Interesting exchange between Foxy and Casino on the last thread - Foxy prefers vibrant towns which aren't monocultural, Casino says small towns are indeed multicultural - all ages and classes.
My part of Surrey is overwhelmingly what I would call monocultural - nearly everyone is white, English and shares broadly similar values. Casino would correctly say that there's a fair mix of ages and (tbh somewhat less) classes, but it does feel extremely homogenous. Whether that's a good thing is where preferences divide.
I'd like to encounter people routinely who see life quite differently - not necessarily like me, just different - Italians, Sikhs, whatever. Many people find that unsettling, though probably most wouldn't mind a bit of it - the first Indian restaurant in a small town is surely seen by most residents as a welcome option, an arrival of 20 Indian restaurants not so much. The key for me is genuine diversity - I wouldn't want to live in a 95% Italian or Sikh district either (and the tendency of different ethnic groups to live together is natural but a pity IMO), but it's great if there's something different around every corner.
That's a wide definition of multicultural. I wouldn't say all ages and classes means it's "multicultural" - that's just a community - because I'd argue you need to be following slightly different ways of life for that to be valid, and I don't think we have much of that here.
I actually agree with much of the rest of your post, surprisingly. I think most people want enough diversity to enrich the choice of options and experiences within their communities but not so much as it fundamentally changes it; they want everyone to feel part of that whole community, and play a part in it - not to have utterly bland uniformity nor to segregate into lots of little cultural ghettos that only mix at work or at the shops.
But, that's where the debate tends to polarize to two extremes - where the average median Briton is not.
Interesting exchange between Foxy and Casino on the last thread - Foxy prefers vibrant towns which aren't monocultural, Casino says small towns are indeed multicultural - all ages and classes.
My part of Surrey is overwhelmingly what I would call monocultural - nearly everyone is white, English and shares broadly similar values. Casino would correctly say that there's a fair mix of ages and (tbh somewhat less) classes, but it does feel extremely homogenous. Whether that's a good thing is where preferences divide.
I'd like to encounter people routinely who see life quite differently - not necessarily like me, just different - Italians, Sikhs, whatever. Many people find that unsettling, though probably most wouldn't mind a bit of it - the first Indian restaurant in a small town is surely seen by most residents as a welcome option, an arrival of 20 Indian restaurants not so much. The key for me is genuine diversity - I wouldn't want to live in a 95% Italian or Sikh district either (and the tendency of different ethnic groups to live together is natural but a pity IMO), but it's great if there's something different around every corner.
But if you go to Woking or Aldershot there is a lot more diversity and its only 10 miles away. Godalming is a little bit lost in time, but a nice place.
A question: why is it that places that are multicultural are always described as vibrant? I live in an area which is predominantly white (but not exclusively) and with a higher than average number of retirees. Pre-lockdown it seemed that every week there was a fete, fair, flower show, concert, charity fun run or bike ride, etc. Sometimes I felt exhausted just reading the local noticeboard. Isn't this vibrant?
Is this the highest figure in the world for any country with more than about 10 million people? Probably. (You'd expect it to be almost 100% in a place like Iceland).
Interesting exchange between Foxy and Casino on the last thread - Foxy prefers vibrant towns which aren't monocultural, Casino says small towns are indeed multicultural - all ages and classes.
My part of Surrey is overwhelmingly what I would call monocultural - nearly everyone is white, English and shares broadly similar values. Casino would correctly say that there's a fair mix of ages and (tbh somewhat less) classes, but it does feel extremely homogenous. Whether that's a good thing is where preferences divide.
I'd like to encounter people routinely who see life quite differently - not necessarily like me, just different - Italians, Sikhs, whatever. Many people find that unsettling, though probably most wouldn't mind a bit of it - the first Indian restaurant in a small town is surely seen by most residents as a welcome option, an arrival of 20 Indian restaurants not so much. The key for me is genuine diversity - I wouldn't want to live in a 95% Italian or Sikh district either (and the tendency of different ethnic groups to live together is natural but a pity IMO), but it's great if there's something different around every corner.
But if you go to Woking or Aldershot there is a lot more diversity and its only 10 miles away. Godalming is a little bit lost in time, but a nice place.
A question: why is it that places that are multicultural are always described as vibrant? I live in an area which is predominantly white (but not exclusively) and with a higher than average number of retirees. Pre-lockdown it seemed that every week there was a fete, fair, flower show, concert, charity fun run or bike ride, etc. Sometimes I felt exhausted just reading the local noticeboard. Isn't this vibrant?
Edinburgh is vibrant despite being 95% white British. Same sort of thing with Dublin. So the idea you need racial diversity is nonsense. Big African cities are no doubt vibrant despite being almost completely populated by black African people.
Labour won't win for as long as they see a preponderance of white people in certain areas, and/or proud overt celebrations of English identity and history, as "problems" to be fixed. No matter how much is offered in services, spending and benefit because community trumps cash.
The solution is to bind people in to our national story and identity, enriching it as we go, yes, and addressing racial injustices, but not relegating it to one of a number of competing multicultures in a geopolitical state in name only, which then risks fracturing along racial lines.
It's so dumb it shouldn't even need pointing out. However, the average voter can smell this agenda a hundred miles away from a Labour activist and it's why they won't touch them with a bargepole.
A devastating report from Compass exposes the near-impossibility of Labour winning alone at the next election. We divide, they conquer, by Grace Barnett and Neal Lawson, shows Labour now needs at least a 10.52% swing, greater than in 1945 and 1997.
I see that report is repeating tired old canards about progressive alliances and changing the voting system.
When is Labour going to actually engage with the electorate as it is to, you know, win votes?
I will get round to finishing the header I'm working on, but Hartlepool will likely add to Labour's woes on just how and where to fight the next election. Essentially, if you say the Tories and Labour are each going to put resources into 100 seats, the Tories can put that into 80 on defence and 20 on offence. Labour has to put it into 100 on attack - and even then, they have to leapfrog some of their low-hanging fruit and go for medium-difficult targets. And unless fortunes change dramatically for the SNP, it won't be in Scotland.
Labour has to hope that the political tide goes so far in their favour that it swamps the Tory defences.
Or accept that they will not win power in less than 2 attempts.
Labours greatest difficulty in attacking 100 seats is that their support bases are punctiliar and inconsistent with each other - socially conservative BAMEs have little in common with wokes, Guardianistas, champagne socialists, students and others who make up their patchy, clumpy support. Tory support is much more of a spectrum and continuum, from dustmen to dukes, appealing to the English (especially) tradition of contempt for theory and pseudo-intellectualism and hatred of class war. All of which will make Hartlepool huge fun. Currently I think a narrow Labour win most likely.
Given Hartlepool's recent electoral history I'm tempted to put money on the NIP!
A devastating report from Compass exposes the near-impossibility of Labour winning alone at the next election. We divide, they conquer, by Grace Barnett and Neal Lawson, shows Labour now needs at least a 10.52% swing, greater than in 1945 and 1997.
I see that report is repeating tired old canards about progressive alliances and changing the voting system.
When is Labour going to actually engage with the electorate as it is to, you know, win votes?
I will get round to finishing the header I'm working on, but Hartlepool will likely add to Labour's woes on just how and where to fight the next election. Essentially, if you say the Tories and Labour are each going to put resources into 100 seats, the Tories can put that into 80 on defence and 20 on offence. Labour has to put it into 100 on attack - and even then, they have to leapfrog some of their low-hanging fruit and go for medium-difficult targets. And unless fortunes change dramatically for the SNP, it won't be in Scotland.
Labour has to hope that the political tide goes so far in their favour that it swamps the Tory defences.
Or accept that they will not win power in less than 2 attempts.
Hartlepool coming into play is absolutely fascinating but it's unlikely to damage Labour. The balance of risk is the other way. It's Brexit Central, stuffed full of white working class patriots, each and every one of them imbued with love of country and good old-fashioned commonsense, and the timing could not be better for the government. Brexit is done and looking inspired due to the EU vaccine shambles. By contrast our own vaccine efforts are paying off in spades, motoring us out of lockdown before other countries, liberties taken about to be restored. If the Tories, the party of hard leave, can't win in Hartlepool, the capital of hard leave, at this time, in these circumstances, it will be telling us the tide is turning and opposition beckons before too long. They need to win it (and convincingly) to retain control of the narrative. By this analysis, which imo is the right one, the pressure is all on them. It's something of a free hit for Labour.
Nice try. But an opposition party losing a seat to the governing party is still rarer than rocking-horse shit.
But if another dozen Red Wall Labour MPs would like to resign to give Labour some "free hits" - they know where the Chiltern Hundreds are....
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Neither does Dr Paul Williams as MP.
The Paul Williams tweet shared earlier begs the question of whether Truss ticks his box.
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Indeed, Liz Truss has done a good job with the post Brexit trade deals but she is basically still an Orange Book LD not a conservative, if she was Conservative leader she would lose some voters to Labour because she is too rightwing economically and some voters to UKIP and Reform UK and Fox as she is too socially liberal
More importantly, her CV is thinner than BoJo's. Surely she would need a spell in a Great Office to be papable?
A devastating report from Compass exposes the near-impossibility of Labour winning alone at the next election. We divide, they conquer, by Grace Barnett and Neal Lawson, shows Labour now needs at least a 10.52% swing, greater than in 1945 and 1997.
True, there is near zero chance of a Labour majority in 2024, there remains a significant chance of a Labour minority government propped up by the SNP and LDs however, even if the Tories win a majority in England.
A devastating report from Compass exposes the near-impossibility of Labour winning alone at the next election. We divide, they conquer, by Grace Barnett and Neal Lawson, shows Labour now needs at least a 10.52% swing, greater than in 1945 and 1997.
I see that report is repeating tired old canards about progressive alliances and changing the voting system.
When is Labour going to actually engage with the electorate as it is to, you know, win votes?
I will get round to finishing the header I'm working on, but Hartlepool will likely add to Labour's woes on just how and where to fight the next election. Essentially, if you say the Tories and Labour are each going to put resources into 100 seats, the Tories can put that into 80 on defence and 20 on offence. Labour has to put it into 100 on attack - and even then, they have to leapfrog some of their low-hanging fruit and go for medium-difficult targets. And unless fortunes change dramatically for the SNP, it won't be in Scotland.
Labour has to hope that the political tide goes so far in their favour that it swamps the Tory defences.
Or accept that they will not win power in less than 2 attempts.
