can't help cynically thinking that the wedding was timed to diffuse fall-out from the Cummings appearance - afterall, "everything is political" - it would be interesting to see when it was booked in!
I'm not sure about that. A greater slice of the public are likely to take more interest in the wedding than Cummings ramblings, particularly how Boris managed to get married in a Catholic church and whether/ if he's reconverted and what that might mean.
It's a simple human interest story.
It has pissed me off mightily. Not the fact of them getting married. But the way the Catholic Church, the church I have on and off belonged to all my life, seems to have abandoned all pretence of believing in the 10 Commandments, especially the 6th one.
We're all sinners deserving of mercy blah, blah, I know all that. But this same church, not content with overlooking the most revolting crimes against children by some of its priests, says that my gay son, born like that and, according to church doctrine, made in the image of God, is "disordered" and "intrinsically immoral".
Well stuff that, frankly. If the church going to opine on immorality, it needs to take a good hard look at itself. I know who in that little group listed above is immoral and it isn't my son.
According to Roman Catholic doctrine Boris has never been married before, as none of his previous marriages took place in a Roman Catholic church or cathedral in accordance with Catholic doctrine
So by this logic, his four children by Marina are illegitimate. That will hack off some people.
Neither of his previous wives or children were Catholic, indeed his second wife was Sikh
My uncle got married three times. The joke was three tries for a welshman. My auntie thought that very unfair as he had been rather let down by his previous wives.
One of my Welsh ancestors was married three times, although, of course, it being the 19C, he was widowered twice. He apparently left the farm to his third wife, not to his children. What the story was I'll probably never know.
can't help cynically thinking that the wedding was timed to diffuse fall-out from the Cummings appearance - afterall, "everything is political" - it would be interesting to see when it was booked in!
I'm not sure about that. A greater slice of the public are likely to take more interest in the wedding than Cummings ramblings, particularly how Boris managed to get married in a Catholic church and whether/ if he's reconverted and what that might mean.
It's a simple human interest story.
The cynical view of the wedding as a dead cat does not really work because if anything, it underlines Cummings' charge that Boris was distracted by his romance with Carrie from taking key pandemic decisions.
Maybe Johnson married her quickly so she can't give evidence against him. If that is a thing in real life and not just on American TV.
That rule was abolished a long time ago. I suspect she's as hard as nails and had no intention of ending up as another discarded mistress with a child.
Are you sure @Cyclefree? I am not an English lawyer but the CPS website says that a spouse is only compellable by the prosecution in cases that are concerned with:
An allegation of an assault on, or injury or a threat of injury to the spouse or civil partner; An allegation of an assault on, or injury or a threat of injury to a person who was at the material time under the age of sixteen years; An alleged sexual offence against a victim who was at the material time under the age of sixteen years; or Attempting, conspiring or aiding and abetting, counselling and procuring to commit the offences in the categories above.
Nothing about wallpaper there. That said, in Scotland at least the protection covers communings within the marriage and would not cover information received whilst a fiancée.
I thought that in such cases the law used to be that wives could not be compelled to testify against their husbands hence the need to make it explicit that this is no longer the law.
I'm not aware of any law stating that wives cannot testify against husbands over fraud, for instance. (I may be wrong on this, though.) To be honest, some of the most interesting whistleblowing cases were often from pissed off partners dobbing their husbands in .....
I am having to brush up on all this stuff because I am delighted to say that I have just been appointed a part time Advocate Depute and will hopefully be prosecuting cases in the High Court quite soon.
I've got a little list.......
Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately) I don't get to choose. Just a wee cog in the machine. But it will be proper advocacy as opposed to all this arguing about contracts and leases I have been doing of late. I am really looking forward to it.
My son is now about 2.5 hours into Cummings' evidence. He is finding it fascinating, not so much for the political tittle tattle but for the analysis of how governments work (or don't) and why their decision making processes are flawed. I really must find the time myself.
I am surprised, however, that it has cut through with the general public in the way that Opinium have apparently found. It will be interesting to see if this is a blip or a change in the weather.
Yes, that's what I said at the time. The Cummings testimony was fascinating and gripping for students of the machinery of government, less so for the 'he said/she said' elements.
It was comments by yourself and a few others that got me to encourage him to do so. It genuinely seems one of the best insights into the actual operation of the modern state that we have had for a long time. For someone who will be studying politics as a part of his degree in the Autumn it is required viewing I think.
One point not commented on is that Cummings' testimony that Boris and Number 10 were overwhelmed by three simultaneous problems – the pandemic, the Middle East, and Carrie – rather undermines the centralised "war room" model Cummings was trying to impose.
The other problem was that a centralised model like that is very dependent upon there being a decision maker at the pinnacle of the structure. Boris's illness, which Cummings confirmed had been life threatening and the consequential effects of long Covid were clearly an even larger issue than was let on at the time resulting in a huge loss of momentum and direction. Although Raab did get some praise for the way that he filled in its just not the same if the PM is returning.
That's not just a Dom thing, though. One of the lines which rang true on Wednesday was the one about how Boris likes chaos because it forces everyone to look to him as the Great Leader. Even with a diligent workaholic in charge- a Thatcher or a Brown- that doesn't work, because there's too much going on. With Boris at the top, it's a recipe for predictably bad government. Which, with one important exception, is what we've seen.
My uncle got married three times. The joke was three tries for a welshman. My auntie thought that very unfair as he had been rather let down by his previous wives.
One of my Welsh ancestors was married three times, although, of course, it being the 19C, he was widowered twice. He apparently left the farm to his third wife, not to his children. What the story was I'll probably never know.
Probably some issue to do with Welsh laws on inheritance requiring equitable sharing of proceed of estate when passed to children. The basic reason allegedly why Wales never built up a unified state that could challenge the English.
Although perhaps that was long since gone by the C19th.
1/25 Update thread on where NHS hospitals are at the moment, concentrating on 3 things: a) hotspot hospital admission rates. b) overall pressure. c) what this may mean for easing lockdown measures (spoiler alert - we will need a full, evidence based, debate given trade offs!)
My uncle got married three times. The joke was three tries for a welshman. My auntie thought that very unfair as he had been rather let down by his previous wives.
One of my Welsh ancestors was married three times, although, of course, it being the 19C, he was widowered twice. He apparently left the farm to his third wife, not to his children. What the story was I'll probably never know.
Maybe he didn't have a will. If you die it goes to your spouse.
My son is now about 2.5 hours into Cummings' evidence. He is finding it fascinating, not so much for the political tittle tattle but for the analysis of how governments work (or don't) and why their decision making processes are flawed. I really must find the time myself.
I am surprised, however, that it has cut through with the general public in the way that Opinium have apparently found. It will be interesting to see if this is a blip or a change in the weather.
Yes, that's what I said at the time. The Cummings testimony was fascinating and gripping for students of the machinery of government, less so for the 'he said/she said' elements.
It was comments by yourself and a few others that got me to encourage him to do so. It genuinely seems one of the best insights into the actual operation of the modern state that we have had for a long time. For someone who will be studying politics as a part of his degree in the Autumn it is required viewing I think.
One point not commented on is that Cummings' testimony that Boris and Number 10 were overwhelmed by three simultaneous problems – the pandemic, the Middle East, and Carrie – rather undermines the centralised "war room" model Cummings was trying to impose.
The other problem was that a centralised model like that is very dependent upon there being a decision maker at the pinnacle of the structure. Boris's illness, which Cummings confirmed had been life threatening and the consequential effects of long Covid were clearly an even larger issue than was let on at the time resulting in a huge loss of momentum and direction. Although Raab did get some praise for the way that he filled in its just not the same if the PM is returning.
That's not just a Dom thing, though. One of the lines which rang true on Wednesday was the one about how Boris likes chaos because it forces everyone to look to him as the Great Leader. Even with a diligent workaholic in charge- a Thatcher or a Brown- that doesn't work, because there's too much going on. With Boris at the top, it's a recipe for predictably bad government. Which, with one important exception, is what we've seen.
Chaos is a ladder. Now hes at the top chaos should no longer appeal.
My uncle got married three times. The joke was three tries for a welshman. My auntie thought that very unfair as he had been rather let down by his previous wives.
One of my Welsh ancestors was married three times, although, of course, it being the 19C, he was widowered twice. He apparently left the farm to his third wife, not to his children. What the story was I'll probably never know.
Probably some issue to do with Welsh laws on inheritance requiring equitable sharing of proceed of estate when passed to children. The basic reason allegedly why Wales never built up a unified state that could challenge the English.
Although perhaps that was long since gone by the C19th.
You never know with 'race memory'. I don't think it was a very big farm, and as he appears to have died in a care home in the 1920's there might have been costs which ate into the estate.
Digging into my family history is something I've done during lockdown, and one of the plans for when it's over is to go to S Wales and see what I can find.
can't help cynically thinking that the wedding was timed to diffuse fall-out from the Cummings appearance - afterall, "everything is political" - it would be interesting to see when it was booked in!
I'm not sure about that. A greater slice of the public are likely to take more interest in the wedding than Cummings ramblings, particularly how Boris managed to get married in a Catholic church and whether/ if he's reconverted and what that might mean.
It's a simple human interest story.
It has pissed me off mightily. Not the fact of them getting married. But the way the Catholic Church, the church I have on and off belonged to all my life, seems to have abandoned all pretence of believing in the 10 Commandments, especially the 6th one.
We're all sinners deserving of mercy blah, blah, I know all that. But this same church, not content with overlooking the most revolting crimes against children by some of its priests, says that my gay son, born like that and, according to church doctrine, made in the image of God, is "disordered" and "intrinsically immoral".
Well stuff that, frankly. If the church going to opine on immorality, it needs to take a good hard look at itself. I know who in that little group listed above is immoral and it isn't my son.
According to Roman Catholic doctrine Boris has never been married before, as none of his previous marriages took place in a Roman Catholic church or cathedral in accordance with Catholic doctrine
Does he have to convert to Catholicism to marry in a Catholic church? I rather think he will have had to.
My son is now about 2.5 hours into Cummings' evidence. He is finding it fascinating, not so much for the political tittle tattle but for the analysis of how governments work (or don't) and why their decision making processes are flawed. I really must find the time myself.
I am surprised, however, that it has cut through with the general public in the way that Opinium have apparently found. It will be interesting to see if this is a blip or a change in the weather.
Yes, that's what I said at the time. The Cummings testimony was fascinating and gripping for students of the machinery of government, less so for the 'he said/she said' elements.
It was comments by yourself and a few others that got me to encourage him to do so. It genuinely seems one of the best insights into the actual operation of the modern state that we have had for a long time. For someone who will be studying politics as a part of his degree in the Autumn it is required viewing I think.
One point not commented on is that Cummings' testimony that Boris and Number 10 were overwhelmed by three simultaneous problems – the pandemic, the Middle East, and Carrie – rather undermines the centralised "war room" model Cummings was trying to impose.
At least Carrie got one thing right. Cummings had to be got rid of.
can't help cynically thinking that the wedding was timed to diffuse fall-out from the Cummings appearance - afterall, "everything is political" - it would be interesting to see when it was booked in!
I'm not sure about that. A greater slice of the public are likely to take more interest in the wedding than Cummings ramblings, particularly how Boris managed to get married in a Catholic church and whether/ if he's reconverted and what that might mean.
It's a simple human interest story.
It has pissed me off mightily. Not the fact of them getting married. But the way the Catholic Church, the church I have on and off belonged to all my life, seems to have abandoned all pretence of believing in the 10 Commandments, especially the 6th one.
We're all sinners deserving of mercy blah, blah, I know all that. But this same church, not content with overlooking the most revolting crimes against children by some of its priests, says that my gay son, born like that and, according to church doctrine, made in the image of God, is "disordered" and "intrinsically immoral".
Well stuff that, frankly. If the church going to opine on immorality, it needs to take a good hard look at itself. I know who in that little group listed above is immoral and it isn't my son.
According to Roman Catholic doctrine Boris has never been married before, as none of his previous marriages took place in a Roman Catholic church or cathedral in accordance with Catholic doctrine
Does he have to convert to Catholicism to marry in a Catholic church? I rather think he will have had to.
They’re okay with ‘mixed’ marriages from most other Christian denominations these days.
They’re not usually okay with divorcees though, and having children first is very much frowned upon!
can't help cynically thinking that the wedding was timed to diffuse fall-out from the Cummings appearance - afterall, "everything is political" - it would be interesting to see when it was booked in!
I'm not sure about that. A greater slice of the public are likely to take more interest in the wedding than Cummings ramblings, particularly how Boris managed to get married in a Catholic church and whether/ if he's reconverted and what that might mean.
It's a simple human interest story.
It has pissed me off mightily. Not the fact of them getting married. But the way the Catholic Church, the church I have on and off belonged to all my life, seems to have abandoned all pretence of believing in the 10 Commandments, especially the 6th one.
We're all sinners deserving of mercy blah, blah, I know all that. But this same church, not content with overlooking the most revolting crimes against children by some of its priests, says that my gay son, born like that and, according to church doctrine, made in the image of God, is "disordered" and "intrinsically immoral".
Well stuff that, frankly. If the church going to opine on immorality, it needs to take a good hard look at itself. I know who in that little group listed above is immoral and it isn't my son.
According to Roman Catholic doctrine Boris has never been married before, as none of his previous marriages took place in a Roman Catholic church or cathedral in accordance with Catholic doctrine
Does he have to convert to Catholicism to marry in a Catholic church? I rather think he will have had to.
