Put it this way, I'm not counting on being back onsite before the end of March.
I agree about the two weeks' notice. Life would be far easier now if the government had made the call about January on December 9th, as anyone with half a brain would have done but the DfE didn't.
Interesting More or Less today explaining that the risk to teachers of catching Covid was no greater than the risk to the general population.
Should give you some comfort when you go back.
(And as a mere stripling of 37 you won't have been jabbed!)
And? the issue is more that schools being open create a vector that increases R by about 0.4
Yup, and with SA COVID out there it would be absolutely stupid to reopen schools until we're in a position to do adjusted boosters in April as the Oxford team are working on.
Not good. Forgive my ignorance but do you know if synagogues are still holding services?
This is grim in the circumstances, but also oddly expressed. Time to become a Christian man...
'Even after adjusting for socio-economic factors, data from Public Health England shows that Jewish men are twice as likely to die from Covid-19 than Christian men in the UK.'
Some synagogues are still, unbelievably, holding regular services. Mine stayed open for a bit during lockdown but then shut after Sadiq Khan led a push to close all places of worship (one of the few things he's ever done I can unconditionally support).
Worth noting that the report Roger links to relates to (as far as I can tell) the ultra-orthodox community specifically, which is a fairly small and self-contained part of the wider community. Although it's pretty clear that the findings are applicable to both, albeit to differing extents.
Some church 'leaders' (whatever that means) are taking the Scottish government to court for not allowing any church services. One of them was interviewed on the radio on Sunday and the air of messianic entitlement was gobsmacking:
In this time of crisis coming together and witnessing the good news of Jesus is the only way we can bring redemption to the world (I paraphrase but only in detail not intent).
It is also absurd because streaming of services is possible. It is what my church did during the first lockdown. Not ideal, obviously. But nothing is at the moment. When so many are making sacrifices - often at great cost to themselves - I find myself increasingly annoyed with those demanding special privileges.
Depends on your religion. Within (Orthodox) Judaism, streaming the service is pointless because prayer is intended to be communal, which requires a physical presence.
Prayer is communal in Catholicism too. Holy Communion is pretty key but has been impossible.
Does doing something which risk killing / harming people really override everything else?
No, of course it doesn't. Quite the reverse, actually.
I was just pointing out that streaming services is functionally the same as cancelling them outright.
I understand. Streaming Mass functionally kills one of its key components - Communion. Churches still did it and it was better than nothing. In an emergency we are all making sacrifices and no group should get a free pass from doing that.
And it's worth remembering that receiving Communion frequently is a relatively recent thing in the context of the Church.
[And elections are due for the General Synod of the CofE this year, having been postponed from 2020. So there's the electoral dimension.]
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
The model was only yesterday, Keir hasn't had a chance to retaliate yet. It' s coming.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
A Churchill tank perhaps?
A Cromwell would give the right parliamentarian, non-conformist note.
Will Johnson get asked about stepping up school openings at PMQs?
Brady on the radio this morning was getting his freak on.
He won't be alone.
Brady has been getting his freak on all pandemic. If we'd listened to him things would be far worse now.
As much as the girls want to go back to school (and I'd be happy for it to happen), the proposal of giving 2 weeks notice for future changes to schools is a good one.
I was worried schools wouldn't be going back until after the Easter break, which pushes us into April before they go back. Saying they'll go on the 8th March instead - I doubt many people will quibble over a fortnight.
At this moment, my understanding is that the 8th March is the *earliest* schools may start going back. Not that they definitely will be going back. Put it this way, I'm not counting on being back onsite before the end of March.
I agree about the two weeks' notice. Life would be far easier now if the government had made the call about January on December 9th, as anyone with half a brain would have done but the DfE didn't.
Interesting More or Less today explaining that the risk to teachers of catching Covid was no greater than the risk to the general population.
Should give you some comfort when you go back.
(And as a mere stripling of 37 you won't have been jabbed!)
And? the issue is more that schools being open create a vector that increases R by about 0.4
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
The model was only yesterday, Keir hasn't had a chance to retaliate yet. It' s coming.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
You don't have to look that hard to find Starmer statements / actions at odds with his current inage. I mean he played up how much of a leftie he was during the leadership race, then immediately switched.
Starmer is a "nice guy" but views politics as a real-time tactical challenge of presentation and triangulation.