Hartlepool coming into play is absolutely fascinating but it's unlikely to damage Labour. The balance of risk is the other way. It's Brexit Central, stuffed full of white working class patriots, each and every one of them imbued with love of country and good old-fashioned commonsense, and the timing could not be better for the government. Brexit is done and looking inspired due to the EU vaccine shambles. By contrast our own vaccine efforts are paying off in spades, motoring us out of lockdown before other countries, liberties taken about to be restored. If the Tories, the party of hard leave, can't win in Hartlepool, the capital of hard leave, at this time, in these circumstances, it will be telling us the tide is turning and opposition beckons before too long. They need to win it (and convincingly) to retain control of the narrative. By this analysis, which imo is the right one, the pressure is all on them. It's something of a free hit for Labour.
This wholly fallacious argument gets 10 out of 10 for effort. The Tories won this (similar) seat by 182 votes in 1959 and Labour have held it for the last 62 years. It's not an old Labour fiefdom where they weigh the votes (Harlepool and area bear no relation to southern ideas if it) but for an opposition to lose this historically safe seat against this government would be very very bad. It's a free hit for the Tories.
The fact that a leave leaning seat makes it more difficult for Labour is just a small part of the evidence of how rubbish L:abour have been, not a defence for losing the seat. (Which they won't).
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Neither does Dr Paul Williams as MP.
It must be a cause for concern for Labourites that the absolute shitstain is Starmer's idea of a good candidate.
Wowsers. On what planet is he an "absolute shitstain"? He's done medical mission work in Uganda. He's a well-respected popular GP. He led a co-op of GP practices to bring local services back in-house to improve provision. As an MP he actually went to all parts of the constituency unlike James "Where's" Wharton his immediate predecessor. His campaign work on autism diagnosis was important.
He has been badly advised, both in running for PCC and now being bounced into the Hartlepool candidacy, but "absolute shitstain" says more about you than it does him.
Putting a candidate who said let's have another referendum into a seat that is one of the most pro-Brexit is a mistake. At the moment, views on Brexit (still) play one of the major influencing factors on voting. Implicitly, it also feeds into the view that Labour think their target voters are stupid.
Of more concern for Labour is what this says about Labour's decision making skills and thought processes.
They are betting that the NHS card plays more than the Brexit card.
Don't forget this will be a very very low turn out affair. Core vote turning out will be crucial.
I think it's less about independence and more about a very precise remit (set by John Swinney) as to whether specific actions by Nicola Sturgeon were in breach. If Hamilton comes back on those very specific issues it is likely his report will exonerate the FM, but *not* from the charges of breaching the code laid at her door by Salmond. It has been acknowledged that Hamilton is 'allowed' to broaden his remit, but we don't know if he will do so. If he doesn't, but perhaps makes passing references that there may have been other breaches outside his remit, the SNP will seize on it as a clean bill of health, as nobody has the energy to launch another enquiry. So her statements about potentially ignoring the Fabiano enquiry in favour of Hamilton are extremely disingenuous, and it is to be profoundly hoped that Hamilton takes at face value the offer to widen his remit.
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Neither does Dr Paul Williams as MP.
It must be a cause for concern for Labourites that the absolute shitstain is Starmer's idea of a good candidate.
Wowsers. On what planet is he an "absolute shitstain"? He's done medical mission work in Uganda. He's a well-respected popular GP. He led a co-op of GP practices to bring local services back in-house to improve provision. As an MP he actually went to all parts of the constituency unlike James "Where's" Wharton his immediate predecessor. His campaign work on autism diagnosis was important.
He has been badly advised, both in running for PCC and now being bounced into the Hartlepool candidacy, but "absolute shitstain" says more about you than it does him.
Putting a candidate who said let's have another referendum into a seat that is one of the most pro-Brexit is a mistake. At the moment, views on Brexit (still) play one of the major influencing factors on voting. Implicitly, it also feeds into the view that Labour think their target voters are stupid.
Of more concern for Labour is what this says about Labour's decision making skills and thought processes.
100%. Its a catastrofuck on many levels. 1. Shows Starmer up as a liar. At his personal direction Williams has been imposed on the CLP. And yet a year ago in the midst of the leadership campaign he said this: https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1224662165271056385
2. Williams has been campaigning to become PCC and has abruptly and very late in the day binned it off for a better gig. A key attack line already being thrown about is that he is just a gravy train career politician with no interest in Hartlepool. That the leaked email mentions that "the party and Paul anre't quite as well informed as we'd like them to be" is plain embarassing
3. Paul was the poster boy for the People's Vote campaign who has been unafraid to tell people why respectfully in his opinion they are better off in the EU. Punters in Hartlepool aren't going to like being told they are wrong, especially by someone who represents the kind of Labour Party who deeo down thinks they are stupid.
Labour couldn't have fucked this up more had they tried. They will lose the seat, they will lose the PCC election, they have already lost the Mayoral election. The blue / independents wave sweeping Teesside isn't about to stop.
Police spent millions of pounds replacing helicopters with aircraft that cannot operate in dense urban areas.
Four fixed-wing aircraft, which cost £2.5 million each, were intended to fly across England and Wales but cannot land at most airfields because they need lengthy runways.
Two of the planes are grounded at a purpose-built £2.85 million hangar in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, because pilots do not want to work there.
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Indeed, Liz Truss has done a good job with the post Brexit trade deals but she is basically still an Orange Book LD not a conservative, if she was Conservative leader she would lose some voters to Labour because she is too rightwing economically and some voters to UKIP and Reform UK and Fox as she is too socially liberal
Are there any conservatives apart from you? You set a remarkably high bar.
A devastating report from Compass exposes the near-impossibility of Labour winning alone at the next election. We divide, they conquer, by Grace Barnett and Neal Lawson, shows Labour now needs at least a 10.52% swing, greater than in 1945 and 1997.
True, there is near zero chance of a Labour majority in 2024, there remains a significant chance of a Labour minority government propped up by the SNP and LDs however, even if the Tories win a majority in England.
As it stands at the moment part of the Tory 2024 campaign will be the two choices: a Tory government or an alliance of wokes, Guardianistas, nationalist separatists, LDs, Marxists, Pidcocks, student radicals, champagne socialists led by Polly, benefits junkies and greens haplessly held together by less than brilliant centre left Labour old remainers, forming a bare majority because the fenians have stayed at home. It makes Asquith's problems after WW1 look easy.
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Neither does Dr Paul Williams as MP.
It must be a cause for concern for Labourites that the absolute shitstain is Starmer's idea of a good candidate.
Wowsers. On what planet is he an "absolute shitstain"? He's done medical mission work in Uganda. He's a well-respected popular GP. He led a co-op of GP practices to bring local services back in-house to improve provision. As an MP he actually went to all parts of the constituency unlike James "Where's" Wharton his immediate predecessor. His campaign work on autism diagnosis was important.
He has been badly advised, both in running for PCC and now being bounced into the Hartlepool candidacy, but "absolute shitstain" says more about you than it does him.
Putting a candidate who said let's have another referendum into a seat that is one of the most pro-Brexit is a mistake. At the moment, views on Brexit (still) play one of the major influencing factors on voting. Implicitly, it also feeds into the view that Labour think their target voters are stupid.
Of more concern for Labour is what this says about Labour's decision making skills and thought processes.
100%. Its a catastrofuck on many levels. 1. Shows Starmer up as a liar. At his personal direction Williams has been imposed on the CLP. And yet a year ago in the midst of the leadership campaign he said this: https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1224662165271056385
2. Williams has been campaigning to become PCC and has abruptly and very late in the day binned it off for a better gig. A key attack line already being thrown about is that he is just a gravy train career politician with no interest in Hartlepool. That the leaked email mentions that "the party and Paul anre't quite as well informed as we'd like them to be" is plain embarassing
3. Paul was the poster boy for the People's Vote campaign who has been unafraid to tell people why respectfully in his opinion they are better off in the EU. Punters in Hartlepool aren't going to like being told they are wrong, especially by someone who represents the kind of Labour Party who deeo down thinks they are stupid.
Labour couldn't have fucked this up more had they tried. They will lose the seat, they will lose the PCC election, they have already lost the Mayoral election. The blue / independents wave sweeping Teesside isn't about to stop.
The real issue for Labour is that this byelection has been obvious for months - they should have been lined up ready to go...
Interesting exchange between Foxy and Casino on the last thread - Foxy prefers vibrant towns which aren't monocultural, Casino says small towns are indeed multicultural - all ages and classes.
My part of Surrey is overwhelmingly what I would call monocultural - nearly everyone is white, English and shares broadly similar values. Casino would correctly say that there's a fair mix of ages and (tbh somewhat less) classes, but it does feel extremely homogenous. Whether that's a good thing is where preferences divide.
I'd like to encounter people routinely who see life quite differently - not necessarily like me, just different - Italians, Sikhs, whatever. Many people find that unsettling, though probably most wouldn't mind a bit of it - the first Indian restaurant in a small town is surely seen by most residents as a welcome option, an arrival of 20 Indian restaurants not so much. The key for me is genuine diversity - I wouldn't want to live in a 95% Italian or Sikh district either (and the tendency of different ethnic groups to live together is natural but a pity IMO), but it's great if there's something different around every corner.
But if you go to Woking or Aldershot there is a lot more diversity and its only 10 miles away. Godalming is a little bit lost in time, but a nice place.
A question: why is it that places that are multicultural are always described as vibrant? I live in an area which is predominantly white (but not exclusively) and with a higher than average number of retirees. Pre-lockdown it seemed that every week there was a fete, fair, flower show, concert, charity fun run or bike ride, etc. Sometimes I felt exhausted just reading the local noticeboard. Isn't this vibrant?
Because 'vibrant' makes it sound desirable rather than the reality being that you're renting a room in Lewisham or Walthamstow.
Indeed. The word used to be a polite euphemism - a way of finding something positive to say about a place whose niceness might not be immediately apparent. Nothing wrong with that of course.
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Indeed, Liz Truss has done a good job with the post Brexit trade deals but she is basically still an Orange Book LD not a conservative, if she was Conservative leader she would lose some voters to Labour because she is too rightwing economically and some voters to UKIP and Reform UK and Fox as she is too socially liberal
Are there any conservatives apart from you? You set a remarkably high bar.
I am a conservative member and HYUFD does not speak for me
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Indeed, Liz Truss has done a good job with the post Brexit trade deals but she is basically still an Orange Book LD not a conservative, if she was Conservative leader she would lose some voters to Labour because she is too rightwing economically and some voters to UKIP and Reform UK and Fox as she is too socially liberal
Are there any conservatives apart from you? You set a remarkably high bar.
I'm re-joining the Tory party so I can vote for Liz Truss, we republicans need to stick together.
A devastating report from Compass exposes the near-impossibility of Labour winning alone at the next election. We divide, they conquer, by Grace Barnett and Neal Lawson, shows Labour now needs at least a 10.52% swing, greater than in 1945 and 1997.