My sister married a Catholic (almost 60 years ago) and 'all' she had to promise to do was bring the resulting children up as Catholics. Apart from three christenings I don't think she's been in a Catholic Church since, and certainly not since poor bro-in-law died.
My son is now about 2.5 hours into Cummings' evidence. He is finding it fascinating, not so much for the political tittle tattle but for the analysis of how governments work (or don't) and why their decision making processes are flawed. I really must find the time myself.
I am surprised, however, that it has cut through with the general public in the way that Opinium have apparently found. It will be interesting to see if this is a blip or a change in the weather.
Yes, that's what I said at the time. The Cummings testimony was fascinating and gripping for students of the machinery of government, less so for the 'he said/she said' elements.
It was comments by yourself and a few others that got me to encourage him to do so. It genuinely seems one of the best insights into the actual operation of the modern state that we have had for a long time. For someone who will be studying politics as a part of his degree in the Autumn it is required viewing I think.
One point not commented on is that Cummings' testimony that Boris and Number 10 were overwhelmed by three simultaneous problems – the pandemic, the Middle East, and Carrie – rather undermines the centralised "war room" model Cummings was trying to impose.
The other problem was that a centralised model like that is very dependent upon there being a decision maker at the pinnacle of the structure. Boris's illness, which Cummings confirmed had been life threatening and the consequential effects of long Covid were clearly an even larger issue than was let on at the time resulting in a huge loss of momentum and direction. Although Raab did get some praise for the way that he filled in its just not the same if the PM is returning.
That's not just a Dom thing, though. One of the lines which rang true on Wednesday was the one about how Boris likes chaos because it forces everyone to look to him as the Great Leader. Even with a diligent workaholic in charge- a Thatcher or a Brown- that doesn't work, because there's too much going on. With Boris at the top, it's a recipe for predictably bad government. Which, with one important exception, is what we've seen.
When I am at my most delusional in complex litigation I sometimes imagine myself as the captain of a ship taking on water in a terrible storm trying to address every crisis that arises as it arises. I rather imagine Boris has a similar self image but with something like government it creates its own chaos with inconsistent decisions being made on the hoof without thinking through the consequences which can be contradictory.
This is not a new problem in fairness. Similar complaints were made about Blair's sofa government where informality and a lack of structure came up against similar problems. OTOH Brown's attempt to control this by making sure all the decisions came through a grid in No 10 just resulted in paralysis.
I am not sure that there is a perfect system but a pandemic stretches an imperfect system to its limits.
It is possible this poll has identified a Cummings effect but it has not been evident in the other polls released since Cummings appearance so it is prudent to wait and see if this is a trend away from HMG
The critical factor will be Boris's decision on opening the economy and we presently have a media obsessed with the zero covid narrative and simply not giving airtime to any other contrary views
As I said yesterday I intend acting in a responsible manner but will make my own judgment on these matters
It is time for HMG to step aside and trust the public as I fear the public are at the point where compliance to HMG edicts is going to evaporate anyway
You can only keep the public prisoner to restrictions for so long and I believe the dam is about to burst, if it has not done so already
The only way HMG will gain the trust of the public is if they provide detailed hospitalisation figures and clearly demonstrate the vaccine status of the patients and the media stops succumbing to and giving their platform to those who want to eliminate the disease
So, in short, you’re intending to take the law into your own hands because you think you know best. I trust you’re happy for everyone else to do the same.
Haven’t we seen people take similar positions repeatedly through the pandemic, whilst exponential growth quietly does its work undoing gains.
Everyone is fed up with Covid, but it’s premature to say it’s all done and dusted and to go rogue.
I have been vaccinated along with millions of others and unless there is real evidence to justify this present zero covid mantra then yes, I and millions of others willl decide our own freedoms in a responsible way
So you, in your infinite wisdom, get to define what is ‘responsible’ for the management of this virus basically because your now are a bit fed up.
Read what I said
Unless their is real evidence the NHS is being overwhelmed and the vaccine is not effective then yes, we cannot be held ransom to something which is not much more serious than flu in those contracting it
Move over Whitty, Big G knows best, he’ll judge the evidence and tell us what to do.
I am not telling anyone what to do
I am making the point about myself and others must take their own responsibility
All through this pandemic there have been armchair experts claiming they know best, that they are responsible and speak for the majority. By and large they are total nutters.
I am sad to see you want to join their ranks because, like the rest of us, are fed up. We are so close to getting out of this hell, now is not the time to go rogue.
BigG in his post set criteria that he wants to see to be prevented from taking his own decisions. It is entirely reasonable for individual "armchair generals" to question why they should continue to obey the rules laid down by our superiors, when the proclaimed reasons for them are so far away from those we were given when we entered this whole thing. He is prepared to continue to follow if shown how by doing so is justified. But when hints are made that restrictions should continue to prevent the NHS being overwhelmed by non-Covid patients then it is entirely reasonable to ask questions about what is happening...
Questioning experts is essential. Making up your own rules based on an amateur interpretation of data and Internet discussions, which is what BigG was actually saying, is something very different.
No it is not
I have explained my position to you in detail
It is reasonable and most probably nearer to public opinion than you may think
I’ve read your posts, I understand your position. I think you are wrong. You’re a big boy, you’ll live.
I have no doubt there are a whole bunch of people out there who agree with you. Folks like Piers Corbyn.
I am nothing like Piers Corbyn and that is disingenuous of you
I absolutely 100% support vaccinations nor do I share his politics
Bless. I suspect you have more in common than either of you would care to admit. You both doubt expert analysis and are prepared to make up your own rules.
Which is the point. You, naturally, think your judgement is sound and are being reasonable and fair. Maybe it is. But then again, accordingly to your logic, everyone else out there should be free to make their own mind up. So I have to trust you, Piers and everyone else’s ability to analyse and form conclusions on complex data and act in a rational way. Yet this is demonstrably not something where the wisdom of crowds work.
Personally I prefer the current sensible incremental approach that has delivered benefits.
So you're allowed to question experts (in fact it is "necessary") but you're not allowed to doubt their analysis if you consider their answers unsatisfactory?
Question is what do you do if you doubt the analysis?
Questioning the analysis, particularly if you have the ear of someone in power, is one thing. As we saw last March, when a quick calculation of the consequences of herd immunity by infection showed what a calamity that would be. (If 50 million people are going to get infected over 8 months, half a million will die and the NHS will rapidly run out of everything, including Nightingales.) So the policy changed.
Saying I don't care what the state has concluded, I'm following my own conscience/thinking is another matter. It can be honourable to engage in civil disobedience. But when there are a lot of people who are still unprotected, or have limited protection, it can be thought of as more than a bit selfish.
The point is that it has not been proven that serious hospitalisations are increasing and the NHS is under threat
The case has to be made and at present the media are obsessed with the zero covid brigade which will see us in lockdowns indefinitely
To take the public with you, you have to provide convincing evidence that is the case which it has not
I don't understand why you, and others, are complaining about the media, pro-caution scientists, 'zero-Covid' scientists, independent Sage and so on. None of these people/groups make the decisions: the government does.
It strikes me as reasonably healthy that there is a public debate, between scientists and others, about how cautious (or not) we should be over the next few months in ensuring that we are finally rid of this beastly disease. Differences of opinion are healthy. It is the government's role to weigh up all the evidence and come to a considered view.
It's almost as if there's a pre-emptive strike to blame the scientists and/or the media, rather than the politicians, if those politicians make decisions that you disagree with. That applies to both sides - those favouring faster loosening of restrictions, and those favouring more caution.
If government decisions are influenced too much by voices in the media, that's the government's weakness, not the media's.
My son is now about 2.5 hours into Cummings' evidence. He is finding it fascinating, not so much for the political tittle tattle but for the analysis of how governments work (or don't) and why their decision making processes are flawed. I really must find the time myself.
I am surprised, however, that it has cut through with the general public in the way that Opinium have apparently found. It will be interesting to see if this is a blip or a change in the weather.
Yes, that's what I said at the time. The Cummings testimony was fascinating and gripping for students of the machinery of government, less so for the 'he said/she said' elements.
It was comments by yourself and a few others that got me to encourage him to do so. It genuinely seems one of the best insights into the actual operation of the modern state that we have had for a long time. For someone who will be studying politics as a part of his degree in the Autumn it is required viewing I think.
One point not commented on is that Cummings' testimony that Boris and Number 10 were overwhelmed by three simultaneous problems – the pandemic, the Middle East, and Carrie – rather undermines the centralised "war room" model Cummings was trying to impose.
Interesting that the flooding (which from memory was THE issue in Jan/February - to the extent that there were questions in the House of Commons criticising Johnson for skipping COBRA meetings about it) doesn't seem to get a mention*
*maybe it did, i'm only going on second/third hand reporting.
can't help cynically thinking that the wedding was timed to diffuse fall-out from the Cummings appearance - afterall, "everything is political" - it would be interesting to see when it was booked in!
I'm not sure about that. A greater slice of the public are likely to take more interest in the wedding than Cummings ramblings, particularly how Boris managed to get married in a Catholic church and whether/ if he's reconverted and what that might mean.
It's a simple human interest story.
It has pissed me off mightily. Not the fact of them getting married. But the way the Catholic Church, the church I have on and off belonged to all my life, seems to have abandoned all pretence of believing in the 10 Commandments, especially the 6th one.
We're all sinners deserving of mercy blah, blah, I know all that. But this same church, not content with overlooking the most revolting crimes against children by some of its priests, says that my gay son, born like that and, according to church doctrine, made in the image of God, is "disordered" and "intrinsically immoral".
Well stuff that, frankly. If the church going to opine on immorality, it needs to take a good hard look at itself. I know who in that little group listed above is immoral and it isn't my son.
According to Roman Catholic doctrine Boris has never been married before, as none of his previous marriages took place in a Roman Catholic church or cathedral in accordance with Catholic doctrine
So by this logic, his four children by Marina are illegitimate. That will hack off some people.
I am not sure that there is a perfect system but a pandemic stretches an imperfect system to its limits.
How about we try a system where everybody has their own department to run, they meet once a week (or more) to discuss cross departmental issues, and the PM only gets involved if a decision can't be made at lower level?
Looking at Mr Al's post, there are two systems of 'leadership' are there not? The first is the 'I'm in charge, follow me' style. When it works, OK, but too often it becomes that the "leader' takes to view preferred by the last advisor to whom the Leader spoke. Secondly, there's the collegiate system where the decision are arrived at as a result of debate, the Chairman sums up and accedes to the majority. If decisions are finely balanced that can lead to delay and confusion.
Question is what do you do if you doubt the analysis?
Questioning the analysis, particularly if you have the ear of someone in power, is one thing. As we saw last March, when a quick calculation of the consequences of herd immunity by infection showed what a calamity that would be. (If 50 million people are going to get infected over 8 months, half a million will die and the NHS will rapidly run out of everything, including Nightingales.) So the policy changed.
Saying I don't care what the state has concluded, I'm following my own conscience/thinking is another matter. It can be honourable to engage in civil disobedience. But when there are a lot of people who are still unprotected, or have limited protection, it can be thought of as more than a bit selfish.
The honourability or otherwise of an incident of civil disobedience seems to vary in almost exact proportion with the extent to which the observer of the civil disobedience agrees with the cause of the disobeyer.
No, it's also a function of how far you believe in the value of collective decision-making (necessarily through government). I tend to agree with XR, but dislike most of their civil disobedience actions. I disagree with Quakers that no armed forces are needed, but respect those who refuse to pay a proportion of taxes and accept the penalties that result. The key issue for me is, like Stuart, whether your actions affect others. If your actions may actually kill others, you should take advice from the government of the day, as presumably having the best scientific input available, even if you otherwise disagree with the governing party.
The most damaging part of Cumming's testimony is the impression that Johnson goes by instinct rather than advice, so the guidance we get from Government is suspect, forcing us to err on the safe side in case it's just Johnson making a spontaneous decision. I don't dislike him personally but I'm not convinced his instincts are reliable.
Covid produces another appalling revelation. British science has been bought and sold for Chinese gold
‘On Friday night, it emerged that leading scientific journals including Nature Medicine declined to publish evidence showing the virus may have been engineered in a lab.
‘Letters seen by The Telegraph show that last April vaccine specialists contacted several journals over concerns that structural details in the virus which looked man-made were being ignored, as well as pointing out flaws in previously published papers which suggested a natural origin.
‘Despite finding no fault with the analysis, Nature Medicine declined to publish the work, telling the authors that there were many other "pressing issues of public health and clinical interest that take precedence".
‘The Journal of Virology and the biology preprint server BioRxiv also turned down the work, even though one eminent professor told The Telegraph in confidence: "The paper seems good to me and the conclusions, whilst startling, seem valid." ‘
I am not sure that there is a perfect system but a pandemic stretches an imperfect system to its limits.
How about we try a system where everybody has their own department to run, they meet once a week (or more) to discuss cross departmental issues, and the PM only gets involved if a decision can't be made at lower level?
We could call it, I don't know, cabinet, perhaps?
Ridiculous - they would have to meet round a table, it would clearly be called Table Government if such a thing existed.
It is possible this poll has identified a Cummings effect but it has not been evident in the other polls released since Cummings appearance so it is prudent to wait and see if this is a trend away from HMG
The critical factor will be Boris's decision on opening the economy and we presently have a media obsessed with the zero covid narrative and simply not giving airtime to any other contrary views
As I said yesterday I intend acting in a responsible manner but will make my own judgment on these matters
It is time for HMG to step aside and trust the public as I fear the public are at the point where compliance to HMG edicts is going to evaporate anyway
You can only keep the public prisoner to restrictions for so long and I believe the dam is about to burst, if it has not done so already
The only way HMG will gain the trust of the public is if they provide detailed hospitalisation figures and clearly demonstrate the vaccine status of the patients and the media stops succumbing to and giving their platform to those who want to eliminate the disease
So, in short, you’re intending to take the law into your own hands because you think you know best. I trust you’re happy for everyone else to do the same.