He risks losing everyone with that approach.
And the risk isn't all to his right. Too much RW chasing could lose support in the MML (which is bigger than the RW). For example, on PT you told me that in order to win an election these days a Labour Party core value needs to be not just "loving your country" - which makes me squirm a bit but I can totally live with - but something rather more and rather different.
It must be OPENLY loving your country (you said).
I don't like that. I don't like that one bit. If that becomes a core Labour value I won't be voting Labour.
Genuine question this: why would Labour openly loving the country stop you voting Labour?
I don't understand why making it the "love that dare not speak its name" is more acceptable to you.
Will Johnson get asked about stepping up school openings at PMQs?
Brady on the radio this morning was getting his freak on.
He won't be alone.
Brady has been getting his freak on all pandemic. If we'd listened to him things would be far worse now.
As much as the girls want to go back to school (and I'd be happy for it to happen), the proposal of giving 2 weeks notice for future changes to schools is a good one.
I was worried schools wouldn't be going back until after the Easter break, which pushes us into April before they go back. Saying they'll go on the 8th March instead - I doubt many people will quibble over a fortnight.
Any R close to or above 1 is a recipe for unwanted evolutionary selection pressure, particularly once a significant proportion of people have immunity.
Schools should not go back until we are sure that cases will continue to fall when they do. Even R=1 with 1000 cases a day is a risk.
This SA mutation (E484K) seems to appear naturally in populations with some immunity and the only way we aren't going to have lots of it is to keep the numbers falling. As long as no variants are expanding their range it will be fine.
In some sense imported variants don't really matter if R is below 1 unless they are _much_ more transmissible.
Once most people are vaccinated then it will be a lot easier, although I imagine we'll need a new booster jab by Autumn.
I worry about the schools in Scotland going back in 2 weeks. It can't be long before we have a "Scottish" variant.
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
The model was only yesterday, Keir hasn't had a chance to retaliate yet. It' s coming.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
A Churchill tank perhaps?
A Cromwell would give the right parliamentarian, non-conformist note.
But he cut of a monarch's head!!
Ok, scrub that..
Dont forget Ireland - wouldn't want to provoke an ally.
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
The model was only yesterday, Keir hasn't had a chance to retaliate yet. It' s coming.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
A Churchill tank perhaps?
Or an "English Workman" (admittedly barely WW2, and a Soviet name for the Vickers Medium).
Not good. Forgive my ignorance but do you know if synagogues are still holding services?
This is grim in the circumstances, but also oddly expressed. Time to become a Christian man...
'Even after adjusting for socio-economic factors, data from Public Health England shows that Jewish men are twice as likely to die from Covid-19 than Christian men in the UK.'
Some synagogues are still, unbelievably, holding regular services. Mine stayed open for a bit during lockdown but then shut after Sadiq Khan led a push to close all places of worship (one of the few things he's ever done I can unconditionally support).
Worth noting that the report Roger links to relates to (as far as I can tell) the ultra-orthodox community specifically, which is a fairly small and self-contained part of the wider community. Although it's pretty clear that the findings are applicable to both, albeit to differing extents.
Some church 'leaders' (whatever that means) are taking the Scottish government to court for not allowing any church services. One of them was interviewed on the radio on Sunday and the air of messianic entitlement was gobsmacking:
In this time of crisis coming together and witnessing the good news of Jesus is the only way we can bring redemption to the world (I paraphrase but only in detail not intent).
It is also absurd because streaming of services is possible. It is what my church did during the first lockdown. Not ideal, obviously. But nothing is at the moment. When so many are making sacrifices - often at great cost to themselves - I find myself increasingly annoyed with those demanding special privileges.
Depends on your religion. Within (Orthodox) Judaism, streaming the service is pointless because prayer is intended to be communal, which requires a physical presence.
Prayer is communal in Catholicism too. Holy Communion is pretty key but has been impossible.
Does doing something which risk killing / harming people really override everything else?
No, of course it doesn't. Quite the reverse, actually.
I was just pointing out that streaming services is functionally the same as cancelling them outright.
I understand. Streaming Mass functionally kills one of its key components - Communion. Churches still did it and it was better than nothing. In an emergency we are all making sacrifices and no group should get a free pass from doing that.