True, there is near zero chance of a Labour majority in 2024, there remains a significant chance of a Labour minority government propped up by the SNP and LDs however, even if the Tories win a majority in England.
As it stands at the moment part of the Tory 2024 campaign will be the two choices: a Tory government or an alliance of wokes, Guardianistas, nationalist separatists, LDs, Marxists, Pidcocks, student radicals, champagne socialists led by Polly, benefits junkies and greens haplessly held together by less than brilliant centre left Labour old remainers, forming a bare majority because the fenians have stayed at home. It makes Asquith's problems after WW1 look easy.
At least Asquith had the drink to make it all bearable.
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Neither does Dr Paul Williams as MP.
It must be a cause for concern for Labourites that the absolute shitstain is Starmer's idea of a good candidate.
Wowsers. On what planet is he an "absolute shitstain"? He's done medical mission work in Uganda. He's a well-respected popular GP. He led a co-op of GP practices to bring local services back in-house to improve provision. As an MP he actually went to all parts of the constituency unlike James "Where's" Wharton his immediate predecessor. His campaign work on autism diagnosis was important.
He has been badly advised, both in running for PCC and now being bounced into the Hartlepool candidacy, but "absolute shitstain" says more about you than it does him.
Putting a candidate who said let's have another referendum into a seat that is one of the most pro-Brexit is a mistake. At the moment, views on Brexit (still) play one of the major influencing factors on voting. Implicitly, it also feeds into the view that Labour think their target voters are stupid.
Of more concern for Labour is what this says about Labour's decision making skills and thought processes.
100%. Its a catastrofuck on many levels. 1. Shows Starmer up as a liar. At his personal direction Williams has been imposed on the CLP. And yet a year ago in the midst of the leadership campaign he said this: https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1224662165271056385
2. Williams has been campaigning to become PCC and has abruptly and very late in the day binned it off for a better gig. A key attack line already being thrown about is that he is just a gravy train career politician with no interest in Hartlepool. That the leaked email mentions that "the party and Paul anre't quite as well informed as we'd like them to be" is plain embarassing
3. Paul was the poster boy for the People's Vote campaign who has been unafraid to tell people why respectfully in his opinion they are better off in the EU. Punters in Hartlepool aren't going to like being told they are wrong, especially by someone who represents the kind of Labour Party who deeo down thinks they are stupid.
Labour couldn't have fucked this up more had they tried. They will lose the seat, they will lose the PCC election, they have already lost the Mayoral election. The blue / independents wave sweeping Teesside isn't about to stop.
You may be right that Labour will lose. But I think you are wrong that Williams was imposed by the NEC. My understanding is that the CLP wanted Williams, unless they are lying. There is no evidence that I can see that he was imposed by Starmer.
Given that most Labour activists were opposed to Brexit (which has happened), I'd suggest that excluding anti-Brexit candidates would narrow the field unreasonably. I guess by your reckoning they should get rid of Starmer and virtually all the front bench as well.
A devastating report from Compass exposes the near-impossibility of Labour winning alone at the next election. We divide, they conquer, by Grace Barnett and Neal Lawson, shows Labour now needs at least a 10.52% swing, greater than in 1945 and 1997.
I see that report is repeating tired old canards about progressive alliances and changing the voting system.
When is Labour going to actually engage with the electorate as it is to, you know, win votes?
I will get round to finishing the header I'm working on, but Hartlepool will likely add to Labour's woes on just how and where to fight the next election. Essentially, if you say the Tories and Labour are each going to put resources into 100 seats, the Tories can put that into 80 on defence and 20 on offence. Labour has to put it into 100 on attack - and even then, they have to leapfrog some of their low-hanging fruit and go for medium-difficult targets. And unless fortunes change dramatically for the SNP, it won't be in Scotland.
Labour has to hope that the political tide goes so far in their favour that it swamps the Tory defences.
Or accept that they will not win power in less than 2 attempts.
*FEWER*
The Tories are going to seed...
I think "less" is correct given the context - that of an absolute, countable number.
Police spent millions of pounds replacing helicopters with aircraft that cannot operate in dense urban areas.
Four fixed-wing aircraft, which cost £2.5 million each, were intended to fly across England and Wales but cannot land at most airfields because they need lengthy runways.
Two of the planes are grounded at a purpose-built £2.85 million hangar in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, because pilots do not want to work there.
Well, use the helicopter in 'dense urban areas' then. I assume the problem is line of sight in tall buildings when the plane is circling and the tracking camera isn't able to stay locked. They'll be much cheaper to fly elsewhere though.
It hasn't stopped them buzzing us, so they can't be permanently grounded.
And WTF is wrong with Donny? It has its problems, but you don't have to live in an ex-mining village. Or even go near the town centre.
OT just been jabbed. No plaster, let alone a lollipop. Judging from the waiting room, there is a mopping-up operation targeting elderly Asian patients.
A devastating report from Compass exposes the near-impossibility of Labour winning alone at the next election. We divide, they conquer, by Grace Barnett and Neal Lawson, shows Labour now needs at least a 10.52% swing, greater than in 1945 and 1997.
True, there is near zero chance of a Labour majority in 2024, there remains a significant chance of a Labour minority government propped up by the SNP and LDs however, even if the Tories win a majority in England.
Polly and the report she references pretty much ignore entirely the fact that Labour are perfectly capable of winning 3 elections in a row if they do that old fashioned, unwoke, out of date thing called getting a few million centrist voters to vote for them. As they have more or less airbrushed this achievement from the record they may find it hard to learn from it.
What is the obsession with this tweet on here about? Its hardly scandal of the century?
Ask Jess Phillips how she views it
Is the issue fancying politicians from a different party, the use of the word milf, or objectifying women?
I dont see the issue on the first, the word milf has been around for over twenty years now. On the third it would be inappropriate for an office holder now but hardly disqualifying for something said 10 years ago by someone not a politician at that stage.
Maybe the free speech union will make a big fuss supporting him......or not.
OT just been jabbed. No plaster, let alone a lollipop. Judging from the waiting room, there is a mopping-up operation targeting elderly Asian patients.
Church of England accidentally announces Lutheran reformation, as all statutes and symbols relating to Christ are removed from Churches for fear they cause offence...
What is the base r0 of B.1.1.7 under a normal unvaccinated (And not locked down) population ?
3 ? 3.5 ?
I mean it's something we'll never fully know but the inverse is basically the herd immunity vaccinated threshold we need to achieve to push Covid out. Our 94% willing to be vaccinated is encouraging in that respect - if you add children to that in a similar proportion that *should* be sufficient.
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Neither does Dr Paul Williams as MP.
It must be a cause for concern for Labourites that the absolute shitstain is Starmer's idea of a good candidate.
Wowsers. On what planet is he an "absolute shitstain"? He's done medical mission work in Uganda. He's a well-respected popular GP. He led a co-op of GP practices to bring local services back in-house to improve provision. As an MP he actually went to all parts of the constituency unlike James "Where's" Wharton his immediate predecessor. His campaign work on autism diagnosis was important.
He has been badly advised, both in running for PCC and now being bounced into the Hartlepool candidacy, but "absolute shitstain" says more about you than it does him.
Putting a candidate who said let's have another referendum into a seat that is one of the most pro-Brexit is a mistake. At the moment, views on Brexit (still) play one of the major influencing factors on voting. Implicitly, it also feeds into the view that Labour think their target voters are stupid.
Of more concern for Labour is what this says about Labour's decision making skills and thought processes.
100%. Its a catastrofuck on many levels. 1. Shows Starmer up as a liar. At his personal direction Williams has been imposed on the CLP. And yet a year ago in the midst of the leadership campaign he said this: https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1224662165271056385
2. Williams has been campaigning to become PCC and has abruptly and very late in the day binned it off for a better gig. A key attack line already being thrown about is that he is just a gravy train career politician with no interest in Hartlepool. That the leaked email mentions that "the party and Paul anre't quite as well informed as we'd like them to be" is plain embarassing
3. Paul was the poster boy for the People's Vote campaign who has been unafraid to tell people why respectfully in his opinion they are better off in the EU. Punters in Hartlepool aren't going to like being told they are wrong, especially by someone who represents the kind of Labour Party who deeo down thinks they are stupid.
Labour couldn't have fucked this up more had they tried. They will lose the seat, they will lose the PCC election, they have already lost the Mayoral election. The blue / independents wave sweeping Teesside isn't about to stop.
You may be right that Labour will lose. But I think you are wrong that Williams was imposed by the NEC. My understanding is that the CLP wanted Williams, unless they are lying. There is no evidence that I can see that he was imposed by Starmer.
Given that most Labour activists were opposed to Brexit (which has happened), I'd suggest that excluding anti-Brexit candidates would narrow the field unreasonably. I guess by your reckoning they should get rid of Starmer and virtually all the front bench as well.
Believe me, this was a direct selection by Starmer. If you are referring to the leaked email when you say "the CLP wanted Williams", look more carefully at it. The email is from the secretary to various unknown people, I assume the chair and a few other officers. It talks about the need to inform the Executive Committee both of Mike Hill's resignation and of the choice of Williams. The EC meeting to do that hadn't yet happened. It then talks about the forthcoming General Committee meeting - not sure if they have a delegate system or all member meetings, either way it is ONLY at this meeting that the CLP make any decision.
The *Secretary* and the officers being written to had obviously already spoken. They wanted him, and "LOTO *require* a formal letter from us to the NEC requesting that Paul be the candidate" - LOTO had already decided, and was working with these officers to create the paper trail.
It feels very similar to 2017. Stockton South was not a target seat which meant that candidates would be selected late from whatever pool was left. Two candidates were discussed by the executive officers - Paul Williams who we wanted, and Jessie Joe Jacobs who Momentum wanted. Phonecalls took place to ensure that Paul would still be available when it came down to candidate selection. We - the core exec officers - selected the candidate with the collusion of region. Just like Hartlepool selected him this time with the direct collusion of LOTO.
In 2017 he was a local candidate with a great narrative - the absolute best candidate we could get. In 2021 the opposite is true for Hartlepool.
We didn't have a 50% more transmissive variant in June.
And we didn't have a decent number of people with some protection from vaccinations (or from having had the virus).
It's easy to forget that there was a lot of hope (wishful thinking) that we'd be able to relax and not have to worry about a second wave.
Keeping cafes shut until 17 May seems pretty extraordinary to me I must say. People have gone beyond just being numbed into submission by these measures, it's become more normalised than it was last June. Frightening.