Haven’t we seen people take similar positions repeatedly through the pandemic, whilst exponential growth quietly does its work undoing gains.
Everyone is fed up with Covid, but it’s premature to say it’s all done and dusted and to go rogue.
I have been vaccinated along with millions of others and unless there is real evidence to justify this present zero covid mantra then yes, I and millions of others willl decide our own freedoms in a responsible way
So you, in your infinite wisdom, get to define what is ‘responsible’ for the management of this virus basically because your now are a bit fed up.
Read what I said
Unless their is real evidence the NHS is being overwhelmed and the vaccine is not effective then yes, we cannot be held ransom to something which is not much more serious than flu in those contracting it
Move over Whitty, Big G knows best, he’ll judge the evidence and tell us what to do.
I am not telling anyone what to do
I am making the point about myself and others must take their own responsibility
All through this pandemic there have been armchair experts claiming they know best, that they are responsible and speak for the majority. By and large they are total nutters.
I am sad to see you want to join their ranks because, like the rest of us, are fed up. We are so close to getting out of this hell, now is not the time to go rogue.
BigG in his post set criteria that he wants to see to be prevented from taking his own decisions. It is entirely reasonable for individual "armchair generals" to question why they should continue to obey the rules laid down by our superiors, when the proclaimed reasons for them are so far away from those we were given when we entered this whole thing. He is prepared to continue to follow if shown how by doing so is justified. But when hints are made that restrictions should continue to prevent the NHS being overwhelmed by non-Covid patients then it is entirely reasonable to ask questions about what is happening...
Questioning experts is essential. Making up your own rules based on an amateur interpretation of data and Internet discussions, which is what BigG was actually saying, is something very different.
No it is not
I have explained my position to you in detail
It is reasonable and most probably nearer to public opinion than you may think
I’ve read your posts, I understand your position. I think you are wrong. You’re a big boy, you’ll live.
I have no doubt there are a whole bunch of people out there who agree with you. Folks like Piers Corbyn.
I am nothing like Piers Corbyn and that is disingenuous of you
I absolutely 100% support vaccinations nor do I share his politics
Bless. I suspect you have more in common than either of you would care to admit. You both doubt expert analysis and are prepared to make up your own rules.
Which is the point. You, naturally, think your judgement is sound and are being reasonable and fair. Maybe it is. But then again, accordingly to your logic, everyone else out there should be free to make their own mind up. So I have to trust you, Piers and everyone else’s ability to analyse and form conclusions on complex data and act in a rational way. Yet this is demonstrably not something where the wisdom of crowds work.
Personally I prefer the current sensible incremental approach that has delivered benefits.
So you're allowed to question experts (in fact it is "necessary") but you're not allowed to doubt their analysis if you consider their answers unsatisfactory?
Question is what do you do if you doubt the analysis?
Questioning the analysis, particularly if you have the ear of someone in power, is one thing. As we saw last March, when a quick calculation of the consequences of herd immunity by infection showed what a calamity that would be. (If 50 million people are going to get infected over 8 months, half a million will die and the NHS will rapidly run out of everything, including Nightingales.) So the policy changed.
Saying I don't care what the state has concluded, I'm following my own conscience/thinking is another matter. It can be honourable to engage in civil disobedience. But when there are a lot of people who are still unprotected, or have limited protection, it can be thought of as more than a bit selfish.
The point is that it has not been proven that serious hospitalisations are increasing and the NHS is under threat
The case has to be made and at present the media are obsessed with the zero covid brigade which will see us in lockdowns indefinitely
To take the public with you, you have to provide convincing evidence that is the case which it has not
I don't understand why you, and others, are complaining about the media, pro-caution scientists, 'zero-Covid' scientists, independent Sage and so on. None of these people/groups make the decisions: the government does.
It strikes me as reasonably healthy that there is a public debate, between scientists and others, about how cautious (or not) we should be over the next few months in ensuring that we are finally rid of this beastly disease. Differences of opinion are healthy. It is the government's role to weigh up all the evidence and come to a considered view.
It's almost as if there's a pre-emptive strike to blame the scientists and/or the media, rather than the politicians, if those politicians make decisions that you disagree with. That applies to both sides - those favouring faster loosening of restrictions, and those favouring more caution.
If government decisions are influenced too much by voices in the media, that's the government's weakness, not the media's.
Those you describe are all in the same mindset and overwhelming pro lockdown
BBC have just announced over 50% of over 30s have now been vaccinated, but we are also now hearing all children should be vaccinated
We have to have clear evidence the NHS is being overwhelmed to justify continued lockdown
Provide the evidence and the public will support it, but that evidence has not been shown to date
I am not sure that there is a perfect system but a pandemic stretches an imperfect system to its limits.
How about we try a system where everybody has their own department to run, they meet once a week (or more) to discuss cross departmental issues, and the PM only gets involved if a decision can't be made at lower level?
We could call it, I don't know, cabinet, perhaps?
I think that completely underestimates the interaction of the departments, particularly in a time of crisis. So, firstly, everything depends on money. That is how Osborne kept such a tight grip of the Cameron government and Brown was so influential in Blair's government. The Treasury are always involved. But the department of Health and Social Care, or whatever it is called this month, also needs to work with local government, with education, with business etc.
Hancock might well have wanted to shut the borders, for example. Shapps didn't and the FO didn't seem keen either. The Treasury position is slightly unclear, potentially because there are pluses and minuses from such a policy. This requires leadership from the centre and resolution of the issues, otherwise you end up with departments simply heading off and doing their own thing, potentially undermining what others are doing too.
Apart from the political results Opinium is also interesting on extending lockdown - 43% want to extend, 34% want to relax in June as planned, 10% think we should have relaxed sooner. Delicately balanced but certainly no great pressure to get on with it at all costs, as some here have been suggesting.
I think most people would be OK with an extension of a few weeks or longer if necessary. If it was extended for a short period and then extended again they'd find that irritating. If Johnson said "until 90% of willing adults have been vaccinated" or something like that, I think people would sigh but go along with it.
Those who want an extension to the restrictions can stay in their own homes if they choose.
I doubt they will though.
I know quite a few who plan to do that, but it's not really the point. Few if any positively want longer restrictions, but most would favour them, reluctantly, if the Government advised that they were necessary to avoid a major resurgence. If there's a major risk, then our personal preferences are seen as irrelevant.
I've switched personally to being relaxed about it all and go shopping, have meals out, etc. But if the Government advised that this was becoming risky, then I'd stop, and would want that to be a national policy. Just leaving it to our individual judgment would abdicate responsibility - few of us have enough information to make a solid judgment.
I do wonder how many people are able to simultaneously have these two opinions:
It is possible this poll has identified a Cummings effect but it has not been evident in the other polls released since Cummings appearance so it is prudent to wait and see if this is a trend away from HMG
The critical factor will be Boris's decision on opening the economy and we presently have a media obsessed with the zero covid narrative and simply not giving airtime to any other contrary views
As I said yesterday I intend acting in a responsible manner but will make my own judgment on these matters
It is time for HMG to step aside and trust the public as I fear the public are at the point where compliance to HMG edicts is going to evaporate anyway
You can only keep the public prisoner to restrictions for so long and I believe the dam is about to burst, if it has not done so already
The only way HMG will gain the trust of the public is if they provide detailed hospitalisation figures and clearly demonstrate the vaccine status of the patients and the media stops succumbing to and giving their platform to those who want to eliminate the disease
So, in short, you’re intending to take the law into your own hands because you think you know best. I trust you’re happy for everyone else to do the same.
Haven’t we seen people take similar positions repeatedly through the pandemic, whilst exponential growth quietly does its work undoing gains.
Everyone is fed up with Covid, but it’s premature to say it’s all done and dusted and to go rogue.
I have been vaccinated along with millions of others and unless there is real evidence to justify this present zero covid mantra then yes, I and millions of others willl decide our own freedoms in a responsible way
So you, in your infinite wisdom, get to define what is ‘responsible’ for the management of this virus basically because your now are a bit fed up.
Read what I said
Unless their is real evidence the NHS is being overwhelmed and the vaccine is not effective then yes, we cannot be held ransom to something which is not much more serious than flu in those contracting it
Move over Whitty, Big G knows best, he’ll judge the evidence and tell us what to do.
I am not telling anyone what to do
I am making the point about myself and others must take their own responsibility
All through this pandemic there have been armchair experts claiming they know best, that they are responsible and speak for the majority. By and large they are total nutters.
I am sad to see you want to join their ranks because, like the rest of us, are fed up. We are so close to getting out of this hell, now is not the time to go rogue.
BigG in his post set criteria that he wants to see to be prevented from taking his own decisions. It is entirely reasonable for individual "armchair generals" to question why they should continue to obey the rules laid down by our superiors, when the proclaimed reasons for them are so far away from those we were given when we entered this whole thing. He is prepared to continue to follow if shown how by doing so is justified. But when hints are made that restrictions should continue to prevent the NHS being overwhelmed by non-Covid patients then it is entirely reasonable to ask questions about what is happening...
Questioning experts is essential. Making up your own rules based on an amateur interpretation of data and Internet discussions, which is what BigG was actually saying, is something very different.
No it is not
I have explained my position to you in detail
It is reasonable and most probably nearer to public opinion than you may think
I’ve read your posts, I understand your position. I think you are wrong. You’re a big boy, you’ll live.
I have no doubt there are a whole bunch of people out there who agree with you. Folks like Piers Corbyn.
I am nothing like Piers Corbyn and that is disingenuous of you
I absolutely 100% support vaccinations nor do I share his politics
Bless. I suspect you have more in common than either of you would care to admit. You both doubt expert analysis and are prepared to make up your own rules.
Which is the point. You, naturally, think your judgement is sound and are being reasonable and fair. Maybe it is. But then again, accordingly to your logic, everyone else out there should be free to make their own mind up. So I have to trust you, Piers and everyone else’s ability to analyse and form conclusions on complex data and act in a rational way. Yet this is demonstrably not something where the wisdom of crowds work.
Personally I prefer the current sensible incremental approach that has delivered benefits.
So you're allowed to question experts (in fact it is "necessary") but you're not allowed to doubt their analysis if you consider their answers unsatisfactory?
Question is what do you do if you doubt the analysis?
Questioning the analysis, particularly if you have the ear of someone in power, is one thing. As we saw last March, when a quick calculation of the consequences of herd immunity by infection showed what a calamity that would be. (If 50 million people are going to get infected over 8 months, half a million will die and the NHS will rapidly run out of everything, including Nightingales.) So the policy changed.
Saying I don't care what the state has concluded, I'm following my own conscience/thinking is another matter. It can be honourable to engage in civil disobedience. But when there are a lot of people who are still unprotected, or have limited protection, it can be thought of as more than a bit selfish.
The point is that it has not been proven that serious hospitalisations are increasing and the NHS is under threat
The case has to be made and at present the media are obsessed with the zero covid brigade which will see us in lockdowns indefinitely
To take the public with you, you have to provide convincing evidence that is the case which it has not
I don't understand why you, and others, are complaining about the media, pro-caution scientists, 'zero-Covid' scientists, independent Sage and so on. None of these people/groups make the decisions: the government does.
It strikes me as reasonably healthy that there is a public debate, between scientists and others, about how cautious (or not) we should be over the next few months in ensuring that we are finally rid of this beastly disease. Differences of opinion are healthy. It is the government's role to weigh up all the evidence and come to a considered view.
It's almost as if there's a pre-emptive strike to blame the scientists and/or the media, rather than the politicians, if those politicians make decisions that you disagree with. That applies to both sides - those favouring faster loosening of restrictions, and those favouring more caution.
If government decisions are influenced too much by voices in the media, that's the government's weakness, not the media's.
Those you describe are all in the same mindset and overwhelming pro lockdown
BBC have just announced over 50% of over 30s have now been vaccinated, but we are also now hearing all children should be vaccinated
We have to have clear evidence the NHS is being overwhelmed to justify continued lockdown
Provide the evidence and the public will support it, but that evidence has not been shown to date
You're missing my point, sorry. I agree with you, as it happens. But if the pro-lockdown people win, you should blame the government, not the pro-lockdown people. If Toby Young and the other Covid deniers had got their way last year, I'd have blamed the government, not Toby and his mates.
It is possible this poll has identified a Cummings effect but it has not been evident in the other polls released since Cummings appearance so it is prudent to wait and see if this is a trend away from HMG
The critical factor will be Boris's decision on opening the economy and we presently have a media obsessed with the zero covid narrative and simply not giving airtime to any other contrary views
As I said yesterday I intend acting in a responsible manner but will make my own judgment on these matters
It is time for HMG to step aside and trust the public as I fear the public are at the point where compliance to HMG edicts is going to evaporate anyway
You can only keep the public prisoner to restrictions for so long and I believe the dam is about to burst, if it has not done so already
The only way HMG will gain the trust of the public is if they provide detailed hospitalisation figures and clearly demonstrate the vaccine status of the patients and the media stops succumbing to and giving their platform to those who want to eliminate the disease
So, in short, you’re intending to take the law into your own hands because you think you know best. I trust you’re happy for everyone else to do the same.