And it's worth remembering that receiving Communion frequently is a relatively recent thing in the context of the Church.
[And elections are due for the General Synod of the CofE this year, having been postponed from 2020. So there's the electoral dimension.]
I'd be interested to know how RCs did Communion in one Element (ie bread not wine for the congregation) before the invention of modern wafers - was it a single loaf broken up?
Nonconformists are quite fun wrt unity at communion. Sometimes it involves a small 'liqueur' glass each, and doing a one-two-three quaff at the same time.
Will Johnson get asked about stepping up school openings at PMQs?
Brady on the radio this morning was getting his freak on.
He won't be alone.
Brady has been getting his freak on all pandemic. If we'd listened to him things would be far worse now.
As much as the girls want to go back to school (and I'd be happy for it to happen), the proposal of giving 2 weeks notice for future changes to schools is a good one.
I was worried schools wouldn't be going back until after the Easter break, which pushes us into April before they go back. Saying they'll go on the 8th March instead - I doubt many people will quibble over a fortnight.
At this moment, my understanding is that the 8th March is the *earliest* schools may start going back. Not that they definitely will be going back. Put it this way, I'm not counting on being back onsite before the end of March.
I agree about the two weeks' notice. Life would be far easier now if the government had made the call about January on December 9th, as anyone with half a brain would have done but the DfE didn't.
Concerning that you're not expecting to go back before the end of March.
Do you expect there to be a difference between Primary and Secondary education on this? IE back on 8 March for Primary but after Easter for Secondary?
Will Johnson get asked about stepping up school openings at PMQs?
Brady on the radio this morning was getting his freak on.
He won't be alone.
Brady has been getting his freak on all pandemic. If we'd listened to him things would be far worse now.
As much as the girls want to go back to school (and I'd be happy for it to happen), the proposal of giving 2 weeks notice for future changes to schools is a good one.
I was worried schools wouldn't be going back until after the Easter break, which pushes us into April before they go back. Saying they'll go on the 8th March instead - I doubt many people will quibble over a fortnight.
At this moment, my understanding is that the 8th March is the *earliest* schools may start going back. Not that they definitely will be going back. Put it this way, I'm not counting on being back onsite before the end of March.
I agree about the two weeks' notice. Life would be far easier now if the government had made the call about January on December 9th, as anyone with half a brain would have done but the DfE didn't.
Interesting More or Less today explaining that the risk to teachers of catching Covid was no greater than the risk to the general population.
Should give you some comfort when you go back.
(And as a mere stripling of 37 you won't have been jabbed!)
Do you have a link? Such figures as i have seen suggest that is not true.
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
The model was only yesterday, Keir hasn't had a chance to retaliate yet. It' s coming.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
The model was only yesterday, Keir hasn't had a chance to retaliate yet. It' s coming.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
Will Johnson get asked about stepping up school openings at PMQs?
Brady on the radio this morning was getting his freak on.
He won't be alone.
Brady has been getting his freak on all pandemic. If we'd listened to him things would be far worse now.
As much as the girls want to go back to school (and I'd be happy for it to happen), the proposal of giving 2 weeks notice for future changes to schools is a good one.
I was worried schools wouldn't be going back until after the Easter break, which pushes us into April before they go back. Saying they'll go on the 8th March instead - I doubt many people will quibble over a fortnight.
At this moment, my understanding is that the 8th March is the *earliest* schools may start going back. Not that they definitely will be going back. Put it this way, I'm not counting on being back onsite before the end of March.
I agree about the two weeks' notice. Life would be far easier now if the government had made the call about January on December 9th, as anyone with half a brain would have done but the DfE didn't.
Interesting More or Less today explaining that the risk to teachers of catching Covid was no greater than the risk to the general population.
Should give you some comfort when you go back.
(And as a mere stripling of 37 you won't have been jabbed!)
And? the issue is more that schools being open create a vector that increases R by about 0.4
Yup, and with SA COVID out there it would be absolutely stupid to reopen schools until we're in a position to do adjusted boosters in April as the Oxford team are working on.
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
The model was only yesterday, Keir hasn't had a chance to retaliate yet. It' s coming.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
A Churchill tank perhaps?
A Cromwell would give the right parliamentarian, non-conformist note.
But he cut of a monarch's head!!
Ok, scrub that..