My daughter works a few hours a week in a cafe. They are open for takeaway coffee and stuff. The owner has some plastic chairs stacked outside and a few punters sat on them with their coffees. The other day someone actually took the time and trouble to call the police, who duly showed up and made her store the chairs out of the public's sight.
Church of England accidentally announces Lutheran reformation, as all statutes and symbols relating to Christ are removed from Churches for fear they cause offence...
They'll be putting the Bible into English next. Where will it ever end?
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Neither does Dr Paul Williams as MP.
It must be a cause for concern for Labourites that the absolute shitstain is Starmer's idea of a good candidate.
Wowsers. On what planet is he an "absolute shitstain"? He's done medical mission work in Uganda. He's a well-respected popular GP. He led a co-op of GP practices to bring local services back in-house to improve provision. As an MP he actually went to all parts of the constituency unlike James "Where's" Wharton his immediate predecessor. His campaign work on autism diagnosis was important.
He has been badly advised, both in running for PCC and now being bounced into the Hartlepool candidacy, but "absolute shitstain" says more about you than it does him.
Putting a candidate who said let's have another referendum into a seat that is one of the most pro-Brexit is a mistake. At the moment, views on Brexit (still) play one of the major influencing factors on voting. Implicitly, it also feeds into the view that Labour think their target voters are stupid.
Of more concern for Labour is what this says about Labour's decision making skills and thought processes.
100%. Its a catastrofuck on many levels. 1. Shows Starmer up as a liar. At his personal direction Williams has been imposed on the CLP. And yet a year ago in the midst of the leadership campaign he said this: https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1224662165271056385
2. Williams has been campaigning to become PCC and has abruptly and very late in the day binned it off for a better gig. A key attack line already being thrown about is that he is just a gravy train career politician with no interest in Hartlepool. That the leaked email mentions that "the party and Paul anre't quite as well informed as we'd like them to be" is plain embarassing
3. Paul was the poster boy for the People's Vote campaign who has been unafraid to tell people why respectfully in his opinion they are better off in the EU. Punters in Hartlepool aren't going to like being told they are wrong, especially by someone who represents the kind of Labour Party who deeo down thinks they are stupid.
Labour couldn't have fucked this up more had they tried. They will lose the seat, they will lose the PCC election, they have already lost the Mayoral election. The blue / independents wave sweeping Teesside isn't about to stop.
You may be right that Labour will lose. But I think you are wrong that Williams was imposed by the NEC. My understanding is that the CLP wanted Williams, unless they are lying. There is no evidence that I can see that he was imposed by Starmer.
Given that most Labour activists were opposed to Brexit (which has happened), I'd suggest that excluding anti-Brexit candidates would narrow the field unreasonably. I guess by your reckoning they should get rid of Starmer and virtually all the front bench as well.
Believe me, this was a direct selection by Starmer. If you are referring to the leaked email when you say "the CLP wanted Williams", look more carefully at it. The email is from the secretary to various unknown people, I assume the chair and a few other officers. It talks about the need to inform the Executive Committee both of Mike Hill's resignation and of the choice of Williams. The EC meeting to do that hadn't yet happened. It then talks about the forthcoming General Committee meeting - not sure if they have a delegate system or all member meetings, either way it is ONLY at this meeting that the CLP make any decision.
The *Secretary* and the officers being written to had obviously already spoken. They wanted him, and "LOTO *require* a formal letter from us to the NEC requesting that Paul be the candidate" - LOTO had already decided, and was working with these officers to create the paper trail.
It feels very similar to 2017. Stockton South was not a target seat which meant that candidates would be selected late from whatever pool was left. Two candidates were discussed by the executive officers - Paul Williams who we wanted, and Jessie Joe Jacobs who Momentum wanted. Phonecalls took place to ensure that Paul would still be available when it came down to candidate selection. We - the core exec officers - selected the candidate with the collusion of region. Just like Hartlepool selected him this time with the direct collusion of LOTO.
In 2017 he was a local candidate with a great narrative - the absolute best candidate we could get. In 2021 the opposite is true for Hartlepool.
What I find worrying is that he is the best option Labour could come up with. The fact there wasn't a suitable local candidate is frankly worrying.
I do wonder if part of the issue is that Baroness Chapman is now sat in the Lords and if this had been 3 weeks earlier Paul wouldn't have been the first choice...
A devastating report from Compass exposes the near-impossibility of Labour winning alone at the next election. We divide, they conquer, by Grace Barnett and Neal Lawson, shows Labour now needs at least a 10.52% swing, greater than in 1945 and 1997.
True, there is near zero chance of a Labour majority in 2024, there remains a significant chance of a Labour minority government propped up by the SNP and LDs however, even if the Tories win a majority in England.
Polly and the report she references pretty much ignore entirely the fact that Labour are perfectly capable of winning 3 elections in a row if they do that old fashioned, unwoke, out of date thing called getting a few million centrist voters to vote for them. As they have more or less airbrushed this achievement from the record they may find it hard to learn from it.
But New Labour needed the political wizard Blair. Could they have done it in '97 with John Smith? Possible. But a landslide and then three times?
Top left: Federation Star from Australian flag. Bottom left: New Zealand version of the Southern Cross from NZ flag. Top right: Union flag. Bottom right: Candian maple leaf.
There's no problem with the theology; the most active and proud Christians I meet (by a longshot) are Black.
However, the CoE clergy are overwhelmingly left-wing, and also rather white, so this "burn their house down" approach is probably due to guilt and discomfort over that.
Church of England accidentally announces Lutheran reformation, as all statutes and symbols relating to Christ are removed from Churches for fear they cause offence...
It is more statutes linked to slavery, the Anglican church worldwide has a growing black congregation, though ironically it is rather more conservative on social matters than most of the white Anglican clergy
What is the base r0 of B.1.1.7 under a normal unvaccinated (And not locked down) population ?
3 ? 3.5 ?
I mean it's something we'll never fully know but the inverse is basically the herd immunity vaccinated threshold we need to achieve to push Covid out. Our 94% willing to be vaccinated is encouraging in that respect - if you add children to that in a similar proportion that *should* be sufficient.
Police spent millions of pounds replacing helicopters with aircraft that cannot operate in dense urban areas.
Four fixed-wing aircraft, which cost £2.5 million each, were intended to fly across England and Wales but cannot land at most airfields because they need lengthy runways.
Something's not right with this story. The P68R has 500m balanced field takeoff. What airfields can't they get into and out of?
I spent a summer at RAF Finningley when I was a student and had some mega nights out in Donny. It was where I first got the fuck beat out of me in a brawl.
WTF is Reasoned UK - given that Darren Grimes is just the latest right wing "opinion" star.
The move to Salford was not pefect but it opened up jobs to folk across Lancashire, and those from further afield willing to brave the Trans Pennine Express or the M62 in rush hour.
The moves announced yesterday should only enhance that. For too often graduates have drifted to London after University because of the burgeoning jobs market and too often its the same middle class, liberal, rent in Clapham/Walthamstow/Peckham bankrolled by mum and dad sorts applying.
These folk will continue to move to the capital but by moving jobs in the other direction the Beeb should be able to gradually diversify their new intake (providing those handing out the jobs also change their approach).
What do we want? Free speech and no-one cancelled! (ps apart from the bbc and anyone from London must be cancelled if they ever talk negatively about the govt, flag or queen)
We didn't have a 50% more transmissive variant in June.
And we didn't have a decent number of people with some protection from vaccinations (or from having had the virus).
It's easy to forget that there was a lot of hope (wishful thinking) that we'd be able to relax and not have to worry about a second wave.
Keeping cafes shut until 17 May seems pretty extraordinary to me I must say. People have gone beyond just being numbed into submission by these measures, it's become more normalised than it was last June. Frightening.
My daughter works a few hours a week in a cafe. They are open for takeaway coffee and stuff. The owner has some plastic chairs stacked outside and a few punters sat on them with their coffees. The other day someone actually took the time and trouble to call the police, who duly showed up and made her store the chairs out of the public's sight.
That mid May date is going to look utterly ridiculous a week or two after Easter imho. Far too cautious. But I can understand why Johnson has swung so far the other way after the Xmas disaster. Whether there is any actual science involved is a moot question.
How can this be? When Colston and the docklands dude were tipped in the drink, some PBers raised the alarm, and suggested iconoclasm was generally bad, tended to get out of hand, and history was being erased. Those anxieties were loudly shouted down by lefties who asked: has any other statue toppled? No, so it will end here, stop fretting
Given how often Nippy and her fans have prayed in aid of the outcome, there is some expectation that it will not be wholly unfavourable to the current FM...
WTF is Reasoned UK - given that Darren Grimes is just the latest right wing "opinion" star.
The move to Salford was not pefect but it opened up jobs to folk across Lancashire, and those from further afield willing to brave the Trans Pennine Express or the M62 in rush hour.
The moves announced yesterday should only enhance that. For too often graduates have drifted to London after University because of the burgeoning jobs market and too often its the same middle class, liberal, rent in Clapham/Walthamstow/Peckham bankrolled by mum and dad sorts applying.
These folk will continue to move to the capital but by moving jobs in the other direction the Beeb should be able to gradually diversify their new intake (providing those handing out the jobs also change their approach).
Have you been to Manchester recently? It's basically London these days and full of the same middle class, liberal, bankrolled by mum and dad sorts.
What is the base r0 of B.1.1.7 under a normal unvaccinated (And not locked down) population ?
3 ? 3.5 ?
I mean it's something we'll never fully know but the inverse is basically the herd immunity vaccinated threshold we need to achieve to push Covid out. Our 94% willing to be vaccinated is encouraging in that respect - if you add children to that in a similar proportion that *should* be sufficient.
If Warwick uni's assumptions are true, life is going to be very rough indeed for antivaxxers. Basically we'll probably all get it, even vaccinated in the long run but it'll be milder for those vaccinated.
How can this be? When Colston and the docklands dude were tipped in the drink, some PBers raised the alarm, and suggested iconoclasm was generally bad, tended to get out of hand, and history was being erased. Those anxieties were loudly shouted down by lefties who asked: has any other statue toppled? No, so it will end here, stop fretting
And yet, on and on it goes. It has not stopped
Interesting one. To those of a more puritan protestant persuasion, all images of Our Lord are idolatrous. There will need to be a lot of pictures and statues that need to go to ensure no one takes offence. Barking mad!
WTF is Reasoned UK - given that Darren Grimes is just the latest right wing "opinion" star.
The move to Salford was not pefect but it opened up jobs to folk across Lancashire, and those from further afield willing to brave the Trans Pennine Express or the M62 in rush hour.
The moves announced yesterday should only enhance that. For too often graduates have drifted to London after University because of the burgeoning jobs market and too often its the same middle class, liberal, rent in Clapham/Walthamstow/Peckham bankrolled by mum and dad sorts applying.