Haven’t we seen people take similar positions repeatedly through the pandemic, whilst exponential growth quietly does its work undoing gains.
Everyone is fed up with Covid, but it’s premature to say it’s all done and dusted and to go rogue.
I have been vaccinated along with millions of others and unless there is real evidence to justify this present zero covid mantra then yes, I and millions of others willl decide our own freedoms in a responsible way
So you, in your infinite wisdom, get to define what is ‘responsible’ for the management of this virus basically because your now are a bit fed up.
Read what I said
Unless their is real evidence the NHS is being overwhelmed and the vaccine is not effective then yes, we cannot be held ransom to something which is not much more serious than flu in those contracting it
Move over Whitty, Big G knows best, he’ll judge the evidence and tell us what to do.
I am not telling anyone what to do
I am making the point about myself and others must take their own responsibility
All through this pandemic there have been armchair experts claiming they know best, that they are responsible and speak for the majority. By and large they are total nutters.
I am sad to see you want to join their ranks because, like the rest of us, are fed up. We are so close to getting out of this hell, now is not the time to go rogue.
BigG in his post set criteria that he wants to see to be prevented from taking his own decisions. It is entirely reasonable for individual "armchair generals" to question why they should continue to obey the rules laid down by our superiors, when the proclaimed reasons for them are so far away from those we were given when we entered this whole thing. He is prepared to continue to follow if shown how by doing so is justified. But when hints are made that restrictions should continue to prevent the NHS being overwhelmed by non-Covid patients then it is entirely reasonable to ask questions about what is happening...
Questioning experts is essential. Making up your own rules based on an amateur interpretation of data and Internet discussions, which is what BigG was actually saying, is something very different.
No it is not
I have explained my position to you in detail
It is reasonable and most probably nearer to public opinion than you may think
I’ve read your posts, I understand your position. I think you are wrong. You’re a big boy, you’ll live.
I have no doubt there are a whole bunch of people out there who agree with you. Folks like Piers Corbyn.
I am nothing like Piers Corbyn and that is disingenuous of you
I absolutely 100% support vaccinations nor do I share his politics
Bless. I suspect you have more in common than either of you would care to admit. You both doubt expert analysis and are prepared to make up your own rules.
Which is the point. You, naturally, think your judgement is sound and are being reasonable and fair. Maybe it is. But then again, accordingly to your logic, everyone else out there should be free to make their own mind up. So I have to trust you, Piers and everyone else’s ability to analyse and form conclusions on complex data and act in a rational way. Yet this is demonstrably not something where the wisdom of crowds work.
Personally I prefer the current sensible incremental approach that has delivered benefits.
So you're allowed to question experts (in fact it is "necessary") but you're not allowed to doubt their analysis if you consider their answers unsatisfactory?
Question is what do you do if you doubt the analysis?
Questioning the analysis, particularly if you have the ear of someone in power, is one thing. As we saw last March, when a quick calculation of the consequences of herd immunity by infection showed what a calamity that would be. (If 50 million people are going to get infected over 8 months, half a million will die and the NHS will rapidly run out of everything, including Nightingales.) So the policy changed.
Saying I don't care what the state has concluded, I'm following my own conscience/thinking is another matter. It can be honourable to engage in civil disobedience. But when there are a lot of people who are still unprotected, or have limited protection, it can be thought of as more than a bit selfish.
The point is that it has not been proven that serious hospitalisations are increasing and the NHS is under threat
The case has to be made and at present the media are obsessed with the zero covid brigade which will see us in lockdowns indefinitely
To take the public with you, you have to provide convincing evidence that is the case which it has not
I don't understand why you, and others, are complaining about the media, pro-caution scientists, 'zero-Covid' scientists, independent Sage and so on. None of these people/groups make the decisions: the government does.
It strikes me as reasonably healthy that there is a public debate, between scientists and others, about how cautious (or not) we should be over the next few months in ensuring that we are finally rid of this beastly disease. Differences of opinion are healthy. It is the government's role to weigh up all the evidence and come to a considered view.
It's almost as if there's a pre-emptive strike to blame the scientists and/or the media, rather than the politicians, if those politicians make decisions that you disagree with. That applies to both sides - those favouring faster loosening of restrictions, and those favouring more caution.
If government decisions are influenced too much by voices in the media, that's the government's weakness, not the media's.
Those you describe are all in the same mindset and overwhelming pro lockdown
BBC have just announced over 50% of over 30s have now been vaccinated, but we are also now hearing all children should be vaccinated
We have to have clear evidence the NHS is being overwhelmed to justify continued lockdown
Provide the evidence and the public will support it, but that evidence has not been shown to date
From the noises this morning, it sounds as if some are gearing up to use Covid as an excuse because of wider problems in the NHS as the full scale and implications of the lockdown induced backlogs start to materialise.
The long twitter thread from an NHS CEO above is referencing the NHS currently operating at near full capacity across the country, with very little of it directly COVID related. But he is linking loosening of restrictions to making the pressure "overwhelming", both directly ("a very small rise in Covid admissions will have disproportionate impacts") and indirectly - ("loosening restrictions in themselves will create further non Covid related pressures"). So the message ("stay at home to protect the NHS remains"), even if the aim isn't really to prevent spread of Covid). On interesting tidbit, however, is that part of the current pressures are explicitly mental health related...
I am not sure that there is a perfect system but a pandemic stretches an imperfect system to its limits.
How about we try a system where everybody has their own department to run, they meet once a week (or more) to discuss cross departmental issues, and the PM only gets involved if a decision can't be made at lower level?
We could call it, I don't know, cabinet, perhaps?
I think that completely underestimates the interaction of the departments, particularly in a time of crisis. So, firstly, everything depends on money. That is how Osborne kept such a tight grip of the Cameron government and Brown was so influential in Blair's government. The Treasury are always involved. But the department of Health and Social Care, or whatever it is called this month, also needs to work with local government, with education, with business etc.
Hancock might well have wanted to shut the borders, for example. Shapps didn't and the FO didn't seem keen either. The Treasury position is slightly unclear, potentially because there are pluses and minuses from such a policy. This requires leadership from the centre and resolution of the issues, otherwise you end up with departments simply heading off and doing their own thing, potentially undermining what others are doing too.
I think that completely underestimates the interaction of the departments, particularly in a time of crisis.
Seemed to work well enough for hundreds of years, through several wars and at least one other pandemic.
I always liked the story of Wellington's first cabinet. "It was a rum affair," he allegedly said, "I gave them their orders and they seemed to want to stay and discuss them."
I think that the reality is that the strength of the Cabinet against the PM has varied hugely over time depending on the quality of the leadership and the quality of the Cabinet ministers. What you describe is an ideal but practice is often very different.
Could No 10 really just check in with Hancock once a week or so to see how things were going, especially when Boris's principal advisor was clearly convinced that Hancock could not be trusted or relied upon? Not a chance.
I think that completely underestimates the interaction of the departments, particularly in a time of crisis.
Seemed to work well enough for hundreds of years, through several wars and at least one other pandemic.
I think a study of the UK state response to national crises would probably show that the response to the Covid pandemic is far from an outlier. In simplistic terms - poor start, dodgy middle, strong finish. Generally leaving a longer lasting historical perception that the system worked out pretty well.
If there's a bustle in your hedgerow, don't be alarmed now It's just a spring clean for the May queen Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run There's still time to change the road you're on Your head is humming and it won't go, in case you don't know The piper's calling you to join him Dear lady, can you hear the wind blow, and did you know Your stairway lies on the whispering wind?
Could No 10 really just check in with Hancock once a week or so to see how things were going, especially when Boris's principal advisor was clearly convinced that Hancock could not be trusted or relied upon? Not a chance.
The appropriate cabinet response would have been to sack Hancock and replace him.
Instead he is still in place, as others have noted acting purely as a human shield for BoZo, destined to be eviscerated at the public enquiry.
Could No 10 really just check in with Hancock once a week or so to see how things were going, especially when Boris's principal advisor was clearly convinced that Hancock could not be trusted or relied upon? Not a chance.
The appropriate cabinet response would have been to sack Hancock and replace him.
Instead he is still in place, as others have noted acting purely as a human shield for BoZo, destined to be eviscerated at the public enquiry.
If he was smarter, he would quit.
The judgements and discussions about Hancock's performance, as outline by Cummings, were i believe almost all centred on the period of March/April last year and the first wave. I think it is far from certain that a public inquiry covering the whole of the pandemic - second wave, vaccination programme and all - will be quite as damning as you seem to believe. From May 2020 onwards, he basically seems to have been on the right side of every decision taken.
Covid produces another appalling revelation. British science has been bought and sold for Chinese gold
‘On Friday night, it emerged that leading scientific journals including Nature Medicine declined to publish evidence showing the virus may have been engineered in a lab.
‘Letters seen by The Telegraph show that last April vaccine specialists contacted several journals over concerns that structural details in the virus which looked man-made were being ignored, as well as pointing out flaws in previously published papers which suggested a natural origin.
‘Despite finding no fault with the analysis, Nature Medicine declined to publish the work, telling the authors that there were many other "pressing issues of public health and clinical interest that take precedence".
‘The Journal of Virology and the biology preprint server BioRxiv also turned down the work, even though one eminent professor told The Telegraph in confidence: "The paper seems good to me and the conclusions, whilst startling, seem valid." ‘
Apart from the political results Opinium is also interesting on extending lockdown - 43% want to extend, 34% want to relax in June as planned, 10% think we should have relaxed sooner. Delicately balanced but certainly no great pressure to get on with it at all costs, as some here have been suggesting.
I think most people would be OK with an extension of a few weeks or longer if necessary. If it was extended for a short period and then extended again they'd find that irritating. If Johnson said "until 90% of willing adults have been vaccinated" or something like that, I think people would sigh but go along with it.
Those who want an extension to the restrictions can stay in their own homes if they choose.
I doubt they will though.
I know quite a few who plan to do that, but it's not really the point. Few if any positively want longer restrictions, but most would favour them, reluctantly, if the Government advised that they were necessary to avoid a major resurgence. If there's a major risk, then our personal preferences are seen as irrelevant.
I've switched personally to being relaxed about it all and go shopping, have meals out, etc. But if the Government advised that this was becoming risky, then I'd stop, and would want that to be a national policy. Just leaving it to our individual judgment would abdicate responsibility - few of us have enough information to make a solid judgment.
I do wonder how many people are able to simultaneously have these two opinions:
The government is crap
and
I want the government to tell me what to do.
I don't think the government is universally crap - parts are doing a good job. But more importantly, they have access to much better advice than you or I can get merely by scanning the internet, and since lockdown is something that is only effective if generally followed, I'd rather take their advice on public health than act on whatever amateur personal view I have. Insisting on making an individual assessment in a crisis is like a soldier pondering whether to take part in an offensive - he may have doubts about the generals, but with luck they will judge the situation better than he can - and it certainly won't be helped if he arbitrarily decides to opt out.
A lot of the contrary view from the start has been based on faux libertarianism - the idea that we're adults and can jolly well decide these things individually. On that basis, we shouldn't have speed limits (why not let drivers decide?), we should all decide for ourselves how much tax to pay, and so on - it denies the whole idea of democratic decision-making. If the government is crap, that's unfortunate, but let's hope they are less crap than the result of 60 million people making partly-informed individual guesses.
I think that completely underestimates the interaction of the departments, particularly in a time of crisis.
Seemed to work well enough for hundreds of years, through several wars and at least one other pandemic.
I think a study of the UK state response to national crises would probably show that the response to the Covid pandemic is far from an outlier. In simplistic terms - poor start, dodgy middle, strong finish. Generally leaving a longer lasting historical perception that the system worked out pretty well.
It seems to match the way we have always fought wars as well - at least over the last two centuries.
1 - Start off woefully unprepared because we are still planning on fighting the same way as last time. Because of course we kind of won. 2 - Have a few really bad battles where a lot of men get killed unnecessarily because of outdated tactics. 3 - Learn lessons very very rapidly and bring in senior leadership who not only get the new paradigms but also have the ability to think ahead and create their own innovations 4 - Finish strongly with a victory that is completely misunderstood as meaning we got everything right and we now are secure with cutting edge strategy and tactics in case of future wars.
Return to number 1 and do it all over again a couple of decades later.
I think that completely underestimates the interaction of the departments, particularly in a time of crisis.
Seemed to work well enough for hundreds of years, through several wars and at least one other pandemic.
I think a study of the UK state response to national crises would probably show that the response to the Covid pandemic is far from an outlier. In simplistic terms - poor start, dodgy middle, strong finish. Generally leaving a longer lasting historical perception that the system worked out pretty well.
It seems to match the way we have always fought wars as well - at least over the last two centuries.
1 - Start off woefully unprepared because we are still planning on fighting the same way as last time. Because of course we kind of won. 2 - Have a few really bad battles where a lot of men get killed unnecessarily because of outdated tactics. 3 - Learn lessons very very rapidly and bring in senior leadership who not only get the new paradigms but also have the ability to think ahead and create their own innovations 4 - Finish strongly with a victory that is completely misunderstood as meaning we got everything right and we now are secure with cutting edge strategy and tactics in case of future wars.
Return to number 1 and do it all over again a couple of decades later.
Crimea Boer War WW1 WW2
Every time we followed this same pattern.
Or not so rapidly, in the case of WW1... Churchill moving his way around the Cabinet table?!
Mr. Tyndall, didn't most/all of the main players in WWI cock it up for years?
Yep, this pandemic was probably unusual in that we had our own vaccine in addition to America arriving from over the hill and knocking some heads together...