IIRC WSC wanted to name a dreadnought after Noll. HM was not in the least amused. I'm still surprised he got away with the tank, but tanks have never featured quite so high in Britnat mythology.
Will Johnson get asked about stepping up school openings at PMQs?
Brady on the radio this morning was getting his freak on.
He won't be alone.
Brady has been getting his freak on all pandemic. If we'd listened to him things would be far worse now.
As much as the girls want to go back to school (and I'd be happy for it to happen), the proposal of giving 2 weeks notice for future changes to schools is a good one.
I was worried schools wouldn't be going back until after the Easter break, which pushes us into April before they go back. Saying they'll go on the 8th March instead - I doubt many people will quibble over a fortnight.
At this moment, my understanding is that the 8th March is the *earliest* schools may start going back. Not that they definitely will be going back. Put it this way, I'm not counting on being back onsite before the end of March.
I agree about the two weeks' notice. Life would be far easier now if the government had made the call about January on December 9th, as anyone with half a brain would have done but the DfE didn't.
Interesting More or Less today explaining that the risk to teachers of catching Covid was no greater than the risk to the general population.
Should give you some comfort when you go back.
(And as a mere stripling of 37 you won't have been jabbed!)
Do you have a link? Such figures as i have seen suggest that is not true.
Seriously, we need to actually punch this arsehole in the face as hard as possible.
Boris is just too weak. Needs to sack half the cabinet including this Shapps. Fuck international travel, I want to go to the pub at some point this year.
I think most commentators and on here are underestimating the economic tsunami coming our way. Any government would be effected by it , and how it handles the debt once the pandemic is eventually under control.
It's pretty obvious how they are going to handle it; keep borrowing and let inflation rip.
What are the other options?
70's here we come
Been there done that. Apart from the Summer of 1976 the rest of it we can skip (except for the lols of the SNP ushering in Mrs Thatcher).
70's were brilliant, politics were as much in my mind as pensions. It was a great time to be young though looking back at the fashions is a bit disturbing. London was also brilliant in those days, great pubs.
Lots of places and times are good when you're young. Especially if looking back.
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
The model was only yesterday, Keir hasn't had a chance to retaliate yet. It' s coming.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
- A super Churchill (tick) - A shout out to ethnic minorities (tick) - A shout out to Royalty (tick) - A finger flick at the French (tick)
Great knowledge, love it!
The history of British tank design in WWII is a wonderful opportunity to study dysfunctional organisations, the lunatics that reform them and the bizarre engineering attracts that get produced.
Seriously, we need to actually punch this arsehole in the face as hard as possible.
Boris is just too weak. Needs to sack half the cabinet including this Shapps. Fuck international travel, I want to go to the pub at some point this year.
I don't know who wins out of this policy of not shutting down travel completely....the airlines are still losing money hand over fist operating a much reduced schedule.
I don't think so. The key thing is he says "used to" - he just needs to say clearly how much respect he has for Her Maj and that it serves the country well etc. etc.
Of course it's going to be a fucking problem. This is the new patriotism. If you don't gush about how the Queen has served the nation for 60 years by being driven to the races in a Bentley and selflessly accepting 40,000 bunches of flowers you are fucked.
He will just have to hope the Queen rolls a two before the next GE as republicanism will be very much in vogue once we have King Gobshite and his nervous wreck heir.
Perhaps it can be fought off with more flags. Which is another reason not to go ape on flags now. You have to leave yourself somewhere to go. Some gears unused.
Thankfully SKS seems to have only a single flag habit at the moment. Keep a beady eye open for any increase, and casually placed models of aircraft carriers.
The model was only yesterday, Keir hasn't had a chance to retaliate yet. It' s coming.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
You still whining about the misinformation being peddled by the Westminster yahoos. Give it a rest or publish the death rates and really embarrass yourself. No-one is impressed by your constant lies other than your other cult members.
Comments
Husband was in London for work and to be with our sons who have been largely alone this year and who needed a bit of TLC. Then it seemed nice to stay with them for Xmas. After that it was too late to move.
It must be OPENLY loving your country (you said).
I don't like that. I don't like that one bit. If that becomes a core Labour value I won't be voting Labour.
It will be interesting to see what happens with the Pfizer secondary school age trial in the US. Do we have any information when that is supposed to report?
"Schools are shut, borders are open." - I've been saying this for ages.