These folk will continue to move to the capital but by moving jobs in the other direction the Beeb should be able to gradually diversify their new intake (providing those handing out the jobs also change their approach).
Yes, you're not going to change a mindset, overnight, simply by moving people from London to Salford. But over the long term you might open up the BBC to a wider range of people. This does far more, in the long term, to increasing diversity at the BBC than any amount of target setting. But it takes a while.
Church of England accidentally announces Lutheran reformation, as all statutes and symbols relating to Christ are removed from Churches for fear they cause offence...
It is more statutes linked to slavery, the Anglican church worldwide has a growing black congregation, though ironically it is rather more conservative on social matters than most of the white Anglican clergy
I know what they meant, but they should be careful what they say.
The biblical Jesus offended a lot of people and Christian iconography and other features of worship can and do cause offence.
How can this be? When Colston and the docklands dude were tipped in the drink, some PBers raised the alarm, and suggested iconoclasm was generally bad, tended to get out of hand, and history was being erased. Those anxieties were loudly shouted down by lefties who asked: has any other statue toppled? No, so it will end here, stop fretting
And yet, on and on it goes. It has not stopped
It's interesting that this report specifically references the toppling of the Colston statue as if that was somehow representative of the mood of the nation and desired by Black people in particular, to which the CoE must respond.
Of course it isn't, as polling shows, but it will be boosted - again - when Rhodes falls at Oriel, which is precisely why the Left does it.
WTF is Reasoned UK - given that Darren Grimes is just the latest right wing "opinion" star.
The move to Salford was not pefect but it opened up jobs to folk across Lancashire, and those from further afield willing to brave the Trans Pennine Express or the M62 in rush hour.
The moves announced yesterday should only enhance that. For too often graduates have drifted to London after University because of the burgeoning jobs market and too often its the same middle class, liberal, rent in Clapham/Walthamstow/Peckham bankrolled by mum and dad sorts applying.
These folk will continue to move to the capital but by moving jobs in the other direction the Beeb should be able to gradually diversify their new intake (providing those handing out the jobs also change their approach).
Have you been to Manchester recently? It's basically London these days and full of the same middle class, liberal, bankrolled by mum and dad sorts.
Only in certain, more central parts. Didsbury / West Didsbury and central Manchester definitely (and areas like Ancoats which are being gentrified). There is a lot of Greater Manchester which is reasonably easy commuting distance and which are still underdeveloped. Certainly a lot of the old mill towns to the North. I'd also recommend Tameside, as it also gives easy access to the Peak District.
How can this be? When Colston and the docklands dude were tipped in the drink, some PBers raised the alarm, and suggested iconoclasm was generally bad, tended to get out of hand, and history was being erased. Those anxieties were loudly shouted down by lefties who asked: has any other statue toppled? No, so it will end here, stop fretting
And yet, on and on it goes. It has not stopped
It's interesting that this report specifically references the toppling of the Colston statue as if that was somehow representative of the mood of the nation and desired by Black people in particular, to which the CoE must respond.
Of course it isn't, as polling shows, but it will be boosted - again - when Rhodes falls at Oriel, which is precisely why the Left does it.
There are now more Anglicans in Nigeria than England, this is just reflecting that and removing statues linked to slavery.
How can this be? When Colston and the docklands dude were tipped in the drink, some PBers raised the alarm, and suggested iconoclasm was generally bad, tended to get out of hand, and history was being erased. Those anxieties were loudly shouted down by lefties who asked: has any other statue toppled? No, so it will end here, stop fretting
And yet, on and on it goes. It has not stopped
Interesting one. To those of a more puritan protestant persuasion, all images of Our Lord are idolatrous. There will need to be a lot of pictures and statues that need to go to ensure no one takes offence. Barking mad!
The analogy between Puritans and Wokesters is entirely apt. Both had a rigid certainty about the righteous ness of their cause and both believe(d) they are / were 100% right. Puritans, of course, also believed they were automatically saved by virtue of their religion, just like.....
Church of England accidentally announces Lutheran reformation, as all statutes and symbols relating to Christ are removed from Churches for fear they cause offence...
It is more statutes linked to slavery, the Anglican church worldwide has a growing black congregation, though ironically it is rather more conservative on social matters than most of the white Anglican clergy
I know what they meant, but they should be careful what they say.
The biblical Jesus offended a lot of people and Christian iconography and other features of worship can and do cause offence.
Maybe the BBC can start off by removing the Eric Gill statues at its HQ. Not sure I won't be to paying the licence fee to an organisation headquartered in a building adorned with work by a paedophile, incest-loving weirdo.
How can this be? When Colston and the docklands dude were tipped in the drink, some PBers raised the alarm, and suggested iconoclasm was generally bad, tended to get out of hand, and history was being erased. Those anxieties were loudly shouted down by lefties who asked: has any other statue toppled? No, so it will end here, stop fretting
And yet, on and on it goes. It has not stopped
It's interesting that this report specifically references the toppling of the Colston statue as if that was somehow representative of the mood of the nation and desired by Black people in particular, to which the CoE must respond.
Of course it isn't, as polling shows, but it will be boosted - again - when Rhodes falls at Oriel, which is precisely why the Left does it.
There are now more Anglicans in Nigeria than England, this is just reflecting that and removing statues linked to slavery
Very much like Trotskyites the CoE has to go where the politics is.
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Neither does Dr Paul Williams as MP.
It must be a cause for concern for Labourites that the absolute shitstain is Starmer's idea of a good candidate.
Wowsers. On what planet is he an "absolute shitstain"? He's done medical mission work in Uganda. He's a well-respected popular GP. He led a co-op of GP practices to bring local services back in-house to improve provision. As an MP he actually went to all parts of the constituency unlike James "Where's" Wharton his immediate predecessor. His campaign work on autism diagnosis was important.
He has been badly advised, both in running for PCC and now being bounced into the Hartlepool candidacy, but "absolute shitstain" says more about you than it does him.
Putting a candidate who said let's have another referendum into a seat that is one of the most pro-Brexit is a mistake. At the moment, views on Brexit (still) play one of the major influencing factors on voting. Implicitly, it also feeds into the view that Labour think their target voters are stupid.
Of more concern for Labour is what this says about Labour's decision making skills and thought processes.
100%. Its a catastrofuck on many levels. 1. Shows Starmer up as a liar. At his personal direction Williams has been imposed on the CLP. And yet a year ago in the midst of the leadership campaign he said this: https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1224662165271056385
2. Williams has been campaigning to become PCC and has abruptly and very late in the day binned it off for a better gig. A key attack line already being thrown about is that he is just a gravy train career politician with no interest in Hartlepool. That the leaked email mentions that "the party and Paul anre't quite as well informed as we'd like them to be" is plain embarassing
3. Paul was the poster boy for the People's Vote campaign who has been unafraid to tell people why respectfully in his opinion they are better off in the EU. Punters in Hartlepool aren't going to like being told they are wrong, especially by someone who represents the kind of Labour Party who deeo down thinks they are stupid.
Labour couldn't have fucked this up more had they tried. They will lose the seat, they will lose the PCC election, they have already lost the Mayoral election. The blue / independents wave sweeping Teesside isn't about to stop.
You may be right that Labour will lose. But I think you are wrong that Williams was imposed by the NEC. My understanding is that the CLP wanted Williams, unless they are lying. There is no evidence that I can see that he was imposed by Starmer.
Given that most Labour activists were opposed to Brexit (which has happened), I'd suggest that excluding anti-Brexit candidates would narrow the field unreasonably. I guess by your reckoning they should get rid of Starmer and virtually all the front bench as well.
Believe me, this was a direct selection by Starmer. If you are referring to the leaked email when you say "the CLP wanted Williams", look more carefully at it. The email is from the secretary to various unknown people, I assume the chair and a few other officers. It talks about the need to inform the Executive Committee both of Mike Hill's resignation and of the choice of Williams. The EC meeting to do that hadn't yet happened. It then talks about the forthcoming General Committee meeting - not sure if they have a delegate system or all member meetings, either way it is ONLY at this meeting that the CLP make any decision.
The *Secretary* and the officers being written to had obviously already spoken. They wanted him, and "LOTO *require* a formal letter from us to the NEC requesting that Paul be the candidate" - LOTO had already decided, and was working with these officers to create the paper trail.
It feels very similar to 2017. Stockton South was not a target seat which meant that candidates would be selected late from whatever pool was left. Two candidates were discussed by the executive officers - Paul Williams who we wanted, and Jessie Joe Jacobs who Momentum wanted. Phonecalls took place to ensure that Paul would still be available when it came down to candidate selection. We - the core exec officers - selected the candidate with the collusion of region. Just like Hartlepool selected him this time with the direct collusion of LOTO.
In 2017 he was a local candidate with a great narrative - the absolute best candidate we could get. In 2021 the opposite is true for Hartlepool.
What I find worrying is that he is the best option Labour could come up with. The fact there wasn't a suitable local candidate is frankly worrying.
I do wonder if part of the issue is that Baroness Chapman is now sat in the Lords and if this had been 3 weeks earlier Paul wouldn't have been the first choice...
For his faults, dodging Laura Pidcock as candidate goes in the credit column.
Church of England accidentally announces Lutheran reformation, as all statutes and symbols relating to Christ are removed from Churches for fear they cause offence...
It is more statutes linked to slavery, the Anglican church worldwide has a growing black congregation, though ironically it is rather more conservative on social matters than most of the white Anglican clergy
I know what they meant, but they should be careful what they say.
The biblical Jesus offended a lot of people and Christian iconography and other features of worship can and do cause offence.
The report does not mention removing icons of Jesus and the altar and turning the Anglican church Lutheran, it is just statues linked to slavery
We didn't have a 50% more transmissive variant in June.
And we didn't have a decent number of people with some protection from vaccinations (or from having had the virus).
It's easy to forget that there was a lot of hope (wishful thinking) that we'd be able to relax and not have to worry about a second wave.
Keeping cafes shut until 17 May seems pretty extraordinary to me I must say. People have gone beyond just being numbed into submission by these measures, it's become more normalised than it was last June. Frightening.
My daughter works a few hours a week in a cafe. They are open for takeaway coffee and stuff. The owner has some plastic chairs stacked outside and a few punters sat on them with their coffees. The other day someone actually took the time and trouble to call the police, who duly showed up and made her store the chairs out of the public's sight.
Lockdown has indeed become normal life. It’s kind of comforting. You don’t have to go anywhere or do anything
As I speculated earlier this week, I wonder if we are experiencing a new form of institutionalisation, the same thing that long term prisoners experience. The deadening routine and unchanging stasis has its own consolations.