1. This new ship. Great! Don't knock work being unveiled to "reinvigorate the shipbuilding industry". Probably worth pointing out though that we have been a major sea-faring power for a long time. The notion that it will be "distinct from any previous national flagship reflecting the UK's new status as an independent trading nation and helping us to seize the opportunities that status presents" is laughable. Year Zero was not 1996. Or 1973. We have spent centuries as an "independent trading nation" and have a long history of sending in flagships to "seize" opportunities.
2. The Unite plot to spread itself through the party and oust Iain Duncan Starmer. If Unite was a force for good or change then perhaps I would get their plan. Instead Unite could get done under RICO laws in America and wasted £2m of member's money in an absurd legal action against a Labour MP.
I keep making this point that its now absolutely clear that the hard left and the centre right can no longer occupy the same party. Their sole aim seems to be war against the other. The Labour brand is beyond tarnished anyway, let the nutters have it, and take the majority of members, MPs and the party machine away to do something relevant.
3. Congratulations to Boris and Carrie! Boris better get writing some more books to pay for the inevitable divorce when he shags someone else again.
It never ceases to amaze me how indignant second wives(who were partially responsible for the break up of their husbands first marriage) become when their husband buggers off with someone else..
Surely one of the first things the second wife found out about her future husband, is that he’s the sort of man who cheats on his wife?
Years ago I knew a guy who had had two kids with the first wife, then had an affair and went off to the next wife and had two more. Then had another affair and moved off to the third wife. Who had two children... You’d have to be worried at that point, right?
I have an old shipmate who has married and divorced four flight attendants in succession. He has less money than Johnson.
Covid produces another appalling revelation. British science has been bought and sold for Chinese gold
‘On Friday night, it emerged that leading scientific journals including Nature Medicine declined to publish evidence showing the virus may have been engineered in a lab.
‘Letters seen by The Telegraph show that last April vaccine specialists contacted several journals over concerns that structural details in the virus which looked man-made were being ignored, as well as pointing out flaws in previously published papers which suggested a natural origin.
‘Despite finding no fault with the analysis, Nature Medicine declined to publish the work, telling the authors that there were many other "pressing issues of public health and clinical interest that take precedence".
‘The Journal of Virology and the biology preprint server BioRxiv also turned down the work, even though one eminent professor told The Telegraph in confidence: "The paper seems good to me and the conclusions, whilst startling, seem valid." ‘
Legacy of the climate change thing. Big Science decides that dissent is intolerable and dissenting views unpublishable, and there you are.
Incredibly, even last week Nature was peddling this “it didn’t come from the lab”, “stop talking about the lab”, pro-Chinese Communist Party bullshit
“Divisive COVID ‘lab leak’ debate prompts dire warnings from researchers Allegations that COVID escaped from a Chinese lab make it harder for nations to collaborate on ending the pandemic — and fuel online bullying, some scientists say.”
We mustn’t investigate the likely lab origin of the virus that killed 7 million people, and is still rampaging around the world, because it might “fuel online bullying”
That’s their argument.
Nature and The Lancet, two great British science journals, two entirely trashed reputations. Sad
Mr. Tyndall, didn't most/all of the main players in WWI cock it up for years?
I would suggest that they were locked into a style of fighting that precluded a decisive blow based on new tactics. They certainly tried plenty that on their own were successful innovations - the creeping barrage and the use of armour being two. But they were poorly used by men who didn't actually understand their importance.
It is interesting that on the German side the development of the Sturmtruppen - operating as tight integrated units using cover rather than simply walking towards the enemy - didn't have as much of an impact as one might have expected.
It looks to me that the Conservatives have a ceiling of under 40% in Batley & Spen.
Now you might mention the 12.2% who voted for the Heavy Wollens in 2019.
But are the people who voted for a no hope protest party in a general election really going to switch to a governing party in a byelection ?
Well the BXP voters in Hartlepool did you might say.
But those Hartlepool BXP voters were voting for the party they thought could win in 2019 whereas the Heavy Wollen voters were deliberately making a protest vote during a general election.
It looks to me that the Conservatives have a ceiling of under 40% in Batley & Spen.
Now you might mention the 12.2% who voted for the Heavy Wollens in 2019.
But are the people who voted for a no hope protest party in a general election really going to switch to a governing party in a byelection ?
Well the BXP voters in Hartlepool did you might say.
But those Hartlepool BXP voters were voting for the party they thought could win in 2019 whereas the Heavy Wollen voters were deliberately making a protest vote during a general election.
I think that Labour should be favourites.
Interesting analysis.... I also note that the Yorkshire Party got 9% in the Mayoral elections...not sure if their B&S candidate is up to much but there is more volatility in the vote in my opinion which makes it tighter than many suggest. Labour as favourites is perhaps too generous but I wouldnt stake much on a Tory gain
Covid produces another appalling revelation. British science has been bought and sold for Chinese gold
‘On Friday night, it emerged that leading scientific journals including Nature Medicine declined to publish evidence showing the virus may have been engineered in a lab.
‘Letters seen by The Telegraph show that last April vaccine specialists contacted several journals over concerns that structural details in the virus which looked man-made were being ignored, as well as pointing out flaws in previously published papers which suggested a natural origin.
‘Despite finding no fault with the analysis, Nature Medicine declined to publish the work, telling the authors that there were many other "pressing issues of public health and clinical interest that take precedence".
‘The Journal of Virology and the biology preprint server BioRxiv also turned down the work, even though one eminent professor told The Telegraph in confidence: "The paper seems good to me and the conclusions, whilst startling, seem valid." ‘
Legacy of the climate change thing. Big Science decides that dissent is intolerable and dissenting views unpublishable, and there you are.
Incredibly, even last week Nature was peddling this “it didn’t come from the lab”, “stop talking about the lab”, pro-Chinese Communist Party bullshit
“Divisive COVID ‘lab leak’ debate prompts dire warnings from researchers Allegations that COVID escaped from a Chinese lab make it harder for nations to collaborate on ending the pandemic — and fuel online bullying, some scientists say.”
We mustn’t investigate the likely lab origin of the virus that killed 7 million people, and is still rampaging around the world, because it might “fuel online bullying”
That’s their argument.
Nature and The Lancet, two great British science journals, two entirely trashed reputations. Sad
As with many companies, many of the scientific publishers are compromised because of their financial links with China. If they publish articles deemed critical, they suddenly find their contracts cancelled and Chinese academics barred from submitting articles. For the SP giants, China is seen as a key future engine of growth, especially given pressures in Western countries to reduce the costs of publication.
Covid produces another appalling revelation. British science has been bought and sold for Chinese gold
‘On Friday night, it emerged that leading scientific journals including Nature Medicine declined to publish evidence showing the virus may have been engineered in a lab.
‘Letters seen by The Telegraph show that last April vaccine specialists contacted several journals over concerns that structural details in the virus which looked man-made were being ignored, as well as pointing out flaws in previously published papers which suggested a natural origin.
‘Despite finding no fault with the analysis, Nature Medicine declined to publish the work, telling the authors that there were many other "pressing issues of public health and clinical interest that take precedence".
‘The Journal of Virology and the biology preprint server BioRxiv also turned down the work, even though one eminent professor told The Telegraph in confidence: "The paper seems good to me and the conclusions, whilst startling, seem valid." ‘
Legacy of the climate change thing. Big Science decides that dissent is intolerable and dissenting views unpublishable, and there you are.
Incredibly, even last week Nature was peddling this “it didn’t come from the lab”, “stop talking about the lab”, pro-Chinese Communist Party bullshit
“Divisive COVID ‘lab leak’ debate prompts dire warnings from researchers Allegations that COVID escaped from a Chinese lab make it harder for nations to collaborate on ending the pandemic — and fuel online bullying, some scientists say.”
We mustn’t investigate the likely lab origin of the virus that killed 7 million people, and is still rampaging around the world, because it might “fuel online bullying”
That’s their argument.
Nature and The Lancet, two great British science journals, two entirely trashed reputations. Sad
As with many companies, many of the scientific publishers are compromised because of their financial links with China. If they publish articles deemed critical, they suddenly find their contracts cancelled and Chinese academics barred from submitting articles. For the SP giants, China is seen as a key future engine of growth, especially given pressures in Western countries to reduce the costs of publication.
Indeed.
But if they come to be seen as unreliable and biased, if not outright fraudulent, their worth as science publishers will be zero.
I think that completely underestimates the interaction of the departments, particularly in a time of crisis.
Seemed to work well enough for hundreds of years, through several wars and at least one other pandemic.
I think a study of the UK state response to national crises would probably show that the response to the Covid pandemic is far from an outlier. In simplistic terms - poor start, dodgy middle, strong finish. Generally leaving a longer lasting historical perception that the system worked out pretty well.
It seems to match the way we have always fought wars as well - at least over the last two centuries.
1 - Start off woefully unprepared because we are still planning on fighting the same way as last time. Because of course we kind of won. 2 - Have a few really bad battles where a lot of men get killed unnecessarily because of outdated tactics. 3 - Learn lessons very very rapidly and bring in senior leadership who not only get the new paradigms but also have the ability to think ahead and create their own innovations 4 - Finish strongly with a victory that is completely misunderstood as meaning we got everything right and we now are secure with cutting edge strategy and tactics in case of future wars.
Return to number 1 and do it all over again a couple of decades later.
Crimea Boer War WW1 WW2
Every time we followed this same pattern.
Or not so rapidly, in the case of WW1... Churchill moving his way around the Cabinet table?!
I think you are being very generous about the British Army in WW2.... I am not sure British troops had a particularly strong victory apart from a few local battles... our friends from across the water, the commonwealth or the Urals did nearly all the heavy lifiting....
Covid produces another appalling revelation. British science has been bought and sold for Chinese gold
‘On Friday night, it emerged that leading scientific journals including Nature Medicine declined to publish evidence showing the virus may have been engineered in a lab.
‘Letters seen by The Telegraph show that last April vaccine specialists contacted several journals over concerns that structural details in the virus which looked man-made were being ignored, as well as pointing out flaws in previously published papers which suggested a natural origin.
‘Despite finding no fault with the analysis, Nature Medicine declined to publish the work, telling the authors that there were many other "pressing issues of public health and clinical interest that take precedence".
‘The Journal of Virology and the biology preprint server BioRxiv also turned down the work, even though one eminent professor told The Telegraph in confidence: "The paper seems good to me and the conclusions, whilst startling, seem valid." ‘
Sort of off topic, but given the way this thread had gone, maybe not. Son 2, who lives in Thailand wants to go to China on business in September. By then he will have been vaccinated in Thailand, but with what vaccine he isn't sure. Yet, anyway. However, apparently the Chinese will only accept evidence of vaccination with a Chinese vaccine as 'evidence of vaccination'. Equally, as he understands it, the British authorities will NOT accept vaccination with a Chinese vaccine as evidence of vaccination. Is he right, and if so what to do?
Mr. Tyndall, didn't most/all of the main players in WWI cock it up for years?
I would suggest that they were locked into a style of fighting that precluded a decisive blow based on new tactics. They certainly tried plenty that on their own were successful innovations - the creeping barrage and the use of armour being two. But they were poorly used by men who didn't actually understand their importance.
It is interesting that on the German side the development of the Sturmtruppen - operating as tight integrated units using cover rather than simply walking towards the enemy - didn't have as much of an impact as one might have expected.
One could add the Napoleonic/French revolutionary war to that list. Another common failing is to think that any future war can be won on the cheap, because the previous one was eventually successful.
We did learn one valuable lesson from the Boer war, that defensive rifle fire was deadly, at eight hundred yards. French and German observers learned the wrong lesson - that riflemen could be overwhelmed by huge numbers, which is why their casualties were so dreadful in the opening months of WW1.
Covid produces another appalling revelation. British science has been bought and sold for Chinese gold
‘On Friday night, it emerged that leading scientific journals including Nature Medicine declined to publish evidence showing the virus may have been engineered in a lab.
‘Letters seen by The Telegraph show that last April vaccine specialists contacted several journals over concerns that structural details in the virus which looked man-made were being ignored, as well as pointing out flaws in previously published papers which suggested a natural origin.
‘Despite finding no fault with the analysis, Nature Medicine declined to publish the work, telling the authors that there were many other "pressing issues of public health and clinical interest that take precedence".
‘The Journal of Virology and the biology preprint server BioRxiv also turned down the work, even though one eminent professor told The Telegraph in confidence: "The paper seems good to me and the conclusions, whilst startling, seem valid." ‘
Covid produces another appalling revelation. British science has been bought and sold for Chinese gold
‘On Friday night, it emerged that leading scientific journals including Nature Medicine declined to publish evidence showing the virus may have been engineered in a lab.
‘Letters seen by The Telegraph show that last April vaccine specialists contacted several journals over concerns that structural details in the virus which looked man-made were being ignored, as well as pointing out flaws in previously published papers which suggested a natural origin.
‘Despite finding no fault with the analysis, Nature Medicine declined to publish the work, telling the authors that there were many other "pressing issues of public health and clinical interest that take precedence".
‘The Journal of Virology and the biology preprint server BioRxiv also turned down the work, even though one eminent professor told The Telegraph in confidence: "The paper seems good to me and the conclusions, whilst startling, seem valid." ‘
Legacy of the climate change thing. Big Science decides that dissent is intolerable and dissenting views unpublishable, and there you are.
More likely that journal space, especially in the top journals, is severely rationed.
Lol
So there are more important issues in human medicine than the origins of the deadliest global pandemic, and worst medical emergency, in a century? That’s why all of these journals refused to publish articles that contradicted the enforced consensus about the wet market?