About time for the Government to be scrutinised on this issue.
https://twitter.com/skynewssarah/status/1356936476055994369?s=20
If you can organise vaccinating 10 million people in a few weeks you can organize this.
I don't understand why making it the "love that dare not speak its name" is more acceptable to you.
I was just pointing out that streaming services is functionally the same as cancelling them outright.
To reprise:
It's Keir
K-E-I-R
K
E
I
R
It would be easier for him if it didn't become a focus though.
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/02/covid-vaccine-pfizer-plans-to-deliver-200-million-doses-to-us-by-may-sooner-than-expected.html
And once this is in place while traveller numbers are low it can be scaled up if and when traveller numbers increase until it is safe to remove all restrictions.
Not sure that we do have better ways of addressing needs. Just look at all the desperate attempts to provide 'community' during lockdown - which already exist in such structures.
We now even have a decaffeinated, individualistic pseudo-religion called "mindfulness" everywhere
The republic versus monarchy debate is, I believe, still trapped in the 19th century when we had absolutism versus democracy debates going on. It doesn't apply today where we effectively have a crowned republic.
Not only do I believe it works here but I also believe it would work well elsewhere where - for example, if Putin were simply the Russian first minister under a constitutional Tsar (provided they were strong and neutral enough) it would be much easier to patriotically oppose him without being seen to be against Mother Russia.
The republic versus monarchy debate is, I believe, still trapped in the 19th century when we had absolutism versus democracy debates going on. It doesn't apply today where we effectively have a crowned republic.
Not only do I believe it works here but I also believe it would work well elsewhere where - for example, if Putin were simply the Russian first minister under a constitutional Tsar (provided they were strong and neutral enough) it would be much easier to patriotically oppose him without being seen to be against Mother Russia.
I agree about the two weeks' notice. Life would be far easier now if the government had made the call about January on December 9th, as anyone with half a brain would have done but the DfE didn't.
My bet is a miner's helmet in the corner, next to a model of a WW2 tank.
Should give you some comfort when you go back.
(And as a mere stripling of 37 you won't have been jabbed!)
[And elections are due for the General Synod of the CofE this year, having been postponed from 2020. So there's the electoral dimension.]
https://twitter.com/Political_AlanS/status/1356707373646303236?s=20
come for the political analysis, stay for the LOLz
But he cut of a monarch's head!!
Ok, scrub that..
Then agains, given todays revelation - The Black Prince - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Prince_(tank)
- A super Churchill (tick)
- A shout out to ethnic minorities (tick)
- A shout out to Royalty (tick)
- A finger flick at the French (tick)
Schools should not go back until we are sure that cases will continue to fall when they do. Even R=1 with 1000 cases a day is a risk.
This SA mutation (E484K) seems to appear naturally in populations with some immunity and the only way we aren't going to have lots of it is to keep the numbers falling. As long as no variants are expanding their range it will be fine.
In some sense imported variants don't really matter if R is below 1 unless they are _much_ more transmissible.
Once most people are vaccinated then it will be a lot easier, although I imagine we'll need a new booster jab by Autumn.
I worry about the schools in Scotland going back in 2 weeks. It can't be long before we have a "Scottish" variant.
I am sure that if I have not misheard he has just escalated the EU row
Nonconformists are quite fun wrt unity at communion. Sometimes it involves a small 'liqueur' glass each, and doing a one-two-three quaff at the same time.
Do you expect there to be a difference between Primary and Secondary education on this? IE back on 8 March for Primary but after Easter for Secondary?
Or do you think 8 March is optimistic for anyone?
What revelation, please?
6 months ago they would have waited until some twitter hashtag had trended for days before saying thats a good idea.
There is of course plenty of info on this and more wrt school age children (Nov 2020):
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/935125/tfc-covid-19-children-transmission-s0860-041120.pdf
He might consider the blunder by the EU gives him licence to act where he couldn't before.
Seriously, we need to actually punch this arsehole in the face as hard as possible.
Boris is just too weak. Needs to sack half the cabinet including this Shapps. Fuck international travel, I want to go to the pub at some point this year.
And just now Sky have confirmed Boris's words and triggering A16 is now in play
I notice that everyone seems to have missed the bit about the Black Prince tank being an utter waste of time, bordering on demented.