Many of my friends report similar feelings. They are more reclusive than they need to be. Monosyllabic. Numbed. Not unhappy, just resigned. The days trudge on
Maybe that’s why we accept these intense restrictions so obediently. We’ve lost the will. It may take us quite a while to venture out when unlockdown finally happens; the young will lead the way
On topic: lay the favourite. It’s easy to be popular when handing out cash under one of the worlds most generous support programs - less so when the bill needs to be paid.
Off topic: New series of Drive to Survive, the F1 documentary, just landed on Netflix. Well worth watching, even if you’re not a fan of the sport itself.
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Neither does Dr Paul Williams as MP.
It must be a cause for concern for Labourites that the absolute shitstain is Starmer's idea of a good candidate.
Wowsers. On what planet is he an "absolute shitstain"? He's done medical mission work in Uganda. He's a well-respected popular GP. He led a co-op of GP practices to bring local services back in-house to improve provision. As an MP he actually went to all parts of the constituency unlike James "Where's" Wharton his immediate predecessor. His campaign work on autism diagnosis was important.
He has been badly advised, both in running for PCC and now being bounced into the Hartlepool candidacy, but "absolute shitstain" says more about you than it does him.
Putting a candidate who said let's have another referendum into a seat that is one of the most pro-Brexit is a mistake. At the moment, views on Brexit (still) play one of the major influencing factors on voting. Implicitly, it also feeds into the view that Labour think their target voters are stupid.
Of more concern for Labour is what this says about Labour's decision making skills and thought processes.
100%. Its a catastrofuck on many levels. 1. Shows Starmer up as a liar. At his personal direction Williams has been imposed on the CLP. And yet a year ago in the midst of the leadership campaign he said this: https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1224662165271056385
2. Williams has been campaigning to become PCC and has abruptly and very late in the day binned it off for a better gig. A key attack line already being thrown about is that he is just a gravy train career politician with no interest in Hartlepool. That the leaked email mentions that "the party and Paul anre't quite as well informed as we'd like them to be" is plain embarassing
3. Paul was the poster boy for the People's Vote campaign who has been unafraid to tell people why respectfully in his opinion they are better off in the EU. Punters in Hartlepool aren't going to like being told they are wrong, especially by someone who represents the kind of Labour Party who deeo down thinks they are stupid.
Labour couldn't have fucked this up more had they tried. They will lose the seat, they will lose the PCC election, they have already lost the Mayoral election. The blue / independents wave sweeping Teesside isn't about to stop.
You may be right that Labour will lose. But I think you are wrong that Williams was imposed by the NEC. My understanding is that the CLP wanted Williams, unless they are lying. There is no evidence that I can see that he was imposed by Starmer.
Given that most Labour activists were opposed to Brexit (which has happened), I'd suggest that excluding anti-Brexit candidates would narrow the field unreasonably. I guess by your reckoning they should get rid of Starmer and virtually all the front bench as well.
Believe me, this was a direct selection by Starmer. If you are referring to the leaked email when you say "the CLP wanted Williams", look more carefully at it. The email is from the secretary to various unknown people, I assume the chair and a few other officers. It talks about the need to inform the Executive Committee both of Mike Hill's resignation and of the choice of Williams. The EC meeting to do that hadn't yet happened. It then talks about the forthcoming General Committee meeting - not sure if they have a delegate system or all member meetings, either way it is ONLY at this meeting that the CLP make any decision.
The *Secretary* and the officers being written to had obviously already spoken. They wanted him, and "LOTO *require* a formal letter from us to the NEC requesting that Paul be the candidate" - LOTO had already decided, and was working with these officers to create the paper trail.
It feels very similar to 2017. Stockton South was not a target seat which meant that candidates would be selected late from whatever pool was left. Two candidates were discussed by the executive officers - Paul Williams who we wanted, and Jessie Joe Jacobs who Momentum wanted. Phonecalls took place to ensure that Paul would still be available when it came down to candidate selection. We - the core exec officers - selected the candidate with the collusion of region. Just like Hartlepool selected him this time with the direct collusion of LOTO.
In 2017 he was a local candidate with a great narrative - the absolute best candidate we could get. In 2021 the opposite is true for Hartlepool.
What I find worrying is that he is the best option Labour could come up with. The fact there wasn't a suitable local candidate is frankly worrying.
I do wonder if part of the issue is that Baroness Chapman is now sat in the Lords and if this had been 3 weeks earlier Paul wouldn't have been the first choice...
Three weeks earlier? Surely they've seen this coming for ages.
Church of England accidentally announces Lutheran reformation, as all statutes and symbols relating to Christ are removed from Churches for fear they cause offence...
It is more statutes linked to slavery, the Anglican church worldwide has a growing black congregation, though ironically it is rather more conservative on social matters than most of the white Anglican clergy
I know what they meant, but they should be careful what they say.
The biblical Jesus offended a lot of people and Christian iconography and other features of worship can and do cause offence.
Maybe the BBC can start off by removing the Eric Gill statues at its HQ. Not sure I won't be to paying the licence fee to an organisation headquartered in a building adorned with work by a paedophile, incest-loving weirdo.
Eric Gill!
His excellent biography by Fiona MacCarthy has the most famous index entry in literary history
A devastating report from Compass exposes the near-impossibility of Labour winning alone at the next election. We divide, they conquer, by Grace Barnett and Neal Lawson, shows Labour now needs at least a 10.52% swing, greater than in 1945 and 1997.
I see that report is repeating tired old canards about progressive alliances and changing the voting system.
When is Labour going to actually engage with the electorate as it is to, you know, win votes?
I will get round to finishing the header I'm working on, but Hartlepool will likely add to Labour's woes on just how and where to fight the next election. Essentially, if you say the Tories and Labour are each going to put resources into 100 seats, the Tories can put that into 80 on defence and 20 on offence. Labour has to put it into 100 on attack - and even then, they have to leapfrog some of their low-hanging fruit and go for medium-difficult targets. And unless fortunes change dramatically for the SNP, it won't be in Scotland.
Labour has to hope that the political tide goes so far in their favour that it swamps the Tory defences.
Or accept that they will not win power in less than 2 attempts.
Hartlepool coming into play is absolutely fascinating but it's unlikely to damage Labour. The balance of risk is the other way. It's Brexit Central, stuffed full of white working class patriots, each and every one of them imbued with love of country and good old-fashioned commonsense, and the timing could not be better for the government. Brexit is done and looking inspired due to the EU vaccine shambles. By contrast our own vaccine efforts are paying off in spades, motoring us out of lockdown before other countries, liberties taken about to be restored. If the Tories, the party of hard leave, can't win in Hartlepool, the capital of hard leave, at this time, in these circumstances, it will be telling us the tide is turning and opposition beckons before too long. They need to win it (and convincingly) to retain control of the narrative. By this analysis, which imo is the right one, the pressure is all on them. It's something of a free hit for Labour.
Nice try. But an opposition party losing a seat to the governing party is still rarer than rocking-horse shit.
But if another dozen Red Wall Labour MPs would like to resign to give Labour some "free hits" - they know where the Chiltern Hundreds are....
Sure, but this is a very particular scenario and the result has potentially huge ramifications for where our domestic politics is heading.
If Labour win here, the most Brexity of seats, so soon after Brexit and with it looking to the untrained eye to be a great decision, it will mean Europe is losing its salience as an issue driving votes and that by the time of the next GE it will barely feature. Plus Corbyn has gone, remember, and will be a distant memory by then. Labour now has a leader that, dull or not, most people can envisage as PM. This hasn't happened since 2010.
It will leave just one of the 3 key factors from the "BBC" election of Dec 19 still in play. "Boris". Can he carry that load? Can this political magician do it again, even after 5 years in power and with the economy in the toilet? I yield to no-one in my recognition of his powers, the guy's a vote magnet in the places that count, but I'm not so sure he can.
So that's the big story. A Labour win. If the Cons take it, it's a shrug and business as usual.
You have to remember that every tory policy is now calibrated toward the uneducated and ignorant whims of a notional 54 year old fat white man from Hartlepool who has the suit symbols of playing cards tattooed on his nicotine stained knuckles. Diamond Liz as leader doesn't tick that box.
Indeed, Liz Truss has done a good job with the post Brexit trade deals but she is basically still an Orange Book LD not a conservative, if she was Conservative leader she would lose some voters to Labour because she is too rightwing economically and some voters to UKIP and Reform UK and Fox as she is too socially liberal
You have to admit it would be interesting to have a republican as PM, especially a Tory republican.
What is the base r0 of B.1.1.7 under a normal unvaccinated (And not locked down) population ?
3 ? 3.5 ?
I mean it's something we'll never fully know but the inverse is basically the herd immunity vaccinated threshold we need to achieve to push Covid out. Our 94% willing to be vaccinated is encouraging in that respect - if you add children to that in a similar proportion that *should* be sufficient.
If Warwick uni's assumptions are true, life is going to be very rough indeed for antivaxxers. Basically we'll probably all get it, even vaccinated in the long run but it'll be milder for those vaccinated.
0.94 (willing pop) * 0.85 (Vaccine efficacy) * ( 1 - 0.213) (Under 18) = 62.88 - so yes r would still be over 1.
If you can get a vaccine approved for children then you can immediately push that up. Infections amongst the vaccinated will push immunity up from the worked on 85% baseline, also infections amongst the unvaccinated. Eventually you'll reach a local herd immunity with a flare up (Probably amongst a particularly unvaxxed cohort....) but it won't transpose fully back to a pandemic. Basically my reading is this means winter 21-22 becomes like a normal (Or hopefully light) endemic winter flu season. And it probably decreases after that. Globally of course it's going to be much worse for a while.
Church of England accidentally announces Lutheran reformation, as all statutes and symbols relating to Christ are removed from Churches for fear they cause offence...
It is more statutes linked to slavery, the Anglican church worldwide has a growing black congregation, though ironically it is rather more conservative on social matters than most of the white Anglican clergy
I know what they meant, but they should be careful what they say.
The biblical Jesus offended a lot of people and Christian iconography and other features of worship can and do cause offence.
The report does not mention removing icons of Jesus and the altar and turning the Anglican church Lutheran, it is just statues linked to slavery
Almost any historical figure in the age of Empire - say 1600-1850, can be ‘linked to slavery’. Same goes for many historical figures before then, too.
Anyone famous in the classical world, from Ceasars to philosophers, would have kept slaves. Likewise much of the Muslim world until about 50 years ago?
WTF is Reasoned UK - given that Darren Grimes is just the latest right wing "opinion" star.