Yet the same journals found space to publish a letter organized and written by Peter Daszak, denouncing any allegations against the novel bat coronavirus research at the Wuhan Insitute of Virology. Yet I guess it was the same “lack of space” that prevented them mentioning, at the same time, that the letter organiser, Peter Daszak, has spent ten years funding gain-of-function experiments on novel bat coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology
Mr. Tyndall, didn't most/all of the main players in WWI cock it up for years?
I would suggest that they were locked into a style of fighting that precluded a decisive blow based on new tactics. They certainly tried plenty that on their own were successful innovations - the creeping barrage and the use of armour being two. But they were poorly used by men who didn't actually understand their importance.
It is interesting that on the German side the development of the Sturmtruppen - operating as tight integrated units using cover rather than simply walking towards the enemy - didn't have as much of an impact as one might have expected.
Ironically I believe German military thinking was influenced by the British offensives at the end of WWI, the value of which Britain seemed to have forgotten by WWII. Blitzkrieg was a term largely coined by the West and despised by the Wehrmacht; perhaps we convinced ourselves that such a form of waging war was un-British by giving it a foreign name.
Sort of off topic, but given the way this thread had gone, maybe not. Son 2, who lives in Thailand wants to go to China on business in September. By then he will have been vaccinated in Thailand, but with what vaccine he isn't sure. Yet, anyway. However, apparently the Chinese will only accept evidence of vaccination with a Chinese vaccine as 'evidence of vaccination'. Equally, as he understands it, the British authorities will NOR accept vaccination with a Chines vaccine as evidence of vaccination. Is he right, and if so what to do?
Whether Western countries will accept Chinese vaccines is a hot topic of discussion in the sandpit, where both Sinopharm and Pfizer vaccines are in use. Thankfully with a choice in most cases. The answer is that we don’t yet know, but there’s potential for chaos in situations as your son finds himself.
A sensible approach (yes I know) would be for everyone to follow the WHO list of approved vaccines, which at the moment is Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZenica, Johnson & Johnson, and Sinopharm. Not yet Sputnik, Sinovac or some of the newer vaccines coming downstream.
Covid produces another appalling revelation. British science has been bought and sold for Chinese gold
‘On Friday night, it emerged that leading scientific journals including Nature Medicine declined to publish evidence showing the virus may have been engineered in a lab.
‘Letters seen by The Telegraph show that last April vaccine specialists contacted several journals over concerns that structural details in the virus which looked man-made were being ignored, as well as pointing out flaws in previously published papers which suggested a natural origin.
‘Despite finding no fault with the analysis, Nature Medicine declined to publish the work, telling the authors that there were many other "pressing issues of public health and clinical interest that take precedence".
‘The Journal of Virology and the biology preprint server BioRxiv also turned down the work, even though one eminent professor told The Telegraph in confidence: "The paper seems good to me and the conclusions, whilst startling, seem valid." ‘
Legacy of the climate change thing. Big Science decides that dissent is intolerable and dissenting views unpublishable, and there you are.
More likely that journal space, especially in the top journals, is severely rationed.
Lol
So there are more important issues in human medicine than the origins of the deadliest global pandemic, and worst medical emergency, in a century? That’s why all of these journals refused to publish articles that contradicted the enforced consensus about the wet market?
Yet the same journals found space to publish a letter organized and written by Peter Daszak, denouncing any allegations against the novel bat coronavirus research at the Wuhan Insitute of Virology. Yet I guess it was the same “lack of space” that prevented them mentioning that the letter organiser, Peter Daszak, has spent ten years funding gain-of-function experiments on novel bat coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology
I think that completely underestimates the interaction of the departments, particularly in a time of crisis.
Seemed to work well enough for hundreds of years, through several wars and at least one other pandemic.
I think a study of the UK state response to national crises would probably show that the response to the Covid pandemic is far from an outlier. In simplistic terms - poor start, dodgy middle, strong finish. Generally leaving a longer lasting historical perception that the system worked out pretty well.
It seems to match the way we have always fought wars as well - at least over the last two centuries.
1 - Start off woefully unprepared because we are still planning on fighting the same way as last time. Because of course we kind of won. 2 - Have a few really bad battles where a lot of men get killed unnecessarily because of outdated tactics. 3 - Learn lessons very very rapidly and bring in senior leadership who not only get the new paradigms but also have the ability to think ahead and create their own innovations 4 - Finish strongly with a victory that is completely misunderstood as meaning we got everything right and we now are secure with cutting edge strategy and tactics in case of future wars.
Return to number 1 and do it all over again a couple of decades later.
Crimea Boer War WW1 WW2
Every time we followed this same pattern.
Or not so rapidly, in the case of WW1... Churchill moving his way around the Cabinet table?!
I think you are being very generous about the British Army in WW2.... I am not sure British troops had a particularly strong victory apart from a few local battles... our friends from across the water, the commonwealth or the Urals did nearly all the heavy lifiting....
From late 1942, the army performed well. The record of the Royal Navy was outstanding from the beginning.
Mr. Tyndall, didn't most/all of the main players in WWI cock it up for years?
I would suggest that they were locked into a style of fighting that precluded a decisive blow based on new tactics. They certainly tried plenty that on their own were successful innovations - the creeping barrage and the use of armour being two. But they were poorly used by men who didn't actually understand their importance.
It is interesting that on the German side the development of the Sturmtruppen - operating as tight integrated units using cover rather than simply walking towards the enemy - didn't have as much of an impact as one might have expected.
Ironically I believe German military thinking was influenced by the British offensives at the end of WWI, the value of which Britain seemed to have forgotten by WWII. Blitzkrieg was a term largely coined by the West and despised by the Wehrmacht; perhaps we convinced ourselves that such a form of waging war was un-British by giving it a foreign name.
Basil Liddell-Hart did a lot of the theorising. Unfortunately, our army ignored him, while the Germans studied him with keen interest.
Funnily enough Peter “Wuhan is nothing to do with me” Daszak, the man who funded gain-of-function novel bat coronavirus research at Wuhan, has deleted this tweet from November 2019
Sort of off topic, but given the way this thread had gone, maybe not. Son 2, who lives in Thailand wants to go to China on business in September. By then he will have been vaccinated in Thailand, but with what vaccine he isn't sure. Yet, anyway. However, apparently the Chinese will only accept evidence of vaccination with a Chinese vaccine as 'evidence of vaccination'. Equally, as he understands it, the British authorities will NOR accept vaccination with a Chines vaccine as evidence of vaccination. Is he right, and if so what to do?
Whether Western countries will accept Chinese vaccines is a hot topic of discussion in the sandpit, where both Sinopharm and Pfizer vaccines are in use. Thankfully with a choice in most cases. The answer is that we don’t yet know, but there’s potential for chaos in situations as your son finds himself.
A sensible approach (yes I know) would be for everyone to follow the WHO list of approved vaccines, which at the moment is Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZenica, Johnson & Johnson, and Sinopharm. Not yet Sputnik, Sinovac or some of the newer vaccines coming downstream.
Thanks for that. Agree about the recipe for chaos. It might also be that if he lands in Beijing with a record of, let us say, Pfizer vaccination he might be OK, but he has, I think, customers in towns served by smaller airports.
Covid produces another appalling revelation. British science has been bought and sold for Chinese gold
‘On Friday night, it emerged that leading scientific journals including Nature Medicine declined to publish evidence showing the virus may have been engineered in a lab.
‘Letters seen by The Telegraph show that last April vaccine specialists contacted several journals over concerns that structural details in the virus which looked man-made were being ignored, as well as pointing out flaws in previously published papers which suggested a natural origin.
‘Despite finding no fault with the analysis, Nature Medicine declined to publish the work, telling the authors that there were many other "pressing issues of public health and clinical interest that take precedence".
‘The Journal of Virology and the biology preprint server BioRxiv also turned down the work, even though one eminent professor told The Telegraph in confidence: "The paper seems good to me and the conclusions, whilst startling, seem valid." ‘
Legacy of the climate change thing. Big Science decides that dissent is intolerable and dissenting views unpublishable, and there you are.
More likely that journal space, especially in the top journals, is severely rationed.
Lol
So there are more important issues in human medicine than the origins of the deadliest global pandemic, and worst medical emergency, in a century? That’s why all of these journals refused to publish articles that contradicted the enforced consensus about the wet market?
Yet the same journals found space to publish a letter organized and written by Peter Daszak, denouncing any allegations against the novel bat coronavirus research at the Wuhan Insitute of Virology. Yet I guess it was the same “lack of space” that prevented them mentioning that the letter organiser, Peter Daszak, has spent ten years funding gain-of-function experiments on novel bat coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology
That's very lame. The virus does what it does; the main thrust of the argument about origins is circumstantial and not related to how it does it, because it is common ground that both mother nature, and clever scientists in labs, are capable of making and altering viruses.
Also note the final paragraph- have you ever read anything more feeble?
"Also my sincere apologies to people who saw the original version of this thread, where I confused the previously published paper with the new one. Since the title and authors were the same I mixed up the two. Deleted that thread and reposted the analysis of the old paper here."
I think that completely underestimates the interaction of the departments, particularly in a time of crisis.
Seemed to work well enough for hundreds of years, through several wars and at least one other pandemic.
I think a study of the UK state response to national crises would probably show that the response to the Covid pandemic is far from an outlier. In simplistic terms - poor start, dodgy middle, strong finish. Generally leaving a longer lasting historical perception that the system worked out pretty well.
It seems to match the way we have always fought wars as well - at least over the last two centuries.
1 - Start off woefully unprepared because we are still planning on fighting the same way as last time. Because of course we kind of won. 2 - Have a few really bad battles where a lot of men get killed unnecessarily because of outdated tactics. 3 - Learn lessons very very rapidly and bring in senior leadership who not only get the new paradigms but also have the ability to think ahead and create their own innovations 4 - Finish strongly with a victory that is completely misunderstood as meaning we got everything right and we now are secure with cutting edge strategy and tactics in case of future wars.
Return to number 1 and do it all over again a couple of decades later.
Crimea Boer War WW1 WW2
Every time we followed this same pattern.
Or not so rapidly, in the case of WW1... Churchill moving his way around the Cabinet table?!
I think you are being very generous about the British Army in WW2.... I am not sure British troops had a particularly strong victory apart from a few local battles... our friends from across the water, the commonwealth or the Urals did nearly all the heavy lifiting....
The main British contribution to WW2 was not losing. But quite an important one.
Funnily enough Peter “Wuhan is nothing to do with me” Daszak, the man who funded gain-of-function novel bat coronavirus research at Wuhan, has deleted this tweet from November 2019
Funnily enough Peter “Wuhan is nothing to do with me” Daszak, the man who funded gain-of-function novel bat coronavirus research at Wuhan, has deleted this tweet from November 2019
I think that completely underestimates the interaction of the departments, particularly in a time of crisis.
Seemed to work well enough for hundreds of years, through several wars and at least one other pandemic.
I think a study of the UK state response to national crises would probably show that the response to the Covid pandemic is far from an outlier. In simplistic terms - poor start, dodgy middle, strong finish. Generally leaving a longer lasting historical perception that the system worked out pretty well.
It seems to match the way we have always fought wars as well - at least over the last two centuries.
1 - Start off woefully unprepared because we are still planning on fighting the same way as last time. Because of course we kind of won. 2 - Have a few really bad battles where a lot of men get killed unnecessarily because of outdated tactics. 3 - Learn lessons very very rapidly and bring in senior leadership who not only get the new paradigms but also have the ability to think ahead and create their own innovations 4 - Finish strongly with a victory that is completely misunderstood as meaning we got everything right and we now are secure with cutting edge strategy and tactics in case of future wars.
Return to number 1 and do it all over again a couple of decades later.
Crimea Boer War WW1 WW2
Every time we followed this same pattern.
Or not so rapidly, in the case of WW1... Churchill moving his way around the Cabinet table?!
I think you are being very generous about the British Army in WW2.... I am not sure British troops had a particularly strong victory apart from a few local battles... our friends from across the water, the commonwealth or the Urals did nearly all the heavy lifiting....
From late 1942, the army performed well. The record of the Royal Navy was outstanding from the beginning.
Not that well off Malaya. Although that might have been due to poor air cover, due to inadequate planes available. Not sure, either, how 'well' Bomber Command did.
It looks to me that the Conservatives have a ceiling of under 40% in Batley & Spen.
Now you might mention the 12.2% who voted for the Heavy Wollens in 2019.
But are the people who voted for a no hope protest party in a general election really going to switch to a governing party in a byelection ?
Well the BXP voters in Hartlepool did you might say.
But those Hartlepool BXP voters were voting for the party they thought could win in 2019 whereas the Heavy Wollen voters were deliberately making a protest vote during a general election.
I think that Labour should be favourites.
I'm leaning to Labour here too.
Re the Woollens, that's a hardcore racist vote, so whilst all votes count one, and all parties need votes, you'd have to ask yourself some hard questions if that bloc moves en masse to a party that you lead, are a member of, or support.
As the Spectator notes (your link) Dixon ran the anti-Brexit website infacts.org and it is fun (even if childish) to read some of the old headlines on its no-longer-updated front page:-
7 reasons to vote Johnson out Johnson won’t stop the chaos – that’s just propaganda... At Christmas you tell the truth, but not if you’re Johnson Johnson’s dishonesty and disorganisation on Irish Sea border... http://infacts.org/
Funnily enough Peter “Wuhan is nothing to do with me” Daszak, the man who funded gain-of-function novel bat coronavirus research at Wuhan, has deleted this tweet from November 2019
I wonder why
I’m feeling nostalgic for paedo Joe.
Shut up, I’m doing you a service. I could charge for this
Sort of off topic, but given the way this thread had gone, maybe not. Son 2, who lives in Thailand wants to go to China on business in September. By then he will have been vaccinated in Thailand, but with what vaccine he isn't sure. Yet, anyway. However, apparently the Chinese will only accept evidence of vaccination with a Chinese vaccine as 'evidence of vaccination'. Equally, as he understands it, the British authorities will NOT accept vaccination with a Chinese vaccine as evidence of vaccination. Is he right, and if so what to do?
I think that completely underestimates the interaction of the departments, particularly in a time of crisis.
Seemed to work well enough for hundreds of years, through several wars and at least one other pandemic.
I think a study of the UK state response to national crises would probably show that the response to the Covid pandemic is far from an outlier. In simplistic terms - poor start, dodgy middle, strong finish. Generally leaving a longer lasting historical perception that the system worked out pretty well.
It seems to match the way we have always fought wars as well - at least over the last two centuries.
1 - Start off woefully unprepared because we are still planning on fighting the same way as last time. Because of course we kind of won. 2 - Have a few really bad battles where a lot of men get killed unnecessarily because of outdated tactics. 3 - Learn lessons very very rapidly and bring in senior leadership who not only get the new paradigms but also have the ability to think ahead and create their own innovations 4 - Finish strongly with a victory that is completely misunderstood as meaning we got everything right and we now are secure with cutting edge strategy and tactics in case of future wars.
Return to number 1 and do it all over again a couple of decades later.
Crimea Boer War WW1 WW2
Every time we followed this same pattern.
Or not so rapidly, in the case of WW1... Churchill moving his way around the Cabinet table?!
I think you are being very generous about the British Army in WW2.... I am not sure British troops had a particularly strong victory apart from a few local battles... our friends from across the water, the commonwealth or the Urals did nearly all the heavy lifiting....
From late 1942, the army performed well. The record of the Royal Navy was outstanding from the beginning.
Was it? Didn't the navy take some time to remember the lessons about convoys it had learned in the first world war?
Sort of off topic, but given the way this thread had gone, maybe not. Son 2, who lives in Thailand wants to go to China on business in September. By then he will have been vaccinated in Thailand, but with what vaccine he isn't sure. Yet, anyway. However, apparently the Chinese will only accept evidence of vaccination with a Chinese vaccine as 'evidence of vaccination'. Equally, as he understands it, the British authorities will NOT accept vaccination with a Chinese vaccine as evidence of vaccination. Is he right, and if so what to do?
This is delicious. At one point Daszak claimed they never even collected bats at Wuhan. They just met some nice friendly bats in a faraway field and gently took samples before letting the happy bats fly off into the golden Yunnanese twilight.
But then.....
‘ You had some folks like Peter Daszak insisting that the WIV never collected live or dead bats, but there are too many accounts of WIV staffers, press coverage, and BAT CAGE PATENTS FILED BY WIV that make that contention unbelievable.’
Mr. Tyndall, didn't most/all of the main players in WWI cock it up for years?
I would suggest that they were locked into a style of fighting that precluded a decisive blow based on new tactics. They certainly tried plenty that on their own were successful innovations - the creeping barrage and the use of armour being two. But they were poorly used by men who didn't actually understand their importance.
It is interesting that on the German side the development of the Sturmtruppen - operating as tight integrated units using cover rather than simply walking towards the enemy - didn't have as much of an impact as one might have expected.
One could add the Napoleonic/French revolutionary war to that list. Another common failing is to think that any future war can be won on the cheap, because the previous one was eventually successful.
We did learn one valuable lesson from the Boer war, that defensive rifle fire was deadly, at eight hundred yards. French and German observers learned the wrong lesson - that riflemen could be overwhelmed by huge numbers, which is why their casualties were so dreadful in the opening months of WW1.
It looks to me that the Conservatives have a ceiling of under 40% in Batley & Spen.
Now you might mention the 12.2% who voted for the Heavy Wollens in 2019.
But are the people who voted for a no hope protest party in a general election really going to switch to a governing party in a byelection ?
Well the BXP voters in Hartlepool did you might say.
But those Hartlepool BXP voters were voting for the party they thought could win in 2019 whereas the Heavy Wollen voters were deliberately making a protest vote during a general election.
I think that Labour should be favourites.
Interesting analysis.... I also note that the Yorkshire Party got 9% in the Mayoral elections...not sure if their B&S candidate is up to much but there is more volatility in the vote in my opinion which makes it tighter than many suggest. Labour as favourites is perhaps too generous but I wouldnt stake much on a Tory gain
I think it’s tighter than the current odds suggest. Tories still narrow favourites, but the betting value with Labour.
It looks to me that the Conservatives have a ceiling of under 40% in Batley & Spen.
Now you might mention the 12.2% who voted for the Heavy Wollens in 2019.
But are the people who voted for a no hope protest party in a general election really going to switch to a governing party in a byelection ?
Well the BXP voters in Hartlepool did you might say.
But those Hartlepool BXP voters were voting for the party they thought could win in 2019 whereas the Heavy Wollen voters were deliberately making a protest vote during a general election.
I think that Labour should be favourites.
I'm leaning to Labour here too.
Re the Woollens, that's a hardcore racist vote, so whilst all votes count one, and all parties need votes, you'd have to ask yourself some hard questions if that bloc moves en masse to a party that you lead, are a member of, or support.
What evidence is there that the Woolens are racists? Or that they're people who view UKIP as too soft?
I see this accusation bandied about a lot - especially by those on the left - but I've not seen any evidence of it.
These are people who abandoned UKIP when UKIP marched to racist policies post-referendum, and their website doesn't mention race at all.
Abandoning UKIP when UKIP is going outright racist is a good thing not a bad one in my eyes.
Apart from the political results Opinium is also interesting on extending lockdown - 43% want to extend, 34% want to relax in June as planned, 10% think we should have relaxed sooner. Delicately balanced but certainly no great pressure to get on with it at all costs, as some here have been suggesting.
I think most people would be OK with an extension of a few weeks or longer if necessary. If it was extended for a short period and then extended again they'd find that irritating. If Johnson said "until 90% of willing adults have been vaccinated" or something like that, I think people would sigh but go along with it.
Those who want an extension to the restrictions can stay in their own homes if they choose.
I doubt they will though.
I know quite a few who plan to do that, but it's not really the point. Few if any positively want longer restrictions, but most would favour them, reluctantly, if the Government advised that they were necessary to avoid a major resurgence. If there's a major risk, then our personal preferences are seen as irrelevant.
I've switched personally to being relaxed about it all and go shopping, have meals out, etc. But if the Government advised that this was becoming risky, then I'd stop, and would want that to be a national policy. Just leaving it to our individual judgment would abdicate responsibility - few of us have enough information to make a solid judgment.
I do wonder how many people are able to simultaneously have these two opinions:
The government is crap
and
I want the government to tell me what to do.
I don't think the government is universally crap - parts are doing a good job. But more importantly, they have access to much better advice than you or I can get merely by scanning the internet, and since lockdown is something that is only effective if generally followed, I'd rather take their advice on public health than act on whatever amateur personal view I have. Insisting on making an individual assessment in a crisis is like a soldier pondering whether to take part in an offensive - he may have doubts about the generals, but with luck they will judge the situation better than he can - and it certainly won't be helped if he arbitrarily decides to opt out.
A lot of the contrary view from the start has been based on faux libertarianism - the idea that we're adults and can jolly well decide these things individually. On that basis, we shouldn't have speed limits (why not let drivers decide?), we should all decide for ourselves how much tax to pay, and so on - it denies the whole idea of democratic decision-making. If the government is crap, that's unfortunate, but let's hope they are less crap than the result of 60 million people making partly-informed individual guesses.
The government's 'much better advice' led it to allow Indian variant into this country for weeks after PBers were saying travel with India needed to be stopped.
This isn't a situation of wanting an anarcho-libertarian free for all but on whether we have freedoms and restrictions fir for purpose.
Given that many of the restrictions have been openly flouted for some time I have doubts about their usefulness - it is better IMO to have lesser restrictions that are applied rather than heavier ones which are ignored (motorway speed limits would be an everyday example).
I think that completely underestimates the interaction of the departments, particularly in a time of crisis.
Seemed to work well enough for hundreds of years, through several wars and at least one other pandemic.
I think a study of the UK state response to national crises would probably show that the response to the Covid pandemic is far from an outlier. In simplistic terms - poor start, dodgy middle, strong finish. Generally leaving a longer lasting historical perception that the system worked out pretty well.
It seems to match the way we have always fought wars as well - at least over the last two centuries.
1 - Start off woefully unprepared because we are still planning on fighting the same way as last time. Because of course we kind of won. 2 - Have a few really bad battles where a lot of men get killed unnecessarily because of outdated tactics. 3 - Learn lessons very very rapidly and bring in senior leadership who not only get the new paradigms but also have the ability to think ahead and create their own innovations 4 - Finish strongly with a victory that is completely misunderstood as meaning we got everything right and we now are secure with cutting edge strategy and tactics in case of future wars.
Return to number 1 and do it all over again a couple of decades later.
Crimea Boer War WW1 WW2
Every time we followed this same pattern.
Or not so rapidly, in the case of WW1... Churchill moving his way around the Cabinet table?!
I think you are being very generous about the British Army in WW2.... I am not sure British troops had a particularly strong victory apart from a few local battles... our friends from across the water, the commonwealth or the Urals did nearly all the heavy lifiting....
From late 1942, the army performed well. The record of the Royal Navy was outstanding from the beginning.
Was it? Didn't the navy take some time to remember the lessons about convoys it had learned in the first world war?
IIRC they had the arrangements set up and put them into practice pretty quickly for the long distance convoys. I'm not so sure about the coastal convoys - but the issue there might have been Churchill's insistence in forcing them through the Channel after France and Belgium were overrun.
It looks to me that the Conservatives have a ceiling of under 40% in Batley & Spen.
Now you might mention the 12.2% who voted for the Heavy Wollens in 2019.
But are the people who voted for a no hope protest party in a general election really going to switch to a governing party in a byelection ?
Well the BXP voters in Hartlepool did you might say.
But those Hartlepool BXP voters were voting for the party they thought could win in 2019 whereas the Heavy Wollen voters were deliberately making a protest vote during a general election.
I think that Labour should be favourites.
Interesting analysis.... I also note that the Yorkshire Party got 9% in the Mayoral elections...not sure if their B&S candidate is up to much but there is more volatility in the vote in my opinion which makes it tighter than many suggest. Labour as favourites is perhaps too generous but I wouldnt stake much on a Tory gain
I think we should start from the premise that Labour are favourites unless a convincing explanation is given to the contrary.
And I've not seen anything to convince me that the Conservatives should be favourites.
can't help cynically thinking that the wedding was timed to diffuse fall-out from the Cummings appearance - afterall, "everything is political" - it would be interesting to see when it was booked in!
I'm not sure about that. A greater slice of the public are likely to take more interest in the wedding than Cummings ramblings, particularly how Boris managed to get married in a Catholic church and whether/ if he's reconverted and what that might mean.
It's a simple human interest story.
The cynical view of the wedding as a dead cat does not really work because if anything, it underlines Cummings' charge that Boris was distracted by his romance with Carrie from taking key pandemic decisions.
Maybe Johnson married her quickly so she can't give evidence against him. If that is a thing in real life and not just on American TV.
That rule was abolished a long time ago. I suspect she's as hard as nails and had no intention of ending up as another discarded mistress with a child.
Are you sure @Cyclefree? I am not an English lawyer but the CPS website says that a spouse is only compellable by the prosecution in cases that are concerned with:
An allegation of an assault on, or injury or a threat of injury to the spouse or civil partner; An allegation of an assault on, or injury or a threat of injury to a person who was at the material time under the age of sixteen years; An alleged sexual offence against a victim who was at the material time under the age of sixteen years; or Attempting, conspiring or aiding and abetting, counselling and procuring to commit the offences in the categories above.
Nothing about wallpaper there. That said, in Scotland at least the protection covers communings within the marriage and would not cover information received whilst a fiancée.
I thought that in such cases the law used to be that wives could not be compelled to testify against their husbands hence the need to make it explicit that this is no longer the law.
I'm not aware of any law stating that wives cannot testify against husbands over fraud, for instance. (I may be wrong on this, though.) To be honest, some of the most interesting whistleblowing cases were often from pissed off partners dobbing their husbands in .....
AIUI, albeit you are the lawyer and I am not, the law used to be that the law was wives were *not allowed* to testify against their husbands, whether they wanted to or not.
Whereas now the law is that they cannot be *forced* to give evidence except under certain circumstances, but can do so *if they wish to*.
can't help cynically thinking that the wedding was timed to diffuse fall-out from the Cummings appearance - afterall, "everything is political" - it would be interesting to see when it was booked in!
I'm not sure about that. A greater slice of the public are likely to take more interest in the wedding than Cummings ramblings, particularly how Boris managed to get married in a Catholic church and whether/ if he's reconverted and what that might mean.
It's a simple human interest story.
The cynical view of the wedding as a dead cat does not really work because if anything, it underlines Cummings' charge that Boris was distracted by his romance with Carrie from taking key pandemic decisions.
Maybe Johnson married her quickly so she can't give evidence against him. If that is a thing in real life and not just on American TV.