The move to Salford was not pefect but it opened up jobs to folk across Lancashire, and those from further afield willing to brave the Trans Pennine Express or the M62 in rush hour.
The moves announced yesterday should only enhance that. For too often graduates have drifted to London after University because of the burgeoning jobs market and too often its the same middle class, liberal, rent in Clapham/Walthamstow/Peckham bankrolled by mum and dad sorts applying.
These folk will continue to move to the capital but by moving jobs in the other direction the Beeb should be able to gradually diversify their new intake (providing those handing out the jobs also change their approach).
Have you been to Manchester recently? It's basically London these days and full of the same middle class, liberal, bankrolled by mum and dad sorts.
Used to live there, now live in London. Can guarantee it is nowhere near as bad as London. However can't comment on who the Beeb are giving the jobs too! ITV have a lot of staff in Salford too.
What is the base r0 of B.1.1.7 under a normal unvaccinated (And not locked down) population ?
3 ? 3.5 ?
I mean it's something we'll never fully know but the inverse is basically the herd immunity vaccinated threshold we need to achieve to push Covid out. Our 94% willing to be vaccinated is encouraging in that respect - if you add children to that in a similar proportion that *should* be sufficient.
If Warwick uni's assumptions are true, life is going to be very rough indeed for antivaxxers. Basically we'll probably all get it, even vaccinated in the long run but it'll be milder for those vaccinated.
0.94 (willing pop) * 0.85 (Vaccine efficacy) * ( 1 - 0.213) (Under 18) = 62.88 - so yes r would still be over 1.
If you can get a vaccine approved for children then you can immediately push that up. Infections amongst the vaccinated will push immunity up from the worked on 85% baseline, also infections amongst the unvaccinated. Eventually you'll reach a local herd immunity with a flare up (Probably amongst a particularly unvaxxed cohort....) but it won't transpose fully back to a pandemic. Basically my reading is this means winter 21-22 becomes like a normal (Or hopefully light) endemic winter flu season. And it probably decreases after that. Globally of course it's going to be much worse for a while.
But you need to add in that proportion of the unwilling population and the under 18s who have antibodies through having had the disease, which is (*sticks finger in the air*) about 30%. Which brings us up to about 70.
Police spent millions of pounds replacing helicopters with aircraft that cannot operate in dense urban areas.
Four fixed-wing aircraft, which cost £2.5 million each, were intended to fly across England and Wales but cannot land at most airfields because they need lengthy runways.
Two of the planes are grounded at a purpose-built £2.85 million hangar in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, because pilots do not want to work there.
Well, use the helicopter in 'dense urban areas' then. I assume the problem is line of sight in tall buildings when the plane is circling and the tracking camera isn't able to stay locked. They'll be much cheaper to fly elsewhere though.
It hasn't stopped them buzzing us, so they can't be permanently grounded.
And WTF is wrong with Donny? It has its problems, but you don't have to live in an ex-mining village. Or even go near the town centre.
I'm from around there. There's some nice, semi-rural places in the vicinity if you like that sort of thing. Very tranquil and high quality houses with big gardens etc. The town though ... no. No.
A devastating report from Compass exposes the near-impossibility of Labour winning alone at the next election. We divide, they conquer, by Grace Barnett and Neal Lawson, shows Labour now needs at least a 10.52% swing, greater than in 1945 and 1997.
I see that report is repeating tired old canards about progressive alliances and changing the voting system.
When is Labour going to actually engage with the electorate as it is to, you know, win votes?
I will get round to finishing the header I'm working on, but Hartlepool will likely add to Labour's woes on just how and where to fight the next election. Essentially, if you say the Tories and Labour are each going to put resources into 100 seats, the Tories can put that into 80 on defence and 20 on offence. Labour has to put it into 100 on attack - and even then, they have to leapfrog some of their low-hanging fruit and go for medium-difficult targets. And unless fortunes change dramatically for the SNP, it won't be in Scotland.
Labour has to hope that the political tide goes so far in their favour that it swamps the Tory defences.
Or accept that they will not win power in less than 2 attempts.
Hartlepool coming into play is absolutely fascinating but it's unlikely to damage Labour. The balance of risk is the other way. It's Brexit Central, stuffed full of white working class patriots, each and every one of them imbued with love of country and good old-fashioned commonsense, and the timing could not be better for the government. Brexit is done and looking inspired due to the EU vaccine shambles. By contrast our own vaccine efforts are paying off in spades, motoring us out of lockdown before other countries, liberties taken about to be restored. If the Tories, the party of hard leave, can't win in Hartlepool, the capital of hard leave, at this time, in these circumstances, it will be telling us the tide is turning and opposition beckons before too long. They need to win it (and convincingly) to retain control of the narrative. By this analysis, which imo is the right one, the pressure is all on them. It's something of a free hit for Labour.
Nice try. But an opposition party losing a seat to the governing party is still rarer than rocking-horse shit.
But if another dozen Red Wall Labour MPs would like to resign to give Labour some "free hits" - they know where the Chiltern Hundreds are....
Sure, but this is a very particular scenario and the result has potentially huge ramifications for where our domestic politics is heading.
If Labour win here, the most Brexity of seats, so soon after Brexit and with it looking to the untrained eye to be a great decision, it will mean Europe is losing its salience as an issue driving votes and that by the time of the next GE it will barely feature. Plus Corbyn has gone, remember, and will be a distant memory by then. Labour now has a leader that, dull or not, most people can envisage as PM. This hasn't happened since 2010.
It will leave just one of the 3 key factors from the "BBC" election of Dec 19 still in play. "Boris". Can he carry that load? Can this political magician do it again, even after 5 years in power and with the economy in the toilet? I yield to no-one in my recognition of his powers, the guy's a vote magnet in the places that count, but I'm not so sure he can.
So that's the big story. A Labour win. If the Cons take it, it's a shrug and business as usual.
Total bollocks. If Starmer can’t win back a northern, traditionally Labour seat like Hartlepool, after seven zillion years of Tory government, then his leadership is in trouble. Simply the case. People won’t just ‘shrug’.
Yes there are complicating factors that make it somewhat harder. But, he should still win it
A devastating report from Compass exposes the near-impossibility of Labour winning alone at the next election. We divide, they conquer, by Grace Barnett and Neal Lawson, shows Labour now needs at least a 10.52% swing, greater than in 1945 and 1997.
I see that report is repeating tired old canards about progressive alliances and changing the voting system.
When is Labour going to actually engage with the electorate as it is to, you know, win votes?
I will get round to finishing the header I'm working on, but Hartlepool will likely add to Labour's woes on just how and where to fight the next election. Essentially, if you say the Tories and Labour are each going to put resources into 100 seats, the Tories can put that into 80 on defence and 20 on offence. Labour has to put it into 100 on attack - and even then, they have to leapfrog some of their low-hanging fruit and go for medium-difficult targets. And unless fortunes change dramatically for the SNP, it won't be in Scotland.
Labour has to hope that the political tide goes so far in their favour that it swamps the Tory defences.
Or accept that they will not win power in less than 2 attempts.
Hartlepool coming into play is absolutely fascinating but it's unlikely to damage Labour. The balance of risk is the other way. It's Brexit Central, stuffed full of white working class patriots, each and every one of them imbued with love of country and good old-fashioned commonsense, and the timing could not be better for the government. Brexit is done and looking inspired due to the EU vaccine shambles. By contrast our own vaccine efforts are paying off in spades, motoring us out of lockdown before other countries, liberties taken about to be restored. If the Tories, the party of hard leave, can't win in Hartlepool, the capital of hard leave, at this time, in these circumstances, it will be telling us the tide is turning and opposition beckons before too long. They need to win it (and convincingly) to retain control of the narrative. By this analysis, which imo is the right one, the pressure is all on them. It's something of a free hit for Labour.
Nice try. But an opposition party losing a seat to the governing party is still rarer than rocking-horse shit.
But if another dozen Red Wall Labour MPs would like to resign to give Labour some "free hits" - they know where the Chiltern Hundreds are....
Sure, but this is a very particular scenario and the result has potentially huge ramifications for where our domestic politics is heading.
If Labour win here, the most Brexity of seats, so soon after Brexit and with it looking to the untrained eye to be a great decision, it will mean Europe is losing its salience as an issue driving votes and that by the time of the next GE it will barely feature. Plus Corbyn has gone, remember, and will be a distant memory by then. Labour now has a leader that, dull or not, most people can envisage as PM. This hasn't happened since 2010.
It will leave just one of the 3 key factors from the "BBC" election of Dec 19 still in play. "Boris". Can he carry that load? Can this political magician do it again, even after 5 years in power and with the economy in the toilet? I yield to no-one in my recognition of his powers, the guy's a vote magnet in the places that count, but I'm not so sure he can.
So that's the big story. A Labour win. If the Cons take it, it's a shrug and business as usual.
Presumably the plan is to pitch "1% payrise for Nurses" against "We got Brexit done, but it is still in peril".
OT just been jabbed. No plaster, let alone a lollipop. Judging from the waiting room, there is a mopping-up operation targeting elderly Asian patients.
My wife got hers yesterday. Unlike me, absolutely no side affects. She's skipping around the place. Quite annoying.
We didn't have a 50% more transmissive variant in June.
And we didn't have a decent number of people with some protection from vaccinations (or from having had the virus).
It's easy to forget that there was a lot of hope (wishful thinking) that we'd be able to relax and not have to worry about a second wave.
Keeping cafes shut until 17 May seems pretty extraordinary to me I must say. People have gone beyond just being numbed into submission by these measures, it's become more normalised than it was last June. Frightening.
My daughter works a few hours a week in a cafe. They are open for takeaway coffee and stuff. The owner has some plastic chairs stacked outside and a few punters sat on them with their coffees. The other day someone actually took the time and trouble to call the police, who duly showed up and made her store the chairs out of the public's sight.
Lockdown has indeed become normal life. It’s kind of comforting. You don’t have to go anywhere or do anything
As I speculated earlier this week, I wonder if we are experiencing a new form of institutionalisation, the same thing that long term prisoners experience. The deadening routine and unchanging stasis has its own consolations.
Many of my friends report similar feelings. They are more reclusive than they need to be. Monosyllabic. Numbed. Not unhappy, just resigned. The days trudge on
Maybe that’s why we accept these intense restrictions so obediently. We’ve lost the will. It may take us quite a while to venture out when unlockdown finally happens; the young will lead the way
I see evidence of this on here – there are several PBers who happily tolerate, even relish, lockdown. Not only are they perfectly relaxed about doing nothing and seeing nobody, they want to present their mentality as some sort of superior, altruist state of being. Their MO is to denounce those who break cover to see their beloved family and friends as "selfish".