That rule was abolished a long time ago. I suspect she's as hard as nails and had no intention of ending up as another discarded mistress with a child.
Are you sure @Cyclefree? I am not an English lawyer but the CPS website says that a spouse is only compellable by the prosecution in cases that are concerned with:
An allegation of an assault on, or injury or a threat of injury to the spouse or civil partner; An allegation of an assault on, or injury or a threat of injury to a person who was at the material time under the age of sixteen years; An alleged sexual offence against a victim who was at the material time under the age of sixteen years; or Attempting, conspiring or aiding and abetting, counselling and procuring to commit the offences in the categories above.
Nothing about wallpaper there. That said, in Scotland at least the protection covers communings within the marriage and would not cover information received whilst a fiancée.
I thought that in such cases the law used to be that wives could not be compelled to testify against their husbands hence the need to make it explicit that this is no longer the law.
I'm not aware of any law stating that wives cannot testify against husbands over fraud, for instance. (I may be wrong on this, though.) To be honest, some of the most interesting whistleblowing cases were often from pissed off partners dobbing their husbands in .....
A spouse is always a competent witness so they can dob their spouse in without difficulty and there is an oddity in that they are compellable by the defence but they are not, AIUI, compellable by the Crown except where there is violence against them, a child or in respect of a sexual offence. Of course a co-accused is not compellable either unless they have already pleaded guilty.
I am having to brush up on all this stuff because I am delighted to say that I have just been appointed a part time Advocate Depute and will hopefully be prosecuting cases in the High Court quite soon.
Is that English law, Mr L, or just Scottish law? And congratulations on your appointment.
Comments
What the story was I'll probably never know.
Even with a diligent workaholic in charge- a Thatcher or a Brown- that doesn't work, because there's too much going on. With Boris at the top, it's a recipe for predictably bad government.
Which, with one important exception, is what we've seen.
Although perhaps that was long since gone by the C19th.
1/25 Update thread on where NHS hospitals are at the moment, concentrating on 3 things: a) hotspot hospital admission rates. b) overall pressure. c) what this may mean for easing lockdown measures (spoiler alert - we will need a full, evidence based, debate given trade offs!)
https://twitter.com/ChrisCEOHopson/status/1398871050931290112?s=20
Digging into my family history is something I've done during lockdown, and one of the plans for when it's over is to go to S Wales and see what I can find.
https://i.pinimg.com/736x/59/3a/84/593a840645062bb19ed9b99d2069673b.jpg
They’re not usually okay with divorcees though, and having children first is very much frowned upon!
Apart from three christenings I don't think she's been in a Catholic Church since, and certainly not since poor bro-in-law died.
This is not a new problem in fairness. Similar complaints were made about Blair's sofa government where informality and a lack of structure came up against similar problems. OTOH Brown's attempt to control this by making sure all the decisions came through a grid in No 10 just resulted in paralysis.
I am not sure that there is a perfect system but a pandemic stretches an imperfect system to its limits.
It strikes me as reasonably healthy that there is a public debate, between scientists and others, about how cautious (or not) we should be over the next few months in ensuring that we are finally rid of this beastly disease. Differences of opinion are healthy. It is the government's role to weigh up all the evidence and come to a considered view.
It's almost as if there's a pre-emptive strike to blame the scientists and/or the media, rather than the politicians, if those politicians make decisions that you disagree with. That applies to both sides - those favouring faster loosening of restrictions, and those favouring more caution.
If government decisions are influenced too much by voices in the media, that's the government's weakness, not the media's.
*maybe it did, i'm only going on second/third hand reporting.
https://twitter.com/DarrenGBNews/status/1398927758957367296?s=20
We could call it, I don't know, cabinet, perhaps?
Secondly, there's the collegiate system where the decision are arrived at as a result of debate, the Chairman sums up and accedes to the majority. If decisions are finely balanced that can lead to delay and confusion.
The most damaging part of Cumming's testimony is the impression that Johnson goes by instinct rather than advice, so the guidance we get from Government is suspect, forcing us to err on the safe side in case it's just Johnson making a spontaneous decision. I don't dislike him personally but I'm not convinced his instincts are reliable.
‘On Friday night, it emerged that leading scientific journals including Nature Medicine declined to publish evidence showing the virus may have been engineered in a lab.
‘Letters seen by The Telegraph show that last April vaccine specialists contacted several journals over concerns that structural details in the virus which looked man-made were being ignored, as well as pointing out flaws in previously published papers which suggested a natural origin.
‘Despite finding no fault with the analysis, Nature Medicine declined to publish the work, telling the authors that there were many other "pressing issues of public health and clinical interest that take precedence".
‘The Journal of Virology and the biology preprint server BioRxiv also turned down the work, even though one eminent professor told The Telegraph in confidence: "The paper seems good to me and the conclusions, whilst startling, seem valid." ‘
https://twitter.com/johnhemmings2/status/1398541925058154496?s=21
BBC have just announced over 50% of over 30s have now been vaccinated, but we are also now hearing all children should be vaccinated
We have to have clear evidence the NHS is being overwhelmed to justify continued lockdown
Provide the evidence and the public will support it, but that evidence has not been shown to date
Still remarkable how much they screwed up the final season.
Hancock might well have wanted to shut the borders, for example. Shapps didn't and the FO didn't seem keen either. The Treasury position is slightly unclear, potentially because there are pluses and minuses from such a policy. This requires leadership from the centre and resolution of the issues, otherwise you end up with departments simply heading off and doing their own thing, potentially undermining what others are doing too.
The government is crap
and
I want the government to tell me what to do.
The long twitter thread from an NHS CEO above is referencing the NHS currently operating at near full capacity across the country, with very little of it directly COVID related. But he is linking loosening of restrictions to making the pressure "overwhelming", both directly ("a very small rise in Covid admissions will have disproportionate impacts") and indirectly - ("loosening restrictions in themselves will create further non Covid related pressures"). So the message ("stay at home to protect the NHS remains"), even if the aim isn't really to prevent spread of Covid). On interesting tidbit, however, is that part of the current pressures are explicitly mental health related...
I think that the reality is that the strength of the Cabinet against the PM has varied hugely over time depending on the quality of the leadership and the quality of the Cabinet ministers. What you describe is an ideal but practice is often very different.
Could No 10 really just check in with Hancock once a week or so to see how things were going, especially when Boris's principal advisor was clearly convinced that Hancock could not be trusted or relied upon? Not a chance.
If there's a bustle in your hedgerow, don't be alarmed now
It's just a spring clean for the May queen
Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run
There's still time to change the road you're on
Your head is humming and it won't go, in case you don't know
The piper's calling you to join him
Dear lady, can you hear the wind blow, and did you know
Your stairway lies on the whispering wind?
Instead he is still in place, as others have noted acting purely as a human shield for BoZo, destined to be eviscerated at the public enquiry.
If he was smarter, he would quit.
A lot of the contrary view from the start has been based on faux libertarianism - the idea that we're adults and can jolly well decide these things individually. On that basis, we shouldn't have speed limits (why not let drivers decide?), we should all decide for ourselves how much tax to pay, and so on - it denies the whole idea of democratic decision-making. If the government is crap, that's unfortunate, but let's hope they are less crap than the result of 60 million people making partly-informed individual guesses.
Absolutely not.
1 - Start off woefully unprepared because we are still planning on fighting the same way as last time. Because of course we kind of won.
2 - Have a few really bad battles where a lot of men get killed unnecessarily because of outdated tactics.
3 - Learn lessons very very rapidly and bring in senior leadership who not only get the new paradigms but also have the ability to think ahead and create their own innovations
4 - Finish strongly with a victory that is completely misunderstood as meaning we got everything right and we now are secure with cutting edge strategy and tactics in case of future wars.
Return to number 1 and do it all over again a couple of decades later.
Crimea
Boer War
WW1
WW2
Every time we followed this same pattern.
“Divisive COVID ‘lab leak’ debate prompts dire warnings from researchers
Allegations that COVID escaped from a Chinese lab make it harder for nations to collaborate on ending the pandemic — and fuel online bullying, some scientists say.”
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01383-3?utm_source=twt_nat&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=nature
We mustn’t investigate the likely lab origin of the virus that killed 7 million people, and is still rampaging around the world, because it might “fuel online bullying”
That’s their argument.
Nature and The Lancet, two great British science journals, two entirely trashed reputations. Sad
It is interesting that on the German side the development of the Sturmtruppen - operating as tight integrated units using cover rather than simply walking towards the enemy - didn't have as much of an impact as one might have expected.
Compare the Conservative votes from 2010 onwards
2010 33.0%
2015 31.2%
2017 38.8%
2019 36.0% +3.0% from 2010
Not much evidence of growth there.
Now compare with the neighbouring constituencies:
Dewsbury
2010 35.0%
2015 39.1%
2017 45.1%
2019 46.4% +11.4% from 2010
Calder Valley
2010 39.4%
2015 43.6%
2017 46.1%
2019 51.9% +12.5% from 2010
Bradford South
2010 29.1%
2015 26.3%
2017 38.2%
2019 40.4% +11.3% from 2010
Morley & Outwood
2010 35.3%
2015 38.9%
2017 50.7%
2019 56.7% +21.4% from 2010
Wakefield
2010 35.6%
2015 34.2%
2017 45.0%
2019 47.3% +11.7% from 2010
Huddersfield
2010 27.8%
2015 26.8%
2017 33.0%
2019 37.2% +9.6% from 2010
It looks to me that the Conservatives have a ceiling of under 40% in Batley & Spen.
Now you might mention the 12.2% who voted for the Heavy Wollens in 2019.
But are the people who voted for a no hope protest party in a general election really going to switch to a governing party in a byelection ?
Well the BXP voters in Hartlepool did you might say.
But those Hartlepool BXP voters were voting for the party they thought could win in 2019 whereas the Heavy Wollen voters were deliberately making a protest vote during a general election.
I think that Labour should be favourites.
He was there as he has been a friend of Boris' since prep school despite their disagreement over Brexit
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/boris-and-carrie-mystery-guest-revealed-as-top-remainer
But if they come to be seen as unreliable and biased, if not outright fraudulent, their worth as science publishers will be zero.
However, apparently the Chinese will only accept evidence of vaccination with a Chinese vaccine as 'evidence of vaccination'. Equally, as he understands it, the British authorities will NOT accept vaccination with a Chinese vaccine as evidence of vaccination.
Is he right, and if so what to do?
Edit; proof-reading!
We did learn one valuable lesson from the Boer war, that defensive rifle fire was deadly, at eight hundred yards. French and German observers learned the wrong lesson - that riflemen could be overwhelmed by huge numbers, which is why their casualties were so dreadful in the opening months of WW1.
So there are more important issues in human medicine than the origins of the deadliest global pandemic, and worst medical emergency, in a century? That’s why all of these journals refused to publish articles that contradicted the enforced consensus about the wet market?
Yet the same journals found space to publish a letter organized and written by Peter Daszak, denouncing any allegations against the novel bat coronavirus research at the Wuhan Insitute of Virology. Yet I guess it was the same “lack of space” that prevented them mentioning, at the same time, that the letter organiser, Peter Daszak, has spent ten years funding gain-of-function experiments on novel bat coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology
A sensible approach (yes I know) would be for everyone to follow the WHO list of approved vaccines, which at the moment is Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZenica, Johnson & Johnson, and Sinopharm. Not yet Sputnik, Sinovac or some of the newer vaccines coming downstream.
I wonder why
Also note the final paragraph- have you ever read anything more feeble?
"Also my sincere apologies to people who saw the original version of this thread, where I confused the previously published paper with the new one. Since the title and authors were the same I mixed up the two. Deleted that thread and reposted the analysis of the old paper here."
Not sure, either, how 'well' Bomber Command did.
Re the Woollens, that's a hardcore racist vote, so whilst all votes count one, and all parties need votes, you'd have to ask yourself some hard questions if that bloc moves en masse to a party that you lead, are a member of, or support.
7 reasons to vote Johnson out
Johnson won’t stop the chaos – that’s just propaganda...
At Christmas you tell the truth, but not if you’re Johnson
Johnson’s dishonesty and disorganisation on Irish Sea border...
http://infacts.org/
But then.....
‘ You had some folks like Peter Daszak insisting that the WIV never collected live or dead bats, but there are too many accounts of WIV staffers, press coverage, and BAT CAGE PATENTS FILED BY WIV that make that contention unbelievable.’
https://twitter.com/jimgeraghty/status/1397603353924866050?s=21
We have had no end of a lesson: it will do us no end of good.
The Lesson, by Rudyard Kipling (1901)
https://www.npg.org.uk/whatson/display/2014/no-end-of-a-lesson-the-boer-war-1899-1902.php
I see this accusation bandied about a lot - especially by those on the left - but I've not seen any evidence of it.
These are people who abandoned UKIP when UKIP marched to racist policies post-referendum, and their website doesn't mention race at all.
Abandoning UKIP when UKIP is going outright racist is a good thing not a bad one in my eyes.
This isn't a situation of wanting an anarcho-libertarian free for all but on whether we have freedoms and restrictions fir for purpose.
Given that many of the restrictions have been openly flouted for some time I have doubts about their usefulness - it is better IMO to have lesser restrictions that are applied rather than heavier ones which are ignored (motorway speed limits would be an everyday example).
And I've not seen anything to convince me that the Conservatives should be favourites.
Whereas now the law is that they cannot be *forced* to give evidence except under certain circumstances, but can do so *if they wish to*.
Which might explain the confusion.
Take it you mean them. Although I don't think one could so describe Nancy Astor!