Yet I feel completely the opposite. I am going mad indoors. I absolutely hate it. I miss seeing people, my friends, my clients, my colleagues. I have come to loathe Zoom and resent computers themselves. I now see technology as a tool of oppression. It's an extreme reaction. But the world is grey and colourless.
OT just been jabbed. No plaster, let alone a lollipop. Judging from the waiting room, there is a mopping-up operation targeting elderly Asian patients.
My wife got hers yesterday. Unlike me, absolutely no side affects. She's skipping around the place. Quite annoying.
I didn't get my side effects (mild) until 20 hrs after
Police spent millions of pounds replacing helicopters with aircraft that cannot operate in dense urban areas.
Four fixed-wing aircraft, which cost £2.5 million each, were intended to fly across England and Wales but cannot land at most airfields because they need lengthy runways.
Two of the planes are grounded at a purpose-built £2.85 million hangar in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, because pilots do not want to work there.
Well, use the helicopter in 'dense urban areas' then. I assume the problem is line of sight in tall buildings when the plane is circling and the tracking camera isn't able to stay locked. They'll be much cheaper to fly elsewhere though.
It hasn't stopped them buzzing us, so they can't be permanently grounded.
And WTF is wrong with Donny? It has its problems, but you don't have to live in an ex-mining village. Or even go near the town centre.
I'm from around there. There's some nice, semi-rural places in the vicinity if you like that sort of thing. Very tranquil and high quality houses with big gardens etc. The town though ... no. No.
Comments
I actually agree with much of the rest of your post, surprisingly. I think most people want enough diversity to enrich the choice of options and experiences within their communities but not so much as it fundamentally changes it; they want everyone to feel part of that whole community, and play a part in it - not to have utterly bland uniformity nor to segregate into lots of little cultural ghettos that only mix at work or at the shops.
But, that's where the debate tends to polarize to two extremes - where the average median Briton is not.
https://redfieldandwiltonstrategies.com/majority-of-germans-would-prefer-soder-over-laschet-as-chancellor/
Is the Hamilton enquiry genuinely independent?
The solution is to bind people in to our national story and identity, enriching it as we go, yes, and addressing racial injustices, but not relegating it to one of a number of competing multicultures in a geopolitical state in name only, which then risks fracturing along racial lines.
It's so dumb it shouldn't even need pointing out. However, the average voter can smell this agenda a hundred miles away from a Labour activist and it's why they won't touch them with a bargepole.
But if another dozen Red Wall Labour MPs would like to resign to give Labour some "free hits" - they know where the Chiltern Hundreds are....
You clearly love your bikes, cars and houses and, well, they wouldn't.
The fact that a leave leaning seat makes it more difficult for Labour is just a small part of the evidence of how rubbish L:abour have been, not a defence for losing the seat. (Which they won't).
Don't forget this will be a very very low turn out affair. Core vote turning out will be crucial.
1. Shows Starmer up as a liar. At his personal direction Williams has been imposed on the CLP. And yet a year ago in the midst of the leadership campaign he said this:
https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1224662165271056385
2. Williams has been campaigning to become PCC and has abruptly and very late in the day binned it off for a better gig. A key attack line already being thrown about is that he is just a gravy train career politician with no interest in Hartlepool. That the leaked email mentions that "the party and Paul anre't quite as well informed as we'd like them to be" is plain embarassing
3. Paul was the poster boy for the People's Vote campaign who has been unafraid to tell people why respectfully in his opinion they are better off in the EU. Punters in Hartlepool aren't going to like being told they are wrong, especially by someone who represents the kind of Labour Party who deeo down thinks they are stupid.
Labour couldn't have fucked this up more had they tried. They will lose the seat, they will lose the PCC election, they have already lost the Mayoral election. The blue / independents wave sweeping Teesside isn't about to stop.
Four fixed-wing aircraft, which cost £2.5 million each, were intended to fly across England and Wales but cannot land at most airfields because they need lengthy runways.
Two of the planes are grounded at a purpose-built £2.85 million hangar in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, because pilots do not want to work there.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/police-paid-10m-for-four-useless-planes-lzls7whkf
TBF who wants to go to Doncatraz?
What is this one behind Mr Grimes?
https://twitter.com/talkRADIO/status/1372854107585839110
Good times...
Given that most Labour activists were opposed to Brexit (which has happened), I'd suggest that excluding anti-Brexit candidates would narrow the field unreasonably. I guess by your reckoning they should get rid of Starmer and virtually all the front bench as well.
https://twitter.com/Fox_Claire/status/1372849050857451522
It hasn't stopped them buzzing us, so they can't be permanently grounded.
And WTF is wrong with Donny? It has its problems, but you don't have to live in an ex-mining village. Or even go near the town centre.
https://www.politico.eu/coronavirus-in-europe/
It's easy to forget that there was a lot of hope (wishful thinking) that we'd be able to relax and not have to worry about a second wave.
I dont see the issue on the first, the word milf has been around for over twenty years now. On the third it would be inappropriate for an office holder now but hardly disqualifying for something said 10 years ago by someone not a politician at that stage.
Maybe the free speech union will make a big fuss supporting him......or not.
I may have mentioned that.
3 ? 3.5 ?
I mean it's something we'll never fully know but the inverse is basically the herd immunity vaccinated threshold we need to achieve to push Covid out.
Our 94% willing to be vaccinated is encouraging in that respect - if you add children to that in a similar proportion that *should* be sufficient.
The *Secretary* and the officers being written to had obviously already spoken. They wanted him, and "LOTO *require* a formal letter from us to the NEC requesting that Paul be the candidate" - LOTO had already decided, and was working with these officers to create the paper trail.
It feels very similar to 2017. Stockton South was not a target seat which meant that candidates would be selected late from whatever pool was left. Two candidates were discussed by the executive officers - Paul Williams who we wanted, and Jessie Joe Jacobs who Momentum wanted. Phonecalls took place to ensure that Paul would still be available when it came down to candidate selection. We - the core exec officers - selected the candidate with the collusion of region. Just like Hartlepool selected him this time with the direct collusion of LOTO.
In 2017 he was a local candidate with a great narrative - the absolute best candidate we could get. In 2021 the opposite is true for Hartlepool.
My daughter works a few hours a week in a cafe. They are open for takeaway coffee and stuff. The owner has some plastic chairs stacked outside and a few punters sat on them with their coffees. The other day someone actually took the time and trouble to call the police, who duly showed up and made her store the chairs out of the public's sight.
I do wonder if part of the issue is that Baroness Chapman is now sat in the Lords and if this had been 3 weeks earlier Paul wouldn't have been the first choice...
Bottom left: New Zealand version of the Southern Cross from NZ flag.
Top right: Union flag.
Bottom right: Candian maple leaf.
So CANZUK would be my guess.
However, the CoE clergy are overwhelmingly left-wing, and also rather white, so this "burn their house down" approach is probably due to guilt and discomfort over that.
It will lead to more people leaving the CoE.
I spent a summer at RAF Finningley when I was a student and had some mega nights out in Donny. It was where I first got the fuck beat out of me in a brawl.
The moves announced yesterday should only enhance that. For too often graduates have drifted to London after University because of the burgeoning jobs market and too often its the same middle class, liberal, rent in Clapham/Walthamstow/Peckham bankrolled by mum and dad sorts applying.
These folk will continue to move to the capital but by moving jobs in the other direction the Beeb should be able to gradually diversify their new intake (providing those handing out the jobs also change their approach).
And yet, on and on it goes. It has not stopped
But over the long term you might open up the BBC to a wider range of people.
This does far more, in the long term, to increasing diversity at the BBC than any amount of target setting. But it takes a while.
The biblical Jesus offended a lot of people and Christian iconography and other features of worship can and do cause offence.
Of course it isn't, as polling shows, but it will be boosted - again - when Rhodes falls at Oriel, which is precisely why the Left does it.
65% of BAME voters backed removing the Colston statue (though half of those disapproved of the way it was done), compared to 53% of voters as a whole who backed taking down the Colston statuehttps://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-reports/2020/06/26/nine-ten-bame-britons-think-racism-exists-same-lev
As I speculated earlier this week, I wonder if we are experiencing a new form of institutionalisation, the same thing that long term prisoners experience. The deadening routine and unchanging stasis has its own consolations.
Many of my friends report similar feelings. They are more reclusive than they need to be. Monosyllabic. Numbed. Not unhappy, just resigned. The days trudge on
Maybe that’s why we accept these intense restrictions so obediently. We’ve lost the will. It may take us quite a while to venture out when unlockdown finally happens; the young will lead the way
Off topic: New series of Drive to Survive, the F1 documentary, just landed on Netflix. Well worth watching, even if you’re not a fan of the sport itself.
His excellent biography by Fiona MacCarthy has the most famous index entry in literary history
“Dog, family, sex with - page 53”
If Labour win here, the most Brexity of seats, so soon after Brexit and with it looking to the untrained eye to be a great decision, it will mean Europe is losing its salience as an issue driving votes and that by the time of the next GE it will barely feature. Plus Corbyn has gone, remember, and will be a distant memory by then. Labour now has a leader that, dull or not, most people can envisage as PM. This hasn't happened since 2010.
It will leave just one of the 3 key factors from the "BBC" election of Dec 19 still in play. "Boris". Can he carry that load? Can this political magician do it again, even after 5 years in power and with the economy in the toilet? I yield to no-one in my recognition of his powers, the guy's a vote magnet in the places that count, but I'm not so sure he can.
So that's the big story. A Labour win. If the Cons take it, it's a shrug and business as usual.
If you can get a vaccine approved for children then you can immediately push that up.
Infections amongst the vaccinated will push immunity up from the worked on 85% baseline,
also infections amongst the unvaccinated.
Eventually you'll reach a local herd immunity with a flare up (Probably amongst a particularly unvaxxed cohort....) but it won't transpose fully back to a pandemic. Basically my reading is this means winter 21-22 becomes like a normal (Or hopefully light) endemic winter flu season. And it probably decreases after that.
Globally of course it's going to be much worse for a while.
Anyone famous in the classical world, from Ceasars to philosophers, would have kept slaves. Likewise much of the Muslim world until about 50 years ago?
Yes there are complicating factors that make it somewhat harder. But, he should still win it
FWIW I think Labour will succeed
Could go either way.
Yet I feel completely the opposite. I am going mad indoors. I absolutely hate it. I miss seeing people, my friends, my clients, my colleagues. I have come to loathe Zoom and resent computers themselves. I now see technology as a tool of oppression. It's an extreme reaction. But the world is grey and colourless.
Doesn't anyone else feel like me?
Let me out. Set me free.